Episode 49
Bori faced the promotion examination with a trembling heart.
She hadn’t even told her Master on purpose.
‘How surprised would he be if I went to him with a D-Rank certificate?’
Students of the Hunter Department became E-Rank rankers upon graduation alone. That was quite a significant privilege.
But there were geniuses everywhere.
In fact, at Bori’s school as well, there were already C-Rank talents among the fourth-year seniors.
And no one said a word even if such people skipped almost all their classes.
Most of the professors were only around C-Rank themselves. Moreover, if one surpassed D-Rank in the department, nearly all classes were practically exempt.
‘I should get exempt from classes too and stick close to Master.’
Bori was quite a promising talent at school, but looking at those around her, she felt insignificant.
The people around her were none other than Ryu Jonghyeon, Yu Jinseong, and his disciples.
Even Jonghyeon’s bodyguards were chosen solely from among those who could defeat Bori.
So Bori had applied for the D-Rank ranker examination conducted by the state, matching her schedule to Jonghyeon’s A-Rank dungeon expedition.
“Participant 76, please enter.”
There were fewer participants than expected; it was quite spacious.
The D-Rank examination hall conducted individual evaluations one at a time.
There had been a time when many people applied, back when a great number passed D-Rank through dishonest means, but following the global trend of examinations, it had changed to 1:1 sparring, so not many applied anymore.
Inside the room she entered following the female staff member’s guidance, a burly-looking man stared at Bori and said,
“What the hell? It’s a woman?”
At those words, Bori’s face hardened in an instant. Of course, she was wearing a mask, so her outward appearance was different, but the man had said that after seeing the gender on her application.
The sparring began lightly.
Since there were no restrictions on abilities, Bori encountered more difficulties than expected.
Clack-!
The sound of wooden swords clashing echoed.
The man, who had tried to end things roughly at the word “woman,” now had an unmistakably flustered expression.
‘What the hell is this?’
Strength he couldn’t possibly believe belonged to a woman. On top of that, though it was difficult to call it sword ki, she had reached a certain realm of swordsmanship.
All of it flustered the examiner.
Having received instruction from Jonghyeon, Bori knew how to efficiently convert ki into muscular strength.
She still lacked the training to draw out sword ki, but she had more than received Jonghyeon’s know-how.
The fight lasted approximately ten minutes.
Usually, if one exceeded a certain level, the examiner would declare a pass, but the examiner refused to declare her pass, as though he considered fighting on equal terms with a woman a disgrace.
Of course, Bori was exhausted as well.
‘Isn’t there a referee here? If we’ve fought this much, isn’t this a pass?’
But unfortunately, the country called Korea was one that valued high efficiency.
In world tournaments, referees held some authority over matches, but in Korea, there was no personnel budget for referees.
Only the examiner held all authority.
Bori’s hand gripping the sword began to tremble. Her ki was nearly depleted, and her stamina was at rock bottom.
‘I have to bet it all on a final move.’
Bori instantly switched the hand holding the sword. Gripping it in her left hand, just like her Master.
“Hah!”
The examiner, too, seemed intent on settling it, charging at Bori with a powerful downward strike.
Bori barely deflected the descending sword with her left hand, and slight openings appeared for both.
But people usually have overwhelmingly more strength in their dominant hand.
Pouring her last ki into her feet, Bori quickly closed in and roughly grabbed the arm with which the examiner held his sword.
And practically gripping the middle of the wooden sword in her left hand, she tried to bring it straight to the examiner’s throat.
But the examiner, unflustered, pushed away the arm she had grabbed and kicked at Bori’s sword hand.
Ting-ti-di-ring—
The wooden sword that fell from Bori’s hand rolled coldly across the floor, and just like that, the match ended.
★ ★ ★
They had barely managed to clear the Chimera and Hound, but the damage was quite severe.
The healer, Seon Jusik, had died, and Gim Hyeonseok was half unconscious.
The others had also sustained injuries to varying degrees; the most unharmed were Jonghyeon and Gang Jeongu.
And the biggest problem was,
“You son of a bitch!”
That Gang Jeongu and I Seokcheon started fighting as soon as they finished clearing the Chimera and Hound.
Gang Jeongu had abandoned his position again. Thanks to that, Seon Jusik, who had tried to protect Gim Hyeonseok, lost his life instead.
It was because Jonghyeon, too, found it difficult to fight while protecting someone with both the Chimera and Hound joining the fray. If he had used his darkness ability, the result might have changed, but Jonghyeon did not want to reveal his ability for the sake of strangers’ lives.
There was no guarantee that his ability wouldn’t be revealed even if he saved Seon Jusik and Gim Hyeonseok. And they wouldn’t shield him from the repercussions and problems if it were revealed.
Originally, the stronger one’s ability, the more enemies one made, and if problems occurred, the one who had to take responsibility in the end was oneself.
‘I Seokcheon will win.’
No matter how talented and cunning Gang Jeongu was, he couldn’t overcome I Seokcheon’s experience.
Because the outcome of the fight was obvious, Jonghyeon didn’t intervene.
Or rather, it would be more accurate to say he didn’t particularly care if a piece of trash like Gang Jeongu died.
But a result that overturned Jonghyeon’s expectations came to pass.
Gang Jeongu took advantage of I Seokcheon’s waist injury and won.
“You bastard!”
“Well. I won’t kill you with my own hands. If you lie down quietly, you’ll die on your own inside the dungeon. But just in case you might survive… I’ll make sure you can’t hold a sword.”
As he spoke, Gang Jeongu slashed deep into I Seokcheon’s shoulder.
The three members of Dangun Guild were all rendered combat-incapable like that.
Gang Jeongu looked at Jonghyeon and said,
“Hey. Brat, what are you going to do? You gonna lie down like them? I’ve never liked you much either.”
He could kill Gang Jeongu and the other two here and leave the dungeon right now.
If he killed them all using his ability, no evidence would remain anyway.
But if he did that, he definitely wouldn’t get to see the A-Rank hidden boss.
Jonghyeon still found it difficult to enter an A-Rank dungeon personally unless he joined a famous guild.
‘Hmm. What should I do.’
There was no time to think.
Jonghyeon had hardly ever acted before, but he made the most flustered expression he could and shook his head.
Because if he opened his mouth, he felt a torrent of curses would burst forth.
“What? You can’t even open your mouth because you’re scared? See, this is why you can’t trust the news. So what if you’re A-Rank? You’re just a cowardly bastard. Wasn’t the story about you destroying the Red Rose Guild alone a lie too?”
Gang Jeongu babbled on like that and snickered with his teammates.
‘I must endure. I must endure… I must endure…’
Jonghyeon constantly repeated the word *endure* in his mind.
Because the reward for the A-Rank hidden boss was far too precious to ruin things here.
Even the B-Rank Imugi had been tremendous help to Jonghyeon. Though it had been quite a while since he consumed the Imugi’s inner core, the 10% of ki he had yet to absorb was still writhing inside him.
But what if it was A-Rank? The reward was beyond imagination.
“Hey. What are you doing over there? Hurry up and follow.”
Gang Jeongu had now started to completely belittle Jonghyeon.
Jonghyeon moved the unconscious I Seokcheon and Gim Hyeonseok to a corner and quickly followed them.
The journey of an A-Rank dungeon was quite long.
There were some dungeons that took over a month to clear.
Conversely, there were very rare dungeons that ended within an hour.
They were either cases of total annihilation, or cases like right now.
Cases where there were two bosses.
The Chimera boss was similar in build to an average person. This much was within Jonghyeon’s expectations.
But the Hound standing beside it like a pet.
Its size reached an adult man’s chest, and it even had horns.
And the biggest problem was that there was no mage right now.
‘How do I bring that thing down from the sky?’
The Chimera would surely snatch them from the sky one by one and attack. And the Hound would keep them in check from the front to prevent them from interfering.
In short, it was most suitable for one person to block the Hound with their life on the line while the remaining three hunted the Chimera.
‘Is this the influence of the watch too?’
Dungeons like this weren’t common.
No, they were extremely rare. Two bosses. Moreover, their appearance was clearly strengthened.
As if to prove it, normal Hounds had reddish-brown fur, but the Hound before them was completely black.
The Chimera looked similar to an ordinary Chimera boss. Since Jonghyeon had never seen a Chimera boss anyway, he could only guess that it looked similar.
“Hey. Jonghyeon.”
Gang Jeongu called Jonghyeon with a smiling face.
Whether to use honorifics or casual speech.
Jonghyeon was looking at Gang Jeongu while contemplating such things. But Gang Jeongu seemed to think Jonghyeon was too overwhelmed by his presence to answer properly, so he continued without waiting for a response.
“We’ve reached a conclusion. Right now, someone has to hold down the Hound. You know what I’m saying?”
At Gang Jeongu’s vulgar smile, Jonghyeon’s hands began to tremble.
He felt he couldn’t endure any longer.
★ ★ ★
“Fail.”
“Excuse me?”
The examiner spoke, catching his breath with difficulty.
Bori’s eyes went wide at the word “fail,” and she asked,
“Why did I fail? We fought for ten minutes.”
“You lost to me. You fail.”
It was truly a nonsensical reason. Bori argued and questioned several more times, but the examiner, repeating the same words, eventually called someone and had Bori thrown out.
The examiner watched Bori being driven out with a sneer.
At that sight, Bori’s anger flared to its limit.
“What should I do about this.”
Bori fell into worry. She had never once involved her family or pulled strings just because she was angry.
Partly because Bori was innately kind, and partly because she had wanted to live as normally as possible.
And because the usually cheerful and obliging Bori had never experienced unfair treatment anywhere before.
But now the situation was different.
Rather than the system not working properly, wasn’t this purely an issue with the examiner’s character?
Already in a fit of anger, Bori was calling someone.
“Hello? It’s me, Bori.”
“Ah, yes. Miss Bori. What brings you to call me?”
The person who answered the call was none other than Yu Jinseong.
“I told you I was going to take the D-Rank exam today.”
---------= Author's Afterword ---------=
A sweet potato for those of you who might be hungry at dawn..
(There's still one step left!)