Mr. Cheolgi was genuinely happy about my awakening. Having struggled for so long himself, he celebrated the good fortune that had come to me all the more.
……As expected, Mr. Cheolgi was a good person.
“By the way, what’s the name of your class?”
“…Spatialist.”
I could not bring myself to call it Princess. I could predict exactly how he would tease me.
“What a stupid-ass ability.”
“How is it stupid? I’m an S-Grade porter.”
“Why? So you can carry beef into Gates, too?”
“Wouldn’t that be nice? Beef inside a Gate. Sounds delicious.”
“Hmm. You’ve got a point.”
We laughed as we traded pointless jokes.
We joked like this, but we both knew how useful this ability was.
At a glance, you might think it was an ability useless in combat, like a Druid’s or Bard’s.
Anyone outside the hunter industry would have told me to use it in transportation or smuggling.
But we were not outsiders.
Even recent headlines have been like this.
<The United States has decided to invest 300 trillion won in equipment development for Awakened hunters. The main goals are to make equipment lighter and more compact…….>
<As entry limits for recently appearing high-level Gates decline, countries around the world are investing in reducing the weight of Awakened supplies…….>
Anyone in the hunter industry would know how valuable this ability was.
The world had changed as though it were a game, but there was no such thing as an inventory.
An ability that could manage equipment in your stead. It did not seem like much, but it was unexpectedly indispensable.
Especially for advanced teams of high-level Awakened. You could not know what awaited inside a Gate until you entered it.
“Congratulations.”
“Thank you.”
I grilled the beef I had bought on the grill. Mr. Cheolgi handed me a piece of meat and asked.
“Then how much can that Subspace hold?”
“About the amount that fits in one shipping container?”
“Crazy. Will the space get bigger as the skill levels up? You really are an S-Grade porter.”
Mr. Cheolgi’s mouth fell open.
I grinned. How much more surprised would he be when I told him what was inside?
“Things are going to get noisy.”
“What is?”
“The Association. Other countries, too.”
“Will it be worse than in your day?”
Mr. Cheolgi gave a bitter smile at my words.
“It could be worse than mine. The United States says it is investing 300 trillion won.”
“They might invest all that and end up not needing it.”
“What do you mean, not need it? Your ability is what advanced teams need most.”
Mr. Cheolgi looked at me as he said that.
“Of course, the most important thing is you.”
He was right. Even if you acquired a good class and a good ability, what mattered was whether you could fight well as a hunter.
There were quite a few who had acquired abilities anyone could see were good, only to die in Gates or give up being hunters.
“I know.”
“Still, unlike me, it will be easy for you to make a living even if you do not become a hunter?”
“Should I become a smuggler?”
“You crazy bastard.”
I laughed at his words.
“Anyway. I nearly died awakening to this. I ran into a dragon.”
“What bullshit is that? Are you teasing me because I do not have a dragon?”
“Ah, no. That’s not what I mean.”
Unlike what I had told the Association, I told him the truth. Fortunately, he believed me without question.
“……If you awakened in such a dangerous situation, then it makes sense that your ability is S-Grade. They say the environment matters for awakening, too.”
“That’s why I’m asking. Will you help me verify this ability?”
“Now?”
I opened the Subspace. When the entrance became the size of a front door, Mr. Cheolgi startled.
“I can go inside, but I’m curious whether you can, too.”
“Can you go inside? In there?”
“Yeah.”
Mr. Cheolgi stood and reached a hand toward the Subspace. But trapped by a transparent membrane, he could not move forward.
It was the same even when I thought about allowing him to enter.
“It doesn’t work.”
I had wanted to surprise him, but that did not seem possible. It could not be helped.
“Just a moment.”
I went into the Subspace.
“You really can go in?”
I soon returned. Then I came out holding something to my chest with both hands.
That was right. The dragon egg.
“Wh-what is that?”
“I told you I ran into a dragon earlier. I even stole that lizard bastard’s egg.”
Mr. Cheolgi stared at the egg. His eyes had grown as large as lanterns. Mr. Cheolgi was Awakened, too.
That meant he could see the egg’s information.
“A dragon egg……?”
“What do you think? Is it enough to make you return?”
Mr. Cheolgi said nothing. But I saw something in the unusual glint in his eyes.
I suspected it was a passion that he had forgotten long ago.
I gently set the dragon egg on the grill.
“Will it hatch if I leave it like this?”
“Y-you crazy bastard!”
***
-Let’s talk again if that really hatches later.
There had been an unusual glint in his eyes, but Mr. Cheolgi was an adult. He was right. I did not know whether the egg would hatch.
The dragon had been brooding over the egg. A human like me might not be able to hatch it.
And even if a dragon hatched from the egg, it might attack me rather than follow me. I needed to reflect a little.
I had shown him the egg because I was happy.
‘That was an immature thought.’
I had not considered the hurt Mr. Cheolgi would feel if it did not work.
I could only feel grateful that he had not said a word about it.
For now, I put the egg inside the Subspace. Time did not pass in there.
Maybe I could try hatching it after I leveled up a little more.
“Hmm.”
It was late at night, but I was not sleepy. I had slept a lot while resting to replenish my mana in the dragon’s lair.
I was not especially tired, and the realization that I had awakened an S-Grade skill made my mind feel keenly alert.
[Lv. 6 Princess (Void Lord), Han Hye]
Strength: 4
Agility: 3
Stamina: 15 (+10)
Mentality: 3
Mana: 15 (+10)
Spare Points: 18
Skills: Subspace (S-Grade) Lv. 1, Swordsmanship (F-Grade) Lv. 1
I had known that my Stamina and Mana rose after being splashed with dragon’s blood, but seeing the status window gave me a deep sense of satisfaction.
When you first awakened, you received three points, and you received three more points every time you leveled up.
On top of that, stabbing a dragon in the eye once had raised my stats by 20. You could say I had gained seven levels for free.
Maybe that was why I was not sleepy. My Stamina had gone up.
Feeling satisfied, I headed into the Subspace.
It was time to check the ‘Sun Blossom’ I had received as a reward. The moment I opened the wooden box, I felt heat.
[Sun Blossom (A-Grade)]
-A flower containing the power of the sun. Consuming it makes you feel as though you will become immensely resistant to flames and heat.
-If you have a fire-related skill or acquire one later, that skill will be strengthened.
It was certainly a good elixir. In the first place, fewer than ten A-Grade elixirs, as far as I knew, had been released.
More than that, the phrase stating that I would become ‘immensely’ resistant to flames and heat was important.
If an item description said something like that, it meant you would truly become strong.
I immediately put it into my mouth.
‘There’s no reason to sell something this good.’
My ultimate goal was to beat the monster that killed my parents to death. To do that, I had to grow stronger.
I might gain tens or hundreds of billions of won by selling it, but that was only a secondary goal.
“Hmm.”
I had been worried, but it was not especially hot. Should I call it a warm heat? The warmth slipped down my throat.
Then the heat began to spread through my body. It was burning, but not painful.
“Phew.”
When all that energy spread through my body, I instinctively let out a deep breath. I could feel heat in my breath.
RATTLE—.
At that moment, the dragon egg moved slightly. Was it because of the heat?
I was startled, wondering if it was going to hatch. But it did not move again.
I checked my status window once more.
[Lv. 6 Princess (Void Lord), Han Hye]
Strength: 7 (+3)
Agility: 6 (+3)
Stamina: 18 (+3)
Mentality: 6 (+3)
Mana: 18 (+3)
Spare Points: 18
Skills: Subspace (S-Grade) Lv. 1, Fire Resistance (A-Grade) Lv. 1, Swordsmanship (F-Grade) Lv. 1
“Wow, that’s insane.”
Every stat had risen by three. Fifteen. With this, I had effectively gained another five levels for free.
Was that the power of an A-Grade elixir?
What was more, I had gained a Fire Resistance skill. It was A-Grade, no less. Even with the same skill, its abilities differed by grade.
C-Grade Fire Resistance Lv. 1 would be stronger than F-Grade Fire Resistance Lv. 3. In other words, its efficiency was insane.
‘I think I heard that A-Grade Fire Resistance means even lava fields are no problem.’
And that was not all. If I obtained an ability similar to fire later, it would strengthen that skill as well.
I could see why the Awakened who had consumed Thousand-Year Snow Ginseng became an S-Grade hunter.
I happily turned my gaze.
The books I had seen before remained there.
[Basic Swordsmanship of the Svinhood Empire (E-Grade)]
[Red Mage Tower Basic Spellbook (E-Grade)]
I had been a porter, but I knew well that the direction of growth was important. It was important to acquire skills suited to your talent and invest your stats accordingly.
The Gates had turned reality into something like a game, but there was no cash-shop item for resetting stats.
Mages rarely invested in Strength. Warriors and Rogues invested in Mana as well, but they did not allocate many stats to it.
Especially because what lay before me now were swordsmanship and a spellbook. The gap between them was large, so I needed to choose carefully.
‘I’ll do it tomorrow.’
Among rare classes was one called an Assessor. It could check an Awakened’s talents.
When I registered as an Awakened at the Hunter Association, they would give me a talent test, so there was no need to rush.
***
“Did you hear that?”
“What?”
“The United States is investing 300 trillion won in hunter equipment development this time.”
“Ah. Equipment compacting and lightening? Of course I heard. They say they are treating high-grade magic stones as strategic materials and buying them in unlimited quantities.”
Assistant Manager Kim, who handled Awakened certification work at the Hunter Association, nodded.
“Advance teams do not even bring porters along, so they have to invest.”
For advanced teams entering high-level Gates, every individual was precious because of the entry limit.
Being short on the strength of just one person could lead to the annihilation of the entire team.
“That is true. Advance teams carry an enormous amount of gear.”
You could not know the environment inside a Gate before entering. There were places where you could make an educated guess, but there were many where you could not.
Snowy mountains, lava fields, deserts, oceans, underground cities, swamps filled with poisonous gas. You never knew which one would appear.
Even if the chance was low, you could not gamble your life on it.
They entered with a wide variety of equipment: cold-weather and fireproof gear, gas masks, sleeping bags, tents, rubber boats, food, even bombs and plant seeds.
They sometimes threw items away the moment they entered, but having a lot of luggage directly weakened their combat power.
When ambushed inside a Gate, heavy luggage slowed their response by a beat.
An Awakened’s death was devastating.
Unlike guns, bombs, and fighter jets, Awakened could not be mass-produced.
-Awakened, more important than nuclear weapons since the Gate Crisis.
Even a globally discussed column showed it. Against Awakened monsters with mana force fields, bullets and shells did not mean much.
They were not completely ineffective.
Sometimes a single bullet could break a force field. At other times, a monster remained unharmed by hundreds of shells.
Countries vanished because of Gates. The Catoblepas that appeared in Australia remained unharmed even after eleven tactical and strategic nuclear strikes.
And Australia became the monsters’ land.
Only weapons imbued with an Awakened’s mana could easily cut through the mana force fields of Awakened monsters.
It was an era when Awakened themselves were a national power.
Unless a country wanted to fire dozens of nuclear bombs into its own territory, high-level hunters were its highest-priority strategic assets.
It was not for nothing that great powers recruited foreign Awakened for enormous sums of money.
Making hunters’ equipment lighter and more compact was meant to raise the survival rate of those strategic assets, even a little.
“And it is not only the United States, is it?”
“That is true.”
The scale was larger, but other countries were the same. The entire world was devoting itself to making equipment for hunters lighter and more compact.
Countless resources were being spent on temporarily reducing the size and weight of equipment using magic stones and magic.
The declining entry limits of high-level Gates also played a part in this investment.
Thirty to twenty. Twenty to ten. Ten to five.
The uncertainty inside Gates remained, and the amount of gear they had to bring had not changed much.
There was no choice but to devote themselves to research.
“Come to think of it, it’s funny.”
“What is?”
“The world changed into something like a game, and we can see status windows, so why are there no inventories?”
Assistant Manager Kim nodded at their superior’s words.
“Exactly. And no one has awakened as a porter, either.”
“What do you mean, awakened as a porter?”
“Why not? Just as unawakened hunters enter as porters, shouldn’t there be Awakened whose class is ‘Porter’? They could put all kinds of equipment into an inventory in a flash.”
“It would be a jackpot if someone like that existed. They could increase their stats as they levelled, so we would find them secret manuals and train them.”
At that moment, a man in his early twenties opened the door and walked in. He had a fairly tired-looking face.
It was Han Hye.