The Hunter of the Other World Who Is Being Misunderstood Chapter 311. Introduction (3)

Chapter 311. Introduction (3)

I was already curious about what had happened, so this works out perfectly.

I answered the incoming call right away. On the other end of the speaker ca a sharp cry for help that stirred a deep sense of unease in my soul.

Giryeo-ssi, please help !

What's more, after waiting a mont, Esther, half-sobbing, first recounted the entire story...

***

Finally, we've arrived at the introduction.

[ Why did this ss happen? ]

First of all, to understand the incident, the quickest way was to hear the testimony of an Earthling. An S-rank hunter nad Esther had actually sensed the initial signs of the event a full 48 hours earlier.

"This matter involves a gate, so honestly, I wouldn't say it was particularly fast."

To explain first—this Earthling woman runs a hunter corporation the size of a major conglorate, so she naturally has access to a significant amount of information. And so, a few days ago, she happened to catch wind of sothing.CEO Sho, have you heard? I an, can you believe it? An A-rank gate has been sold to a civilian.

A gate being sold? Ever since the world entered the era of dungeon Shock, governnts across the planet have been forced to spend far more money in various areas.

Naturally, in the past, maintaining a city just ant occasionally digging up the sidewalks. But now, collapsed walls are routine. In fact, during the early days of the Shock, the underground of the National Assembly building was overrun with ghost-type monsters, and fighting them ended up destroying the governnt bunker.

The most dramatic increase in tax expenditure was, as expected, in the maintenance and repair of public facilities. Dungeon Shocks not only killed people but also inflicted trillions of material damage on various countries. Consequently, governnts needed significantly more tax revenue. However, squeezing an already cliff-edge populace risked the very survival of democracy.

So the governnt, while taking responsibility for the dangers of every gate, also began claiming temporary ownership of these otherworlds. To raise additional funds, they started selling access rights to the wealthy. Even then, the ownership contracts were issued in short terms—three or five years at most—and had to be renewed through strict re-evaluation processes. In a way, it was their attempt at minimal risk managent...

...or so one could say—at least until a week ago.

A-rank?Yes.

Selling A-rank gates to civilians—the sa high-level danger where even a single monster escaping from the Nest of Grass or the deepest area causes chaos?

Just a few days ago, the Korean Hunter Association carried out an inexplicable delegation of managent rights.

Even a dragon that brings trendous benefit to humanity—if classified as a high-grade magical beast—can cause casualties from the slightest mistake. That's why, according to institutional regulations, the transfer of A-rank gates is strictly prohibited. And yet, when the Association went ahead and sold an A-rank gate under these circumstances, Esther's imdiate thought was this.

"At first, I thought it might've been a clerical error. Like maybe so employee just typed the wrong letter when registering the gate."

Of course, the reality was completely different from the inference.

"But the more I investigated, the stranger things got. The deeper I went, there wasn't just one unsettling aspect, you know?"

The strange things Esther found were as follows.

• First, the rumor about the sale of an A-rank gate—thought to be nonsense—turned out to be true.

The organization in charge of managing dungeon auctions had, in fact, privately sold a portion of another world—with an entrance passage asuring a staggering 5.4 ters. Because the spatial rift was so large, the mana leaking out was easy to detect, making the phenonon itself relatively easy to discover.

Of course, right after that.

• Second, for gate transactions supervised by the state, the bid price and owner must always be disclosed, but only that for A-rank gate is the information missing from the database?

The problem was that a more serious abnormality was observed.

"So... to sum it up, Esther-ssi noticed a high-level gate transaction and tried to figure out what was going on."

"Yes."

"Before making any formal inquiries, she first tried to find out the na of that gate—but couldn't find any trace of an A-rank gate in the official transaction disclosures from the agency."

"Yes."

"So, thinking sothing was off, you first went to the site—just like Executive Director Yoo of Hanshin Guild said—where soone was reportedly occupying the area."

"Those guys had blocked off the area with the gate with tal construction signs."

Sniffle, sniffle.

For reference, this wasn't the Neo Hospital but another dical facility within Seoul. Following her suggestion that we talk in person, I ca here—and the one who summoned this alien was now leaking so kind of fluid, though I could tell it was blood or not. This healing ability user had already co and gone by now, so that pitiful expression likely wasn't just due to physical pain.

"Sniff... So as soon as I picked up on the clues, I went straight to the Association headquarters. And after cornering the person in charge, I heard sothing completely absurd."

"The person in charge?"

Esther was still very angry about 'what happened.' Even though her wounds had healed, her face was still flushed as she spoke heatedly.

"The ones who bought that A-rank gate turned out to be so unheard-of, small-scale hunter company."

"Yes?"

"Not our Tower, not Neo, not even Mideum or Hanshin Guild—so brand-new, small-ti guild just casually ended up owning one of Korea's A-rank gates?"

Now that I think about it, it is strange. I was only surrounded by high-ranking gates because of my position. In reality, fifty-tier Awakened are extrely rare, so the odds of a newly founded guild having soone that powerful are slim. And if we're talking about a full team capable of safely managing an A-rank gate? That's even more unlikely.

But from who knows where, it appeared...

[QuantumPulse]

How could a small company like that possibly be allowed to own a high-tier dungeon?

• Third, when asked about the situation, the final official in charge of gate transactions explained that the failure to disclose the transaction was rely due to a processing delay caused by the junior staff's sumr vacation.

When the reply ca back, it was explained that although the gate was classified as A-rank, ownership was transferred as an exception because internal research had confird it contained substances that would have a trendous impact on human advancent.

• Fourth, upon hearing this explanation, the head of the Korea Magic Tower guild snapped: "You skipped over our guild and Neo Sisters to grant an exception to so tiny guild—do you seriously think that makes sense? Did you even hold a proper auction?"

• Fifth, in response, a senior official from the Association, Kim OO, gave a rambling explanation that the exclusive rights to this A-grade gate were granted because a researcher from the purchasing guild had achieved significant results in analyzing the new substance found inside.

This is what she's been through for the past 48 hours.

"Complicated procedures, just like Earth."

The woman with the purple hair glanced irritably at the blood-stained blouse she wore and continued speaking.

"Anyway, that official keeps insisting their handling of the matter was legally sound. But co on—anyone can see this is suspicious."

"Legally sound, you say?"

"I confird that the A-rank gate transaction restriction was indeed lifted recently. Anyway, that part was more of a lie. I'm no stranger to an actual law. Besides, since it was an internal organizational rule, there would have been nothing to stop soone with a bit of influence from changing it with so money and maneuvering."

"Hmm."

"What kind of shady backroom dealing is this supposed to be?"

I'm not sure what those administrative terms in the middle an, but the sorcerer seems angry, so I'd better shut up for now.

"So I couldn't make sense of it at all, and in the end, I... may have threatened the Association President's life to get to the truth."

Look at that.

"I told the new Association President, if you're going to handle your job like this, then maybe it's better if you're charged with dereliction of duty and I get thrown in jail for assault—we can be cellmates or sothing."

As expected, it's a good thing I didn't get on her bad side.

Then they hurriedly looked into it and finally said that the person in charge had been bribed. Oh, and I also took down the video that was uploaded online without permission around that ti."

"...?"

"Going so far as to resort to bribery just to own an A-rank gate... It was bound to be exposed and beco a huge controversy anyway. Do you understand why they would pour billions into it, Giryeo-ssi?"

"Well."

"Furthermore, upon closer investigation, the [QuantumPulse] Hunter Guild that purchased that gate turned out to be no re small guild. It was a 'ghost company' whose mbers' identities couldn't be properly verified."

"I"

"But the real mystery is... how could such a small company afford the kind of massive lobbying funds it would take to sway a high-ranking official?"

Tuk.

Esther, as if she felt a twinge of pain again in her previously injured right eye, raised her hand to her face once more and continued explaining.

To be honest, if a crisis were to arise in this country where countless innocent citizens were about to die, she was confident she could eliminate the root cause—even if that culprit were a world leader.

"Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like this one can be solved by simple ans."

Well, that's about it.

"I did manage to threaten the association president with a curse and got a belated promise to revoke the ownership of the gate. But, well, even when I tried contacting the other party through their registered number, there was no response."

Esther lifted her face from her hands again.

"However, the dungeon that was traded had appeared a full six days prior."

"Given the circumstances, it seems a break is imminent. Or perhaps, depending on its size, it might have already surpassed it."

"That's why I had no choice but to bypass all legal procedures and push through to imdiately enter the site..."

It took quite a while to explain everything, but it was worth the wait—at last, the heart of the whole incident had finally been revealed.

"I truly had no idea there would be a 'beast pack' inside."

"Yes. Who would have expected sothing like that?"

Shockingly, the identity of the thug who attacked Esther's eye... was a Beast.

"More precisely, it was a fake Beast—soone trying to stop this Earthling from clearing the gate."

I lost myself in thought with my back to the ground.

"The Beast pack that's been all over the news lately... was inside the dungeon?"

Seriously, what kind of major incident is this? All this ti, as if in so twisted act of racism, they never even set foot in neighborhoods primarily inhabited by Asians. Yet, the owners of the bone masks suddenly landed in South Korea. And Esther, as a result, was critically injured from the attack by those beasts occupying the dungeon.

"H, heuk. Those bastard if only my ability wasn't one of those curse-type skills with low lethality, I would've taken out at least two of them... But all I managed to do was break one guy's rib."

"Were their ranks high?"

"They weren't just high-ranking. I could tell the mont I faced them directly — all three of those Beasts the news has been talking about were top-tier!"

Esther is lanting her crushing defeat, exaggerating it by half a bit. But rather than that kind of emotional outburst, what concerned more were the scars left on her skin.

"Ah, my god. How could soone carelessly harm one of Korea's precious S-ranks...?"

Damn fake beast b*star!

"That curse mage is my second bodyguard responsible for my safety in old age!"

Feeling sympathetic, I took a wet wipe nearby and cleaned the blood off Esther's stained tentacle.

Correction. Co to think of it, Earthlings' hair wasn't a tentacle—just a bunch of dead cells.

"Giryeo-ssi..."

While wiping the strands of her purple hair with my hand, I thought to myself. In any case, there was no doubt sothing had gone wrong in this second ho where the alien had settled. According to Esther's testimony, there were three S-rank Hunters inside that gate.

"Were top-rankers always this common in this world? I don't think so."

As the news has been making a fuss, three unidentified superpowered people wearing bone masks have appeared. Esther repeatedly expressed her concern about what those people might be planning to do with an unverified A-rank gate.

However, given the circumstances, it's a bit inappropriate for an archmage to get directly involved in this incident.

"Haseong-ah, I'm sorry. I know I said that back then, but... the real loser was actually all along..."

Even Brooklyn barely managed to defeat them with all her gear boosts. And now, there were three enemies with S-rank awakening stats camped out in a dungeon in Korea.

However, I couldn't just ignore it, since this incident happened right in front of the place where I was staying, so it kept bothering . After discussing it with Esther, I decided to go to the site myself. I originally planned to just briefly check what kind of dungeon had caused the water to occupy.

—No, damn it, what is that!

However, the mont I laid eyes on the actual gate in question, the peace within was instantly replaced by a wall of despair. And once I fully grasped the true nature of the dungeon that had been taken over, a strong sense of urgency hit —I needed to call not only Jung Haseong but even Kang Changho, a third-party specialist, to this place imdiately. The more ti passed, the more the situation grew entangled and complicated.