Episode 4. The Meat Gluttony Desires
Sindae returned to his studio apartment, worrying about what to do.
He watched the hunters' raid broadcast on TV, lost in thought.
'How should I go about this...'
The most stable method was to obtain meat as rewards from dungeon raids, just like the hunters on TV.
However, that was premature for Sindae.
"Haah, this is troubling..."
On TV, the hunters were finally entering the boss room.
Sindae watched their raid with an envious heart before turning off the TV.
'Are they not going to the boss room again...?'
Having heard that he had received praise from the guild executives for handling the boss room collection better than expected this time, Sindae looked at his phone with anticipation for a moment.
However, the screen showed not even the usual spam emails.
Sindae let out a sigh as he browsed HunterJob.
It wasn't even a recession, and yet there weren't even the usual job postings looking for porters.
'Am I being too impatient...'
If he posted the stats Sindae had achieved in just one month on the internet, anyone who saw it would curse at him to stop faking.
However, thinking of O Gayeon, who was probably getting stronger even now, he couldn't stay still for even a moment.
Sindae looked up at the ceiling, wondering what to do.
Then, as if something had come to mind, he sprang up from his bed.
"Wait, that bastard Hyeonu might know something, don't you think?"
Sindae hurriedly picked up the phone to call his friend.
However, he tilted his head at the incoming call from an unknown number.
'It's a number I don't know....'
Thinking it might be an insurance sales call, Sindae was about to ignore it, but decided to answer anyway just in case.
[Is this Mr. Bak Sindae?]
A baritone male voice came through the receiver.
Sindae wondered if he had heard the voice before, then shook his head.
[Yes, that's correct, but who is this?]
[Ah! I'm Choe Jicheol, team leader of the HR department at Osiris Guild. Do you have a moment to talk?]
'The HR department of Osiris Guild...'
A team leader of the HR department was a figure who belonged to the guild's executive leadership.
[I have a moment, but is there something you need...]
[I was wondering if you could come work as a day laborer for Collection Team 1?]
[Collection Team 1?]
Sindae had thought they might ask him to handle the boss room corpse disposal, so he sighed internally in disappointment.
'Didn't Squad Leader say that Collection Team 1 only enters important dungeons within the guild?'
Since they only ran important dungeons where rare equipment and items appeared, repeatedly entering the same places, Collection Team 1 was not an attractive proposal to Sindae.
[I'm sorry, but I want to travel around and experience many dungeons. I'm sorry.]
[I've already heard from Squad Leader Yi Yeongjin, so I'm aware.]
Sindae couldn't understand why they would make such an offer.
As if understanding Sindae's thoughts, a low laugh from Choe Jicheol came through the receiver.
[And if it's Collection Team 1, we can meet all the conditions you want.]
[What do you mean by that?]
[You know that Osiris Guild alone has 100 dungeons that Collection Team 1 operates in, right?]
[......]
Sindae was surprised to hear that Osiris Guild, said to be a mid-to-small sized guild, possessed 100 important dungeons.
While he was surprised, Choe Jicheol's words continued.
[Furthermore, I heard you want the meat that comes from dungeons. We'll provide all of it to you. And we'll pay 600,000 won per day.]
'I need to take a leave of absence.'
Sindae smiled brightly at Choe Jicheol's words, already planning his leave of absence.
***
Having been notified that he would enter the dungeons in one week, Sindae walked the path to school with grand dreams.
'How many will I be able to get...'
100 owned dungeons.
The majority of them were 4-star dungeons or higher, and if he consumed just the meat from the boss mobs and regular monsters that appeared there, his stats would clearly rise significantly.
Forcing down a laugh that felt like it would burst out, Sindae turned his head at a tingling sensation while walking down the street.
"This is..."
A feeling like static electricity flowing through his body.
It was clearly a sign that a dungeon had appeared nearby.
'It probably doesn't have much to do with me?'
He didn't know about other regions, but a dungeon appearing in a metropolis like Seoul would definitely be resolved by hunters rushing to the scene soon.
"I should hurry to school."
Sindae was about to move his feet.
But suddenly, finding his salivary glands beginning to act up, his eyes went wide.
'Why?'
It was unbelievable that the skill had activated when there was no butchered meat around.
Then, an astonishing message appeared before Sindae's eyes.
[A monster desired by the Gluttony skill has appeared nearby.]
[The rewards obtained upon consumption will be doubled.]
"What?"
Surprised by the sudden message for a moment, Sindae discovered that he was walking toward the direction where the dungeon had appeared, as if being pulled by something.
'Should I just go and check?'
Sindae frowned at how his body was moving in reaction to the skill without his knowledge, but he decided to move his feet to check anyway.
***
"This is a 2-star dungeon."
Looking at the 2-star dungeon gate located in a back alley with little foot traffic, Sindae stroked his chin.
'At 2-star, it's a difficulty that a hunter over level 20 can handle smoothly...'
Sindae's current level was 10.
Because he hadn't hunted at all since his military days, his level hadn't risen one bit.
"Should I still go in?"
Recalling the stats he had raised so far, Sindae entered the dungeon with the mindset of running away if things got dangerous.
The moment he passed through the dungeon gate, he frowned at his salivary glands automatically secreting.
'Just what kind of monster is it...'
A treeless blue plain stretched out before him, as if embodying the blue sky itself.
True to its rank as a 2-star dungeon, the scale was small, and the boss room was visible in the distance even from the entrance.
While looking at that scenery, Sindae discovered a cow grazing on grass before him.
"It's a cow, right?"
Calling it a cow would be inaccurate—it was a chimera with a pig's head in place of where the cow's should be, and wings that looked like a chicken's attached to its body.
The chimera, which had been tearing at grass, began to shriek the moment it locked eyes with Sindae.
[Kuaaaaaar!]
'That's the sound of a pig being slaughtered....'
Hearing the sound of slaughtering that he had heard at the pig butchering sites his father had shown him several times, Sindae frowned.
After shrieking, the chimera ran toward him as if about to fly. Sindae's eyes went wide.
"They said it's a 2-star monster, so why is it so slow?"
Thinking it was because of the pig head, Sindae easily dodged the slowly charging chimera.
He quickly drew the trainee's sword he carried every day and swung it at the chimera.
"You know, with cows, the hang tender and the chuck tender are delicious."
Having butchered countless animals since he was young, Sindae knew this well.
He precisely plunged his trainee's sword into the parts where the hang tender and chuck tender were located on the chimera, and he could see the monster collapse while shrieking.
[Your level has increased.]
"Why is this so easy...."
Wondering if this wasn't a 1-star dungeon, Sindae frowned at the collapsed chimera before him.
Looking at the fallen chimera, his salivary glands began to gush once more.
"Let's eat first and think later."
Sindae began butchering the chimera, contemplating how to prepare it in a way that would make for a truly excellent meal.
***
[Agility has increased by 4.]
Having eaten the chimera meat using his [Orc Rotisserie Preparation Skill], Sindae wiped the grease from his mouth and looked at the message with satisfaction.
"My Agility went up by 4."
On top of that, his level had risen from the successful hunt.
Having invested all 10 stat points into Agility, Sindae rose from his spot with a satisfied expression.
"Strangely, no other monsters are appearing..."
Sindae gathered the 2-star mana stone and leather, putting them in his school bag.
He thought it strange that no other monsters appeared around him, and walked toward where the boss room was.
Creeeak.
Since the earlier chimera was weaker than expected, Sindae opened the boss room door without much tension. The sound of rusty hinges reached his ears.
'It's reacting here too.'
Saliva began to gush out to a degree that couldn't even be compared to when he saw the chimera earlier.
When Sindae entered the boss room, bright lights burst out in the dark space.
"Is that it?"
As the lights turned on, a giant cow revealed itself.
Unlike the pig-headed chimera from before, this one's face and body were that of a cow, but what caught his eyes was the nine snakes attached to its tail.
[Woooooo!]
[Hiiiiisss Hissssss]
The cow and the snakes shrieked as if on guard upon discovering Sindae.
It was twice the size of the chimera he had encountered earlier, but for some reason, Sindae didn't feel tense at all.
"Strange.... When I first entered a dungeon, my legs were shaking from the start..."
The tension and fear Sindae had felt when he first saw orcs in a 1-star dungeon after raising his level to 10 during his military days was nowhere to be felt.
He still didn't know, but considering the stats he had raised, he was already at a higher level than level 20 Awakened.
This time as well, he leisurely dodged the charge of the snake-tailed cow that came screaming at him.
'You're the same as a regular cow, right?'
After dodging the charge, the snakes rushed at him from multiple directions, but thanks to them looking slow even to him, he could evade smoothly.
Immediately after, Sindae succeeded in plunging his trainee's sword into the parts containing the chuck tender and hang tender once again.
Just like the chimera he had successfully hunted earlier, the boss monster collapsed so easily that he couldn't believe it.
"What the hell... Isn't this a 1-star dungeon?"
The momentum that had been charging at him was nowhere to be seen. Sindae made a dumbfounded expression as he looked at the fallen chimera.
Sighing, Sindae resolved to hurry up and butcher it so he could go to school. As he began butchering and was skinning it, an astonishing object fell before his eyes.
"Th... this came from here?"
A stone containing faint mana and engraved with several unknown characters.
Sindae was astonished that a runestone, which he had purchased from the Hunter Association last time, had come from a boss monster.
"A runestone... Hoo boy, I should buy a lottery ticket on my way home today."
Since runestones were worth at least 500,000 won, and potentially tens of millions at best, Sindae grinned and put the runestone in his pocket.
"I'll get it appraised, and if it's a good one, I'll use it myself."
It was a 2-star dungeon, so it was best not to expect much, but since it was the first runestone he had found, Sindae was in a good mood.