The Monster Front

Grandheim's Monster Front.

The name referred to the place where monsters appeared more frequently than anywhere else in the kingdom. In truth, the very idea of a "Monster Front" shouldn't have made sense. Monsters crossed over from other dimensions and could erupt anywhere they pleased, which was precisely why the ones that spawned in Laoren had always been such a headache.

Grandheim, however, had solved the problem with a method so ingenious it bordered on absurd. To be precise, a single mage had solved it. That mage had gathered every scrap of Grandheim's space and forged it into one entrance.

Dimensional rifts opened wherever space had grown thin enough to tear. So the mage wrapped the entirety of Grandheim in a separate, independent space — and left a single opening in one location. A rift that would originally have ripped through the city anywhere at all instead slid along the surface of that separate space, pooled at the opening, and erupted there.

Magic that forced every dimensional crossing inside Grandheim to happen at one place and one place only. That was Grandheim's Monster Front.

"Haren, I didn't understand a single word of that!"

When I finished explaining, Wolfgar beamed at me, bright and completely unbothered.

Yeah. Figures. Even I, a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠mage, had been hanging onto the concept by my fingernails. How was Wolfgar supposed to get it? Understanding the whole thing on the first try would have been the strange part.

"D-do I really need to come along if you're going to hunt monsters?"

Seranea spoke up, her eyes full of worry. I couldn't blame her. You didn't normally bring a civilian along on a monster hunt. But Seranea's situation was what it was.

"If you stay behind alone and get attacked, that'll be a problem of its own, won't it?"

She pressed her lips shut. She looked like she would rather go anywhere in the world except the Monster Front, but there was no other option.

We followed Grandheim's main road until a massive rampart rose ahead of us. Beyond it, hunters bustled about their work, and a few of them glanced our way as we passed. The Monster Front sat close to the capital's hunter guild — close enough that if anything went wrong, hunters could respond at a moment's notice. That much was obvious.

No familiar faces.

Unlike back in Laoren, every hunter here was a stranger. It really drove home that we had come to a new place.

A pair of guards stood at the entrance. They checked our hunter licenses and said nothing more. Even without a rank badge, they didn't give me any trouble, and when I said Seranea was a porter they waved her through immediately. Everyone seemed to be phoning the job in.

I wondered why — and the moment we stepped beyond the rampart, I understood. A profoundly alien sensation rose through the soles of my feet, the strange, sliding feeling of passing through a colossal mana field. I swallowed my breath. I had heard it was spatial magic, but what kind of mage could have cast something like this? The aura of mana was so vast it sent goosebumps racing across my entire body.

So this is a capital mage.

I could feel, if only indirectly, the kind of power that magic-school mages possessed. And in the same instant, I understood why the guards at the gate had been so casual.

"...There's no need to bother checking people, is there."

Right in front of the entrance we had come through lay the corpse of a massive monster. And it was not just one or two. They stretched on endlessly in every direction — the result of gathering every dimensional rift from across all of Grandheim into a single place. Monsters were spawning on a scale that defied reason. Any ordinary person who walked in here would turn pale and run for their life. And if they charged in anyway, well — that was on them.

"Hey, don't block the road! Move!"

A monster cleaner hurried past us, riding a peculiar horseless carriage. I had seen those now and then on the main roads. So this was what they were used for.

That carriage was a kind of Magic Tool as well — one the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠hunter guild seemed to operate directly. They really did have everything here.

At this point, even the cleaners aren't ordinary.

Maybe it was because I had spent more years as a cleaner than as a hunter. My eyes kept drifting toward the cleaning crews.

"I don't see any monsters!"

"Wolfgar, monsters don't appear near the entrance."

The Monster Front had been famous even back in Laoren, so I had heard a thing or two about it.

"This is where the corpses of monsters killed at the Front get hauled out right away. The real Monster Front is beyond that."

I pointed. There stood an enormous entrance leading underground — a colossal tower descending into the earth, created by twisting space upon itself again and again. The Monster Front was, in essence, a trap designed to hunt monsters. Depending on their rank, they manifested in the tower's lower levels, and the higher the rank, the longer it took them to climb to the surface. It was the pinnacle of spatial magic: a system for hunting monsters automatically.

There's a saying that Grandheim is a giant monster farm for mages.

The more people there were, the higher the spawn rate. So in exchange for protecting people from monsters, mages received a steady supply of mana stones. Calling it a mage's monster farm was not wrong.

"Whoa."

Wolfgar had done nothing but gape in awe since we arrived in Grandheim. Well — even just the entrance was a spectacle. A massive opening dozens of meters across, and down below, true to the name, monsters swarmed in droves.

"Let's move further in."

"Oh!"

"Hahh... I can't believe I'm actually going to the Monster Front."

We entered the Monster Front.

The Grandheim Hunter Guild was in a frenzy, and there was only one reason.

A single man.

Haren.

The hunter whom Ran had recognized as Platinum rank.

"Ran acknowledged him as Platinum?"

"What? What are you talking about?"

"They say it hasn't been processed yet. Apparently he single-handedly stopped the Night Fang's rampage."

"Damn it, find him right now. We need him on our team!"

People raced through the guild in every direction, searching for Haren. Competition among the teams had been intensifying for some time. Prodigies had been appearing from all over the kingdom — newcomers so monstrous they seemed to be ripping out the old era and slamming a new one into its place, bursting onto the scene like comets. No one knew why. But the hunters had a name for it.

The Generation of the Firmament.

Firmament — the tenth and highest rank a hunter could achieve. It was the name given to a generation that might just produce hunters of that caliber. Perhaps that was why the scout war among the teams had grown so fiercely overheated. The protagonist of the Generation of the Firmament had to emerge from their own team. Whichever team claimed that protagonist would become number one. That rumor had spread throughout Grandheim, and it had driven the scouting frenzy past all reason.

And now, in that climate, a new Platinum-rank monster of a rookie had suddenly appeared. No one in history had ever been recognized as Platinum from the very start. Naturally, the moment everyone heard the news, they all felt the same thing.

At last, the protagonist had arrived. All five major teams moved at once. Countless scouts set out to find Haren, ready to offer him the finest treatment imaginable, and the rumors about him spread even faster.

"Haren?"

Some tilted their heads as if they recognized the name.

"Who's that? Ran lost to him in the exam?"

Others inflated the rumor even further. Depending on who claimed him, the overheated team competition would ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠be thrown into chaos. And so, while everyone was tearing the guild apart looking for Haren, not a single person imagined this: that someone who had taken his exam that very day — whose rank had not even been finalized — would go to the Monster Front.

A storm raged through the guild in search of Haren. But the Monster Front was far too distant for their howls to reach.

In front of the Monster Front's entrance, I led the two of them onward. How long we walked, I wasn't sure, but a few hunter teams moving in the same direction came into view. Besides us, plenty of others had come to hunt. Then one of those hunters glanced our way, tilted his head — and his whole team started walking toward us.

"Haren, those guys are coming over for some reason!"

Why, indeed. I didn't know the reason, but as I watched them, the hunters stopped in front of us.

"You lot are the new arrivals, right?"

One of them — a hunter with a mop of brown hair — addressed me. I had thought Grandheim hunters didn't pay much attention to each other. How had he recognized us so quickly?

"Haren, that's the man. You remember him."

Seranea answered the question I hadn't asked.

"The one who mouthed off to the examiner and got sent flying in a single hit."

Ah. That guy. Sharp eyes. Apparently he had remembered our faces the same way Seranea had.

"...Well, Haren doesn't exactly have a common face."

What's wrong with my face?

Seranea nodded as if that explained everything.

"That's right."

When I confirmed it, the hunter let out a knowing sigh.

"You guys got wrecked by that examiner too, huh."

He nodded to himself, looking thoroughly sympathetic.

"That examiner bastard went too far, right? Me, a Steel rank? I don't care what anyone says, I can't understand giving me a rank that low."

"Pio, you are Steel rank."

"They gave you exactly what you deserved, so quit with the pride. You're satisfied with it too, and you know it."

His companions started chiming in one after another.

"What are you talking about?! You think Purna's Rising Star is a joke? I'm a dragon risen from a ditch!"

Pio flared up, but his companions looked thoroughly unimpressed. The Purna barony — I had heard it was a region in the west of the Runheim Kingdom, famous for its grapes. The city wasn't particularly large, so monster appearances weren't all that frequent.

"So what did you want to say?"

That was enough of their comedy routine. When I cut to the point, Pio cleared his throat.

"This is the first time at the Monster Front for both of us. Figured we might as well stick together on unfamiliar ground. We can help each other if things get ugly."

He wasn't wrong. It just didn't apply to us.

"Grandheim folks are such tightwads. I tried talking to the other newbies and they all ignored me."

Grandheim natives did have that kind of temperament. The atmosphere was a lot less warm than Laoren.

"How about it? Fellow countryside rookies ought to stick together, right?"

It wasn't a particularly appealing offer for Wolfgar and me. But our group had Seranea.

More people means Seranea will be a little safer.

This was my first time at the Monster Front too. I didn't know the scale of the place, so I wanted to be cautious. Now ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠that I was a mage, complacency was a one-way ticket to the grave. Whether as a hunter or a mage, this was a time for caution.

"Fine."

When I agreed, Pio's face lit up. The other hunters didn't seem opposed either.

"Introductions are late. Name's Pio, like I said — from Purna, Steel rank. This is Maron, and that's Oden."

Maron, who carried a bow on his back, and Oden, a swordsman like Pio. All three were clearly well-trained at a glance. They would have made a name for themselves even in Laoren.

"We're from Laoren. Haren, Wolfgar, and Sera."

I slapped a rough alias on Seranea. She didn't react, so she didn't seem to mind.

"What rank?"

"Silver rank!"

Wolfgar answered first. Judging by the thoroughly smug look on his face, he was pretty proud of it.

"S-Silver rank?"

Pio's expression turned bewildered. Apparently Wolfgar's rank was higher than he had expected.

"Silver rank."

"That's the same rank as the examiner."

Maron and Oden muttered between themselves. Pio started glancing at us nervously. Wolfgar was about the same age as him — he might even have been younger. The face of someone who had just been calling himself Purna's Rising Star now looked thoroughly embarrassed.

"Th-then what about Haren?"

Pio looked restless. According to Ran, I had been evaluated as Platinum. But Ran's assessment still had to be processed by the guild, so it would take time.

"My rank hasn't been decided yet."

I couldn't exactly claim to be Platinum when I had no way to prove it.

"Ahh."

When I said that, Pio's face inexplicably brightened. He seemed to have taken "rank not decided" to mean a low rank. Simple guy.

"Right, of course! Haren's gonna have a rough time too!"

Meaning it must be hard standing next to a prodigy like Wolfgar?

"Well, yeah."

I gave a halfhearted answer out of laziness, and Seranea heaved a long sigh beside me.

"What are you going to do about this later?"

I didn't technically lie.