“Wow, where did you even find a place like this?”
“How did you get the Gate Clearing Rights?”
The party members asked Choi Yoon-seo after entering the Gate.
Gate Clearing Rights.
South Korea had relatively few Gates because the country itself was small.
Unless someone belonged to an organization like a Guild, obtaining the right to clear one was not easy.
That was why most Hunters joined Guilds.
And those who could not?
“I’m Choi Yoon-seo, remember? I used to be a Team Leader in the Baeksu Guild.”
They either cleared Open-Access Gates periodically released by the Association, or used their own connections to purchase the clearing rights to Gates that fell into a gray area.
The risks were far greater, but since they did not have to hand over a cut to a Guild, it was also a way to make a great deal of money.
If you wanted to form a private party, this much was necessary.
“Oh, Yoon-seo. You finally scored one. You always brought us garbage Gates before.”
“Garbage?!”
“They were. They were either way too dangerous for the rewards, or barely even worth calling Gates. I was starting to think we should disband the party and look for a Guild….”
“How the hell did you find a gold mine like this?”
The party members looked around the Gate.
This Gate was different from all the ones they had entered before.
Calling it a gold mine was not an exaggeration.
A C-rank Gate.
The difficulty was manageable.
“The Monsters here are Orcs. They’re annoying, but we can handle them, and there aren’t any major gimmicks.”
“More importantly….”
Now they understood why Choi Yoon-seo had unnecessarily gone out of the way to hire a Porter.
“There’s a mine.”
A mine.
Hunters had several ways to earn money.
There were the rewards for successfully clearing a Gate, and the Items that could rarely be obtained.
But the largest source of income by far was Mana Stones.
Mana Stones obtained from hunting Monsters were the new energy source of this era.
However, hunting Monsters was not the only way to obtain Mana Stones.
“A Gate with a Mana Stone Mine is the kind of place major Guilds usually fight over, isn’t it?”
There was also the rare possibility of mining them from a Mana Stone Mine.
“I told you, I’m Choi Yoon-seo. Anyway, all we have to do is hunt a reasonable number of Monsters, collect the Mana Stones, and leave.”
“Ooh!”
The party members’ expressions brightened.
“And… hey, Porter!”
Swoosh.
“Do you understand how lucky you are now?”
He was only a D-rank Hunter.
Normally, someone of his rank would never even be allowed inside a mining Gate.
Ordinarily, even a Porter like him would still take home a fair number of Mana Stones.
But—
‘The idiot doesn’t even know what Contribution-Based Distribution means.’
Inside a Gate, contribution ultimately meant one thing.
‘Monster hunting.’
And there was no way a mere D-rank Hunter could fight Orcs.
‘He can’t find out until the very end. That way, he’ll keep picking everything up diligently.’
With that thought, Choi Yoon-seo looked at Kim Si-hyeon.
But Kim Si-hyeon himself did not seem particularly impressed.
“Is that so?”
“…Is that so?”
“I’ve never really been lucky before.”
‘What?’
Choi Yoon-seo felt an inexplicable sense of discomfort.
‘Why is a D-rank acting this calm even though he only got in because he joined a party?’
Judging by the fact that he did not even know what Contribution-Based Distribution was, this had to be his first Gate.
For some reason, Kim Si-hyeon’s composure irritated Choi Yoon-seo.
Choi Yoon-seo tossed him the Subspace Backpack as though throwing it at him.
“Stop pretending to be tough when you’ll start trembling the second you see an Orc. Anyway, that Subspace Backpack costs over five hundred million won, so take good care of it. Just get ready to fill it to the brim with Mana Stones.”
Even then, Choi Yoon-seo had no doubt that they would be able to take advantage of Kim Si-hyeon.
“One Orc heading your way!”
“Okay!”
CHWIIIK!
‘So that is an Orc.’
An Orc was a humanoid Monster with green skin.
It had enormous tusks and bulging muscles.
In some ways, it resembled the Dark Elves.
“Ugh! This pig bastard is too strong!”
“Orcs have always had ridiculous destructive power! Hold on! I’ll help you in a second!”
This was different from the Dark Elves.
It felt completely different from my first Gate.
Most importantly—
“Haaaaah!”
For the first time in my life, I was watching other Hunters hunt Monsters.
Choi Yoon-seo’s party consisted of six people besides me.
“Die! Die, you damn pig!”
Choi Yoon-seo fought with a sword.
There were other Hunters carrying shields, and a man who appeared to be an Archer.
And finally—
“Is your Skill ready yet?!”
“Fireball!”
There was the female Hunter standing with me at the very back of the formation.
A Mage.
‘So that is magic.’
Crimson flames flickered above the woman’s hands before shooting straight toward the Orc.
BOOM!
They exploded against it.
I had never seen anything like that before.
A strange flow.
Compression and explosion.
But—
“Aaaah!”
“The Orc bastard is still alive!”
The destructive power was weaker than I expected.
If anything, the burning Orc seemed even angrier as it charged toward the female Mage.
“Don’t come closer! Stay away!”
The female Mage screamed in fear.
‘This could be dangerous.’
I had seen countless people panic while fighting Zombies.
If they stayed calm, they could usually survive somehow.
But once panic set in, they often let Zombies tear chunks of flesh from them.
Worse, they could drag their companions into danger as well.
So—
CLANG!
The blade I drew collided with the grotesque weapon in the Orc’s hands, sending sparks flying.
CHWIIIEEEK!
The Orc snorted as though frustrated that its prey had slipped away at the last moment.
It immediately tried to swing its bizarre weapon as though to split my body in half.
But—
Chwik?
The creature seemed to realize that something was wrong.
A thin horizontal line had appeared across the Orc’s neck.
THUMP.
The Orc’s head fell.
The female Mage’s eyes widened in shock.
“Yu-bin! Are you okay?”
After finishing off the remaining Orcs, Choi Yoon-seo hurried over and shouted toward the Mage.
“Huh? Uh… y-yeah. Thanks to….”
But the Mage was looking at me.
“You’re not hurt, are you?”
“I’m not.”
“Your name was Kim Si-hyeon, right? Porter!”
If this had been the Special Division, this would have been the point where I received praise.
But the words that came out of Choi Yoon-seo’s mouth were completely unexpected.
“Who told you that you could act on your own?”
“……?”
“You nearly got Yu-bin hurt because of that!”
I could not understand.
The female Mage had clearly been in danger.
Was I supposed to do nothing in that situation?
“If you’re a Porter, then act like one and stay still. Don’t stick your nose where it doesn’t belong!”
“…But how did you kill it?”
One of the other party members approached and asked.
Before I could answer, Choi Yoon-seo snorted.
“We already wore it down. He just got lucky and hit it with a blind swing. You know how stupid Orcs are.”
“For that, the cut looks…….”
“Enough. Let’s move.”
Choi Yoon-seo spoke without even glancing at the Orc I had killed.
“We’ve probably cleared most of the Orcs near the mine by now….”
The party had regained its composure and started moving again.
“Now let’s go get the main course.”
Soon, we arrived at the entrance of a cave that radiated a deep blue light.
I could feel several people looking at me.
The female Mage.
And the other party member who had mentioned the cut on the Orc’s neck.
‘Why are they staring at me like that?’
Both kept glancing my way.
The Mage looked like she wanted to say something, while the other party member seemed to suspect that I was hiding something.
‘It doesn’t matter. I’m only here to make money.’
Once this part-time job ended, I would probably never see these people again.
Whatever they thought while looking at me did not matter.
“Wow… damn, this place is loaded with Mana Stones.”
Once we reached the deeper part of the cave, the party members each took out a pickaxe and began mining Mana Stones.
“Porter! What are you doing?”
“Where is my pickaxe?”
At that, Choi Yoon-seo smiled at me as though I had said something absurd.
“You think you can mine Mana Stones with your strength? You’re D-rank. What are you planning to do? See the Mana Stones on the ground?”
Mana Stones the party members had broken loose with their pickaxes were scattered across the ground.
“Put all of those into the backpack.”
“That is all I need to do?”
“What else can you do? Hurry up and pack them.”
I see.
“Understood.”
So that was all I needed to do.
I was certain now.
‘They are good people.’
Choi Yoon-seo’s words were a little rough, but they were clearly a good person.
Not only had Choi Yoon-seo readily hired me when I was looking for work, but all I had to do was pick up stones lying on the ground.
Even the warning earlier, after I killed the Orc, must have been because Choi Yoon-seo was worried that a D-rank Hunter like me might get hurt.
‘I should work hard.’
The people in the Special Division.
Choi Yoon-seo.
This world really was full of good people.
Rustle. Rustle.
I began putting the Mana Stones scattered across the ground into the backpack.
Every single one.
How much time passed?
CLANG! CLANG!
The cheerful sound of pickaxes rang through the cave while I repeated the simple task of picking up Mana Stones from the ground.
“Whew! I’m dying. This really is insane. There are so many Mana Stones.”
Choi Yoon-seo threw the pickaxe aside.
“By the way, is that bastard keeping up properly?”
After mining while staring only ahead, Choi Yoon-seo finally turned around.
“Gah! Fuck, you scared me!”
Choi Yoon-seo met my eyes from point-blank range, fell backward, and cursed.
“What the hell! Why are you here?”
“……? Didn’t you tell me to pick up the Mana Stones?”
“No, I mean…!”
Choi Yoon-seo’s eyes swept behind me.
“……! There are no Mana Stones on the ground?”
The floor was spotless.
“What? What happened?”
The party members farther ahead approached after hearing the commotion.
“The Mana Stones… are gone.”
“Huh?”
“The Mana Stones are gone! All the ones we’ve mined until now!”
“That can’t be!”
The flustered party members began raising their voices as they looked around the floor.
I stared at them in confusion.
“If you mean the Mana Stones, they are here.”
“Huh?”
I turned the backpack upside down for them.
RATTLE-RATTLE-RATTLE!
Mana Stones poured out endlessly.
“Ah, and…….”
Leaving the mountain of Mana Stones in front of them, I walked away for a moment and brought something else over.
Drag. Drag.
“Kyaaaah! An Orc…!”
“No, wait! That’s…….”
“A sack made from Orc hide?”
I showed them the green sack with Mana Stones protruding from the top.
“I collected every Mana Stone without leaving a single one behind.”
They had been mining so slowly, and at some point the backpack stopped accepting any more, so I had skinned the corpse of the Orc we killed earlier and quickly fashioned a sack from its hide.
‘But why do they all look pale?’
Was there some kind of problem?
“No way…….”
The female Mage muttered.
“No way!”
“I would prefer it if you told me what the problem is.”
“You were carrying all of this that lightly? A Subspace Backpack… doesn’t reduce the weight, does it?”
Ah.
If she meant the backpack filled with Mana Stones—
“It was definitely a little heavy.”
It had been heavy.
But still manageable.
Lately, no matter how much weight I lifted, it barely felt like training.
This had actually given my body a decent amount of stimulation.
“C-crazy…….”
Hmm.
For some reason, the way they were looking at me was starting to resemble the way the people in the Special Division looked at me.