Breaking Up with the Heroine of the Female-Oriented Game

Memory is a fickle thing.

Even though the memories of playing the game in his past life assailed him vividly as if they were from just yesterday, they were now no more than fragments faded by time.

Even if it was a life-encompassing game played with fervor for a long time, against the passage of time, it crumbled effortlessly like a sandcastle, a natural progression.

Thus, managing to get this far using memories of his past life could be considered partly luck.

Luck, indeed…

Lee Jinhyuk couldn’t help but smile bitterly in secret.

Surely, it could be called luck, since almost everything from the monsters he recalled, the locations of traps, to the foolish riddles, had aligned perfectly with his memories.

It felt akin to receiving an exam paper and finding that all the questions you studied for were asked one after the other.

Moreover, the fact that they had barely encountered any monsters on the way here could definitively be called lucky.

In the game, they would have had to engage in at least three or four more battles.

Even though they avoided monster-prone areas as much as possible, thanks to Yoo Seolhyun’s extraordinary ability, he didn’t expect things to resolve this smoothly, leaving him feeling a bit uneasy.

Games and reality differ.

Reality can produce countless variables incomparable to a game.

Hadn’t Lee Jinhyuk recently defeated the Black Hand Monkey in a way he couldn’t have in the game?

Thus, numerous variables could arise.

Whether they were good or bad.

‘Things are going smoothly now, but let’s not get complacent. We never know what might happen next.’

Lee Jinhyuk’s thoughts deepened.

And rightly so, for without others’ help, he was weak enough that he couldn’t even properly face monsters or villains, let alone conquer a dungeon.

Born without talent, ability, or family support, and even with effort, there were realms he could not hope to reach.

Whether it’s good or bad news, or an unexpected turn of events, only the strong could laugh it off nonchalantly.

The strong who were confident they could overcome any situation or at least survive.

But Lee Jinhyuk?

If an unfavorable variable arose or an unexpected event occurred, could he handle it on his own?

‘Ah, I really need to start farming for items…’

To become even slightly stronger and react proactively to danger, Lee Jinhyuk desperately needed that item lying dormant deep within the dungeon.

After all, an RPG game boils down to leveling up or ‘item power.’

‘But knowing where various items are, what good is it if I can’t go farming for them?’

Lee Jinhyuk was well aware of the locations of not-yet-revealed items, but there was a reason he hadn’t, or rather couldn’t, retrieve them yet.

Most items were located in dangerous places: dungeons, monsters’ lairs, villains’ secret bases…

How could Lee Jinhyuk possibly retrieve items from such perilous places?

To actively farm items, he needed someone willing to help.

That’s why he approached Yoo Seolhyun.

Providing her with information and dispatching a hero team to clear dungeons so he could share in the rewards.

‘Yoo Seolhyun isn’t a bad choice.’

Even though she was set up as an antagonistic noble lady, she was reasonably approachable before her ‘corruption.’

And Yoo Seolhyun had her own hero team, didn’t she?

With her abilities, talents, and family backing, she had everything: understanding, heroes to command…

She was the most suitable candidate for the time being.

Having lied about having foresight, he could tell her about any item’s location without raising too much suspicion.

Yoo Seolhyun would benefit from clearing multiple dungeons and earning recognition from her family, while Lee Jinhyuk could accumulate items and wealth without lifting a finger—a mutually beneficial relationship.

In essence, Yoo Seolhyun was an excellent business partner.

‘If we wrap this up well, I’ll tell her about a few more hidden dungeon locations so we can share the items. She knows I have foresight, so she wouldn’t dare do anything foolish over a few items.’

Of course, first, they had to safely clear this dungeon.

As long as they managed this without incident, there would be no cracks in Yoo Seolhyun’s mental state, and they could establish a friendly relationship for the foreseeable future.

“Lee Jinhyuk? What are you thinking about so deeply?”

Yoo Seolhyun’s curious voice pulled Lee Jinhyuk out of his reverie.

“Just this and that.”

“There’s a lot on your mind, I see.”

“We just have to defeat the gatekeeper now, and we’ll reach the laboratory. We need to prepare for facing Kate.”

“Hmm? Is that so?”

Mad Wizard Kate.

Kate was obsessed with fusion magic.

She mixed her own body with monsters to the point of becoming a monstrosity herself.

It granted her a nearly ageless body and immense magical and physical strength—but at the cost of a tainted mind and regressed intelligence to the level of a child.

If things were the same as in the game, then Kate and the missing heroes would be trapped there.

“With our current strength, we should be able to subdue her without much trouble.”

As the setting of the world wasn’t home to overwhelmingly strong monsters, and the weaknesses were clear, especially for these veterans, Kate was not considered a particularly dangerous opponent.

They had the skill to even defeat the Black Hand Monkey, albeit by ganging up on it.

While he didn’t trust his past memories completely, his research had given him a fair estimation of Kate’s strength.

Unless they were scattered and picked off one by one, they would surely clear this dungeon safely.

“Alright, break’s over. Let’s start moving.”

“Is it over already?”

Erina’s grumpy response followed Han Seowoo’s announcement that the rest period had ended.

As a mage, she had less stamina than the other heroes.

“Erina, I told you to improve your stamina.”

“Maybe I’m just not cut out for fieldwork.”

“Quiet, and get up. Aren’t you embarrassed in front of your junior?”

“Always nagging. I got it, okay?”

Grumbling, Erina rose to her feet and glanced over at Lee Jinhyuk and Yoo Seolhyun.

“Kids, she says to come on. Hurry up, hurry.”

“Okay.”

Lee Jinhyuk and the others began to move again, towards the deep and dark place.

Ready for the imminent battle with the dungeon boss, and to take down the gatekeeper guarding the laboratory.

***

“What a vast room.”

The party hadn’t gone far before reaching the chamber where the gatekeeper awaited.

“About 100 meters across?”

They faced a room as open as a field, with an exit on the opposite side.

“Hmm?”

While surveying the unusually vast room from outside, Oh Jeongnam soon noticed a giant figure in the center.

“Is that an orc? Has horns and is quite tall too?”

“Could be a mutant.”

As Oh Jeongnam and team leader Han Seowoo exchanged thoughts, Lee Jinhyuk also observed the orc.

This was the dungeon gatekeeper, the Black Horned Orc.

Being one of the creatures fused with fusion magic before Kate’s intelligence regressed, this orc was much stronger than the average.

But still, an orc remained an orc.

If it fought the party, it wouldn’t last a few minutes before falling.

‘What’s important in this room isn’t that orc.’

Because here lay a trap far more dangerous and bothersome: the random teleportation device.

A sinister mechanism that could teleport the room’s occupants to random locations throughout the dungeon.

Once they entered, the magical circle on the floor would glow, activating the random teleportation device after five minutes. So, unless they wasted time unnecessarily, they had plenty of time.

The room stretched no more than 100 meters.

Knocking down the orc and strolling to the exit would take no more than three minutes.

Or, well…

They could simply retreat to the entrance.

“Yoo Seolhyun, how’s the room? Besides that orc, are there any monsters hiding?”

“Just a moment.”

Han Seowoo asked Yoo Seolhyun.

She asked the rookie Yoo Seolhyun because of her extraordinary ability. Yoo Seolhyun’s ability was scanning, detecting any monsters within a certain radius, excluding humans.

The ability was quite draining on her psychic and mental energy, limiting its frequency and duration, but it proved extremely useful in dungeon exploration. If any monsters hid in that large room, they would be detected by Yoo Seolhyun’s radar.

“The room is too big to scan completely, but for now, I don’t detect anything.”

“Is that so? For the moment…”

“Wait.”

Erina approached, casting a spell.

“There’s a faint magical circle on the floor.”

“A magical circle?”

“Yes.”

Erina then began to decipher the magical circle’s content, her magical energy illuminating it.

“…It appears to be related to teleportation. It’s triggered by intruders but takes time to activate. Maybe about 5 minutes?”

Thanks to Erina’s explanation in the game, players didn’t waste time in the room.

“Can you disrupt the magic circle?”

“Probably not.”

“Even if we break the ground it’s drawn on?”

“Yes.”

“Then we need to defeat that orc quickly.”

“Or, we could just lure the orc out of the room, right?”

“It looks like a gatekeeper… would it work?”

“Shall I try luring it out with magic?”

After exchanging opinions, the team members decided to try luring the orc.

But…

“Damn it, the orc isn’t following, is it?”

“As expected, it’s not working.”

Fitting for a gatekeeper, it wouldn’t rashly follow them. Created by Kate herself, it followed her commands, controlled by her brainwaves, as per the game setting.

Of course, this control didn’t extend to other monsters.

“Just wasted magic.”

Erina tried attacking from outside the room with magic, but the distance was too great for a precise hit, and it was fruitless to expect strong firepower from her, whose specialty was support spells.

In this place, the only ranged damage dealers were Lee Jinhyuk and Erina.

Thus, the team members concluded they needed to quickly defeat the orc and pass through the room.

“Let’s maintain a triangular formation and break through quickly. And watch out for any unexpected traps.”

Upon setting foot inside the room…

“The magic circle is activating! We have 5 minutes, so hurry up!”

“Got it!”

At Erina’s shout, the team members charged toward the orc.

“Kiiieeek, eeeeeeek!”

Is there no bettering a mob?

The Black Horned Orc fell, bellowing in defeat, within two minutes of engagement.

It wasn’t much of a powerful monster, to begin with.

While there were more monsters created by Kate, none were strong enough to warrant concern, and since they didn’t appear in the game, there wasn’t much information about them.

‘Even if Kate appears, with our current strength, we shouldn’t have any problems.’

As he thought this…

“Nothing much, let’s hurry and get out of here…”

“Wait a moment.”

Yoo Seolhyun shivered.

She was intently looking towards the dark entrance from where indistinguishable figures approached.

Not just one or two, but dozens upon dozens.