Evolution Theory of the Hunter

Evolution Theory of the Hunter (ETH)
Volume 1 Chapter 55

Sooah made a face as if she was annoyed about something.

"What?"

"Isn’t this where you’re supposed to hide like p.o.r.n and stuff?"

"This girl…what kind of guy do you take me for…."

There’s no way I would hide that kind of stuff in such an obvious spot.

I made it so that even if you did a word search, you wouldn’t find anything.

And the whole reason I did that much is because of her. Stop making my single life so complicated. Jeez.

"Waaa."

Jung Sooah lay down on my bed and started going through a comicbook as if it were her own home.

Gla.s.ses girl sat at my desk and resumed surfing the internet.

I somehow started feeling as if I were the one out of place in my own room. What the h.e.l.l.

"Today’s a rest day. Don’t you guys have plans?"

"Speaking of rest days, don’t you have any plans?"

"I like staying home. I don’t like going out anyway. I’m an introvert. And even if I did go out, there’d be nothing for me to do. It’s not like I have any friends to hang out with either."

"You have a friend right here."

"Here too."

The both of them raised their hands.

"So are you saying we should go out and do something?"

"I mean the weather is nice – maybe we should go out to the park."

I nodded my head. I guess that could be fun.

Swoosh Swoos.h.!.+

"I’m wearing a dress.."

"Come on! Proper posture!"

Tap.

"Ok."

Sooah responded as she lowered her upper body.

Since we were coming out to the park, we decided to get some practice in. Because if you didn’t practice these kinds of things often, your body starts forgetting.

I made gla.s.ses girl do some shooting with the practice bow I had from my college days.

"How peaceful."

I finally felt ok. It was the first time I felt so uncomfortable in my own home. There was a weird kind of aura in that room that I couldn’t figure out. But this was good.

While the two of them kept at it, I looked through my manual.

The item storage was already full. I checked my stats next.

Skill type: Effort (0). Skill has the ability to use reward points to increase physical abilities.

Extra skill/option: None

Proficiency: 19

Reward Points: 4530

Abilities: Strength 200, Endurance 300, Reflexes 150, Focus 150, Defense 150

Upgrade: 26/100

I had saved up quite a bit of reward points.

I should have used them to raise up my abilities at Baeksapyoung (Flat Sand Bar) dungeon, but things got so crazy I wasn’t able to get around to doing it.

Luckily I didn’t have to go through all the crazy training to raise my abilities anymore. I was actually worried for a moment that I might have had to run a cross country marathon at some point.

Hm. What should I raise up next though.

Not including Endurance, I could probably raise up everything else at least two times with the points I had. Since I have some reliable equipment now like the Honcheon sword, I guess it would make more sense to raise up reflexes and defense rather than strength.

I pressed the reflexes tab.

Tap.

Whoa. It felt like I really pressed on something real. So real.

Yes, No. Two options appeared. I pushed my finger to the "yes" option.

"What?"

What the h.e.l.l does that mean?

"SunbehOppa?"

"Partyhead?"

Both girls stared at me with concern in their eyes.

This is wrong.

We finally came to a point where we could confidently clear a level 2 dungeon.

But now it’s saying they’re going to be erased…? So we have to start from scratch again?

s.h.i.+T s.h.i.+T s.h.i.+T! EFFING s.h.i.+T!

Shouldn’t they at least give us some time to get used to clearing level 2 dungeons and gain more experience so that we don’t die in level 3s?

"Cancel! Cancel! No. s.h.i.+t. What the h.e.l.l am I supposed to do now?"

Since there wasn’t a cancel b.u.t.ton, I kept yelling the word out loud like a crazy person. But the manual didn’t respond.

I hurriedly took off the gla.s.ses. Maybe if I’m not wearing it, it’ll stop whatever crazy thing it was trying to do.

Like h.e.l.l.

I put the gla.s.ses back on.

Reflexes 200, Reward Points 2530.

Proficiency 20.

I should have realized the

Now that I think about it, it was when I clocked in 10 in my proficiency that Level 1 dungeons had disappeared. 10 minutes hadn’t even pa.s.sed when I got the call from Han Joonseok with that bit of happy news.

Ring!

Yeh. Like now.

"h.e.l.lo?"

-Party head! BAD NEWS!…

"Level 2 dungeons are all gone?"

-What? What are you talking about? What do you mean level 2 dungeons are gone?

Hm? What the h.e.l.l’s going on then?

"Wait. Then what do you mean bad news?"

-The Yellow Sea…the Yellow Sea disappeared!

"….what?"

I almost dropped my phone.

Once we got back to my place and searched the internet, Han Joonseok had gotten it wrong.

It’s not that the sea disappeared.

Land had appeared out of nowhere.

"What in the world…"

Jung Sooah had her mouth wide open.

The new land that had appeared was huge.

It was strange that new land of this size had appeared without so much as an earthquake or tsunammi.

Just looking at this it was obvious that this was not natural.

"This is crazy."

The news was lit. I wonder if they had felt this way 50 years ago when the monsters had first shown up.

"They’re saying it’s not just in our country…"

In Africa, a new island appeared next to Madagascar.

In North America, the Yucatan Peninsula was now connected by land with Florida, Alaska, and Siberia.

"Wow…does this mean we need a new world map?"

Jung Sooah said in wonder.

"We’re lucky if that’s the extent of it…"

It wasn’t clear if this was it. It probably wasn’t.

"Isn’t it good that we now have more land? Our country was too small as it was."

"No. We have a lot of land…we just can’t use it properly because of all the monsters."

I continued surfing the internet for some answers.

-[A number of monsters found on the new lands. These monsters are found to be low level monsters of levels 1 and 2s. None others are reported to have been found as of yet.]

-[About 10 minutes ago, coinciding with the upheaval of the new continents, disappearance of level 2 dungeons have been confirmed. It is reported that the government feels the two incidents are related in some manner and an investigation is under way.]

d.a.m.n it. So the level 2 dungeons did disappear.

The government had decided to name the new land as "The West Sea".

But now there was the not so small matter of Korea being connected to China.

The idea of joint management of the new land was quickly ignored.

China became so adamant that the new land was theirs that they deployed a large number of hunters to forcefully seize it.

And the Korean government immediately followed suit.

Then the Chinese government made the threat that they would not trade any agriculture to which the Korean government threatened to remove all hunter markets.

And so finally China was forced to take a step back.

At the time, the removal of hunter markets would spell disaster for China.

So in the end, they came to a kind of agreement.

"So what happened?"

Cho Youngoo asked. We had all met up at the Cafe in s.h.i.+nchon to talk about the recent events.

"It seems they will be sending out as many hunters as they can to the West Sea. In terms of hunters, Korea has the most and of the highest levels."

"Well, that’s all thanks to Wheeseung teacher."

He was the first real hunter…and the strongest of them all.

It was thanks to him that Korea was able to corner the hunter market and raise the levels in a shorter amount of time than other countries – though most of them were at level 3 and 4.

Anyone at and above a level 5 were considered the best of the best.

These were the hunters who had been raising their skills since 50 years ago.

"In general, our hunter power is at least 3 times that of those in China. But the problem is…"

"That China’s population is 30 times that of Korea."

Han Joonseok finished.

Since the day of the disaster when the monsters first appeared, the population of Korea near the Yellow Sea had stayed at a steady 20,000 while the population of China along their border was at 500,000.

"But it would be difficult for China to exert their power."

"How is that? Now that the level 1 and level 2 dungeons are gone, even if we just stationed those hunters who are now out of jobs at the West Sea…the sheer population of China…"

"Well the real problem is whether or not the West Sea is even worth fighting over."

Everyone became quiet and lost in thought at what I had just said.

There was plenty of land filled with monsters.

But that wasn’t the issue.

The issue was that we couldn’t lay around while we had perfectly good land s.n.a.t.c.hed out from under us…even if it was riddled with monsters.

"Well, even if it isn’t worth fighting over…we now have no choice to go to that land. Since all the level 2 dungeons are gone now, that’s the only place we can really hunt now. Who knows, maybe the hunt might be even better since they did say that only level 1 and level 2 monsters were seen there. But before that."

I looked to Jong Sawon.

"Can you come with us?"

"…I will do whatever you ask."

"The Yellow Sea is very big. We might not b.u.mp into that monster for another 6 months."

"It doesn’t matter. No matter the species, a monster is a monster."

"Understood. Then we’re all agreed."

"But would we be able to move in the same parties? Don’t you think the government will likely form groups themselves based on equipment and skill levels?"