Chapter 005
[Chapter 005]
< Internal Energy Increases >
5
Hunter Management Bureau Support Division weekly meeting.
The air in the conference room was heavy from Monday morning.
“So, what happened to the mana disruptor total failure problem?”
The Support Division Chief asked, and Old Man No of the equipment management team answered.
“We are still identifying the cause. Until last Friday, they were fine, but over the weekend, the circuits of three disruptors that were on standby simultaneously went out.”
“You mean you don't know the cause and can't repair them?”
“Yes.”
A cold silence flowed in the conference room.
Mana disruptor.
It was essential equipment to ensure the safety of Hunters at the Rift site.
If exposed to unrefined mana continuously, even an Awakener's concentration becomes blurred and fatigue accumulates.
Without this, even a C-Rank Hunter could have their ankles caught by a low-rank monster's irregular attack.
But three of those important pieces of equipment broke down at the same time.
“And what happened with the transport vehicle explosion accident that occurred early yesterday morning?”
“That... seems to be because of the monster debris collected from the Gangnam Rift site last week.”
“Because of debris?”
“Yes. Classifying an Ogre's mana stone fragments as general waste was the trigger. During transport, the unstable mana inside the fragments went berserk, causing the entire vehicle's cargo bed to explode. Fortunately, there were no casualties, but....”
“Is it enough that there were no casualties? A Bureau vehicle exploded in the middle of the city!”
The 1st Team Leader's shoulders slumped at the Division Chief's shouting.
Old Man No let out a deep sigh and muttered.
“...If Manager Jang had been here, this wouldn't have happened.”
“Manager Jang? Manager Jang Kang-hyun?”
“Doesn't everyone know? Manager Jang staying every day to check the stability of equipment mana circuits one by one by hand, that was something not even in the manual.”
Gaze focused on Old Man No.
“The same goes for the mana stone fragments. If you look with your eyes, can you tell which one is dangerous? That guy picked them out like a ghost. Other people just sweep them up as told, but Manager Jang distinguished them all one by one.”
“Come to think of it, I remember. The briefing materials before the Tower raid, and the separate risk factor summary he used to send, the Hunters said that was subtly very helpful. But since that guy left, no one takes care of such things.”
Following Old Man No, a team leader from the Support Division even added to it, and Park Jin-soo flared up and stepped forward.
“Listening to this, are you saying the entire division's work is paralyzed because just one E-Class contractor left?”
“It’s not that....”
“There are plenty of replacement personnel! And thanks to this restructuring, unnecessary E-Class and D-Class were all cleared out, so how much better has the organizational atmosphere become?”
Park Jin-soo shouted triumphantly.
In fact, as support for B and C-Rank Hunters increased with the budget saved by clearing out low-rank Hunters, several Hunters who were going to transfer to private guilds renewed their contracts.
Since he had achieved results on the surface, he couldn't help but be confident.
“Rather, it’s a good thing. Isn't our Bureau finally being reborn as a true expert group? Let's just consider these minor accidents as such.”
“Well, it’s true that Team 3’s performance has been good lately.”
In fact, the 'selection and focus' strategy led by Park Jin-soo was producing results in the short term.
A strategy to reduce unnecessary administrative procedures and focus all support on high-rank Hunters.
Thanks to that, the speed of Rift processing and monster subjugation results had noticeably increased.
“This quarter's results are especially important as we have a report to the public ahead, don't we?”
After the Tower appeared.
The South Korean Hunter system was divided into two main pillars: the state-led Hunter Management Bureau and private guilds established by giant capital.
The Bureau emphasized stability and a sense of mission, but guilds always stepped ahead with overwhelming capital and flexible reward systems.
The media and the public always criticized the Bureau by comparing its rigid administration and low performance with the guilds, so this quarter was an important period where the Bureau had to stake its fate and prove its performance.
“Let's show them we're working properly and win over all the people's hearts. How long are we going to just watch those private guild bastards bragging that they’re better than us?”
The atmosphere instantly shifted toward Park Jin-soo at his speech.
“If we just keep going like this, there’s no problem.”
* * *
The morning after planting the Hasuo seeds.
“What on earth is this?”
I was standing in the middle of the field, looking at the sight before my eyes.
In the spot where I had planted a single Hasuo seed yesterday evening, a giant vine had grown overnight.
“Th-this came from where I planted?”
Not only was a red vine the thickness of an adult's forearm covering the entire field, but in every spot where vines gathered, three Hasuo the size of an adult male's fist were bulging out of the ground with their roots.
-Hmyoot!
Muryong, who had climbed onto my shoulder, cried excitedly as if it had seen a fascinating toy.
Of course, it was something that could be deduced as the work of my EX-Rank skill.
‘According to the skill description, this field is not affected by external time laws.’
Perhaps a single night in this field was equivalent to tens or hundreds of years in the outside world.
Furthermore, this land was the only space that directly received the power of my EX-Rank trait, [Earth's Contractor].
The result of my skill acting on this land's laws to pull the life force dwelling in an ordinary seed to the extreme was exactly this before my eyes.
Tap-
I carefully dug out the Hasuo roots.
A powerful energy transmitted as soon as it touched my hand.
‘It’s different from mana.’
It felt subtly different from the feeling given by mana.
A feeling like the pure and refined primordial energy (Won-gi) of life, fundamentally different from the rough and artificial mana felt from the Tower and Hunters.
‘My mana still remains at E-Rank.’
Now I can tell without even needing to measure.
Even when I first saw the EX-Rank awakening message, and even now, I could hardly feel any change in my body itself.
‘Even if I awakened, it should be seen accurately as just the closed door having opened, while the room inside the door is still empty.’
I stared at the Hasuo root in my hand.
Hasuo in martial arts novels is a type of medicinal herb.
Furthermore, the level of efficacy is divided according to the years of aging, and Hasuo just harvested was considered no different from a regular herb and regarded as a level of auxiliary for Qi and blood.
‘Of course, I don't know how long it has been aged.’
Among the three Hasuo, I picked the one that was largest and most vivid with uniquely thick roots and cut off the base to carefully lift it.
And then I didn't hesitate and took a big bite of the root.
The bitter yet honey-sweet juice filled my mouth.
“!”
As soon as I bit it, I felt the energy of the Hasuo flowing along the blood vessels of my whole body.
It was a feeling as if the mana core trapped in the limits of E-Rank deep inside my body was screaming and beginning to expand.
A feeling like blocked blood vessels were opening and every single sleeping cell was waking up.
“Kugh...!”
Simultaneously, I felt a pain as if my internal organs were being squeezed.
-Hmyoot?!
Muryong hopped and cried as if worried.
After a bit of time passed, my condition began to return to normal.
‘My body became lighter?’
I raised my trembling hand and clenched and unclenched my fist.
I felt a power that couldn't even be compared to before.
‘It’s not just that I became stronger; the world looks different.’
The flow of minute mana floating in the air, the texture of the wind shaking the leaves, even the breath of the ground under my feet.
Everything was felt vividly.
Just then, a faint system window appeared before my eyes.
[You have absorbed the essence of the 100-Year Fleeceflower (Hasuo).]
[Internal Energy (Naegong) increases slightly.]
[Qi and blood are purified, the body is strengthened, and you will not tire easily.]
‘100-Year Fleeceflower?!’
Does this mean I grew a spiritual medicine with a hundred years of age, something only seen in martial arts papers, in just one night?
It was the same as saying a single night in my field is like a hundred years in the outside world.
‘Furthermore, Internal Energy.’
Internal Energy, not mana.
But the essence of the power felt inside the body wasn't much different.
If the mana leaking from the Tower is like unrefined crude oil, rough and explosive so there are limits to the human body accepting it as it is.
This power filling my body now was clear and pure Internal Energy that contained the essence of the earth.
‘Even physical strengthening.’
It was a truly amazing effect.
Is this the power of an EX-Rank skill?
I looked at the remaining Hasuo before my eyes.
* * *
For a moment, I had many thoughts.
Among them, the impulse I felt strongly was.
‘Shouldn't I feed this to So-ye right now?’
Was the thought.
I suppressed the impulse to go up to Seoul right now.
The part that bothered me most was whether I could trust this.
‘I’m an adult who has eaten enough years, but So-ye is different.’
A terrible memory from several years ago came to mind.
Mom had once boiled the root of an unidentified herb, saying she grew it herself in the country garden, and fed it to So-ye.
It was a time when she endured with a heart that she’d do anything to cure her daughter's illness.
But that night.
So-ye couldn't even endure the minute energy of the herb and had convulsions and seizures all night.
The appearance of my young sister whose whole body became hot like a ball of fire and who turned blue because she couldn't even breathe properly.
‘Back then I thought for sure something went wrong with So-ye.’
A fragile body that reacted hypersensitively to even a handful of mana.
I couldn't recklessly feed such a powerful spiritual medicine, whose efficacy and side effects were not confirmed, to such a sister.
‘First, a clear verification is needed.’
And as I looked at the other Hasuo roots for a long time, there were parts that were visible.
“It looks different to you too, doesn't it, Muryong?”
-Hmyoot!
The two roots were a bit different from the one I ate.
Was it because of the senses that changed after eating the 100-Year Fleeceflower?
I felt the density of the energy each root held.
“At most 3 to 5 years?”
I only felt exactly that much energy.
It seemed the one I ate was the unique 100-Year Fleeceflower where the essence of this vine was condensed.
Vrrr-
‘Engine sound?’
The sound of an old truck's engine rattling along the unpaved road.
It was a noise that didn't suit this quiet rural village.
Soon, an old truck stopped in front of my house.
“?”
I hadn't given the address to anyone, so there was no one to visit.
The person who got out of the car was an unexpected figure.
“Old Man No?”
“Hey, Manager Jang!”
Old Man No of the equipment management team.
He took off his brown sunglasses and walked with big strides.
“How did you know about this place?”
“When I came to this village and asked if anyone knew Kang-hyun, they told me.”
“Pardon?”
“At your mother's funeral, you told me this was your mother's hometown. Didn't you know I’m also from here?”
“Ah.”
To think he’d remember what happened when Mom passed away the year before last.
“But what brings you all the way here suddenly? What about the company?”
“I got angry during a meeting and just took a vacation and came. Also to see your face, Manager Jang.”
“You took a vacation?”
I doubted my ears. Someone who lived in the Bureau 365 days a year, saying "The field is a battlefield, where is there a vacation in a battlefield!", suddenly took a vacation.
“Did something happen?”
“No, it’s just too strange not to see someone I saw every day.”
No Ban-jang.
No Ban-jang was Old Man No from the beginning.
No one knew his real name and no one was curious.
Because Old Man No was Old Man No from the beginning. Since he was an original member, that was the familiar feeling.
A veteran among veterans who worked for over 20 years just in the Bureau.
When I first joined, he was the scariest boss because of his blunt expression.
Passing by, he was closer to a tsundere who took care of you in invisible places.
“Is it livable here? Wow, the air is good. But... looking around here, there isn't just one or two places to repair.”
Old Man No scanned the old house with an expert's eye.
He kicked the creaking veranda a few times and gestured toward the roof with his chin.
“Especially that roof, do you see the rafters sagging there? If you don't do waterproofing work properly, the house will collapse during this summer's monsoon.”
“Yes, I think it’ll cost some money.”
“I’ll call someone for this kind of thing. Don't worry about the cost.”
“Pardon?”
“When an elder says he’ll do it, you take it without a word.”
“Still, how can I do that, it’s okay.”
“Ahem!”
While I was having a tussle with Old Man No, Muryong was squirming in my shirt pocket, trying to poke its head out.
In order not to get caught, I tapped the pocket with my finger.
-Hmyoo....
I felt the sign of it hiding away inside the pocket as if it was sulking.
A stranger, especially Old Man No who had the energy of another Awakener, it was on guard as if it thought he might be a harmful person.
“Right, I almost forgot this.”
Old Man No took something out from the car.
“This, you said it was hard to get last time.”
“N-no way... isn't this Black Bard Fish scale?”
I had mentioned it in passing to Old Man No before.
It was something known to be good for So-ye’s illness, but I said it was hard to get because mostly large corporations won the bid for it.
The amount of money wasn't the problem, but the scarcity was the biggest problem.
“I didn't buy it, I just happened to get it in the field.”
“I can't accept something so precious.”
“Ah, if you think of your sister, are you in a position to be picky? Between us.”
And then he forced it into my arms as if pushing it.
"...I will accept it shamelessly."
After a moment of silence without saying anything, Old Man No spoke.
“Manager Jang, can't you come back?”
“Old Man No, I didn't leave of my own feet, I was laid off.”
“If you come under me, we can work together. I’ll somehow create a permanent TO for the equipment management team.”
Old Man No was a contemporary of the Division Chief and one of the influential people in the Bureau that no one could ignore.
Realistically, it wasn't an impossible thing if he set his mind to it.
“...No. Calling you to enter even as a contractor again is something I shouldn't do.”
As he spoke, he retracted his words as if he thought it wasn't right and let out a deep sigh.
“A large number of D-Class and E-Class were cut this time. If Manager Jang had just been C-Class, this kind of thing wouldn't have happened....”
He genuinely felt sorry and tapped his own knee with his fist.
“I said something useless. I’m sorry, Manager Jang.”
“I told you I’m not Manager Jang anymore.”
“Haha, that just sticks to my mouth.”
Old Man No changed his posture and inadvertently touched his waist, then slightly furrowed his brow.
“Old Man No, does your back still hurt?”
< Internal Energy Increases > END