A Double-Edged Deal
“Congratulations on clearing the tenth floor!”
She sounded far more excited than I was.
“Ms. Kang Mina?”
Kang Mina from the Talent Management Team. Why was she waiting at the entry gate?
“It feels like just yesterday when I first met you, Hunter Lee Taepyeong, and now you’ve already cleared the tenth floor!”
“Ah, hahaha…”
“I already knew you were incredible, but this is a feat that neither I nor the team leader ever expected!”
“Th-thank you…?”
Did they think I was going to take the money and run before even reaching the tenth floor?
Well, they weren’t entirely wrong.
That was exactly what I had planned to do at first. It was just that, along the way, I found it surprisingly fun and suited to my talents, so I kept climbing.
“Starting today, I am your dedicated manager.”
“Dedicated manager?”
Where did this come from all of a sudden? Did every hunter get a dedicated manager assigned to them? I didn’t think so.
“Oh, right. Look at me forgetting.”
Mina clapped her hands together as if remembering something. She handed me a black envelope made of a peculiar material.
“What’s this?”
“Well, that is—oh, just open it! It’ll be much more moving if you see it for yourself!”
“If you say so…”
What, did they give out bonuses for clearing the tenth floor? Indifferently, I tore open the black envelope. Inside was a neatly packaged…
A card?
It was a transparent card with the number ‘0’ printed on it.
“Well? What do you think?”
Mina asked, her voice brimming with anticipation.
“Do you want my honest opinion?”
“Yes!”
Hmm. I scratched my chin for a moment.
“I have absolutely no idea what this is.”
“Wh-what?!”
Was it really that shocking? I mean, how was I supposed to know what a card with just a single ‘0’ on it meant?
“You’re joking, right?”
“I’m completely serious.”
Mina looked horrified. Her shoulders slumped in disappointment, but she quickly perked up and looked at me with a bright face again.
“Well, that makes sense! It’s not exactly something you see every day!”
“So, what is it?”
“This is…”
Mina let out a strange, giggly chuckle.
“It’s the keycard to your very own residence in the Zero Section, Hunter Lee Taepyeong!”
The Zero Section? I stared at her, blank-faced.
“Y-you didn’t forget what the Zero Section is, did you? I’m sure I explained it to you before!”
Ah. Right now, I was staying in the First Section… and the one above it was the Zero Section. A special residential area reserved for top-tier hunters like Ban Haeyeong and Han Sion. The First Section was already so luxurious that I had completely forgotten a higher tier even existed.
“The place I have now is already great, though.”
“Pardon?”
“Do I really have to move?”
“Wh-what?!”
Mina looked as if she had just been struck by lightning. But I was being entirely serious. The First Section was already incredibly nice. Why go through the hassle of moving? It was just annoying.
“Th-the Zero Section offers services on a completely different level compared to the First Section!”
“Hmm…”
“Everything is five times better! Not to mention the helpers, and a professional security detail…”
“Does my helper change too?”
“Yes. We will hire a team of specialized helpers to cater to your every need in various fields…”
“I’m perfectly fine with just Do Sangjin.”
“Pardon?”
“And security… I don’t really see the point.”
“B-but you are now one of the Hunter Administration Office’s key hunters…”
“I’ll keep using Do Sangjin.”
He cooked a mean kimchi stew and kept the place spotless. There was absolutely no reason to replace him.
Mina tried to pitch several other benefits, but I turned down almost all of them. I even handed back the Zero Section keycard. The First Section I was staying in was more than enough. Why bother? Sure, the Zero Section would be much better. But…
They’re being way too pushy, and it’s making me uncomfortable.
South Korea already had nine hunters who had climbed past the 50th floor of the Babel Tower. Considering that even the United States, the world’s strongest nation, only had sixteen hunters above the 50th floor, that was an astronomical number. But I had only just cleared the 10th floor. For them to offer me the Zero Section already…
Am I going to end up like Choi Muryeong?
Choi Muryeong. He was, without a doubt, South Korea’s number one hunter. Ever since the Babel Tower appeared, he had been the savior leading the nation up to the 60th floor. But on the flip side…
He’s the Administration’s dog.
Having received massive government support from the very beginning, Choi Muryeong had essentially become their lapdog. It was a chaotic time when the Babel Tower first appeared, and since he was an active-duty soldier back then, it must have been difficult for him to refuse the government’s demands.
Of course, as South Korea’s strongest hunter, Choi Muryeong enjoyed countless privileges and luxuries. Things ordinary people couldn’t even dream of. But still.
The nickname ‘the Administration’s dog’ didn’t come out of nowhere. No matter how well you were treated, what was the point if you weren’t free? I had no desire to get tangled up so deeply with the Administration Office. The perks of the First Section were plenty.
“I suppose it’s too late to ask you to reconsider?”
Mina asked cautiously, but I smiled and shook my head.
“Phew…”
Mina let out a sigh so deep it could have collapsed the floor. She seemed incredibly disappointed. But it only lasted for a moment.
“Still, I plan to support you with everything I’ve got, Hunter Lee Taepyeong!”
Mina pumped her fist, her energetic expression returning.
“Please don't reject that too!”
To be honest, Mina didn’t seem like a bad person. She was passionate, and I could feel her genuine sincerity in wanting me to succeed.
“Sure. I’ll be relying on you.”
I shook her hand with equal sincerity. She was my dedicated manager, after all. I had no intention of joining a guild, and a dedicated manager was different from a helper. I could get a lot of help regarding the Babel Tower through her.
“In that case, shall we go meet the Foreign Relations Team first?”
“Pardon?”
Not the Information Analysis Team, but the Foreign Relations Team? Why so suddenly?
“The Foreign Relations Team?”
“Yes. Oh, you haven’t heard yet?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about…”
Mina checked her tablet.
“Ah. The request came in while you were on the tenth floor, so you wouldn’t know.”
“What kind of request?”
“Do you remember ‘Wrath of the Sun’?”
Wrath of the Sun. That was the map where I met Nairin.
“I remember.”
“And you know you’re the first human to ever clear it, right?”
“So I’ve heard.”
I recalled hearing something about that during my interview. First human, blah blah blah.
“There are countries that want to purchase the full transcript of your interview regarding ‘Wrath of the Sun.’”
“The interview?”
“To be precise, the map information.”
“Information…”
“Lately, rookie hunters have been disappearing in droves in an unidentified map. Many countries suspect that ‘Wrath of the Sun’ might be that very zone.”
Ah. So that was why they wanted to buy my interview.
“We actually bought the interview for the ‘Noah’s Ark’ map from the US in the early days. We have a decent amount of information on the Babel Tower now, but back then, it was really…”
Mina went on to explain the details of these international transactions. As I listened, we arrived at our destination.
CONFERENCE ROOM
Another government official, who had been looking over some documents, jumped up from his seat.
“Hunter Lee Taepyeong!”
A genial-looking middle-aged man quickly approached and grabbed my hand.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Hello.”
“I am Jang Jinseok, the head of the Foreign Relations Team.”
The middle-aged man handed me his business card.
“The reason I asked to meet you today is…”
Jang Jinseok began to speak with a broad smile. Thanks to the explanation Mina had given me beforehand, I was able to follow the conversation smoothly.
“So, the United States and Japan?”
“Yes. Other countries have shown interest as well, but we plan to deal with those two first.”
I had done several interviews about ‘Wrath of the Sun,’ and it seemed they had finally compiled all the data. Out of the many nations that showed interest, the two we were prioritizing were the US and Japan.
“The United States has promised a massive sum.”
Oh. As expected of the global superpower.
“Thanks to that, we should be able to reach a smooth agreement, but…”
Jang Jinseok explained a few more things, then suddenly wore a complicated expression.
“However, the condition proposed by Japan is something we need to discuss with you, Hunter Lee.”
“What is their condition?”
Jang Jinseok hesitated for a moment.
“They asked if we would be willing to trade for an ‘item.’”
An item? I instinctively looked at Mina. She nodded and turned to Jang Jinseok.
“We need to know what kind of item it is before the hunter can make a decision, don’t we?”
Jang Jinseok glanced at me at her words. He seemed slightly annoyed by Mina’s presence. Had he planned to just push the deal through if she hadn’t been here?
“…”
I deliberately stayed silent and just stared at him. Jang Jinseok smacked his lips a few times before finally answering.
“Well, that item is…”
“Yes?”
“An S-rank weapon.”
An S-rank? Why would they give away something like that? I looked at him, puzzled. Jang Jinseok let out a deep sigh.
“You might have heard of it.”
“Heard of what?”
“About ‘Dan’ (Sever).”
It was my first time hearing of it.
“Ah, it’s a pretty old story, so you might not know,” Mina quickly chimed in to explain.
‘Dan’. It was the first S-rank weapon Japan had ever acquired. A reward obtained from a Diamond Chest by Nakamura, one of Japan’s top-tier hunters. That should have made it an incredible item. At the time, the entire Japanese archipelago was buzzing with anticipation, wondering if Nakamura would become the strongest hunter in Asia.
But that anticipation quickly fizzled out. Despite being an S-rank weapon, ‘Dan’ had no special abilities other than draining the user’s life force. It didn’t even have a common stat boost like a 5% increase in attack power. An S-rank weapon that actually gave the user a debuff? If it couldn’t cut or pierce anything, it was no longer worthy of being called an S-rank weapon. People even self-deprecatingly joked that an Orc’s club would be stronger.
Why was such a useless piece of junk classified as S-rank? That question was answered soon after. A Chinese hunter named Li Xian acquired ‘Jeol’ (Break). Just like ‘Dan,’ ‘Jeol’ was an S-rank weapon with no special abilities, unable to cut or pierce anything—another useless S-rank weapon.
But if ‘Jeol’ and ‘Dan’ were truly useless, they wouldn’t have been classified as S-rank. By then, both Japan and China realized the truth: the two weapons were a pair. Their true value would only be revealed when they were brought together.
However, neither side was willing to back down. For Japan and China, handing over an S-rank weapon to the other country was…
Out of the question.
And so, ‘Jeol’ and ‘Dan’ became white elephants for China and Japan, respectively. Now, Japan was trying to get rid of its white elephant. Since China would never yield ‘Jeol’ to anyone, Japan was pretending to offer an S-rank weapon on the surface, while in reality, they were just dumping their useless junk. There was a high-level political calculation at play here, too. If South Korea took possession of ‘Dan,’ China would undoubtedly start putting pressure on them.
In that case, my choice was…
“Let’s make the deal.”
Double down and let it ride.