Money situation

A person stepping outside the house in the early hours of dawn would inevitably be cautious in their movements. Well, they might end up accidentally waking up their family members, after all.

That was why Seong Jin-Ah was silently closing the front door to her home, so that her brother wouldn't wake up from his sleep, as she was about to leave for school.

But, then….

"You going to school now?"

"Eh?"

She was taken by surprise when a voice came from near her, and she quickly turned around to look. And she saw Jin-Woo jogging towards her.

He was kitted out in tracksuit and sneakers. He had pulled the hood up high and looked as if he'd been on an early morning jog.

Jin-Ah's eyes opened up real wide in shock.

"What the heck? Oppa, you were up already?"

"Yup, been a while since I was up, you know. Hey, have fun today and be careful on the road."

"Uh…. Sure."

Jin-Ah watched her brother's back as he entered the apartment and tilted her head.

'Now that is so strange. Oppa actually woke up before I did….'

One would never call Jin-Woo a lazy type, but Jin-Ah was always the first one to start the day until now simply because she was unusually industrious, which was quite unfitting for her age group.

'Now that I think about it…'

Her older brother's back seemed broader than before, for some reason.

'Eii, no way that's true.'

A human's body wasn't made out of some rubber band, so how could it make any sense for him to expand and contract in a space of a few days?

'I've probably made a mistake.'

*Ding*

SFX Doorbell sound

"I'll go ands get it."

*Creakkk*

SFX Opening door

"Naruto, what are you doing here?"

"Didn't Jin-Woo told you I'm coming today?"

"No, not at all, Oppa, why didn't you tell me?"

"Uh..... I forgot?? Anyway, whatchu doing here man?"

"My application got accepted!! I'm moving into college next term!!"

"Say what?!? Bro, I thought you were like a year younger than me, like are you skipping out on Senior year?"

"What do you mean a year younger than you!!! I'm only 18, my Asian ass genes just failed me. You got that!! How am I suppose to skip Grad year if I already graduted!?!?"

"As much 'fun' hearing the two of you squabbling, I still need to attend school. Anyways, congrats babe!!"

Jin-Woo suddenly pushed forward an umbrella to her.

"Why an umbrella?"

Jin-Ah received it and took a look at the sky. As it was still early dawn, the sky remained dark, but it seemed to be more or less clear and cloudless.

"But, it doesn't look like it's going to rain, though?"

"Take it anyway."

"But, it's heavy, you know?"

"Take it with you regardless. Besides, it's a folding type umbrella so it doesn't even weigh anything. Stop exaggerating, will ya?"

Slam.

Jin-Woo then closed the door.

"Che…. Acting as he feels like."

Jin-Ah lightly kicked the door a couple of times to express her disgruntlement, folded the umbrella and shoved it inside the empty space in her school bag, and turned around to leave.

'Hang on….'

Her steps came to an abrupt halt after she remembered the difference in the eye levels between her and her brother. Something was rather odd.

His eye level had definitely risen up higher compared to before.

"Do guys continue to grow taller even in their twenties?"

Eii, there was no way that could be true….

Jin-Ah shook her head again and hurriedly walked towards her school.

"Girls, huh? I pray for your soul in the future mate."

"Watch it, I'll be more worried since you're with my sis."

Jin-Woo then locked the door and summoned his Inventory.

"Storage."

Storage, 'inven', Inventory.

He had discover it through various experimentation and learned that the word used didn't matter as long as they had the same meaning.

It was the same story when accessing the mailbox.

As long as the word spoken meant 'open', the desired effect took place without fail. 

Jin-Woo then shoved the umbrella he just got from the random box inside the 'digital' storage in front of his eyes. 

"It's no good today again, huh."

Four days had passed by since he cleared that instant dungeon. He always remained hopeful whenever he got to open up a random box, praying for another dungeon key to pop out, but unfortunately, he hadn't been lucky so far. It must've been a pretty rare item if it was this hard to get.

"Just be glad that you do not have my luck."

"You're right, Mister Zero-luck hunter."

"Oh piss off... I still have luck on me alright!?!"

"Who was the one to activate every trap in any dungeon he go to and what was your other nickname?Oh th-

"You don't have to make fun of me, ya know?"

Out of no where, a ringing sound came from the living room.

"You gonna take that or what?"

"I think the assocation is calling me!"

In the past, he didn't want to participate in the raids so he did his best to ignore the calls until the last possible moment, but right now, he was raring to go and test out his raised abilities against various monsters.

Jin-Woo quickly snatched up the receiver.

"This is the Hunter Seong Jin-Woo."

"Aigoo, you finally picked up the phone."

Too bad, it wasn't a call from the Association.

A rueful sigh leaked out of his mouth.

"Learner Jin-Woo, why is it so difficult to get in touch with you lately?"

The voice coming from the speaker was a familiar one.

It'd been four years already since he graduated from high school and therefore stopped being a 'learner', but the owner of the building always attached that prefix in front of Jin-Woo's name ever since taking in both the Seong siblings when they were still young kids.

"I'm really sorry about that. I was admitted to the hospital because of an incident a few days ago."

"Tsk, tsk, so that's what happened. I should've known. Well, there's that and, learner Jin-Woo…. The rent for this month hadn't come in yet. What should I do? If it's a bit too tough for you, should I delay it for a month or two?"

"Oh, no. It's fine. I'll send the money in a bit later."

"Okay. But, don't force yourself, you hear? Trying to look after your mom and your younger sister, you're going through so much hardship there. I know money is important, but don't forget to take care of your body, too."

"Thank you. I won't forget that."

Then the call ended there.

Jin-Woo pulled out the bank balance book from one of the drawers. The remaining amount in the account was only around ₩800,000.

"Fuu…."

A groan leaked out from his mouth.

After paying the rent of ₩500,000, he'd have ₩300,000 left for the month's living expenses.

And the rent could be that low only because the apartment building was located on the remote outskirts of the city, as well as it being old and decrepit, plus the owner of the building taking into consideration Jin-Woo's troubles and not raising the amount for the last couple of years.

There was no way anyone would be able to find an apartment to rent for 500 grand per month nowadays and trying to survive on 300 grand for the whole month was even tougher.

"What's wrong buddy?"

"Nothing much, just thinking about this month expense."

"How much do you need?"

"Ah? I'm not taking your money anymore, I need to figure this one out myself."

"I see.... No matter, I always got your back. Now, let's go get money!"

How did Hunters make money?

The best way was to kill monsters.

Hunters ranked S or A could get sponsorships, shoot commercials, make appearances in TV shows and the like to hoover up a lot of money, as much as some entrepreneurs made, but their number was exceedingly few. 

Indeed, there were too few of them.

Excluding those too few ones at the top, the majority of the Hunters had to go to a dungeon in order to make money.

The higher the rank…

The greater the experience….

The earnings would be decided by each individual's own capabilities.

For someone like Jin-Woo, who was ranked E, worked only for the Association, and had no experience in dungeons rated higher than C, such a condition was an incredibly tough one to overcome.

Jin-Woo's expression scrunched up into something unsightly.

'Disregarding the conditions, for now, if I could just enter an assault team, now that would be great….'

He took a look at the job postings on the Hunter websites' bulletin boards and called a few numbers, but all of them turned out to be a waste of time. No one wanted to work with a Hunter ranked E.

Those Hunters seeking outside help via job postings were freelancers almost all of the time, which meant that they were responsible for preserving their own necks, so understandably, they paid close attention when forming a raid team or letting someone into theirs.

These people didn't possess enough abilities to enter big Guilds, but their ranks were too high to work for the Association.

They were all kind of stuck in-between a rock and a hard place, but unable to go either way.

'Even then, these Hunters still earn more than ₩10,000,000 a month, as far as I know.' 

It was the case of 'High Risk, High Reward'.

Since they put their lives on the line, the profit they earned was just as big at the end of the day. It wasn't for nothing that Hunters were the targets of envy from the general populace.

From Jin-Woo's perspective, he could only get impatient, though.

'Should I just take the rank reassignment test and increase my rank right away?'

Eventually, Jin-Woo shook his head.

He knew that was a stupid thing to do, no matter how hard he thought about it.

A Hunter ranked E suddenly became a high-ranked one!

Whether that was A or B, or maybe even C, it didn't matter.

The Re-Awakening would always become a hot topic of conversation.

The masses loved nothing more than a good gossip, and Hunters just so happened to be a good subject to chew on.

"A Hunter who can raise his abilities up higher?"

"He becomes stronger as time goes by?"

"Who is this Hunter?"

"How can he do something like that?"

"What should we do to become like him?"

Without a doubt, many people would express their interest. After all, there hadn't been a Hunter like him before. And among those expressing interest, there would be those who try to use him, or reveal their hostile intentions towards him as well.

'If just one of those possesses incredible power, then….'

Just imagining it gave him the chills.

He was far too weak as he was now. Until he possessed enough power to protect himself, he didn't want the world to know of his existence. Meaning, taking the test to reassign his ranks was out of the question.

'But, I still need to make money here….'

However, that didn't mean he could go out and get a part-time job, either. He didn't know when the Association would call him for a raid. By raiding a dungeon, he'd get to earn both money and experience, so how could he blow that important chance just to scrounge up a few bucks by working in a local store?

While he was seriously deliberating on what he needed to do, he spotted something in the bulletin board that caught his attention.

'Emergency! Searching for a single Hunter, regardless of the rank! Needs to come right away!'

Jin-Woo's eyes shot right open. This posting had popped up literally a second ago.

When he hurriedly checked the contents of the posting, it wasn't too far from his home, too.

Jin-Woo quickly picked the phone up. The other side must've been in a hurry as well because he answered the call even before the first ringtone.

"Hello?"

Jin-Woo stated his reasons for calling as precisely as possible and calmly waited for the answer.

"Oh, you are an E rank?"

The response from the other side was better than expected.

"It's fine. We just need someone to show up and fill up the headcount, that is all. However, it's a Gate ranked C so it'd be hard for you to hunt there. So, we'll just spilt the profits among ourselves and we just give you ₩2,000,000 in cash. How about it? Can you come right away?"

It was a lot of money for simply being there to make up the numbers. A rather tempting offer this was. It was regrettable that he couldn't get to share the dungeon's loot, but he might end up losing out on making 2 million just by trying to be too greedy.

'For now, let's put out the urgent fires first.'

Such an opportunity wouldn't come around every day, after all.

2 million was enough for him and his sister's monthly living expenses.

Jin-Woo said yes to the offer.

"I'll be there in less than 15 minutes."

"₩2,000,000 huh? Quickly go now, I'll see you later. Don't forget Mister Oh words. Chao!"