D-Class Hunter Jeon Somin — Enhancement (1)
About three days had passed since Garam came by the security office.
Whether that was fortunate or not, there still hadn't been any word from her.
The problem was that after saying what she said, she hadn't streamed for two days — then yesterday, she'd started streaming again.
...Nothing will happen. Right?
Taejin stood his post, praying nothing would go wrong.
For the record, he'd put the boring shift hours to good use with some lively stat upgrades.
Specifically, his Virility was now at 19, and his Stamina at 16.
I barely raised Stamina, so I can't really verify that one yet.
He was standing guard, fiddling with his phone, when—
—Riiing!
At the sharp blast of his smartphone's ringtone, Taejin stepped outside briefly to take the call.
"T-Taejin-aaa..."
An unexpected voice came through.
Well — not entirely unexpected. It was Somin, whom he hadn't managed to talk to lately because she'd been so busy.
"It's been a while since you called, hasn't it?"
"I-I've been so busy I couldn't call..."
For the record, her words were absolutely not a lie.
After acquiring the skill Succubus Transformation, she'd gone in for another awakening evaluation.
Apparently, with additional abilities on the board, a re-examination was necessary.
Of course, before that, she'd diligently run dungeons so as not to raise suspicion — riding bus parties, half-pretending she was still mostly powerless.
Anyway, the rank Somin received after re-measurement was—
"A-A-class?!"
Combat power: A-class, apparently.
Just as Taejin's mouth fell half open in shock, she clarified over the phone that she wasn't A-class yet.
"I-It's more like my potential is around A-class, and for now I'm barely scraping D-class..."
"Ah."
That made sense.
Somin had been scraping the bottom of E-class — and now she was suddenly A-class? It wasn't as if she had a solo status window cheesing the whole system. With a normal setup, that would have been absurd.
So Taejin accepted it and asked her:
"So you're training hard, then?"
With A-class potential on the table, the Association wouldn't just leave her alone. The guilds wouldn't either. He'd figured she'd be getting some pretty solid training — but.
"Y-Yeah... I am..."
Why did Somin's voice sound so particularly dark?
"Is something wrong?"
When Taejin asked, just in case—
"Actually, I called because of that training."
Apparently there was a problem with the training.
When news broke that Jeon Somin had A-rank potential, the Association went into an uproar.
Taejin lived in a Hunter apartment, so he might not fully grasp it — but A-class? Hell, even a bottom-tier B-class could at least pull their own weight.
So what about A-class potential, and a psychic-type at that?
Handled well, you might even pull S-class or beyond out of her.
Of course there was chaos.
Of course, the ability wasn't without its penalty.
Namely: that Subjugation.
The problem was an ability that only functioned under her master's commands.
The even bigger problem was that the identity of that master hadn't been revealed.
After all, if that so-called master told her to die, she might simply die — how could anyone rest easy?
At least the person in question claimed the one she recognized as her master wasn't that kind of person.
But there's no way to know for sure.
There was no way to know.
So after fierce internal debate, the Association reached a single conclusion.
"For now, rather than enhancing her physical abilities, let's focus on mastering the skill."
Too dangerous not to support her, too many variables if they did full-bore — so first, they would develop the abilities that had come after the Succubus Transformation.
Even a psychic-type wouldn't easily work on high-rank Hunters, so this was a measure to ensure they could comfortably subdue her if anything went wrong.
Thanks to that, Somin was able to receive training with a decent amount of support.
"What's this, a newbie~?"
"Ah, hello..."
"Hehe. Looking forward to working with you~"
The mentor who would oversee her training.
Specifically, she would be training under someone ranked among the very strongest of psychic-type ability users.
Her name was Hong Seol.
She was Chinese, but had come to Korea over internal issues — an S-class Hunter.
And she was a striking figure: messy red hair, and dead, rotten-fish eyes that looked half-extinguished.
A Korean S-class Hunter not well known to the public.
Partly because psychic-types were rare to begin with, and also...
"Hmm. Nightmare and Pheromones... interesting."
"I-Is that so?"
"Interesting enough that I want to tear open your brain right now."
"Eek!"
Among S-class Hunters, she was such an inscrutable figure that they'd minimized her public activities as much as possible.
"Just kidding. Hehe."
Of course, that didn't mean her abilities were a lie.
"Follow me. First, let's see what your ability can do."
Nodding at her words and following along, they arrived at—
"Wh-Where is this...?"
"Nothing special. Test subjects... is that too harsh? Just sick people."
It was a place filled with people who were clearly not of sound mind — half out of their minds.
"Half of them are people who went insane after taking drugs manufactured by North Korean refugees. The other half are people whose minds collapsed for various reasons. The country says I can do whatever I want with them — but if you don't want to kill anyone, be careful."
"Ugh..."
Somin felt something rising from her stomach at those words.
Hundreds of people lying as if dead, or laughing and crying half out of their minds — how could anyone feel nothing?
"At least this place is only stocked with the docile ones, so relax."
Of course, the woman in front of her — Hong Seol — didn't seem to feel that way at all.
"Um, e-excuse me, what on earth is this..."
When Somin, thoroughly sickened, asked afterward—
"...Better not to know. Just think of it as a place to test your ability."
She wanted to ask how anyone could say that, but—
"All psychic-types train like this."
Hong Seol said it while stroking the head of a young child who looked as if their soul had left their body.
That touch carried pity and compassion.
Apparently, in Somin's estimation, this psychic ability wasn't such a good thing after all.
After that, Somin suppressed the deeply uncomfortable feeling rising in her chest and began using her ability.
"So this is Succubus Transformation? Definitely erotic~"
"I-If you stare like that, it's embarrassing..."
"Hmm~ Can I touch your tail?"
"Th-That's absolutely not allowed!"
...There were some minor hiccups along the way, but anyway.
As Somin used her ability, she gradually accumulated data and began to understand what her power actually was.
And the data obtained in the process was clear.
"Definitely A-class potential. Looking at how Nightmare lands without issue on a B-class for a full minute."
"I-Is that so?"
"Psychic-types like us are heavily affected by mana, and your mana capacity is small — yet you're doing this. That seals it."
At her words, Somin felt relieved, and continued using Nightmare afterward.
It was while she was using Nightmare extensively that—
"Stop using Nightmare now."
"Yeees? Why?"
Somin, who had been pouring Nightmare out as usual to gather ability data, was puzzled by Hong Seol's words.
"We've gotten enough data, and I've got a handle on your ability level. The problem is... the growth of your ability is noticeably stagnant."
"W-Wasn't that normal? Hunters only grow by running gates..."
"That's true too — but psychic-type Hunters usually improve precision and the like the more they use their abilities. Not you."
She said that no matter how much Somin used her ability, growth hit a wall past a certain point.
As if something solid were blocking any further advancement.
At Hong Seol's words, Somin wondered if it might be related to her passive. She fretted over it — and eventually called Taejin.
"...So. You want to experiment whether my semen enhances your stats?"
"Y-Yeah..."
Hearing her out, Taejin thought for a moment — is that right?
"Well, alright then."
The passive did say it enhanced stats, so it made sense. And if Somin did well, he also benefited as her master — at least for now(?).
So Taejin arranged a date to meet her.
"When works for you...? I'm free anytime..."
Without hesitation, Taejin said:
"Let's just meet tomorrow. I don't have any plans locked in anyway."
"Ah! Then let's meet after you get off work tomorrow!"
"Okay."
Having set the schedule, Taejin hung up and thought.
Come to think of it... isn't the government monitoring her?
It suddenly occurred to him that with her receiving A-class support, there was no guarantee they wouldn't come looking for him.
Once that thought landed, he wondered for a moment whether this was okay.
No way they'd put surveillance on me.
Even so — they wouldn't go as far as surveillance, right?
Taejin continued his shift with the thought that surely it wouldn't go that far.
Of course, this expectation of Taejin's proved correct.