How To Survive as a Class a Hunter

35. Kim Geuk of the Korean Awakening Alliance – [2]

“Go to the new shelter for awakened people in Incheon? You mean the facility for awakened people, right? Yes, I’m going…”

Too tired to attempt teleportation, I barely managed to get into a passing taxi.

When I arrived at the place the official mentioned, a noisy situation was unfolding.

I looked up at the Incheon Awakened People Facility. Despite its grand name, it was just an apartment complex surrounded by a wall.

On the 8th-floor balcony of one of the apartments, a middle-aged man was hanging one leg over the railing, looking like he might fall at any moment. Was it a suicide attempt?

The middle-aged man was shouting at the top of his lungs.

“Come on, you b*stards! If you want to die, come closer! I’ll freeze your hearts solid!”

Were the threats frightening? The police gathered here were waiting behind the wall, not daring to approach the man.

It seemed the reason I was called was because of this situation. I approached the police and asked.

“What’s going on?”

The police turned to look at me. One of them recognized me and widened his eyes.

“Hunter Kim Geuk? Why are you here?”

“The official told me to come here.”

“They sent Hunter Kim Geuk instead of Choeun? No, Choeun should be here…”

I knew the name Choeun too.

An A-rank hunter from Cambodia contracted by Incheon City. I had never met him in person, but I had seen his corpse.

“Choeun died in the last Incheon Gate incident.”

“What, Choeun is dead?”

“Yes. He faced the rift monster before me and got his belly split and his neck cut.”

“No, it has to be Choeun…”

I couldn’t understand why the police were saying that.

From my own investigation, Choeun was a physical enhancer like me. If he could do it, I should be able to as well. Why did it have to be Choeun?

“Just explain what’s going on. What were you going to ask Choeun to do?”

The police pointed to the middle-aged man still shouting on the balcony.

“Do you see that person causing a commotion right now?”

“Yes. Isn’t it a suicide attempt?”

“It’s not just a suicide attempt. It’s a suicide attempt to make everyone listen to him because he’s angry. That person is very angry right now, and he’s not just making a fuss about committing suicide, he’s threatening to kill anyone who interferes with his rampage. And that person is an ice ability user…”

“So, to prevent anyone from getting hurt, an awakened one has to step in. But aren’t there any awakened ones in the police?”

“There’s one. An ice ability user.”

“Then can’t we call that person?”

The police officer mumbled reluctantly in response to my question.

“That’s the person…”

The police officer pointed to the middle-aged man on the balcony, and I narrowed my eyes.

Looking around, it seemed that the soldiers couldn’t do anything either. The soldiers who originally worked here were all killed last time, weren’t they? The newly replenished personnel seemed to not know how to handle this situation.

In that case, there’s no choice. I, who had been just watching, stepped forward.

I crossed the facility’s main gate and moved forward. The middle-aged man, who had been shouting that he would kill anyone who came closer, seemed to recognize me.

“Kim Geuk?”

“Yes, Incheon Manse, Hunter Kim Geuk.”

The middle-aged man who saw me looked flustered. With the unique vision of a body enhancer, I could see that he was rolling his eyes. He seemed very embarrassed, as if he hadn’t expected me to come.

I didn’t want to make him feel even more embarrassed in this situation. I asked in the calmest voice possible.

“Sir, is there a reason you’re doing this right now? Are you protesting?”

The middle-aged man hesitated and answered.

“Yes, I’m protesting!”

“Why are you protesting?”

“Since the day before yesterday, these b*stards have been conducting roll calls… roll calls!”

“Roll calls?”

“You know, the roll calls they do in prisons to check the number of people?”

“Yes, the ones they do in the military and prisons! Every evening before bed, they conduct roll calls! The residents have to come out into the hallway and count off, one, two, three, like that!”

“Is roll call that bad?”

“Of course it’s bad! Am I a prisoner? I came back from work, took a shower, went out for a smoke, and when I came back, the duty officer was yelling at me for missing roll call, saying everyone was waiting and couldn’t lie down because of me. Does that make sense?”

In such detention facilities, isn’t it very important to check if the number of ice ability users matches the number of people?

And since the soldiers were all killed last time, the soldiers managing the detention facility seemed to feel the need to show a more thorough appearance, even if it was just for formality. So, it seems they added one more annoying and frustrating procedure, which made that man angry and rampage.

While I was trying to understand the situation, a police officer behind me spoke quietly.

“Can’t you just teleport him down?”

“No, you can’t drag down someone protesting their injustice in a humiliating way. If they get angry and start using their powers on you, I can’t protect you.”

“Ah, well, that’s true…”

I looked up at the middle-aged man again and asked.

“So, how can I help you? It seems like you’re doing this because you feel wronged. Should I call a journalist I know? But from my experience with the Korean Awakening Alliance, journalists don’t properly cover stories about ice ability users.”

“Forget the journalist, just get me out of this damn place! Or at least stop these damn roll calls or whatever!”

And I thought about how I could meet his demands. I wasn’t a soldier, so I didn’t have the power to stop the roll calls…

I racked my brain as much as I could, but I was too tired to think straight. So I suggested the simplest solution that came to mind.

“If you’re feeling suffocated living here, do you want to stay at my place for a while? I have a spare room that’s not being used right now!”

The middle-aged man seemed taken aback by my suggestion.

“No, I didn’t mean for you to help me that much… What are you talking about all of a sudden…”

“No, it’s fine! I live alone! Do you want to pack your things now?”

I shouted, and the middle-aged man seemed very burdened by my offer. Or maybe he felt mentally burdened by the idea of troubling a hunter who had almost gotten his neck half-cut protecting them last time.

In the end, the middle-aged man didn’t know what to do for a while and then surrendered.

“Damn, I’m sorry…”

He soon stopped the commotion. He stepped away from the railing and went back into his house.

After that, the police went in and persuaded him, and the situation was resolved.

“Mr. Kim Geuk, thank you so much for your help. You’re better than the police…”

I suddenly thought of something and asked the police officer who was thanking me.

“But is this really something I should be doing?”

“Excuse me?”

“No, no matter how I look at it, this doesn’t seem like a job for a hunter. Why did you call me? Is it really okay for me to interfere in police work like this? Is there some kind of legal exemption if something goes wrong?”

I may look like this, but I’ve never slept through criminal law class. I used to listen to criminal law lectures with one ear and let it out the other, but after the criminal law professor bought me a cup of coffee, saying he didn’t know I studied so hard, I felt bad about goofing off in class and started paying attention.

So I learned that a hunter like me shouldn’t get involved in things like this.

A hunter carries a gun, but legally, they’re just a civilian. They shouldn’t act like they’re the police.

At least that’s what I learned, but I was too tired to argue, and I thought the public official wouldn’t have called me for no reason, so I decided to step in.

But since I still felt uneasy, I tried to confirm again, and the police officer didn’t give a proper answer and mumbled.

“Well… I don’t really know…”

I was thinking I should ask the responsible public official when I heard a familiar voice.

“What is this? Why is Mr. Kim Geuk here?”

It was Ms. Park Mi-hyung. She had a look on her face that really said, “Why are you here?” so I answered truthfully.

“The official in charge told me to come here.”

“An official? Why would an official call you, Mr. Kim Geuk?”

“How would I know? I thought it must be something important since they called me, but the official who called me is nowhere to be seen… I have no idea what’s going on.”

Ms. Park Mi-hyung was silent for a moment after hearing my answer.

But for some reason, she seemed to be angry, as she clenched her fists tightly.

Still angry, Ms. Park Mi-hyung forced a smile and said to me.

“Mr. Kim Geuk, you went hunting today too, right? I heard you came back quite late…”

“Yes, well.”

“Then you must be dead tired right now? Go on in. Go on, go on. I’ll tell them to give you a ride in the car I came in…”

The forced smile was gradually hardening, but I decided not to ask why she was so angry. It was definitely too late and I was too tired to meddle.

I got into the car Ms. Park Mi-hyung had arranged for me. As soon as I leaned back in the seat, I heard Ms. Park Mi-hyung’s shout from behind.

It was an angry shout that I had never heard from her before.

“You crazy b*stard! Are you out of your mind? Have you really gone insane?”

I looked back in surprise at Ms. Park Mi-hyung shouting into her phone as the car started moving.

Until the car was quite far away, Ms. Park Mi-hyung’s shouts kept ringing in my ears.

*

Even after waking up, I couldn’t understand what had happened yesterday. No one, including the official in charge, had properly explained the situation.

To find out what was going on, I logged into HuntWeb.

Ⓐ BabyBerserker: Hey guys, hey guys! BabyBerserker has a question!

I wrote down what had happened yesterday in quite detail and posted it, and soon several comments appeared.

Ⓑ GoodHunter: Oh, that’s a 9th-grade call…

Ⓐ BabyBerserker: What’s a 9th-grade call? From the word ’emergency’ attached to it, is it a system where hunters are called for urgent matters?

Ⓑ GoodHunter: No, it’s not ’emergency’ as in an ambulance, but ‘9th-grade’ as in a 9th-grade civil servant. It’s called a 9th-grade call because a 9th-grade civil servant called a hunter.

I couldn’t understand what they were saying at all.

But as Ms. Park Mi-hyung had roared yesterday, it seemed like something that would make anyone angry.

Ⓐ syberMagneto: Are the non-awakened trash really insane?

Anonymous: Is this for real? This can’t be happening.

Anonymous: A 9th-grade call for Kim Geuk? Is Incheon City crazy?

The comments were coming in at an unusual speed, and the reactions were all similar. Everyone seemed either shocked or angry.

It seemed that the fact that I was the one who received that emergency call made their reactions so intense.

So, to find out what that emergency call was, I searched and roughly understood their reactions.

Ⓐ syberMagneto: I’ve always wanted to kill those city hall officials, but this time I really want to kill them all.

There is a bad practice called an emergency call.

When the government urgently needs awakened personnel, they call upon the awakened hunters contracted with the local government to do the work.

Unlike before, nowadays, when an emergency situation arises, the local government, police, and fire departments all work together to respond. So, the agencies communicate closely and help each other more than before.

And when the police or fire department urgently need an awakened person, the local government sends the awakened hunters they have contracted to do the work. This happens in cases like responding to awakened crimes or when a few monsters appear in residential areas.

Also, as I had already noticed, all of this is, of course, illegal. Hunters are not affiliated with the local government but with the association, and they are external personnel who do not receive any compensation even if they die, so it is not a structure where officials can directly command them.

Especially in cases like this one involving the police. As the criminal law instructor taught, hunters are civilians, not officials, so if they intervene in police work and hurt someone, it becomes a legal issue.

So, to prepare for things going wrong, the high-ranking officials of the local government delegate the role of giving orders to hunters to lower-ranking officials. They pass the responsibility to the lowest-ranking person who cannot be held accountable if things go wrong.

So, 8th or 9th-grade officials contact the awakened hunters and give them illegal mission orders, and the impact of a 9th-grade official bossing around an awakened person is so significant that it’s called an emergency call.

Ⓐ BabyBerserker: No one told BabyBerserker about such a thing?!

Anonymous: That’s because you are as unlikely to experience such a thing as Kang Junchi, so there was no need to tell you, BabyBerserker…

Ⓐ StoneheadYouth: Should I change my nickname to StoneheadMushroom?

And I also found out why everyone was so shocked that I experienced such a thing. Not all awakened hunters are subjected to such abuse.

Ⓐ ElmayaKayo: Emergency calls are a skill exclusive to Seoul officials, so why did it happen in Incheon?

Ⓐ BabyBerserker: Why? Because Seoul folks are wicked?

Ⓐ ElmayaKayo: No; only in Seoul do A-rank hunters keep renewing their contracts because they want to stay in the officials’ good graces;

Ⓐ ElmayaKayo: They only abuse A-rank hunters who frequently miss hunts or have poor performance because they are worried about not renewing their contracts, but they can’t even attempt emergency calls on high-performing A-rank hunters in Seoul.

Ⓐ ElmayaKayo: But an emergency call on Kim Geuk, not even another hunter in Incheon? As a senior, I want to explain this situation, but it doesn’t make sense to me either.

The senior hunter added that local officials in places like Incheon cannot attempt emergency calls on A-rank hunters.

Unlike Seoul, the local governments have a poor environment for awakened hunters, so it’s not the hunters who have to be careful to renew their contracts, but the local governments who have to be careful.

Despite that, it was incomprehensible that they would dare to make an emergency call on me in Incheon, which is notoriously the most avoided place by awakened hunters. They should be treating me with utmost respect for next year’s contract renewal, so how could they dare?

Ⓐ StoneheadYouth: I’ve heard that emergency calls do happen in local areas.

Ⓐ ElmayaKayo: This is the first time I’ve heard of it.

Ⓐ StoneheadYouth: Well, you’re Korean, so you wouldn’t know. They can’t do it to Korean A-ranks, but they abuse foreign A-ranks.

Ⓐ ElmayaKayo: They abuse foreign A-ranks?

Ⓐ StoneheadYouth: Foreigners don’t know what’s what, right? Even if it’s not a hunter’s job, if an official orders it, they think it’s in the contract and follow it, so it’s easy to boss them around.

Ⓐ StoneheadYouth: Come to think of it, didn’t that Cambodian A-rank die in Incheon? Maybe they used to boss around that Cambodian awakened person and called this friend this time?

Ⓐ syberMagneto: Are non-awakened trash really insane??

As comments trying to interpret the situation kept pouring in, I sighed, mentally exhausted.

By this point, I was starting to understand the situation myself.

Judging by the fact that the police asked why I came instead of Choeun, it seemed that in Incheon, when such incidents occurred, they would usually call in Choeun, an A-rank hunter from Cambodia, to handle it (it goes without saying that it was the work of Seoul seeds who had infiltrated Incheon).

However, as you know, that man heroically died in the last gate incident. So, when the police contacted my duty officer, who was on duty at the time, they couldn’t send Choeun and felt obligated to send another awakened hunter instead.

In the midst of this, my duty officer was a guy around twenty years old. A high school graduate who hadn’t even served in the military yet. I was the same at that age, often doing things without knowing what was what, without permission.

He probably didn’t even know if what he was doing was legal or just a bad custom, and thought it was okay to send any hunter contracted with Incheon.

Whatever the actual reason, my duty officer sent me to the scene instead of the already deceased Choeun.

So, when the police saw me, they must have thought something was wrong, but they didn’t know exactly what was wrong, so the situation just flowed vaguely and ended ambiguously.

And when Park Mihyung arrived late, she must have realized what was going on and roared in anger.

Ⓑ GoodHunter: No, this is too serious. We hunted until almost 6 PM yesterday, didn’t we? Calling someone who risked their life hunting on a day off is outrageous. They should be resting.

Ⓐ syberMagneto: This isn’t enough; they should be executed by dismemberment.

Ⓐ syberMagneto: Or beheaded and displayed at Gwanghwamun.

Anonymous: Even that concept troll is making sense now ㅠ

Ⓐ syberMagneto: Anyway, I never imagined that the great Baek Dambi would suffer something like this. It’s unbelievable.

Ⓢ Kang: Seeing those sandworms’ actions still makes me feel suffocated…

Ⓢ Kang: If I wasn’t paid to stay in Seoul, I would have stormed in and overturned everything. Can someone hold off Behemoth for me?

Even a big shot like Kang Junchi appeared, denouncing what I had gone through.

As various posts about what happened to me kept coming up on HuntWeb, another post appeared.

Anonymous: An article about this incident is already up ㅎㄷㄷ