The Struggles of the #1 Rank - Chapter 15
Joo-ah put down her glass of juice and glared at the image of herself on the screen.
The video showed her fighting virtual monsters at the training center and defeating monsters that had emerged outside the Towers.
She couldn’t understand when they had started showing Hunters these ridiculous videos.
Just then, Yeon-joo, who was sitting beside her, stifled a laugh and whispered to Joo-ah.
“Look at Yoo Chan-hee and Shin Jae-rim’s faces.”
Puzzled by the unexpected remark, Joo-ah turned to look at Chan-hee and Jae-rim. Their eyes were fixed on the screen.
“They’re going to get sucked right into it at this rate. Don’t you think?”
Yeon-joo said with an amused smile. Just as she had said, Chan-hee and Jae-rim were staring blankly at the screen, looking almost as if they had lost their minds.
Joo-ah glanced at them with an extremely uncomfortable expression before asking Yeon-joo.
“Why are they so focused on watching it?”
At her question, Yeon-joo shifted her gaze toward Eun-young’s image on the screen.
“Do you know who that person in the video is?”
Joo-ah’s eyes shifted uneasily as she put on an awkward expression before answering a moment later.
“…No?”
Yeon-joo smiled slightly and began to explain.
“That person is the strongest Hunter in the Republic of Korea.”
Joo-ah didn’t know how to respond, so she remained silent. Assuming Joo-ah was simply surprised, Yeon-joo continued.
“The Special Awakener Association gathered the Hunters at the top of the rankings and formed a separate elite unit. There are exactly two elite teams in our country.”
Joo-ah parted her lips, pretending she knew nothing.
“So one of them is the person in that video?”
“That’s right. That’s Hunter Kwon Eun-young, the number one ranked Hunter.”
The elite unit was extremely reluctant to reveal its members’ identities, so very few people outside the unit knew what they looked like.
The only information people could learn was basic details such as their names, ages, and rankings that occasionally leaked through the media.
Joo-ah furrowed her brows and spoke.
“Since when has the Chairman been showing videos like that?”
The Chairman had left the banquet hall after giving his brief greeting at the beginning.
Yeon-joo glanced upward as she answered.
“It’s been going on for quite a while. Hunter Kwon Eun-young is in the hospital now, but I think they were showing the videos even before that.”
Joo-ah asked with a confused expression.
“Why do they show them?”
“The Chairman says they’re educational materials. But from what I’ve seen, I think he’s just showing them off. There was even a time when we had to watch nothing but Hunter Kwon Eun-young’s videos all day long.”
Yeon-joo giggled before adding another comment.
“Maybe that’s why there was a rumor inside the training center that Hunter Kwon Eun-young was the Chairman’s secret daughter.”
Joo-ah’s expression twisted with genuine disgust.
Who was whose daughter…?
Yeon-joo returned to the main topic and looked at Jae-rim and Chan-hee, who were still staring at the screen with vacant expressions.
“And those two are huge fans of Hunter Kwon Eun-young, just as much as the Chairman is.”
“?”
Joo-ah seriously reconsidered what she had just heard.
She was pretty sure Yeon-joo had said something about them being fans…
Joo-ah’s face grew increasingly grim. She looked at Yeon-joo with resentment, as though she had heard something she absolutely never wanted to know.
“Chan-hee makes sense, but Jae-rim is unexpected, right? Even I find it funny sometimes because it doesn’t suit his personality at all.”
“…W-Why do they like her so much?”
Yeon-joo shrugged as if it were nothing special.
“Jae-rim once survived a Tower because of Hunter Kwon Eun-young. He said he started respecting her after that. Apparently, having the number one ranked Hunter as his role model helped him raise his rank quickly, too.”
Yeon-joo grinned at Joo-ah.
“If you want to rank up quickly, too, find someone amazing like Hunter Kwon Eun-young to look up to.”
That was somewhat unexpected.
Jae-rim had once been saved by her in a Tower?
Joo-ah turned her head to look at Jae-rim. He was still staring intently at Eun-young’s image on the screen without even blinking.
For the first time, the eyes that usually showed nothing but dry indifference were shining with light.
When had they met?
As Joo-ah continued to observe Jae-rim, her gaze naturally shifted to the side. Chan-hee was staring at the screen as if he were under a spell.
Joo-ah furrowed her brows.
Could he have been saved by me at some point, too?
Joo-ah turned to Yeon-joo and asked.
“Why is Hunter Yoo Chan-hee acting like that? Was he saved by Hunter Kwon Eun-young, just like Hunter Shin Jae-rim?”
Honestly, Chan-hee surprised her more than Jae-rim did.
Perhaps because she had only ever seen him casually dating different women, the idea of him sincerely respecting someone or being a devoted fan seemed strange.
Yeon-joo shook her head.
“No, Chan-hee has never even met Hunter Kwon Eun-young. He was incredibly jealous when he found out that Jae-rim had met her before.”
She shrugged and added.
“Actually, it’s not strange. The Hunters at our training center have hardly ever met members of the elite unit, either.”
The training facilities and dormitories used by the elite unit had been built separately from those used by ordinary Hunters.
Even from a distance, the buildings looked quite luxurious, and police officers guarded the entrances to prevent outsiders from approaching easily.
Since elite Hunters were among the most valuable personnel in the country, the government had designated them for special protection. Losing even one member of the elite unit could be equivalent to losing one of the most powerful weapons in the Republic of Korea.
Although treating people as weapons was wrong in the first place.
Joo-ah parted her lips with a puzzled expression.
“Then why did Hunter Yoo Chan-hee become a fan of Hunter Kwon Eun-young?”
She couldn’t understand why he liked her so much when they had never even met.
At her question, Yeon-joo shrugged and laughed before whispering into Joo-ah’s ear.
“He’s just a genuine fan. He doesn’t even need a reason.”
Joo-ah’s eyebrow twitched.
No reason…?
Yeon-joo continued with a bright smile.
“People have been talking about the number one ranked Hunter for a long time. Most Hunters hope they won’t encounter an SSS-rank monster while climbing a Tower. Even Hunters with high ranks might not be able to defeat monsters of that level.”
“…”
“But Hunter Kwon Eun-young supposedly defeated three SSS-rank monsters all by herself. You have to admit, that’s impressive.”
Yeon-joo brought the orange juice on the table to her lips as she spoke.
“Whenever a post about the elite unit appears on the community, it usually gets hundreds of comments. But once, someone uploaded a picture of Hunter Kwon Eun-young defeating a monster all by herself. The server went down because too many people accessed it at once.”
The Community for All was only activated when a Gate opened in a Tower.
Hunters could access it through their system windows, while ordinary people usually visited the community site through the website of the Special Awakener Association.
The community regularly featured posts from its administrators, who provided real-time updates on the situation inside the Towers. Through these posts, ordinary people could follow the Hunters climbing the Towers.
Ever since the Community for All first appeared on the Association’s website, ordinary people had started visiting the site almost obsessively.
Perhaps the fact that it could only be accessed when a Gate appeared made people even more eager to use it.
Other community sites that could be accessed freely were eventually created, but none became as popular as the Community for All.
The higher the group’s rank, the more comments its posts received. Needless to say, posts about the elite unit attracted enormous attention.
Yeon-joo tried to hold back her laughter as she revealed Chan-hee’s secret.
“I bet Hunter Yoo Chan-hee has tons of pictures of Hunter Kwon Eun-young on his phone. I once saw him saving screenshots of posts about her from the community.”
Joo-ah glanced at Chan-hee with an expression of extreme disgust. However, he was too busy admiring her image on the screen to notice.
A little while later, the video switched to another Hunter. Jae-rim simply looked away without any particular reaction, while Chan-hee openly showed his disappointment.
Then he noticed Joo-ah looking at him strangely from beside him.
“What are you looking at?”
He muttered in an irritated voice.
Joo-ah wrinkled her nose and turned away.
Because of the prestigious title of the elite unit and the special treatment its members received, both ordinary citizens and Hunters belonging to the Special Awakener Association had high expectations of them and showed great interest in their activities.
Therefore, Chan-hee and Jae-rim’s reactions weren’t particularly strange. But that only applied when they didn’t know the people involved personally.
Now that Joo-ah had gotten to know their personalities to some extent, it was difficult for her to accept their admiration so easily.
By the time the video ended, the food spread across the tables had also disappeared.
Just as an Association employee standing on the podium was about to take the microphone, a faint vibration shook the banquet hall.
Fine cracks began to form across the floor, and people started murmuring in confusion.
Joo-ah’s expression hardened as she surveyed
her surroundings.
Then…
BOOM!
Something sharp and cone-shaped suddenly burst out from beneath her table, spinning rapidly as it shot upward.
In an instant, the round table shattered into pieces.
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