013 - Warning

After arranging a meeting with his handler, Jinwoo visited the Hunter Management Bureau. When he arrived, he found the Bureau in a state of utter chaos.

"Contact all the hospitals and secure as many beds as possible! Find a place for a temporary relief shelter, too!"

"How many cots do we have left? No! That's not enough, get more! What if we have leftovers? We'll be lucky if we have leftovers, you idiot!"

"We're being flooded with supply requests from Hunters! Where's the person in charge? I can't handle all of these alone!"

The Bureau always descended into mayhem whenever a special Gate opened.

A special Gate like the "0th Floor" offered immense rewards, so a huge number of Hunters would attempt it. Consequently, there was a surge in requests for supplies and support, a flood of Hunters looking for teams, and a corresponding increase in the number of injured.

The Bureau had to prepare as much as possible to handle every eventuality.

"Ah, Hunter Jinwoo-nim, you're here! This way, please."

His handler was also rushing around, sweating profusely. Despite the chaos, she led Jinwoo to a small, private room and sat down with him.

"You look busy. Do you really have time for a one-on-one briefing like this?"

"The Mayor instructed us to provide you with every possible convenience, Hunter Jinwoo-nim."

"Well, thank you for that. I'll only ask what I need to so I don't take up too much of your time."

"It's about the 0th Floor, correct?"

"Yes."

Jinwoo began by sharing what he already knew about the 0th Floor. Although he had never experienced it himself, he had gathered as much information as he could from the internet.

The 0th Floor: The Seat of Trial.

It was a solo Gate. Unlike regular Gates where everyone entered the same world, each Hunter was guided to a different world to face their own personal trial.

These trials usually involved facing a large number of enemies, ranging from a small monster settlement to enemies on the scale of a city or even a nation. For a novice Hunter like Jinwoo, who had only recently awakened, the trials were typically on the level of clearing out a goblin tribe or a nest of ratmen in the sewers.

Having to face a village-sized force of enemies alone made the difficulty considerable.

Nevertheless, there were two factors that made Hunters welcome these special Gates.

Can't wait for the 0th Floor rewards. I've been sharpening my blade just for today.

My skills are good, but I wonder if I'll get a really amazing item? A single great item is better than a mediocre skill.

If you search hard enough, you're bound to find something lolololol.

The first, of course, was the reward. In a 0th Floor Gate, a Hunter was guaranteed to awaken at least one new skill or acquire an item worthy of being called a treasure. If they were lucky, they could get both.

While Jinwoo could rapidly acquire skills by cutting down Black Flames, that wasn't the case for ordinary Hunters. Many Hunters would go in and out of Gates more than ten times just to awaken a single new skill. The terrifying part was that even then, there was no guarantee they would gain anything.

But by clearing a trial on the 0th Floor, they were guaranteed at least one reward—either a skill or a treasure of equivalent value. It was enough to make anyone's eyes glaze over with greed.

And on top of that…

Everyone, be careful. If you die instantly, you can't escape, so don't get too complacent.

I heard people still die every year, even though you can escape just by giving up.

If the difficulty is too high, you'd give up quickly, but if it's just barely manageable, you can't bring yourself to quit and end up dying suddenly? Anyway, be careful.

In special Gates, including the 0th Floor, a Hunter could immediately return to Earth just by choosing to forfeit the trial. This meant they didn't have to wander around searching for a blue portal like in a regular Gate.

In other words, the risk was close to zero. You could enter, check out the trial, and if it seemed too dangerous, you could just give up. You wouldn't get any skills or items, but at least you wouldn't die—as long as you weren't killed instantly before you could even react.

‘Though they say there are fatalities every time.’

Even with a safety net like an emergency escape, people still died in special Gates. So he couldn't be completely at ease, but the mortality rate was significantly lower than in regular Gates. In fact, you had a higher chance of dying in a traffic accident.

Because of this, some Hunters ignored the dangerous and unpredictable regular Gates, choosing to only venture out when a special Gate opened. The number of these "specialty Hunters" was by no means small, and every time a special Gate appeared, the Bureau's workload would increase exponentially as people who normally worked regular jobs all came rushing in at once.

"Wow, there's almost nothing left for me to tell you," the handler said, impressed, after Jinwoo finished explaining everything he knew.

"I just looked it up online. Was all the information correct?"

"Yes. Nothing was wrong, but there are a few more things you should be careful about. Hunters who enter special Gates don't only die from being killed instantly. There are cases where they can't escape because they've been poisoned by some strange substance or fallen under a mental magic spell."

"That's definitely scary."

"For example, you need to be careful even in a goblin tribe. You can assume that almost every goblin tribe has a shaman, and you'll be in big trouble if it's a high-level shaman who can use mental magic."

"How can I defend against that?"

"For lower-ranking Hunters, mental magic is a catastrophe, so your only option is to be observant… If you want to be completely safe, just turn back the moment you spot a shaman. You don't even need to be hypnotized; if you get hit with a simple sleep spell, it's over."

"I'll keep that in mind."

"Another thing to watch out for is…"

The handler pointed out several more precautions and case studies. Jinwoo listened intently, mulling over each point and organizing the warnings in his head.

However, no matter how much he heard, he could never be fully prepared. The trials handed down on the 0th Floor were different for every Hunter, and there had never been a single identical case. In the end, what mattered most was one's ability to adapt and react to the situation.

"Prepare yourself thoroughly, and I'll say it again: if it gets even a little bit dangerous, escape immediately! Your life is the most important thing."

"Don't worry. My life is the most precious thing to me, too."

In Jinwoo's case, especially, he didn't need to risk his life for a new skill. As long as he could find and destroy the Cores of Erosions, he could gain new abilities.

‘Which is more dangerous? Wandering outside the city looking for Erosion Cores, or a special Gate?’

The conditions and environments were so different that a simple comparison was impossible. Still, he knew he didn't need to bet his life on the rewards of a special Gate.

"I'll be back."

"I wish you the best of luck. If it's dangerous, please! Please run away!" the handler emphasized one last time as she saw him off.

---

Jinwoo didn't enter the special Gate that day. He spent the next few days gathering more information and even contacted Chartia to hear her advice.

Beyond that, he maintained his body in peak condition by managing his rest and diet, and he honed his senses until they were as sharp as a newly polished blade.

Three days later, all his preparations were complete.

‘Let's go. Stay sharp.’

Unlike regular Gates, which dropped you in a random location in a primeval forest, the 0th Floor dropped you right into enemy territory. That meant he had to switch his mind and body into combat mode before even entering.

The next moment, Jinwoo was in another world, not on Earth.

[0th Floor: The Seat of Trial]
[Annihilate the seed of the long-eared ones.]

He was in a dark forest. A forest at night, after the sun had set.

Within the forest stood a mansion of considerable size. It wasn't built in a clearing but was an astonishing structure skillfully woven into the trees of the forest. It was an architectural style he had never seen before.

The mansion was engulfed in flames, illuminating the dark woods.

‘…This is too gruesome.’

Jinwoo immediately ducked down, his brow furrowed at the scene before him. Fragments of corpses were scattered everywhere—horrific bodies that had been clawed, torn, and chewed apart.

Only the corpse lying right in front of him was relatively intact, and even its right arm had been ripped off, exposing the raw cross-section of bone and muscle.

Looking at the corpse's head, he saw long, pointed ears.

‘Elves… Is this a world where Elves live?’

The trial he had been given was to annihilate the long-eared ones. In other words, he was supposed to subjugate the group of Elves here.

If it were an intact Elven community, the difficulty would have been absurd. He would have escaped without a second thought.

But the mansion was already consumed by a fiery demon, and the Elves were all dead.

‘Is there anything left for me to do?’

He couldn't see a single living Elf. Forcing down the urge to vomit at the horrific sight, Jinwoo expanded his senses and counted the Blue Flames.

The mansion was filled with Blue Flames, but they weren't Elven.

They were bipedal monsters with the heads and fur of wolves. The species commonly known as werewolves.

There were dozens in the mansion alone… no, he could feel countless more flames in the nearby mountains. A pack of werewolves, numbering in the hundreds at least, was in the process of completely annihilating a single Elven estate.

‘I'm not getting involved.’

If he needlessly intervened, he would be in danger too. It seemed the trial would resolve itself if he just stayed put, so Jinwoo covered his mouth with his hand and hid in the shadows of the forest.

Just then, a single Blue Flame caught his attention. Even though he could sense over a hundred flames in the vicinity, this one stood out because it was exceptionally small and faint.

It was a small child. Was she four or five years old? Her black hair was so long it nearly reached her feet, dragging along the ground.

The child couldn't open her eyelids, and blood was trickling from both of her closed eyes. It looked like she had been injured very recently.

With her unseeing eyes, the child was fumbling on the ground, searching for something.

"&@#, &@#."

She kept muttering a word he couldn't understand as she continued to feel around on the ground.

What could that word mean? He didn't know a lick of Elvish, so he had no idea. Still, with foreign languages, you could often guess the meaning from gestures and context.

Behind the child stood a werewolf that looked to be at least three meters tall. It was looking at the child, licking its chops.

"&@#, &@#."

The blind child, oblivious to the danger, just kept crawling on the ground. Even if she had noticed, it was unlikely a child of four or five could do anything against a three-meter-tall wolf monster.

Jinwoo had decided not to interfere, to wait until the trial was over, but…

Before he knew it, he was running.

He had imagined it. In this situation, he imagined what a blind child would be so desperately searching for, and he just couldn't stay still.

Reason warned him of the danger, but his heart pushed him forward.

He tried to pull a sword from his inventory as he ran. But no sword appeared. Not the white jewel sword, not even the standard-issue iron sword—nothing came out.

‘What's wrong with my inventory!? Is it broken?’

He panicked at this unprecedented event, but he didn't have time to dwell on it. Fortunately, the ground was littered with swords the Elves had used to fight back.

While running, he pulled a longsword that was stuck in the ground. The moment he gripped it, it fit into his hand so perfectly it felt as familiar as his own body.

'Shadow Sword.'

The sword vanished into the darkness, concealing its presence. Although the sword's presence was hidden, Jinwoo's was not, and the werewolf turned to look at him. The beast roared and swiped its claws.

The longsword emerged from the shadows and severed its arm.

K-huheong!?

The werewolf was completely stunned by the undetectable attack that seemed to come from a blind spot. In that opening, Jinwoo thrust the recovered sword into the beast's core, piercing its Blue Flame.

Fwoosh.

The flame shattered and was absorbed into the sword. The werewolf, its body impaled, collapsed with a thud.

…He'd done it. All he had to do was stay quiet, but he had needlessly stepped forward and exposed himself. The nearby werewolves all turned their heads toward Jinwoo in unison.

Jinwoo's chest heaved as he breathed heavily.

[WARNING]
[Annihilate the seed of the long-eared ones.]

‘Werewolves have long ears too. Doesn't that count for the trial?’

[WARNING]

It was a completely useless argument.

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