003- Portal

This was unbelievable.

Slicing a charging wolf in two wasn't something you could explain away by calling someone a master swordsman.
And the one who had swung the blade was a complete novice who hadn't held a sword once in his 26 years.

It was just like the time he had run at full tilt for 40 minutes. A power that clearly defied the laws of nature was at work.

Huuu.

Taking a step back to avoid the splattering blood, Jinwoo gasped for breath as he stared at the wolf's bisected corpse.
He couldn't see it in the darkness, but strangely, an image of the wolf, split in half, formed in his mind.

The very quality and density of the air felt different from moments ago.
That vivid sensation gradually faded as the wolf's corpse grew cold.
It was as if a switch had been flipped the moment the wolf's soul completely departed its body.

The battle against the two wolves had taken less than a minute.
And from that fight, he had learned one thing.

"Looks like I was a swordsman."

He had discovered a fragment of his past life.

As the excitement of battle subsided, his breathing gradually returned to normal.
The sweat that had beaded on his skin cooled in the chilly night air, rapidly stealing his body heat.
At the same time, Jinwoo was able to regain his composure.

'I have to get out of here.'

He stored the wolf carcasses in his inventory for now.
Picking up the staff he had dropped, he left the area.
There might be more of the wolf pack, and the smell of blood could attract other monsters.

Using the staff to check the ground, he moved farther and farther away.
But he couldn't just wander aimlessly, not knowing what crisis might unfold if he roamed for too long.
There was no right answer.
He had no choice but to rely on luck and intuition.

'A tree.'

Just then, he found a tree.
The forest was full of them, but this one, in particular, caught his attention.
It was enormous.

'The base of this trunk is no joke.'

He took a moment to check. The trunk was so thick it would take several adults with their arms outstretched to encircle it.
He couldn't see how tall it was, but a tree this thick was bound to be incredibly high.

Deciding that wandering further in the darkness was too risky, Jinwoo stopped his search and began to climb.
He fumbled with his hands and feet, gripping the curved parts of the trunk to pull himself up.
He was used to climbing trees; he'd done plenty of it as a kid.
There weren't many ways for a poor child to play. Tree climbing was one of the most fun and exciting games an energetic kid could find.

After climbing to a considerable height, Jinwoo picked a thick branch and sat on it.
He took a rope he had prepared from his inventory, crossed it over his waist and shoulders, and tied it securely to the branch.
He took a sip of water to wet his throat, then pulled out the familiar olive-drab blanket and wrapped himself in it.
He couldn't lie down, so he leaned against the trunk and closed his eyes.

His posture and the situation weren't exactly conducive to a deep, restful sleep.
He just dozed lightly, hoping to at least ease the fatigue in his eyes.
His head bobbed as he drifted in and out of a shallow sleep.
Following a policy of getting as much rest as possible even in this uncomfortable situation, he focused on resting, and before he knew it, dawn broke.

Just as the forest grew dark quickly, it also brightened quickly.
The moment the sun rose and light filtered through the leaves, Jinwoo woke up.
Shaking himself awake, he opened the blanket and looked down at the base of the tree.
And his mind snapped to attention as if he'd been doused in ice water.

Piled at the base of the tree were the carcasses of four wolves.
Each had an arrow stuck in its neck or head.

It seemed yesterday's wolves had companions. Climbing the tree had been a good decision.
The only problem was that there were also enemies that couldn't be stopped by simply climbing a tree.

'What on earth?'

At least five or six question marks popped up in his head.
After experiencing this twice, his bewilderment had only grown.
What did this Elf want? Why was she hovering around him, doing things like this? It felt like he was in some old fairy tale, yet he'd never exchanged a single word with the Elf. All he had done was make eye contact and run away.
He couldn't imagine she felt anything from that brief encounter.
That meant the Elf's actions weren't because of him, but purely a product of her own whim.

'Dammit, is she planning on keeping a pet human or something?'

It was hardly a pleasant thought, but whatever the reason, she hadn't killed him and was even providing him with tangible benefits.
Even if the hand net and fish she'd left were originally his, her killing four wolves and neatly leaving their carcasses for him was a definite gain.

Wolf pelts were worth a good amount, and while wolf meat wasn't as expensive as beef or pork, it was still pricier than synthetic meat substitutes.

Remaining wary, Jinwoo climbed down from the tree and pulled the arrows from the wolf carcasses.
All four had been killed with a single arrow, so the pelts were in the best possible condition. A clean hide like this could even sell for a premium.
'These arrows aren't ordinary, either.'
But the retrieved arrows seemed more valuable than the wolf carcasses.
The shafts, made of some unidentifiable white wood, were light, yet their elasticity rivaled that of rubber. The arrowheads were ordinary iron, but the craftsmanship was exceptional.
Even to Jinwoo, a layman in the art of smithing, the luster was so unique that he could tell they were no ordinary arrows.

He gathered the four white arrows and the wolf carcasses and stored everything in his inventory.
Straightening up, Jinwoo turned his head, scanning a full 360 degrees around him.
As expected, not a single strand of the Elf's hair was in sight.
But just because he couldn't see her didn't mean she wasn't watching him from somewhere.
He could no longer be optimistic and think she had gone off to do her own thing.

'I'll stop worrying about the Elf.'

He knew for certain now. She was beyond his control.
This wasn't the time to waste mental energy on a whimsical Elf, but to do what he had to do.
Escape the Gate as quickly as possible.

'Find the blue portal.'

This was no time for leisurely gathering or hunting.
With no way of knowing how long the Elf's whim would last, he had to return as soon as possible.
The world inside the Gate contained several blue portals whose locations changed at random intervals. Passing through one would allow you to return to your original world.
They were a kind of escape route.
Not only Hunters from Earth, but also other species like Elves, Dwarves, and Orcs had to use the blue portals to return to their own worlds.

He had been looking for a blue portal while on the move, but he hadn't found one yet.
Since they appeared randomly, luck was a major factor.
Still, he'd heard there were many portals, so finding one wasn't too difficult if you searched persistently.
He'd heard a story about a Hunter who had set out to find and count them, managing to discover 50 over ten days.
They weren't as rare as one might think, and with a little bit of luck, one could be found quickly.
But whether you could survive until that little bit of luck arrived was what determined life or death.

A gentle breeze rustled her long, black hair.
Having returned to the lake she used as her base, she passed the time by quietly gazing at the water's surface.
The light from a simple lantern she had set up next to her camp flickered, illuminating the lake.
Just then.
A fellow kinsman's voice came from behind her.

"Why are you playing around in a place like this, second daughter of Garcia?"

Her lips, which had been curved in a pleasant expression until a moment ago, immediately turned down.
"That's my business."

"With such an insincere attitude, it will be hundreds of years before you can restore your family's honor."

"Oh."

"Please be diligent. Fulfill your calling for the Mother World Tree."

The other Elf, not seeming particularly pleased either, continued to nag in a brusque tone.
To these tiresome words, the black-haired woman gave the wisest possible answer.
"I'll handle it."

Her companion clicked their tongue. Tsk.
"I will be watching."

Leaving only those words, the presence vanished.
The woman, now alone, sat on a rock and crossed her white legs.
Resting her chin on her hand, she looked down and saw her own reflection on the placid surface of the water.

Why was she doing this?
Even she didn't know.
It was, quite literally, a whim, but for a whim to be sparked by a mere human was something that had never happened before.
Because it was a first, she was curious.
What was the nature of this whim, and where did it come from?
What was the underlying emotion, and what had her subconscious realized?

Plip.

A fish slapped the surface with its tail fin, sending small ripples across the water.
If not for that fish, the tranquil surface would have remained endlessly calm, without any change.
The black-haired Elf silently watched as the ripples caused by the small tail spread across the entire surface of the water.
It was a night without a single speck of moonlight.

It was the third day since he started searching for a blue portal.
He hadn't found the portal, but Jinwoo was still safe.
One other peculiar thing was that every morning, some kind of prey was left in front of his shelter.

On the first day, it was a deer with half-grown antlers.
On the second day, a small, neat pile of rabbit carcasses.
And on the third day, an entire wild boar had been left for him, already dead.
The prey had all been killed with a single arrow—one of those same white arrows.

'Is that twenty-one of them now?'

He now had 21 white arrows in his inventory.
Not only that, but the carcass of the wild boar he'd dreamed of, and a deer with young antlers.
The meat and hide of the boar were far more expensive, but the deer's velvet antlers were a luxury item of an even higher class.
He'd heard that velvet antlers were often used by the upper class when brewing precious medicinal tonics. It was self-evident that they would be more expensive than a simple food item.

'Her whim is still going.'

Three days had passed, but thankfully, the Elf's whim hadn't changed.
But he couldn't let his guard down. Being a whim, he had no idea when it might suddenly turn.
Feeling like he was wearing a bomb collar with an unknown timer, Jinwoo gritted his teeth and continued his search for a blue portal.
However, he didn't find a blue portal. Instead, what he found was a red portal.

'Damn.'

In the distance, inside the trunk of a tree as large as a house, Jinwoo saw a shimmering red portal and clicked his tongue.
Unlike the blue portals for returning to Earth, red portals led to the next stratum.
From here, the 1st Stratum, passing through the red portal would take him to the 2nd Stratum.
The 2nd Stratum, a place where you had to be at least a D-class Hunter to have a decent chance of survival.
In other words, it was a place the current Jinwoo couldn't even think of entering.

'I'll remember where it is, though.'

Still, he committed the red portal's location to memory.
If the Elf's whim ended and she came to kill him, he would rather dive into the red portal and flee than simply die.
Passing through the portal would drop him at a random location in the 2nd Stratum, allowing him to escape the pursuing Elf.
Whether he could survive in the 2nd Stratum... was a problem to think about then.

'In the end, I have to find a blue portal... huh?'

Just then, he spotted a human silhouette a short distance from the red portal.
He wasn't as surprised as when he'd met the Elf at the stream, because the owner of the silhouette wasn't moving at all.
He was dead.
The species was likely human. Meaning, a Hunter from Earth.