Chapter 30: Chapter30-Dullahan
I focused inward. "System, activate Seer’s Eye right now."
The system’s reply came right away.
[Host, I apologize, but I cannot do that. It is your skill. Only you can activate it yourself.]
Oh, right. Of course. It was my skill, not the system’s.
I nodded slightly. "I see. Then how do I activate it?"
The system responded without delay.
[Host, simply say the skill name in your mind, and it will activate within a few seconds.]
I paused. "Oh, just like that?"
I’d honestly expected the process to be more complicated.
[Yes, Host.]
Alright then.
I took a breath and concentrated.
"Seer’s Eye."
For the first few seconds, nothing happened. Then, suddenly, a sharp pain shot through my head.
"Agh..."
Before I could even understand what was happening, I felt myself collapse back into the seat.
Then everything went dark.
***
The next moment I opened my eyes, I realized I was somewhere completely different.
I was standing in the middle of an area filled with thick fog.
What the hell?
Where was I?
I quickly looked around, trying to make sense of my surroundings.
The entire space around me was shrouded in dense fog. I couldn’t see more than a few feet in any direction.
When I looked down, I couldn’t even make out the ground beneath my feet.
What the hell was going on?
The last thing I remembered was activating Seer’s Eye. Then I’d felt that sudden, stabbing pain in my head, and after that I must have passed out. Now I was here, in some place I didn’t recognize at all.
What the hell? Where even is this place?
Well, I might as well just ask the system.
I focused my thoughts. "System, where am I? What is this place? I thought I was supposed to see the future, but all I’m seeing is a bunch of thick fog."
The moment I finished asking, a system screen suddenly appeared in front of me with a message.
[The future sight will begin in 10 seconds!]
Oh. So it hasn’t actually started yet.
Alright, I should prepare myself then.
A countdown suddenly appeared.
[5... 4... 3... 2... 1... 0]
The instant the countdown hit zero, the fog in front of me began to move. It spread apart quickly, clearing a path down the center and revealing something beyond it.
Then an image started to form in front of me.
Wait. Is that a hospital?
An image of what looked like a hospital appeared before my eyes. The building seemed abandoned. There was a name written across the top.
HA Healthcare.
Huh? What kind of hospital...
Before I could finish the thought, the scene in front of me suddenly zoomed in and shifted perspective. Now it was slowly focusing on a large dungeon portal sitting on an empty plot of ground right next to the hospital.
Hmm. Interesting.
As I watched the portal, something else drew my attention.
A timer had appeared on the left side of my vision.
[52... 51... 50...]
The numbers were slowly counting down.
It didn’t take long for me to realize what it meant. The timer was showing how much time I had left before the skill ended.
Anyway, putting that aside.
I quickly turned my focus back to the scene, which started to change once more.
This time, as the image shifted, I heard a voice.
"Leon, help me! Leon!"
It was a desperate plea for help.
With the voice came a new scene. I was now looking at a middle-aged man, probably somewhere in his forties, running frantically through a jungle at night.
He was wearing simple, unremarkable clothes. He had an ordinary face, green hair, and hazel eyes.
He kept running while shouting the same name again and again.
What the hell is going on?
Who is this guy?
And... is this the inside of a dungeon?
It certainly looked that way.
Still, something felt off.
No F-rank dungeon should have a dense jungle like this, let alone a moon hanging overhead. The landscape stretched endlessly in every direction, far beyond anything an F-rank dungeon should have been capable of containing.
If my understanding was correct, this had to be a D-rank dungeon or higher. Only dungeons of that level were directly connected to other worlds and large enough to contain environments on this scale.
For the moment, I pushed those thoughts aside and focused on the scene unfolding before me.
The middle-aged man was still running through the jungle, panic written all over his face.
"Leon!" he screamed desperately. "Come out! He’s going to kill me! Please, help me! Please! This wasn’t our deal! You promised me that..."
His voice cut off abruptly.
A sword suddenly flew out of the darkness.
Before he could even react, the blade sliced cleanly through his neck.
What the...
For a brief moment, everything seemed to stand still.
Then his head separated from his body.
A massive spray of blood burst from the stump, splattering the ground beneath him. His severed head spun through the air before landing several meters away with a dull thud.
At the same time, his headless body continued running forward for a few more steps as though it hadn’t yet realized what had happened.
Only after those few steps did it finally collapse.
The corpse crashed onto the blood-soaked ground and lay motionless.
Blood continued pouring from the severed neck, spreading rapidly across the jungle floor.
The entire sequence happened so quickly that my mind struggled to keep up with it.
I stood there frozen, staring at the scene in disbelief.
What the heck just happened?
Who killed him?
And where had that sword even come from?
Before I could figure out who had killed the man, the scene suddenly changed.
Dense fog rushed in from every direction, swallowing the jungle, the corpse, and the blood-stained ground. For a moment, all I could see was white.
Then the fog slowly parted.
A new scene appeared before me.
The moment I saw it, my eyes widened.
What on earth...?
The scene revealed a huge cave. Its interior was dimly lit by a strange pale light.
At first, I thought the ground was covered in rocks.
Then I realized they weren’t rocks at all.
They were human skulls.
Countless skulls and bones covered the cave floor, stretching as far as I could see.
A chill ran down my spine. But that wasn’t what shocked me the most.
My gaze was drawn to the center of the cave.
There stood a throne made entirely of human bones.
And sitting on that throne was a monster.
No.
Calling it a monster didn’t feel right.
It looked like something that shouldn’t exist at all.
The creature was dressed in black from head to toe, its body hidden beneath a dark cloak.
What caught my attention immediately was its neck.
There was no head on its shoulders.
For a second, I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me.
Then I noticed its right hand.
It was holding its own head.
My breath caught in my throat.
In its left hand was a sword.
Fresh blood was still dripping from the blade onto the pile of bones below.
I stared at the severed head.
Its flesh looked rotten and sickly. A huge grin stretched across its face from ear to ear, and its eyes glowed with an eerie yellow light.
The sight made my skin crawl.
Oh my goodness...
Is that what I think it is?
My heart skipped a beat.
Is that a fucking Dullahan?
The more I looked at it, the more convinced I became.
But that didn’t make any sense.
I clearly remembered reading that Dullahans had gone extinct fifteen years ago.
So how was one sitting right in front of me?
And more importantly...
Was this the creature that had just killed the man in-
Before I could finish the thought, the fog rolled back in and swallowed the entire scene.
For a brief moment, everything vanished behind a wall of white.
Then the fog began to thin once more.
As the new scene came into view, I immediately realized I was looking at something completely different.
This time, there was a handsome young man who appeared to be in his late twenties.
He had a well-built physique, dark green hair, and matching dark green eyes.
He was seated in the middle of what remained of a Dullahan’s corpse. A golden sword had been driven straight through the creature’s severed head, pinning it firmly to the ground.
The young man sat motionless.
His gaze remained fixed on the blood-soaked earth beneath him, and his expression was completely blank.
Not a trace of satisfaction. Not a hint of relief.
Nothing.
My attention shifted to the Dullahan.
There was no doubt about it.
The creature was dead.
I could tell from its eyes alone. Earlier, they had glowed with that yellow light. Now they were completely dark and lifeless.
The scene itself didn’t surprise me all that much.
This was the future, after all.
I had activated Seer’s Eye specifically to witness events that hadn’t happened yet, so seeing the Dullahan dead wasn’t exactly shocking.
What caught my attention instead was the identity of the man sitting beside it.
If I wasn’t mistaken, this guy had to be Leon.
That was the same name the middle-aged man had been desperately shouting earlier.
The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became.
Based on what I’d seen so far, it looked like Leon had betrayed that man and left him to die.
The guy had practically been begging for help.
He’d sounded desperate.
Terrified.
Yet Leon never appeared.
At least, not until after the man was already dead.
From what I’d seen, Leon didn’t seem like the type to keep his promises. If anything, he struck me as the kind of person who would smile to your face while planning something entirely different behind your back.
A two-faced bastard.
That was my first impression of him.
My gaze lingered on the young man for a few more moments.
Regardless of his personality, one thing was obvious.
He was strong.
Very strong.
Killing a Dullahan was no easy feat, especially at such a young age.
A Dullahan was classified as an Elite-rank monster, and monsters of that level possessed strength comparable to an Ace-rank hunter.
That meant Leon was almost certainly an important figure.
There was no way someone capable of defeating a creature like that would be an insignificant side character.
Whether he was an ally, an enemy, or something in between, I had a feeling this wasn’t the last time I would be seeing him.
I glanced at the timer in my peripheral vision. Only fifteen seconds left.
Damn it. There was no way Seer’s Eye would only show me this. A middle-aged man getting killed, a dullahan, and some guy finishing it off. How was any of this supposed to help me? Aside from a face and a name, I’d gotten nothing useful.
The countdown continued.
[10... 9... 8...]
Shit. Only a few seconds left. Was I really not going to get anything valuable out of this?
Without warning, the fog rolled back in and swallowed the scene once more. A new image began to take shape.
It was the same dimly lit cave where I’d first seen the Dullahan. The view centered on the skeletal throne the creature had been sitting on earlier.
I let out a tired sigh. "Great. Another useless clue. Looks like using Future Sight was a complete waste."
I’d already given up. But with only six seconds left on the clock, the scene suddenly began to zoom in. The perspective shifted beneath the throne, where a faint blue glow caught my attention. Something was resting there in the shadows.
I quickly squinted to get a better look.
Then I finally saw it.
Wait.
Is that a skill book?
Yeah, I was right. It was.
The image sharpened, bringing the object into focus. For the first time, I could clearly read the title written across its cover.
When I saw the cover, I was totally taken aback...
No way. That’s a...
