Prologue: Hunter Kim Bongpal
Kim Bongpal, a 1-year-old, was named Kim Bongpal. At age 12, he escaped from the orphanage. At the age of 17, he started making a living with his natural fighting skills. And at 21 years old.
The world was destroyed.
* * *
Ptooey!
A young man in his early to mid-20s spat bloody phlegm on the ground.
“Haah. Fuck. I can’t even do this.”
Behind him was the hunched corpse of a monstrous creature.
“Hey. If you have any cigarettes, give me one.”
The young man leaning on the monster’s corpse spoke to the man next to him. The man, busy catching his breath, hurriedly approached at the young man’s prompting and put a cigarette in his mouth.
Crackle-
“Whooo. Haah. It’s fucking hard, isn’t it?”
“Yes. You’re right, Captain.”
“Captain, my ass. I told you to just call me hyung.”
It was a strange sight. The young man in his early to mid-20s was called the captain, but the other man must’ve at least been thirty. But no one found it strange.
“Whooo. Hey. Think well.”
The young man, smoking the cigarette down to its butt, exhaled a long sigh.
“Yes?”
“As you can see from the last few months, this is a fucking bad life.”
“…”
“Money? Yeah, fuck, you make good money. But do you know that?”
The man laughed bitterly at the young man’s words. He had said the same thing since the first time they met.
The hunter life it’s nothing.So, don’t think about becoming a hunter and do what you’ve been doing.
The older man could only hear it as someone complaining for the sake of it.
“I started my Hunter life at the age of twenty-one. The number of people who chose the same line of work at that time was 100…and I’m the only one who didn’t die.”
“…”
“Son of a bitch, you don’t seem impressed. Fuck, okay, I’m not the only one. About ten are alive, and two of them lost a few limbs. About five guys are like me and still make a living by slicing up monsters. The other three are over there, up there.”
Crackle-
The young man lit another cigarette with the one still smoldering in his mouth.
“The S-class Hunter you wanted to be, those bastards. They are 3 out of 100.”
“It’s four.”
“What?”
“If you try, you can get an S-class license, right?”
The young man laughed.
“Bullshit. Do you think that anyone can become an S-Class? You say that because you don’t know, but in front of them, I’m a joke.”
“What? Last time, you dealt with three other A-class Hunters alone…?”
“They only have A-grade labels. Fuck. If it’s a real S-class, even if there’s one truck of guys like that, they’ll all die in a single swing.”
Although he said that, the A-class Hunters the young man dealt with were veterans who’d been Hunters for more than 10 years. In fact, according to the standards of this young man, more than half of the S-class Hunters, of which there were only 50 in the world, were only labeled S-class Hunters.“Anyway. Think well. Fuck, there’s a lot of talks because the number of monsters that appear has decreased. Sooner or later, this will be over.”
“…Thanks for the advice.”
“Advice, my ass. Hey, I’ll go first, so clean this up and follow me. Haah, fuck. Is it because I’m getting old? What did I do to make my body ache? I’m going to have to stop doing this soon. Fuck.”
So, 37-year-old A-class hunter Kim Bongpal added a 6-star monster to his hunting list, and four years later, Kim Bongpal, 41 years old, retired from the hunting life.
And at 57, the monsters disappeared.
===
The world’s largest nightlife city, El Plades. The best hotel there, Caesars Palace, had a rumor close to a legend.
[In Caesars Palace lives a god.]
It was about a property god. A man who spent money like water in El Plades, which boasted several times the price of other cities. A man who didn’t hesitate to spend thousands of dollars on a meal before returning to his hotel room with a smile, even if he lost hundreds of thousands of dollars overnight at the gambling board.
El Plades was a gathering place for wealthy people who prided themselves on being second to none when it came to spending money. Even there, the property god was said to spend the most.
And there was one more rumor related to the property god.
[If the Property God is on your gambling board, never leave that board.]
Usually, gambling was about sometimes losing and sometimes winning. However, the property god’s gambling had a slightly different meaning.
“Fuck, I’m hungry. All in!”
“…Call.”
Everyone’s attention was focused on the dealer’s fingertips except one person. The man commonly referred to as the Property God didn’t seem to care what kind of cards the dealer would get.
“What should I get for dinner? Seafood? No, I ate that yesterday.”
What was important to him right now was the dinner menu, not the gambling board that cost him nearly $1 million. And when the cards came out.
Someone shouted.
“I-It’s me! I won!”
The joy of taking the whole million dollars couldn’t be contained. Of course, the man nicknamed Property God was still not interested.
“Hmm. I had fun.”
He just said that to the man who got the money and left the table. He didn’t seem to have any regrets about losing.
[If the Property God is on your gambling board, never leave that board.]
This maxim came from the attitude of the man. He didn’t gamble to win money; he would play a bit and always go all-in at the end. And if he won? He would go all in again. He would repeat it until he lost. For him, gambling wasn’t an act to win money. It was just a game as long as it didn’t end without losing all the money he had brought.
“Whoa! Oh, Property God-!”
That was why the gamblers of El Plades fervently praised the Property God. He was a man who never went back after winning money and who betted everything on his hand no matter what it was. How could someone not love him, given that?
“Don’t be dramatic, fuck.”
Of course, the man called Property God, 53-year-old former A-class hunter Kim Bongpal, was still not interested.
* * *
Kim Bongpal was a successful Hunter.
He was incredibly successful. Not enough to make a name for himself in history, but enough to be rich. Hunters made a lot of money if only they survived, and Kim Bongpal was a Hunter who survived until his retirement. Therefore, he made a lot of money. But if you had to ask if the money earned through life as a Hunter made Kim Bongpal the Property God…
Well, it didn’t.
* * *
Every awakened Hunter had a status window.
[Name: Kim Bongpal / Age: 21 / Special Ability: Longevity]
This was the status window that Kim Bongpal first opened. It simply displayed only his name, age, and special abilities obtained upon awakening. What should be noted here was Kim Bongpal’s special ability, Longevity.
Kim Bongpal pondered and pondered, what was longevity? Others used their telekinesis to crush monsters; some awakened their swordsmanship and fought with weapons. What did his special ability mean? It was simple to explain; it meant a long life.
However, Kim Bongpal thought that his special ability couldn’t just be a matter of living longer. Everyone else received a combat ability to fight monsters, but his simply was to live longer. There could be nothing funnier.
So Kim Bongpal continued to think about what his special ability did.
Boom-But the thinking didn’t last long.
“Son of a bitch, fuck! Hey! Pick up the sword!”
The continuous appearance of monsters wouldn’t allow Kim Bongpal to think, and he was too busy fighting. Especially in the beginning, after the world had changed, it was worse. All infrastructure collapsed, and people were worried about surviving from day to day.
All he had was a strong body, but thanks to his awakening, Kim Bongpal took up a sword to live. Fortunately, it wasn’t just special abilities that made Hunters stronger. The more you fought, the more mana accumulated in your body, and the more monsters killed, the stronger that mana became.
Kim Bongpal had a talent for using his body. Even if he didn’t have the special abilities that everyone else had, he fought well. And 10 years later, when the world stabilized to some extent, Kim Bongpal was treated differently.
“Wow. Mr. Bongpal didn’t age at all.”
Naturally, Kim Bongpal realized his special ability. He lived long and didn’t grow old. No more, no less, that was all.
“What? Others shoot fireballs like this, but longevity? Just not getting old and living longer?”
The day he found out, Kim Bongpal-
“Son of a bitch, this fucker!”
Slash!
He fought harder then than he had ever before. Because he was born an orphan, Kim Bong-pal had a stronger obsession with life than anyone else. He didn’t want to die but to live long until he became senile.
But Kim Bongpal didn’t age. He would continue to live unless he was killed by a monster or someone else who bore a grudge against him.
But he continued to seek the battlefield. It wasn’t to die. However, the life he wanted was one of playing and eating as much as he wanted.
“Fuuuck! Just because I built a building!”
Kim Bongpal had become rich thanks to his hard work fighting. However, he hadn’t become rich enough to play and eat as much as he wanted in his lifetime. For Kim Bongpal, a lifetime was something he couldn’t quantify.
“Scout? How much money will you give me?”
“M-Mr. Bongpal!”
“Fuck, what? Will you be the one giving me more money? If so, stay.”
So, Kim Bongpal had decided that he would make money. And a whole load of it, too, so that he could have fun and eat for the next few hundred years. Then, he’d retire from this fucking Hunter life.
Rip-
“Oh, fuck. The eyeballs went out. This is expensive.”
Fortunately, it was a good world for Kim Bongpal to make money. Gradually, he became rich. He went through the B-class and became an A-class Hunter, and started to rake in cash. But did he make a fucking lot?
“Damn government bastards! Why do you take so much in taxes?”
He didn’t. As the world stabilized, the new government needed a lot of money. And in the changing world, the occupations that made the most money were Hunters. Hunters made millions, tens of millions, and hundreds of millions won by killing a single monster. The tax rates levied on them were higher than any other occupation. If you risked your life to catch a monster, the government would take more than half of that profit.
Naturally, dissatisfaction rose among the Hunters. He would stand up and turn the sword aimed at the monsters at the government. And to stop it, the government gave the Hunters a leash and collar named the S-Class Hunter. Full tax exemption, annual maintenance of dignity paid by the government, free public facilities, immunity from most crimes except murder…
There were dozens of benefits granted solely to them. Everyone wanted to become S-class Hunters, but only a handful could. Those that did were satisfied with the government’s policies. No matter how much garbage Hunters got taxed, what did it matter? Rather, it made their privileges even greater.
So, did Kim Bongpal, the man with a special talent for slicing Monsters, become an S-class Hunter?
“Fuck, son of a bitch!”
He didn’t.
There were conditions to become an S-class Hunter. One must have the ability to fight the giant monsters that started appearing. Only those who could conjure a fireball the size of a 5-ton truck from their hands or increase their swordsmanship to the point it could cut down buildings were qualified as S-class Hunters.
It was an open secret that it was actually a condition put down to organize all the low-level Hunters who might stand up to the government rather than the giant monsters.
In any case, such an ability would be impossible without a special ability focused on destructive power, no matter how much mana was accumulated in the body, especially for Kim Bongpal, who lived long without getting old. So, when many of those who started life as Hunters with Kim Bongpal became S-class Hunters.
Slice-!
He still worked as a hunter while resenting the damn world. But from a certain moment, Kim Bongpal stopped resenting the world. Why?
The world had stabilized, but people’s lives were still harder than before. And people who had a hard life always dreamed of making money. So, the lottery was reborn with a whopping 1 billion in prize money,
“Oh my god, fuck? I-I won?”
This time, the world sided with Kim Bongpal.
“A billion dollars?!”
If someone made a billion dollars, people would say:
“It’s money you can play with for the rest of your life.”
Kim Bongpal also thought so.
“Fuck! This Hunter’s life is over! This is retirement, retirement!”
So, Kim Bongpal played and ate and continued on after retirement.