I Activated Cheat Mode in a Bizarre Game

Maybe it was because the number of monsters to observe in my house had increased to three, but Choi Yerim was now darting her eyes around even busier than ✪ Nоvеlіgһt ✪ (Official version) before as she took it all in.

She wandered around the house like it was some kind of monster zoo, clearly having a blast, and eventually ended up at the living room table—sitting down right beside me as I carefully copied talismans.
I was surprised that someone usually so fixated on monsters suddenly seemed interested in something else—until she abruptly asked me what my secret was.
"What’s your secret? I mean, how do you naturally lure monsters into your home like this?"

"Secret, huh…"
As if I had one.
I just silently figured I had a slightly deeper connection with monsters than most people.

Not that she was really expecting an answer anyway—she moved on right away to her next point.
"You’ve been digging into Dongto’s activities lately, right? I’ve been managing some of the galleries, and I think I’ve found something interesting."
New information about Dongto?

That definitely caught my ear, but before that, there was something I needed to ask.
"Hold on. Are you seriously still managing those galleries? Dongto doesn’t pay you anymore, right?"
She nodded without hesitation, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Yup. Not just the monster gallery either—I’m doing the Exploration Team gallery, the Urban Legend gallery, the Monster Phenomenon gallery, even the Item gallery."
I didn’t even know all those existed.
She told me she spent most of her day just monitoring galleries.

I asked how she made any money.
"I sort through all the info I collect and only sell the parts that don’t directly harm any monsters. I sell that to other monster-related agencies or companies. It’s pretty lucrative."
Only selling info that doesn’t harm monsters—her peculiar work ethic made me smirk wryly.

But honestly, the fact that she was still handling information was great news for me.
Now that my curiosity was satisfied, I asked her what she’d discovered about Dongto.
"First of all, Dongto’s official activity has dropped off a lot recently."
That, I was already well aware of.

I was the one who had directly diminished Dongto’s influence, after all.
They were probably still scrambling to recover from the chaos I caused.
But the next bit of news she shared was unexpected.

"Also, the number of monster sightings, which had been steadily rising until recently, has actually started to decline."
She said there were growing threads about this in the unfiltered monster gallery, raising suspicions that maybe Dongto had been the one creating the monsters all along.
I glanced at Bianca, who was quietly sewing in a corner of the living room.

The animal hospital near Dongto, and the lab that turned items into monsters…
Yerim’s theory wasn’t baseless rumor—it had weight.
She continued.

"And lately, Dongto’s been in frequent contact with privately-run or small-team monster offices."
Something new was definitely beginning.
After Choi Yerim left, I reopened the quest message window for the first time in a while.

[Time remaining until the next main quest: 23 hours 59 minutes]
The quest that once said I had a week left was now down to a single day.
It was the first main quest with such a clearly defined countdown.

There was even a warning attached, saying to be especially cautious.
It felt like this would be more dangerous and important than any quest I’d received so far, and that thought alone made my chest feel heavy.
I knew I had to get stronger to prepare for the coming threat.

And right now, the easiest way to do that was through talisman techniques.
When I encountered monsters immune to physical attacks, that was the power I relied on.
And talisman techniques had saved me from danger more than once.

Of course, Bora would probably argue that what I was doing didn’t really count as talisman technique.
Still, I sat down at the living room table and pulled out my brush and talisman paper again.
And then a thought struck me.

“Energy… energy, huh…”
Bora had said a talisman was all about infusing it with your own energy.
And then there was the [Killing Intent (殺氣)] skill I’d gained from Leo’s quest.

If you looked at it broadly, wasn’t that also a kind of energy?
If so, could I try channeling that killing intent into a talisman?
I held my brush and activated the skill.

From deep within, I felt a cold, eerie aura begin to radiate out of me.
And in that exact moment—
"Yelp!"
"Grrrrng!"
"Eek!"

All three monsters that had been lounging peacefully in the living room shrieked and scrambled away from me.
They huddled together in a corner of the room, the two animals and one girl shivering visibly.
It seemed my killing intent had felt like a real threat to them.

Feeling guilty, I apologized: "Sorry, sorry, just a sec," and continued writing the talisman while still maintaining the killing intent.
And then something amazing happened. As I finished the strokes, a vivid red aura began to rise from the talisman like heat waves.
It worked.

Just like how Bora’s talismans glowed with blue electricity when she imbued them with lightning energy, mine now shimmered with a malevolent red aura.
I should show this to Bora sometime.
Satisfied, I nodded and tucked the red talisman into my inventory, then immediately dispelled the killing intent.

All three monsters let out ragged breaths and started protesting with their whole bodies.
Daeho whimpered, Leo made swiping gestures at me, and even the human-loving Bianca gave me a look full of reproach.
"Next time, please give us a warning first, Mister Human..."

Yeah… maybe I shouldn’t use that skill at home. I gave a sheepish smile and tried to calm them down.
The next day at work, the atmosphere in the hallway was off.
On the Exploration Team floor, staff from the support teams—who normally stayed on their own levels—were packed into the hallway.

Everyone was moving around with tense expressions, and I started to worry that there might’ve been some massive rescue mission or something.
I opened the door to our temporary Team 10, where Chief Park was already prepping for a briefing.
The moment I took my seat, he began, his expression grave.

"Today’s mission is a little different from usual."
His voice was low and serious.
"Recently, across Incheon and Seoul, small-scale monster offices have been disappearing one after another. The frequency and scale are alarming, and the Monster Affairs Bureau has flagged this as a top-priority case and submitted an urgent request. Starting today, all of Baekho’s Exploration Teams will be tasked with rescue missions related to these disappearances."

"All of Baekho’s Exploration Teams?"
That seemed a bit excessive—but thinking about it, this was more serious than it sounded.
There were a lot more companies dealing with monsters these days, but still, nearly half of all cases were handled by monster offices.

Then Shun raised a question.
His Korean was still a little rough, but his question was sharp.
"Could they not have simply gone missing while handling a monster?"

It was true—disappearances weren’t uncommon in this line of work.
People often died or vanished in the middle of missions. It was a sad but common reality.
But Chief Park shook his head.

"That’s what we thought at first. But lately, monster appearances have actually decreased, while the number of disappearances has gone up. That’s strange. And the Monster Affairs Bureau has identified a few odd patterns among the missing offices—they’ve been especially fixated on them."
He brought up a screen showing four common points:
All the missing offices were run by individuals or small teams.

All were located in Incheon or Seoul.
Most were struggling financially.
All had recently come into contact with a certain “special religious group.”

That last one stood out like a sore thumb.
"What’s this ‘special religious group’?"
I asked, and Chief Park continued.

"It’s a new fringe religion that recently formed. They call themselves the 'Nature Worship Society'. Their main motto is recycling properly and loving nature."
"...Uh."
At first glance, they just sounded like an environmental group or some nature-loving club.

But being the only shared link in all these suspicious disappearances made them far from ordinary.
"Anyway, based on those patterns, we’ve identified several offices that are at high risk of being the next victims. Starting today, your mission is to monitor those offices using various methods and try to uncover any leads."
In other words—undercover surveillance.

We looked at the list of candidate offices displayed on the screen and began prepping for our next mission.
But I had misunderstood what "various methods" meant.
"Miss Bora and Miss Park Sunja, please keep watch from the car."

"Yes."
They both replied.
"Hanbit, I’m sorry, but we’ll be using the Jinmyeong Group’s name to have you send in client requests to some of the offices. Baekho will cover the content and payment."

"...That’s no problem."
It was something only Hanbit could do.
"Shun and Minjun, I need you to apply for interviews at the offices I’ll assign you now."

"...What?"
So it wasn’t surveillance. It was infiltration.