When I opened my eyes, I saw a white ceiling.
I was lying on a bed.
Where am I…?
Curtains surrounded me.
Shrrk.
When I pulled them aside, the hospital room came into view.
Did I collapse again?
Patients and nurses were moving through the hallway outside.
I stared blankly for a moment, then came to my senses and called up my Status window.
『 Status 』
Name: Lee Jihan
Age: 24
Level: 2
Rank: F
Trait: Talent Adjustment (EX)
Skills
Right. I didn’t see it wrong.
Just looking at them made my mouth water.
Skills I never could have dreamed of possessing in my entire life were lined up before me.
The only reason I had been able to cross swords with the named goblin Kuhullen was because of these Skills.
But among them, what interested me most was the Trait.
『 Trait Description 』
Name: Talent Adjustment (EX)
Grade: EX
Effect: Experience gained becomes 10,000,000%.
Special Effect: [ Locked ]
There wasn’t much of an explanation.
It simply stated that my Experience would become 100,000x.
Pressing the Special Effect section did nothing.
Still, this made it certain.
It hadn’t been a dream or an illusion.
This was a Trait I had genuinely obtained.
I can’t believe this kind of luck came to me…
My brow furrowed.
No.
This wasn’t simply luck.
This is something the System created.
Through causality adjustment, the System had granted me the Trait Talent Adjustment (EX).
Even the name itself was worth examining.
Once I interpreted it in my own way, the meaning was simple.
Because I was overwhelmingly talentless, the System gave me an absurdly powerful Trait.
It adjusted talent that didn’t exist to meet the required standard.
If Cheon Seongho had come here instead, would the System have produced a different result?
Maybe Cheon Seongho’s overwhelming talent would have been forcibly suppressed by the System instead.
Thinking about it that way, maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing that I had returned to the past.
Swish, swish.
I moved various parts of my body.
I felt a little stiff, but everything moved without any real problem.
Overall, I was healthy.
I couldn’t remember every detail, but I was pretty sure Kuhullen had injured me badly.
There’s no way a healing hunter came all the way here. Is this because of one of my Skills?
Sure enough, when I checked my Skills, there was a new one.
『 Natural Recovery Lv.10 』
『 Natural healing ability is enhanced to superhuman levels. 』
“Oh.”
I turned my head and inspected my body.
All I had done was sleep, yet my injuries had completely healed.
As a bonus, the Skill had already reached its maximum Level.
The problem was how long I had been lying here.
I was looking around for something that could tell me the date when—
“Oh! How are you already awake? The doctor said it would take at least another week.”
A pretty woman approached me.
I narrowed my eyes and searched my memory.
“Who are you?”
“We saw each other inside the gate!”
Apparently frustrated, the woman searched inside her clothes and pulled out an identification badge.
“I’m Yoon Seohyeon, a C-rank hunter with the Hunter Association. I rescued you after you collapsed fighting that goblin.”
Only then did I remember.
She had appeared near the end of my duel with Kuhullen.
Once Kuhullen realized it was outnumbered, it had cowardly fled.
After listening to everything Yoon Seohyeon said, I shook my head.
“No. I saved your life, Yoon Seohyeon.”
If things had proceeded as they originally had, Yoon Seohyeon, the rescue hunter, would have died, and the hunters sent in after her would have died as well.
But there was no way Yoon Seohyeon could know that—
“Well, I’ll admit that much.”
Apparently she did.
She seemed to understand the situation roughly.
“The survivors from the Vanguard Guild testified. That goblin—Kuhullen, was that its name? I know how strong that monster was.”
It seemed they had already finished taking statements while I was unconscious.
Good.
That meant I didn’t have to explain anything unnecessary.
“How long has it been?”
“Two days.”
“How many survived?”
“Two besides you. Eight people entered an F-rank gate, and only two survived. Ridiculous, isn’t it?”
It wasn’t that only two had survived.
Two people had survived a hellhole no one should have escaped alive.
Yoon Seohyeon, who had no way of knowing that, swallowed a bitter smile.
Then she narrowed her eyes and asked me a question.
“But you’re the real problem, Lee Jihan. You’re not part of the Vanguard Guild, so why were you there?”
I entered a portal to return to the past and fell inside a gate.
I obviously couldn’t say that.
“Hmm…”
I closed and opened my eyes, pretending to think.
“I must have wandered in while taking a walk at night. I’m terrible with directions.”
“You seriously expect me to believe that?”
Of course it made no sense.
I needed some time to organize my thoughts.
An outsider had emerged from a gate claimed by the Vanguard Guild.
That could be connected to criminal activity, so it wasn’t something they could simply overlook.
Still, I had an excuse.
“I needed money. I was planning to enter an F-rank gate, kill a few goblins, pick up some magic stones, and leave.”
Yoon Seohyeon looked me over after hearing that, then nodded.
…The fact that she accepted it so easily somehow annoyed me.
After staring at me for a moment, Yoon Seohyeon spoke.
“Fine. Let’s say that’s what happened.”
“……”
“I’ll write the report so you don’t get fined. And that isn’t what I’m actually curious about.”
So that was the kind of person she was.
She looked strict, but surprisingly, she was pretty loose about things.
I felt like I might have seen her somewhere in my previous life…
No.
I still couldn’t remember.
“Then what else is the problem?”
“…The Hunter Association probably won’t acknowledge what you did. But they won’t hold you responsible either. Because you’re F-rank.”
So that was it.
That was why they weren’t treating me as a criminal.
Entering the gate had been illegal, but apparently that was as far as it went.
After comparing the victims’ statements, they seemed to have concluded that I wasn’t a threat.
But Yoon Seohyeon frowned.
“Doesn’t that bother you?”
“What does?”
“You drove that goblin away. I saw it. No matter if you’re F-rank, you were the one who actually defeated it. And the Hunter Association is going to pretend it never happened.”
She seemed to be concerned about me in her own way.
But I didn’t want anything to do with this incident.
I should make that clear here.
I looked at her and spoke.
“Listen, Hunter Yoon Seohyeon. Just remember that you owe me. Like you said, even if I really did defeat that goblin myself, I know no one in the Hunter Association would believe it.”
“Well, that’s true, but…”
Yoon Seohyeon avoided my gaze and trailed off.
She must have already checked my records.
She would know perfectly well that I was a talentless hunter who had been stuck at F-rank for years.
The Hunter Association wasn’t an agile or clean organization.
It was more accurate to call it rotten.
If it had been a proper organization, South Korea wouldn’t have fallen to the demons so easily.
“But…”
After chewing on her lip for a moment, Yoon Seohyeon spoke.
Apparently there was something else she had really wanted to say.
“But you won.”
Then she began spilling out everything she had been holding inside.
“An F-rank hunter who saved two hunters during a crisis. That’s the kind of thing that could make newspaper headlines and become a major TV story. Famous guilds would probably be fighting to recruit you.”
“……”
I was speechless.
There really was an unusually kind person standing right in front of me.
But aside from that, another thought occurred to me.
Is this girl seriously trying to send me to my death?
I had already decided to conceal this ability as much as possible.
This world was moving toward destruction with every passing moment.
There were already demons hiding within human society.
I had no intention of going on television and advertising myself to the demons as a promising rookie they should come kill.
There didn’t seem to be any point continuing the conversation.
I got out of bed.
Rustle, rustle.
“What are you doing?”
“Something personal. Don’t concern yourself with it.”
There were consolation gifts that seemed to have been sent by the Hunter Association.
I packed a bag with juice and fruit from the refrigerator.
Anything that wouldn’t fit in the bag, I stuffed into my mouth.
“!”
Tears welled in my eyes.
It had been ten years since I’d eaten a banana.
I had forgotten bananas could taste this sweet.
While I was doing that, Yoon Seohyeon stared at me as though I were unbelievable.
Why was she still here?
I glared at her.
“If you’re done here, could you leave? I want to change and get discharged.”
“…You really are a strange person.”
***
Flop.
Home.
It was a one-room apartment that smelled of mold, but still.
I had missed this place.
The moment I lay down on the musty mattress, it felt like heaven.
After finishing the discharge process at the hospital, I had come straight home.
Fortunately, the Hunter Association had paid the hospital bill.
I needed time alone to organize my thoughts.
Grrrr.
“Right. Food first.”
A few pieces of fruit hadn’t done anything to satisfy my hunger.
Spicy mixed noodles.
That had been the number-one thing I wanted to eat if I ever returned to the past.
Like I had told Younghoon, I took spicy mixed noodles very seriously.
I had desperately missed that spicy-sweet artificial seasoning.
I sprang to my feet and checked the cupboard.
“There’s nothing.”
It didn’t matter if I had no noodles.
I could just go buy some.
All I needed was money.
“Nothing here either.”
I hurriedly searched my pockets, but I didn’t have a single coin.
I turned over every corner of my tiny apartment, but couldn’t even find 100 won.
Strangely, my wallet was gone.
Fortunately, my smartphone was still at home.
I remembered being able to pay with this somehow…
“Ah, fuck.”
I had forgotten the unlock password.
It would have been stranger if I remembered after twenty years.
This was bad.
Without the phone, I had no way to buy noodles.
Damn it.
I dropped back down where I was.
As my head gradually became calmer, one fact became painfully clear.
…Is this really something I can solve?
I had returned in place of the hero who was supposed to save humanity.
Inside the gate, I had been too busy desperately trying to survive to think about future plans.
Now that I had time to think everything over, the seriousness of my situation finally sank in.
The fate of humanity is in my hands.
At this point in time, I was the only person who knew the world was going to end.
If I did nothing, humanity would ride a one-way roller coaster straight into the sea of destruction.
I needed a plan.
…But I barely remember anything useful.
Cheon Seongho, the person who was originally supposed to return, had probably memorized every major incident and important location.
Compared to him, I had returned by accident.
I barely knew anything useful about the past.
I knew the major events, but I couldn’t remember the details of things like the incidents that accelerated the demon invasion.
After turning the problem over in my head for a while, I came up with a novel idea.
Wait. Wouldn’t everything solve itself if I just did nothing?
If another twenty years passed exactly as before…
If the Last Five found the return item again and used it…
Maybe the problem would solve itself naturally.
It was irresponsible, but it seemed better than carelessly interfering and twisting the future.
Of course, I only entertained the idea.
Realistically, it was impossible.
…There are too many problems with that.
There was no guarantee the return item would exist again.
If it did, infinite returns would be possible.
And I would also need to avoid affecting the future in any way.
But I had already interfered with the past.
If it weren’t for this new Trait, I would’ve died in that gate too.
[ Talent Adjustment (EX) ]
The moment this Trait came into my possession, the past had already begun to change.
I didn’t want to simply wait around anymore, hoping someone else would solve everything.
Now I had something that could genuinely be called power.
……
This was the conclusion I reached.
I have to become strong.
Stronger than anyone.
If I didn’t become strong myself, I would eventually fail to survive.
There were far too many enemies.
And the fact that it was difficult to distinguish trustworthy people from untrustworthy ones only made things worse.
The demons, the root cause of everything, were overwhelmingly stronger than humans and even drew humans over to their side.
The magical projectile that flew at me before I returned definitely passed through the barrier.
That barrier had never been breached.
Not even once.
Not even at the very end.
It was entirely possible that someone who wasn’t on humanity’s side had been mixed in among us.
If one of the Last Five was a traitor…
I didn’t even want to think about it.
That was why I had to become stronger than anyone else.
And—
There was one more reason I had to save the world.
I don’t want to see that kid lose his parents and wander the streets again.
In the world twenty years later, I hadn’t been alone.
Younghoon and I had struggled together and survived until the very end.
This time, I wanted to make sure none of that ever happened in the first place.
Once I made that decision, I knew what I needed to do first.
Whew. There’s one mountain I need to overcome before anything else.
It was a difficult decision.
But once a man made up his mind, he couldn’t hesitate.
I immediately got up and headed toward the shopping district.
The place I arrived at was a small bookstore.
…Time to read.
My fight with Kuhullen had taught me something.
100,000x Experience wasn’t omnipotent.
I didn’t acquire Skills just by performing random actions.
I had to go through a meaningful experience before it became a Skill and raised my proficiency.
Which meant I had to deliberately create proper experiences.
Having a teacher would have made things easier, but for now, I had to do it alone.
I slowly scanned the inside of the bookstore.
Good. Exactly what I wanted.
It was only a neighborhood bookstore, but the books were neatly categorized.
Economics, history, essays, novels, humanities, science…
If I wanted something difficult, science was the obvious choice.
I walked toward one section of the bookstore.
There were books about space and books explaining AI.
A book about aliens was marked as a bestseller.
But among them, I picked up the book that looked the most incomprehensible.
If I wanted something truly difficult, this was the obvious choice.
Just reading the title made me dizzy.
Gulp.
I swallowed once and opened to the first page.
I steeled myself and began reading from the first line.
At first, it seemed somewhat understandable.
Once I passed the third line, every sentence made me wonder whether it was even written in English.
But I didn’t stop.
What the hell is this saying?
Painful, but unquestionably meaningful experience.
Simply breathing or moving lightly couldn’t generate Experience.
If it could, everyone on Earth would have become a master.
Reading this is more than enough to stimulate my brain.
Only actions capable of stimulating me and causing growth became Experience.
It was something everyone already knew.
I did my absolute best to understand the meaning without skipping a single word.
And when I finally finished the entire page—
『 High-dimensional intellectual activity detected. 』
Shrrrk!
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Intelligence Lv.1 ]. 』
…
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Intelligence Lv.10 ]. 』
『 The Skill ‘Intelligence’ has reached its maximum Level. 』
After checking the messages, I let out a long breath.
I did it. Just like I expected.
My head was throbbing, but this much was tolerable.
I had acquired a Skill just by reading a single page.
That was an excellent return on investment.
Nine times eight is seventy-two…
Five times nine is forty-five…
Seven times seven is forty-nine…
Did anything actually change?
Unlike Swordsmanship or Strength, the effects of Intelligence were difficult to feel directly.
I checked the Skill description.
『 Magic Proficiency +25%, Power of All Magic +10%, Magical Energy +10% 』
“……”
There was nothing about my brain working faster.
Thump.
I closed the book and returned to my apartment.
I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t hoped for an increase in intelligence, but that wasn’t what I was really after anyway.
Intelligence isn’t the Skill I actually need.
Intelligence, Strength, Perception, stamina-related Skills—
Skills like these formed the foundation of everything.
Hunters called them fundamental Skills.
I had once been such an idiot that I couldn’t even obtain those.
But now things were different.
Once you acquire the fundamental Skills, new possibilities open up.
One talent could give birth to another.
And the first Skill I intended to acquire after returning from the future was this.
Remember.
I sat cross-legged and closed my eyes.
I reached into the sea of my unconscious and tried to drag deeply buried memories back to the surface.
I tried to remember the things from twenty years ago that should have long since vanished from my conscious mind.
And that effort would return to me as 100,000x Experience.
How much time passed?
『 Accessing the region of memory connected to the unconscious. 』
『 Skill ‘Perception Lv.10’ has taken effect. 』
『 Skill ‘Intelligence Lv.10’ has taken effect. 』
Remember.
Everything I had accumulated over twenty years in a dying world.
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Memory Search Lv.1 ]. 』
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Memory Search Lv.2 ]. 』
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Memory Search Lv.3 ]. 』
…
『 You have acquired the Skill [ Memory Search Lv.10 ]. 』
『 The Skill ‘Memory Search’ has reached its maximum Level. 』
Yes.
That was what I wanted to remember.
Exactly that.
『 All latent memories within the unconscious are perfectly recalled. 』
I picked up the smartphone plugged into the charger.