The Trainer's True Value
Meanwhile, Kim Gyojun couldn’t stop his body from trembling.
He had only corrected his posture.
Of course, Kang Yujun had injected mana into him at the same time as the posture correction, subtly stimulating his body.
But that alone shouldn’t have produced such a dramatic change in his movements.
Yet Kang Yujun gestured at him again and gave another instruction.
“Keep going.”
Kim Gyojun swallowed hard and continued executing the sword technique.
His physical strength was lower than that of other awakened individuals. It wasn’t that he had neglected training—his body had simply been born that way.
Because of that, all his previous training had focused on reinforcing his weak physique.
But just now, he had felt it clearly.
This training was fundamentally different from anything he had experienced before. He didn’t understand exactly what had changed, but there was something else in Kang Yujun’s guidance—something more.
“What… should I do next?”
“I’ll observe a little more first. I’ll make my decision after watching longer.”
Yujun spoke in a calm, even tone.
“All you need to do is trust me.”
Trust.
That was all it took.
Though the words were directed at Kim Gyojun, they were meant for every trainee present.
After all, training was impossible without trust.
That had quite an impact.
The trainees gathered here had spent a long time together. In other words, they knew one another extremely well.
They knew exactly what kind of trainee Kim Gyojun was.
They’ll also know that the strike he just delivered was far beyond his usual power.
That was why their shock was inevitable.
“Today, I will only train three people.”
There were twenty people gathered in the room.
The moment he announced he would only train three of them, every hand shot up—unlike before.
“Please train me! Sir!”
“I need training!”
“Sir!”
Yujun didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he carefully observed each trainee one by one.
The numbers are roughly decided.
From what he could see, Kim Gyojun was the weakest among them.
I’ll start by training Kim Gyojun.
His plan was to raise the lowest-level youth to the highest level possible.
I’ll make a clear impression on the guild.
Trained awakened Kim Gyojun.
Training Score: 5/10
Points acquired based on training score.
It was the same score as before.
But Yujun had begun to grasp the system. He now had a feel for how to utilize this ability.
One point gained.
The final third skill at Lv. 1 required ten points to unlock.
I still need more points.
He already knew what the third skill was.
It would be best to unlock it as quickly as possible.
“Line up in order! I will choose.”
“This doesn’t make any sense. You’re really going to hand our youths over to an outside trainer?”
“It doesn’t make sense, I agree. But don’t worry. He’s only training three of them. He won’t touch the rest.”
Sky Guild currently employed three full-time youth trainers.
That was why the guild master had gathered them together to explain the situation.
He intended to entrust some of the youths to a freelance trainer under an outsourcing contract.
The backlash was fierce, as expected.
“You know this is ridiculous. Why are you doing this?”
The trainer serving as team leader among the three asked.
“He fixed Woo Hana’s flaw. In just one day.”
“…Excuse me?”
The youth trainer team leader couldn’t believe his ears and asked again.
Instead of answering, the guild master pulled out a smart pad and played a video.
It was footage of Woo Hana’s training session.
“…Huh.”
“This is really Hana…?”
“……”
After watching the video to the end, the trainers muttered in stunned voices.
They finally understood why the guild master had allowed this breach of tradition.
Seeming to read their thoughts, the guild master smiled and said,
“They’re in the middle of youth training right now. You’re welcome to go watch if you’d like.”
Training grounds.
The Sky Guild trainers watched Kang Yujun’s session with rapt attention.
“It really is Kang Yujun.”
They had already been shocked that he corrected Woo Hana in a single day.
But learning that the man was none other than the former Promise Guild youth, Kang Yujun, left them stunned once again.
“Wait, is that really Kang Yujun? Not just someone who looks like him?”
“Yes, it’s him. That Kang Yujun.”
“Didn’t he get expelled recently? He’s only ever received awakened training since he was young. He never went through professional trainer education, right?”
Trainers and awakened individuals were fundamentally different.
To teach awakened people, one had to convert everything they had once done by instinct into clear, verbal data that could be explained.
Since every awakened person possessed unique senses, the trainer had to stimulate those senses through precise explanation.
That was why professional trainer courses existed—to transform one’s awakened experience into teachable data.
They had been worried about Kang Yujun jumping straight into the trainer market, but seeing him in action, his explanations were incredibly fluent.
Not only that, he made the trainees understand with surprising ease.
“This is impossible.”
“He can read their conditions that quickly?”
“It looked like he barely even glanced at them.”
Innate insight.
Thanks to that, Kang Yujun quickly identified problems and provided the perfect solution in an instant.
“That’s not the important part.”
However, the team leader was focused on something else.
“Solutions can be found just by watching closely.”
What truly mattered was making the other person understand.
“He’s making them understand so easily. Understanding is the hardest part, yet he’s doing it perfectly. He’s performing at a level far beyond where I was in my fifth year. And these kids aren’t exactly geniuses.”
This wasn’t the work of an ordinary fifth-year trainer.
This was the work of someone who had been broken and forged through countless failures over five years.
Yet the current Kang Yujun’s training ability clearly surpassed even that version of himself.
“Ha, so that Kang Yujun really became a trainer and fixed Woo Hana’s problem?”
Among all of Sky Guild’s youths, Woo Hana had been the most difficult case.
She possessed the highest potential among the guild’s youth members.
If that potential could be awakened, it would add a massive achievement to any trainer’s career.
But drawing it out had proven incredibly difficult.
Woo Hana was an awakened individual with a unique sensory perception unlike any other.
Even though awakened people had vastly different senses, there were always overlapping aspects.
But Woo Hana had none. Or rather, what seemed to overlap was actually different in subtle ways.
Explaining things in a way she could understand was the dividing line between competent and exceptional trainers.
“Just how did he do it?”
He muttered, half frustrated and half amazed.
Having trained her himself, he knew the problem well.
But fixing it had been nearly impossible.
Even Woo Hana had recognized her own issue but hadn’t known how to solve it.
Yet Kang Yujun had done it.
In just one day.
The Woo Hana they were watching now was no longer the same person.
Look at that explosive mana circulation.
Once that sensation fully settled, she would be able to leap straight past the tenth floor of the tower.
It meant she now had the foundation to jump into the upper ranks in one go.
And all of it had begun with Kang Yujun’s training.
Grind.
“What’s different?”
It was clearly different. But he couldn’t pinpoint exactly what.
“I need to watch more.”
This wasn’t the time to sit around feeling jealous.
Kang Yujun had experienced countless trainers during his time as a Promise Guild youth.
That experience must have given him an edge despite being a brand-new trainer.
“We can’t just hand everything over like this.”
“Woo Hana is being assigned to Team 3.”
Sky Guild Sales Team 3.
The guild’s tower conquest operations were handled by the sales teams.
They were divided into Teams 1, 2, and 3.
Teams 2 and 3 were training teams that helped newly assigned awakened individuals adapt to the tower by accumulating experience. Team 1 was the main climbing team that tackled the tower in earnest.
In short, the goal of every Sky Guild youth was to build experience in Teams 2 or 3 and eventually advance to Team 1.
The same was true for Woo Hana. Her goal was to reach Team 1, where tower climbing was possible.
“Woo Hana?”
Lee Deokbae, leader of Sales Team 3, frowned.
“You’re putting her in Team 3? I haven’t heard that her flaw was fixed yet.”
Her acceleration ability was evaluated as having tremendous potential. If used properly, she would be perfect for the vanguard position.
Placed at the front, she could throw monsters into chaos and provide massive support.
Moreover, if they needed to complete a speed run—one of the tower’s missions—there was no one better than Woo Hana.
However, she had one major flaw.
“You’re saying it’s been fixed? Not just because she’s old enough now?”
The vice-leader shook his head at the team leader’s question.
“I didn’t believe it either, so I looked into it. They say it really has been fixed.”
“That chronic problem? As far as I know, she was ready ages ago, but they couldn’t promote her for years because they couldn’t solve it.”
Lee Deokbae had personally visited the training grounds not long ago to check on the youths’ progress.
The standard procedure was to move them to Sales Team 3 once they reached the proper age. However, if a youth showed real promise even before that age, they would sometimes be brought in early to gain experience.
The reason he had visited was because several capable members of Team 3 had been promoted to Team 2, creating vacancies.
He had planned to evaluate the youths and request that any promising ones be sent to Team 3.
“She was still the same when I saw her then?”
It had only been a short while ago.
The time frame was far too short for that long-standing problem to have been resolved.
But since they said it was fixed and had sent her over, there was no point arguing further.
“Well, since she’s here now…”
He could evaluate her himself.
At that moment, Woo Hana entered the room.
“Hello! I’m Woo Hana!”
As soon as she appeared, everyone in Team 3 greeted her warmly.
“Welcome, Hana.”
“Yes, Team Leader! I’ll work hard!”
“Can you participate right away, Hana? We have a tower raid scheduled for today.”
“Yes, I can!”
Woo Hana answered confidently.
She was overflowing with self-assurance.
After all, she had received her second training session from Yujun just yesterday.
“I like that enthusiasm. Let’s get going.”
Tower of Clouds.
This massive tower was always bustling with awakened individuals.
For the past several decades, South Korea had poured tremendous effort into conquering the top floors of the Tower of Clouds. Yet the highest floor currently cleared was only the forty-fifth.
When the forty-fifth floor was first conquered, there had been hope that they might become the first in the world—not just East Asia—to reach the top floor.
But that hope had ended at the forty-fifth floor.
The team that first broke through the forty-fifth floor had since become part of the established elite, now called the “Masters.”
Of course, that didn’t mean they had given up on further conquest.
The top guilds continued to challenge the next floors repeatedly.
However, the majority of guilds and awakened individuals repeatedly cleared the lower floors. It was safer and more profitable that way.
“Alright, let’s head in.”
Gooooong—
Floor one of the tower. Up to the ninth floor—which was considered the last of the tower’s lower levels—one could travel comfortably using something similar to an elevator.
Gooooooong—
Sky Guild disembarked on the fifth floor.
The fifth floor was a very standard, textbook stage.
The leader of Sales Team 3, standing at the very front, spoke.
“Everyone pay attention! We didn’t come here today to do anything amazing. We’re here to gain experience. The fifth floor is one of the easiest areas in the Tower of Clouds. The mission is simple.”
Ding—!
At that moment, the same notification window appeared before every member of Sales Team 3.
Each floor of the Tower of Clouds presented a mission, and one could only ascend after completing it.
The mission for the fifth floor was…
Clear the Fifth Floor
📍 Objective: Eliminate all monsters!
🎁 Reward: Access to the next floor
It was a very straightforward monster extermination mission.
Because of that, it was a popular floor for awakened individuals visiting the tower for the first time or those who needed experience.
“You all saw the mission, right? Today we are clearing the fifth floor. Do not overdo it under any circumstances. Although the fifth floor is meant for beginners, there are still many dangerous monsters. If you get caught by the wrong one, you’ll at least suffer broken bones. And though the probability is low…”
The team leader warned in a stern voice.
“People have died here. I assume none of you want to die on the fifth floor, right?”
Dying on the fifth floor—not even an upper floor—was truly humiliating.
Everyone took the team leader’s words to heart.
“A moderate level of tension is good. But don’t get too nervous.”
Most of Team 3 were on their first tower climb, and the rest had very little experience as well.
That was why nearly everyone looked tense in one way or another.
But there was one person who remained perfectly relaxed.
That one person was already certain.
Certain that today she would be able to show her true worth.
“Then, for now.”
The leader of Sales Team 3 positioned the newcomers at the front.
“Vanguard, advance.”
Sky Guild training grounds.
“Team Leader?”
Lee Deokbae burst into the room, breathing heavily, and immediately approached one of the trainers.
The youngest trainer hurried over to him in confusion.
“W-what’s going on? Did something happen in the tower…?”
“Just how the hell did you train that Woo Hana?!”
He demanded an answer without any preamble.
The youngest trainer looked bewildered and asked back,
“W-why? Did something go wrong?”
“That’s not it…”
Lee Deokbae shook his head in frustration and shouted,
“Woo Hana shouldn’t be in Team 3—she should be sent straight to Team 1! She’s completely ready! Just who is this Kang Yujun who trained her?!”