Chapter 571: Rank A Hunter Promotion? (1) (Part 3 Start)

About two weeks after the day of the Three-headed Basilisk extermination battle in the Abandoned Village.

Due to various circumstances, my Hunter rank still remained at B-rank.

It wasn’t that I had any disqualifying reasons for promotion or anything like that, of course; it would be more accurate to say that I simply didn’t have the time to even get promoted due to how busy I was over the past two weeks.

First off, if I were to summarize what happened over the past two weeks, it’s basically that there were many busy events due to various incidents.

First, just gathering B-rank and A-rank Hunters to deal with the boss monster of the ‘Abandoned Village’ was a considerably big incident, and the fact that most of the details of that extermination operation were released to the media via video was the biggest reason why I was so busy.

When the Three-headed Basilisk was exterminated, one employee from the Union side among the few remaining Guild Alliance staff recorded the scene on video, and they rashly released that content to the media without consulting us.

Thanks to that, the fact that we caught the ‘Abandoned Village’ boss monster and the fact that I am a male Awakened were effectively revealed. Regardless of the Union employee who broke security rules being fired on the spot, the video had already spread worldwide through the media.

Thanks to that, the Three-headed Basilisk extermination battle involving me and my colleagues became publicly known, regardless of our wishes. The fact that I was the male Awakened, previously only a subject of rumors, also eventually became known.

…Furthermore, the mask of unknown identity also seemed to have been damaged while fighting inside the Basilisk’s mouth and had disappeared at some point, making it impossible to hide my identity with a mask from now on.

Well, anyway, I had planned to reveal my identity once I became an A-rank Hunter, so the timing itself wasn’t too bad.

The video of me active as a Hunter was fully revealed without any secondary manipulation, and in the first place, the mask of unknown identity was a perception-hindering artifact that only worked on those who didn’t know the face inside the mask.

Simply by properly revealing the fact that I am a male Awakened through major media outlets was enough for people to recognize the person in the video as me.

Fortunately, the part about my nakedness wasn’t revealed, and President Seo Ok-hee’s quick thinking played a big role in that.

As soon as she confirmed the corpse of the Three-headed Basilisk we defeated, she used her Awakened ability to block all surrounding electronic devices and then began to manage the situation.

She said it was a habit she developed because it would become troublesome if public opinion started forming elsewhere before the Guild could make their statement.

Well, the fact that the President was a Multi-Awakened was something I already knew, so it wasn’t surprising at this point.

Regardless, thanks to her using a wide-area EMP, the incident of my naked body, seen by others when I was rescued after being trapped inside the Basilisk’s mouth, being revealed to the media did not happen.

What was revealed was strictly only the video footage from before she appeared.

It was truly fortunate, as even I didn’t have the courage to show my naked body to the unspecified masses of the whole world.

Thanks to that, I had no choice but to spend the past two weeks in days that were tiring both physically and mentally.

After all, it was an unavoidable and natural phenomenon for much attention to be focused on the world’s first male Awakened Hunter.

If I had refused all the media interviews flooding in when attention was at its peak, it would have unnecessarily amplified strange suspicions. So, I agreed to a few interviews only with a few reasonably influential media outlets that seemed unlikely to publish biased articles.

Especially since most of my Hunter life has been filled with intertwined connections with other colleagues, interviews conducted together with various colleagues like Hye-eun and Cha Yuri were included once or twice.

Anyway, thus I, Sung Taekyung, proudly became known worldwide as a ‘male Awakened’ and a ‘Multi-Awakened’.

Completely shedding my second identity as Union Hunter Kim Sungchul.

⁎ ⁎ ⁎

Thanks to the few media interviews I recently responded to, the information about me was fortunately reported in the media without significant distortion.

Thanks to extensively revealing through the media things like how I worked at the Union for a while after first awakening, then transferred to a company and joined the A-rank party Sky Blue Shield, and how I had consistently worked as an Awakened Hunter within the company already.

Perhaps thanks to expressing my Awakened abilities freely within the company without hiding them, the fact that I had worked while hiding my Awakened abilities was not well known.

It seems that taking off the mask of unknown identity inside the company and only wearing it briefly during my commute to and from work worked properly.

It was also a moment when I realized the perception-hindering ability of the mask of unknown identity was truly incredible.

…Although it can no longer be used now.

Even if the mask itself had remained, it would be more accurate to say I couldn’t use it now that I’ve become so famous.

Since the artifact’s limitation was that the perception hindrance doesn’t work on people who know the face inside the mask.

And although I responded to interviews about my Awakened abilities several times, I naturally didn’t mention the condition for getting stronger: having sex with women.

This can’t be helped. If I revealed the fact that I get stronger through sex with women in my current position, the consequences were obvious.

I absolutely didn’t have the confidence to face the sight of crazy women, claiming they could become stronger if they had sex with me, swarming my house and turning me into a worldwide public stud.

At least, I wanted to choose my partners to share my body with myself.

There was even one institution that cautiously requested something like semen, saying they wanted to test my genes, but the company resisted strongly and refused it on my behalf.

To be honest, it was a crossing-the-line act, and I also didn’t want to unnecessarily inform others about what Hwayoung Sunbae was already researching and create competition, so it was fortunate in many ways.

In the first place, giving my sperm was quite uncomfortable, not to mention that if I had given 0% semen without sperm to avoid troublesome matters, a distorted article claiming the world’s first male Awakened was infertile would have swept the media instead.

My honest feeling was that I didn’t want to get involved in things that could potentially cause stress, as much as possible.

Separate from the fact that I am a male Awakened being revealed, I want to maintain this current life itself for a long time.

These current days where I devote myself to my activities as a Hunter while sharing my body every day with many compatible female Hunters.

Anyway, for those two weeks, I truly used all my strength just on revealing my personal details, to the point that day by day passed by in a blur.

Let alone dungeon expeditions, I truly didn’t even have time for sex, and the days passed quickly.

It was to the extent that my A-rank promotion, which I should have received long ago, was delayed for various reasons.

‘That too will end today, though.’

Today, I finally step up as an A-rank Hunter.

It was the time for promotion, postponed and postponed.

⁎ ⁎ ⁎

I went to work in the morning with Han Min-ah, in time for the morning rush.

As soon as I appeared at the company, I felt the sensation of quite a lot of Hunters’ gazes reaching me.

“You’ve totally become a celebrity.”

“Still, it’s fortunate it’s better than about a week ago. Until then, reporters were camped out in front of the company, to the point I couldn’t even get to work.”

“It was really intense back then…”

Well, the persistence of Korean reporters was something I couldn’t do anything about, so I had no choice but to wait for them to quietly subside.

Nevertheless, after doing a few interviews through major media outlets, the scale had greatly reduced now.

Perhaps the company itself must have taken measures to protect me, the male Awakened.

“Well, still, it was a fact known through word-of-mouth among the company people anyway. It paid off that I worked diligently as a company healer.”

“…By any chance, did you expect all this when you worked as a healer at the company?”

“I didn’t expect this much, but gradually revealing that I am an Awakened was included as one of the reasons for my healer activities.”

Of course, the most important purpose among those was becoming friends with fellow healer Hunters and learning how to handle Awakened abilities.

And I’m still in good contact with Lulusia, who was like that goal. It was fortunate in many ways.

I did think she might be shocked in many ways, considering I showed her my naked body just one day after meeting her, but when I actually thought back on it, it didn’t seem like such a serious matter.

Indeed, in the original world, it would be a situation not much different from a man accidentally witnessing a woman’s naked body.

Lulusia had such an extremely innocent and untainted, Saintess-like image, but nevertheless, she too was a person of this world.

Naturally, her sense of chastity would likely not be very different from that of ordinary women, and if I, the man who showed her my body, wasn’t embarrassed by it, Lulusia likely wouldn’t think of unnecessarily ruining our relationship.

Of course, we don’t mention the incident itself that happened that day intentionally, but excluding that, the KakaoTalk chat room that she and I joined was still active.

“When will you give me that tour of Korea you mentioned last time~?”

“I will try to make time soon.”

“Oh, I’m looking forward to it~!”

Moreover, even the date promise I mentioned during the purification work last time… seems to still be valid.

It was truly fortunate in aspects like this that her personality was bright and innocent.

“What are you thinking about so much alone?”

“…Just, various thoughts.”

“Indeed, it’s understandable you’d have many thoughts seeing the events of recent times. Did you say you had plans today too?”

“Today is just a personal schedule. Once I get to work, I’ll have a meeting with the President, and after that’s over, it’s a date with Cha Yuri-ssi.”

“You seemed extremely busy the past few weeks, and as soon as you became free, it’s a date right away? You really are consistent.”

Along with such conversation, after getting into the company elevator together, I sent Han Min-ah off on the 14th floor where the Sky Blue Shield conference room is located.

I then went up to the 17th floor where the President is.

It’s the first time I’m seeing her since the time I met her inside the Abandoned Village, I wonder if she’s been well during that time.