The Hunter of the Other World Who Is Being Misunderstood Chapter 481. Campaign

When the reporter t those sambaegan eyes shadowed by dark circles, his breathing grew shallow.

"-_-"

anwhile—Kim Giryeo himself was also startled to unexpectedly run into a reporter.

"I've been working hard at this ti just to protect the citizens..."

Despite all the difficult situations he'd been dealing with, Kim Giryeo calmly opened his mouth to speak.

"To think soone's been following like this..."

For reference, that day, questioning tone was sothing that could easily intimidate others.

"I'm an alien doing good deeds here, so why treat so harshly? I'm hurt.

In truth, that was the sentint Kim Giryeo had intended to convey. But the mont he heard that voice, the person with the cara bag misunderstood on his own and began trembling like an aspen tree.

"E-eek!"

At the sa ti, the reporter, who had been trembling, suddenly raised his voice.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry! I was wrong!"

He reacted as if he had co face to face with a man-eating alien. Fortunately, however, the one standing there was—relatively—a gentlemanly Archmage. Their conversation quickly shifted in a peaceful direction.

"I'll never do anything like this again!"

"May I ask which broadcasting station you're from..."

"A broadcasting station? N-no! That's not it at all. I an, my workplace is so small you wouldn't recognize the na anyway!"

While Kim Giryeo scanned the reporter's outfit, searching for any information, the reporter—his face pale—hurriedly grabbed his cara. He then pulled out a small black chip and held it out as he spoke.

"F-first of all! Please take this. It's the mory card with all the footage I took of you, Hunter."

"A mory card?"

"But this—I want you to keep it. I'm g-giving it to you as proof that I'll never write an article about you, sir."

A man who called himself a reporter was handing over footage that was practically his lifeline without a second thought. What's more, the other party was a completely ordinary person, with not a trace of magic power leaking out. So, despite being exhausted from overwork, Kim Giryeo relaxed his brow a little and faced him calmly.

"Yes. But, reporter—was there anyone who might have hired you to follow like this?"

Even if things had cald down, this was sothing that needed to be made clear.

It might even be soone Hunter Kang Changho planted to gather information, considering his history of surveillance...

At that point, the blond man subtly revealed his suspicion toward a certain mammalian alien.

"Ah, about who sent !"

The response that ca back was surprisingly candid. Maybe it was because he had co face to face with those intimidating sambaegan eyes he'd only ever watched secretly through a viewfinder. Anyway, before any real threat even ca his way, the Earthling spilled every bit of information on his own.

Apparently, soone had sent him money and instructed him to take photos of him. On the surface, they claid to be an anti-hunter group, but in reality, it seed that a political party in this country was backing them behind the scenes, or so he said...

"I've been in this line of work for a few years, you know. You think I couldn't dig up at least that much?"

"So even in this country, there are people in power trying to get ahead by rejecting Awakeners, huh."

"And besides, in front of soone like you, Hunter, only a lunatic would dare to lie. Ah, please—I'll tell you everything honestly, just please don't kill !"

He hadn't even raised a hand, yet the other person kept acting like that, which made the alien feel a little wronged. Still, Kim Giryeo eventually cald down. The reporter quickly made things clear by showing bank transaction records and DNS direct ssages that identified the person who had hired him.

"It wasn't like I wasn't so strange like Kang Changho pulling sothing sudden."

The timid reporter couldn't even bring himself to et the sambaegan eyes right in front of him.

"Well, I've benefited plenty from reporters as an intellect addict in my daily life, so maybe I can let this one slide."

So, taking the man's obvious fear as further proof of sincerity, Kim Giryeo chose to believe the reporter's promise not to publish any pointless articles—and let him go.

Click.

And about a day later, he regretted it

***

[Exclusive] 5-Rank Awakened Kim Involved In Scandal Over Threatening a Civilian

• Kim Giryeo, Why Did He Mistreat a Fan Who Wanted to Write A Positive Article About Him?

***

The next day. The front page of the portal site I checked every morning looked strangely different.

"Ah, what is this now..."

Having just woken up from my first proper sleep in a while, I groggily picked up my phone. Then I tapped through the top headlines one by one.

"All of them are insults."

After trembling so hard while promising not to publish anything about ... he went and did it anyway. The articles that I went up that morning included a familiar photograph. More precisely, it seed that soone had secretly re-photographed, from a distance, the very mont when this body had t the reporter face-to-face.

"This is practically the spread of false information, isn't it?"

And as for the captions written beneath the photo—what were those supposed to be? One dia outlet had compared the posture of an ordinary citizen bowing deeply with my own rigid, unbending stance, and added the following comntary. It claid that Mr. K, a figure currently making waves in the hunting industry, had brought a struggling reporter to the brink of tears the mont he discovered he was being followed.

It wasn't exactly a lie, but the account felt exaggerated in more ways than one.

"That man just started crying on his own the mont he saw my face."

It really did seem like there were groups out there intent on tarnishing an Awakener's reputation.

"There's quite a reaction from Earthlings."

Tuk.

I absentmindedly scrolled down to check the comnts below the article.

[**#1674: Of course an 5-rank Hunter's going to attract dia attention—they're famous. But does he really have to treat an ordinary person like a rat just for taking one photo? —----]

[Likes: 72 Dislikes: 30]

[**#174: It's only natural for a reporter to follow soone as influential as an influencer. Honestly, this hunter really handled it poorly]

[Likes: 63 Dislikes: 34]

But this was a bit strange too.

The comnts in the BEST section have an unusually high number of dislikes. Normally, those numbers stop at around four or five at most.

Setting aside the odd ratio—which was rare to see in the first place—sothing about it felt off.

[**#14: LOL I was wondering why such a dumb comnt was getting so many reactions. Hey, you part-tir bots, it's a post literally says to delete the part before copying it = =]

[Likes: 40 Dislikes: 0]

Part-tirs. Without spacing, that word clearly referred to temporary hired workers—in this case, the kind used for online manipulation.

[Que**#52: I keep seeing the sa accounts topping the comnts in other articles too. They're obviously work accounts, boosting each other's votes to manipulate public opinion.]

It seems the person who wrote that comnt is probably right. The series of opinions soon so far were clearly written by soone receiving monetary compensation. The actual reactions from real citizens appear to differ from the negative tone portrayed.

Now that I look, the article's views aren't that high. And it hasn't even been reprocessed and uploaded on any video streaming sites...

A few fleeting thoughts passed by.

I got the answer. Most mammals aren't interested in this issue.

anwhile, as I was lost in thought, a sowhat welco ssage arrived on my phone.

Dring, dring.

[010-XXXX-XXXX]

To explain briefly, the identity of this mysterious sender was none other than the reporter I had t yesterday while being followed. I'm not sure how everyone manages to get a hunter's contact so easily. Anyway, when I answered the call, a voice I had heard before imdiately shouted through the speaker.

Hunter Kim Giryeo! This is really Hunter Kim Giryeo's number, right? I'm so sorry! No, I didn't even realize there was soone filming . But anyway, I'm really sorry!

It was a thoroughly apologetic tone.

"Could this also be so elaborate setup using the recording function to trick ?"

Moreover, the reporter who got through not only apologized but also promised to take follow-up asures. I can't expect the reporter to expose every political contact who wired them money. But at the very least, they promised to issue a correction for this morning's incident.

I can't expect them to expose the political figure who wired them money. Of course, at least for this morning's incident, the reporter promised to issue a correction.

"That's about as much effort as an ordinary citizen could reasonably give."

Well then, the apology was perfectly received. Anyway, since this article didn't really damage my image, there's no need to fuss over it too much.

"-_-"

Swish. Swish.

I lingered for a while in the portal site's news section.

[Comprehensive News Live Chat]

[Wow, that celebrity bought another building...]

[I'm jealous.]

[My stocks got crashed again today]

[Why are there so many trashy hunters these days without any sense?]

[Most of the comnts trashy hunters were generated by AI or just copy-pasted...]

I skimd through the lines on my phone screen and drifted into thought for a mont.

I did get an apology from the person who followed , but thinking it over, this issue isn't just about that one human.

At that mont, a wave of pessimism I'd kept buried for a while suddenly surfaced.

"Sobody out there is taking advantage of the situation, badmouthing all awakened humans for their own gain."

Yesterday, it was like this. The day before that, too. Even just this past week, I worked so hard I broke a sweat.

No matter how much I felt the urgency due to the absence of the Gisimche, the reason I handled dungeon breaks so diligently was fundantally for the safety of mammals.

[Free Bulletin Board]

[Anonymous 1: So what if public opinion is manipulated?? Anyway, even without major fabrication, KGR was a school bully and as a minor [underage], caused a ton of trouble trying to buy cigarettes at a convenience store run by a classmate's grandmother lol]

[Anonymous 19: Haven't those all been clarified as false ages...]

[Anonymous 3: Honestly, I just don't like Kim Giryeo->]

Watching humanity's reactions quietly, I suddenly felt sothing refreshing.

"Feels like I just got smacked on the back of the head a little."

Ahn Yoonsung, Jeong Hasaeng, Seonwoo Yeon. Ou Seohyeong.

Maybe my senses had dulled because I'd kept only good examples like them close by until now. In any case, the species known as humans that occupies this planet had maintained clear traits from the very beginning. Short lifespans.

Soft, fragile bodies that weren't properly protected by magic.

"Such pitiful little e*tards..."

In fact, many of these individuals simply had bad temperants.

It's annoying enough that my dreams of a jobless life have gone down the drain, but now these Earthlings are starting to get on my nerves."

Still, what could I do even if so people annoyed ? If I wanted to keep the people I had grown attached to alive, I had no choice but to maintain this lifestyle for a while. While analyzing the gates, I also wanted to devise a way to control the anomaly known as Dungeon Shock.

In other words, as an Archmage, I wanted to sohow take the reins of control.

***

Several dozen minutes later.

By the ti the sumr insects outside the window had quieted down, I having finished my work preparations, stepped out of the usual seaside villa and checked my phone.

"The damn Monday."

Fortunately, the recent surge in "high-level gates" had subsided, staying within a range that hunters could handle. However, there was no guarantee that this wouldn't escalate into a major incident, so I refocused on investigating the anomalous phenona.

"There are no more S-rank gates now, so I can just take my ti checking out the scattered A-rank dungeons in the provinces."

Moreover, after spending a few calm days, genuine ideas finally began to form.

"What is the cause of the dungeon shock that descended upon Earth?"

What worried most was if the answer to that question turned out to be 'Super Alien'. Anything more intelligent and technologically advanced than an Alphaurin, who had amassed a fair amount of magical knowledge... if such a thing truly existed, that would be the worst-case scenario.

Yet, reasoning calmly and logically, the Solar System fundantally can't support an independently advanced magical civilization, right?

"Do they call units larger than a system a "galaxy" here?"

The right words welled up from within this flesh.

"If I were to express it in Korean—then, there was only a single planet in this galaxy where mana was detected."

As I was thinking just now, surprisingly few planets in the universe actually contain mana. It seed almost as rare as the probability of a planet having life—so that basically said it all.

Of course, the old binary systems—including Alphaurin—were rare cases; unusually, they had several nearby mana-rich planets, which naturally even led to invasions by magical aliens.

"Is it really sothing to be proud of, this kind of peculiarity?"

Earth.

From the perspective of magical energy resources, this place is astonishingly a backwater in the universe. Above all, even when scanning at the galactic cluster level, there were no nearby sources of mana.

And I was actually drawn to this isolated, island-like characteristic of Earth, which is why I chose to start a second life here. But as explained so far, it was a situation in which it would have been extrely difficult for any magical civilization to arise nearby.

"The probability that an enterprise surpassing Alphaurin could have flourished in this area is extrely low."

From now on, it was purely speculation based on common sense. The ones who raided this planet could very well have been the aliens from that binary star system I know. The evidence for this cos from the Alphaurin creatures that occasionally appear in the dungeons. The only thing that cos to mind is that the previous Gisimche settled in an environnt with no real competitors and developed adaptive defenses.

"Could it be that those things underwent unexpected evolution, significantly altering the traits of their main form?"

For the ti being, I planned to keep all other plausible scenarios open while carrying out my activities.

I don't know."

To gather more information, I'd need to track down Korea's third S-rank hunter and have a conversation. And if I'm going to leave the country, I first have to deal with the dangers currently erging dostically.

"First of all, let's give it our best today, too."

I steeled myself and set off.

"Co to think of it, isn't it about ti to pay the health insurance fee?"

But as I was about to step over the fence at ho, a minor task suddenly caught my attention.

"What day is it today?"

I pulled out my phone to check the date. At that very mont, around the sa ti, a call ca in on the small electronic device.

"A call?"

For now, I decided to take it. But I had no idea I'd be having this kind of conversation so early in the morning.

Hello? Hi, sir. I'm an investigator from ** Police Station △△△.