Leveling Up Alone

Ding!

[Your continuous use of a chain has created a new skill.]

[A new skill has been created—Chain Mastery.]

‘Huh?’ Han-Yeol was confused by the sudden creation of a skill. ‘Chain Mastery…’ he muttered in his mind as he read the skill’s details.

[Chain Mastery (F)]

Type: Passive

Description: Your proficiency over chain-type weapons will increase. The damage dealt by your chain attacks will increase. Your movements will receive an assistance buff.

‘I’m getting all sorts of weird skills now,’ Han-Yeol thought with an awkward smile.

The skill not only allowed him to use the chain to restrain targets, but also let him use his chain offensively. He felt grateful and dumbfounded by its creation at the same time.

“Oh well.” Han-Yeol sighed and thought, ‘I guess it’s time to get up…!’ He had to get up and check the mysterious fruit that had fallen to the ground anyway.

Tap… Tap…

Han-Yeol lightly dusted the fruit after picking it up, thinking, ‘What the hell are you?’

He could not discern the identity of the fruit no matter how many times he observed, smelled, and touched it; but he did not dare to eat it, as the dots on it resembled those of a poisonous mushroom.

‘Hold on, maybe…?’ Han-Yeol thought before infusing his eyes with mana. ‘Mana Eyes.’

He looked at the mysterious fruit, thinking, ‘There’s a huge concentration of mana in it!’

The objects Han-Yeol observed with Mana Eyes usually only had a minuscule amount of mana within them. Han-Yeol checked the other objects around him after seeing the mana within the mysterious fruit, just to check whether his skill was working properly or not. He looked back and forth between the mysterious fruit and the trees, but the only special thing he saw was that the trees possessed a little bit more mana than those outside the hunting grounds.

‘But this fruit possesses a huge concentration of mana…?’ Han-Yeol thought, perplexed. He did not possess any skills at the moment that could reveal the details of a target.

[The rank of ‘Mana Eyes’ will need to increase before you can observe the target’s details.]

[You will receive the M rank, which stands for Master, if your skill ranks up from A.]

[The skill might evolve or create a completely new skill once you reach the M rank.]

[You will need to experience it yourself to completely understand the concept.]

‘That was what Karvis told me before. The only answer is to keep using my skills whether I like it or not,’ Han-Yeol thought as he put the mysterious fruit in his backpack. He would be able to solve the mystery surrounding the fruit one day.

“Hmm…?” He raised a brow as a Volax emerged from the bushes after he got into his truck.

‘Look at this punk! You dare disturb my rest?’ He smirked confidently as he exited the truck. He was about to take out his slingshot when he suddenly noticed his chain and thought, ‘I can now attack with my chain thanks to Chain Mastery, right…?’

Whoosh...! Whoosh…! Whoosh…!

Han-Yeol whirled his chain in a circle while observing the Volax.

Grrwaaah!

The Volax charged and lunged at him, but Han-Yeol swung his chain at the same time and slammed it into the monster’s body.

Puek!

Kekeng…!

It was impossible for a monster to change course in midair if it did not have any flight capabilities. The Volax flew a great distance before slamming against a tree and falling to the ground.

Tremble… Tremble…

‘Eh? One hit?’ Han-Yeol was surprised at the damage he had just dealt.

The monster had not immediately died, but it was left incapacitated, which made it impossible for it to avoid the knuckle knife Han-Yeol stabbed into its neck.

Puuuuk!

‘This is amazing…!’ Han-Yeol thought excitedly.

His arsenal had been diversified even further; now, he could use the slingshot to attack enemies at long range and use the chain to deal with enemies at mid-range. Previously, the chain could only be used to restrain an enemy, but it was now able to deal a significant amount of damage as well.

Han-Yeol did not forget to extract the mana stone and load the Volax corpse into the truck.

Crack… Crack…!

It was only his first hunt, but he seemed to have pushed himself too far, as his whole body ached and his bones creaked and cracked. He did not feel particularly tired, but his body screamed for rest.

‘I’ll end the hunt here,’ Han-Yeol thought, deciding to wrap things up. Today was not the only time he could hunt; the hunting ground was a place he could always return to as long as he stayed alive.

‘I should come as an official Hunter next time,’ he resolved.

He had gone on an illegal hunt this time because he needed to make some quick cash and increase his level. There was no guarantee that he would be able to keep it up and get lucky by not getting caught, however. Besides, he also needed to be able to legally cash in on the monster corpses. Thus, he made a resolution to come back the next time as a fully-fledged official Hunter.

Vrooom…!

Han-Yeol drove the truck back to the military checkpoint. He had to answer a few questions they had for him before they would let him pass and leave the hunting grounds behind him.

“It looks all clear, Sarge,” a soldier said after searching Han-Yeol’s truck.

“Pass,” the sergeant said, and the gates opened as he spoke.

The reason why the security checks were so stringent was that it was completely illegal under any circumstances to capture a live monster and smuggle it back to the city. The soldiers had been tasked to check if there were any live monsters being smuggled out of the hunting grounds. That was the reason why Han-Yeol had loaded a few Volax corpses into the truck, even though he would not be able to sell them.

‘They would definitely be suspicious if a truck that had gone out to hunt came back without any monster corpses loaded into it,’ Han-Yeol thought as he leisurely passed through the security checks. He went to a secluded area afterward to bury the Volaxes before going home.

That was how Han-Yeol’s first ever monster hunt concluded.

***

A day passed. It was already noon by the time Han-Yeol woke his fatigue-ridden body up and prepared to leave his house. The place he went to was an underground black market he had first heard of while working as a Porter, from another Porter who dealt in illegal goods.

The black market was tucked away from the public eye underneath a busy marketplace in Seoul. This place not only dealt with illegally obtained mana stones, but also with all sorts of other contraband.

Han-Yeol walked around the black market a few times, before entering a shop that he had decided was the best one.

Inside, an old lady behind a counter asked, “How can I help you?”

Rustle… Tatatak… Clack…

Han-Yeol silently took out all of the mana stones he had extracted from the Volaxes and placed them on the table. The old lady behind the counter, who looked to be in her 60s, suddenly raised a brow; the mana stones Han-Yeol had taken out seemed to have piqued her interest. She put on a pair of magnifying spectacles that were hanging from her neck and observed the mana stones, remarking, “You must be quite a skilled Hunter judging by the sheer amount of mana stones you brought, but why are you trading these on the black market?”

“That’s none of your business,” Han-Yeol replied curtly.

“Well, that’s true. All I have to do is to pay you for these, after all. That was my mistake,” the old lady said before placing the mana stones on a special weighing scale.

[22,170,000]

The weighing scale was a device manufactured by crafting-class Hunters that measured the density of mana stones, and the number that appeared on the scale was the final price those stones would be traded for.

‘Damn it… I brought 24, but they’re only worth 22,170,000 won. As expected of the Volaxes. That’s why those guys aren’t famous at all… Tsk…’ Han-Yeol clicked his tongue inwardly.

Not all of the mana stones held value. In fact, out of the thirty Volaxes Han-Yeol had hunted, six of them had produced damaged mana stones. The 22,170,000 won figure had emerged because those damaged stones were mixed into the pile.

“You seem to have hunted Volaxes. They’re quite infamous for their damaged mana stones… But the fact that you still went ahead and hunted them down means there’s something fishy about you,” the old lady said with a grin.

“Shut up and give me my money,” Han-Yeol shot back curtly.

“You are aware of how the black market works, right? The real price outside might be 22.17 million won, but I’ll buy them for half the price at 11 million won,” the old lady offered sharply.

“Euk…” Han-Yeol could only groan. He would only have had to pay a 10% tax if he sold the mana stones directly to the government, but the black market took a whopping 50% of the total amount and rounded down the other digits aside from the first two.

It might have been unfair to sellers, but most sellers who came to the black market were troublesome figures, and no other places would be willing to accept their wares. That was exactly why the black market merchants held the upper hand against them.

“Alright, I’ll sell it for that,” Han-Yeol said, accepting the offer.

“Hehe. Good thinking, young man,” the old lady said with a laugh. She took out an envelope that contained 11 bundles of 1 million won each, then passed it to Han-Yeol.

‘Finally!’ Han-Yeol rejoiced. The amount might have been far below what he would have received if he sold them properly, but the money in his hands at that moment was the largest amount of cash he had ever touched in his entire life.

“Fwuuuuuh—haaaaa…!

This! This smell of money!” Han-Yeol exclaimed as he sniffed the bundles of cash one by one. He took in an especially deep breath when he reached the last two, and the smell of freshly printed bills filled his nostrils.

“Hehe, you’re a funny one. Come again if you need anything from me,” the old lady said.

However, Han-Yeol snapped, “No way, granny. Did you really think I would come here again?”

An ordinary person who saw Han-Yeol speaking to the old lady would probably think he was a bastard with no manners at all. However, anyone who knew how the black market worked would not find his actions strange at all.

All of the people who came to the black market, whether to buy or sell, were people with checkered pasts. The old lady Han-Yeol had just dealt with had also been a Hunter in her younger days, before she lost her mana due to her age. She had been one of the so-called ‘Black Hunters’, Hunters who were infamous for stealing and robbing other Hunters. She had used the money she saved up and the connections she had made to enter the black market and set up shop.

“I would easily have killed someone like you back in the day,” the old lady said with a sinister smile as she reminisced about her glory days.

“Then you should’ve killed me back in the day,” Han-Yeol shot back before adding, “Then I’ll get going.”

He left the shop in a good mood, his steps light. He thought, ‘I should pay off the pending medical bills with this money before anything else.’

Han-Yeol had always done his best to work two jobs to make ends meet, but treating his father’s rare illness that had no cure in sight was like pouring water into a broken jar. The illness was a rare form of cancer, to be exact, so the doctors had tried every single treatment available with modern medical technology. The costs of those procedures had added up to hundreds of millions of won.

Of course, not all of the hundreds of millions of won remained as debts. Han-Yeol had paid most of them off with the money he had earned from risking his life as a Porter. However, a significant amount of the debt was still left over, and he would have to use all of the money he had just earned to repay the outstanding amount.

‘I’ll be able to pay back my debt in no time at this pace,’ he thought as he balled his hands into fists and clenched them tightly. He was already planning to hunt the way he just had from now on, so money would no longer be an issue for him.

‘First, I have to go visit my father,’ Han-Yeol thought. He could not cure his father’s illness with his Heal skill, but he had still found out that it greatly helped his father’s condition, so he wanted to go and cast the skill on his father again.

“Father, I have come to visit,” Han-Yeol said as he entered the ward, but only silence greeted him.

“…”

There was no way that a miracle would happen twice in a row. His father was asleep by the time Han-Yeol visited him.

Han-Yeol turned his father over the way he always did to prevent his skin from blistering. He then began massaging his father’s back and wiping his body clean with a towel. The nurses usually handled that task, but Han-Yeol did it whenever he visited nonetheless, as it would be beneficial for his father.

“Father, I earned a lot of money today. You do not have to worry about your hospital bills anymore. So please… Please do not leave me,” Han-Yeol pleaded, tears welling up in his eyes. He had resolved not to cry before he came to the hospital, but he could not hold his tears back after seeing his father sleeping motionlessly.

After he finished massaging his father, it was time for him to do what he had come for. Han-Yeol held his father’s hand and muttered, ‘Heal.’

Woooong…

Han-Yeol closed his eyes and focused on infusing as much mana as he could into his father. His continued use of mana, paired with the Mana Control skill, allowed him to have better and more efficient control of his mana. That, in turn, translated into him being able to further amplify the effect of his Heal skill.

‘I have to keep going until visiting hours are over!’ he thought, gritting his teeth. Heal was a skill that consumed a lot of mana, and he could not help but feel dizzy after using Heal for an extended period of time.

‘Eu… Eup…!’ He forced his nausea back down, despite his churning stomach.

‘Not yet! Not yet!’ He gritted his teeth and pushed on despite the headache and nausea. He had to finish before the nurse came in once visiting hours ended.

Woooooong…!

Han-Yeol kept infusing his mana into his father using the Heal skill for quite some time. Cold sweat started to form on his forehead, while his face slowly started to look more haggard. It was the price he had to pay for overusing his mana.

‘Euk..!’ he groaned.

Just then, the nurse came to inform him, “Mr. Lee Han-Yeol, visiting hours have ended.”

“Hap… Haa-ap… Hap…!” Han-Yeol started to breathe heavily, stopping his use of Heal as soon as the nurse came in.

Ding!

[The rank of ‘Mana Control’ has risen from (F) to (E).]

[The rank of ‘Heal’ has risen from (F) to (E).]

“Hoo… Hoo… Hoooo…” Han-Yeol breathed raggedly. A delightful notification had popped up notifying him that two of his skills had leveled up, but he could not rejoice over it at all; he was barely conscious due to the side-effects of overusing his mana.

“Mr. Lee Han-Yeol?” the nurse called out.

“Ah… Hak… Hak… I will get going soon…” Han-Yeol muttered.

“…Sure,” the nurse replied, looking at Han-Yeol as if he were a crazy person. There was no reason for anyone to be out of breath in the ICU.

‘Has he finally gone mad…?’ the nurse thought out of concern. It had already been four years since she started working at the ICU, and Han-Yeol’s father was the first patient she had begun taking care of, so she felt a special attachment to the father and son duo.

‘Sigh… I can only imagine how a son who has been taking care of his father for the past four years without even knowing what the name of the illness was would feel…’ the nurse thought as she looked at Han-Yeol with eyes full of pity. She knew better than anyone that it was completely expected for Han-Yeol to gave gone crazy after so long.

“Mr. Lee Han-Yeol, you should not do anything drastic no matter how hard life becomes!” the nurse cautioned Han-Yeol.

“Huh?” Han-Yeol muttered in confusion as he thought, ‘What the hell is she talking about…?’

“Hang on! Fighting![1]” The nurse sincerely cheered Han-Yeol on before going to check up on another patient.

Meanwhile, Han-Yeol was left standing there absolutely confused about what had just happened. ‘What the hell was that all about…?’

1. ’Fighting’ or ‘화이팅’ is a cheer in Korean, used as a way to cheer someone up. ☜