The Rank Assessment
Knock, knock. Someone rapped on the door. Park Haesu, who had been frantically reviewing documents on his desk, didn't even look up as he spoke.
"Come in."
A woman in her mid-twenties, Yoon Hyewon, opened the door and stepped inside. "Team Leader, I checked what you asked about. It was true."
"Are you sure?" Park Haesu finally tore his gaze away from the paperwork and looked at Hyewon.
"Yes, I'm certain. The hospital records and the CCTV footage both confirm it."
"Ha... I really can't believe it. A vegetable for five years, and the moment he opens his eyes, he takes down a Harpy? Isn't this a bit too much like fiction?"
"Team Leader, I'm just reporting the facts."
"I know, I know. I was just saying..." Park Haesu pressed his temples with his fingers, clearly feeling a migraine coming on. "Did you check if he's registered as a hunter?"
"Yes, I checked that too. It's true. Cheon Yooshin hasn't registered as a hunter. There's no record of him entering any gates, either. Well, that's to be expected, considering he was a vegetable for five years."
"So, he woke up from being a vegetable and awakened as a hunter in the time between, but is that even possible? I mean, I could understand the awakening part—nobody knows when that might happen. But being able to take down a Harpy immediately after awakening? That's a different story." Park Haesu, who had been spinning a pen with his fingers, stood up from his seat.
"You got his home address, right?"
"Isn't that why you told me to have him taken home?"
"Well, it was a bit of both. Let's head over to his place."
"Right now?" A flicker of displeasure crossed Hyewon's face.
"Why, what now?"
"Team Leader..."
"Yeah, go ahead." Park Haesu was already putting on the jacket that had been hanging on his chair, preparing to leave.
"It's 6:00 PM in one minute."
"So? What about it?"
"I mean, it's quitting time. We have 55 seconds left."
Ah... he had forgotten. The Yoon Hyewon standing before him was a quintessential member of the MZ generation who drew a clear line between work and personal life. He had lost count of how many times this had happened.
"...Even if I pay you overtime?"
"Why would I take overtime? Overtime pay is for people who can't get their work done. Oh, look, it's already 6:00. See you tomorrow."
With a quick bow, Hyewon walked right out the door. Park Haesu stared blankly at the firmly closed door for a moment before sinking back into his chair.
"I really can't understand the kids these days." His grumbling voice echoed through the room.
# 9:00 PM
With his mother off to work, Yooshin, left alone, pressed the power button on his computer to kill some time. The computer tower let out a loud, grinding noise, as if it hadn't been used in ages, filling the room. Yooshin felt a brief moment of awkwardness as he fiddled with the keyboard and mouse. But as his fingers began to dance across the keys, his old instincts slowly returned.
"Let's see."
After searching around, he ended up on HunterNet. The site was filled with content that looked like it had been ripped straight from the pages of a fantasy novel. Tales of gate appearances, the birth of hunters, and the moments of peril they faced.
Yooshin sat with his mouth slightly agape, completely immersed in reading through HunterNet. A moment later:
"Hmm. Isn't this just a generic fantasy novel setup? So, hunters exist, and if you catch the monsters inside the gates, you make money from the magic stones or items they drop?"
As Yooshin leaned his chair back, his eyes suddenly caught the ceiling, which was covered in patches of mold. Reality finally set in.
"...I need to start by making some money."
Fortunately, the fighting style he was best at seemed to work in this world. The problem was that most of his skills were sealed. He stared at the ceiling, lost in thought. Becoming a hunter, recovering his abilities, and building a better life for his family. Having set his plans for the future, Yooshin let out a long yawn and drifted off to sleep.
# The Next Day.
After opening a bank account and thoroughly researching on HunterNet, Yooshin headed straight to the Hunter Management Department. The hunter registration process was simple. It ended after a brief identity verification and filling out the necessary paperwork. Then, he was led to the testing area by an attendant. The testing room was filled with strange, unfamiliar machinery.
The attendant flipped through the documents Yooshin had filled out.
"Hmm, let's see. Your ability is..." The attendant looked up from the papers to stare at Yooshin.
"'Versatile'?"
Yooshin nodded. "Yes. I'm quite versatile."
It was true. Even though they were sealed, his status window was registered with countless skills. The attendant shook his head in disbelief. Hunters like this showed up from time to time—fools who believed they were omnipotent just because they had just awakened. These hunters were E-rank, one hundred percent of the time.
'Well, he'll realize it once he gets roughed up in a gate,' the attendant thought, pointing somewhere with a bored expression.
"You see that cross drawn on the floor? Just stand in the center, and the rank assessment will begin."
"Do I just have to stand there?"
"Yes. Just stand there, and it will measure you automatically."
Following the attendant's instructions, Yooshin stood on the crosshairs and waited. Before long, the measurement was finished. The attendant's eyes began to tremble violently as he stared at the monitor screen.
"T-this is impossible!"
"Is the test over?" Yooshin asked, tilting his head. But the attendant had no time to answer. Although his career wasn't long, he had registered hundreds of hunters. He had seen all sorts of stats, but this was a first.
"H-how could it come out like this?" With trembling eyes, he turned his gaze from the monitor to the awakened individual named Cheon Yooshin.
"H-how... how can your stats be 1?"
"Yes?" Yooshin blinked. My stats are 1? What kind of nonsense is that?
The attendant spoke as if frustrated. "This machine is designed to grasp an awakened person's stats and mana capacity. A 1 means you're practically no different from an ordinary person."
At the attendant's words, Yooshin pulled up his status window. Strength 71, Agility 72... That's strange? Unless he had forgotten how to read numbers, the figures before his eyes were clearly not 1. However, Yooshin soon understood the situation from the attendant's follow-up explanation.
The maximum stat the hunter rank assessment equipment could display was 50. Therefore, the equipment couldn't properly measure his stats and had glitched, displaying a 1. Furthermore, Yooshin didn't use mana. He used Magi. Naturally, the attendant, unaware of this fact, had no choice but to judge that his mana capacity of 78 was all he had.
Yooshin listened as the attendant muttered nonsense about how he had never seen such pathetic ability stats and that this should be recorded in the Guinness World Records.
"So, are you going to issue the hunter license or not?"
"Well, I suppose I'll issue it. Even if your stats aren't up to par, you do have a basic amount of mana. Though the fact that it's so faint is the problem. And if you enter a gate with ability levels like this, you'll die for sure. I suggest you reconsider your hunter career."
Yeah, I'll die for sure. The monsters inside the gate, that is.
"Just give me the license. I don't need a high rank."
According to his research, entering a gate was entirely up to the hunter's own will. Having a low rank didn't stop someone from entering a gate. In the end, Yooshin was able to receive his fresh, warm hunter license.
Rank: E-class
Name: Cheon Yooshin
Address: Gyeonggi-do...
'What is this? It's not much different from an ID card.' It felt like only the word "Resident Registration Card" had been swapped out. Anyway, the content didn't matter. The fact that it was a hunter license was what was important.
Yooshin walked out of the Hunter Management Department and headed straight toward the gate he had checked on HunterNet yesterday. Upon arriving at the target gate, Yooshin clicked his tongue.
"Ha. A lot has changed."
The buildings he remembered were gone, and in their place sat an ominously shimmering red gate. The area around the gate was surrounded by iron fences, and near the passage, a management official sat in front of a makeshift barracks.
"So that's the place." Yooshin's eyes narrowed. He never expected that after returning, he would be the one voluntarily going to hunt monsters. But what could he do? He couldn't let his family starve. And he couldn't just plunder others' belongings like he did in the Abyss.
Yooshin held his hunter license between his fingers and leisurely walked past the management official. Or rather, he tried to.
"Hey, you there?"
"I'm a hunter, is there a problem?" He held his hunter license out in front so it would be clearly visible.
"You have to pay the entrance fee before you go in."
"...Is there an entrance fee?"
At Yooshin's words, the official scoffed as if it were ridiculous. "What, do you think we live off digging dirt? Our guild finished clearing this gate three months ago. That means our guild manages it for six months after the clear. So if you're going in, pay the entrance fee."
"Ha, how much is it?"
To think he had to pay money to hunt monsters—what an absurd situation. However, this was a rule of the hunter world he didn't know yet. In the early days of the Great Cataclysm, the Hunter Management Department cleared all gates and handled their management, but after the Special Act on Private Guild Establishment was passed, the management rights for most gates had been transferred to private guilds.
"It's 200,000 won. And that's cheap, too."
Two hundred thousand won? Two hundred thousand won? What is this son of a... what is he saying? His mother's daily wage was a little over 100,000 won. And that was for working like a machine, standing in one place all day long. Yet, they were demanding 200,000 won just to enter and exit a gate once?
'Should I just smack him in the back of the head and walk in?'
But Yooshin shook his head. He couldn't become a criminal the moment he returned. Yooshin pulled 200,000 won out of his pocket.
'Damn it, this is the money Mom gave me this morning.'
His mother had pressed 500,000 won into his hand, telling him to go see the sights and buy whatever he wanted to eat or own. Yooshin knew better than anyone that this money was earned through back-breaking labor. He had intended to save as much as possible, but now he was about to pay 200,000 won just for an entrance fee.
As he handed over the 200,000 won with trembling hands, the official snatched it up quickly. Then, looking around, he shoved it into his pocket.
"Ahem... It's originally 300,000 won, but since you look like you're in bad shape, I've lowered it to 200,000 won, so don't go around telling people you paid 200,000 won to get in. You hear me?"
He then opened the gate's iron fence and gestured with his hand.
Yooshin entered the gate immediately and looked around. The city environment had suddenly changed into a dense forest. 'It is fascinating, I'll give it that.'
But that was the extent of his appreciation. His mind was filled with the thought that he had to make his money back—no, double it. Just then, monsters appeared, making grunting sounds like beasts catching their breath. They were dwarves with green skin—three Goblins in total.
Yooshin watched the Goblins. They were the same as the ones he had seen in the Abyss. There was only one difference. If he caught them, they dropped magic stones. According to what he had found out, each magic stone was worth 100,000 won. If they don't drop anything, I'm going to flip this place upside down!
Yooshin's eyes gleamed as he reached out his hand. Meanwhile, the Goblins were also rushing toward him, letting out shrieks. They had murderous intent gleaming in their eyes and sharp daggers in their hands.
But Yooshin just chuckled as he watched them.
"To have eyes but fail to recognize your opponent is death itself."
In an instant, a Dark Arrow was sharply fired from his hand.
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!
The Dark Arrow, flying with fierce speed, pierced through the Goblins' heads as if it had a life of its own. Standing before the corpses, Yooshin picked up the daggers the creatures had been using.
"They said to cut the heart, right?"
If you cut the heart, you get a magic stone. The probability was random. It was a cruel thing to say, but Yooshin acted without hesitation. And from the three of them, he was able to obtain one magic stone.
"This thing is worth 100,000 won?"
The magic stone he held in his palm was the size of a marble. The emergence of gates had plunged the world into despair, but the emergence of magic stones had opened a new chapter in human history. The red and orange magic stones had completely changed daily life. From streetlights illuminating city streets to household appliances, magic stones had established themselves as an efficient and eco-friendly energy source.
However, the yellow magic stone remained shrouded in mystery. Ever since the existence of the yellow magic stone was confirmed, it had been immediately classified as a national strategic resource on the level of a state secret. There were only rumors that top-secret research was being conducted deep within a research facility. According to the rumors, a single yellow magic stone could handle all the electricity needed for three months.
Intellectuals cautiously predicted that these three types might not be the only ones. Regardless, an industrial revolution had occurred due to just two types of magic stones, and people's lives had become even more affluent than before the gates. If the general public benefited, it went without saying for the hunters who directly mined the magic stones. As proof, he had gained a harvest worth 100,000 won in less than five minutes.
"Good. I'm going to sweep the place clean today."
Yooshin's eyes began to gleam with greed.