*
As I entered the 4th day, the difficulty of survival began to increase.
In the beginning, it was relatively easy to hunt, but as stronger monsters appeared, it became difficult to obtain food through hunting.
I could see tree fruits and rivers nearby that could be used as drinking water, but it seemed insufficient to satisfy my hunger.
A difficult situation to survive alone, the less skilled students began to unite among themselves.
Exerting all efforts in the given environment, if it cannot be solved with one's own strength, creating an alliance is also a way.
It doesn't matter if they trust each other, but in the case of allying with people they see for the first time, there were occasional cases of stabbing in the back.
However, the students who needed the alliance were ultimately in the lower ranks, and the benefits that could be obtained from betrayal were not that great.
Besides, even if they drop out here, they will still see each other's faces anyway, the alliance was shaky at first, but now it felt like it was slowly settling down.
One of the large-scale alliances with over 30 people stopped beyond the border.
"Supplies are dropping over there..."
"It has to drop there..."
"No one who went there has ever come back alive, right?"
Thanks to someone, I don't know who, setting up all sorts of trap magic around there, it wasn't just one or two students who went near there and were eliminated.
Looking at the range of magic they have set up, they must be a student in the top ranks.
"There must be food in the supplies..."
"Are you talking about what we ate when we were lucky enough to get it?"
The mid-tier alliance swallowed hard as they looked at the falling supplies.
They were lucky enough to get supplies once. The cube inside was taken by the student who was the leader of this alliance, and the rest of the food was shared.
When they recalled the taste of the food at that time, they unknowingly began to salivate.
Hot kimchi stew with steaming rice.
As they recalled the supplies that contained various types of food, regardless of Korean, Western, or Japanese, their patience began to run out.
"Ah... it was nothing special outside..."
"I want to eat chicken..."
"Freshly fried and crispy..."
"Stop talking about food, I'm hungry!"
They say that even if you only drink water, a healthy person can last for a month or two.
As Hunters, it wasn't that difficult for them to last a week, but because they had little experience with this, it was hard to last even a day.
As much as the tuition is expensive, it was not easy to suddenly adapt to this environment after living without any shortages.
They can't sleep comfortably, can't eat food, don't have a proper place to wash, it's truly an extreme situation.
Still, as there are many people, they are succeeding in hunting monsters, but it was not easy to cook in a situation where there were no special cooking tools.
In addition, there was a unique fishy taste that they couldn't catch.
There were students who only filled their stomachs with water because of the fishy taste, even after succeeding in hunting.
"I can't stand it! I don't know who it is, but how many of us are there?!"
"Yeah, no matter how outstanding they are, it would be burdensome to face all of us, right?"
"No. The risk is too great."
Choi Seung-tae, the leader of the alliance, began to calm the students down.
In the beginning, the students followed Choi Seung-tae's opinion, but as stress accumulated, they began to change.
"How can a person live on just water?!"
"If you think about it, aren't they just saying that and secretly eating something behind our backs?"
"That's not true. Don't make strange speculations."
"There's no way to accumulate points even if we stay in the alliance anyway."
Because there were so many people, it was not easy to distribute points.
If there was a system that distributed points according to the damage inflicted, it would have been different, but the structure was such that all points were accumulated by the person who dealt the final blow accurately.
They are taking turns dealing the final blow, but it takes a long time for more than 30 people to accumulate points.
"Isn't it better to fight than to continue suffering like this?"
Compared to the top-ranked scores that are released every day, their scores were terrible.
Even if they survive this hard, wouldn't it be just suffering if they can't accumulate points?
As such opinions began to emerge, cracks began to appear in the alliance.
'Is this the reason why there are no restrictions on alliances...'
There was nothing advantageous about being in an alliance.
"Anyway, I'm going over there!!"
"I'll just suffer and be in the lower ranks if I stay still!!"
"Yeah, if we're lucky enough to take them down, we can immediately move up to the top ranks, right?"
"Hey, wait a minute!!"
Despite Choi Seung-tae's dissuasion, the students began to cross the border.
"We've already taken down other guys before!"
"Yeah, that bastard was careless and went to hell!!"
I felt like I was gaining courage that I didn't have before as the number of people increased.
They began to explore the surroundings and enter the area, and the moment they crossed a certain range, the trap magic began to activate.
"Kyaaak!!!"
"What is this again!!"
Suddenly, the ground under their feet sank, and fireballs flew in from the surroundings.
By raising their shields and succeeding in defending urgently, no major damage occurred.
"It's doable?"
"We were scared for nothing?"
As they muttered that and tried to escape from the swamp, they suddenly felt something activating under their feet.
"Something under my feet... keureureureureuk...."
Intense sparks that were visible to the eye flew in all directions. The students whose feet were tied could not resist and were electrocuted and fainted.
If the bracelet hadn't reduced the shock, they would have died.
In an instant, 7 students were eliminated. The moment the shield was broken, they began to warp out of the artificial dungeon.
Everyone was silent at what happened in an instant.
They didn't detect the trap at all until just before it was activated. An overwhelming difference in skill.
"Electric attack..."
"Could it be Lee Da-eun?"
"It could just be magic..."
Everyone was becoming more calm, perhaps because they saw 7 people disappear in an instant.
"W-was it too much after all?"
"Haha, it seems so..."
Just as they realized how different the level of the top-ranked students was from themselves, they felt a presence from behind.
"Who is it!"
"I heard an explosion and came to see... why are there so many people?"
A playful-looking manly face, an attractive voice with a mid-low tone, and a appearance that even men couldn't help but acknowledge.
"Kim Si-woo...?"
"He is handsome..."
"Is that what you're going to say now?"
Choi Seung-tae scanned Kim Si-woo with wary eyes.
Enhanced equipment, whether he got a cube like himself.
'It's on a different level than my sword...'
He had a much better-looking appearance than his own weapon, which he had enhanced with a cube. In addition, a slightly different-looking bracelet.
"What's going on here?"
Choi Seung-tae, the leader, came forward and spoke to Kim Si-woo.
Kim Si-woo didn't care much because he could clearly see the intention of buying time for the students around him to prepare for battle.
He was confident that he could take down all the guys around him even if they all attacked at once.
"I'm collecting supplies, did you see where they dropped?"
Since supplies no longer drop in the snow mountain area, I had no choice but to come down to the center.
As the last day of the test approaches, they must be thinking of gathering people in the center.
"If it's supplies, they dropped over there."
"Over there is where I heard the explosion earlier?"
"That's right."
Choi Seung-tae started to think quickly while pretending to be calm.
Although 7 people were eliminated, there were still about 30 people left.
Compared to that, Kim Si-woo is alone, and if you compare the rankings, he is higher than them, but wouldn't it be possible with this many people?
Haven't they already had the experience of taking down a few people?
"That forest is dangerous, are you thinking of going in?"
"Dangerous?"
A situation where they have matched to some extent while repeating hunting several times.
'It's not a student like Lee Da-eun, but wouldn't it be possible to take down Kim Si-woo?'
If they drop students starting with this and move in that direction, they might be able to eliminate competitors and take a high ranking.
'I'm worried about the video I saw recently... but still, if 30 people attack at the same time, the shield...'
Everyone must have had similar thoughts, as they began to exchange hand signals silently.
They slowly began to surround Kim Si-woo. Choi Seung-tae began to talk as much as possible to attract Kim Si-woo's attention.
"I don't know who it is, but they've covered the surroundings with trap magic. We tried to go in and a few of us got hit."
"Heuum?"
They began to take their positions secretly, as if hunting monsters. Choi Seung-tae deliberately raised his voice to attack at the best timing.
"Yeah! It's better not to go in."
"Why are you telling me that?"
"I've been watching your performance! So I don't want to see you get eliminated absurdly."
"I see..."
Kim Si-woo muttered that and burst into a smirk.
"Me too. But..."
A face with no playfulness, everyone noticed the change in the suddenly heavy atmosphere.
'Did he already know...?'
Well, there were more than 30 people.
No matter how dull he is, there's no way he wouldn't know after seeing 30 people moving.
'But I was too arrogant.'
Although the opportunity to attack by surprise was gone, they had already almost taken their positions.
The formation created while hunting monsters, each of them already knew what their role was.
With the retreat already blocked, will they be able to defend against attacks coming from all directions?
There was no need to make a strong attack.
If they use wide-range and difficult-to-defend attacks such as fire attacks, breaking the shield would be a piece of cake.
If I just send a signal, the students around me will probably move at the same time to hunt Kim Si-woo.
In the midst of the tension, the names of the top-ranked students began to appear on the field along with an alert sound.
1st place Yoon Seo-ah.
2nd place Park Hye-ji.
As the names went up one by one, the confrontation continued without doing anything, as if they had promised each other.
They could just attack right away, but they couldn't give the attack command because of a strange sense of pressure.
...
5th place Lee Da-eun.
Unlike the tense Choi Seung-tae alliance, Kim Si-woo began to check the list above with a relaxed expression.
To be in the top 30 out of more than 1000 students meant that they were unbelievable monsters.
"Seo-ah suddenly jumped up?"
"..."
"Did Min-ji go down?"
24th place Kang Min-ji.
...
30th place Kim Si-woo.
"30.. 30th? ?"
Kim Si-woo, who was in front of me, grinned.
"A-attack!!!!"