Chapter 3

Let’s eat! (1)

Il-hyun sat alone at the window of a cafe in Suwon, watching the scenery outside turn dark with the approaching evening..

The cafe is located on the 3rd floor of the building and has a wide view.

Of course, he never came to Suwon for a view or a visit.

Il-hyun was watching the controlled street.

Traffic on the road was blocked, and the police and eight Dane Company Awakeners were talking.

Around the barricades, there were several heavy armored vehicles and police cars marked as special.

It’s a little scary.

Il-hyun looked at the sight in front of him. There was his mission right in front of him. For the first time in his life, he felt life surging inside him. He felt truly alive.

But now I can’t chicken out.

It was a simple E-rank gate, so there were only policemen assigned to the area, and there were not a lot of them gathered.

Moreover, Dane Company, who took charge of this place, was not a well-known Awakening company.

If the people in charge of this place was the Government Gate Response team or the world’s best company, Aegis, he would have looked for another gate without consideration.

The chances of getting past the gate and the people in charge is good.

It was safe to say that it was the best bet for him.

He was thrilled when he glanced his watch and noticed that the time for the monsters to come out of the gate was getting closer.

Awakeners in black coats began to enter the control area after passing through the street barricades.

I should start slowly.

He gulped down the rest of the coffee in one swallow, snatched up his bag and left.

Outside the cafe, Il-hyun entered a building he had previously seen.

The building was just outside the barricade, facing the gate. It may be dangerous.

Il-hyun entered the men’s bathroom in the building.

No one was in the bathroom. He quickly entered the middle compartment.

He took out the black coat from a man’s bag next to it.

On one arm, the initial DE was small.

It was a fake outfit that looked almost exactly like the defensive coat worn by the Awakeners.

He wanted to wear the real thing, but he couldn’t help it because he had no money and it was hard to get.

Quickly, he slipped on the clothes in and checked himself out with the bathroom mirror.

“Oh, good. Nice!”

Il-hyun, satisfied with his appearance, said with a smile.

After wearing a black coat, he felt like the veteran Awakener he had always dreamed of.

“Now, beyond this …”

Il-hyun touched the wall of the bathroom.

The thick wall gradually faded and formed a hole the size of a person.

“Good!”

He was delighted on the about-to-be-success of his ability. His heart surged with ecstasy.

Before he got to that building, he began first by making an itinerary plan of how he’d go in and out of the controlled gate.

The best place was right here—his plan was concrete.

It was an easy place to enter through his Transformation ability.

Il-hyun lowered his head and crossed over the wall, then restored the bathroom wall to its original state.

The more he used this feature, the more he felt better at it.

The streets in the barricade also held parked cars.

The people had time to move their valuables and cars in time so that they do not get involved in the fight.

He went up to the building where the construction was underway without using the dark street.

He went down through the 4th floor, which was open above and to the side, looking down at the other Awakenings waiting near the eagle gate.

“You know all the points of understanding, right? Just do as usual. Don’t be careless.”

A man with an awkward impression of being a leader was telling his other colleagues.

One came after another, and the number of Awakeners increased to nine.

The man talking over there is a D-class… So was the curly hair next to him. There was a total of 2 class D awakeners?

Il-hyun tried to recall the information he saw at Dane Company’s website homepage.

All seven of them, except the two, were E-class. The rest, he couldn’t remember.

Then, I wonder what grade they will be.

Awakening, monsters, and gates – each are all ranked.

Unlike Awakening and intelligence that can be determined by simple examination, as in the previous one, the combat power is measured through a fairly complicated process to determine the approximate grade of the awakening.

Most of the Awakeners are not able to take advantage of their ability, so it has nothing to do with the rank of the Awakener and the rank of the ability. Each one has a probability to get stronger, or weaker, depending on how they use their ability, and how much their body could handle it.

Among the ranks, the Class A Awakened was treated as an excellent veteran wherever he went, and Class B Awakened is a major national power.

Uninterested people in Korea will often only see the various A-ranked Awakeners on TV and ignore other ratings.

However, the A-ranked Awakened people were out-of-field, so there were usually not more than one or two people in any country.

It’s not long since I’ve been awakened.

Il-hyun roughly expected his grade to be E or F.

But he knew he would not stop there.

He remembered his SSS ranking from the test.

There is no such rank as ‘SSS’, although it includes the highest grade: S.

There are only four Class S Awakened in the world.

“It’s starting.”

Just then, the gate began to open.

The gate shook with a strange sound that seemed to scratch his nerves.

“It started!” The leader of the Dane Company group called out.

“All ready!” His colleagues responded, pulling out their weapons, bracing for battle.

Most of them had swords, but some had spears or axes.

All were weapons processed with ether.

“Key profit!” was their battle cry, as they watched dozens of monsters starting to pour out of the gate.

The monsters are red-skinned humanoid frogs called Forn.

Standing on both legs with a crude spear, Forns have a nasty face with red thorns on their back.

“Die!!!!”

Awakeners stormed the pouring Forn, then a fierce battle ensued.

The sound of their weapons echoed and reverberated as they clashed against each other. The Awakeners hacked the monsters in half one by one.

The Forns attack by bowing back and firing the stinger on their backs.

However, the Awakened deliberately did not even care about the flying sting, and did not even try to avoid them.

All of the attacks of these less powerful E-class monsters were blocked by the self-protection of the Awakeners’ defense coat, each stinger falling off uselessly after hitting the tough coat.

“Oh, is there any Awakener here who has the ability?”

Il-hyun said with admiration in the middle of a fight as the flames burst out of the hands of an Awakener.

This is the first battle scene of the Awakeners that he has witnessed, and he watched it excitedly.

“Okay!”

An Awakener with an ax screamed and cut off the necks of two Forns in one blow.

“Come out here!”

The man shouted when he saw one of the Forn stepping away from him, trying to exit the battle.

Although the Awakeners are superior in power, it was unreasonable to stop dozens of monsters from escaping with only nine members.

“Damn, it’s annoying to follow them”, the man complained.

Thanks to the special police, the monsters will not be able to get out of the barricade, but if you are stuck somewhere in the inner buildings near the barricade, you may encounter one.

The annoyed man turned and was forced to focus on the other Forn in front of him.

And this was when Il-hyun moved.

“It’s a building over there.”

Il-hyun happened to watch the Forn escape.

He came here to aim for monsters that escaped in battle from the beginning and now was the only chance.

He went to the building the monster had escaped to.

He had to make sure no one sees him as he entered the dark interior.

“Damn, I can’t even turn on the light.”

The electricity wasn’t cut off, but he couldn’t turn on the lights as he needed to remain unnoticed and not draw any attention.

Now that he had become an Awakener, he went inside, relying on his improved sensitivity.

“Kkeok, Kkeok.”

Forn’s cry was heard far and wide.

Il-hyun lowered his posture and chased after the sound, pulling out his knife – a fruit-cutting knife.

“Damn, I don’t have the money to buy an ether sword.”