S-Class Climber!
Reuniting with my juniors after three days apart was pure bliss.
"Keh heh heh!"
"Ugh, stop cackling with that face…! It overlaps with your old one and it's giving me goosebumps."
We'd been yakking across a shared desk for hours by then. Amazingly, the junior guys had already adapted completely to me being a woman.
"Come on, give me a little more of a heart-pounding reaction!"
"Can I just choke you out once with my telekinesis, for real?"
"Do it, Juhyeok."
Before long we were laughing and talking like any other day, and lunch hour was creeping up. But today I had half a day off. I shot up from my seat.
"You guys go eat at the cafeteria! I've got half-day leave to pick up my Climber registration."
"Yes, please go and never come back."
"Bring merona ice cream tomorrow~"
"Yeah, get lost!"
I bid them farewell by stiffly raising my slender middle finger, then headed for the nearest center.
"Man, I'm buzzing."
Climber registration—it felt like taking a legendary Pocket Monster to the Pokémon Center for safekeeping. The sheer lift of it had me barely touching the ground as I ran, until I was naturally kicking off empty air itself. Like that verse from the Bible: the beginning was humble, but the end would be glorious. What started as a playful attempt at air-stepping evolved, before I knew it, into the pinnacle of light-foot technique—Walking the Empty Void.
As expected of a genius who runs on vibes: without any real effort, I could race through the sky as I pleased. Though if you really thought about it, wasn't it all thanks to the martial novels I'd read since childhood and the external arts I'd drilled? "So this genius of mine is the fruit of my own hard work, too." I nodded along, thoroughly convinced.
How long had I been streaking alone through the air while everyone else trudged along staring at the pavement? In no time at all, I arrived at the center.
"Oh, nice."
Built only a few years ago, the place still had a clean exterior. I made a beeline for the reception kiosk.
"Hmm… what if my fingerprints changed?"
Awakening sometimes altered a person's appearance along with their abilities, so the kiosk only checked fingerprint matches for identity. For someone whose gender had flipped, even that was a worry. My prints could have changed too, for all I knew. I pressed my ID and fingerprint to the scanner and waited, hoping nothing weird would happen.
Beep-beep-beep—click!
Identity verification complete.
Thankfully, even with a gender swap, my fingerprints still matched. I took the number ticket from the kiosk and sat among the lobby chairs, waiting for my turn to flash on the board.
"Wow, plenty of room, huh?"
Only a few years back, these chairs had been packed so tight you couldn't even sit. Now, maybe a dozen people visited a day, total. I'd seen online posts arguing that the place was a waste of space and should be converted for public use.
"Hmm, it does look like a waste of real estate…" If they put a proper national fitness center right here—prime location—it'd be great for public health, great for me… everybody wins, right?
I zoned out waiting for my number, and before I knew it my turn came up. At the counter sat a male civil servant in his thirties or forties, dark circles drooping under his eyes like a panda's from the grind of office life. For a second, my looks startled him—then the professional mask snapped back into place.
"Alright, ID and number ticket, please. One moment…"
I handed over my ID as instructed.
"Name, Kang Hyundo… age twenty-three by full years… um? Gender's listed as male, but…?"
He kept glancing between the photo on my ID and my actual face, looking thoroughly flustered, so I answered calmly.
"Ah. I became a woman last week."
That only made him more flustered.
"Uh… well, uh, congratulations on the surgery going well…? Must've been painful."
I realized in that instant I'd left out a critical subject.
"No, no! I'm not a transgender person—I awakened and my gender changed!"
"…Excuse me?"
His work-worn face shifted into a peculiar expression, as if he'd just heard something impossible. Then he asked about my rank.
"Ah… gender can just… change? Then, for now—what rank does your status window show?"
I puffed out my chest and declared it proudly.
"Triple S!"
I felt his gaze briefly snag on how prominently that chest stuck out—then he furrowed his brow, thought for a moment, and spoke with grave seriousness.
"Ma'am… please don't take this the wrong way, but there's a hospital nearby that I go to. How about we head over together? Of course, if you'd rather not, that's fine…"
This man clearly thought I was a pathological liar! Treating me like a patient in urgent need of help… I immediately conjured a massive surge of Magi at my fingertips.
"Look at this! I really did awaken, okay?!"
"W-wait—ma'am, please calm down!"
If anything, that only made the situation feel more dire.
"No, seriously, I really awakened!"
"Yes, I understand, ma'am. Just stay calm. Calm. Please wait just a moment—just one moment!"
With trembling hands, he pulled a heavy crystal orb from the drawer under the desk. It looked like something out of a tarot parlor. Apparently this was a temporary mana-measurement tool.
"Could you inject some mana into this?"
If I produced an overwhelming result, this ridiculous misunderstanding would clear right up—so I wrung every last scrap of power I had and poured Magi into it. Light bloomed inside the orb… then, as if a fuse had blown, it went dark. And crumbled to pieces on the spot.
"Uh…?"
Seems the equipment's durability couldn't keep up with measuring this body's strength. The moment he saw the state of the orb, the clerk's face turned grim. He asked my pardon, left his seat, and vanished behind the counter. The way he hurried off with a phone in hand, he was probably calling upstairs about me.
A minute or two later, he returned.
"For now, ma'am—would you come with me?"
After some urgent call with higher-ups, he wanted me to follow…? Half-suspecting he meant to drag me somewhere shady, I asked,
"Where are we going?"
"Ah—orders came down from above. We need to measure your mana levels more accurately."
He led me into a restricted zone buried deep inside the building. When he opened a thick steel door, what greeted me was a massive mana-measurement apparatus—and, on a lit screen, a rather familiar face seated and waiting.
"Huh?"
"Hmm!"
He recognized me too. Swallowing a quiet sound of surprise, he spoke first.
"To think the Climber who saved Yeongdeungpo's streets was still an unregistered Awakened who hadn't even set foot in the Tower…"
"Haha—yeah, that's just how it worked out…?"
What a coincidence… The official who'd come to take my report back then was sitting right there on the screen.
"Well, secondary matters can wait. Allow me to introduce myself properly first. I am Lee Gicheol, Section Chief of the National Cooperation Climber Management Association."
"Ah—I'm Kang Hyundo, a social service worker…"
"Pardon? A social service worker?"
Section Chief Lee Gicheol echoed the words, as anyone would when faced with something that made no ordinary sense. The clerk beside me stepped in to explain.
"According to Mr.—ah, Ms. Kang Hyundo, their original gender was male, and it changed upon awakening."
Section Chief Lee lowered his head, thinking hard.
"Hmm. A gender change… Then the Triple S rank you mentioned is no fabrication, is it?"
"Excuse me?"
"This is something the public is somewhat aware of, but we estimate that the higher the rank, the more extreme the physical transformation."
"Huh? But lower-ranked Climbers undergo bodily changes pretty often too, don't they?"
"The principle is simple. What people call 'physical change'—a particular body part developing, a face growing a bit more attractive—is merely the body adapting to mana at a moderate level."
"Ahh…"
"True high-rank Climbers can alter their bodily composition into liquid or solid states, or even shapeshift into entirely different beings. The range of those abilities is vast, and they take forms that fall outside any standard."
Section Chief Lee paused, then regarded me seriously through the screen.
"But no matter how great the power one obtains, anyone who has not climbed the Tower is, in principle, no different from a civilian."
For a second I thought I was about to get chewed out over the Yeongdeungpo incident. Instead—
"And yet you stepped forward for others… I offer my deepest respect for that noble courage and sense of justice."
He bowed his head.
"And so, on behalf of the Association, I would like to convey our gratitude once more."
"Aw, it was nothing! Anyone else would've done the same."
Praise this high from someone this important left me with nowhere to put myself. Seeing my bashfulness, the Section Chief smiled warmly and made a proposal.
"Your strength is already well known to the world, so tools like that measurement device are unnecessary… Therefore, I'd like to extend one offer to you now."
"An offer?"
"Yes. You could call it a kind of 'bribe' to keep high-rank Climbers rooted in the country."
"Uh… a bribe?"
I'd never received so much as a single letter of the word "bribe" in my life, so the idea of one coming from the Association left me looking mildly stunned.
"Haha, no need to worry. We call it a bribe, but it's essentially national support."
He listed them off: a large monthly stipend from the national treasury under the name of living expenses, top-tier items needed for climbing, and the assignment of dedicated personal staff to handle administrative procedures and special care. Benefits that extravagant were impossible for anyone but a nation to offer.
"With that much on the table, I've got no reason to refuse. I wasn't planning on leaving the country anyway."
"Whew… Hearing you say that is a real relief. Thank you."
The visible, almost excessive relief on his face raised a question.
"Do other countries really work that hard to poach high-rank Climbers?"
"Hmm… No point hiding it. China, North Korea, and Japan next door are too busy with internal control to bother, but Russia and the United States, for example, are constantly headhunting top Climbers."
"Russia and America?"
"Yes. Their vast territories and shortage of Climbers mean they can't keep up with the ever-increasing gates. They're pouring enormous sums into hiring high-rank Climbers as a substitute for military forces."
I'd thought the world's superpowers were holding up just fine—but like swans, they looked serene on the surface while paddling frantically underneath.
Then Section Chief Lee slid a document onto the screen.
"Unfortunately, under the current global Climber Association system, the official designation and code for 'Triple S (SSS)' have not yet been established. It's a rank without precedent worldwide. Therefore, as a temporary administrative measure, we will first issue you the highest existing rank: an S-Class Climber Registration Certificate."
"Oh, S-Class? Nice."
"And as for the status issue that must concern you most—namely, your social service obligation—we will coordinate with the Military Manpower Administration and complete your exemption within this week. It will of course be a fully legal exemption process, so you need not worry about a thing."
An exemption… I only had three weeks left until discharge anyway, so it felt weirdly like a loss. But given the mood, I kept my mouth shut.
"And the certificate renewal is already complete, so if you wish, you may enter the Tower as early as today."
"Starting today?"
"Yes. However, please be careful about a certain choice when you climb."
"What choice?"
"The Tower makes high-class Climbers one particular offer. Hard Mode—in short, an extremely difficult climb."
"Huh. First I've heard of it."
"Haha. It isn't widely known. Only a handful of high-class Climbers in the country are attempting it as it is."
"So I should take the offer, right?"
"To be frank, the World Climber Association does not recommend Hard Mode. That's why we deliberately omit any separate explanation."
"Why? Hard Mode should mean better rewards."
"From what we've confirmed, Hard Mode does not appear for every high-class Climber. Once people learn it exists, many overestimate their own skill and force themselves into it."
"Ah…"
"There have been no small number of accidents involving high-class Climbers as a result. So the Association prioritizes recommending the standard clear."
"Aww, so I can't climb Hard Mode?"
I hung my head, voice thick with disappointment at Section Chief Lee's words—until he added something more.
"However, for you, Ms. Kang Hyundo, I will say this: the choice is yours alone. We can hardly force a decision on someone who has already demonstrated the strength of a top Climber."
"!"
My head snapped up toward the Section Chief.
"Just… be careful. Hard Mode is, true to its name, an extremely difficult challenge."
"Yes, sir!"
"Haha. Then we'll be looking forward to great things, Hyundo."
With Section Chief Lee Gicheol's encouragement ringing in my ears, all these brand-new revelations set my heart racing.