After leaving Seoul, Kang-hoo headed straight to Incheon Airport and was able to board the chartered jet at the scheduled time.

He finished a phone call with Emilia right before boarding and expressed his repeated thanks for her favor.

After all, footing the bill for a charter and adjusting takeoff and landing schedules wasn’t an easy ask.

Inside the chartered jet bound for France—

Seated and buckled in, Kang-hoo read through the request message from Lars Abel before takeoff.

Skimming the contents, it didn’t look like the need for a gunner was very high, so Ayane wouldn’t be strictly necessary.

If push came to shove, he could slot in Ban Se-yeong as a substitute—she was a hunter who handled firearms too.

The personnel mix posed no particular problem, but something in the brief looked awfully familiar.

‘Isn’t this… the Golden Triangle region in Germany?’

The Golden Triangle region—

In the original, it was where the Thirteen Stars, including Lars, launched a group raid and reaped huge gains.

When they later plotted the dungeon locations where they’d profited and connected the dots, it formed a triangle—hence the name.

Of course, not every dungeon inside that triangle paid out big.

The profits mainly came from particularly hard, first-clear dungeons.

‘If I remember right, they kept pulling Grade-0 items there…’

He remembered them obtaining highly unusual items.

Thanks to that, every member of the Thirteen Stars—including Jang Si-hwan—saw a massive power spike.

Grade-1 items fetched hundreds of billions of won, but starting at Grade-0, the price jumped into the trillions.

Each of them had gotten one in hand; the combined value defied words.

‘Even if dungeon intel is thin, I’ve got a trump card—this is worth a shot.’

If needed, he could use the Mischievous Traitor constellation’s ability to grasp full dungeon information.

For now, Lars’s request was simply to complete an internal map of the dungeon.

Because the paths were narrow and rough and there were many long-range harassing monsters, he wanted the Kang-hoo + gunner combo.

The offer officially said they could raid—or not—at their discretion.

It seemed they didn’t expect much because, so far, it hadn’t been cleared at all—this would be a first clear.

‘Monsters identified at the entrance are already in the 500s. Definitely not a soloable place for me.’

He assessed the information coolly.

This wasn’t a dungeon to sweep clean; if they attempted it, they’d skim only the “cream.”

Either way, he wasn’t about to kick away a request with a chance at a Grade-0 item.

‘I’m in.’

He’d accept—no question.

He’d see how it went.

Kang-hoo decided to contact Lars as soon as he got off the jet. This was the kind of thing you took even if the odds were slim.

----------------------------------------

He wasn’t sure when it had happened.

Reclining in a seat that was practically a bed, Kang-hoo drifted off while resting comfortably.

He thought he’d only closed his eyes for a moment, but he must have fallen asleep.

He dreamed.

In the dream, Kang-hoo watched someone typing furiously at a keyboard.

Even blurred, he could make out the filename: A Villain-Turned-Savior’s Survival Guide.

Yes—his original work’s title.

Only, the text itself was washed out by the monitor’s glow and hard to see.

Only the portions less affected by the glare entered Kang-hoo’s view.

【Just when he thought everything was over, what appeared before Kang-hoo was……】

Like a serialized cliffhanger, it stopped at the most tantalizing point.

What the—? he thought.

He had no memory of writing that sentence in the original. It wasn’t something from the ending either.

At that moment—

“Ah.”

He woke from the dream.

He’d known from the start it was a dream, so he didn’t confuse it with reality.

But he wondered why he’d dreamed it.

Had his unconscious projected thoughts of the author’s life—his past life now—into a dream?

‘Honestly, I’ve wanted to change the content even now more than once. Shin Kang-hoo’s storylines were harsh, and not just once or twice.’

It wasn’t a pleasant dream.

You don’t need to assign meaning to dreams, but the lack of a clean period at the end left him feeling vaguely uneasy.

----------------------------------------

At Charles de Gaulle Airport, Kang-hoo met Emilia and moved straight to where her car was waiting.

Her favored goth look was the same. So was her hairstyle.

If anything had changed, it was the parasol—different from before, though still covered in rose patterns.

“You made it?”

Seeing Kang-hoo, Emilia beamed and brought her fingertips together like castanets in a little hand-greeting.

He didn’t know the meaning, but it seemed to be her personal greeting gesture, so he mirrored it back.

She let out a small laugh and dipped her head shyly, as if she hadn’t expected him to mirror her reaction.

“Thanks to you, I arrived well.”

“I watched the plaque ceremony on the live stream. Did Chae Gwanhyeong try to pick a fight?”

Kang-hoo only smiled in reply. A silent yes.

Emilia sighed and shook her head.

“That’s just who he is. Ignore him. He only exhausts anyone who engages him.”

“That’s what I did.”

“Did Jang Si-hwan step in to stop him?”

When Kang-hoo nodded, Emilia added:

“Good cop, bad cop. Good mom, bad dad. I wish they’d stop these transparent routines…”

For Kang-hoo, it wasn’t news—he’d known the dynamic from the start.

Jang Si-hwan and Chae Gwanhyeong had long split the roles of good and evil with precision.

Because the build-up had been meticulous, people now trusted Jang Si-hwan so much.

“Shall we get going? The ceremony is already yesterday’s news.”

“Right. I’ve gone on long enough. This way.”

Emilia personally escorted Kang-hoo to her car.

A strapping adult man being escorted by a woman who looked quite young—visually, it didn’t look all that suave.

But since it was Emilia’s kindness, Kang-hoo settled in comfortably.

Then he looked out the window.

A sky filled with blue and warm sunlight. A perfect day for a drive.

----------------------------------------

In the moving car—

At some point they entered central Paris, and the Eiffel Tower came into full view.

He’d seen countless photos, but it was his first time seeing it in person.

The impression was brief, though.

Kang-hoo asked Emilia:

“Ms. Emilia.”

“Yes?”

“I asked several times before—why didn’t you give me information about the dungeon we’re going to?”

“That? I had my reasons.”

“You ‘had your reasons’… So the reason you insisted I come to France was a test?”

“Maybe?”

“Heh.”

He laughed.

Of course, it was a laugh born of fully understanding her mind and thinking.

Like Takashi, Emilia probably wanted to see how he responded under the conditions and environment she envisioned.

If he passed her test here, then she would look to truly befriend him from that point on. A kind of rite of passage.

‘Just like Kim Shin-ryeong.’

Throw trials and hardship at him, then observe his decisions coolly within them—he’d seen it before.

He found it rather fun.

Even if the dungeon came with no prior intel, all he had to do was enter, refrain from rushing, and explore carefully.

He didn’t plan to tap the Mischievous Traitor constellation for this one—he didn’t feel enough pressure to warrant it.

Cutting through central Paris, they soon arrived at Emilia’s mansion—and it was palatial.

Even if it was on the outskirts, in famously pricey Paris the scale was beyond what he expected.

It was a fresh reminder of the power of capital.

From the tall iron gate at the front to the high walls ringing the estate—

Guards stood at fixed intervals, providing airtight security.

“A bit dark, isn’t it?”

“I get the feeling I’m about to feast my eyes.”

“You really have no tact.”

When Kang-hoo hinted that she seemed poised to stage some performance with the dim lighting, Emilia pouted.

As expected, she placed her hand on a red crystal sphere beside the front gate and began infusing mana.

In an instant, more than four thousand units of mana poured in—so much that even Kang-hoo could see it.

The amount Emilia released in one breath was beyond imagination.

‘So it’s not just Dark Energy—she’s got mana in spades.’

He’d expected high mana stats since she was a magic-type hunter, but the scale of her expenditure was far greater.

Pop! Pop! Pop!

Lights fed by that mana switched on one after another from the main gate inward.

Every fixture bore a finely etched rose pattern, and the warm-white bulbs glowed softly.

“Wow.”

Kang-hoo let out an exclamation.

He wasn’t surprised that some two hundred fixtures had roses on them.

He was surprised that every area touched by the light was filled with roses of every color.

Thinking of Seoul prices—where a single bloom could top 50,000 won—the total cost easily exceeded five hundred million won.

‘I’m going to develop a rose phobia at this rate. This is too many. Is Emilia’s love of roses really this intense?’

With roses, the issue wasn’t the purchase price but the maintenance. There must have been quite a few dedicated caretakers.

Sensing his curiosity right away, Emilia smiled and explained:

“When I’m not in France, I let the caretakers—guards included—stay comfortably at the estate.”

“You’re a good owner.”

“I just want my house to feel warm all the time. Even if I’m away, I don’t want the place to feel lonely.”

“Lonely…”

“That’s right. I hate loneliness.”

Whatever the reason, letting others have free run of such a luxurious estate wasn’t easy.

Once again, beneath her cool, haughty image, Emilia showed a thoughtful side.

But people who judged by externals alone saw her as very finicky.

The Thirteen Stars were no exception; Chae Gwanhyeong and Casey hardly even spoke to her.

Then—

“Wait.”

“Hm?”

“Could you stop for a moment?”

“……”

Following Emilia past the garden and deep into the mansion, Kang-hoo stopped in his tracks.

He’d sensed a place where the surrounding flows of Dark Energy and holy power warped and sank abnormally.

The mana flow was fine, but there was a space like a black hole that sucked in holy power and Dark Energy.

Here.

There was something underground.