Chapter 10

At that, Jaeha watched the video Seungho had recorded. Since it was filmed with a phone rather than the system, the quality wasn’t great, but you could still tell he was hammering iron with tremendous force.

“I should film the next thing I make too.”

“Go ahead. Even someone like me who knows nothing could feel something from that.”

Saying that, Jaeha looked back at the forge. He took out the iron inside and examined it briefly before dipping it into the blood beside him.

Sssss—

After staying still for about a minute, Jaeha took out the bow stave. Then he put it back into the forge. He repeated that process over fifteen times. When he dipped the twentieth heating into the blood, a bright light appeared from within the blood.

“Hm?”

At that, Jaeha quickly pulled out the iron that had been submerged in the blood. The bow stave had a magnificent appearance. Seeing it, Jaeha smiled.

“It’s done.”

“A bow?”

“Of course.”

“So now you just need to string it?”

“Yeah.”

Saying that, Jaeha dipped the Ogre Sinew he had prepared nearby into the blood, then pulled it out. The sinew, which had been white, had turned red as if soaked in blood. Jaeha strung it onto the bow stave.

Twang—

After stringing the sinew onto the bow, Jaeha plucked the bowstring with his finger.

“It’s complete.”

[Congratulations. You have crafted an item.]

“Oh.”

“What?”

“It’s an item.”

“What? An item?”

“Yeah.”

“No way, I’ve never seen a weapon that’s an item before. Do those normally exist?”

“Of course not.”

“So…… you’re saying you made the first one in the world?”

“Well, I expected it, but seeing it come out like this feels great.”

Smiling, Jaeha checked the item’s effects.

[Sarlinga]

[Rank: Legendary]

[Attack Power: 225]

[Grants complete immunity to fire caused by the weapon, and allows control of fire created by the weapon]

[Attacks are converted to Fire Attribute]

[Owned arrows are automatically nocked]

“Whoa.”

“What?”

“Something way more incredible than I thought got made.”

“That good?”

“Yeah. This is all I need.”

Saying that, Jaeha gripped the bow and looked around.

“Let’s try shooting it once.”

Then Jaeha moved to the forest behind the blacksmith shop. Arriving at the forest, he took out three arrows from his Inventory. He tucked them at his waist, took his stance, and drew the bowstring.

“Hey, aren’t you going to nock an arrow?”

“Just watch.”

Then he released the bowstring without an arrow on it, and one of the arrows at Jaeha’s waist suddenly materialized on the bowstring and began to fly.

Swoosh—

When the arrow struck the tree, it didn’t stop—it flew straight through like a sharp knife cutting through paper.

“Whoa, that’s insane.”

Watching that, Seungho’s mouth hung wide open. Then smoke rose from the tree, and soon it caught fire and began to blaze.

“Huh? Hey, that!”

“Ah. So that’s because of the Fire Attribute attack.”

Then Jaeha tried to put out the fire. At that, the flames that had been burning wildly stopped moving. Confirming this, Jaeha stood still for a moment, looked at it, and spoke.

“Disperse.”

At that, the fire vanished instantly.

“What the—how did you do that?”

“I guess being able to control fire means something like that.”

“That’s all the weapon’s ability too?”

“Yeah. This is a Legendary-rank item, after all. It should be at least this good.”

“L-Legendary?”

Leaving the stunned Seungho alone, Jaeha put the arrows at his waist back into his Inventory. Then he drew the bowstring again.

Swoosh—

“Arrows in the inventory work too. That’s awesome.”

Then Jaeha smiled and spoke while looking at Seungho.

“Let’s head back to the blacksmith shop. I’ll just make some arrows and then we’ll go.”

“Huh? Oh…… okay.”

With that, Jaeha and Seungho returned to the blacksmith shop.

* * *

Back at the blacksmith shop, Jaeha flattened the remaining 3 Iron Ingots and made them into arrows. Making arrows didn’t take long, and since dozens could be crafted at once, it was finished quickly.

“But it’s pretty wild that making one gives you 20 arrows.”

“Even though I’m making them by pounding with a hammer, it’s still a skill.”

With that, Jaeha stuffed over a thousand arrows into a bag. Then he loaded that into his Inventory. Each slot could hold up to 16 items, and arrows were also capped at 16 per slot, as were bags. So Jaeha got a very large bag, put the arrows in it, and then placed that into his Inventory.

“Alright. Let’s head back now.”

“Yeah.”

“Finally done.”

The two of them got into their rented car and headed home. Once back, Jaeha put his old shabby bow up on the Auction House.

Then he ordered some food delivery and started drinking with Seungho.

“Ahh, this is good. By the way, I didn’t mention this earlier because things were crazy.”

“Huh?”

“You know that video you uploaded.”

“Yeah.”

“I checked a little while ago — it’s at 8,000 views.”

“Oh, really?”

“Korea’s population is 5,000 ten-thousands, and your video has 8,000 ten-thousands views right now.”

“What, should I make a big fuss about it?”

“It’s not that, but you’re just too cool about it…….”

Jaeha smiled at his words.

Chapter 9

“Haaah.”

Waking from sleep, Jaeha prepared a simple meal, then sat on the sofa and turned on the TV. He watched the news while eating.

<Today’s Hunter issue: two days ago, a video by a certain Hunter was uploaded to MuTube.>

Creak—

“You up?”

“Ugh……. Ahh, my stomach feels awful.”

“Want me to give you some of that stuff you had last time?”

“You have some?”

“Yeah.”

“Give it.”

At that, Seungho walked over to where Jaeha was. Jaeha opened his Inventory and handed over a downgrade version of Hua Tuo’s elixir. Seungho took it, peeled off the sealed packaging, and ate it.

“Mmm. Can’t you make it taste better?”

“If that were possible, I would’ve done it.”

“Fair enough.”

Jaeha turned his gaze back to the TV.

<This video has become a hot topic, hitting 80 million views just two days after being uploaded. Let’s take a look together.>

“Hm?”

As the video started, Jaeha let out a small sound. The footage on the news was none other than Jaeha’s own video. Seeing it, Seungho’s eyes went wide as he spoke.

“See? I told you it was something big!”

“Who said it wasn’t.”

Jaeha then looked at the video.

“The editing turned out better than I expected.”

“Heh.”

Seungho smiled, and Jaeha watched the TV. The broadcast segment was fairly short, as if they couldn’t show the whole video. When it ended, the announcer began explaining again.

<The Hunter in this video is named Na Jaeha, and he possesses the unpopular Archer class. However, as you can see in the footage, he’s become a hot topic thanks to his incredible physical ability and combat sense.>

Praise for Jaeha continued after that, and eventually he switched the channel elsewhere.

“Hmm, I think I need to film more videos and upload them.”

It had been on the news, and his subscriber count was already surpassing 1 million. Since he’d decided to upload videos anyway, Jaeha muttered to himself.

“Right? Go film some videos.”

“Got it.”

With that, Jaeha finished his meal. After eating everything, he cleaned up and came back to sit on the sofa.

“Dungeons, huh. Where should I go?”

“What’s your Total Ability now?”

“160.”

“At 160, you’re still C-Rank.”

“Yeah.”

“Is that so?”

“Or maybe I’m already B-Rank by now. I’m not sure if the weapon stuff gets factored into Total Ability.”

“Either way, it’d be best to look for a dungeon around D-Rank then.”

“If the conditions are right, I think a C-Rank dungeon might be doable too.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“But later on, if you want to go into S-Rank dungeons or higher, won’t you need a guild or party members?”

“I’ll think about that later. I don’t even know exactly how fast I can grow yet.”

“True, that’s fair.”

“Let’s worry about the rest later — first we need to decide which dungeon to go to.”

Jaeha and Seungho moved to the computer, turned it on, and started searching through various things.

“These are all the F to D-Rank dungeons. We’ll have to pick from these.”

Jaeha logged into the Hunter-exclusive site and pulled up the full list of F to D-Rank dungeons. After pulling up the list, he spoke to Seungho beside him.

“The dungeon name basically tells you what the dungeon is like.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. So like Goblin Forest, or Ent’s Cave, Orc Settlement — you can tell just by the name. Goblin Forest has goblins and the terrain is a forest, Ent’s Cave has ents and it’s a cave.”

“Ah, I see.”

“So pick while looking at the names. The type of monster doesn’t really matter for now. With the weapon I just made, I should be able to take anything down in one hit anyway. So let’s go somewhere with a wide area and plenty of places to hide.”

“Hmm. Like a forest, a settlement, or a swamp?”

“Yeah.”

“Got it.”

Seungho nodded and started scrolling through the list on his phone. Jaeha also began scanning the list. After sorting through all the dungeons, Jaeha took Seungho’s compiled list and slowly read through it.

“Let’s drop the swamps. It’s not like we’re short on dungeons worth going to, so there’s no need to go there.”

“But wouldn’t a swamp have more places to hide and be more convenient?”

“It’s true that lots of trees and underbrush would mean plenty of hiding spots, but I’m not a monkey. I can’t just stay up in the trees, and more than anything, if it’s a swamp, there’s a chance I could get my feet stuck.”

“Ah, that’s true.”

“So swamps are out.”

Seungho slowly went through the list, asking Jaeha’s opinion as he narrowed it down to three dungeons total.

“Chonchon’s Tomb, Imp Village, and Kobold Forest. We can pick one of these three and go.”

“Hmm. They’re all E-Rank dungeons though?”

“So what? Easy is good.”

“I mean, we chose this for hunting, but we also need to film videos. Going after only the easiest dungeons feels a bit off. Let’s drop Chonchon’s Tomb, and I’ll pick one from the D-Rank dungeons.”

“Well, if you say so.”

Jaeha thought for a moment, then nodded and spoke.

“Let’s drop Chonchon’s Tomb and go with Troll Forest.”

“Troll Forest? Troll Forest is a D-Rank dungeon, sure, but the difficulty itself is about the same as C-Rank. Isn’t it a bit much to go into a same-rank dungeon solo?”

“It’s fine. There’s a reason Troll Forest is D-Rank.”

“You mean the troll’s weakness?”

“Yeah. The troll’s weakness.”

“Trolls don’t have any weakness other than being vulnerable to magic. And you can’t use magic.”

“It’s not that I can’t use magic.”

“Really?”

“Of course, I can’t use magic right this second, but if I wanted to, I could.”

“Oh. Really?”

“Of course, I can’t right now though.”

Jaeha smiled as he said that.

“Then how are you going to hunt there?”

“You know what the troll’s strength is, right?”

“Of course. Its strength is its powerful physique — not quite on par with an ogre, but still formidable. Plus tireless stamina, and above all, an incredible level of regeneration. That’s what makes trolls strong.”

“Right. But being weak to magic isn’t the troll’s only weakness.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. As everyone knows, they’re dumb, and maybe because of their regeneration, they just recklessly push forward when fighting.”

“Yeah. That’s right.”

“But there’s a way to hunt them by taking advantage of how stupid trolls are.”

“How?”

“If you sear the wound with fire, it won’t regenerate.”

“Ah, right. No matter how good the healing is, if you cauterize the wound, it can’t recover anymore.”

“Exactly. And on top of that, my attacks are fire attribute, and strong enough that even a glancing pass sets trees on fire. So if I hit them, the flesh will burn and I can stop them from regenerating properly.”

“Ohh, that’s right.”

“Alright, time to start preparing then.”

With that, Jaeha stood up from his seat.