*
"I helped because you looked like you were in danger. Are you okay?"
"How can a student... a student..."
The man was muttering, emphasizing the 'student' part. Did he never have a time when he was a student?
Wasn't everyone a student before becoming a formal Hunter?
Maybe not in Choi Tae-soo-yeonggam-nim's time, though.
"Is this... the difference in talent..."
The man made a hollow expression and then broke his bracelet. Watching him, I was a bit dumbfounded.
"I don't think you're the one to talk, Ajusshi."
Is he jealous of my unique ability?
Well, he might be, but if you just look at talent, this guy wasn't someone to be ignored.
Just passing the Mana measurement means he's almost in the top tier of Hunters.
For a Hunter, talent is ultimately Mana.
'Well, his Mana control seems a bit lacking...'
If his control wasn't lacking, he probably would have taken down that beetle easily too.
Seeing how his Mana is still leaking out, I guess he's just been brute-forcing his way up by throwing in Mana without finesse.
Well, that's enough in itself, but it doesn't seem to work in this special environment.
"I'm lacking. That's all... Thanks for the help."
The man muttered in resignation and gave up on the test. It seemed he had calculated that he couldn't do it with his abilities.
Giving up quickly isn't necessarily a bad thing.
For a Hunter, it's a matter directly related to survival.
In the end, there's no point unless you survive, right?
"..."
I thought about telling him to improve his control, but I decided to just let it go.
He probably knows as much as I do, and he wouldn't want to listen to a student nagging him.
As soon as he broke the bracelet, a pillar of light appeared around the man and started pushing away everything around him.
Is it some kind of protective magic? I don't know the principle, but it looked like an application of portal magic.
'I got one for now.'
I picked up a coin from where the beetle had fallen.
'Are they filtering it out like this again?'
A test to filter out Hunters with simply large Mana hearts. The man's Mana wasn't lacking, but his density seemed insufficient.
Even if the amount of Mana is the same, the power varies depending on how compressed it is, so Hunters with poor control will all fail here.
Honestly, pushing out the Mana outside while simultaneously using Mana application and combat is by no means an easy task.
'Huu... It's not easy.'
I guess S-Rank is S-Rank after all. I don't know if it's because the environment is special, but operating Mana isn't easy, and I regretted thinking it would be easy.
'That aside, it's a bit strange.'
Usually, when Mana collides with Mana, they cancel each other out, but here, it felt like they were just scattering without doing that.
'Is it a characteristic of the high-pressure zone?'
It's common sense for Hunters that specific techniques are created depending on the Mana arrangement, but it felt like that didn't work here.
I couldn't use techniques, maybe because of the collision with the surrounding Mana.
[ Unique Territory: Activated ]
Even when I activated my Unique Territory, the surrounding Mana hardly moved. Since the surrounding Mana isn't synchronized, I should consider this meaningless too.
It feels like I can only simply apply Mana here.
Since I can't use techniques that apply Mana, is it a pure combat physical fight?
'Well, I'm confident in that area.'
Have you ever heard of Esoteric Swordsmanship?
*
"Hmm, the level has definitely increased."
"What. It's full of guys with no perseverance."
"It's always important to be careful in an unknown space. We only have one life."
A biscuit floated in the air and headed towards the mouth of a woman wearing a black robe.
Yoon Seung-ah sighed as she looked at the countless screens in front of her.
"Tsk. Still, really. They give up so easily when it's not even dangerous?"
"That's how the MZ generation is these days, I hear. My granddaughter told me."
Choi Tae-soo chuckled as he looked at Yoon Seung-ah, who was complaining.
"Who? Ah, Hye-ji? I heard she failed this time?"
"Well. She's still lacking. But still..."
"Our Seo-ah passed, though. How did you educate your granddaughter, Yeonggam?"
"She just failed the Mana measurement. That's not everything..."
"Didn't you say the amount of Mana was important to the kids earlier?"
Yoon Seung-ah chuckled as she watched Choi Tae-soo, who had been scaring them by saying it was so important before the test started, contradict himself.
Well, it must hurt that his granddaughter failed.
In comparison, his daughter passed the measurement.
"Tsk... I wonder how things are going over there."
"Focus on this test. Nothing good will come of me interfering."
"I can distinguish between public and private matters, you know?"
She was curious about how her daughter, Yoon Seo-ah, was doing on the test, but she was in the position of test supervisor right now.
She had to wait here in case of any possible accidents.
"So, they're adapting faster than I thought. I thought they'd struggle a bit more."
"But aren't they the ones representing Korea? We have to trust and entrust them."
"Ha. A healthy Yeonggam is already trying to retire. Do you know how much my work will increase when you retire?"
"Keul keul. What can I do? The flow of time is unavoidable."
"Shut up. You're smashing Villain's heads just fine, what's with all the fuss about retiring?"
He's been flying around and smashing Villain's heads recently, so why is he already talking about retiring?
Thanks to Mana, his aging is slower than ordinary people, so Choi Tae-soo should be active for much longer than he is now.
Yoon Seung-ah muttered that she didn't think that day would come.
"So, what do you think?"
"If you're going to talk about retiring, be quiet. You're not even doing your job properly because you're always meditating in the mountains."
"Keul keul. I'm not talking about that, but about Kim Si-woo student."
"Si... Si-woo? Why Si-woo..."
As soon as she heard Kim Si-woo's name, Yoon Seung-ah shouted in a flustered manner.
Maybe it's because she hasn't been able to meet him recently due to work, but he appeared in her dream last night.
How could she say that she woke up and was unconsciously touching her hand because of it?
"Hmm...?"
Choi Tae-soo looked at Yoon Seung-ah's reaction strangely for a moment, but he didn't think much of it and opened his mouth again.
"Do you think he can replace our position when you look at him?"
"What... what? Is that what it was?"
"?"
"Ahem... Well, if he keeps growing like that, it's possible. He's more manly than the... other guys..."
Choi Tae-soo looked at Yoon Seung-ah with a shocked expression at her somehow girlish reaction.
"Hmm? You don't have feelings for a guy who could be your son, do you?"
"Wh... What crazy talk! It's... it's just because he suits our Seo-ah..."
"Heum? What does that mean? Kim Si-woo is the match for our Hye-ji."
"Haa? He's going to marry our Seo-ah?"
"Heoheo. I was going to see our Hye-ji get married, what are you talking about?"
The two people glared at each other. The moment an unusual atmosphere began to flow, an alarm sounded from the screen.
"Tsk. If they don't have the skills, they should just give up quickly. Why doesn't that Choi Ah-rin Halmanggu's thing work again?"
"Didn't you say they lacked perseverance earlier?"
"Ah, I don't know! Annoying!"
*
I opened my eyes at the sound of a pillar of light rising in the distance.
'Another one.'
It seemed that the number of dropouts was increasing as time passed.
They probably went deeper to find monsters and then gave up because they didn't have enough Mana to return.
Maybe it's because I'm constantly exposed to high-density Mana, but my body felt too heavy and tired.
Even though I closed my eyes for a moment, I didn't feel recovered at all.
It felt like I was just more tired.
'Is it because Mana operation isn't possible during sleep?'
How many people can sleep while being pressed down by something? I definitely slept, but I was even more tired.
I searched around, but I couldn't see any food or water.
I've been continuing to fight without eating or drinking, and it definitely seemed impossible to last all day.
I've only collected 12 coins because I haven't seen as many monsters as I thought.
I couldn't tell if this was a lot or a little because I didn't know how much other people had collected.
'I want to collect more if I could.'
I had to consider returning to the base camp now.
There's nothing more unfair than hunting excitedly and then not being able to return because I ran out of Mana.
'But it's not bad.'
Maybe it's because it's a special environment, but I was able to do training that I couldn't do in other places.
When else would I be able to move in such a high-density Mana environment?
Also, if I were to fight in the opponent's Unique Territory, it would probably feel like this.
"Is it cutting it close considering the distance?"
I couldn't just hunt like the other people and drop out, so I started walking back to the base camp again.
I met and dealt with one more insect-type monster in the middle, and I was able to finish the test with 13 coins.
...
I felt like I was going to live after coming out of the test site.
Should I say it feels too light because the thing pressing down on my body disappeared?
I led my light body to the place where the results were written.
"Oh."
My name was located higher than I thought, unlike what I was worried about.
Jia Unnie and Kim Si-young instructor-nim were above me, and the rest were people I didn't know.
'Where is that bastard?'
While looking for the name of Natae-nam, I was able to confirm that his name was written below my name.
His coin count was 12. It was a blessing that I met a monster at the end.
"..."
Speak of the devil, Natae-nam, who had come next to me at some point, checked his name and shouted as if he couldn't accept it.
"Ha... What is this! You must have used some kind of trick? Me, below a student??"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"He... He must have stolen the coins! There's no other way this makes sense!"
"Do you think that's possible? It's not like you're ignoring the Association..."
"Don't lie! What kind of scam did you pull!!"
I thought he was good at holding back, but it seems he can't stand having his name below mine.
As he made a fuss, Choi Tae-soo, who had been watching from afar, approached us.
"Choi... Choi Tae-soo-nim! The test results are wrong! A student like this..."
"Are you doubting the Association right now?"
"Th... That's not it..."
"Well, it doesn't matter. You'll have no choice but to accept it anyway."
Yeonggam-nim smiled at me after looking at my face.
"Because next is the tournament."
That's how Natae-nam became my opponent.