By Zephyria A good body saves the mind a lot of trouble.
After many twists and turns, Eui-jae succeeded in registering as an Awakened, creating an alibi, and resolving Lee Sa-young’s request. He was now facing a new problem.
The kimchi and side dish automatic self-service bar, which devoured Mana Stones instead of electricity, had terrible cost-effectiveness, but it gave Eui-jae a little bit of free time.
Hunters only had to stack empty bowls next to the self-service bar, and after ordering Hangover Soup, they would set up their own kimchi, radish kimchi, and Cheongyang peppers. Eui-jae only had to boil the Hangover Soup and take out the bowls of rice from the warmer. It seemed that it wasn’t for nothing that the Wave Guild’s engineers were ground like peppercorns for this ultimate automatic self-service bar.
So, what does Cha Eui-jae do with the little free time he has?
“……”
Eui-jae sat at the counter, scratching his temple with a pen. It was a common sight when he was managing the pre-payment ledger, but for some reason, his usually expressionless and neat face was filled with obvious annoyance. Instead of the ledger, a thick stack of books was piled up in front of him like a hill.
The Hunters slurped their Hangover Soup and whispered.
“Does anyone know why the part-timer looks like he’s about to kill someone?”
“Right? I want to eat another bowl, but he looks so pissed that I can’t even talk to him.”
“Ugh, can’t we just cook it ourselves?”
“Ugh, I don’t wanna.”
“What are you saying, dude, that’s gross. Finish eating before you talk.”
“The part-timer is taking Hunter basic education and studying for the qualification exam.”
When a Hunter who had Awakened relatively recently answered, the faces of the Hunters sitting around him turned pale. A middle-aged Hunter with a bushy beard muttered in disbelief.
“Wow… they still haven’t gotten rid of that shitty basic education?”
A Hunter in his mid-twenties frowned and added,
“He’s already busy, so that must be a pain in the ass…. How many hours of mandatory attendance are there these days?”
“You have to take 60 hours. 30 hours offline, 30 hours online. If you’re too busy, you can submit a written explanation to the Bureau of Rift Management and switch to online…. But even if you take all the classes, you still have to pass the exam. If you don’t get over 70 points, you have to retake it until you pass.”
“Ugh. They should just get rid of it, but they’re actually increasing the education time.”
“I’m going to confess here. I actually failed the Hunter exam four times.”
“Four times means you passed eventually, so what. Only a crazy brat passes that on the first try. It’s okay.”
“Okay, okay, let’s be a little quiet. Let’s create an atmosphere of learning for our part-timer.”
The Hunter who said he had failed four times made a gagging sound. Eui-jae, who had heard all their conversations, also felt like throwing up a little. White is paper, and black is like a worm Ha-eun drew.
For the past few days, Cha Eui-jae had understood a hundred times why Ha-eun had drawn worms on her worksheets.
Every Awakened in Korea must go through the process of registering at the registration center in accordance with the Awakened Special Act. Once registration is complete, an Awakened registration card with their name and grade is issued.
Cha Eui-jae was also pleased to receive his stiff D-grade registration card. It was four grades lower than his real grade, but it was more precious because it was a D-grade registration card he had received after enduring all sorts of crazy hardships. He even subtly showed it off to his regulars, which was unlike him.
But.
“Wow, the part-timer got his registration card. Congratulations.”
“Then you have to prepare for the exam now…. Sigh, fighting. I have a collection of past exam questions that I used to use, so let me know if you need them….”
What came back was a look of pity.
It wasn’t a look of disdain for his D-grade. The Hangover Soup Restaurant regulars weren’t Hunters who discriminated against people based on their grade. Then what was the identity of that lukewarm look? Eui-jae was puzzled, but he had to go investigate the Incheon Port every morning, so he didn’t have time to find out more.
However, after the Incheon Port incident was resolved, Bae Won-woo handed him an old collection of questions on his way back after finishing his meal, as if the rumor had spread in that short time. His face was quite solemn. Eui-jae looked at the collection of questions with a puzzled expression.
“…What is this?”
“This is definitely not a gift. It’s the part-timer’s precious human rights.”
“Huh?”
“You’ll understand in a little while. The Hangover Soup was delicious today, I’m leaving!”
The next day, Honeybee also came early in the morning and slammed a thick textbook bound with a spring on the counter.
“I heard the story, Cha Eui-jae-ssi. You’re preparing for ‘that’?”
“What is that?”
“Well, I guess you want to escape reality. I understand how you feel. Anyway, I talked to Team Leader Han and brought the HB Guild’s new recruit training materials, so use them well. Got it?”
“Honeybee-ssi, all the reporters are gathered in front of the Dungeon!”
“Ah, those crazy brats are so fast. Well, I have a Dungeon raid, so I’ll be going.”
As this happened repeatedly, Eui-jae’s absurdity slowly evaporated.
Based on the Hunters’ stories, it seemed that these days, in order to become a proper Hunter after registering as an Awakened, you had to take a separate exam. Registering was already hard enough, but an exam? What kind of exam? When he was active as J, such a thorough registration system and exam didn’t exist!
That night, Eui-jae closed the store and started searching the internet.
“Hi, NexB. Search for Hunter exam.”
―Searching for Hunter exam.
―Hunter exam is shitty
―When is the next Hunter exam?
―When will I ever pass? I can’t become a Hunter because I can’t pass the Hunter exam even after Awakening ―Who made question 30 on the January exam? XX crazy brat
└It’s Nam Woo-jin, who else would it be
└Nam Woo-jin, let’s fight fair and square
―I’m taking the Hunter exam for the 8th time, ask me anything └At that point, isn’t it better to give up on being a Hunter?
―Hunter exam die die die die die die die die die
And the search results he faced were very shocking. Cha Eui-jae, a Hunter ancestor who became a Hunter 11 years ago, stared into space at the unbelievable reality.
‘Ah, I’m… not a Hunter yet?’
That’s right. Cha Eui-jae had only received his Awakened registration card, he hadn’t become a Hunter yet!
The registration card received after going through the registration process at the center was for the purpose of certifying that you were an Awakened. That was it. Ordinary people who didn’t know anything like Eui-jae thought they could work as Hunters as soon as they received their registration card, but the law had changed and you couldn’t be certified as a Hunter with just that. In other words, it was just an empty can.
‘I… went through all that trouble and got an empty can card?’
Eui-jae looked at the stiffly shining D-grade registration card with a hollow look. But that was only for a moment, the following content was even more shocking.
In order to escape from the empty can card and be recognized as a formal Hunter, you had to complete the ‘Hunter Basic Education Program’ and then pass the ‘Hunter Qualification Exam’. You could only get a formal Hunter license after passing the exam, and only then could you use things like the Hunter Market.
In particular, the ‘Hunter Qualification Exam’ was notorious for its crazy difficulty despite being a written exam! It was called all sorts of difficult exams, such as the SAT of the Hunter world, the bar exam of the Hunter world, and so on. Just taking the Hunter exam would automatically complete the search term ‘Hunter exam difficulty’.
Eui-jae tore at his hair.
‘Why is it so hard to become a Hunter.’
The Hunter Basic Education was created five years ago. In fact, when the education was first created, it wasn’t this strict.
At the time, it was really just to instill basic survival knowledge in newly Awakened Hunters, and it taught only the essential knowledge. The content of the education was about the ecology of 10th and 9th grade Monsters that new Hunters would commonly see, and the Dungeon ecosystem.
However, as time went on, the number of Awakened increased, 「Awakened crime rate rises daily… Is the safety of the people okay as it is?」
「The unfair abuse of power by Hunters, where will it end?」
The number of Hunters who believed in their power and oppressed the weak and ordinary people also increased. Even though the Awakened Management Bureau thoroughly cracked down on it, cases of Hunters showing off their Awakening and indiscriminately misusing their power continued to occur.
In the end, the government abolished the existing system of becoming a Hunter immediately upon Awakening, and decided to grant Hunter qualifications only after completing Hunter Basic Education and passing the Hunter Qualification Exam separately.
Eui-jae put his hands together and cursed after finishing his search.
‘If you’ve Awakened, you should be catching Monsters, why are you catching ordinary people….’
What’s worse, after searching further, he found out that Hunters who were scouted by Guilds could submit Guild Leader certification documents to pass the qualification exam. It was a kind of guarantee. It was like a dirty network society. Eui-jae only knew one Guild Leader among his narrow network.
Lee Sa-young.
But he didn’t want to ask Lee Sa-young for a certification document. In fact, this was a matter of pride. If the number one Hunter in Korea couldn’t pass this qualification exam on his own, his ego would die….
‘Let’s study.’
So Cha Eui-jae started studying for an exam that was never meant to be in his fate.