I've Always Had Great Intuition

I've always had great intuition.

“Mom.”

“Yeah?”

“Let's skip this one and take the next train.”

“Huh? Why? If we catch this one we'll see Dad sooner.”

“Doesn't matter. Next one.”

“Is the station that fascinating to you?”

“It's not that. I just have a really bad feeling!”

“...You do? Then let's do that.”

Ever since I was little, my gut feeling has been eerily accurate. And I'm not talking about some vague hunch. Thanks to that sense, I saved both my mother's life and my own. That should give you an idea of how sharp it was. Of course, when I was really young I couldn't tell good from bad, so it caused me plenty of headaches.

“Hey. Park Hyunsung. Where you headed?”

“Home.”

“You're going the wrong way, dumbass.”

“Mom's errand. Need to buy eggs.”

“Copy that.”

Once I got a bit older and my head grew into my shoulders, I finally figured out exactly how this “sense” warned me. After that, my life became remarkably smooth. When something good was coming, I'd feel blood rushing to my head. When something bad was approaching, goosebumps would crawl across my entire body.

Number one is actually number three. Got it.

Twenty-three is number one. Wait, is it two? Oh. It's two.

Twenty-four is thirty-one. Huh? Then minus thirty-one? Correct.

Using it properly let me pull off stuff like this. Thanks to it, I never once worried about underperforming on exams.

Of course, my parents had their own take.

“Honey.”

“Ah. Sorry. It's the only thing that came to mind.”

My parents were the first to notice my little quirk, and they hated me using it. But they never flat-out banned it. They simply told me to restrain myself and explained exactly why I should.

“I get it. I won't rely on it too much.”

“Good. You understand what Mom's saying, right?”

“Yes.”

Thanks to them, I was able to grow up as an ordinary person. I studied like everyone else, played like everyone else, and whenever goosebumps rose or my face suddenly flushed hot, I'd just look around carefully.

“Watch out.”

“Kyaa!”

“Car was coming.”

“...Thank you.”

I even managed to do a few good deeds along the way. Looking back, I was incredibly lucky to have parents like mine. In movies, kids with special powers either go full chuunibyou, cackling about how special they are before turning evil, or they become twisted villains because their parents couldn't handle their child's uniqueness.

So.

“Mom. Dad.”

“Yeah?”

“Don't go to work today.”

“What? What are you saying all of a sudden?”

I was twenty-three, freshly discharged, and until I went back to school I was doing an excellent job as a full-time house guard. The fact that I could stop my parents from leaving for work that day must mean heaven itself was giving me a chance to repay them for raising me.

“I-I'm serious. You can't go outside right now. Mom. Dad.”

“Hyunsung, why are you acting like this all of a sudden? ...Wait. You don't mean—”

“Roll up your sleeves. Oh my. You're covered in goosebumps.”

That's right. That entire day I had to fight off the constant wave of chills covering my body.

Towers had sprouted up all across the globe.

A pure, one-hundred-percent real martial law—not some political stunt.

The military's desperate attempt to contain the situation inside the Yeouido Tower had ended in complete defeat.

“This is bad... But are you sure we don't need to go to a shelter?”

“Home is the safest place. That shelter gives me a terrible feeling.”

“Really?”

The monsters pouring out of the black Towers had turned the capitals of every major nation into wastelands. Fortunately, bullets worked on them, so the front lines were somehow holding.

Still... trying to calmly aim and fire at massive earthworms that burrow through asphalt like sand, flying stone statues, or truck-sized spiders? Not exactly easy. The kind of thing that, if my discharge had been delayed by just one week, would've been my problem.

While some people were still out there risking their lives shooting monsters, others were sitting at home writing garbage like this. As a freshly discharged sergeant whose military habits hadn't quite worn off, all I could do was sigh.

But then.

“Huh?”

Who would've thought there'd be treasure hidden among all that crap.

Several months later.

“So when exactly is the semester starting?”

“No idea. They said they'd announce it but there's been zero contact.”

The world that had been teetering on the brink of destruction had slowly started finding its footing again.

“They're still charging full tuition though. Unbelievable.”

Well, some places still weren't fully normalized, but...

“I heard once they clear the fifth floor, schools and stuff will finally reopen.”

“In what lifetime? They barely managed the third floor.”

“That's the Hunters' problem, not ours.”

Entry and Offering. The two words someone had discovered created a miracle.

By entering the Tower, clearing it, and offering the Mana Stones that dropped, you could prevent monster spawns. That was the truth uncovered by scholars worldwide so far. There were rumors that grad students were locked in some lab with a Korean dictionary, endlessly muttering to themselves, but that was just an urban legend.

Once you entered the Tower and cleared the tutorial, you would Awaken. In Korea, these people were naturally called Hunters. That much had ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠become common sense.

But did that make becoming a Hunter easy? Absolutely not. Some famous Hunter had once said, “Compared to the second floor, the first floor is basically a tutorial,” which is why people called it that. But even the tutorial required risking your life.

Participation rates always tank the moment you have to pay with something valuable. And when that price was your life? Yeah, no thanks.

“Park Hyunsung. You better not—”

“I'm not.”

“Good. They say tons of people who tried becoming Hunters never came back. Even my friend's son.”

“He didn't come back?”

“No, he did. But he's been locked in his room ever since. They're talking about forcing him into a psych ward for treatment.”

“Ah.”

Even the thought made my skin crawl. I wasn't doing that. No way.

Of course, the Mana Stones were tempting. The government had announced they would buy them for 100 million won each with unlimited purchasing power. Rumors said selling them secretly to corporations ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠would net you five times that amount.

But so what? The clear reward was only one Mana Stone per floor. Risking my life for a measly 100 million? Hard pass. My life wasn't that cheap.

Even without doing the math, my sense was screaming at me not to go in. This was seriously bad news. Extremely dangerous.

“Thanks for the meal. I'll do the dishes.”

“You will?”

“I'm unemployed, so I should at least do this much.”

“There you go again.”

In the end, I became an unemployed young man by circumstance. Even if I wanted to do something, there was nothing to do. School? Indefinitely closed. Part-time jobs? Even though society was somewhat functional again, full normalization was still far off, and every ambitious boss already had veteran part-timers who'd survived years in the industry.

Going out with friends? Not when I could hear my parents sighing heavily every night. I wasn't thoughtless enough to waste money like that.

So I just lay in my room, mindlessly tapping on my phone.

“Ugh. This is driving me insane.”

Along with this weird app.

Damn it. My head's getting hot again.

And then, a few days later.

“Private!”

“I'm not a private, I keep telling you.”

“New recruit!!”

“You can just call me normally...”

I had completed my mandatory service as an Army sergeant and been honorably discharged. Yet somehow, I had become a new recruit again.

“While you were fumbling around wasting time, the orcs have already breached the defensive line!”

In a world that was not Earth.