Proof-reader: Asada
“Next person?”
The NPC called out to Soo Hyuk again .
“Excuse me . It’s your turn now . ”
At the NPC’s call, the users that were behind Soo Hyuk all haggled at him with annoyed voices .
“Ah, yes . Sorry . ”
Finally snapping out of his thoughts, Soo Hyuk closed his character tab and walked forward to the NPC .
“What have you come here for . ”
“I want to see the mission catalogue . ”
Soo Hyuk answered while getting out his new token from his inventory . The NPC quickly verified the token, then pulled out a stack of papers from his drawer and handed them to Soo Hyuk . It was the E-rank mission catalogue .
“Tell me after choosing . ”
At the NPC’s words, Soo Hyuk received the paper from the NPC and started looking through the different missions .
‘Hmm?’
Soo Hyuk cocked his head as he read through the list .
‘Are they only in F-rank?’
What Soo Hyuk was looking for was a mission that required gathering items to complete, but he couldn’t spot them anywhere so far on the list .
‘Hmph . ’
When Soo Hyuk arrived at the last mission on the list without any progress, he let out a dissatisfied grunt and went back to the first page again .
‘This is probably the next best one . ’,
He thought while staring at the very first on the list . It was an orc hunting mission, and since there were a lot of orcs around Hadrac’s outskirts, it wouldn’t take a long time .
“I’ll choose this mission . ”
[You have selected the quest ‘Orc Village Investigation’,]
After he received the mission from the NPC, Soo Hyuk came out of the Mercenary Agency and opened his quest window .
[Orc Village Investigation]
Orcs have been appearing near the city of Hadrac . Go to their village and stop them!
[Orcs: 0 / 200 ]
[Quest Reward: 200 gold]
‘The NPC said that the orcs were everywhere except on the southern side . ’
After remembering what the NPC said before, Soo Hyuk closed his quest window and turned towards the east . There was no particular reason, just that the closest city gates to the agency were the eastern gates .
“Who wants to go goblin hunting together!”
“Looking for people to hunt tigers together! We have healers and tanks already! Just need a damage dealer! Magicians are welcome!”
Soo Hyuk was met with a scenery similar to the Matab city gates as he arrived at the crowded east gate .
‘Gates are gates . ’
He thought as he looked around at the numerous users searching for a party . Of course, he wasn’t planning to join a party himself, so he headed out alone to the hunting areas around Hadrac .
-Human!
-It’s a human!
Soo Hyuk entered the ‘Goblin Plains’ not long after he headed out . Immediately, goblins jumped at him ferociously, swinging their short weapons .
“Flame Dance . ”
Meanwhile, Soo Hyuk was unfazed by their sudden attacks as he calmly cast Flame Dance and burned the goblins down to ashes .
“Firebolt . ”
“Poison Sphere . ”
“Poison Chains . ”
For the next ten minutes, goblins kept leaping at him from the tall grass, while Soo Hyuk reacted quickly with various spells with Soo Hyuk coming out victorious each time . And so, he was able to escape the goblin plains and arrive at the Kamain Mountains, the habitat of the orcs .
“Looking for a party!”
“We need a healer! Is there a healer anywhere? Our party member is dying! We’ll give you compensation!”
Like the city gates, the entrance to the Kamian Mountains also had a lot of users camped around it . They were calling out to each other, trying to get into parties and whatnot .
“Hey, isn’t that a poison magician?”
“Wow, a poison magician . ”
“That’s a poison magician, right?”
“Yeah…”
“That user, I respect him . How did make it here with poison magic? I heard it was a crazy hard element . ”
As Soo Hyuk was walking through the crowds of users, his ears picked up a conversation between three users, who were talking loudly while pointing at him .
‘Is it just those guys, or are poison magicians generally badly received?’
Soo Hyuk thought as he listened to their conversation . He had already known that poison magicians were the least popular out of all the elements, both as an element and a choice in hunting parties . However, it seemed he had underestimated just how much they were looked down on .
“Excuse me Mr Magician, do you want to party with us?
“Ah, I’m sorry, I’m already in a party . ”
“Are you perhaps a healing magician? Can we hunt in a party?”
“Do we leave immediately if I do?”
Magicians were few in number in Hadrac, so there were naturally many trying to party with them . In other words, magicians were popular . However, no one could be seen trying to approach Soo Hyuk .
‘Even though I wasn’t going to party up…’
If someone had come up to him asked to party up, he would’ve refused them without hesitation . But even so, seeing no one approaching him left him with a bad aftertaste .
At that moment .
“Excuse me!”
As he was feeling grumpy about his poor popularity, someone walked up to him and blocked his path .
“Eh?”
Soo Hyuk couldn’t help but feel flustered as he stared at a woman in front of him .
“Hello!”
The woman greeted him cheerfully .
“Ah, yes . Nice to meet you . ”
Soo Hyuk tentatively greeted her back as he tried to hide his confusion .
“Do you remember me?”
“Err…”
However, he ended up falling deeper into confusion at the woman’s next question .
‘Do I know her?’
Remember? Did he know her before? All sorts of questions popped into existence, yet he still couldn’t remember .
‘Did she make a mistake? But now that I look at her again, she seems familiar…’
He couldn’t deny that there was a familiar feeling coming from the woman . He felt that the memory was just an arm’s reach away, yet he couldn’t quite get his head around it .
“So you don’t remember!”
The woman then arbitrarily came to a conclusion by herself when she noticed his reaction . Though she wasn’t wrong, he was still frustrated .
“Oren library? Do you remember now?”
“…Ah!”
Soo Hyuk exclaimed in realisation when she offered a hint .
‘It was that woman!’
The woman that he had met at the Oren Library . She had rattled on about how wisdom could be increased in other ways, how reading was inefficient, and so on . Of course, he didn’t look down on, or even have a negative feeling about her because of it .
“Ah, hello again . ”
Soo Hyuk greeted the woman again after he remembered her .
“You finally remembered!”
The woman exclaimed while smiling in response to his greeting .
“Did you perhaps come here to hunt orcs?”
“Yes, it’s because of a mission . ”
“Then do you want to hunt together? We have a healer, a tanker and everything!”
The first person to offer to team up . Although it raised his self-esteem slightly, it was a shame that he had to refuse .
“I’m sorry . I need to hurry somewhere else after hunting for a while . ”
He answered . He was not hunting to level up . He was hunting for a mission . 200 orcs? It would be over in a blink of an eye . Partying on the other hand would slow him down to a crawl .
“Ah, I see…”
The woman made a regretful expression at his answer and said goodbye with a slight bow .
“Then I’ll see you next time! Have fun hunting!”
The woman then reverted to her usual cheerful tone and ran back to her waiting party members .
“Do you know him?”
“Yep . He’s the person I met at the library . ”
“Ah, that person who used the library just to read books?”
Her conversations with her party rang out as Soo Hyuk started walking again .
-Chueek!
-Human! Chueek!
“Panther-nim! A heal please!”
“Stream of Life!”
Was it because they were near the outskirts?
“Hey, where are the orcs?”
“Should we go in more?”
“Yeah, let’s . ”
There were more users than the orcs, so hunting near the entrance would take a longer time than in the depths of the mountains .
‘I’ll just use the subspace on my way back . ’
And so, he head further inside the mountains .
-Chueek! Humans! Chuueek!
-Kill him! Gueek!
“Heal, heal please! Quickly!”
“It’s on cooldown! Use a potion first!”
Soo Hyuk could still faintly hear the yells of various users as he kept walking . Then at some point, silence descended as users disappeared from around him .
-Uuek?
-Human, chueek .
As Soo Hyuk approached the orcs, he thought,
‘Now let’s hunt these orcs . ’
He could hunt without fear now that the competitors was far away from him . He was more afraid of user ambushes than the monsters .
“Flame Dance . ”
Beginning with the tow orcs in front of him, he began his slaughter .
“Firestorm!”
“Poison Storm!”
“Poison Cloud!”
A new drop appeared every second .
‘The eyeballs…’
The most eye-catching drop was the sheer number of eyeballs in the drop window .
‘This is why it was 1 gold . ’
He had been wondering why the monster drop was so cheap but looking at the continuously rising eyeballs, the reason was obvious .
Then Soo Hyuk, who was still firing spells at the orcs, checked his quest window to see his progress . After a few more spells, the nearly full count was satisfied and his hunt ended .
“Archmage’s Subspace . ”
[Warping to the Archmage’s Subspace . ]
* * *
Mercenary Agency 2nd floor .
‘Unbelievable . ’
Rowling, who was one of the receptionists on the 2nd floor, muttered in shock .
‘How long has it been since he received the mission?’
Although he asked in his head, he already knew the answer .
‘It hasn’t even been 1 hour yet! He already hunted 200 orcs in that time?’
He had already verified that this was true through the Mercenary Token . There had never been a case where the token was false, but that meant that this man had indeed hunted 200 orcs . But there was another problem .
‘An E-rank did this?’
Rowling had a blank look on his face as he struggled to get his around .
“Am I done?”
The man asked .
“Ah, yes…”
Looking at the man who had a dumb expression on his face, Rowling couldn’t help but get a bit angry .
“Then could you return my token?”
But the man’s next words woke him up from his daze and he hurriedly returned the token . He then also took out the box containing the rewards .
“Then goodbye . ”
Once the man received his token and rewards, he returned to the 1st floor with a goodbye . Meanwhile, Rowling stared at the man’s descending back and thought,
‘Soo Hyuk…’
The man’s name was Soo Hyuk .
‘I’ll have to pay attention to him . ’
“Could you please show me your token?”
Rowling resumed his work with Soo hyuk on the back of his mind .
Then 50 minutes after .
“…”
Rowling was surprised again by a person who had walked up to him .
‘Again? How…’
The man from 50 minutes ago . That Soo Hyuk had returned in lightning speed again .
“Here you go . ”
Soo Hyuk was holding out his mercenary token .
‘Don’t tell me he completed another mission?’
People only came up to the 2nd floor for one reason only . The completion of a mission . Rowling received Soo Hyuk’s token with a flustered face .
‘Crazy!’
When Rowling looked at the records on the token, he couldn’t help but scream inside .
‘He hunted 50 ogres?!’
The records clearly showed that he had received a mission about hunting ogres . Ogres weren’t weak in any way . With their powerful physique, even hunting one was difficult . But this man had just set a record for fastest time to hunt 50 ogres .
‘Not even 1 hour!’
Hunting 50 ogres was hard in itself, but doing it in under an hour? This Soo Hyuk was definitely not at the standard of an E-rank . When his soul was about to escape from his mouth,
“Did you finish?”
Soo Hyuk asked .
“Y-yes, could you please wait a moment?”
Rowling hurriedly returned his token and reward . When Soo Hyuk received them, he stood up and walked down to the 1st floor just like before .
‘Don’t tell he’s going to come again?’
Rowling muttered as he stared at the disappearing figure . He had a bad feeling about this . Then 1 hour later, his hunch came true .
“Here you go . ”
Soo Hyuk, who was still nonchalantly handing him his token . At such a man, Rowling couldn’t do anything but stare with his jaws on the floor .
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