Episode 5: The First Highland Expedition

Chapter 1

Haneul stared down at the watch on his wrist.

'So that's it — the hands of the watches we're all wearing today are what counts as the S-pole object.'

Meanwhile, Lee Luin made a point of adding one more caution.

"Unfortunately, Shinseung Group's guided transfer technology isn't perfect. There's a small chance of failure, and when it fails, someone ends up dropped in a completely unexpected place."

"Oh, no..."

At the bolt-from-the-blue warning, the interns' eyes rattled in their sockets. Luin deliberately put on an even sterner face and pressed the point.

"Don't relax just because your transfer succeeds. As I said before, Highland is vast and fickle beyond anything you can imagine. Even if your guided transfer works and you land in a territory where the group's seniors have already laid the groundwork, that territory alone sprawls several times wider than all of Seoul. You will have to survive there on your own, cut off from your fellow interns. Do you understand what I'm telling you?"

"Yes, we understand."

The interns answered louder still. They were shouting themselves hoarse on purpose, hoping to shake loose the anxiety pooling in their chests.

'Heh.'

Luin smirked inwardly.

The truth was, no dangerous magic beasts existed in the zone the interns were being sent to — Shinseung's Awakened made regular sweeps of the area and exterminated every beast they laid eyes on. In other words, today's drop zone was, for all practical purposes, a safe zone.

Of course, there was always that low-probability chance of a transfer failure.

'If one of them lands somewhere completely off the map, outside the safe zone, that's the end of them. If some poor soul draws that lot, there's nothing even I can do.'

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

Luin murmured this to herself, then pressed the interns one last time.

"Don't tell me there's a coward among you who'll turn straight back the moment he arrives, just because Highland scares him?"

"No, ma'am!"

The interns ground the words out through gritted teeth.

"Good. Then let me tell you exactly what you'll be doing. The moment you arrive in Highland, you are to set out on your gathering."

'Gathering.'

While Haneul latched onto the word, Luin laid out a few examples.

"For the strange stones called magic crystals, your gathering quota is one kilogram. Herbs and new materials, likewise — collect at least a kilogram and you're cleared for the return trip. Of course, there's also the monster soul stone, but no intern alive has the gall to haul one of those back."

'Magic crystals, herbs, new materials, monster soul stones.'

Haneul turned the key terms over one after another.

Luin's gaze brushed over him in passing as she went on.

"As you know, a monster soul stone is the crystal embedded in the body of an intermediate beast or higher. Harvesting one means actually winning a hunt against the beast, and that's no easy challenge for interns at your level. In any case, once you've each filled your quota, return to the place where you first arrived, dive back into the blue mist, and you'll come home to Midland Seoul. I trust you all learned in class which things are worth collecting."

"Yes, we did."

"Oh, right! If you're lucky enough to discover a Highland relic, you may disregard the quota altogether. Grab the relic and return at once. The group pays a special reward to any intern who brings in a high-value relic, so feel free to look forward to it. Understood?"

"Yes, understood!"

The moment the interns answered, Luin clapped her hands — clap, clap, clap.

"Now, we dive. Move quickly in employee-number order. Chop chop, chop chop."

Hustled along by Luin, the interns leapt into the blue mist one after another.

Haneul pinched his nose shut with his right hand and plunged in after them.

The instant he entered the mist, a stiff, heavy pressure rushed over him. Luin's advice had been dead on — this wasn't mist at all. It felt like slipping into deep seawater.

'Ulp.'

Bubbles fizzed up from between Haneul's lips. He couldn't hold his eyes open in here. Strangely enough, though, his clothes never got wet.

How much time passed like that? Just as the worry — am I going to suffocate and die here? — began to creep into Haneul's mind, a blinding light burst before his eyes.

The next moment, Haneul arrived in a new world, entirely apart from Midland Seoul.

His first step had come down on a tree branch a meter and a half above the ground. The branch couldn't hold his weight and broke with a sharp crack.

"Gyaah!"

Dropped onto the ground without any warning, Haneul let out an involuntary scream.

'Ack! No.'

His pupils contracted to pinpoints in an instant. There was no telling what dangers lurked in Highland. For a weakling like him to make careless noise in a place this unfamiliar was as good as thrashing about and begging to die.

'Survival rules. Survival rules. Survival rules. Move it, you idiot — remember the rules, NOW.'

Haneul frantically dredged up everything the training program had taught him.

Rule 1: Never let go of your weapon.

Shink!

Haneul drew the thirty-centimeter knife strapped to the side of his right shin and gripped it hard, feeling his way through the rest of the survival rules in his head.

Rule 3: Erase your scent.

Psshh―. Pssh―, Psh―.

He pulled out the deodorizer spray hanging from the side of his backpack and misted it evenly over his face and body.

Rule 4: Always stay low. That keeps your body scent from riding the wind and carrying far.

Haneul immediately dropped flat against the snowy ground.

Only then did the landscape around him come into view. His field of vision opened onto a wide, sweeping panorama of deep-piled snow.

Chapter 2

Wheeeeng―.

Along with a skin-crawling shriek of wind, a flesh-flaying chill battered every inch of Haneul's exposed skin.

'Nngh. It's cold as death out here.'

The extreme cold hurt as though the flesh were being chiseled off his face, fleck by fleck. Worse still was the fact that the hand gripping the knife hilt was freezing solid, its senses going numb.

'Still, thank goodness it's not a flame zone or a lightning zone. My cold resistance runs a notch higher than my fire or lightning resistance, after all.'

It was a thin comfort, and Haneul clung to it. But this was no time for savoring small mercies. When he looked down at his watch, the needle wasn't holding to any fixed direction — it was wheeling around and around.

A watch hand that couldn't find its heading meant, in other words, that no N-pole object was buried within a hundred kilometers of this spot.

'She said there's a low chance of a failed transfer — some unlucky soul dropped in a totally different region. And that unlucky soul is me? Goddammit.'

His disbelief curdled into anger. And while Haneul stood tangled in those thoughts, a huge wolf with silver fur appeared behind him like a ghost.

Strictly speaking, "wolf" was hardly the right word for it. This was a species apart from Earth's wolves — a wolf-type magic beast with an amber octagonal monster soul stone embedded in its forehead and two curved horns seated on either side beneath its jaw.

These beasts, called the Snow Wolf Tribe, bore three defining traits.

First, they excelled at pack hunting. Second, their favored strategy was to turn their bodies transparent and lie hidden, then ghost in behind their prey and strike like a phantom. Third, their resistance went far beyond cold — they shrugged off fire, lightning, and poison alike, leaving elemental magic nearly useless against them.

Even the veteran Awakened of Shinseung Group had their hands full whenever they ran into a pack of Snow Wolves. And an intern — not even a rookie yet — crossing paths with the tribe in Highland? That meant death, plain and simple.

Looked at that way, Haneul's luck was truly rotten. Of all places, he had been dropped right beside a Snow Wolf den. Nor was that all — his scream as he fell from the thin branch was what sealed it. Beasts with a Snow Wolf's keen nose and ears could never have missed that sound.

One wolf, concealed in its transparency, had crept up behind Haneul — then abruptly revealed itself, jaws gaping wide open.

Krrr―RAWRR―.

The thunderous roar shook the snow down from the nearby trees in rustling sheets.

"Wh-what?!"

Haneul jolted around in terror. His reflexive slash cracked against one of the horns jutting from the wolf's jaw, and the blade snapped with a metallic clang.

Then the beast's thick fangs clamped down diagonally across his chest and back.

"AAAGH!"

CRUNCH!

The beast's razor-sharp upper and lower fangs punched through ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Haneul's left arm and crushed it to the bone, while the teeth sunk into his chest and back tore his vest and backpack to shreds without mercy. That blow, at full strength, should have pulped his ribs and speared his heart.

But the combat vest Haneul was wearing blunted a substantial portion of the beast's attack. A genuinely lucky thing. The vests normally issued to interns carried E-grade defense; his was A-grade, superior by several hundred times over. HR Team Leader Lee Jaein had quietly slipped the most expensive equipment available in for Haneul, without telling a soul. Thanks to that, Haneul had escaped instant death.

Krawr, krawr, KRAWRR!

Furious at the failed kill, the wolf clamped onto Haneul's upper body and whipped its head side to side. His whole frame was dragged this way and that like a rag toy.

"Uurraagh!"

He couldn't get a proper breath. The savage cold channeled through the wolf's fangs locked his muscles rock-hard, and his mind blanched to blank white. Even through all of it, Haneul's astonishing mental fortitude held onto a single strand of reason.

He sized up the Snow Wolf that had pounced on him. Its height at the shoulder looked to be a good two meters; if it reared up on its hind legs, its full length would top seven or eight. The rounded horns jutting from its jaws ran nearly a meter long. At that scale, comparing it to an Earth wolf would be almost insulting. To face a magic beast bigger than a Siberian tiger on his very first deployment — Haneul's luck could not have been worse.

'I'm dead.'

He judged that coming out of this alive was impossible. But dying just like this? No — that he couldn't accept.

Haneul's frost-rimed right hand swung in what could only be called a miracle, driving the broken half of his knife toward the beast's leg.

THWACK!

A beat before that, the wolf had batted the blade away with one ponderous forepaw. Then it slowly eased its fangs out of Haneul's body and pinned him down ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠beneath both paws, unable to move so much as a finger.

'Nngh—kh.'

Haneul thrashed, desperate to break free. He shoved at the wolf with every ounce of strength he had, but it didn't budge an inch — solid as a boulder. That alone told Haneul he apparently hadn't Bloomed any physical ability.

'Then magic?'

He wrung energy up from his heart and thrust both hands ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠upward. Another failure. Not so much as the commonest fireball sprang from his palms — no ice arrows, no lightning. Which made it obvious: Haneul had no elemental ability either.

Chapter 3

'Poison, maybe?'

Haneul let himself hope, just maybe, that a poison gland had sprouted somewhere — in his mouth, beneath his fingernails. That hope broke too. Nor had his senses sharpened in any noticeable way.

'If my senses had gotten sharper, I wouldn't have sat there defenseless until a beast ambushed me.'

Then what in the world was his ability?

'Don't tell me I'm ability-less. Did I fail to Bloom?'

That was despair.

'No. If this keeps up, I'm going to end up as the beast's dinner, nothing more.'

Just then, the Snow Wolf holding him captive let the strength drain from its paws.

'Huh?'

A flicker of life stirred in Haneul's eyes.

A tamer — beloved by magic beasts. That was a genuinely rare ability. True, being a tamer didn't mean he could tame every beast, and the number of tameable ones was fixed — but a tamer's strategic value was high all the same. Besides, Haneul had always preferred exactly that kind of power: tamers, necromancers, summoners — the sort that gave orders from a safe spot in the rear.

But his meager hope soon curdled back into despair. Another Snow Wolf had appeared before Haneul's eyes.

This one came lumbering over, its shoulder height half again taller than the beast that had ambushed him from behind, its bulk swelling in proportion. And the monster soul stone embedded in the newcomer's forehead was imposing — easily the size of Haneul's fist. A ghostly white chill swirled around that octagonal stone.

'Ah!'

Only then did Haneul understand. The first Snow Wolf had stepped back because a stronger one had arrived — the leader of the Snow Wolves in this territory.

Even beasts, after all, let the boss eat first.