THUD.
A heavy cardboard box hit the floor, sending stale dust billowing in every direction.
"Ah—COUGH! Open the windows all the way! I can barely breathe in here."
"They're already all open. Should I turn on another fan?"
"That'll just blow even more dust around! Stop asking and hurry up and clear this stuff out!"
From Monday morning onward, Appraisal Room 3 at Iljin Appraisal Center was utter chaos.
Large boxes hauled in by Porters were stacked as high as a person throughout the walkways and every available open space. Unidentifiable pieces of scrap metal and broken wood littered the floor, leaving barely enough room to walk.
An entire warehouse belonging to a small guild that had entered bankruptcy proceedings and was shutting down had been emptied and brought here.
Min Jeongho picked up a dented leather breastplate, only to slam it back onto the floor irritably.
"Why is there so much of this crap? There's not a single useful thing here. It's all scrap and garbage. We're actually getting paid to appraise this junk, and we still have to suffer through all this?"
Exhaustion and irritation were written all over his face.
The other Appraisers were no different. Covered in dust and coughing, they hurriedly gave the items cursory visual inspections before tossing them into disposal boxes.
Most were low-rank pieces of equipment at F-rank or below with obvious limitations, or outright scrap whose Mana Circuits had been completely severed beyond repair.
There was hardly any reason to inspect them carefully.
Taehu also sat at his desk with his mask pulled up over his nose, silently sorting through the miscellaneous items.
Over the weekend, he had sent his parents ample living expenses and eased some of their financial burden, which had given him a profound sense of emotional relief. Thanks to that, his steps had been rather light on the way to work.
Still, once he found himself facing a mountain of work, there was no helping how quickly his stamina drained.
"Hwang Taehu, finding anything worthwhile in that box?"
A fellow Appraiser working across from him asked while rubbing his lower back.
"No. It's no different over here. I've got low-grade swords so dull they're practically saws, and a staff leaking mana because its gemstone is cracked."
"Haa, what a complete waste of time. We got saddled with piles of things that aren't even worth pocket change. Let's just give them rough ranks and dump them into the disposal boxes."
Instead of answering, Taehu gave a slight nod and reached deeper into the box.
Among the cold lumps of metal, his fingertips caught on something rough and brittle.
He pulled it out, sending paper dust drifting into the air.
It was an old book with more than half of its cover burned completely black.
The remaining pages had absorbed so much moisture that they had hardened stiffly, while the writing on the outside was too badly damaged to make out at all.
'What is this supposed to be? A grimoire?'
Taehu lightly wiped some of the black soot from the cover with his thumb and sent a small amount of mana into it.
His most basic Appraisal Skill activated, causing a translucent blue window to appear in the air.
[Damaged Grimoire / Deciphering Impossible]
-The damage is too severe to read the information contained within.
-Mana Preservation Rate: 0%
Any ordinary Appraiser would have thrown it straight into the trash without a second thought.
A bundle of paper with no remaining mana and writing that could not even be read was worth no more than kindling.
But Taehu saw something different.
Behind the ordinary blue window, familiar, vivid golden text began to shimmer into existence, overwriting it with completely different information.
His Special Appraisal Ability had activated.
[Damaged Combat Record]
-Original Rank: A
-Restoration Possible
-Upon restoration, the Passive Skill 'Weapon Adaptation' can be acquired.
-Description: A practical combat record that forcibly imprints the characteristics of variousweapons onto the body.
-Restoration Condition: Mana infusion and temporary sealing of missing sections.
Taehu's eyes widened for an instant.
He inhaled sharply without realizing it.
'A-rank. And it grants a Passive Skill?'
His heartbeat became irregular.
The skill known as 'Weapon Adaptation' was not some common ability that merely increased proficiency with a single specific weapon such as a sword or spear.
It was an extraordinarily rare ability that eliminated the unfamiliarity of wielding any kind of weapon and helped the body rapidly adapt to it.
For Taehu, it was a perfect opportunity for growth whose value could not simply be measured in money.
Until now, Taehu had fought by relying heavily on the power of the high-rank equipment he had restored from discarded items.
Good swords and defensive equipment had made combat considerably easier, but when it came to his own fundamental ability to handle weapons, he had always felt an invisible barrier.
'No matter how good the sword was, my body couldn't completely follow its trajectory.'
Whenever he swung a sword, the angle would be ever so slightly off, and his awkward point of impact would disperse some of the force.
He had compensated by overpowering those flaws with the performance of his equipment, but erasing that sense of unfamiliarity through his own efforts was not easy.
If he acquired this skill, however, everything would change.
No matter what weapon he held, his body would respond naturally as though he had wielded it for years.
It was the perfect opportunity to rebuild the foundation of his combat style from the ground up.
Taehu firmly suppressed the joy boiling inside him and maintained an indifferent expression as though nothing unusual had happened.
He glanced around.
The other Appraisers were still sighing irritably at the piles of garbage in front of them.
Not a single person cared about the old book held by the C-rank Appraiser sitting in the corner.
Taehu quietly rested the book on his lap and considered how to naturally set up the purchase.
He rummaged through the disposal box at his feet and picked out several pieces of scrap equipment that had already been marked for disposal.
A rusty dagger with its hilt completely shattered.
An iron bracer with a gaping hole where its Magic Stone had fallen out.
Then he casually slipped the old book he had just found between the pieces of scrap.
Taehu rose from his seat and approached a man standing to one side of the appraisal room, flipping through a file folder while checking his smartphone.
He was the Guild Liquidation Officer responsible for disposing of the bankrupt guild's equipment.
"Excuse me."
At Taehu's call, the man looked up with an annoyed expression.
"Yes? What is it? Did you happen to find something useful among that mountain of garbage?"
His tired voice practically said not to bother him when there was no money to be made anyway.
"No. Nothing like that. I just have a personal request."
Taehu lightly raised the items in his hands.
A rusty dagger.
A bracer with a hole in it.
A half-burned book.
To anyone looking at them, they were complete garbage that even a scrapyard might refuse to take.
"All of these were appraised and marked for disposal. I was wondering whether I could purchase them personally."
The officer looked Taehu's miscellaneous items up and down in confusion.
"Those? What would you even do with them, Appraiser? They look like garbage without a trace of mana left. Why would you pay for things no one would take even if you gave them away for free?"
"I have a rather unusual hobby."
Taehu continued with an easygoing smile.
"I like collecting old books and decorative antiques to display in my room. Especially things that are old and damaged like these. They have a certain vintage quality to them."
"Vintage, my ass. They're just garbage."
The officer laughed incredulously.
Unfazed, Taehu continued calmly.
"You're going through liquidation proceedings anyway, so you'll be charged for sending those hundreds of discarded items to the Incinerator and having them disposed of. Rather than paying to throw everything away, I thought it might be a little better for your accounting if I paid a modest amount and took a few pieces myself."
They were nothing more than discarded items destined for the Incinerator.
From the officer's perspective, there was no reason whatsoever to refuse someone offering to pay for them.
"Well, if you're that determined, it's fine with me. All I have to do is cross them off the disposal list. You really must have money to burn, though."
"All hobbies are ultimately about personal satisfaction, aren't they?"
The officer nodded at Taehu's relaxed reply.
"Fair enough. If you enjoy it, there's no reason for me to stop you. So how much are you thinking for all three?"
Taehu rubbed his chin, pretending to consider it.
If he offered too little, the man might find haggling over it bothersome.
If he offered too much, spending a large amount on obvious scrap might look suspicious.
"Even by scrap-metal weight, they wouldn't be worth much. How about an even two million won?"
Two million won.
Considering that selling the junk to a scrapyard would probably bring in less than fifty thousand won, the offer was extraordinarily generous even before accounting for the disposal costs it would save.
The exhaustion vanished from the officer's face in an instant.
"Two million? Good grief, if you're willing to pay that much, I'm the one who should be thanking you. I'll process it immediately. It almost feels like I'm getting paid to sell you this stuff."
"For the cost of a hobby, I don't think it's too bad. I'll transfer it now. Please give me the account number."
Taehu took his smartphone from his jacket pocket and quickly opened the banking app.
He entered the guild's dedicated liquidation account number as the officer read it out, then transferred the full two million won without hesitation.
A cheerful notification sounded from his phone.
"Confirmed. As of this moment, those items belong to you, Appraiser Hwang Taehu. Burn them, boil them, do whatever you like with them."
The officer scrawled his signature across a receipt and transfer confirmation form before handing it to Taehu.
Taehu took the document, folded it in half, and slipped it into his pocket.
"Thank you. I'll display them nicely."
When Taehu returned to his desk, complaints were still erupting throughout the appraisal room.
Min Jeongho shook the black dust from his palms and snapped irritably at the person beside him.
"Ugh, let's just go eat lunch early. I've been handling this garbage pile so long I've lost my appetite. Hwang Taehu, don't overdo it either. It's all getting thrown away anyway. Why are you sitting there inspecting everything so carefully?"
"Yes. I'll just finish sorting this and join you."
The others filed out of the appraisal room for lunch like the receding tide, leaving an unusual silence behind.
Taehu quietly looked down at the three objects on his desk.
The rusty dagger and the bracer with a hole through it.
Those two truly were completely useless garbage.
They were pure lumps of scrap metal that did not even trigger his Special Appraisal Window.
Without hesitation, Taehu pushed both into the disposal box beneath his desk.
CLATTER.
Once the pieces of scrap disappeared from sight, only the half-burned old book remained on the desk.
Taehu gently ran his fingers over its rough cover.
A mere two million won.
For an ordinary office worker, it was a substantial sum equivalent to roughly a month's salary.
But compared to the value of the A-rank Passive Skill contained within this book, it was no different from picking up a coin off the street.
Whenever a proper A-rank Skill Book appeared at an auction house, bidding routinely started in the billions of won.
And for a rare, universally useful skill like 'Weapon Adaptation,' sellers could practically name their own price.
That was simply how this market worked. Even someone with tens of billions of won might fail to acquire one because none were available for sale.
Yet Taehu had secured that extraordinary opportunity as his complete legal property for only two million won, right in the dusty corner of an appraisal room.
The corners of his lips curved into a gentle smile.
He had sent his parents three million won for living expenses over the weekend, but before even half a workday had passed, he had obtained a fortuitous opportunity worth billions.
'This is what makes coming to work worthwhile.'
While everyone else complained and grumbled beneath layers of dust, Taehu alone could mine the gold hidden within the piles of garbage.
After checking his surroundings one more time, Taehu opened his bag and carefully slipped the Damaged Combat Record deep inside.
He was itching to infuse it with mana and begin the restoration immediately, but the middle of an appraisal center filled with watchful eyes was no place for that.
He could return home after work, restore it properly, and absorb the skill in complete concentration.
Taehu zipped his bag shut, rose from his chair, and stretched lightly.
Even the stale smell of dust that had made it difficult to breathe that Monday morning now seemed strangely sweet.