Chapter 14

The Lycan that had flown over his head was now looking at him with fear . Its tail lowered, the wolf began to step backwards .

“Huh…?”

Was this the result of putting all of his points into strength?

As he stared at his fist with an open mouth, the headless body of the Lycan convulsed with a finality then stopped moving . A familiar electronic sound rang through Jinwoo’s head .

ring~

You’ve defeated the Steel-tooth Lycan .

You’ve leveled up!

“I’ve leveled up?”

Make sure he didn’t mishear, Jinwoo quickly opened his status screen .

Name: Sung Jinwoo

Level: 2

Class: None

Title: None

HP: 205

MP: 22

Fatigue: 0

Stats

Strength: 32

Constitution: 11

Agility: 11

Intelligence: 11

Sense: 11

(Available stat points: 0)

Skills

Passive Skills

-(Unknown) (Lv . Max)

-Unyielding Spirit (Lv . 1)

Active Skills

-Sprint (Lv . 1)

[1]

He really had leveled up . With it, all of his stats had increased by 1 point . Jinwoo realized that the quest rewards were not the only way to raise his attributes . It was apparent that leveling up increased them as well .

‘To think that I could level-up!’

Something that he had only dreamt about was now a reality before him .

His heartbeat quickened .

‘And the total points I’ve gained is bigger than the daily quest . ’

The stat points he received from quests were 3 .

The stat points he gained from leveling up were 5 .

Although he could not freely distribute these 5 points, the total benefit from a level-up was much bigger than the quest reward .

‘And I leveled up after taking down just two of them . ’

In a video game, low level characters were able to level up quickly .

Jinwoo was currently level 2 . You could say he was at the bottom of the barrel . But his level did not properly reflect his strength . After all, his strength was already above 30; if you treated one level-up being equivalent to one point of strength, Jinwoo already had the strength of someone above level 20 . And when a level 1 character hunts with the strength of a level 20?

‘I think they call this “power leveling”?’

The destructive power of his punch that surpassed all expectations was a testament to his progress .

‘I’ve tripled the strength attribute, but I feel more than just three times stronger than before . ’

Jinwoo’s original strength stat was 10 . The difference between 10 strength and 30 strength was a factor of 3, but his power felt much greater than that .

‘Maybe…’

What if value of his attributes became weighted as they increased[2]? That would explain this destructive power . On top of that, his movements had also become faster . If it was the old him, he could not imagine dodging the beasts’ fast attacks or make the wind howl when he made a punch .

“I suppose increasing my muscles would make me faster . ”

It seemed that increasing the strength stat increased both his ‘strength’ and ‘speed’ . His battle with the Lycan was the proof .

But what about the agility stat? If not his mobility, what would it increase?

Jinwoo knew he could not satisfy his curiosity without more stat points .

‘Even if I had some…’

It felt a little wasteful to use up the points from quest rewards in agility . If he could raise both his power and speed through the strength stat, why put points into agility?

If that’s the case, there was one answer .

‘Increase my level as fast as possible . ’

He would obtain points in the agility stat through leveling up, gathering clumps of dirt until he had a sizeable hill . Surely the result of the incremental increases would be noticed eventually .

‘Then, shall I get started?’

He remembered the remaining Lycan .

“But, where did that bastard go?”

The Lycan that had cowered nearby had disappeared . Jinwoo looked around but could not find traces of the beast . It appeared to have ran away while Jinwoo was focused on his status screen .

“Bleh . ”

He rolled his tongue in his mouth, disappointed at the loss of experience points . As he began to walk away,

‘Wait, do these things drop magic cores?’

He stopped himself in thought .

Every magic beast found in Gates had a magic core in their body; sometimes, a single magic beast could carry multiple cores . If you were lucky, you might even find a Runestone . The magic cores, which had many uses, and the Runestones, which taught valuable skills, could be sold for a high price . It would not be an exaggeration to say that the primary objective of most Hunters in a raid was to obtain magic cores .

Jinwoo was a Hunter . Walking away from a hunt empty handed made him feel disappointed . Just in case, he had cut open the belly of one of the Lycan but found nothing . It seemed like these things were something different than a magic beast .

In his Hunting experience, Jinwoo did not recall hearing anything about a wolf-like magic beast that resembled these Lycans .

As Jinwoo wiped his hands and got up to leave,

“Hmm?”

He saw something shining in the Lycan’s mouth . Jinwoo opened its jaws . One of the Lycan’s teeth was sparkling with light . When he reached out to it, a message appeared .

You’ve found a “Lycan’s canine”

Would you like to acquire it?

“Acquire . ”

Lycan’s canine

Rarity: None

Type: Junk

A Lycan’s large and sharp canine .

You may keep this item in your inventory .

You may sell this item in the shop .

Jinwoo read the canine in his hand and was taken back .

‘There was a shop?’

Where in the world did this unhelpful System come from? To think that it would force the user to figure out everything on his own . Jinwoo recalled how it had given him no explanation about the penalty quest; it just threw him in the penalty zone and expected him to run from death until his body gave out .

Jinwoo gritted his teeth and called the shop .

“Shop . ”

He half expected an NPC shopkeeper to popup out of nowhere . He was disappointed to find that the ‘shop’ just ended up being another information screen floating like a hologram . As if that wasn’t enough, the green letters on the screen displayed just two words .

Buy

Sell

“ . . . ”

Wow . What an amazing shop .

Jinwoo selected “buy” . Although he had no money in his pockets, he was curious on what kind of items could be found in this shop . But of course, the System was not very kind .

Your level is insufficient to use the “buy” function .

He was used to being turned away from places that needed money .

“Yessir, yessir . ”

Not paying mind, he turned his eyes toward the other function .

Would you like to sell the Lycan’s canine?

“Sure . ”

With a sound of coins dropping, his inventory opened up . At the base of the inventory screen, the section that said “Gold” was now displaying 20 . Yesterday, it was 0 .

‘20 gold . ’

Unable to use it in real life or in the System, he was not sure what the value of this amount was .

‘I doubt anything from an E-rank Dungeon would be useful . ’

Even if there was a difference between a Dungeon and an Instant Dungeon . Still, Jinwoo started to head over and collect the other Lycan’s teeth . He facepalmed .

“Right . I blew off its head…”

Disappointed, he turned to leave . He was disappointed at the loss of 20 gold, the value of which he wasn’t even sure about, but he was not about to waste the time to look for a tiny tooth that could’ve flown off to god knows where . As he turned around, his disappointment melted away like snow .

grrrrrrrrl

grrrrl

grrrrrrrl~

The Lycan that had ran away had returned with many more wolves!

Jinwoo’s face bloomed into a smile . At a glance, there were more than 20 of them .

“Eureka!”

‘Wait, that’s not the word… . Whatever . ’

What was certain was his happiness . He squeezed the hilt of his sword .

“Thank you for the meal~”

At his greedy gaze, the Lycans cowered and trembled .

Jinwoo leaped toward the beasts .

You’ve leveled up!

You’ve leveled up!

You’ve leveled up!

As expected, his level rose quickly . Having ran around the entire first floor looking for Lycans, Jinwoo’s level had already increased to 7 . A rather large leap of 5 levels .

whimper-!

As he took down the last remaining Lycan, a strange message appeared .

ring~

You’ve obtained the title, “Wolf Slayer”

“Title?”

Wolf Slayer

All stats increased by 40% against beast type monsters .

A title given to a hunter experienced in slaying wolves .

His status screen reflected the new title as well:

Name: Sung Jinwoo

Level: 7

Class: None

Title: Wolf Slayer

HP: 766

MP: 81

Fatigue: 3

Stats

Strength: 37

Constitution: 16

Agility: 16

Intelligence: 16

Sense: 16

(Available stat points: 0)

Skills

Passive Skills

-(Unknown) (Lv . Max)

-Unyielding Spirit (Lv . 1)

Active Skills

-Sprint (Lv . 1)

A stat boost against beast type monsters . Although the effect was limited against certain types, a 40% boost was nothing to scoff at .

‘There’s a lot of beast type magic beasts out there, wonder if it works against them?’

If it did, it would help a lot in Raiding . Still, the loot so far was rather disappointing .

‘34 canines, two rusty daggers, an adventurer’s clothes and a return stone . ’

Every once in a while, a wolf’s belly would contain items . However, most were not particularly useful . The rusty daggers had lower attack power compared to his steel sword, and the adventurer’s clothes ended up being junk items that he could not use . After selling all the junk he had picked up, Jinwoo had earned about a thousand gold .

Current Gold: 1,060

“ . . . I can’t tell if that’s a lot or little . ”

No matter how much he collected, there was nowhere he could spend it .

Ignoring the gold, the only other item that he had now was the return stone . He recalled the invisible barrier that stopped him no matter how much force was applied . The System had told him he required one of these to exit . So, now he knew he was able to leave .

Jinwoo was at a crossroad .

Ahead was the stairs descending to basement level 2 .

In his hand, the return stone .

‘Forward or retreat…’

If it was his old self, he would’ve ran away without a second thought . After all, it was the only way he survived the many Raids with his weak abilities . Others called it a miracle, but he knew it was due to his clever movements .

But it was different now .

He did not want to turn back .

If he left now, he felt like he could not return .

“I’m sick of running away . ”

It was about time he faced danger head on . He put the return stone back in his pockets .

His footsteps down the stairs were light .

Translator’s Notes:

[1]: Oh shit, I just realized I can stack the stat screens horizontally… I had to keep making page breaks when I had them vertical . Hope it doesn’t impact the mobile readers too much .

[2]: Sorry, I’m actually not a 100% sure what the original phrase is referring to (능력치가 올라갈수록 가중치가 붙는다면?) . Lit would be “as attributes go up” “weighted value” “is applied” . From context, I just gathered it to mean that the increases in his abilities were not arithmetic (straight line progression) but geometric (increasing progression) .

Sponsored Content

I Alone Level-up: Chapter 14.

.

The Lycan that had flown over his head was now looking at him with fear . Its tail lowered, the wolf began to step backwards . .

.

“Huh…?”.

.

Was this the result of putting all of his points into strength?.

.

As he stared at his fist with an open mouth, the headless body of the Lycan convulsed with a finality then stopped moving . A familiar electronic sound rang through Jinwoo’s head . .

.

ring~.

.

You’ve defeated the Steel-tooth Lycan . .

.

You’ve leveled up!.

.

.

.

“I’ve leveled up?”.

.

Make sure he didn’t mishear, Jinwoo quickly opened his status screen . .

.

Name: Sung Jinwoo.

Level: 2.

Class: None.

Title: None.

HP: 205.

MP: 22.

Fatigue: 0.

Stats.

.

Strength: 32.

Constitution: 11.

Agility: 11.

Intelligence: 11.

Sense: 11.

(Available stat points: 0).

Skills.

.

Passive Skills.

-(Unknown) (Lv . Max).

-Unyielding Spirit (Lv . 1).

.

Active Skills.

-Sprint (Lv . 1).

[1].

.

He really had leveled up . With it, all of his stats had increased by 1 point . Jinwoo realized that the quest rewards were not the only way to raise his attributes . It was apparent that leveling up increased them as well . .

.

‘To think that I could level-up!’.

.

Something that he had only dreamt about was now a reality before him . .

.

His heartbeat quickened . .

.

‘And the total points I’ve gained is bigger than the daily quest . ’.

.

The stat points he received from quests were 3 . .

.

The stat points he gained from leveling up were 5 . .

.

Although he could not freely distribute these 5 points, the total benefit from a level-up was much bigger than the quest reward . .

.

‘And I leveled up after taking down just two of them . ’.

.

In a video game, low level characters were able to level up quickly . .

.

Jinwoo was currently level 2 . You could say he was at the bottom of the barrel . But his level did not properly reflect his strength . After all, his strength was already above 30; if you treated one level-up being equivalent to one point of strength, Jinwoo already had the strength of someone above level 20 . And when a level 1 character hunts with the strength of a level 20?.

.

‘I think they call this “power leveling”?’.

.

The destructive power of his punch that surpassed all expectations was a testament to his progress . .

.

‘I’ve tripled the strength attribute, but I feel more than just three times stronger than before . ’.

.

Jinwoo’s original strength stat was 10 . The difference between 10 strength and 30 strength was a factor of 3, but his power felt much greater than that . .

.

‘Maybe…’.

.

What if value of his attributes became weighted as they increased[2]? That would explain this destructive power . On top of that, his movements had also become faster . If it was the old him, he could not imagine dodging the beasts’ fast attacks or make the wind howl when he made a punch . .

.

“I suppose increasing my muscles would make me faster . ”.

.

It seemed that increasing the strength stat increased both his ‘strength’ and ‘speed’ . His battle with the Lycan was the proof . .

.

But what about the agility stat? If not his mobility, what would it increase?.

.

Jinwoo knew he could not satisfy his curiosity without more stat points . .

.

‘Even if I had some…’.

.

It felt a little wasteful to use up the points from quest rewards in agility . If he could raise both his power and speed through the strength stat, why put points into agility?.

.

If that’s the case, there was one answer . .

.

‘Increase my level as fast as possible . ’.

.

He would obtain points in the agility stat through leveling up, gathering clumps of dirt until he had a sizeable hill . Surely the result of the incremental increases would be noticed eventually . .

.

‘Then, shall I get started?’.

.

He remembered the remaining Lycan . .

.

“But, where did that bastard go?”.

.

The Lycan that had cowered nearby had disappeared . Jinwoo looked around but could not find traces of the beast . It appeared to have ran away while Jinwoo was focused on his status screen . .

.

“Bleh . ”.

.

He rolled his tongue in his mouth, disappointed at the loss of experience points . As he began to walk away,.

.

‘Wait, do these things drop magic cores?’.

.

He stopped himself in thought . .

.

Every magic beast found in Gates had a magic core in their body; sometimes, a single magic beast could carry multiple cores . If you were lucky, you might even find a Runestone . The magic cores, which had many uses, and the Runestones, which taught valuable skills, could be sold for a high price . It would not be an exaggeration to say that the primary objective of most Hunters in a raid was to obtain magic cores . .

.

Jinwoo was a Hunter . Walking away from a hunt empty handed made him feel disappointed . Just in case, he had cut open the belly of one of the Lycan but found nothing . It seemed like these things were something different than a magic beast . .

.

In his Hunting experience, Jinwoo did not recall hearing anything about a wolf-like magic beast that resembled these Lycans . .

.

As Jinwoo wiped his hands and got up to leave,.

.

“Hmm?”.

.

He saw something shining in the Lycan’s mouth . Jinwoo opened its jaws . One of the Lycan’s teeth was sparkling with light . When he reached out to it, a message appeared . .

.

You’ve found a “Lycan’s canine”.

Would you like to acquire it?.

.

“Acquire . ”.

.

Lycan’s canine.

Rarity: None.

Type: Junk.

A Lycan’s large and sharp canine . .

You may keep this item in your inventory . .

You may sell this item in the shop . .

.

Jinwoo read the canine in his hand and was taken back . .

.

‘There was a shop?’.

.

Where in the world did this unhelpful System come from? To think that it would force the user to figure out everything on his own . Jinwoo recalled how it had given him no explanation about the penalty quest; it just threw him in the penalty zone and expected him to run from death until his body gave out . .

.

Jinwoo gritted his teeth and called the shop . .

.

“Shop . ”.

.

He half expected an NPC shopkeeper to popup out of nowhere . He was disappointed to find that the ‘shop’ just ended up being another information screen floating like a hologram . As if that wasn’t enough, the green letters on the screen displayed just two words . .

.

Buy.

Sell.

.

“ . ”.

.

Wow . What an amazing shop . .

.

Jinwoo selected “buy” . Although he had no money in his pockets, he was curious on what kind of items could be found in this shop . But of course, the System was not very kind . .

.

Your level is insufficient to use the “buy” function . .

.

He was used to being turned away from places that needed money . .

.

“Yessir, yessir . ”.

.

Not paying mind, he turned his eyes toward the other function . .

.

Would you like to sell the Lycan’s canine?.

.

“Sure . ”.

.

With a sound of coins dropping, his inventory opened up . At the base of the inventory screen, the section that said “Gold” was now displaying 20 . Yesterday, it was 0 . .

.

‘20 gold . ’.

.

Unable to use it in real life or in the System, he was not sure what the value of this amount was . .

.

‘I doubt anything from an E-rank Dungeon would be useful . ’.

.

Even if there was a difference between a Dungeon and an Instant Dungeon . Still, Jinwoo started to head over and collect the other Lycan’s teeth . He facepalmed . .

.

“Right . I blew off its head…”.

.

Disappointed, he turned to leave . He was disappointed at the loss of 20 gold, the value of which he wasn’t even sure about, but he was not about to waste the time to look for a tiny tooth that could’ve flown off to god knows where . As he turned around, his disappointment melted away like snow . .

.

grrrrrrrrl.

.

grrrrl.

.

grrrrrrrl~.

.

The Lycan that had ran away had returned with many more wolves!.

.

Jinwoo’s face bloomed into a smile . At a glance, there were more than 20 of them . .

.

“Eureka!”.

.

‘Wait, that’s not the word… . Whatever . ’.

.

What was certain was his happiness . He squeezed the hilt of his sword . .

.

“Thank you for the meal~”.

.

At his greedy gaze, the Lycans cowered and trembled . .

.

Jinwoo leaped toward the beasts . .

.

.

.

You’ve leveled up!.

.

You’ve leveled up!.

.

You’ve leveled up!.

.

As expected, his level rose quickly . Having ran around the entire first floor looking for Lycans, Jinwoo’s level had already increased to 7 . A rather large leap of 5 levels . .

.

whimper-!.

.

As he took down the last remaining Lycan, a strange message appeared . .

.

ring~.

.

You’ve obtained the title, “Wolf Slayer”.

.

“Title?”.

.

Wolf Slayer.

All stats increased by 40% against beast type monsters . .

A title given to a hunter experienced in slaying wolves . .

.

His status screen reflected the new title as well:.

.

Name: Sung Jinwoo.

Level: 7.

Class: None.

Title: Wolf Slayer.

HP: 766.

MP: 81.

Fatigue: 3.

Stats.

.

Strength: 37.

Constitution: 16.

Agility: 16.

Intelligence: 16.

Sense: 16.

(Available stat points: 0).

Skills.

.

Passive Skills.

-(Unknown) (Lv . Max).

-Unyielding Spirit (Lv . 1).

.

Active Skills.

-Sprint (Lv . 1).

.

A stat boost against beast type monsters . Although the effect was limited against certain types, a 40% boost was nothing to scoff at . .

.

‘There’s a lot of beast type magic beasts out there, wonder if it works against them?’.

.

If it did, it would help a lot in Raiding . Still, the loot so far was rather disappointing . .

.

‘34 canines, two rusty daggers, an adventurer’s clothes and a return stone . ’.

.

Every once in a while, a wolf’s belly would contain items . However, most were not particularly useful . The rusty daggers had lower attack power compared to his steel sword, and the adventurer’s clothes ended up being junk items that he could not use . After selling all the junk he had picked up, Jinwoo had earned about a thousand gold . .

.

Current Gold: 1,060.

.

“ . I can’t tell if that’s a lot or little . ”.

.

No matter how much he collected, there was nowhere he could spend it . .

.

Ignoring the gold, the only other item that he had now was the return stone . He recalled the invisible barrier that stopped him no matter how much force was applied . The System had told him he required one of these to exit . So, now he knew he was able to leave . .

.

Jinwoo was at a crossroad . .

.

Ahead was the stairs descending to basement level 2 . .

.

In his hand, the return stone . .

.

‘Forward or retreat…’.

.

If it was his old self, he would’ve ran away without a second thought . After all, it was the only way he survived the many Raids with his weak abilities . Others called it a miracle, but he knew it was due to his clever movements . .

.

But it was different now . .

.

He did not want to turn back . .

.

If he left now, he felt like he could not return . .

.

“I’m sick of running away . ”.

.

It was about time he faced danger head on . He put the return stone back in his pockets . .

.

His footsteps down the stairs were light . .

.

Translator’s Notes:.

[1]: Oh shit, I just realized I can stack the stat screens horizontally… I had to keep making page breaks when I had them vertical . Hope it doesn’t impact the mobile readers too much . .

[2]: Sorry, I’m actually not a 100% sure what the original phrase is referring to (능력치가 올라갈수록 가중치가 붙는다면?) . Lit would be “as attributes go up” “weighted value” “is applied” . From context, I just gathered it to mean that the increases in his abilities were not arithmetic (straight line progression) but geometric (increasing progression) . .