WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Haruto

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ I Became the EX-Rank Pet Maker Hunters Obsess Over ◈

Chapter 34: S-Rank Seed

──────

Inside the Double Gate within the S-rank Gate in Saitama Prefecture.

Kugugugugung-!

A gigantic centipede-like monster, as large as a subway train, rampaged through the forest, tearing it apart.

Someone stood atop it, driving a spear into a gap in its carapace and enduring the centipede's violent movements.

"Tsururuk-!!!!!"

"...The poison's... spreading too slowly."

Beyond her flowing red hair, black eyes lay dark and hollow.

Shirasaki Ayame, one of Japan's only two S-rank Hunters.

She possessed a trait that produced poison, but her opponent happened to be a venomous centipede.

Venomous insect-type monsters generally had some resistance to poison, and its enormous body made the poison's effects even weaker.

As anyone could see, the matchup was terrible.

But she wasn't alone...

A voice rang out from the centipede's path.

"Shirasaki, that's enough. Get out of there!!"

"Huuuuup-!!!"

A huge Black man braced himself, anchoring his shield to the ground as though he intended to stop the centipede's body slam head-on.

Then...

Kwaaaang-!!!!

Kugugugung-!!!

A tremendous crash rang out, sending shockwaves through the area. The man was pushed back dozens of meters, but he stopped the centipede's advance.

It was Bakuba Karanga, the S-rank tanker Japan had hired.

"...Ghk, damn, it's heavy as hell. What are you idiots doing? Attack while you have the chance, you trash!"

Swoosh-! Kwaang-!! Bang-!!!

At his shout, long-range firepower rained down with enough force to shatter the centipede's carapace.

While Ayame bought time, a barrage of fully cast spells from the A-rank mages filled the sky.

It was far from enough to deal a fatal blow, but...

Flash-!

At that moment, a silver half-moon flashed through the air, cutting through the centipede's body.

Its enormous body split in two and fell to the ground.

Slash-! Kooong-!!

Azuma Ryusei, one of Japan's S-rank Hunters, had precisely targeted a gap in its carapace with his katana and cut it clean in half.

As though he had put every last bit of strength into that strike, he panted heavily.

"Haah... Haah..."

The Gate in Saitama Prefecture had risen to S+ rank.

Three S-ranks and a large group of A-ranks had been sent in to reduce the monster population within it.

They were essentially Japan's strongest forces gathered into one party, yet the S+-rank monsters were far too powerful.

That had not even been a boss monster. It was just an ordinary one.

"Damn, an S+ rank really is worth making a fuss over. And of all things, it's a giant monster. What rotten luck. Ptooey."

Karanga, the S-rank mercenary, spat on the ground and cursed.

Ryusei looked up at the sky inside the Gate and muttered.

"...How much longer do we have to endure this?"

For weeks, they had entered and exited the S-rank Gate without rest, somehow keeping up with the brutal schedule.

"..."

Even with healers' recovery abilities and potions, they had become too worn down to maintain their condition any longer.

They looked as though they would collapse the moment they relaxed.

Even though they were S-rank Hunters, superhumans beyond normal standards, not a single part of their bodies was uninjured.

Karanga, the mercenary S-rank tanker, approached Ryusei.

"Hey, yellow monkey. I can't keep this up, so tell your bosses I'm done here. I'm leaving."

"...The contract period still has a long way to go. You're just going to leave?"

"So what? This country's already finished. The contract never said there'd be a shitty Gate like this, did it? The circumstances changed, so the contract's void."

"What the...!!"

Bakuba Karanga.

A Hunter from the slums of South Africa, he was famous for his extensive criminal record.

An S-rank criminal Hunter even the government could not control.

With the situation what it was, Japan had hired him despite itself, but he caused problems, large and small, at every turn.

Now that things had rapidly worsened, he intended to ignore the contract altogether and desert them.

What made it even more frustrating was that Karanga was so reckless that lawsuits and threats from the state meant nothing to him.

There were plenty of countries that wanted an S-rank, and even someone with such rotten character had skill. Even knowing he would not honor contracts, desperate nations would eventually bow to him.

"Ayame, I might stay a few more days if you keep me company. What do you say?"

Karanga casually draped an arm around Shirasaki Ayame's shoulders.

He quickly pulled it away.

Sizzle-

The part of his arm that had touched Ayame's skin had turned black.

"...Stings. Well, if you change your mind, come find me at the hotel. I'll be staying there for a little while."

The departure of an S-rank Hunter hired as a mercenary.

It meant Japan's situation had entered its worst phase.

Ryusei sighed.

"...We need to find some kind of breakthrough soon."

Things looked bleak.

Japan's Hunter equipment was developing rapidly thanks to Ars Magna, but none of it had proved decisively helpful.

"...At least magical beast pets... seem like they could improve our specs more than other equipment..."

Compared to other fields, magical beasts still had plenty of room to develop.

There had even been stories in neighboring Korea about an A-rank Hunter reaching S-rank with the help of a magical beast.

But Shirasaki Ayame turned toward something with an expressionless face.

"...A magical beast pet? That?"

Her emotionless gaze landed on a pile of monster corpses, where a lump of flesh that had once been a magical beast lay among them.

An A-rank magical beast created by the leading researchers at Ars Magna, pooling all their technology.

As could be seen, it had been unable to do anything and had been beaten into minced meat by the S-rank monsters.

"Ah."

Ryusei tightly shut his eyes at the miserable sight.

* * *

[ Special Report ] "No one to protect us"... Will Japan's Hunter world's chronic tanker shortage finally bring about its worst tragedy?

[ Exclusive ] Gate's monster population cannot be controlled... Countermeasure team that mobilized every A-rank Hunter achieves "zero" results

[ Comprehensive ] A distorted Hunter ecosystem centered on damage dealers... The limitations of Japan's defensive line exposed before an S-rank disaster

[ Breaking ] "It was impossible to maintain formation"... Lack of A-rank frontline tankers identified as cause of failed S-rank Gate raid

"...They said there were no tankers. Looks like the problem really is serious."

The idea of gathering A-rank Hunters to raid ordinary S-rank monsters was not bad in itself. Dozens of A-ranks could take down an S-rank mob.

But as the articles showed, the results were disastrous.

They could not even find an opening to deal damage, so there was no way A-rank Hunters could kill S-rank monsters.

They would not even be able to try unless they were at their best, but their team composition was already a complete mess.

"Huff, huff..."

"All right, all right. I'll knead you, Haengbok."

Squish, squish-

I vigorously kneaded Haengbok, the Jelly Dog.

Then someone opened the laboratory door and approached.

It was Researcher A, Asagiri.

"Director, the Sigma Research Institute has contacted us."

"Really? Later than I expected. I thought they'd come around three days sooner."

With Asagiri in tow, I headed to the Sigma Research Institute.

It was one of the largest research institutes in Ars Magna.

"I'm sorry about before...! Please, for Japan's sake, lend us your strength...!"

Even with his research team watching, Genzaki Yuma, the director of the Sigma Research Institute, immediately bowed at a full ninety degrees.

He seemed to have let go of a lot.

"Well, I'm hired help too, so you don't need to be so deferential. We're wasting time, so let's go see the magical beast's condition right away."

Following their lead, I approached a cultivation chamber deep within the facility.

"This is the Seed we created with great care. As you can see..."

I cut the director off.

"You used a Buffering Array. I explained in detail in my paper that this cannot be used to cultivate an S-rank magical beast. Why did you do it this way?"

"W-Well... this Seed lasted the longest, and it remained stabilized the longest too...! If we can just keep it stable a little longer, we can see a path to success! You know that once a Seed enters its stabilization phase, cultivation is practically guaranteed to succeed!"

"...Dispose of this. It's unusable."

It was true that a Buffering Array improved a Seed's stability. But that only applied up to A-rank.

"Director Genzaki. Listen carefully. There is no Seed in this world that can withstand S-rank mana."

At least with current technology, it was nearly impossible for a Seed to endure S-rank-level mana injection.

It was as difficult as stopping a typhoon with a patchwork tent.

My firm words left Director Genzaki looking despairing.

"W-What does that... Are you saying an S-rank magical beast can never be made?"

"No. It can be made, but not with a Buffering Array, and not with existing cultivation methods either."

"What does that even mean...?"

"We need to abandon conventional thinking if we want to cultivate an S-rank magical beast."

People said that Hunters needed more than talent to reach S-rank. They needed a fortunate opportunity as well.

Whether it was enlightenment or powerful equipment.

That was because the realm of S-rank was difficult to reach through ordinary methods.

So what did we need to do to reach S-rank with a magical beast?

What method could take us into that realm?

My intuition screamed that there were many ways to reach an S-rank magical beast.

From the countless methods that came to mind, I chose the most direct one.

"To reach S-rank, we need to build it expecting the array to be torn to pieces. No, we should not protect the Seed in the first place."

"Yes...? What are you talking about?"

Director Genzaki was flustered.

If the array was torn apart, the Seed's life ended there. That was why they had focused so hard on protecting the array until now. What was I talking about?

The research institute stirred at my absurd statement, which ignored the basics of magical beast cultivation.

Seeing once was better than hearing a hundred times.

"I'll show you."

I gathered materials, made a rough Seed, and stood before the cultivation chamber.

First, I placed the Seed inside the cultivation chamber. Up to that point, it was the existing method.

Then I placed freshly extracted essence around the Seed.

"What is that...? If the essence mixes into the Seed, the array will be altered..."

The researchers spoke with concern.

Even Asagiri, whom I had brought with me, turned pale after seeing the Seed I had prepared and the cultivation chamber's settings.

"Director... are you sure that can work?"

"Just wait."

I silently continued setting it up.

Essence placed inside a cultivation chamber did not naturally disappear easily.

I extracted the essence from the materials and immediately placed it inside the cultivation chamber.

A short while later, the Seed sat in the center of the cultivation chamber, with essence scattered wildly around it as though wrapping it.

If I activated the chamber like this, the flow of mana would make the essence move and mix together.

The moment that randomly mixed essence array came into contact with the Seed, the array would change and cultivation would fail.

Everyone watched my work with bated breath.

Even though failure was expected with 100 percent certainty, their eyes held a faint hope.

'...Mana also has a property where, once it crosses a certain threshold, it gathers into one and tries to optimize itself.'

Magical beasts that consumed mana and grew during the Seed stage were similar.

If they could not exceed the threshold, they collapsed with the flow. If they did, they could move into a new stage. What I had done beforehand was create an environment where it could advance to that next stage.

Wasn't that what Cheon Rin, the Continental Sword Princess, had done? She had broken her own vessel, then filled it again to overcome the wall.

Then the new magical beast Seed I was about to show them would also...

It would break its own vessel and be born anew.

Beep-

Wooooong-!!

When I activated the cultivation chamber, the mana inside began to surge violently.

"H-Hey, Director Yoo Hyun... The mana injection intensity has exceeded S-rank levels! Is this right...?"

No matter what they said, I raised the device's mana injection intensity even further.

Wheeeeeeeeng-!!!!

At an output powerful enough to make even the state-of-the-art cultivation chamber emit a tremendous roar, the array I had placed there was naturally ripped apart.

Then the Seed itself began to break down in the storm of mana.

"Ah... As expected."

"It was impossible from the start..."

The moment the Seed was shredded, they concluded it had failed.

But...

Something strange began to happen inside the cultivation chamber, which was operating at tremendous output.

The Seed and essence were completely pulverized into dust, then disappeared.

They began to gather amid the rotating flow of mana.

It was like watching cosmic dust gather to create a star.

Before long, it consumed the powder of the Seed and essence, gradually growing larger until it became a core.

A core that resembled a Seed.

The Seed that had been destroyed by the flow of mana was gone, and a new form of Seed, born from the intense mana current, revealed itself.

"...M-Madness."

"Oh my god..."

"Ah... Ah..."

Everyone covered their mouths in disbelief or stared with their eyes wide open.

They sensed it.

At this very moment, the first S-rank magical beast in history would be born.

Once again, this alchemist named Yoo Hyun had opened a new horizon in magical beast alchemy.

At last, the mana in the cultivation chamber reached its peak, and the Seed completely stabilized.

Click-

Zing-

The mana injection stopped, and the first S-rank magical beast Seed in history lost its light.

"...?"

"Huh...?"

"Why...?"

The Japanese researchers let out blank, confused groans from all around.

Naturally, everyone's attention turned to Yoo Hyun...

Director Genzaki, who had expected the completion of that noble and wondrous moment, stared at Yoo Hyun with an expression that asked why. Then he grabbed his head and screamed.

"Kraaaah!!! Why did you stop it!!!!! If you'd kept going, the first S-rank magical beast could have been born...!!!!!!!! It would have been the world's first!!!!!!! A historic moment for magical beasts...!!!!!!!!!!!"

It was the fierce reaction of a scientist who had missed the birth of a superconductor right before his eyes.

No, I mean...

I did not really want to register something I had thrown together carelessly as the first S-rank...

"Call those S-rank people. I'll make it into a custom pet."

Footnotes:

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried