Chapter 74

Kang Yuseong scratched the back of his head.

He had just returned home after parting ways with Gil Hyeok-jun.

‘I’ve made a commitment… but how do I actually pull it off?’

Two weeks.

That was all the time he had left.

However, to cure Gil Ji-yeon’s illness, a special potion was required.

It was a potion made from a recipe that hadn’t been invented yet in this era, and the problem was that crafting it was incredibly complex.

Among the most challenging ingredients was the blood of a monster called the Earth Dragon Gainok.

Gil Ji-yeon’s illness was a fatal one that couldn’t be treated by modern medicine. Yet, ever since the Mega Shock began, various cancers and other rare diseases started being cured by medicines made from monster byproducts. Cancer, in particular, had advanced to near-complete remission in recent times.

The main components of these treatments were the monster byproducts discovered due to the Mega Shock.

Some treatments included eyeballs, others bodily fluids, and while the preparation methods were quite complicated, there was no doubt they significantly advanced modern science.

But, naturally, problems still existed.

To obtain the monster byproducts needed for the preparations, one obviously had to hunt those monsters, which was not as easy as it sounded.

While there were quite a few weak monsters, there were also powerful ones that required full-scale raids.

And the treatment for Gil Ji-yeon’s rare disease required byproducts from monsters on par with final bosses.

That’s why Kang Yuseong was scratching his head now.

‘No matter what else, I absolutely have to get the Earth Dragon’s bodily fluid… and that damn Kim Do-jin isn’t answering his phone… This is driving me crazy.’

In truth, he had made the commitment partly because he trusted Kim Do-jin.

He’d expected him to come immediately if called, but Kim Do-jin had turned off his phone and vanished completely.

‘That inflexible fool…’

Without him, hunting the Earth Dragon was impossible to even attempt.

With Kang Yuseong’s current strength alone, taking down an Earth Dragon was out of the question.

To catch it, he would need Kim Do-jin, along with Gil Hyeok-jun’s strength.

Tap-tap-

He quietly tapped on the table.

He couldn’t rely on the power of a major guild.

In fact, the Earth Dragon Gainok was a monster even major guilds avoided due to its notoriously aggressive nature.

This was especially true at the current time, as no treatments or weapons that could be made from Gainok’s byproducts had yet been discovered.

In the future, people would realize that Gainok’s bodily fluid greatly aided in completely activating the immune system and increasing resistance, leading to a surge in Gainok hunts. But for now, it was different.

There was no way they’d participate in a raid where the losses outweighed the gains, even for money.

‘Hmm…’

He picked up his phone again.

He decided to try calling Kim Do-jin one last time.

Ring-ring-ring-

Click-

“The customer you are trying to reach is currently unavailable and will be connected to voicemail.”

He still didn’t pick up.

Kang Yuseong sighed and left a message.

“Kim Do-jin. You’ll regret this if you don’t hear it. Training is good, but hunting an Earth Dragon isn’t something you can do just anytime. So…”

Kang Yuseong paused for a moment.

He only had two weeks anyway.

If Kim Do-jin wasn’t available, he’d have to hunt the Earth Dragon Gainok without him.

“In ten days, come to D-328 Dungeon. The hunt starts at 10 AM. That’s all.”

Would Kim Do-jin even turn on his phone in the next ten days?

Kang Yuseong couldn’t be sure.

He hung up the receiver and rose from his seat.

This wasn’t an issue he could just idly wait on for ten days.

The treatment for Gil Ji-yeon’s illness required many other byproducts besides the Earth Dragon Gainok’s bodily fluid.

‘First.’

Mixing and processing those byproducts was something Kang Yuseong couldn’t do alone.

It required top-tier researchers and a state-of-the-art laboratory for them to work in. That would demand an enormous amount of money.

Kang Yuseong gave a bitter smile.

‘A heavy cost.’

It was a significant cost to gain Gil Hyeok-jun, but wasn’t this why he had been earning money in the first place?

Stamina Potion-S had sold explosively immediately after its release, and Kang Yuseong’s bank balance swelled at an alarming rate.

‘Money can always be earned. Heh heh!’

And Stamina Potion-S wasn’t the only thing he had.

If the Chakra Enhancer Potion were to hit the market…

That would be nothing short of a market-shaking cataclysm.

Recipes for antidotes and defense enhancers were also ready.

He had meticulously planned to release them whenever he needed money.

‘A research lab, huh…’

Kang Yuseong’s eyes gleamed.

The pharmaceutical company he had acquired included a research lab with quite advanced facilities.

He had already anticipated the future when he bought the pharmaceutical company.

Tat-tat-tat!

He accessed the internet and typed on the keyboard.

The site he connected to was a headhunting website.

After the Mega Shock, countless people lost their jobs, and excellent pharmaceutical researchers were no exception.

For those struggling to make ends meet day by day, pharmaceutical research was nothing short of a luxury.

They became jobless overnight, forced to find other work to survive instead of the pharmaceutical research they had dedicated their lives to.

But even in that situation, they hadn’t given up a glimmer of hope.

They had listed their names on headhunting websites, hoping someone would appear who needed their exceptional intellect.

And now, Kang Yuseong was rapidly scanning the list of their names that filled his screen.

* * * * *

“Park! Move faster! You think you’ll get paid at that pace?”

Countless buildings had collapsed due to the Mega Shock.

There were homes that held the dreams of ordinary people, government offices, and military barracks. Factories, schools, and libraries—everything had been mercilessly destroyed, turning into a chaotic mess for years now.

But the government was only now able to focus on national reconstruction.

Until then, they had been too preoccupied with restoring the most critical areas.

So, numerous laborers had flocked to the disaster sites, which had been neglected for years, to work. They needed to earn every penny they could to put food on the table.

Before the Mega Shock, their previous occupations didn’t matter.

Among them were prosecutors, doctors, university professors, and successful CEOs.

But after the Mega Shock, most of them lost their homes, and everything was in disarray.

Thus, all they could do was simple farming, fishing, or working at construction sites like this.

Park Hyeon-jong, the man called Park, was one of them.

“Yes, yes! I’m coming!”

He had been a prodigy who consistently ranked first in his class, graduated from the nation’s top university, earned a six-figure salary, and entered a leading pharmaceutical company, where he had dedicated himself solely to research.

Park Hyeon-jong, who had lived his life in a lab without ever getting his hands dirty, was now grunting as he carried a sack of cement slightly lighter than his own body weight.

His once fair hands were already cracked and rough from cement dust, and his neatly combed hair had been disheveled for ages.

Now, for the sake of his family, he had no choice but to push his frail body to earn every extra penny.

“Ugh, why do they send such weaklings? Even if it’s a government initiative, this is… damn it, they want us all dead!”

The site manager clicked his tongue, watching Park Hyeon-jong.

But Park Hyeon-jong wasn’t the only one; a considerable number of people here were just like him.

People who had never truly gotten their hands dirty.

While the government’s large-scale recovery efforts had significantly increased job opportunities, the reality was that there was a severe shortage of labor to fill them.

Everyone had taken aptitude tests, with some becoming Hunters. Among those who didn’t pass the aptitude tests, the ones with relatively good stamina had become Porters.

Even Porters could earn far more than these construction laborers, so it was difficult to find strong, able-bodied workers at construction sites.

“S-sorry!”

Park Hyeon-jong adjusted his dust-covered glasses and spoke loudly.

‘Hah, hah…!’

But his legs were already trembling.

The weight of the cement had completely crushed his shoulders, and having barely eaten, there was no way he could endure it.

He trudged on, each step heavy, beads of sweat dripping from his forehead.

If he got fired from here, he’d have nowhere to go.

Thinking of his two children waiting at home, he couldn’t collapse here.

But then, he suddenly felt the weight lift from his shoulder.

“You’ll collapse if you keep that up.”

Through his cracked glasses, Park Hyeon-jong saw a man standing beside him, holding the sack of cement. Even with such a heavy bag, the man wore a calm expression.

“Hey, who are you?”

The site manager spotted him and frowned.

At that, the man looked at the site manager.

“I’ve come to take Mr. Park Hyeon-jong.”

The site manager looked bewildered at the man’s leisurely demeanor.

“Are you crazy?! We’re swamped with work today, so don’t interfere and just get out of here!”

But the man walked up to him and offered something.

“In exchange for taking Mr. Park Hyeon-jong… it’s a small token, but.”

It was a white envelope.

The site manager took the envelope with a hesitant expression.

The man leaned closer to the site manager and whispered.

“There are too many eyes on us right now, so please look at it privately later, when you’re alone. It’s my goodwill.”

It was thick.

The site manager gulped, feeling the thickness through his fingertips.

It was definitely money.

He quickly tucked the envelope into his pocket.

As the man said, there were many eyes watching.

The man smiled faintly, watching him.

“Then, I may take him, right?”

“Y-yes, go ahead!”

The man smiled and approached Park Hyeon-jong.

“Mr. Park Hyeon-jong, let’s go.”

Park Hyeon-jong wore a bewildered expression.

“You are…”

The man’s eyes met Park Hyeon-jong’s.

Park Hyeon-jong felt that his eyes were incredibly clear. And the aura within them was…

“I am.”

Then, the man spoke in a low voice.

“I wish to buy your brain, Mr. Park Hyeon-jong.”

Park Hyeon-jong’s eyes widened, shaking greatly.

The man looked at him and smiled faintly once more.

A pure, untainted smile.

A smile that instilled deep trust in anyone who saw it, making Park Hyeon-jong swallow hard.

“Let’s go. To where you belong.”

Park Hyeon-jong stared blankly at the man, then looked at the site manager.

The site manager met his gaze, then quickly turned his head away, feigning indifference.

“Where… I belong…”

Park Hyeon-jong’s voice trembled.

The man placed a hand on his shoulder.

The smile had faded from the man’s lips, and his eyes were now fixed directly on Park Hyeon-jong.

‘Gulp!’

Park Hyeon-jong swallowed hard again.

“Naturally. To a research lab. Mr. Park Hyeon-jong… no, Dr. Park Hyeon-jong.”

A shiver ran down Park Hyeon-jong’s spine.