The Porter (2)
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“You can’t do it.”
Seung-ho’s mother had her back on him as if she couldn’t bear to look at his face.
“Mother, I can do it. I’ll be really safe. Trust me, yeah?”
Seung-ho tried to persuade his mother, but she could not be beaten in this argument.
“No. You cannot die before your mother. You can’t die!” The fear of losing her son once more engulfed her when he said he was going to be a hunter.
Seung-ho reasoned that he had survived over the gate for 20 years, and had eaten a lot of mana stones, so he could definitely survive low-grade gates.
However, his mother is not listening.
“Mother, I’ll have my grade re-measured, and we can decide once we checked the results…”
“I don’t care about that! No, no, no!” His mother’s face was red.
He thought his mother is going to fall, so Seung-ho decided to step back.
“Okay, Mother.”
“Why, why did you come back… Why! Why the hell! You’re not going back to that wicked place again!”
His mother started beating at Seung-ho’s chests, and his heart ached as if torn.
He held his mother in his arms to calm her down and led her to the room.
Tomorrow, he had no choice but to lie so he can go to the association and re-measure his grades.
Still, he was worried because he knew that even if he showed the re-measurement results, it might not be enough to convince his mother.
Min-jong passed by in his head. As soon as the re-measured value came out, he will ask Min-jong to come here and write about it in their living room.
He tried to contact him and let him know. Min-jong however, answered the phone too quickly, as if he had been waiting for it.
“Min-jong, maybe…”
“Please help, Seung-ho! Here, just before the gate out!”
Beyond the phone, Min-jong’s voice rang urgently.
He could hear people screaming in the background.
“Where are you?”
“Sungsung University!!”
As soon as he said the location, he heard Min-jong’s hurried footsteps over the speaker.
“Father! I will see Min-jong.” Seung-ho said lightly as he passed by his father watching TV.
“That call was too noisy. Are you going to a party?”
“Ah, yes. We’re going to have a drink together.” Seung-ho responded.
Maybe his father heard the people shouting in the background and misunderstood the situation.
Fortunately, it helped Seung-ho make an excuse.
“Don’t be too late; your mother is going to worry.”
“Yeah, I will not be late.”
* * *
Gate out.
The time when a gate occurs and how long it would exist depends on the gate gauge value.
The gate master should be defeated, and the gate nucleus must be destroyed during that time.
Otherwise, the monsters become stronger than the original gate gauge. The nucleus had to be destroyed before that happens.
A level 10 gate with a gauge value of 0 had no monsters inside, and it was simply a gate for collecting and mining until a gate out occurs.
When the gate number increases from 0 to 500, it is now considered a 9th-level gate. If the value is close to the 500 maximum, a C-level hunter party or three D-class parties are recommended to shut it down.
Gate numbers from 500 to 1700 and below are now considered 8th grade, and one B-class party or four C-class parties are recommended. C-class parties may not fully overcome the pressure of the monsters close to the 1700 maximum, though, and it is advised to exceed the minimum four parties.
It was almost dusk. The gate that occurred inside Sungsung University had a simple fence controlling access, and five people gathered there.
They look like they’re doing a medieval knight cosplay, but none of the people passing by looked funny at them.
“I confirmed 1670 as I heard from the association. Our net is 1650. Porter, what is your grade?” the biggest man in the group asked the man who was preparing various survival items.
“It is 87.”
The big man carried nodded at the porter, then turned to a man carrying a kite shield.
“You’re a D-class average. Myeong-hoon, are we good? Won’t we die in this gate out?”
“Hey, we’re class B. Class B. The five of us, including the porter over there, we can make it. Also, we can run out right away if we find it too dangerous.”
The man called Myeong-hoon said, and went through the gate first. The others followed him in turn.
The gate was field-shaped.
The first to enter the gate, Myeong-hoon raised the kite shield against the weak sunlight.
Once everyone in the group was in, they slowly moved forward. Each of them was looking at different directions, with determined faces.
It was dusk in Korea, but here, the sun was shining lightly, and moist morning dew covered the tree leaves.
The party began to gradually move toward one side while maintaining tension, and after about 10 minutes, something caught Myeong-hoon’s attention.
He pointed at it with his fingers. The group’s gaze followed where the finger was pointing at.
There is a monster in the distance.
“Ugh… I know that monster… Let’s go back. I’m glad we found it first.” The porter at the back of the party said.
“What? Do you know that?” Myeong-hoon asked him.
“Its nickname is more famous than the actual monster’s name. Dumpling.”
As the porter answered, everyone’s expressions changed sharply.
“Let’s go back, then…” the group decided.
Dumpling.
The official name is Gigantic Gorilla, with an average height of 3.5m.
Usually, 8th level gates only have one of these monsters, but at 6th level gates and up, they appear in groups.
It was called “Dumplings” not because of its size, but because it ate people’s heads as easily as eating dumplings. The recorded number of victims is at 10,000.
It is said that these are smart monsters, and if it found you first, it will block your escape and hunt you slowly.
Fortunately, the party saw it first, and they didn’t have to be ‘dumplings.’ They lowered their postures and crawled back to the gate.
Myeong-hoon found a foreign man standing near the gate. He thought it was a crazy person, but when he saw him pulling out a knife, he realized it was another hunter.
“Get out! There’s a Gigantic Gorilla here.”
Myeong-hun whispered close and whispered low, but the foreign man got up from his seat with a chuckle of laughter.
“That’s good, just right.”
The foreign man looked crazy.
The moment Myeong-hoon passes the man, the man throws the sheath back, pulls it, and cuts Myeong-hoon’s neck.
Myeong-hoon’s head soared into the air, but his body strangely managed two more steps before falling forward.
The men behind Myeong-hoon froze momentarily seeing the shocking sight, but immediately grabbed their weapons afterward.
The man’s blade, which cut through Myeong-hoon’s throat, did not have any blood on it. He immediately charged at the four men in front of him.
It was not simply because the man had a surprise as an advantage, but because there was an overwhelming difference in ability, that it only took him 30 seconds to cut down the rest of the group.
The man noticed that the porter was still alive. The porter crawled slowly, desperately, towards the gate.
Meanwhile, the Gigantic Gorilla noticed the fight and began to run towards them.
The man looked at the crawling porter and laughed bitterly. “No one who worked as a porter could have done what he has done”, he said.
He casually picked up a spear from one of the fallen men and threw it hard at the crawling man.
The spear pierced the man’s neck and stuck him in the ground. The corpse trembled for a few moments.
At that moment, the conditions had been met, and the gate out phenomenon began to occur.
Gigantic Gorilla, who was running with his arms around, sensed an abnormality, and sensed that something had changed in this locked space, and paused.
Leaving the Gigantic Gorilla behind, the man picked up the sheath, put his knife in, and went back to Earth beyond the gate.
Upon coming out, the man glanced at his watch. Soon, a car stopped. He went inside it and left.
Behind him, the gate out phenomenon is happening.