Chapter 8

Chapter 8

"That's impossible......"

Haeseong murmured blankly.

Taking down a Creature Falcon this quickly.

His astonishment didn't end there. The spear, which had been smeared with blood, had reverted to the sorry-looking metal skewer it once was.

"First time in a while doing fieldwork myself. I'm beat."

Sahyeon cracked his neck side to side. His red eyes had returned to grey as well.

'So his eye color changes when his skills activate!'

Just as Haeseong was observing Sahyeon in a daze—

Sahyeon raised an eyebrow and held out his hand.

"Gloves."

"Oh! Yes, here you go."

Haeseong immediately opened his inventory and handed over Sahyeon's gloves with both hands — he'd picked them up on the way.

Sahyeon tossed the skewer to the ground and pulled on his gloves.

'So he uses skills through physical contact, which is why he wears gloves normally.'

Haeseong continued running through deductions in his head.

As he stole a glance up at Sahyeon's face, his body gave a sharp flinch.

Blood spattered across his face.

The all-black clothing hid most of it, but it wasn't just his face — blood covered him everywhere.

"Um, Mr. Sahyeon. There's blood on your face......"

Haeseong spoke carefully.

Sahyeon clicked his tongue and wiped the blood from his face with his sleeve.

"Disgustingly grimy."

The gesture looked very well practiced.

When he scowled with a blood-streaked face, Sahyeon's already fierce features turned downright menacing.

Haeseong's gaze naturally dropped.

Setting aside being intimidated by Sahyeon's fearsome look, Haeseong replayed the fight in his mind.

'With that level of strength, he could've taken down the Falcon without bothering with sensory disruption techniques.'

And yet he'd demonstrated each step of the strategy. As if deliberately showing it to him.

'Could it be that the Association President knew all along? Is that why this assignment too......'

Just then, something on the ground caught his eye.

Beside the skewer that had been tossed aside, something was rolling.

"Hmm?"

Something glinting.

"N-No way."

Haeseong rubbed his eyes and checked the object on the ground again.

"HWAAAH!"

He hadn't been seeing things.

Haeseong clapped a hand over his mouth.

Sahyeon was already sitting on a chunk of asphalt debris.

"Did your eardrums blow out and take your mind with them......"

He looked Haeseong up and down as if examining a specimen.

But right now, Sahyeon's frigid stare didn't register with Haeseong at all.

"Isn't this a Mana Crystal?!"

A rough gemstone lying next to the skewer.

The Creature Falcon's signature wind pressure shimmered faintly across the surface of the Mana Crystal.

"First time seeing a Mana Crystal?"

Sahyeon, on the other hand, was perfectly calm.

Haeseong let out a breath of pure disbelief at the reaction.

"This isn't just any Mana Crystal!"

The higher a monster's grade, the more drastically the odds of obtaining a Mana Crystal dropped.

Usually, destroying the Core destroyed the crystal along with it.

Even a fingernail-sized piece was worth tens of millions of won.

'But this......'

This had come from the Core of an A-rank Creature Falcon, no less.

And a Mana Crystal the size of a fist at that.

Perfectly round and pristine, without a single scratch!

Haeseong asked carefully.

"M-Mr. Sahyeon. Would it be all right if I take a closer look?"

"? Go ahead."

Sahyeon gave a nod.

Haeseong accepted it with trembling hands and immediately began appraising it.

[Skill 'Absolute Appraisal (A)' has been activated!]

A blue system window appeared before his eyes.

[Item Information]

High-purity Mana Crystal extracted from a Creature Falcon Core.

Name: A-rank Mana Crystal

Attribute: Ice

Absorption Efficiency: 75%

Durability: 87%

Purity: 96%

"High-purity, just as I thought."

Haeseong let out an exclamation as he read the window.

Mana Crystals were primarily used as enhancement materials or for equipment crafting.

Awakened individuals also consumed them directly to pursue grade advancement or stat boosts.

The higher a crystal's purity, the more the price was whatever the seller decided to ask.

'With specs like these...... maybe five billion won?'

Way beyond anything my salary could dream of.

Haeseong was running his tongue across his lips as he read down the item details when he suddenly froze at the last entry.

[Estimated Market Value: 10,000,000,000 won]

"T-Ten billion?!"

Haeseong's jaw dropped.

More than double what he'd estimated.

He'd expected the high purity to command a premium, but this much......

It was more than ten times the annual salary of Haeseong, who was fairly high up the ranks as a Hunter Association official.

Terrified of so much as scratching it, he handed the Mana Crystal back to Sahyeon with violently shaking hands.

The crystal's rightful owner caught it with a careless flick.

The kind of casual handling that made Haeseong's heart lurch.

"You can see all that?"

Sahyeon was more interested in the fact that Haeseong could view item status windows than in the crystal's value.

"Oh, uh, yes......"

Haeseong scratched the back of his head awkwardly.

A familiar reaction.

Every hunter who learned about his status window skill said something similar.

"It looks like the status windows that Awakened see for themselves."

From the moment of Awakening, an Awakened could view only their own status window. But an Awakened with a status window reading skill could view others' as well.

Most hunters, however, weren't exactly thrilled about someone having that skill.

Haeseong wet his lips and waited for the response.

"That's handy."

"...What?"

An unexpected answer rolled off Sahyeon's lips.

Haeseong blinked his brown eyes rapidly.

It was short and matter-of-fact, but to him, it landed harder than any words could have.

The reactions of hunters who learned about Haeseong's trait were almost always the same.

— You should skip the fieldwork, it's all getting hurt and dying out there. You're the one who really knows how to survive, Hunter Haeseong!

— You're better suited for fighting with your brain than on the front lines, Hunter Haeseong!

To his face, everyone said things that sounded nice enough on the surface.

But what those same people said behind his back reached Haeseong's ears without much difficulty.

— At the end of the day, hunters have to prove themselves with their bodies. Sitting around in a cozy office doesn't cut it. Tsk.

— I'll give him credit for strategic judgment. But even with a plan, we're the ones doing the actual fighting.

— How are you supposed to trust a hunter with zero battlefield experience?

"Hunters have to fight with their bodies."

A belief accepted as self-evident in the hunter world.

There weren't many places where a non-combat hunter could stand.

It couldn't be helped, he'd thought. He was used to those kinds of words by now.

No — he'd thought he was used to them.

A strange emotion stirred, and Haeseong let out a long, trembling breath.

BUZZ, BUZZ—

His somewhat dazed mind was jolted awake by the vibration of the smartwatch on his wrist.

A notice relayed from the Hunter Association.

Haeseong checked the contents, cleared his throat, and reported to Sahyeon.

"Mr. Sahyeon, additional support personnel are expected to arrive within three minutes."

"It's been over for ages and now they're showing up."

Sahyeon said with a mocking edge.

Haeseong silently agreed, then carefully observed Sahyeon.

Sitting on the debris, Sahyeon was examining the Mana Crystal with an indifferent expression.

He clearly had no idea about market prices.

'Where did this person suddenly come from?'

What was that ability earlier? What's his identity?

The question marks in Haeseong's head kept multiplying.

'And......'

Haeseong recalled the sight of Sahyeon's back, standing between them and the Monstrous Bird.

His eyes lit up with resolve.

"Um, Mr. Sahyeon. Could I ask you something?"

"No."

An immediate answer.

Casual in tone, firm underneath.

"You don't even know what I was going to ask......"

Haeseong grumbled in a wronged voice.

CLANG—

Sahyeon tossed the Mana Crystal carelessly into his inventory.

That priceless thing......!

Just as Haeseong was recoiling in horror, worrying about the crystal's safety—

"You were going to ask about my trait."

Haeseong bit his lip at Sahyeon's bull's-eye.

A trait that could reshape objects and mute specific spaces.

Even after scouring through his entire mental database, he couldn't find a single hunter with similar skills.

Sahyeon stretched both arms behind him, leaning back on his palms, and spoke as if sighing.

"I can't be bothered, so just look for yourself."

"Excuse me?"

"You said you can view item status windows. Then you can view a person's too."

"...Oh, yes, yeah. That's true......"

Haeseong nodded with a dazed, poleaxed expression.

Sahyeon looked up at Haeseong, who was just blinking without moving, with open displeasure.

"What's that vacant look for."

"Oh, it's just......"

Haeseong fidgeted with his cheek and answered.

"People usually don't like me checking their status windows. ......They say it's personal information."

Sahyeon let out a loud snort.

"Ha. It's all recorded on your hunter registration card anyway. What a fuss over nothing."

Somehow those words were deeply refreshing, and a faint smile slipped across Haeseong's face.

Sahyeon gave a lazy nod.

"Just go ahead and check."

Haeseong let out a relieved breath and smiled softly.

"All right. Excuse me, then."

He looked Sahyeon straight in the eyes and activated his skill.

[Skill 'Status Window Reading (S)' has been activated!]

A blue status window soon appeared before his eyes.

<Status Window>

Name: Yeom Sahyeon

Age: 27

Grade: S

Trait: Formless Sovereign

Overall Stats: Stamina (SSS), Strength (SS+), Agility (S+), Intelligence (A+), Mental Fortitude (B)

.......

"Haaah......!"

What kind of stats......

Haeseong clapped a hand over his mouth.

Even at a glance, the numbers were staggering. S-grades across the board.

He'd expected S-rank, but never this far above it.

As he read down the status window with a stunned face, his gaze caught on one section.

Key Skills: Immortal Nightmare (SS+), Phantom Blacksmith (SS), Whisper of the Dead (S).......

'Immortal...... Nightmare?'

At his grade, he could only confirm skill names — but that was enough to form a rough guess.

'...It seems like a hallucination skill.'

In that instant, a conversation with a colleague flashed through Haeseong's mind.

— You know the Mirror Mask they say is in the Hunter Penitentiary? Apparently his torture methods are absolutely vicious. They say he makes you feel the most painful thing you can possibly imagine.

— Hmm, then could he be using a hallucination skill that extends to pain sensation?

— Hmm? ...Oh, that's right! Sharp as always, Hunter Haeseong. Ha ha!

The puzzle pieces clicked into place one by one.

The Mirror Mask, suspected of using a hallucination skill, and Sahyeon, who possessed a hallucination skill.

The Mirror Mask, famous for his blood-red eyes, and Sahyeon's eyes, which turned red every time he activated a skill.......

'......Could it be.'

Mr. Sahyeon is...... the Masked Interrogator......?

Haeseong's pupils shook violently.