After parting from the Dokkaebi, I went to the infirmary where Suk Hayan was. I dropped by the 1st floor's convenience store on the way and bought coffee that supposedly had very little sugar. Should I say it's a patient-visitation present, or bribe?
Since she was going to become an unlimited treasure chest pouring out gold, I should treat her well.
"Is Suk Hayan-ssi here?"
At my question, the infirmary doctor pointed to a room on one side. After writing in the guestbook, I went into the room and saw Suk Hayan lying down on a bed. So she hadn't woken up yet. I pulled a chair over and sat down near the window.
The weather was nice today too. A bit later, it would become seriously hot. This year, I didn't have to worry about the electric bill and could leave the air conditioner on. The company-paid electric bill was the best.
'Since it's the summer 5 years ago.'
Even though I had many things to do here and there, it hadn't been even one week since I returned to the past. Somehow, I was really busy. It was all because that guy Yoohyun suddenly tried to confine me… or actually, it was my title's fault.
'As soon as training is done, I really will live carefree.'
I had regressed, thinking that I would quietly live, receiving help from my amazing dongsaeng, so how did it become like this?
But a big fish was hanging right in front of my nose, so I couldn't just not cast a fishing rod. And the means were good so if you said the probably of catching was about 90%, how could I just watch?
Seeing is wanting. It was impossible before throwing away worldly desires and achieving spiritual enlightenment.
Still, you had to be reasonably greedy.
'Let's see, they said that we'll have a practical exercise in the in the guild tomorrow. Will they use real monsters there?"
The targets of Association training practical exercises were people who dressed up as monsters. Of course, they also didn't give out real weapons. But, if it was someplace like Haeyeon, they would probably have real monsters and real weapons, and,
Even go to a dungeon.
'It would be my first dungeon attack after the regression.'
Of course, it would be an F- or E-like low-ranking dungeon and there would be powerful guards, so I wouldn't need to do much. Maybe A-Rank Hunter Kim Jiyeon, who was nominated to be Yerim's sunbae, would follow us.
'I'll finally be able to use my skill on Yerim and Myeongwoo.'
I had to use it before we went into a dungeon, to be most effective, so I had put it off until now. The problem was that the skill duration time was 3 days.
For Yerim, she would keep on going into dungeons with the guild's support, so it didn't matter, but what should I do about Myeongwoo? Blowing off two days seemed like a waste, and going once into a low-ranking dungeon didn't seem like enough experience to learn a skill.
'I want to make him go into another dungeon before the 3 days pass… Do I have to personally find one? If I ask Kim Sunghan to handle the attack, wouldn't he help?'
Since it's your grandfather's wish, listen to it just once.
While I was thinking this and that, Suk Hayan woke up.
"Are you alright?"
"...Han Yoojin-ssi?"
Suk Hayan raised her upper body up and sat, looking at me with squinting eyes. Why were her eyes… ah.
"Here are your glasses."
After taking and putting on her glasses, she gave a small smile.
"Thank you. It seems like you were caught up in the Dokkaebi's prank because of me."
"No, it was the Dokkaebi's fault."
"I even prepared Oochunghwangsimhwan[1], but I didn't know they would appear so fast. And they were scarier than I had thought."
Suk Hayan slightly shook her shoulders. Well, it was enough to shock someone. I gave the coffee to her. The eyes behind the glasses lenses bent into slits and she smiled.
"The Dokkaebi went back."
Probably. They might actually be around here somewhere.
At my words, Suk Hayan was surprised.
"Already?"
"Dokkaebi, your fashion sense sucks. Blue clothes with a red mask, is it a five-year-old's coloring book?"
"…E-excuse me?"
"Since it's quiet, they must have gone."
If they were here, there was no way they wouldn't have burst in with something with that personality. At the very least, they would have ripped a bald spot on my head or something.
"What I said just now is absolutely a secret from the Dokkaebi."
As soon as I earnestly spoke, Suk Hayan snorted and laughed.
"I'm regretful. There were a lot of things I wanted to ask. Hunters try not to expose their skills, especially special skills. A case like the Dokkaebi is rare."
That was true. Even speaking of me, I was hiding mine.
"Instead, can I give a different offer?"
"An offer?"
She had an expression full of anticipation.
"Are you going to enter my lab? Or a collaboration?"
"I guess it would be close to a collaboration. But it's not a collaboration between labs. What I'm going to provide is, none other than information."
"By information, do you mean dungeons?"
"Yes."
Suk Hayan had a gleam in her eyes as if she had expected it.
"As expected, you have a special route to get information. You know too much for it to just be the results of personal investigation."
"I guess you can say that I have one."
To be specific, it was expected for that to appear.
"Like we spoke of in the classroom, the most lacking thing right now is data about dungeons. I will provide that for Suk Hayan-ssi."
"Good, then a collaboration. I was wondering if I had to go abroad."
"Let's do 5:5 for the stakes in the outputs. Do you perhaps need something like an investment as well?"
Even though right now I was poor.
"No, I don't need it yet. More than anything, collecting data would probably cost the most money. Thinking of what to research first, my heart is already beating fast."
She said extremely excitedly. What do you mean 'what first'.
"How about researching the laws of dungeon formation first?"
"The laws of dungeon formation?"
"Yes. It's a field I've also investigated a little in. It seems like there are a type of rules for dungeon formation. It's possible to be able to partially figure out even a dungeon's internal information according to mainly formation time, surrounding environment, location, etc."
At my words, Suk Hayan's expression became even more earnest than before.
"If that's true, through reverse engineering, it might be possible to predict when and where a dungeon will appear."
"Yes? Um, probably?"
Even 5 years later, formation location and time couldn't be predicted.
Wait, was it really that they couldn't be? Maybe they weren't. At Suk Hayan's words, I became suspicious.
The time when Dungeon Persons[2] in the U.S. that Suk Hayan became affiliated to was able to rake in immense profit in royalties through discovering the laws of dungeon formation, was 3 years later.
After that, the accuracy of the laws increased, but they couldn't give new research results.
Just looking at that, it might have been that they couldn't.
'4 years from now, the White House and leading facilities moved.'
The time when, as the number of dungeons increased and ranks rose, the staturation speed also became faster and the amount of damage started to get bigger, it was at that period. Of course, since it was when something like that was happening, moving to a safer place wasn't strange.
But if my memory was right, even up to 5 years later, the leading facilities in the U.S. hadn't once suffered a dungeon break.
'Instead of couldn't, or didn't… did they hide it?'
No way. Despite everything, they wouldn't have.
But, if they really did hide it. So that they could announce that they could know a dungeon's formation ahead of time, after various countries' governments, especially those of the main rival countries of the U.S., were driven into a corner.
They would have gotten a much greated profit, than if they had announced it during a peaceful period.
'…I don't think they would do something crazy like that. It's something like profiting off war or acting like they can't see the damage from dungeons.'
Even one year, no half a year, later was to the extent of being able to seize China. Russia also wasn't in a good situation.
They would have gone wild playing the role of world police that they had lost for a while, by saying they would protect you from dungeons.
"Suk Hayan-ssi."
"Yes?"
"I'll do my upmost to help you, so please successfully research in Korea."
"If I can, I would be happy too."
Would it be okay with this young lady by herself? Should I catch some researchers to bring over from somewhere? Who were the famous people in dungeons studies again? They had to be ones with a strong sense of justice or morals, too. Or a type who would be satisfied with just being able to research.
"Then, I will contact you again next week. Let's speak about more details then. Can you tell me your contact information?"
"Ah, yes. Please tell me yours as well."
After exchanging contact information with her, I went outside.
My head was a little full because unexpected guess was added, but it was something that hadn't happened yet. I just had to change it.
And I was mostly done preparing for Suk Hayan with just the Dokkaebi, so there wasn't much more I needed to do.
'Should I put the greed for royalties on hold?'
I didn't really need that money; let's do something nice for people. Because the cheap American bastards would get their feelings a little hurt, I'll just release it.
…No, let's get royalties from just the developed nations kicking up a fuss. Especially getting some from Japan would be okay. It wouldn't hurt my conscience to get twice as much.
Second day of novice Hunter training.
After an additional theory class under someone other than Suk Hayan, practice was held with real monsters, as expected.
They were Tooth Moles caught from an F-Rank dungeon, and Yerim dealt with them quickly and Yoo Myeongwoo trembled, about to cry, and only drove in a knife in one hour.
And I was pretending a little to be weak, when Yerim broke the partition and intruded, freezing the Tooth Moles. The problem was that they were frozen so solid that it was harder to kill them. Sawing at an ice chunk with a knife was really hard.
Then the third day.
While the Dokkaebi hadn't come looking for me yet, finally we were able to go into a dungeon. We went to the maintenance room early in the morning.
"Rented equipment must absolutely be returned after the dungeon attack, and in the case of loss or damage, you must compensate for them. But Hunter Bak Yerim has no obligation to compensate."
The person in charge of the maintenance room said. At 'compensate', Yoo Myeongwoo, who was feeling the weapons that were displayed, snatched his hand away. Really, that timid character of his needed to be fixed a little. Then again, once he got the SS-Rank skill, he would probably get self-confident soon. Like when strength automatically fills your shoulders when you drive[3] a sports car.
'Should I slowly use the My Brat skill?'
Towards Yerim, who was swinging around a battle-axe at a display stand that was said to be prepared specially for the S-Rank-nim, I used the single skill growth focus. Then, soon, the Message Window popped… popped… why wasn't it appearing?
'...Did something like a system error occur?'
What was it? I was wondering if I should try again when finally the window popped up.
[My Brat is the Best(L) Applied to single skill growth focus target Bak Yerim!
Unacquired Optimized Skills
Pale Rain(S)
Frozen Earth(S)
Cold Resistance(A)
Mana Up(B)
Other Recommended Skills
Ice Attribute Reinforcement(A)
Flame Resistance(A)
Mana Up(A)
Agility Up(A)
Good Effect Coldpack(B)
The rest has been omitted
Excluding those, choosing a random[4] water pump skill is possible]
…Excuse me, person who made the system? There's a typo here. Instead of 'water pump' isn't it 'random'?[5] And it overlaps with 'random'[6].
'This wouldn't be writing down the skill explanation windows in real time, right?'
If it was, then I would understand the explanations being lacking, but no way. Still, with the long time for it to pop up and even having a typo, I felt odd. Was it a real god? Or something else?
Though, even if I knew, nothing would change. Even before this, and for 5 years after this, many people studied and researched diligently about what the system was, but what was revealed was insignificant. It was a terrible existence that completely turned the world on its head, so it wasn't strange to say that you couldn't find a single hair with humans' ability.
Still, seeing how there was a typo, it didn't seem completely omnipotent. I wanted to tell the cultists who argued that dungeon and Awakened People were given by their god.
'Let's finally use the skill.'
First of all, there were four optimized skills. I didn't know what the difference was from the initial optimized skills, but there were two S-Ranks so I didn't need to hesitate for long.
Pale Rain. This would probably be better. I had a hunch that Frozen Earth would be better to get after achieving Cold Resistance. Since I couldn't see the explanations, I should go safely first.
When I chose Pale Rain, a Message Window appeared again.
[Target Bak Yerim's Pale Rain(S) Achievement Conditions
Attain Level 10(Progress 1/10)]
It seemed like when the condition was fulfilled, achievement was possible. The condition was really easy.
Usually, you earned one skill with every 10 levels, so it was the same as having a basic condition.
Then, I used the skill on Myeongwoo. All sorts of miscellaneous skills came up but since there was only one SS, I didn't have to think about it.
When I directly chose the Gold Forge's Owner skill, the Message Window with the condition popped up shortly.
[Target Yoo Myeongwoo's Gold Forge's Owner(SS) Acheivement Conditions
Attain Level 10(Progress 1/10)
Sharpening the blade of 10,000 bladed tools(Progress 17/10,000)]
...There's a light at the end of labor. Our Myeongwoo, good luck[7].