When an EX-Rank Ability User Appears on the Community

I was still holed up in my room, but my hands were flying.

This wasn't some weird hobby or a way to kill time. I wasn't even trying to rest.

I was looking for a buyer—or a shop—willing to take this gold and these jewels off my hands.

There are merchants and stores I used to deal with through my guild, but…

If I showed up out of nowhere flashing gold and gemstones? The fact that I'd been kicked out was already common knowledge. No matter how well I'd treated them before, the odds of them reporting straight to the new guild master were high.

So I needed new contacts. The problem was, nobody was going to casually accept gold and jewels that might as well have come straight out of a dungeon. Things would have been different if I still held a solid position like guild master—but I didn't.

Which left only one option.

A dark deal. Trading on the so-called Black Market.

I'd get a worse price, and there was a high chance I'd end up dealing with dangerous people—or outright villains. Then again, a surprising number of rare items moved through those underground channels. The more dangerous the path, the better the haul you could walk away with.

So I pivoted. Black Market it was.

To pull that off, I'd either need a faction no one would dare touch… or—

Maybe I should make a summon to stand in for me?

What worried me most right now was my identity getting exposed. Even after being cut off, I was still the youngest son of a chaebol chairman. An S-rank father, four A-rank hunter siblings—and then me, the talentless one. There wasn't a juicier headline on the planet.

But the news that an EX-rank ability user had appeared had completely sucked all the attention away from me. If it came out that I was that EX-rank, things would get messy fast. I needed a proxy to act in my place.

No matter how I made one, it would look human to everyone else. But I was out of materials, which meant money came first.

I'd deal with that once my two summons got back. For now, I flung myself onto the bed to cool my head.

There had been days when, as guild master, I couldn't waste a single minute. Now those chains were gone, and I could sprawl around and mess with my phone like this.

Of course, the place I opened was the Hunter Gallery.

Ever since the first EX-rank ability user appeared, the Gallery hadn't known a quiet day. Every time I hit refresh, dozens of new posts flooded in. That EX-rank was me, of course—but I had to stay hidden for a while. There was no reason to reveal myself yet.

The more desperately the world searched for me, the better it was for me. I wasn't the one in a hurry.

In an age where the idea of nations had almost faded, the Hunter Association, the mega-corporations built on capital, the major guilds—all of them wanted to meet the EX-rank ability user before anyone else. The longer I stayed out of sight, the more frantic they became.

All I had to do was sit in my room, crack open some popcorn, and watch the show.

Refresh. Another new post.

I skimmed a few, then checked one of the hit-gallery posts with a high recommendation count.

I blew past anything that didn't interest me.

Scared? Well… I had to give them partial credit. That was exactly why I was still parked in my cozy little room.

But I was going to build my power base fast, using my creation ability as the foundation. Just wait. The father who disowned me, the guild members who didn't lift a finger when I was in trouble, the siblings who felt less like family and more like strangers—every last one of them was going to kneel at my feet.

Anyway, the post laid out a pretty convincing analysis based on various scenarios. Without even thinking, I tapped the recommend button, then checked the comments.

I couldn't help laughing.

Separate from the desperate power players hunting me down, there were people who were just straight-up enjoying the chaos. And then a truly unhinged title caught my eye.

A guild? I was going to make one, sure—but I had no plans to take people. I was going to fill it entirely with my summons.

I moved on to the next post.

Come to think of it, normally an IP or username would be displayed—but right now there was nothing. No identifiers at all.

People were excited about the EX-rank ability user's arrival. And just as many were terrified of it.

Honestly, even after getting an EX-rank ability, it still didn't fully feel real to me. My actions and direction would take proper shape going forward, but I could at least swear I wasn't headed somewhere dark.

World conquest? What would I even do with the world after conquering it? It would just be a pain in the ass.

I'd finally ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠realized something. The happiest times were when I was buried in my room, eating whatever I wanted, doing whatever I wanted. Especially when I was making my summons—living figures. The anticipation and excitement of those moments were something else entirely.

World destruction? World annihilation? I was no fanatic and no conspiracy theorist.

If I had one regret, it was this: I'd been ignored my whole life for having no ability, lost everything, and only then gained an EX-rank power. And now I was going to show the people who disowned me, abandoned me, and looked down on me just how well I was doing. That was all.

"Hmm… still, way more people are scared than excited, huh?"

Posts full of anticipation sat in the tens to hundreds of thousands of views. But the ones fretting over worst-case futures and drowning in fear? Those hit hundreds of thousands to over a million. That was how deep the fear ran.

I had no intention of revealing my identity—but I couldn't leave things like this either.

I started to write a post on the Hunter Gallery, then stopped. If I posted there, people would definitely start hunting me down through traces. So I decided to write somewhere more special.

The status window itself.

Through the status window, you could send messages only to people who had abilities. And since the status window wasn't man-made technology, anonymity was guaranteed.

I opened it immediately.

Sure enough, it was just as chaotic as the Hunter Gallery. The difference was that only ability users could talk here, so the posts were more specialized. In the free board-style space, messages and conversations were flying back and forth in real time, like a chat room. You didn't even need to type—speaking was enough to post.

I pressed my hand to the screen and opened my mouth.

What could I say to settle these ability users down? They were obviously scheming to use me somehow. Until I secured a complete and unshakable position, I planned to operate through a proxy rather than step forward myself.

It's a little cringe, but better to make it clear from a neutral stance that I'm in an overwhelmingly superior position.

With that thought, I organized what I wanted to say and slowly began to speak.

"This is a notice to everyone. I have no intention of taking anyone's side, and I plan to operate quietly."

Ding!

The moment I started speaking, my words went up sentence by sentence, exactly as I'd said them. And right there, plastered at the front of every line, sat the tag [EX-Rank. Ultimate Creator].

On top of that, my messages stayed pinned at the top and refused to disappear—as if they had trampled every other conversation and planted themselves above it all.

"When the time comes, I will step forward. Anyone who tries to find me or make me any kind of offer will be considered an enemy."

I almost added more, but something told me that rambling on would only undercut the authority. The strong never said much to begin with. This much was already a sufficient warning. Unless someone was completely out of their mind, they wouldn't try to track me down after hearing that.

I closed my mouth there.

Then a familiar sound effect rang in my ears. At first I thought it was the chime confirming my own post had gone up. It wasn't.

In that instant, countless cheers erupted across the status window. They were only written words—and yet somehow the noise was loud enough to rattle my eardrums.