PRESENT DAY: 2040

20 YEARS AFTER THE INVASION BEGAN

10 YEARS AFTER LIM SUHO WAS ADOPTED BY A VILLAGE IN THE COUNTRYSIDE

DECEMBER

“Damn it!”

The mood at the Hunter Bureau branch was not good. The employees were scrambling, papers flying off of desks in their panic, trying to cobble together a solution.

“Director Lee, we can’t delay for much longer,” one woman reported. “The roads are clogged because of the snow. The travel time alone—”

“You think I don't know that?!”

Lee Jihyo, now the head of her own department, slammed her hands down on her desk and heaved a huge sigh. She was older now, wiser, less quick to shirk responsibility but just as quick to anger.

Her branch had received a distress signal from some backwater village in the countryside—a place so far from timely help that no sane person would live there anymore. Things had always been bad that far out in the sticks, and it had only gotten worse in the past 10 years.

A caller was reporting that a gate had broken completely. They hadn't even received a report of a gate appearing. For it to be already at the stage of releasing monsters meant that the people living there didn't have much time to live without a hunter team to protect them. Even if they managed to shuffle a team together, it was illogically far away.

“Fuck, where are those West Edge bastards?” she shouted. “Their jurisdiction is the closest!”

“We haven’t been able to reach them.”

The pen in her grip snapped. The guilds always pretended not to hear once cases like this came up. The moment they thought that there would be dead civilians, they turned tail and fled so their guild wouldn’t be the ones with the responsibility of having “failed” to protect them.

Their reputation and their precious hunters were worth more to them than real people.

“Eep!”

The younger woman in front of her squeaked as she looked at her tablet. The status report had refreshed. Jihyo glanced over.

The ranking of the gate had gone up from D to C. She cursed under her breath.

A D-rank gate was dangerous but survivable for a regular person, if they were lucky. Some monsters weren't particularly violent and just ended up integrating with the landscape. But for both monsters and hunters, C was the rank that separated the mediocre from the strong.

“Fucking hell… ”

Jihyo turned to the huge screen behind her desk, monitoring the map. Thanks to satellites, they could monitor the power signatures emerging in the area. As expected, higher ranked monsters had begun emerging. But something else caught her eye among the blobs of energy that moved across the landscape.

Lower ranks were bluer while higher ranks were redder. C-ranked monsters hovered around green to yellow. Yet inside what she could assume to be a horde of beasts, a prick of red suddenly appeared.

In another second, it was gone. But then it would return—blinking in and out like a firefly.

Although still hectic, some of the employees in the office seemed to notice as well—a strange half-hush falling in the room.

“…What is that?” the girl behind her asked.

Jihyo just stayed silent, brow furrowing. No C-rank monsters could consciously choose to hide their presence. That was the kind of signature only an awakened human could give off.

“Did any hunters report arriving in the area?” she asked.

The employee refreshed her screen several times, scrolling through the information as fast as she could. She shook her head.

“None, Director Lee.”

Jihyo bit her lip.

“This area, has this happened before?” she asked.

Her assistant clicked through the information on her tablet.

“Not at all. In fact…”

She trailed off for a second, as if she wasn't sure if she was reading correctly.

“Hold on a second.

“What’s the problem?”

Jihyo was going to explode if she heard one more piece of bad news.

“…Actually, there hasn't been any reported gate activity here in the last ten years. Is this real?”

Her jaw dropped.

“Ten years?”

Gates appeared all the time. They weren't necessarily more common in the countryside than they were in the city, but the survival rate was much lower, which meant more of them stayed open for longer. It didn’t make any sense that a tiny village in the middle of nowhere had absolutely no reports of gates in a decade. It was either an insane stroke of luck, or maybe…

Her head snapped back towards the screen. That tiny pinprick of red in the middle of the otherwise green and yellow presences. Blinking in and out, as if in control.

Jihyo grabbed her coat and immediately started heading towards the door.

“Alert the driver,” she commanded. “I’m heading out personally.”

“But Director—”

“I don’t aim to clear it. I’m just going to take a look.”

She wasn't going to fight. She was just going to check if her hunch was right.

“Keep pestering West Edge. If they don't respond, I want their guild leader groveling on the floor by the time I get back. No excuses.”

“Yes, Director!”

If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

⊕

Jihyo went in with the expectation that nearly everyone would be dead. It wasn't pessimism, but experience. She liked to lower her expectations before getting them crushed. If she didn’t think this way and accept the bleak reality, then she would’ve had a mental breakdown years ago.

That’s why she had planned to stop the car some distance away from the destination and then proceed on foot. As a B-rank awakened, she could cover a mile in a minute without breaking a sweat. But instead, as she stared outside through the car window, the tranquil countryside covered in a layer of snow continued to pass with not a hair of a monster in sight. And for some reason, it looked a little familiar.

The sign with the town name looked surprisingly new, like it’d been replaced recently. It was totally clear of rust and vines.

The car pulled to the side of an old road with roughly filled-in potholes, and she stepped out. She could see the village—still standing. In fact, it looked fairly untouched. A couple hours ago, she had seen the mass of monsters on the satellite images swarming the mountains beyond the town. But even after all that time, they hadn't made it here.

And then, as expected—

BOOM.

Beyond the buildings, somewhere in the mountains beyond, something exploded. Chunks of dirt and grass and ice flew into the air, entire boulders arching and leaving craters in the ground where they came crashing down.

“You stay here,” she commanded, glancing at the driver.

She turned towards the commotion, put some strength into her legs, and jumped.

She landed on a roof, then leapt again—racing across the town towards where the monsters were charging. But the sight that greeted her once she finally cleared the town almost made her drop out of the air.

She stumbled slightly on landing, eyes still fixed on the unbelievable sight.

In front of her, C-rank monsters that resembled huge, horned velociraptors were racing forward. Their snapping jaws could rip any lower ranked hunter’s arms off in a split second. But instead of a hunter, the person stopping them in their tracks was a young man in civilian clothes.

He was tall and well-built, but there wasn't a single piece of equipment made for hunters on his body. He was in a worn, muddy tracksuit, as if he’d been caught in the middle of doing chores. And the weapon he was slicing through the raptors with was, in fact, a gardening hoe.

It was old, cheap metal that looked like it could snap any second. Yet the moment he swung it, it cut into the monsters’ armored skin like butter.

Shing—

Off came a clawed arm.

Slice—

And then a head.

The hoe was cloaked in a beautiful, deep blue light. Aura.

Jihyo hadn't even realized she’d stopped in her tracks. The image in front of her was just so unbelievable. Aura? Being wielded by a child? Using a gardening hoe? Even experienced hunters had trouble controlling that power. It was like magic—explosive and powerful—but new to humans.

She had suspected after seeing that tiny red speck on the screen that perhaps there was an awakened in the town who hadn't officially registered as a hunter, but this was beyond ordinary. The kid in front of her was soloing a C-rank gate. He didn't look older than twenty.

The gate still loomed and pulsed a deep purple between the trees ahead. As the boy finished off the last raptor, a menacing, low rumble emanated. And then a huge leg stepped out.

The boss monster. Not all gates had them. The mother of all armored raptors stepped out—at least thirty feet tall and with a jaw full of huge teeth.

The boy backed up a step, fixing his grip on the hoe—his entire body already bathed in red blood.

And then she lost sight of him.

In an instant, the chest of the monster exploded. When her brain finally registered the image, she realized that he had leaped right at the boss and buried the entire length of the hoe directly into its heart. Blood spurted everywhere, showering him, but he remained unperturbed.

He leapt back as the monster collapsed. He glanced towards the gate as its body sagged to the ground. The portal rumbled, then shrank as expected. When it finally disappeared, the boy reached forward and pulled the hoe out of the beast’s chest.

Only the handle came out, the blade snapping off with an almost comical TWANG. As soon as the aura was gone, it proved to be as cheap as it looked.

He wiped his brow with the back of his hand, but it didn't help. More blood just got smeared on.

“Suho.”

A voice called out from beside her, making Jihyo jump and whip her head over, nearly taking a defensive stance.

It was a monk who was maybe in his thirties. He stepped towards the young man and held out a white handkerchief.

“Here,” he said.

Suho took it as if it was routine and started wiping his face. Jihyo glanced between them, still nonplussed.

She tensed when the boy’s eyes met hers.

https://i.imgur.com/7TScTKv.jpeg [https://i.imgur.com/7TScTKv.jpeg]

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“I-I’m from the Hunter Bureau,” she replied, regaining her composure.

She took out her badge and showed it to them.

“Director Lee Jihyo?” He read it aloud.

“Yes,” she said. “We received a distress call from here and mobilized.”

He frowned as if he didn't understand.

“…Distress?” he repeated. “Here?”

The monk tilted his head too, confused.

“No one’s distressed,” he added.

They were still standing in a field of monster corpses—monsters that even medium-sized guilds hesitated to face. But she couldn't refute either of them. Clearly, no one had been hurt.

“Ah, perhaps it’s Grandma Lee’s grandkids,” the monk commented. “It’s their first time out here. They must not have known you’d take care of it.”

Suho nodded calmly.

“Pardon me, but as I’m here on official business, could you explain to me what happened?” Jihyo interjected.

“Ah, of course,” the monk replied.

He bowed to her politely.

“Call me Jun,” he said. “I run the temple here. And this is Lim Suho. My son.”

“Son?”

Jihyo’s head was swimming. A monk with a son? Could they do that?

Suho made a face at him.

“I’m not his son,” he corrected. “I live at the temple. Hello again.”

Still matted with blood, he bowed politely in greeting.

“Ah, hello.”

…

Jihyo frowned, confused.

“Wait, again?” she said.

“Yes?”

Suho gave her innocent eyes, like it was obvious.

“Haven’t we met?”

Jihyo squinted at him slightly, trying to get a better look underneath all that blood. He seemed vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t recall why. A kid like this… a kid…

Ah.

She used to be part of the orphan relocation program.

“Did I… back then… oh!”

Her eyes went wide. She scanned the village, starting to recognize it.

“You’re that Suho!”

“I think?”

“Wow. Look at how you’ve grown.”

Jihyo raised a hand to pat him on the shoulder, then remembered he was soaked through with blood and thought better of it.

“How old are you now?” she asked.

“Sixteen.”*

“When did you awaken?”

“I was seven.”

Jihyo’s good mood was immediately frozen stone cold again.

Seven??? Most kids didn't show signs of awakening until twelve or thirteen.

“Have you… been fighting monsters all this time?”

“He’s been protecting the village,” Jun interjected, patting Suho proudly on the shoulder despite the blood. “He’s a good kid.”

“You’ve gone into the gates?” she prodded.

“It’s against the law for people who aren't registered as hunters to go inside,” Jun said. “We’re law-abiding citizens. He’d only hunt them once they broke.”

That was even more difficult. With infinite space to spread out and maneuver, he’d somehow kept the town safe from rampaging monsters alone? Her mind was racing at a million miles per hour.

“I’m sorry, but may I confirm your status?” she asked.

Suho tilted his head as he wiped his neck. Even more disbelief started to creep into her heart.

“You have a status device, right?”

His brow furrowed as he thought, and then he seemed to realize what she was talking about.

“The… watch?” he asked.

“Uh, yes, the watch.”

They took many forms, but almost all hunters wore them as watches. They were man-made machines that measured an awakened’s power and put it into a format similar to a video game’s stat window,

for easy interpretation. They were a staple in the industry.

“I don't have one,” Suho said. “They're expensive.”

“Huh?”

“I could buy beef with that kind of money. Or fix the pothole in front of Auntie Kim’s house.”

Jihyo was getting hit with curveballs left and right today. Not a single sentence that came out of this kid’s mouth had been within her expectations.

He calmly handed the blood-soaked handkerchief back to Jun, his face still streaked with red but apparently clean enough. She just stared at him, unable to find any words. Suho had just soloed a C-rank dungeon break. With a gardening hoe, for god’s sake. That already meant that he was stronger than most awakened—who often were only E or D rank. Not only that, but at 16.

The only kids who were that powerful were at…

Her eyes widened.

They were at National.

“Do you go to school?” Jihyo blurted out.

Suho glanced over at her.

“No,” he answered bluntly.

She had thought that was likely. If he had been in any kind of public setting, they would've already heard of someone of his strength.

“Do you want to?”

The question seemed to surprise him.

“If you want to,” she continued, pressing on before he could answer her, “I can help you.”

She dug into her suit jacket and pulled out a business card with the Hunter Bureau’s logo on it.

“I’m Lee Jihyo, Deputy Director of Operations from the Hunter Bureau,” she said.

Suho took the card from her cautiously, reading it over.

“If it’s okay with you, on behalf of the Bureau, I’d like to write you a recommendation to the Korean National Academy for the Awakened.”