A Hunter's Growth
It was the dead of night.
Only the faint glow of emergency lights cast an eerie pall down the building corridor.
"Just when do you intend to return!"
I was furious.
My disciple Lee Da-yeon had already gone to bed.
Yoon Deok-ja would be in the first-floor security office.
If Na-yeon had returned to the guild, she ought to have stopped by my and Da-yeon's room to report her arrival.
I had been lying down for quite some time, but sleep refused to come, so I wandered the corridor.
Then—
"...Hmm? Has she already returned?"
When I suddenly expanded my senses, a familiar energy brushed against me from the direction of the training room.
"If you're back, you should have reported it."
I grumbled and headed toward the training room.
The lights inside were off.
And in one corner sat the curled-up figure of a woman.
Kim Na-yeon.
I approached and looked down at her in silence.
Sensing my presence, Na-yeon lifted her head as well.
"Kim Na-yeon, what are you doing here?"
"...Shouldn't you call me Unnie?"
"Hmph. There is no honorific for a subordinate who returns late."
"Heh."
Na-yeon gave a small laugh, then hung her head low again.
In the brief flash of her eyes I could read deep exhaustion.
I sat down beside her.
"Was the gate raid that hard?"
"Mm. Being hard isn't really the problem."
"...?"
I tilted my head.
If hardship itself was not the issue, then something else must be wearing her down this badly.
"Yeon-ah."
"Speak."
"Why am I so weak?"
"......."
"There are things in this world that effort alone can't overcome, I guess. I really tried hard, but I'm still weak."
Weak.
In that single word I could read a great deal.
Kim Na-yeon, C-rank hunter.
In Central Plains terms, a second-rate martial artist.
She was lamenting her own frailty.
In this era the method of expanding the vessel for mana—of increasing the maximum internal energy a dantian could hold—had been lost.
I had heard it was because of wars between humans.
Because of firearms that could achieve the killing power of peak masters after only a few hours of handling? Because of conventional weapons whose destructive force no human body could hope to match?
But against the monsters that had appeared with the Great Calamity, conventional weapons were useless.
Only the attacks of martial artists and hunters who wielded internal energy remained effective.
And then came the Awakeners, whose appearance surely bore the mark of some divine influence.
A new humanity that possessed dantians capable of storing mana absorbed naturally, without any training.
Each of them had a differently sized dantian.
So people on the internet said that Awakeners had their "rank spoon" decided from the moment they were born.
"......."
Silence settled over the training room.
I rose to my feet.
And looked down at Na-yeon with indifferent eyes.
Hum.
I circulated the principles of the Natural Realm.
A tyrannical energy began to surge and swirl around my body.
Sensing the shift in my presence, Na-yeon lifted her head.
"...Yeon-ah?"
No.
Right now this was not the girl Wiji Yeon, but the Heavenly Demon Wiji Yeon.
"Na-yeon, you are weak."
"...That's blunt."
Na-yeon smiled bitterly.
I offered her no comfort.
That was how the Heavenly Demon Wiji Yeon had lived.
The Heavenly Demon Divine Cult.
The strong are respected.
Only strength is the path by which one proves oneself.
There is no sympathy for the weak.
Even for a subordinate.
"However."
But the Heavenly Demon Wiji Yeon was not so heartless as to refuse to teach a subordinate the way to grow stronger.
"This Seat can open the path of growth for you."
"...How?"
"Similar to the training This Seat undertook with Da-yeon. But since you already possess mana in your body, Na-yeon, you will have to endure a dangerous process."
"Dangerous...?"
"You could die."
Tension filled Na-yeon's eyes.
Yet she bit her lip and nodded.
Was it trust in the knowledge that had turned ordinary Da-yeon into an Awakener?
Or simply the desperation of someone clutching at any straw?
"I'll do it. As long as I can get stronger."
Her resolve was firm.
I had Na-yeon sit in the lotus position and pressed my palm against her back.
Hum.
What I intended to perform was the art of Transmitting Power Across the Body.
It was a method normally used by martial artists who washed their hands of the world and retired, passing their internal energy to a successor.
Of course my current internal energy was meager.
But if I used the principles of the Natural Realm to draw in the energy of the great natural world, I could fill Na-yeon's dantian with internal energy refined through the Heavenly Demon Heart Method.
I had told Na-yeon the process was dangerous for her, yet my own body—still unfinished in its growth—could also be placed at risk.
Of course I did not mention that burden to her.
Gathering true energy, I explored Na-yeon's interior.
At once I blasted away every scrap of internal energy she possessed.
The power called mana is inefficient.
Even the same quantity of energy is weaker than energy refined through a proper heart method.
Wooooong!
I immediately circulated the Heavenly Demon Heart Method.
The natural energy I had drawn in to a burdensome degree shook the interior of the girl Wiji Yeon like a storm.
"Kh."
Pain sharp enough to blank the mind.
An ordinary child would have fainted long ago.
I kept stuffing the refined internal energy from my body into Na-yeon's dantian.
Na-yeon had already entered a state of no-self.
Soon the energy I transferred began to ride her meridians through a full cycle of the microcosmic orbit.
"Right now, carefully remember the path the mana takes inside your body."
"......."
"This is the process of increasing your maximum mana capacity. If you continue steadily, you will grow without end."
Blood trickled from Na-yeon's tightly bitten lips, yet she made no sound of pain.
"Well done."
My fear that Na-yeon's life might be in danger had been unfounded.
Unlike the frail body of the girl Wiji Yeon, Na-yeon's body—tempered over long years—splendidly endured the tyrannical nature of the Heavenly Demon Heart Method.
Even through the pain I smiled faintly.
"Your efforts were not in vain."
Na-yeon opened her eyes.
"......!"
She could clearly feel a new power endlessly welling up from within her body.
Had her mana capacity increased?
Had she surpassed her innate limits?
No.
The amount of mana itself had not changed much.
But the new mana now swirling inside her radiated a tyrannical force that had never existed before.
Even if she wielded the same quantity of mana as usual, she would be able to form far stronger defenses.
"W-what is this..."
Confusion came before joy.
As a modern person she could not fully grasp the knowledge inside Yeon's head.
She already knew that knowledge could allow an ordinary person to awaken abilities.
But whether it could also help a hunter who already possessed mana grow stronger—that she had half-doubted.
The mana that had flooded into her body through Yeon's palm had left her unable to think straight.
And when the storm of mana that had raged through her state of no-self finally ended, this was the result.
Na-yeon hurriedly looked behind her.
"How on earth...! Yeon-ah!?"
The black-haired girl who had caused all of this, Wiji Yeon, lay collapsed on the floor.
Startled, Na-yeon scooped that small body into her arms at once.
Sweat soaked the girl's forehead.
"Ugh."
Yeon, held in Na-yeon's arms, barely managed to open her eyes.
"Yeon-ah, are you okay!? Why—why are you like this?"
"Hoo... it's nothing."
"Nothing my foot...! You're drenched in sweat.... You overdid it too, didn't you? Why didn't you say anything?"
"Tomorrow I'll teach you the formula. If you learn diligently, you'll be able to perform the microcosmic orbit on your own. And now Unnie Na-yeon has no choice but to take on the role of Left Protector of the Heavenly Demon Divine Cult."
"...Left Protector? Heh. I don't know what that is, but okay."
Na-yeon asked no more.
The girl Wiji Yeon discovered in the laboratory.
Where her bottomless knowledge had come from, what influence it would bring to this world—
None of that mattered.
Right now, in Na-yeon's arms, there was only the precious girl who had helped her grow even at the cost of straining herself.
Soft, even breaths.
Before she knew it the girl was asleep, making small sleeping sounds.
Na-yeon could not help but smile.
With the imposing aura that had made her red eyes gleam so coldly gone, Wiji Yeon was now simply a cute little girl.
Na-yeon carefully cradled Wiji Yeon's body, wiped the sweat from her forehead, and left the training room.
"Thank you, Yeon-ah. No... Your Absolute Majesty? Hehe."
Day two of the B-rank gate raid.
The barrage of fire plants—more numerous than on the first day—filled Na-yeon's vision to the brim.
Kwakwakwakwang! Kwakwakwang!
Crouched behind her golden shield, Na-yeon waited for a lull in the barrage and then swung the shield hard.
Whoosh, bang!
Grrrrk—!!
A bear-form magic beast that had been charging was instead sent flying by the crushing impact of the heavy shield.
"Na-yeon, are you okay?"
"I'm fine here! Look after the others!"
"Y-yeah!? Got it."
When the monster wave in Zone 2 finally ended, every member of Na-yeon's party dropped onto the floor in exhaustion.
"Hoo... it just keeps getting harder."
"Haaah, I'm wiped out too now."
The wider the exploration area grew, the fiercer the monsters' assaults became.
By now even the A-rank hunter Shin Ye-in and the rest of the party clearly looked worn down.
Thud.
Then Na-yeon's shield struck the ground with a solid impact.
"Are you all tired already? I feel like I could handle one more zone."
"...Kim Na-yeon, what the hell are you?"
Disbelief filled Shin Ye-in's eyes.
And for good reason—today's Na-yeon was holding firm like a completely different person from the day before.
"Dunno? Maybe thanks to combat experience."
"Did you eat a Level Upper or something? Otherwise I've never heard of a hunter growing."
"I have no connection to such precious items. Don't have the money to buy one either. So—are we going further or not? Don't tell me you're tired before me, Ye-in."
"Kh...!"
Shin Ye-in chewed her lip in frustration.
But she had nothing to say.
She herself was the one who had openly looked down on Na-yeon the day before.
Na-yeon stood proudly and looked straight ahead.
From this point inward lay the heart of the gate.
At its end, the dungeon's boss would be waiting.