The next day, after finishing the planned upper-body strength training and returning home.
The thumb scrolling up the smartphone screen stopped.
Chae-ho quietly looked down at the recruitment board displayed on the screen.
Short-term mercenary recruitment posts uploaded to the Hunter-exclusive network continued endlessly.
[Seeking Temporary Grade C Party Support. Departure Date Undecided. Preference Given to Those Able to Match Waiting Schedules.]
He let out a short breath and placed the smartphone on the desk.
"Waiting, huh."
Working as a short-term mercenary had noticeably increased his income.
Compared to the days when he was called a porter behind the party and handled only unpleasant tasks, the amount appearing in his account was on an entirely different level.
The problem was the irregular lifestyle.
He had to always remain on standby according to schedules with no fixed departure date, and he had to constantly change his routes according to the party leader's demands.
But more than anything, something else frustrated Chae-ho.
As long as he moved together with others, he could not completely take control of the flow of battle himself.
The party structure was too restrictive to fully test the results of his extreme training in actual combat—the sensation of activating and deactivating his skill at the perfect instant, and forcing his body into position accordingly.
'How long am I going to keep moving according to someone else's rhythm?'
Through extreme reflex training, he had increased his daily skill usage time to 13 seconds.
Now he needed to experience leading the flow of battle from beginning to end under his own control.
Chae-ho immediately opened the laptop in front of his desk.
He would not make the foolish mistake of simply grabbing a weapon and heading toward a gate.
Attempting a solo raid without preparation was not courage.
It was just recklessness.
He moved the mouse and accessed the Hunter Association's exclusive database.
The filtering conditions were clear.
Grade D dungeon.
And a stable gate that allowed solo entry.
Dozens of lists filled the screen.
He mercilessly removed locations with overly complicated terrain or unpredictable monster appearances.
To sharpen his pure fundamentals without relying on the skill, he needed a place with an appropriate level of tension and a clear battlefield.
After scrolling the mouse wheel for a while, his gaze stopped on one entry.
[Dry Reef Cave. Danger Level D. Party Limit: 1~4 People.]
The gate location and the recent mana wave measurements conducted by the Association were extremely stable.
Chae-ho clicked on the detailed information of the dungeon.
The ecology and attack patterns of the main monster, "Claw Ratman," appeared densely across the screen.
It had powerful hind legs that allowed fast straight-line leaps and possessed the characteristic of launching consecutive attacks with sharp front claws.
He opened his notebook and picked up a pen.
He carefully wrote down their jumping distance, the shift of their center of gravity upon landing, and their preferred attack angles.
But he did not stop there.
He opened the dungeon terrain map file and engraved every blind spot where the monsters might ambush him into his mind.
The most important thing was an emergency retreat route for the worst-case scenario.
If too many monsters gathered beyond what he could handle, or if something happened to his body, he needed to be able to withdraw at any moment.
He repeatedly studied the shortest route from the third intersection, passing by the collapsed stalactite pillar and heading directly toward the entrance until he memorized it.
Only after cross-checking every piece of information did Chae-ho put down the mouse.
This was not a reckless gamble.
It was a carefully calculated practical test.
He put on the armor hanging in the closet and firmly secured the sword sheath around his waist.
After placing a blood clotting agent and emergency food into a lightweight backpack, he left the house without hesitation.
Dry and cold air brushed against the tip of his nose.
After crossing the gate, Chae-ho stopped and expanded his vision.
Rough stone walls surrounded him from every direction, and sharp rock formations jutted down from the ceiling.
As the Association's information stated, the inside of the dungeon was quite spacious, but the structure itself was simple.
With his hand resting on the sword handle, he moved silently.
Every time his shoe soles touched the dry dirt floor, a faint friction sound was created.
Although the environment was dark with almost no light entering, the senses sharpened through training did not miss even the smallest flow of air around him.
After walking for a short while, a faint scratching sound came from behind a massive pile of rocks on the right.
Chae-ho stopped.
Maintaining shallow breaths, he fixed his gaze on the cracks between the rocks.
A red glow flashed in the darkness.
A grotesque rat-like creature about the height of a person's thigh emerged.
It was a Claw Ratman.
The creature drooled while scraping its sharp front claws against the ground.
If this had been during his days as a support member in a Grade C party, merely receiving the gaze of such a creature from the rear would have made him tense up and grip his dagger tightly.
Back then, he could only look for an opening after the shield bearer blocked its vision from the front.
But the Ratman reflected in Chae-ho's eyes now was clumsy beyond comparison.
"Kiik!"
With an unpleasant cry, it kicked off with its hind legs and leaped directly forward.
The speed of its straight-line charge was fairly agile, but Chae-ho did not activate his skill.
'I can see it.'
Even without Time Deceleration, the creature's trajectory was clear.
Compared to dealing with hundreds of rubber bullets raining down from all directions in the training room, the charge of a single creature was so predictable it was almost boring.
At the instant the Ratman became airborne, Chae-ho slightly twisted his body to the right.
The Ratman's claws cut through the air and passed harmlessly beside his cheek.
The moment the creature missed its attack and exposed its back.
Chae-ho's sword slid smoothly from its sheath.
The blade without hesitation rushed precisely toward the airborne creature's throat.
Slish!
With a chilling cutting sound, black blood sprayed through the air.
The Ratman, unable even to release a proper scream, crashed into the ground, convulsed twice, and soon became still.
Chae-ho lightly shook the blood from his sword.
There was no heavy breathing.
No trembling fingertips.
His heartbeat remained calm as usual.
He had defeated a Grade D monster using only his pure physical ability and reflexes without relying on the skill.
No luck.
No coincidence.
Only his own strength.
"At this level..."
He was completely different from his former self, who had been stiff and slow.
Confirming that his fundamentals had firmly taken root, his footsteps became lighter.
Chae-ho roughly collected the mana stone from Ratman's corpse and continued deeper into the cave.
The one or two monsters that appeared along the way were also cut down without difficulty.
He continued forward, feeling through his body that his reaction speed was always at least half a beat faster than his enemies' movements.
***
When he reached the middle section of the cave, the narrow passage opened up into a wide circular chamber.
Animal bones were scattered across the floor, and a stale smell rushed toward him.
When Chae-ho had taken about three steps into the center of the chamber.
Red eyes simultaneously lit up in rows throughout the darkness.
"Kiik! Kyaaak!"
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
A total of five Claw Ratmen crawled out from behind the rocks.
They did not recklessly attack.
Instead, they began narrowing their encirclement around Chae-ho.
Several creatures moved together, blocking his escape routes and waiting for the perfect timing to attack.
It was the typical movement of hunters.
No matter how much his fundamentals had improved, blocking five simultaneous attacks with only his naked eyes and physical body carried significant risk.
If his feet became tangled or an attack came from a blind spot, it could immediately lead to a serious injury.
At that moment, all five Ratmen expanded their hind leg muscles as if they had made an agreement and kicked off the ground.
Two from the front.
One from each side.
One from behind.
At the instant vicious claws rushed toward him from every direction.
'Time Deceleration.'
The familiar, quiet switch turned on inside Chae-ho's mind.
At that moment, all the air inside the dungeon became a thick swamp.
"Kiieee..."
The unpleasant cries of the Ratmen flying through the air stretched out like a tape being pulled.
Time itself seemed to have been caught by the neck and forced to collapse within Chae-ho's vision.
He only slightly turned his head and quickly observed the creatures suspended in the air.
The two in front were aiming for his chin.
The one on the right was entering low toward his legs.
The one on the left had an awkward jumping angle and was not threatening.
The creature behind him had the sharpest trajectory, aimed directly at his neck.
Five attack trajectories.
The flow of mana.
The single opening he needed to exploit.
Everything was displayed clearly like a 3D blueprint.
He had all the information he needed.
Chae-ho immediately turned off the skill.
Tap.
The frozen world returned to normal speed like a spring snapping back.
Chae-ho lowered his body and stepped back half a pace.
At the same time, he let the Ratman entering low from the right barely miss its trajectory and kicked it away.
Bang!
The Ratman sent flying by his kick collided head-on with the two Ratmen charging from the front.
While they tangled together and crashed to the ground, Chae-ho's sword had already pierced through the head of the creature approaching from the left.
There was no unnecessary movement in his actions.
After retrieving his sword, he twisted his body smoothly and pushed the blade beneath the chin of the creature that had been aiming for his neck from behind.
Squelch!
After pulling out the sword, Chae-ho turned toward the three tangled creatures trying to stand.
Without giving them time to recover, he stabbed their exposed necks and chests one after another.
A few short exchanges.
Blood began pooling on the floor.
The five Ratmen died beneath Chae-ho's feet.
"Whoo."
Chae-ho shook the blood from his sword.
He summoned the translucent system window in the corner of his vision and checked the remaining time.
[Daily Available Usage Time: 12.5 seconds / 13 seconds]
The time used to break through that fierce encirclement was only 0.5 seconds.
Because his fundamentals supported him, there was no reason to keep the skill active longer than necessary.
If he only confirmed trajectories during brief moments, the rest could be handled through pure physical reactions.
The remaining 12 seconds were more than enough to tear through the entire dungeon.
The days of following behind party leaders like a porter while watching their reactions were completely over.
The flow of battle inside this dungeon was now entirely within his control.
After lightly sliding his sword back into its sheath, Chae-ho slowly walked deeper into the dark cave.
"Let's move to the next area."