Chapter 31

“Yes, all of the prisoners are C-rank, but the HSD Hunter is a B-rank, so there’s nothing to worry about . ”

Kim Sangshik relented and nodded . It was a basic theory that you needed at least 10 C-rank Hunters to defeat a single B-ranker . If such a B-ranker was offering to not only watch the prisoners but also help with the Raid, there was nothing to complain about .

‘A single B-ranker and three C-rankers…’

Jinwoo stared at the HSD Hunter and the prisoners with confusion .

‘Something’s weird . ’

There was a strange killing intent spilling forth from one of them . Was this an effect of the sense stat, or was he just imagining things out of worry? Whatever it was, Jinwoo could not help but feel uneasy .

He whispered to Juhee,

“Juhee-ssi, please don’t go on this Raid . ”

She looked around then responded,

“What about you?”

He answered her question with a question,

“If I go?”

“Then I’m also going . ”

Her face was determined to follow him .

‘I understand you’re worried about me, but…’

Having experienced her stubbornness in the past, Jinwoo relented .

‘I suppose everything should be alright if I’m there . ’

After all, he had single handedly defeated Hwang Dongseok’s party, which included 5 C-rankers .

Jinwoo nodded,

“Alright . Alright . ”

The HSD Hunter finished with the documents then appeared before all the Hunters .

“I’m Kang Taeshik of the Hunter Surveillance Department . I’m sure you’ve already heard the situation . I’ll be keeping a close eye on them, so don’t worry about those bastards . ”

He gestured towards the prisoners, and they came to him and held out their cuffed hands . One by one, Kang Taeshik uncuffed them .

“Aw man, that was really uncomfortable . ”

“You can’t drag us around like this . We’re not slaves, ya know?”

The freed prisoners rubbed their wrists and complained . Ignoring them, Kang Taeshik turned toward the Hunters .

“Who’ll be leading the Raid today?”

Having taken the responsibility normally, Song Chiyeol half-heartedly raised his hand .

Kang Taeshik nodded,

“Understood”

With Song Chiyeol in front, the Hunters started entering the Gate .

“Let’s go . ”

Jinwoo and Juhee also stood before the Gate . Remember her last trip into a Dungeon, Juhee lightly held on to Jinwoo’s sleeves as they entered .

The Dungeon this time was filled with goblins . Faced against the weakest humanoid type magic beasts, the Raid was a lot easier than expected .

screech!

scree-!

Even before he had powered up, Jinwoo could take on these bizarre looking things . He carefully defeated of them one by one . His combat prowess surprised Juhee and Song Chiyeol, who had not remembered him like this .

“Whoa~”

Jinwoo was using the bare minimum power required, as to not get noticed, but the difference between his old self was still noticeable .

Juhee approached him and asked,

“Have-have you been learning somewhere?”

“That’s er… I’ve been running every day . ”

“Running?”

Juhee was confused, but it wasn’t exactly a lie .

‘But… I’m not getting any experience points…’

screech!

The enemy’s level was too low . You’ve gained no experience points .

screech!

The enemy’s level was too low . You’ve gained no experience points .

Jinwoo was disappointed . All he kept getting was the message that the goblins’ levels were too low .

‘At this rate…’

Even worse, the magic cores from the goblins were the lowest tier possible . Jinwoo looked around . Excited at the freedom of movement after a long time, the prisoners were going all out on the goblins .

screech!

screeee!

It was hard to tell who was the human and who was the beast .

‘Looks like I don’t have to do that much . ’

Still, he wasn’t getting experience or good income . This concerned Jinwoo,

‘If it’s going to be like this all the time, should I just leave the Association?’

The Raids under the Association were mostly D-rank or E-rank Gates, and if he was not getting any experience points in those low-level Dungeons, there was no point to staying with the Association .

‘And at this point, I can easily take care of mother’s hospital bills…’

He could leave the Association whenever he wanted . This was why having money was good . It allowed Jinwoo more freedom in the paths that he could take .

While he was lost in thought, the party had ventured deep into the Dungeon .

“Huh?”

“Hmm…”

They came across three different paths . Kang Taeshik suggested to Song Chiyeol,

“The Dungeon’s difficulty is rather low . Shall we split up here?”

“Sounds good . ”

Song Chiyeol agreed . Jinwoo closed his eyes and focused his senses .

‘Now which path leads to the boss?’

He had hoped at least the boss would give him some small amount of experience . Soon, the energy of the various lifeform in the Dungeon entered his senses . Opening his eyes, Jinwoo told Song Chiyeol,

“Ahjussi, let’s go to the left path . ”

“Alright . ”

Jinwoo, Juhee and Song Chiyeol chose the left path . Kang Taeshik and the prisoners chose the right path . The remaining two went down the middle path .

Jinwoo’s heartbeat increased slightly .

‘The boss is at the end of this path . ’

It couldn’t be called strong, but it definitely gave off a tougher presence than the goblins . Jinwoo wanted to get to the boss quickly . But just after taking few steps into the left path, a group of goblins appeared and blocked their way .

“Kikik . ”

“Kiriririk . ”

“Kiiik . ”

There was about ten of them . Holding wooden clubs, wooden swords and wooden staves, the goblins gave absolutely no sense of danger to Jinwoo .

‘Aren’t they tired of this?’

Jinwoo scrunched his face in annoyance . These worthless things that ran at him with no experience points or money were just a thorn at his sides .

“There are ten of them…”

“What should we do? Should we group with the others and come back?”

However, the other two with him were taking it much more seriously .

“Well, since they’re just goblins, we should just give it a go . ”

“Hmm… Okay . ”

A fireball appeared in Song Chiyeol’s hand and Juhee began preparing her healing magic . Jinwoo scratched the back of his head .

‘Now that I think about it, I’ve never been this relaxed in a Dungeon before…’

Was it because he had become incomparably stronger? Applied to a familiar situation from his old life, Jinwoo finally began to feel the changes that he was undergoing .

Song Chiyeol interrupted his thoughts,

“Sung-ssi, are you ready?”

“Yes . ”

Jinwoo matched the pace of his teammates and slowly stepped up towards the goblins . Suddenly, a scream rang forth from somewhere .

“Uwaaaak!”

“Ahhhh!”

It wasn’t goblin . It was a human scream . Jinwoo and co . looked at each other . Just as they thought the screams had died out, another one rang forth .

“Ahhhhhh!”

Song Chiyeol’s face hardened,

“Let’s go check it out . ”

The three Hunters quickly ran towards the direction of the scream . Jinwoo could’ve easily went ahead of the two but decided to match their speed for their safety . After running for some time, they came across the source .

Juhee discovered someone and shouted,

“Over there! Someone is…”

The HSD Hunter Kang Taeshik was kneeling on the ground, covered in blood . He shouted at the approaching party,

“B-be careful! Those bastards are still around somewhere!”

Appearing to have shouted with the last bit of his strength, Kang Taeshik collapsed face-down onto the ground . Unable to ignore him, Juhee quickly ran toward his body .

“I’ll heal him!”

Even after everything she had gone through, Juhee still held pride as a B-rank Healer . Even if there were enemies around, her healing would be quick . She concluded that it would be best to heal Kang Taeshik before they could attack .

“Please just wait . ”

She held out her hands in front of Kang Taeshik, and a light gathered in her hands .

It was in that moment, Kang Taeshik shot up from the ground and stretched a hand filled with magic power toward Juhee’s throat .

woosh!

Before his hand could reach Juhee’s throat, someone grabbed his wrist in the nick of time .

grab!

“Ah…!”

Taking few steps backwards in surprise, Juhee fell onto the ground .

Kang Taeshik was surprised .

‘Someone stopped my attack at this distance?’

It was easy for a higher-ranking Hunter to dispose of a lower-ranking one . That’s why his first target was the female Hunter, who was a B-ranker like him . Fortunately for him, she was a noncombat-class Hunter, so he had expected to take care of her easily through a surprise attack .

But his attack… was stopped .

The efforts he put toward acting disappeared in a puff of smoke .

Kang Taeshik’s eyes followed the hand holding his wrist to Jinwoo’s face . Jinwoo’s eyes were filled with murderous intent . Kang Taeshik frowned,

“Just a shitty Association-affiliated Hunter?!”

woosh!

Kang Taeshik’s other fist flew towards Jinwoo’s face, but the man easily turned his head and dodged the attack .

‘What?’

Kang Taeshik threw aside Jinwoo’s grip with strength .

“What?”

Jinwoo was also surprised . It was a strength worthy of a high-ranking Hunter .

Having freed himself from Jinwoo’s hands, Kang Taeshik rained his fists upon him mercilessly . Not losing to his speed, Jinwoo dodged and counterattacked .

Hit! Strike! Woosh! Bam! Pow!

The two men ceaselessly traded and evaded each other’s blows . Neither of them backed off .

While they were fighting, Song Chiyeol grabbed Juhee and pulled her away from the danger .

“A-ahjussi…”

Juhee could not speak, stunned . Song Chiyeol was even more surprised than her .

‘How is this possible…?’

Their offense and defense were happening at an unbelievable speed . It was too fast even to track with his own eyes . The high-ranking Hunter’s movements made sense, but Sung Jinwoo was not the man he had remembered . The young man was keeping up with the B-ranker .

‘His speed is too fast even for this C-ranker’s eyes!’

He was correct on his feelings earlier . The Jinwoo that was fighting before him was not the same weak E-ranker from before .

Having traded dozens of exchanges in a blink of an eye, the two fighters backed away from each other to catch their breath .

Jinwoo looked at Kang Taeshik with narrowed eyes,

“The blood on your clothes… It’s not yours, is it?”

Kang Taeshik rubbed his wrists replied,

“That’s right . It’s those fuckers’ blood . Putting that aside, to think that I’d meet a Hunter like you here . ”

He was truly awed . He had no idea that there was an Association-affiliated Hunter that was a high-ranker .

‘This is not good . ’

He had thought that today was the best opportunity to act, but Jinwoo’s appearance had thrown a wrench in his plans .

Kang Taeshik asked out of curiosity,

“Who are you? What’s your ranking?”

Jinwoo summoned Casaka’s Poisoned Fang in his hand and answered .

“Sung Jinwoo . E-rank . ”

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I Alone Level-up: Chapter 31.

.

“Yes, all of the prisoners are C-rank, but the HSD Hunter is a B-rank, so there’s nothing to worry about . ”.

.

Kim Sangshik relented and nodded . It was a basic theory that you needed at least 10 C-rank Hunters to defeat a single B-ranker . If such a B-ranker was offering to not only watch the prisoners but also help with the Raid, there was nothing to complain about . .

.

‘A single B-ranker and three C-rankers…’.

.

Jinwoo stared at the HSD Hunter and the prisoners with confusion . .

.

‘Something’s weird . ’.

.

There was a strange killing intent spilling forth from one of them . Was this an effect of the sense stat, or was he just imagining things out of worry? Whatever it was, Jinwoo could not help but feel uneasy . .

.

He whispered to Juhee,.

.

“Juhee-ssi, please don’t go on this Raid . ”.

.

She looked around then responded,.

.

“What about you?”.

.

He answered her question with a question,.

.

“If I go?”.

.

“Then I’m also going . ”.

.

Her face was determined to follow him . .

.

‘I understand you’re worried about me, but…’.

.

Having experienced her stubbornness in the past, Jinwoo relented . .

.

‘I suppose everything should be alright if I’m there . ’.

.

After all, he had single handedly defeated Hwang Dongseok’s party, which included 5 C-rankers . .

.

Jinwoo nodded,.

.

“Alright . Alright . ”.

.

The HSD Hunter finished with the documents then appeared before all the Hunters . .

.

“I’m Kang Taeshik of the Hunter Surveillance Department . I’m sure you’ve already heard the situation . I’ll be keeping a close eye on them, so don’t worry about those bastards . ”.

.

He gestured towards the prisoners, and they came to him and held out their cuffed hands . One by one, Kang Taeshik uncuffed them . .

.

“Aw man, that was really uncomfortable . ”.

“You can’t drag us around like this . We’re not slaves, ya know?”.

.

The freed prisoners rubbed their wrists and complained . Ignoring them, Kang Taeshik turned toward the Hunters . .

.

“Who’ll be leading the Raid today?”.

.

Having taken the responsibility normally, Song Chiyeol half-heartedly raised his hand . .

.

Kang Taeshik nodded,.

.

“Understood”.

.

With Song Chiyeol in front, the Hunters started entering the Gate . .

.

“Let’s go . ”.

.

Jinwoo and Juhee also stood before the Gate . Remember her last trip into a Dungeon, Juhee lightly held on to Jinwoo’s sleeves as they entered . .

.

.

.

. .

The Dungeon this time was filled with goblins . Faced against the weakest humanoid type magic beasts, the Raid was a lot easier than expected . .

.

screech!.

.

scree-!.

.

Even before he had powered up, Jinwoo could take on these bizarre looking things . He carefully defeated of them one by one . His combat prowess surprised Juhee and Song Chiyeol, who had not remembered him like this . .

.

“Whoa~”.

.

Jinwoo was using the bare minimum power required, as to not get noticed, but the difference between his old self was still noticeable . .

.

Juhee approached him and asked,.

.

“Have-have you been learning somewhere?”.

.

“That’s er… I’ve been running every day . ”.

.

“Running?”.

.

Juhee was confused, but it wasn’t exactly a lie . .

.

‘But… I’m not getting any experience points…’.

.

screech!.

.

The enemy’s level was too low . You’ve gained no experience points . .

.

screech!.

.

The enemy’s level was too low . You’ve gained no experience points . .

.

Jinwoo was disappointed . All he kept getting was the message that the goblins’ levels were too low . .

.

‘At this rate…’.

.

Even worse, the magic cores from the goblins were the lowest tier possible . Jinwoo looked around . Excited at the freedom of movement after a long time, the prisoners were going all out on the goblins . .

.

screech!.

.

screeee!.

.

It was hard to tell who was the human and who was the beast . .

.

‘Looks like I don’t have to do that much . ’.

.

Still, he wasn’t getting experience or good income . This concerned Jinwoo,.

.

‘If it’s going to be like this all the time, should I just leave the Association?’.

.

The Raids under the Association were mostly D-rank or E-rank Gates, and if he was not getting any experience points in those low-level Dungeons, there was no point to staying with the Association . .

.

‘And at this point, I can easily take care of mother’s hospital bills…’.

.

He could leave the Association whenever he wanted . This was why having money was good . It allowed Jinwoo more freedom in the paths that he could take . .

.

While he was lost in thought, the party had ventured deep into the Dungeon . .

.

“Huh?”.

“Hmm…”.

.

They came across three different paths . Kang Taeshik suggested to Song Chiyeol,.

.

“The Dungeon’s difficulty is rather low . Shall we split up here?”.

.

“Sounds good . ”.

.

Song Chiyeol agreed . Jinwoo closed his eyes and focused his senses . .

.

‘Now which path leads to the boss?’.

.

He had hoped at least the boss would give him some small amount of experience . Soon, the energy of the various lifeform in the Dungeon entered his senses . Opening his eyes, Jinwoo told Song Chiyeol,.

.

“Ahjussi, let’s go to the left path . ”.

.

“Alright . ”.

.

Jinwoo, Juhee and Song Chiyeol chose the left path . Kang Taeshik and the prisoners chose the right path . The remaining two went down the middle path . .

.

Jinwoo’s heartbeat increased slightly . .

.

‘The boss is at the end of this path . ’.

.

It couldn’t be called strong, but it definitely gave off a tougher presence than the goblins . Jinwoo wanted to get to the boss quickly . But just after taking few steps into the left path, a group of goblins appeared and blocked their way . .

.

“Kikik . ”.

“Kiriririk . ”.

“Kiiik . ”.

.

There was about ten of them . Holding wooden clubs, wooden swords and wooden staves, the goblins gave absolutely no sense of danger to Jinwoo . .

.

‘Aren’t they tired of this?’.

.

Jinwoo scrunched his face in annoyance . These worthless things that ran at him with no experience points or money were just a thorn at his sides . .

.

“There are ten of them…”.

“What should we do? Should we group with the others and come back?”.

.

However, the other two with him were taking it much more seriously . .

.

“Well, since they’re just goblins, we should just give it a go . ”.

“Hmm… Okay . ”.

.

A fireball appeared in Song Chiyeol’s hand and Juhee began preparing her healing magic . Jinwoo scratched the back of his head . .

.

‘Now that I think about it, I’ve never been this relaxed in a Dungeon before…’.

.

Was it because he had become incomparably stronger? Applied to a familiar situation from his old life, Jinwoo finally began to feel the changes that he was undergoing . .

.

Song Chiyeol interrupted his thoughts,.

.

“Sung-ssi, are you ready?”.

“Yes . ”.

.

Jinwoo matched the pace of his teammates and slowly stepped up towards the goblins . Suddenly, a scream rang forth from somewhere . .

.

“Uwaaaak!”.

“Ahhhh!”.

.

It wasn’t goblin . It was a human scream . Jinwoo and co . looked at each other . Just as they thought the screams had died out, another one rang forth . .

.

“Ahhhhhh!”.

.

Song Chiyeol’s face hardened,.

.

“Let’s go check it out . ”.

.

The three Hunters quickly ran towards the direction of the scream . Jinwoo could’ve easily went ahead of the two but decided to match their speed for their safety . After running for some time, they came across the source . .

.

Juhee discovered someone and shouted,.

.

“Over there! Someone is…”.

.

The HSD Hunter Kang Taeshik was kneeling on the ground, covered in blood . He shouted at the approaching party,.

.

“B-be careful! Those bastards are still around somewhere!”.

.

Appearing to have shouted with the last bit of his strength, Kang Taeshik collapsed face-down onto the ground . Unable to ignore him, Juhee quickly ran toward his body . .

.

“I’ll heal him!”.

.

Even after everything she had gone through, Juhee still held pride as a B-rank Healer . Even if there were enemies around, her healing would be quick . She concluded that it would be best to heal Kang Taeshik before they could attack . .

.

“Please just wait . ”.

.

She held out her hands in front of Kang Taeshik, and a light gathered in her hands . .

.

It was in that moment, Kang Taeshik shot up from the ground and stretched a hand filled with magic power toward Juhee’s throat . .

.

woosh!.

.

Before his hand could reach Juhee’s throat, someone grabbed his wrist in the nick of time . .

.

grab!.

.

“Ah…!”.

.

Taking few steps backwards in surprise, Juhee fell onto the ground . .

.

Kang Taeshik was surprised . .

.

‘Someone stopped my attack at this distance?’.

.

It was easy for a higher-ranking Hunter to dispose of a lower-ranking one . That’s why his first target was the female Hunter, who was a B-ranker like him . Fortunately for him, she was a noncombat-class Hunter, so he had expected to take care of her easily through a surprise attack . .

.

But his attack… was stopped . .

.

The efforts he put toward acting disappeared in a puff of smoke . .

.

Kang Taeshik’s eyes followed the hand holding his wrist to Jinwoo’s face . Jinwoo’s eyes were filled with murderous intent . Kang Taeshik frowned,.

.

“Just a shitty Association-affiliated Hunter?!”.

.

woosh!.

.

Kang Taeshik’s other fist flew towards Jinwoo’s face, but the man easily turned his head and dodged the attack . .

.

‘What?’.

.

Kang Taeshik threw aside Jinwoo’s grip with strength . .

.

“What?”.

.

Jinwoo was also surprised . It was a strength worthy of a high-ranking Hunter . .

.

Having freed himself from Jinwoo’s hands, Kang Taeshik rained his fists upon him mercilessly . Not losing to his speed, Jinwoo dodged and counterattacked . .

.

Hit! Strike! Woosh! Bam! Pow!.

.

The two men ceaselessly traded and evaded each other’s blows . Neither of them backed off . .

.

While they were fighting, Song Chiyeol grabbed Juhee and pulled her away from the danger . .

.

“A-ahjussi…”.

.

Juhee could not speak, stunned . Song Chiyeol was even more surprised than her . .

.

‘How is this possible…?’.

.

Their offense and defense were happening at an unbelievable speed . It was too fast even to track with his own eyes . The high-ranking Hunter’s movements made sense, but Sung Jinwoo was not the man he had remembered . The young man was keeping up with the B-ranker . .

.

‘His speed is too fast even for this C-ranker’s eyes!’.

.

He was correct on his feelings earlier . The Jinwoo that was fighting before him was not the same weak E-ranker from before . .

.

Having traded dozens of exchanges in a blink of an eye, the two fighters backed away from each other to catch their breath . .

.

Jinwoo looked at Kang Taeshik with narrowed eyes,.

.

“The blood on your clothes… It’s not yours, is it?”.

.

Kang Taeshik rubbed his wrists replied,.

.

“That’s right . It’s those fuckers’ blood . Putting that aside, to think that I’d meet a Hunter like you here . ”.

.

He was truly awed . He had no idea that there was an Association-affiliated Hunter that was a high-ranker . .

.

‘This is not good . ’.

.

He had thought that today was the best opportunity to act, but Jinwoo’s appearance had thrown a wrench in his plans . .

.

Kang Taeshik asked out of curiosity,.

.

“Who are you? What’s your ranking?”.

.

Jinwoo summoned Casaka’s Poisoned Fang in his hand and answered . .

.

“Sung Jinwoo . E-rank . ”.

.

.