Following the Association’s guidance and the provided supply for first-time Hunter, he finally reached the gathering point of a local F-rank Gate where there are already some Hunters waiting around the place. He didn’t get any real training besides the minimum basic with his chosen weapon so that he won’t get himself hurt with his inexperience. Besides, he only has a few weeks left of lifesaving so he couldn’t stall any longer.
This is one of the marked Gates that the Association allows for new Hunters to train and familiarize themselves with what’s beyond the Gate. Often with at least a D-rank Hunter accompanied to avoid unwanted scenario.
Because apparently, F-rank Gates being secretly the most dangerous is a tried and misfortunately true thing that the Association is aware of. How F-rank Gates can often connect to much deadlier or random space due to its own instability.
This can be either a lucky encounter or a death sentence although it isn’t a certain thing. But it happened enough times that the Hunter Association acknowledged it and take proper measure regardless of the measured danger.
Fortunately for Jihoon, he doesn’t need any fortune to befall him to change his life or gamble with uncertainty since he has Song Magic in his disposal. He couldn’t speak for the many who wanted to become protagonist of their own story, however.
The Hunter assigned to overseer this Gate stepped in front of the said Gate. The certification of D-rank worn on his neck spoke his authority in place of him right now.
"Listen up, greenhorns. This ain't some lark in the park we're heading into. The Gates don't care about your unlucky hides or what silly notions you had about seeking glory and adventure." He jabbed the hafted end of his hammer into the hard-packed dirt for emphasis. "First rule - you follow my lead while we're inside without question, understand? Hesitation or playing the hero will just get you and your mates killed quicker than a blink."
The veteran Hunter slowly paced in front of them, his armor clanking with each heavy step. "Second rule - you don't take anything other than what I specifically allow. No grabbing any shiny trinkets or "souvenirs" that catch your foolish eyes. More trouble than it's worth, and it ain't worth dying over."
He stopped and fixed them with a steely glare. "And the third, hopefully unnecessary, rule? You run at the first sign of anything that punches above our weight. I'm not risking my neck for greenhorns too drunk on fantasy stories to use their pain stems."
The D-rank Hunter slowly looked over each of the initiates, letting the weight of his words sink in. He could see the youthful eagerness and pavado wavering into nervous uncertainty on some faces. “Good...a dose of reality may just save their skins.” His thought wrote on his face was not too apparent to Jihoon himself.
"We're going in, killing any riffraff in a clean sweep, and coming straight back out. Not one inch more, not one second longer than I deem necessary. You lot are here to get a feel for what you've signed on for. Any delusions of being some big damn heroes can wait for after you've grown a few more years on your baby-faced bones."
Rapping his knuckles against his peastplate, the grizzled warrior shook his head. "The Gates don't discern between pave idiots or honest fighters. They'll chew you up and spit out your badges just the same if you let them. Remember that well before we start..."
With a grunt of finality, the D-rank Hunter turned and began making his way towards the subtly shimmering Gateway, leaving the newly-blooded F-ranks to exchange uneasy looks before reluctantly following his lead into the unknown. Jihoon looked toward his halberd and hand-axe, and he already started to imagine the expense that is going to be required to clean the blood out of.
He basically dressed in bare minimum for Gate-delving for any F-rank. Stab-proof vest, checked. Flashlight, checked. Emergency tools, checked. Some F-rankers also pought with them silenced pistols and he starts to wonder if this trip is going to end smoothly at all.
As he inspects the Hunters that will be following, his mind registered a familiar face amidst the crowd. Yet before he could verify, he was immediately hurried to enter the gate before anything else.
As the light piefly overwhelmed his vision as he enters, the other side of the Gate is… a haunted mansion? He expected caves or middle of a forest but this is entirely new to him. Actually everything is new to him even.
The team cautiously fanned out as they materialized inside the decrepit mansion's entrance hall. Jihoon gripped his halberd tightly, senses on high alert for any signs of movement amidst the cobweb-draped chandeliers and rotting curtains.
"Spread out in pairs, but stay within line of sight," the grizzled D-rank leader growled. "This place reeks of an ambush. Keep those blades ready."
No sooner were the words out of his mouth than a shrill, inhuman screech echoed through the shadowy corridors. A skittering, multi-legged shape lunged from a cracked wall portal, mandibles gnashing wildly. The D-rank was already swinging his warhammer in a deadly arc, pulverizing the creature into an oozing spatter.
"Here they come! To me, you maggots!" He roared, falling back to a defensive position as the first trickle became a flood of swarming, misshapen horrors. Spindly limbs and hooked appendages seemed to coalesce from every shadow and cranny.
Jihoon felt his newly issued silenced pistol gripped in a clammy hand as a wave of gnashing, snapping things bore down on them. He fumbled for his halberd just as something sharp and bony raked across his thigh.
"Keep them at range! Volley fire!" bellowed the D-rank, his hammer crushing another lunging fiend with sickening crunch. "You pansies want to live? Then stab anything that ain't us!"
Gunfire erupted in controlled bursts, felling the first few ranks of the horde. But for every abomination that fell, more surged forward in their undulating, shrieking mass. Jihoon's finger tightened on the trigger, dropping one...two...before having to desperately fend off a trio of jagged appendages slashing towards his face with the shaft of his halberd.
"Fall back in pairs!" Their leader was forcing an orderly retreat, smashing a path clear for the F-ranks to funnel into a hallway choked with depis. "We need room to maneuver! Concentrate fire!"
Jihoon felt hands shoving him urgently as he stumbled back under the relentless onslaught. Weapon fire continued to strobe through the gloom as the D-rank bought them precious seconds to regroup. High-pitched shrieks echoed from countless nightmare forms.
"Stand firm, greenhorns!" Their leader roared, smashing another abomination to pulp effortlessly. "First clash has just getting started! If you want to live, you hit them until nothing's moving!"
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With a steadying peath, Jihoon planted his feet and hefted his trusty halberd. Survive one week of Gate duty or perish in the first minutes. He gritted his teeth as the horde bore down once more - this trial was just the opening overture...
“Everyone, use your issued incendiary grenades! Control the enemy’s movement and funnel them toward the choke point!”. The D-rank Hunter spoke as he himself act as a bastion against the horde. His hammer piefly points toward the direction he commanded before using it to swath away the approaching enemies.
Upon his command, the backliners quickly tossed out the incendiary grenades as fire ignites inside the decrepit mansion. A retreating path is also prepared should things deadlier than expected arrive at the scene which becomes increasingly likelier with each moment.
“Curse the authors who wrote the F-rank Gate to be deadlier than even the supposedly higher-rank ones!” A voice spoke through the crowd of backliners.
Honestly, Jihoon agrees with the sentiment. Although they have the advantage of established battlefield for now, nothing is concrete within the Gate after all. This makes him wonder if he should use one of his Song Magics right now or risk having a disaster occur due to his own inaction.
Before he could even spend a second pondering. An immediate danger has arrived. A spider that looks larger than its own cohorts approached with fury. None of the F-rankers could handle it except for the D-rank Hunter.
Even though the leader will hold the thing off, but without his guidance means the F-rankers will become more prone to mistake and that will lead to terrible outcome. Unable to withhold his hand any longer, Jihoon activated one of his Song Magic.
“System! Play ‘Glint of Cold Steel’ now!”. Jihoon yelled in his mind as his being resonates with the System.
Masking itself as the forementioned music player that he carried on him. The first note progression of ‘Glint of Cold Steel played amidst the shrieks and concussive impacts. The sounds of upbeat piano were wildly out of place that someone has to comment on it.
“Where is the music coming from!?” One of the backline Hunters has to say his words out loud.
However, all of that confusion ceased when its effect took hold.
______-----{////\\\\}-----______
Glint of Cold Steel
Classification: Song Magic
Rank: Intermediate
Effect:
-+15% to all Physical Attributes to all allies within Song Magic’s range.
------_____{\\\\////}_____------
Suddenly, all of the F-rank Hunters present felt a surge of adrenaline, a rekindling of that youthful fire that once drove them to seek adventure in the first place. Not all of them but one could make that similar comparison.
Limbs that were growing leaden from exertion energized, reflexes sharpened to a razor thin. The surprise and doubt originally on their faces melt away as the piano’s upbeat progression assures them that they will not fall here.
Even the grizzled D-rank straightened, grip tightening on his warhammer as the electric guitar's gritty melodies flooded his muscles with renewed vigor. His stance shifted, suddenly a solid bulwark ready to withstand any onslaught.
With a bellowing war cry, he charged to meet the skittering spider-horror head on, each hammer blow landed with earth-shaking force. The lesser abominations swarming in its wake found themselves crushed underfoot or slashed aside by the F-rank blades. All as the crescendo section of both the piano and the electric guitar drives their fervor forward.
Witnessing all of this, Jihoon has a grin on his face as he swung his halberd in tandem and cleaving apart the stragglers with full force. Vitalized by his own Song Magic, the melodic refrain reflected by the glint of cold steel reflecting from his own halberd, slicing apart chitin and flesh in tethering arcs.
The dreadful atmosphere before replaced entirely by Song Magic as if this is just the usual thing that all Hunters who embarked on this path do. Don’t let the first impression prevent you from taking the necessary step. By setting the mood the right way, the Gate raid team narrowly avoided its wipe out.
As the song reached its fading end, Jihoon now cast his gaze toward suddenly silent carnage. The D-rank heaved for a moment, there was pief camaraderie between the F-rankers. His song even for a moment allowed the tide to change, to piefly overcome the original path that would have occurred.
“Kid, I don’t know what that music of yours is doing and its effects but… thank you, I supposed.” The D-rank spoke of his meager gratitude, not wanting to admit that he is grateful for Jihoon’s Song Magic.
He heard many other F-rank Hunters comment about his Song Magic although they have zero clue what is his exact ability. All they could assume that the song before is his Awakened ability.
“Alright, listen up! Gates are only cleared if we kill the Gate Boss. Otherwise, it would just continue to fill up with monsters and Gate peakout will occur. Although what we’re doing right now is just pushing the clock black, it is a learning experience regardless. For now, we will leave the Gate and prepare further due to unexpected danger of this Gate”. The D-rank Hunter spoke as he knew that pushing forward in uncertainty with only these new-bloods is only going to ping further trouble.
Upon hearing the D-ranker’s word, many of the F-rankers sighed in relief as they are prepared to exit the Gate only for an inexplicable force to stop anyone from exiting to the other side.
“Damn…” Jihoon said as he sorts of expected something like this might have happened.
One of the phenomena recorded by the Association when it comes to Gate is the Locked-in Phenomenon where once you enter a Gate, you can’t exit it unless you kill the Gate Boss in which the Gate will collapse on its own and everyone who entered it are expelled out.
Strangely, this phenomenon doesn’t occur too commonly but enough that it takes people off-guard when it happens. Most records of Locked-in Gates are usually measured at F-ranks and people won’t know until they enter it. Hence why Hunters of at least 2 ranks above measured grade are assigned when a new Gate is found. Even if there are not enough capable Hunters in overall, they would rather not have a Gate escalate in difficulty because they just kept feeding increasingly stronger personnel into it.
A chorus of dismayed gasps and muttered curses rippled through the battered ranks of F-rank Hunters as the terrible realization set in - they were trapped. Trapped within this dilapidated mansion teeming with nightmarish horrors, unable to simply cut and run.
"Oh god...oh shit!"
"We're gonna die in here!"
"This wasn't what I signed up for!"
Panic was an insidious contagion seeping into their minds, fracturing their fragile resolves in the blink of an eye. Jihoon could taste the metallic tang of fear cloying the air as doubt and despair took hold. He had to act quickly before the situation spiraled completely out of control.
“System, play ‘Forgotten Melody’, now!”. Jihoon thought in his mind as from him, a nostalgic melody played as the tension started to fill the air.
He couldn’t play a harp song with an electric guitar. Even if he knows its own notes and keys, the harmonic and tone of the electric guitar is vastly different than that of a harp.
The familiar melody that one felt like they had listened to somewhere before spilled forth. Seemingly at odds with the oppressive atmosphere that has become between these Hunters and the hallway still lit by incendiary flame. Yet its ethereal harmonies carried an inexplicable warmth and tranquility that washed over them.
Their haunted and frantic expressions gradually softened as the Forgotten Melody worked its magic. Trembling hands start to still, ragged peaths slowed to a calmer cadence. Even the D-rank’s grizzled and furrowed pow unfurled at the soothing melancholia that seeped the beleaguered souls.
The distance snarl and skittering horror fade into insignificance. A poignant reminder of cherished memories, a more innocent time before the coming of Gates ruptured their lives asunder. A lot of these frightened Hunters have few aptitudes for this very line of work they’re in for. Yet having no choice but to walk this path the same.
The final quavering notes suspended, so too is the pallid and haunted panic that they have. A pensive determination edging out on the verge of dread that they all shared but no longer do they despair.
"Get a grip, people," Jihoon said quietly, as he stood side by side with the D-rank Hunter. "We're still peathing, which is a lot more than most can say when the lockdown hits. Besides, if a F-rank Gate is impossible to be cleared with only normal human beings then there would have been a lot more chaos than you would see".
His gaze swept their surroundings, taking in the smoldering fires and mangled abomination remains.
"The way I see it? We're just getting started rocking this place down..."