As Sang-woong opened the guild’s door and stepped inside, an enthusiastic wave of cheers poured out.
“Sunbae-nim, I love you!”
“Sang-woong Hunter-nim, fighting today as well!”
“Hunter-nim, you’re my role model!”
Faced with overflowing praise, he scratched his cheek shyly and responded with a modest smile.
It was more praise than he deserved.
He had simply fulfilled his duties in silence.
At 53 years old, Sang-woong was a veteran Rank 8 Hunter.
When he first awakened, he was considered limited to Rank 2, but through bone-grinding effort and relentless self-improvement, he had risen to the ranks of the elite Rank 8, becoming a legendary figure.
Hunters who overcame the limitations of their innate talent were exceedingly rare, and Sang-woong was one of those precious few.
With sincerity and perseverance, he never hesitated to step into the most perilous dungeons if it was the guild’s command.
He held a firm belief that, having gained extraordinary power, it was his natural duty to dedicate himself to society’s safety.
One day, while taking a rare moment of rest at home, Sang-woong received an urgent call.
The guild master, three years his junior, spoke with a voice heavy with desperation.
“Sunbae-nim, there’s a serious problem with the dungeon we’re responsible for!”
“Alright. I’m on my way.”
Without a moment’s hesitation, Sang-woong headed toward the troubled dungeon.
The destination was none other than a Rank 0 dungeon.
It was a place he had repeatedly warned about due to its dangers, yet the guild had neglected its management.
It was a dungeon teeming with sticky-scaled Lizardmen and sinister Nagas, a place hunters avoided—Dungeon Level 1.
Even among dungeons of the same rank, its monsters were particularly strong and agile, but the mana stone yield was low, making the rewards meager.
The worst part was the natural environment.
Torrential rain fell year-round, obscuring visibility, while sticky mist and the sound of rain made it difficult to detect monsters.
The ankle-deep mud sapped physical strength.
Despite Sang-woong’s warnings, the guild had neglected the dungeon due to manpower shortages and budget issues. As a result, the monster density had reached dangerous levels, teetering on the brink of a dungeon break.
The pale-faced guild master came running to him, stammering.
“Sunbae-nim, I’m so sorry…”
“It’s fine. I know you did your best. Let’s go in.”
Sang-woong patted the guilt-ridden guild master on the back and turned to the other hunters.
Now wasn’t the time to point fingers. Resolving the crisis at hand was the top priority.
“Everyone, prepare to enter the dungeon.”
At the guild master’s command, the hunters, their faces grim, passed through the ominous dungeon gate.
As soon as they stepped inside, they were assaulted by fierce rain and howling winds.
Normally, they would have retreated, but today, that wasn’t an option.
They had to prevent a dungeon break.
Their armor grew heavy with water, and the mud clung to their ankles.
The monsters, on the verge of a dungeon break, were far more ferocious than usual.
Fighting enhanced monsters in the rain and mud was grueling work.
But as always, Sang-woong stood at the forefront, pouring all his strength into cutting down the monsters.
After a full day and night of relentless fighting, they succeeded in reducing the monster population to a safe level.
However, the hunters were utterly exhausted.
They desperately wanted to withdraw, but Sang-woong shook his head.
A sloppy retreat would only lead to greater disaster.
As difficult as it was, they needed to seize this opportunity to close the dungeon.
He persuaded the weary hunters, and they finally reached the lair of the boss monster.
At the final hurdle, a massive Lizardman King revealed itself.
Defeating it and destroying the core would end this.
But the Lizardman King exuded an overwhelming presence beyond imagination.
Brandishing a massive hammer with its iron-hard forearms, it threatened the hunters.
Sang-woong stepped forward without hesitation.
He faced the ferocious Lizardman King alone.
It was a formidable opponent, but he gritted his teeth and sharpened his senses.
Then an unexpected problem arose.
Each time his sword clashed with the Lizardman King’s hammer, it cracked further.
A few more strikes, and the sword would shatter completely—a precarious situation. But he couldn’t back down.
The other hunters’ attacks were landing successfully, and if he could hold on just a little longer, they could bring down the Lizardman King.
Blocking with his sword was futile.
Now, he had to desperately dodge the incoming attacks.
Each time the massive hammer narrowly grazed him, a chill ran down his spine, but he had no choice but to endure.
“GRRROOOAAAR!”
Finally, the Lizardman King let out a pained roar.
No matter how powerful it was, it couldn’t withstand the hunters’ relentless attacks indefinitely.
Its massive body began to waver.
“It’s done!”
Sang-woong was certain of victory.
The long, grueling battle was nearing its end.
But then, from the dying Lizardman King’s body came a tremendous roar, as if it were making a final stand.
“KUOOOAAARRR!”
Its wounds vanished, and an incomparably ferocious aura erupted.
Overwhelmed by the sheer pressure, Sang-woong’s hair stood on end, and his heart froze with terror.
The guild master, realizing the cause of this unbelievable transformation, spoke in a trembling voice.
“This… it’s Berserk!”
A rare phenomenon—Berserk!
It was a terrifying event where a boss monster, on the brink of death, burned all its life force to drastically amplify its physical abilities.
Even Sang-woong had only heard of it in rumors; this was his first time witnessing it.
It wasn’t an entirely hopeless situation.
This was a temporary enhancement fueled by its life force.
If they could endure until its strength ran out, victory was possible.
But to Sang-woong, even that short time felt impossibly long and perilous.
“Everyone… get out of here now!”
Sang-woong, quickest to assess the situation, urgently commanded.
To bring down the Lizardman King with minimal sacrifice in this desperate situation, someone had to buy time.
He had led the guild members to safety, and only he could face the Lizardman King head-on.
He accepted his fate as a matter of course.
“Sunbae-nim, no!”
At that moment, the guild master, his face resolute, ran toward him and shouted.
“I’ll hold it off! Sunbae-nim, you have to escape!”
“Yoo-jun, stop! All its attention is on me right now. If you come, you’ll just die needlessly. As the guild master, your most important job is to take the others and get as far away from here as possible.”
Like his resolute voice, the Lizardman King’s red eyes were fixed solely on Sang-woong.
The guild master couldn’t bring himself to move, but Sang-woong’s gaze and shout finally made him bite his lip and stop.
The only way to honor Sang-woong’s sacrifice was to escape as quickly as possible.
“Everyone… retreat at full speed!”
Suppressing his grief, the guild master issued the order in a trembling voice.
Ensuring the last guild member was accounted for, he shouted to Sang-woong before leaving.
“Sunbae-nim… it was truly an honor to work with you!”
“Me too. I was truly happy to work with such wonderful juniors like you.”
Sang-woong mustered his last strength to buy time.
With his breaking sword, he barely blocked the Lizardman King’s ferocious attacks, darting through the narrow space to keep its attention.
The Berserk-enhanced creature was a calamity in itself.
An already overwhelming opponent had become an unmanageable monster.
CRASH!
Despite his desperate evasion, the Lizardman King’s hammer struck his arm.
Before he could even feel the excruciating pain, his right arm broke like a rotten branch, gushing blood.
He staggered, unable to maintain his balance without his arm.
This happened less than ten seconds after the guild members had escaped.
“Damn it.”
Even amidst the erupting pain, he gritted his teeth.
The lives of over thirty guild members, who hadn’t yet escaped, rested on his shoulders.
BOOM!
With a deafening roar, the massive hammer tore through the air again.
He dodged by a hair’s breadth, but blood trickled down the back of his head, warm and sticky.
He endured, desperately, until the very last moment.
And finally, when the faint sound of the guild members’ footsteps faded completely, Sang-woong let out a sigh of relief.
CRASH!
With a dull, horrific impact, all his thoughts ceased forever.
The Lizardman King’s hammer, swung with its final strength, mercilessly shattered his skull.
The only silver lining was that this horrific pain had finally ended.
…
“Ugh!”
With suffocating pain, Sang-woong gasped violently and bolted upright in bed.
As if waking from a vivid nightmare, his flushed face was covered in cold sweat.
“…W-What the hell is going on?”
He stared at his trembling hands in disbelief.
He touched his body, checking himself over.
“I… I definitely died…”
He was certain he had died.
The Lizardman King’s brutal hammer had shattered his skull, marking his end.
Yet now, his wounds were gone, and his head was perfectly intact on his shoulders.
The place he was in was also utterly unfamiliar.
It should have been the dungeon, but this was someone’s ordinary room.
A room that somehow felt strangely familiar.
In a daze, he looked around and suddenly caught sight of himself in a mirror on one side of the room.
His first feeling was unfamiliarity.
To feel unfamiliar with a face he saw every day.
The reason soon became clear.
He looked young. At least twenty years younger, with the vibrant freshness of youth etched into every feature.
The deep wrinkles around his eyes were gone, as was the gray in his hair.
His skin was taut and healthy, his jawline sharp, and his dark eyes brimmed with vitality, making him seem like a stranger.
“What… what is this?”
He stared at his younger self with wide, disbelieving eyes.
His mind was filled with confusion.
He couldn’t comprehend this situation.
“Could it be… all those horrific memories were just a long, terrible nightmare?”
In the dream, Sang-woong was a veteran Rank 8 Hunter in his fifties.
Among the top 20% in skill, a seasoned warrior who had navigated countless dungeons.
He had poured bone-grinding effort into reaching that point, fighting fiercely through life-and-death moments.
But now, awake from the nightmare, he was enveloped in deep emptiness.
The vivid memories of the dream felt real, yet they were so disconnected from the young self he saw now, as if he had glimpsed the grueling life of another world.
“Why… why did I live so desperately like that?”
A bitter question lingered in his hollow mind.
“Was it for fame?”
In the dream, his thirty-plus years as a hunter.
He had earned quite a bit of money.
But he never had time to spend it properly.
He was always fighting in dangerous dungeons, unable to enjoy even a moment of rest.
In the end, the numbers in his bank account were nothing more than meaningless symbols.
“Or… was it for a woman?”
A faint, bitter smile spread across his face. In the perilous life of a dungeon hunter, romance was an unattainable dream.
Living under the constant shadow of death.
No woman had ever shown genuine interest in him.
His life was lonely, and love was a distant story.
“Then… was it for family?”
He shook his head. That wasn’t it either.
The hunter profession, with its immense stress, left him too exhausted to avoid neglecting his family.
In the dream, he was always alone.
The warmth of a happy family wasn’t permitted.
Next, a faint spark of emotion flickered.
“Was it for a sense of achievement?”
When he first became a hunter, that was certainly true. He felt exhilaration in growing stronger from his ordinary self.
Especially when he surpassed the impossible limits of his talent, it felt like he owned the world.
But that thrill ended there.
At some point, his level stopped rising, and his growth stalled.
“Or perhaps… some vain heroic impulse?”
He firmly denied it.
He hadn’t lived so desperately for such fleeting emotions.
People showed him respect and admiration, but he always felt embarrassed.
He thought of himself as an ordinary person.
He wasn’t particularly virtuous, and there were plenty of stronger, more capable hunters.
“Then… why… why did I struggle so hard to live like that?”
After a long silence, Sang-woong finally arrived at a faint but close-to-true realization.
What flashed through his mind was a bittersweet yet strangely poignant emotion.