The next thing Han remembered was sound.
A rhythmic, mechanical beeping. Slow, steady. Distant at first, but growing louder as awareness clawed its way back into his mind. His eyes blinked open, blurry shapes and pale ceiling tiles swimming above him.
Hospital.
He tried to shift but pain immediately flared through his ribs and chest. A groan escaped his lips—dry, weak.
A shadow moved beside him.
"You finally wake?" came a familiar voice.
Han turned his head. Slowly.
His father sat there, arms crossed over his chest, his white hair neatly combed back like always, glasses perched low on the bridge of his nose. He looked tired, but not in a worried way—more like a man who had been inconvenienced.
"You've been out for almost two days," the older man said, voice cool and sharp. "I even had to pay extra for healing magic crystals to save your useless self."
Han didn't say anything. He didn't have to. He'd heard that tone his whole life.
It was true, though. Magic crystals could heal almost anything—shattered bones, ruptured organs, even near-fatal wounds. But only if you had magic. Awakened individuals could absorb the mana, accelerate their recovery. But Han?
Han had no magic. No rank. No affinity. No spark.
Which meant the crystals had to be externally activated. Costly. Inconvenient. Wasteful.
Especially for someone like him.
"I told your mother it was a waste of money," his father muttered, adjusting his glasses. "But she insisted."
Han closed his eyes. Not because he was tired—but because it hurt to look at the man who should've cared more that his son almost died.
He waited for the lecture. For more words about failure. About wasting time. But they didn't come. His father just stood.
"Get some rest. You're stable now. Try not to do anything stupid for a while," he said, already walking away. "Not that you're capable of much anyway."
The door slid shut behind him with a quiet hiss.
His mother never even came inside.
...
..
.
Time passed.
The light in the room dimmed slightly, the hospital responding to the circadian rhythm of patients to help them sleep. But Han didn't feel like sleeping. He stared at the ceiling for a long time. Mind blank.
Then, slowly, he reached for the small remote on the side table. His fingers were stiff, but he managed. With a soft click, the TV mounted on the opposite wall blinked to life.
The volume was low, but enough.
"—and in today's news. Continuing coverage of the Day of the Break, we have new developments," the reporter said, her voice crisp and serious. "The mass ogre deaths that occurred yesterday are still being investigated."
Han blinked. He turned the volume up slightly.
The screen shifted to aerial footage of various parts of the city—Vasra, ogre corpses. Dozens. Hundreds. In every district they had rampaged through.
"All ogres within Vasra's borders are confirmed dead," the reporter continued. "Including those within still-open dungeons. Experts from the National Guild Association and the Magic Research Division are baffled."
Han's mouth felt dry again.
The system.
He thought it had been a hallucination. Some dying fantasy conjured up by a broken mind desperate for meaning.
All the ogres in the city—gone. Slain instantly. No spell cast. No army sent in. No survivors or awakened reported in the area when it happened.
Only him.
Han's fingers gripped the hospital sheet tightly.
Could he have done it?
Was it possible?
...
..
.
A red-haired man stepped on another ogre's head, the crunch of bone beneath his heel barely audible over the hum of magical instruments in the background.
"Truly puzzling. Who could've done this?" said Arashi.
He was no ordinary hunter. An A-rank investigator from the Magic Research Division, Arashi was known not only for his combat skills but for his rare, S-rank mind-reading ability. That alone had landed him a solid B-rank. His combat prowess had pushed him up to A.
Standing beside him was his long-time partner and close friend. A fellow investigator, though more cautious in nature.
"Or what," his partner muttered grimly.
Together, they were dispatched for cases like these.
Arashi crouched down near the corpse of another ogre and placed a hand on its cracked forehead. With his ability, he could read thoughts, emotions—and in special cases like this—memories, even from the dead.
His mind slipped into the residual thoughts left behind.
Suddenly, he was there.
He saw what the ogre saw.
It was standing in a long line, just behind a group of its kin, all waiting to step out of the rift. The glowing portal pulsed behind them, magic radiating with chaotic energy.
The ogre moved forward.
One step.
Two steps.
Then—darkness.
Everything went black.
There were no screams. No attacks. Just the complete and total absence of sensation.
Arashi blinked and pulled his hand away, shaking off the mental static.
His partner watched him closely.
"What did you see?"
Arashi looked over at the rows of ogre corpses. A faint grimace tugged at his mouth.
"The ogre in front. It was about to step out. Then it just... died. Lights out. Like someone flipped a switch."
His friend frowned. "No struggle?"
"None."
They moved on.
Arashi stepped over blood and ruined concrete as they reached another ogre deeper in the tunnel. He crouched, repeated the process.
His vision shifted again.
This one was near the back of the formation. It tried to push forward, eager for the hunt, but was shoved back by larger brutes ahead. It growled in frustration.
Then, just as the lead ogre stepped into the city—its body collapsed. Then the next. And the next.
Like dominoes, each one fell without warning. The ogre watched them drop with wide, stupid eyes—until its own body locked up.
It never got the chance to react.
Darkness.
Arashi's eyes snapped open.
His partner raised an eyebrow. "Same thing?"
Arashi nodded slowly. "A wave of death. No warning. They just... fell."
"That's not normal. Not even close," his friend muttered, rubbing the back of his neck. "Unless someone launched a city-wide curse or some kind of wide-range spell... but that's beyond even S-rankers."
"We'll need autopsies," Arashi agreed, standing and brushing dust from his coat. "There's no magic residue. No toxins we can detect so far. Nothing."
He took a breath and looked around the dungeon's entrance chamber.
The place still stank of blood and sulfur. The gate behind them shimmered, still open. Pulsing.
"Let's not linger. Dungeon's still active," his partner said.
Arashi gave a final glance at the silent corpses.
"Yeah. Let's check the ones outside. We might get lucky."
They turned and left the chamber, stepping over bodies, still without a single clue who—or what—had wiped out an entire city's worth of ogres in a single night.