Ken, finding out the gym was much larger than he thought. He was in awe, not sure if he was even able to afford the fees. To Ken, the gym looks classy. He went towards the front desk.
"Hey, can I sign up for this gym membership?" Ken asked a jacked gentleman wearing a purple shirt.
"Sure thing, would you like to explore before signing up?"
"Sure - before that, how much is the fee?"
"The fee will be 60 dollars a month with a year-end contract, for minimum access. 150 dollars for access to everything."
Surprising Ken, that’s not expensive at all for this gym, given the size of the gym and the equipment
"I understand, please show me around."
The gentleman showed me the gym. It had everything ranging from spa to pool. It contained the highest end workout machines. The gym also had state-of-the-art Virtual reality fitness training for different martial arts. The gym also provided live coaching. This was all provided within the 150 dollars membership fee.
"We also have a cafeteria, where you can buy and eat what you want. Would you be comfortable moving forward with getting a membership?"
"Yes. Let's do that."
"Alright, follow me back."
"Can I ask a question about the fees?"
"Sure."
"Why isn't it more expensive, more than $150 dollars while being in the slum of it all, crime and what's not?"
The gentleman in a tight purple shirt laughed before responding, "Fair question. Our pricing should be much higher. Good news for us, many hunters donate to subsidize most of the gym's associated cost. And the owner doesn't have profit in their mind, who is also a hunter. The owner’s goal is to try and revitalize the community surroundings. Anyway, let’s get you started.”
The gentleman handed a tablet towards Ken, which Ken grabbed. He started filling out the application to completion.
“Alright, thank you… Ken. My name is Josh, one of the trainers here.” Josh took the application and processed it.
“Josh, I am a license hunter now, I couldn’t find any information. Am I able to take part in fighting bout tournaments?”
“Yes. We do not host any tournaments here, but I have sent you a list of tournaments you can take part in. Lower rank hunters can fight above their rank, but higher rank hunters cannot fight lower. These tournaments do not have any limiting ruleset to restrict the hunters. This means that hunters' abilities and power are not banned. There are cases where hunters are going to restricted by the rulesets, but those are rare. "
“Which one has the highest payout?”
“Highest payout?” Josh looked at Ken analyzing before continuing. "The one with the highest payout is happening 2 months from now, it’s called Fight Royal. You can do take part in it solo or with a team. The first-place prize is 50 million dollars, for S rank – 20 million for A rank – 1 million for B rank and 500k for C rank.”
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Ken did hear about the tournament. The national tournament is broadcasted heavily throughout the kingdom.
"Thank you for that information. Can I sign up for it here?”
“You sure can. Although you should know the fee will be 1000 dollars to join” Josh offered his help.
“Okay, sign me up.”
“Alright, I’ve fed it all the necessary information. Please fill out the rest.”
Ken filled out the rest of the necessary information. He applied for the S-rank. He paid 1000 dollars. He made everything public. He handed the tablet back and Josh looked over it, his eyes bulged a little.
“You really are a G rank?”
“Yup. I’ll start working out now. Thank you.” Ken had gotten the confirmation for the tournament.
He changed his clothes to workout attire and headed towards the weightlifting section.
He started with squats, followed by bench press, overhead press, and then deadlift. He rotated through the workout. The weights he was doing reached the limit of what the gym was offering from the weight room eventually. His healing factor pushed his endurance unlimited.
That was easy. He went back to the changing room. The current clothes he was wearing became tight over the course of the workout. He threw out his gym clothes. He ordered some loose fitted clothing and some more gym clothes of his size. The delivery of the clothes would happen fast.
The clothes arrived via a verified drone, and it delivered them to Ken. Ken waited with a towel wrapped around him in the changing room.
Ken changed to a new set of clothes and headed out to the VR training center. He took some basic training courses for fighting, as that was all he needed for now. He did that for a while, got the basics down.
He exited out of the gym, looking at some of the available F-rank missions. Which requires a group and having to pay for the slot. He made a payment of 100 dollars for the slot. It was refundable if he didn’t get slot. He would be matchmake by Hunter Corp AI, since he does not have a team. He was immediately rejected, he did it for 1000 dollars, which was also rejected.
He applied for dismantling service, 1000 dollars per 10 monsters. He was immediately rejected. He bid 40 dollars per 10 monsters. He got rejected. Perplexing Ken. He also couldn’t get any bid on delivery either. He found it odd that he was getting immediate rejection, so he called for support for Hunter Corp.
“Hello, this is Ken. I am calling concerning my immediate rejection of all missions that I have applied for. I know”
“Hello, this is Katie. Hold on a moment while I check this out. It seems that you are blacklisted. ‘Job not completed' is the stated reason for your blacklist."
Ken knew something fishy was going on.
“Okay, that does not make sense. The job was verified as done by the drone, the drone has record of it stating it was well done for all the jobs. What’s going on here?”
“Uh…” The Kaite panicked before replying “Let me escalate this to upper management. Please hold.”
Ken waited while shuffling his feet before talking to another person.
“Hello Ken, my name is Matthew. I have reviewed the drone material. It looks like the jobs were rendered satisfactory and timely. I’ll investigate to figure out why you were blacklisted. This investigation will take quite a while. I also do not have the authority to remove you from the blacklist. When the investigation is complete and has found valid findings. The leader will evaluate to determine your status and its validity.”
“I guess, thank you. Do you know how long the investigation will take?”
“Ideally, less than a month – this seems straightforward. But I cannot say for certain.”
“Alright, in the meantime, are there methods to increase the bar for my rank in the meanwhile?”
“Yes, you can apply for missions provided by Hunter Corps only.”
Ken tried filtering out only Hunter Corps missions in from F to H ranks. Nothing pops up.
“There’s nothing, no missions for F to H ranks.”
“Uhm…” Michael panicked also “Please keep refreshing.”
There was a refresh option, He became irritated, “Okay, thank you. I’ll keep refreshing.”
“Have a good day, Ken.”
Ken hung up.
Well, that does not bode well for me from a monetary perspective. I’ll wait until the investigation is complete. I see missions available for S-D ranks from Hunter Corps, but nothing beyond those ranks.
Ken tried finding out over the Hunter Corp network on ways to rank up. He was unable to find any other methods besides doing missions.
Ken sighed to himself and started walking through the busy streets of the slum.