Chapter 26
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: penny
Chapter: 26
Chapter Title: Offloading the Grind
-----------------------------------------------------------------
C-rank or not, a gate was still a gate.
The massive spatial rift wavered in front of me. Without hesitation, I took one step inside.
My vision blacked out for a moment, then instantly reconstructed into an entirely different landscape.
"…Whoa."
It was vast.
An enormous cave stretching endlessly. Strange ores embedded in the ceiling emitted a faint glow, like an artificial night sky.
And above all.
The air… it's electric.
I took a deep breath, and thick mana flooded deep into my lungs. A sharp, refreshing energy incomparable to the musty air of my stuffy workshop.
"This is different from what I heard."
They said entering a gate for the first time usually made it hard to endure the oppressive mana filling the space. Especially for someone like me, whose mana was below baseline.
But instead, I felt a strange sense of liberation, like my stuffy chest was suddenly opening up.
Have I been cooped up in the workshop too much?
I briefly considered taking regular walks, but shook my head. Just imagining it was annoying.
Anyway, after confirming the site, I quickly exited the gate. Then I called Old Man Hwang right away.
"H-Hello…."
In the end, he'd agreed to take the commission. For materials cost only. Honestly, I felt guilty asking for more.
"G-Gate… checked. P-Please start."
- Already? You don't want to watch it being built? It's your commission—aren't you curious?
"C-Crowds aren't my thing…."
- Tsk. Kid. Avoiding people like that in this harsh world….
Click.
I hit the end call button immediately.
A few days later, I got word that everything was finished.
I entered the gate again. And for a moment, I was speechless at the sight before me.
The previous empty, silent cave was gone.
"You're here, kid."
In the center of the completed setup, Old Man Hwang stood waiting with arms crossed. Behind him, complex, intricate machinery hummed with a low, steady vibration.
"Don't just stand there gawking. Come here and listen to how your gear works."
He gruffly led me deeper inside.
"Whoa…."
Up close, the setup was even more overwhelming. It looked like a research facility straight out of a movie.
"This is your master chamber for working in."
Following his gesture, I turned to see countless machines lined up on either side of the master chamber.
"And those hundred scattered ones over there are the slave synthesizers."
Master? Slave?
"…Y-Your tastes are a bit…."
"What the hell are you—huh."
Thwack!
"Ow!"
I clutched my forehead from the merciless flick.
"Kid stuffing his head with weird ideas. It's always been called a master-slave structure!"
He tsked in exasperation. I rubbed my stinging forehead and muttered aggrievedly.
"…It h-hurts…."
"Quiet. Listen to the principles properly."
Ignoring my complaints, he continued the explanation.
"When you start working in that master chamber, the exact same thing happens in all hundred synthesizers."
"The exact same…?"
"Yeah. When you move, they move the same way. When you add materials, they add the same ones."
He tapped the core of the system.
"The magitech device here scans your physical movements in real-time—speed, timing, angle—and perfectly replicates them over there."
Replication of physical movements. Which meant the most important part was elsewhere.
"Th-Then… what about mana…?"
At my question, he pointed to a facility boring through the entire cave wall, looking like a giant heart.
"That's the mana reactor."
"……."
It was overwhelmingly huge. I could feel the mana flow inside the gate shifting around that monstrous machine.
"That beast does two things. One: it sucks in the gate's mana to power the entire workshop. And the other…."
His gaze fixed on me intensely, gleaming with excitement unfitting his age.
"…is to sync and amplify your unique mana flow, injecting it identically into every synthesizer."
Replication and synchronization.
Physical movements replicated, mana flows synced.
"In simple terms, you craft one, but this workshop pumps out a hundred at once. Got it?"
"Whoa…."
"You brought the blueprint, but you don't know shit after all."
"Th-That's…."
I had no excuse. He seemed to have figured out long ago that I hadn't designed it myself.
"Whatever. It was a good experience anyway."
He swept his eyes over his creation once, then turned toward the gate exit.
"Well, I'm off."
"Huh? Oh, yeah…."
"Snooping in someone else's workshop is rude. Don't blow it up. I'll send the materials invoice later."
With that, Old Man Hwang vanished outside the gate.
Now, I was alone in this vast space.
I took a deep breath and stepped into the master chamber. The familiar feel of the workbench met my fingertips.
"…Activate."
With those words, the entire dormant workshop began to awaken.
Vwooom—!
The mana reactor roared majestically, starting to draw in the gate's mana.
"Hoo."
I raised my finger in the air as if performing real synthesis, drawing the now-familiar pattern. Then I murmured softly.
"Rise."
As mana flowed from my fingertip, the device recognized it and lit up brightly.
At that instant.
Ziiing—!
An astonishing sight unfolded.
The hundred slave synthesizers lining both sides resonated in unison, forming an identical mana flow inside themselves. Waves of blue light spread across the entire workshop.
It works…!
Next, I picked up a stirring rod and slowly, meticulously twisted my wrist.
In perfect sync with my movement, the hundred synthesizers moved at the exact same speed and angle, without a second's delay.
"Technology…."
My chest swelled with emotion.
No more repeating alchemy until my mana depleted and I collapsed from exhaustion. No more headaches over maturation times.
I just had to perform the perfect alchemy once, following the instincts ingrained in my body.
My body itched to test this amazing equipment right away. Almost running, I headed to the materials storage set up in one corner of the gate.
But the moment I opened the warehouse door, I froze in place.
"……."
Piles of raw materials greeted me like a mountain.
Fresh ogre marrow, flame sacs, slime mucus.
To make a hundred potions, I naturally needed a hundred sets of materials.
And preprocessing all of them to fit the synthesizers' specs was entirely on me.
"Ha…."
I sliced a few ogre marrows, then flopped straight onto the floor.
Facing this reality right after thinking things were easier made it even more tedious. I didn't want to lift a finger.
"…Should I just slack off and dump this on someone else too?"
Thinking about it, I only needed to handle the crucial alchemy part, right?
A high-end talent like me, savior of hunters, wasting time on repetitive grunt work was inefficient.
Damn right.
I pulled out my smartphone immediately.
It barely rang before a familiar voice answered.
- What's up? Something wrong?
"Y-Yuna. Get me some people."
- People? Suddenly?
"N-Need someone to p-prep materials…."
- Got it. Send them to the gate? How many?
"N-No… Bringing them here is weird."
I chose my words carefully. I didn't want strangers in my space.
"Like… receiving pre-prepped ones consistently from elsewhere… possible…?"
- Consistently?
"Yeah… Just peel-and-dump ready…."
- Ah. Outsourcing material processing, huh? Got it. I'll look into it and get back to you.
Yuna was the only one for this.
The next morning.
The Normal Operations Guild office was a total warzone.
"Team leader! Yesterday's orders are missing again! Can you check this?!"
"This needs a tax invoice, but last month's sales summary isn't…."
"Server crashed again!"
The office was already at capacity. Unprocessed orders and tax forms teetered precariously on desks.
Choi Yuna pressed her temples and groaned.
"Haa… And I'm barely handling this…."
She mulled over Seha's request from last night.
Material processing outsourcing.
And considering that factory inside the gate was complete.
"……."
Calculations raced through Choi Yuna's mind like mad.
Volumes incomparable to now would pour out.
Exploding logistics. Unmanageable accounting. Tax filings and customer management ready to burst.
This makeshift hunter guild admin system wouldn't last three days, let alone a week.
"…Might as well start a whole new company."
Buried under the avalanche of paperwork, Choi Yuna muttered blankly.