Chapter 38
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Translator: Wjin
Chapter: 038
Chapter Title: Cooperation
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The research lab had emptied out after the participating researchers left, leaving it quiet and peaceful.
Park Ha-jun was moving his quill at a frantic pace.
The result of actively using [Acceleration Implementation] for an hour was a stack of over forty scrolls on his desk.
"...Uploading them is a chore in itself."
Two sheets of [Barrier] scrolls. The rest were mainly [Mana Arrow]s and various [Magic Bullet]s.
Rather than uploading just one or two expensive scrolls, he hoped to help more hunters by putting up multiple ones.
With that, he registered all the scrolls at the Auction House.
[Magic Scroll─Barrier registered at Auction House]
[Magic Scroll─Fire Magic Bullet registered at Auction House]
[Magic Scroll─Neutral Magic Bullet registered at Auction House]
...
They sold out in the blink of an eye.
He'd earned nearly 200 million gold. Before he knew it, he'd become a scroll maker earning 2 billion gold per hour. The reality still didn't feel real.
Pushing aside his dazed feelings, he opened the hunter community forums.
"I wonder if the people who really needed them bought them."
Sure, he might earn less gold, but selling to hunters in need felt good from the seller's side too, didn't it?
As he scrolled through the community posts...
Wow, thank you so much ㅠㅠㅠ I needed it desperately for our guild performance review, and I finally bought it. Thanks to you, we met the budget requirements...
There were quite a few heartwarming posts like that.
Satisfied, Park Ha-jun closed his smartphone.
Next, instead of the Auction House, he checked his [Mail], sorting out requests for high-performance scrolls separately.
Since he had no way to deliver scrolls directly except through the Association...
He planned to take only high-priced requests where there was less bidding competition.
While sorting, he spotted a relatively recent mail.
Sender: (Official) Fire Spirit Guild
Dear esteemed Creator...
Our guild is currently preparing to conquer the S-grade gate 'Mirror Labyrinth'...
To sum up the contents:
1. They won the rights to conquer a recently emerged S-grade gate overseas and wanted to prepare thoroughly given its rank.
2. The gate involved attacks pouring from hundreds of mirrors, so asd123's Barriers would be a huge help.
3. Compensation: Guaranteed request fee of 500 million gold, plus 15% of gate revenues.
"...Not bad at all?"
Interceptor-type Barrier. The creation process had been grueling, but now he understood the circuits fully.
Redrawing circuits he already comprehended was simple.
However, since the user wasn't the Association President, he'd need to find a way to drastically reduce mana consumption.
"For now, just ask about the deadline."
Park Ha-jun sent a reply, and soon a text arrived.
[Paper review results are out...]
"Already?"
Did they reject it without even reading? If the math professor was the lead researcher, it was plausible.
Calming his unease, he clicked the attached link.
[...Review result: 'Accepted for publication']
The Mage Association had approved a mathematician's paper for publication in just one day.
Around that time, in Kang Eun-ho's training room.
Kim Ahyeon was staring at the attribute section for the 1-circle Fire Magic Bullet listed in the research paper.
She'd come to Kang Eun-ho's training room to ponder in a quiet space, avoiding the lab.
Kang Eun-ho shook his head at the sight.
"Do you know how many hours you've been staring at that?"
Snapping to attention at his words, Kim Ahyeon muttered,
"...I just can't understand it."
In this research, she'd listed the attribute circuits from 1 to 100.
It wasn't hard. As a scroll maker herself, she had past data to copy over.
But she'd only personally mapped up to 80.
Beyond that wasn't in her data.
Yet it had only taken less than a day thanks to Park Ha-jun's guidance and advice.
Watching the process, Kang Eun-ho thought Kim Ahyeon was doubting Park Ha-jun's identity again.
"Do you really need to understand it? Whether the professor is asd123 or not, there's a reason he's hiding it. Don't pry and risk getting on his bad side—just quietly accept his teachings."
Kim Ahyeon shot Kang Eun-ho a glare.
It irked her that this junior awakener by career was acting like a lab senior.
But his words weren't wrong.
She desperately needed his guidance.
No matter what Park Ha-jun's true identity was, his teachings had been immensely helpful.
There was no reason to let idle curiosity push him away. She'd accepted that long ago.
So what she was pondering wasn't Park Ha-jun's identity.
"You know how awakener ranks are assigned, right?"
Kang Eun-ho narrowed his eyes.
"You kidding? Why wouldn't I?"
Awakeners had one main skill and several sub-skills.
...Take Park Ha-jun as an example:
Main skill: [Magic Scroll Creation].
Sub-skill: [Geometric Interpretation].
Any scroll maker could create scrolls.
But how well and how many depended on sub-skills.
Thus, awakener ranks were determined by sub-skill performance and quantity.
"...Exactly. But listen."
Kim Ahyeon suddenly spread a sheet of low-grade parchment on the floor.
Kang Eun-ho frowned at the abrupt action.
"What're you doing?"
"Just wait."
She began drawing a circuit on the low-grade parchment.
She copied the system's Fire Magic Bullet circuit exactly.
The result:
[Baseline destructiveness designed in circuit: 1]
The circuit was designed for baseline destructiveness of 1.
But:
[Scroll's base efficiency limited to 40% due to parchment's mana capacity limit.]
Due to the low-grade parchment's mana capacity limit (40%), baseline destructiveness dropped to 0.4.
[Baseline destructiveness: 0.4]
This 0.4 baseline then underwent one final change.
Final efficiency based on circuit completion.
But Kim Ahyeon had perfectly replicated the system's circuit.
[Final efficiency unchanged due to mediocre circuit completion!]
Final efficiency unchanged.
"...As you know, the system doesn't provide perfect formulas or circuits, right?"
To put it simply, it offered the 'basics.'
If you couldn't even draw those basics properly:
[Final efficiency reduced by 13% due to poor circuit completion!]
Final efficiency would drop instead.
This was why most scrolls on the Auction House were mediocre.
In any case, awakener growth started by imitating the system's 'basics'...
It had been eight years since the awakening phenomenon began.
The era of mere imitation was over.
Those with good sub-skills had moved beyond imitation to pondering perfection.
Kim Ahyeon was one such awakener on that path.
The most famous case was the Association President.
Do you know why mages are exceptionally strong?
Because the Association President published perfect formulas to the academic world.
In other words, mages imitated the Association President's formulas, not the system's.
That's why mages' averages outstripped other awakeners.
"But think about it. Why did the Association President publish them?"
Just to raise mages' averages?
That was part of it, sure...
"...At the time of publication, he had plenty of gold but was still at 5-circle. He lacked the understanding for 6-circle formulas."
Mages couldn't unlock the next circle without sufficient understanding of the current one.
And exchanging knowledge for growth was natural.
Kang Eun-ho nodded, recalling the Association President's interview.
It was probably around unlocking 6-circle.
"...Yeah, he said something like that."
He knew the published formulas were intuitively perfect, but only recently understood why...
"So why bring that up all of a sudden?"
Kim Ahyeon sighed wearily.
"Don't you get what the professor's research means?"
"..."
The Association President published perfect formulas—the answers.
Park Ha-jun was publishing baselines and reasoning—the solutions.
One shouldn't hastily judge which was greater.
But for those chasing behind, the solutions were far more helpful.
Understanding, Kang Eun-ho nodded.
Of course, the Association President had needed broad understanding from 0 to 5-circle then.
Park Ha-jun had only covered the narrow field of 'attributes.'
Her analogy wasn't perfect.
Comparing feats, the Association President still held the edge.
"Yeah, if it's released to the world, it'll cause a storm. Especially since the professor's research covers scroll circuits too."
That didn't make Park Ha-jun's research any less impressive.
Kang Eun-ho kept his thoughts to himself.
He could already picture how certain temperamental mages would react.
"...I need to grow faster."
To become a proper A-rank mage soon and protect the professor.
Around that time, in the Sea of Milk.
At its center, the Association President was still using asd123's [Detection] scroll.
The grid drawn by the [Detection] scroll expanded endlessly, locating 'singularities.'
In the end, three singularities were confirmed.
Now, they just needed to investigate them for the elixir of immortality.
That meant probing the seabed through that poison-filled sea...
Not easy. The plan was to briefly push back the sea with large-scale wind magic.
But.
Even after scanning the entire Sea of Milk, asd123's scroll didn't stop.
As if there was more to do.
So the Association President kept supplying mana as required.
And at one point.
Pang. Pang. Pang.
[Mana Arrow]s suddenly appeared over the three singularities.
"...?"
Hunters panicked briefly, but the Association President saw it: specific information embedded in the mana arrows...
'Harmony attributes again this time.'
It wasn't requested by the Association.
Likely asd123 had added it voluntarily after reading Lee Dong-gyu's report.
'asd123. Not bad instincts.'
To pull off such finesse in that short time?
But whether those [Mana Arrow]s could pierce the deep sea to the seabed was questionable.
Then help make it possible.
Matching rhythms with a scroll maker not physically present felt oddly surreal.
"It's asd123's scroll. Don't panic—prepare the joint magic as planned!"
The magic activation timing was when the mana arrows pierced partway through the sea.
'...Not bad at all. Success rate just skyrocketed.'
As mages and special awakeners synced up.
Crack.
A rift suddenly appeared in empty space.
'Virtual barrier's duration ended.'
Inside was something even the Association President couldn't handle.
All they could do was hope to find the elixir before it vanished.
"Ignore the barrier—focus on the magic first!"
With that, he supplied the final mana the scroll demanded.
At that instant, the harmonious mana arrows swiftly cleaved through the Sea of Milk.
The following joint wind magic from the mages—a powerful gale—widened the arrows' path even further.
Kwaaaah—!
The arrows annihilated the demonic energy, and the weakened Sea of Milk was pushed back harder by the gale.
They reached the seabed singularity smoothly.
Three martial hunters kicked off the air toward the exposed seabed.
The moment Kang Moo-jin among them grabbed a bottle of strange liquid.
Craaaack.
The virtual barrier fully shattered.
Kieeeek!
Vasky roared. It seemed even more enraged by the virtual barrier.
To the point this mind-blasting monster could only screech.
'...What now.'
They had plans, but.
Direct exposure to Vasky's poison meant doom: fratricide or annihilation.
The confused Association President manifested a massive formula with his remaining mana.
His immediate thought: bind it briefly and evacuate the others.
Hoping his lightning would stun it for even a second, he cast.
Kieeeek—!!
Dozens of lightning bolts rained on the charging Vasky.
Yet it charged from afar. Ten seconds to contact.
Gritting his teeth, the Association President began casting a water debuff spell, urgently saying,
"Everyone, retreat..."
But something streaked past him at high speed.
Kang Moo-jin, now on the surface, hurled the mystery bottle with all his might.
Vasky slowed, catching the bottle in its mouth.
Now was the retreat chance with it slowed, but the hunters stood frozen.
A system message appeared in their status windows.
[Cooperative Quest: 'Appease Vasky's Rage']
✅ Status: Completed!