WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Arsène

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◈ How an A-Rank Hunter Lives ◈

Chapter 26: B-Rank Hunter Naito-san - [3]

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We kept passing through one neighborhood after another. As I searched with my mental net spread out, I frowned.

“There’s a pack of Deathclaws in the sewers too.”

“In the sewers?”

I told them how many Monsters there were, where the sewer they were hiding in was, and that there were three manholes nearby.

One Hunter grinned.

“This should be easier, right? We can split into teams, wait by the manholes you mentioned, then concentrate our fire.”

“Could they come out by breaking through the ceiling instead of the manholes?”

“I don’t think so. They can cut through walls and push them over, but if they cut through the ceiling, all the concrete and dirt would fall on them. That’d be a pain. The ceiling’s pretty thick too, so it’d take them a while to break through it their way.”

So we split into three large teams to wipe out those Monsters too.

First was the team I was with, then the team Baek Dambi was with. I’d sent her to another team because I judged that having Baek Dambi draw the Deathclaws’ attacks from the front line would help the Hunters survive. She didn’t seem unhappy about being put to such important use.

The final team was led by Naito-san...

I looked at the sewer entrance in front of me and relayed the monsters’ movements beyond it over the radio.

「Two are heading toward Baek Dambi’s group... Three are heading toward Naito’s group, so get ready...」

After passing all the information on to the other teams, I narrowed the range of my mental net. I had to prepare for the Monsters that would come out in front of us.

The moment three Deathclaws burst out, the other Hunters and I opened fire at once and brought them down.

“Good!”

We took down the Monsters on our side without anyone getting hurt. What about the other teams?

When I spread out my mental net, I found that Baek Dambi’s team had safely dealt with their share too.

I was just about to check on Naito-san’s group.

The radio blared.

「Help! We’re with Naito-san, help us!」

I hurriedly asked as I extended my mental net.

“How many?”

「Two... We only killed one! One of them won’t die even when we shoot it!」

From the explanation, it was a Force-Field Creature. A Monster I had to take care of.

I immediately used Spatial Teleportation to get there, but the Force-Field Creature wasn’t nearby. All I saw was one Hunter with blood gushing from their neck and two others groaning from injuries to their arms and legs.

The Force-Field Creature. Where were the Force-Field Creature and the other Monsters?

An engine roared in the distance. Loud music was playing too.

When I turned toward the sound, I saw them.

Two Deathclaws were chasing a biker.

There was only one Hunter who had brought a bike today.

Naito-san.

I watched the Japanese man race along on his silver bike, firing a shotgun at the Monsters chasing him, with two Deathclaws right behind him. Ah, now there was only one. The one that had been about to pounce on Naito-san had been killed by his shotgun.

The Force-Field Creature was still unharmed and chasing him. I focused on using Spatial Teleportation while watching what happened.

Just as the Force-Field Creature closed the distance, kicked off the ground, and tried to leap, Naito-san tilted both his body and bike at once. It was a move impossible without closely watching the Monster’s every motion and predicting what would happen next.

Naito-san avoided the Force-Field Creature as it barely grazed past him, then turned his bike. Even as he made a sharp turn and sped off in another direction, his upper body remained facing backward.

Naito-san kept firing his shotgun at the Force-Field Creature chasing him. He had to know shots like those wouldn’t be enough, so why?

He was trying to make that monster keep chasing him. The gunfire was meant to pressure it, telling it that he was still attacking so it wouldn’t go after the others and would keep following him, even if he was hard to catch.

If the Force-Field Creature ran wild among the other Hunters, they would all die.

There couldn’t have been another reason. I could tell just by looking at his eyes, fixed directly on the Monster even in a situation where life and death hung on every beat. The music blasting from his bike was probably meant to lure it in too.

Both the Force-Field Creature and Naito-san were moving at absurd speeds. That made it difficult to calculate where I needed to teleport to get close to them...

After taking some time, I somehow succeeded.

At last, I teleported beside them. The Force-Field Creature was running right in front of me. As I pulled the trigger of my Hunter Rifle at its side, I locked eyes with Naito-san, who was pulling the trigger of his shotgun.

Amazingly, in that instant, Naito-san’s eyes darted between me, who had appeared before him, and the Force-Field Creature. I’d never seen dynamic visual acuity like that, not even during my days in combat sports.

Then five bangs rang out.

Five autocannon rounds fired in rapid succession from my Hunter Rifle tore the Force-Field Creature to pieces.

“Ah!”

Only then did Naito-san lower his shotgun, look at me again, and smile as though he could finally relax.

Life returned to his eyes too. His eyes had been so calm that I doubted he could look that composed even while playing a console game on easy mode. Only now did they show any emotion.

“It hasn’t even been a minute since we called on the radio, and you came right away? Spatial Teleportation really is incredible! An awakened Hunter with such amazing specs is basically in several places at once...”

Was this bastard trying to joke around, or suck up to me?

It didn’t seem like either. From the look of him, he was genuinely relieved.

That meant he had looked that calm while tense just moments ago. For a non-awakened piece of trash...

“You hurt anywhere?”

“I’m fine, thanks to you!”

After that, we quickly handled the aftermath.

I used Spatial Teleportation to take the two injured Hunters and the one who had died to the hospital, then returned to the scene.

The smell of blood immediately filled my nose. The Hunter whose neck had been half severed had bled enough to form a pool. I had taken them to the hospital, but judging by the size of that pool, it was unreasonable to expect them to survive.

「Yes, we wiped out another pack. There was one Force-Field Creature mixed in this time, so do we get paid more...」

My body stiffened at the fact that someone had died after all, but the other Hunters didn’t seem to react that way.

“Damn, a Force-Field Creature showed up and only one person died. I should seriously buy a lottery ticket.”

I couldn’t even tell from their expressions which team the dead Hunter had belonged to.

They all looked suitably somber and suitably carefree.

That day, we hunted fifty-nine Deathclaws and one unnamed Monster. There was nothing particularly special about it. Just as new species were constantly discovered in the Amazon rainforest, monsters never seen before would suddenly appear from Gates.

Apparently, that was an astonishing hunting record for a single day.

As if to prove it, we appeared on a broadcast news program that evening.

「The regional recovery project underway in Incheon has gotten off to a smooth start. During the seven-hour operation, a total of sixty Monsters were killed, two neighborhoods completely (......)

It cannot be compared to the previous Operation Eagle, where ten thousand reservists were mobilized, eighteen people went missing, five died, and only one Monster was killed...」

It hit me again just how much the world had changed.

To me, deaths and injuries on the first day of the operation felt like a horribly unlucky start, yet the news described it as an astonishingly smooth beginning.

While I’d been peacefully doing human-rights activism, it seemed the world had changed this much.

「Hunter Kim Geuk, who led this project, also showed remarkable results in Incheon last time...」

* * *

After exercising and showering, I logged onto Huntweb.

I started to write a post in a cute tone, then stopped. It felt like insulting the dead to do that on the day someone had died in an operation I led.

Instead of writing anything, I decided to read.

I searched Huntweb for Naito-san.

As expected of a celebrity, countless posts about him came up.

That was how I learned quite a bit about Naito-san.

He wasn’t just famous as a streamer. He was also well known as an incredibly skilled Hunter. Or rather, his incredible skill as a Hunter was what had made him famous as a streamer.

He also had another nickname online besides Naito-san.

‘B-Rank Hunter.’

There was no B-rank in the Hunter ranking system. There were only A-rank, meaning an awakened person, and S-rank, meaning super, a level beyond that.

So it was a title given solely to Naito-san. As a non-awakened Hunter, he couldn’t fill the role of an A-rank Hunter by unleashing overwhelming firepower against powerful Monsters like Force-Field Creatures, but he was supposedly right below that rank.

Despite the unpleasant impression people got from “B-rank,” it was a title meant purely as praise.

An online nickname that wasn’t meant as mockery? That was really rare. His skill had to be extraordinary for people to admire him that much...

I narrowed my eyes as I kept clicking my mouse.

A system notification appeared saying I had received a message.

It was from that bastard.

Ⓑ GoodHunter: I’m contacting you because I’d like to apologize.

After looking for the comment you mentioned, I can see why you would have been upset by the insult directed at your teammate. I wrote that comment without giving it much thought, but I was careless and rude. Having met Baek Dambi in person, I saw that she is someone who performs her role more than admirably, so she had no reason to hear such an insult from me.

I also apologize for the presumptuous post I wrote going on about you being an ex-convict.

I have already deleted the comment and post in question. No matter how many times I apologize, it won’t be enough, but I sincerely apologize again.

Ordinarily, I should apologize directly to Baek Dambi as well. But to do that, I would have to tell her that a post badmouthing her had been put online, and I’m worried that would upset her. I’m hesitant to apologize immediately just to ease my own mind. I’ll think carefully about it.

And Kim Geuk? Your skill today really was as amazing as I’d heard! I’m deeply grateful that you helped us in such a dangerous situation!

I hope that when we meet again, we can greet each other with a smile. Please get some rest!

I’d heard Japanese people rarely apologized, but I guess that wasn’t always true. It had been a long time since I’d seen an apology written with this much effort.

After reading his entire message, I immediately shut off the computer.

Then I thought about what had happened today and that damned Japanese man.

He definitely fit the image I’d always had of a veteran non-awakened Hunter.

Still, I didn’t think there would ever be a reason for me to like him.

* * *

Footnotes:

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