When Taehu clicked the final appraisal approval button on the monitor, the complicated window smoothly closed.
"Phew."
Taehu let out a light breath and tilted his stiff neck from side to side.
CRACK.
The crisp sound of his joints echoed through the quiet appraisal room.
"Taehu, have you already finished your afternoon quota?"
The senior Appraiser seated beside him leaned over slightly as he asked. There was a trace of caution in his voice.
Ever since Taehu had exposed every detail of Min Jeongho's potentially fatal misjudgment the previous day, the people in Appraisal Room 3 had noticeably changed the way they treated him.
Any sign of casually looking down on him or badmouthing him behind his back had vanished without a trace. If anything, they now seemed to watch Taehu warily whenever he moved.
Apparently, seeing Taehu utterly dismantle the appraisal result of an experienced Senior Appraiser with a single precision scan had thoroughly intimidated them.
"Yes. Most of them were minor consumables, so I finished quickly."
"Oh, really? You've been working hard. I'm going to get some coffee. Do you want one too?"
"I'm fine. I'll make one for myself later."
The senior Appraiser gave an awkward smile before disappearing toward the break room.
Taehu tapped the smartphone resting on one side of his desk. The black screen lit up, and a notification from his mobile banking app caught his eye.
Balance: 160 million won.
For the average office worker, seeing that number might have been enough to make them throw down their resignation letter and run straight to a foreign luxury car dealership.
But Taehu calmly turned off the screen.
He had no intention of disrupting his peaceful daily life just because he had money now. At most, he thought he might take his mother to a decent Korean set-menu restaurant after work. His father, meanwhile, would obviously be too busy polishing the new fishing rod Taehu had bought him a few days ago to even show up for dinner.
A faint smile spread across Taehu's lips. The value he had uncovered while digging through piles of discarded trash was gradually making his family's everyday life more comfortable.
That fact alone made commuting to this tedious appraisal center worthwhile.
Taehu rose from his chair, picked up a file folder, and walked toward one corner of the appraisal room.
A thick transparent glass container surrounded by yellow hazard tape stood there.
It was a Hazardous Item Quarantine Container.
Among the countless by-products that poured out of dungeons, it was where malicious items containing unknown toxins or capable of inflicting severe harm on their owners were temporarily dumped.
Taehu's gaze shifted inside the glass container.
A crude iron ring sat there alone, radiating an ominous dark-red glow.
According to the appraisal center's records, the ring had been picked up in a corner by a Porter who had entered a low-level dungeon several days earlier.
The Porter had been delighted at his apparent windfall when he found the ring lying on the ground. But beginning that very night, after slipping it into his pocket, he suffered from severe headaches and horrific nightmares. Unable to endure it for more than a few days, he was eventually rushed to the hospital. Claiming that the ring was trying to kill him, he handed it over to the appraisal center for disposal and fled as though escaping for his life.
The assessment made by ordinary Appraisers had naturally been abysmal.
[Cursed D-rank Ring]
Complete garbage that offered its wearer no benefit whatsoever and merely gnawed away at their mind.
If things continued as they were, the appraisal center would have to pay an outside specialist disposal company to come in within a few days and throw it into an incinerator.
The Appraisers in the room shook their heads, reluctant even to go near it.
But to Taehu's eyes, the murky dark-red aura did not look like mere ominous energy.
Taehu took a pair of thick rubber-coated work gloves from his drawer and put them on.
He turned the dial on the container, released the lock, and carefully reached inside.
Even before his fingertips touched the surface of the ring, an unpleasant chill and prickling sensation like needles piercing his skin traveled up his hand.
Most people would have immediately pulled their hand away and stepped back.
Taehu, however, gripped the dark-red ring without hesitation.
At that moment—
Brilliant red text filled his vision.
[Sealed Guardian's Ring]
-Original Rank: A
-Status: Cursed and sealed.
-Description: Upon removal of the curse, Mental Resistance and a one-time Barrier will be activated.
Taehu's eyes gleamed with interest.
The true rank of the item that ordinary Appraisers had dismissed as D-rank was actually A-rank.
Moreover, it was an exceptional piece of defensive equipment, possessing the uncommon Mental Resistance effect along with a Barrier that activated in a moment of crisis.
But the astonishing part was not merely that he could see its original specifications.
Beneath the text revealed by his Special Appraisal Ability, an even deeper truth about the ring flowed directly into his mind.
Someone who had obtained the ring in the past had tried to forcibly scrape away the mana contained within it and use it elsewhere.
That crude and violent interference had horribly distorted the delicate protection magic inside.
The Mana Circuit that was originally supposed to shield the wearer's mind from external attacks had become tangled and twisted, transforming instead into a curse that assaulted the wearer's mind.
This was not equipment that had been physically broken or shattered.
Even a cursed item twisted by a magical defect laid its inner workings bare before Taehu's eyes.
He could clearly see the root cause of the curse, the exact point where the Mana Circuit had become tangled, and even how to undo it and restore the ring to its original A-rank state.
"So this is how it got tangled up."
The corners of Taehu's lips rose slightly.
Even cursed items that others feared and had to pay money to dispose of were nothing more than prime prey that he could pick up for next to nothing.
The company would call a disposal contractor in a few days anyway, and it was obvious that doing so would cost the company even more money.
Taehu brought over a thick plastic zipper bag and sealed the ring securely inside it.
Then, without hesitation, he took it down to the Management Department on the first floor.
The Management Department office was as busy as ever, its employees wrestling with mountains of paperwork.
When Taehu approached, the employee in charge looked up.
"Oh, Taehu. What brings you here?"
"I came about a waste disposal matter."
Taehu placed the plastic zipper bag on the desk.
The employee's complexion changed instantly when he saw the dark-red ring radiating an ominous aura from inside the bag.
"Wait, Taehu! That's the one from the quarantine container in Appraisal Room 3, isn't it? Why did you bring that all the way down here?!"
The employee recoiled in horror, pushing his chair sharply backward.
Taehu calmly held out a document to the startled employee.
"I'd like to take care of this myself."
"What? Take care of it? A specialist incineration company is supposed to come collect that in a few days. It's a cursed item that can drive someone insane just from handling it."
"Exactly. I'm offering to take it off your hands. If you call the contractor, won't the company have to spend at least several hundred thousand won on the call-out fee and special incineration charges?"
The employee's eyes wavered.
Taehu was not wrong. Malicious waste like this could not be thrown away like ordinary garbage, so hiring a specialist company to deal with it cost a considerable amount.
With the Management Department's budget already stretched thin this month, it was not an expense they particularly welcomed.
"That's true, but... why would you even want to take this?"
"I've been researching unusual Mana Waves lately. Cursed items are perfect for practice. If you're going to throw it away anyway, hand it over to me. I'll even pay the company 100,000 won as a disposal fee."
"One hundred thousand won?"
The employee's ears practically perked up.
Not only could the department get rid of a troublesome cursed item without spending a single won, money would actually be deposited into the company's account instead. From the Management Department's perspective, there was nothing to lose.
Even so, the employee still looked uneasy.
"Are you really going to be all right? The Porter who picked that thing up had nightmares for days before collapsing and foaming at the mouth."
"It will be fine as long as I wear gloves and keep it inside a thick lead-lined container. If you're still worried, I'll sign a waiver stating that I'm acquiring it for personal research and that I accept full responsibility for anything that happens afterward."
Taehu picked up a pen and swiftly filled in the blank spaces on the purchase application form the employee handed him.
Still looking uncomfortable, the employee quickly gathered up the signed paperwork and filed it away.
"Then... you can transfer the payment directly to the company account. And if you get even the slightest headache or start seeing things, throw it away immediately."
"Don't worry."
After transferring 100,000 won with his smartphone, Taehu placed the zipper bag inside the small lead shielding case for hazardous-material transport that he had prepared in advance and locked it securely.
The ring was now entirely his through a legitimate acquisition process.
Inside the elevator on his way back up to Appraisal Room 3, Taehu lightly ran a hand over the lead shielding case he was carrying.
Even the faint ominous chill he could sense through the thick shielding walls somehow felt exhilarating.
To everyone else, it was the worst kind of trash, something that ate away at a person's mind.
But with a little work, it would be reborn as an excellent piece of defensive equipment.
"I should look into the restoration materials on my way home."
A broad smile spread across Taehu's reflection in the elevator's polished metal doors.