Chapter 152
ㅡWiiiiiiiiing
ㅡA Gate has appeared. Citizens, please move to a safe place quickly-….
Peaceful Seoul today. It's been four minutes since a B-rank Gate opened in eastern Jung-gu and traffic began to grind to a halt.
“Kyaaah! A monster!!”
“Run!!!!”
While countless people fled in panic, sounds rang out here and there between the forest of tall concrete buildings.
ㅡThunk! Thunk!
About twenty of the Eve Project's archer golems ran lightly along the building walls as if they were sidewalks, snapped into place, and began shooting the monsters pouring out of the Gate down.
The monsters were mostly dog-like beast types, so the damage could have spread quickly, but thanks to the Eve Project's golems arriving in just four minutes, no further damage occurred.
ㅡAwooooo!!
A bipedal werewolf-type mid-boss appeared and let out a thunderous howl to threaten the people.
ㅡSwoosh..!
BOOM ㅡ !!
Immediately, a powerful arrow came slanting down from the sky, pierced the creature's head clean through, and then scattered into mana particles and vanished without leaving even the slightest mark on the ground.
ㅡTing-ting
Atalante was stringing blue threads between the tall buildings and standing on them to snipe the monsters. Her mana optical-fiber technique was the same as Ophelia's.
“One down~”
At the same time, trouble also broke out in Dasan New Town, Namyangju, when a B+rank Gate appeared.
ㅡSwaaaash!!
BOOM ㅡ !
Here, a cavalry unit led by Bradamante had come racing in like lightning, wiping out the undead-type monsters that needed gas masks and restoring the streets to normal.
“Situation cleared! Let's just grab the mana stones and head back!”
ㅡClack!
They'd now grown capable enough to handle Gates that opened almost simultaneously in different places. The Eve Project had reached the point where it was handling about 70 percent of the open Gates that appeared roughly 10 to 15 times a day across all of Seoul and Gyeonggi Province.
“Where is it? The Eve Project?”
“Yep, yep.”
“Got it.”
At the Korean Hunter Management Association's Open Gate Participation Survey/Management Team, it had become routine to ask first whether the job was for the Eve Project whenever work came in.
* * * * *
[GamJuice : The Eve Project is kind of too much...
(Photo)
Here’s the status of Gates in the Gyeonggi area for the third week of May. The ones marked in blue are the Gates handled by the Eve Project, and as you can see, almost everything is blue...
At this rate, how are small and medium Hunters supposed to make a living?]
-ㅇㅇ : It's the flow of the times. Accept it, idiot.
ㄴ GamJuice : Fuck off.
-HamCarpenterChief : Only C+ and above get dispatched, so below that can just participate, can't they?
ㄴ HamCarpenterChief : And who the hell even makes money from open Gates? They're the kind that maybe show up once a week around here, so basically...
ㄴ GamJuice : I used to live off the nice little pocket money I made from open Gates...
ㄴ HamCarpenterChief : @GamJuice You don't look like someone who wants to gather a party, pay the entry fee, and go in; you look like some freeloader who wanders around looking for open Gates, then when one pops up stands nearby and hacks a few times to milk money out of it, yeah.
-Jwejweiya : Seoul has a crazy number of people, so the frequency of open Gates was insanely high, but honestly saying you could make money off that is total bullshit.
ㄴ Jwejweiya : Just by looking at it, you seem like one of those guys who freeload off high-rank open Gates, so just accept it.
In the current Hunter Gallery, it had become a hot-button issue lately. As the Eve Project had started sweeping up open Gates as soon as they appeared, almost monopolizing them, it had a very high level of trust and a likable image among ordinary people, whereas.
The small number of individual Hunters who sometimes participate in open Gates to make money see the Eve Project's monopolizing behavior as wrong.
Of course, most Hunters make their money from entry-type Gates. You can't choose the difficulty, the number of monsters can't be controlled, you can't choose the monster type, and open Gates of just the right difficulty don't conveniently pop open in front of you only when you're geared up and ready.
Since open Gates are a nuisance to society, disliking the Eve Project is the minority view.
Large guilds are basically in the latter camp as well. With powerful high-rank Hunters, they have anywhere from two or three parties to four or five raid teams on hand, and for them an open Gate is a miraculous money-losing activity, since sending them out actually makes them lose money.
From the perspective of those elite personnel, the 'mere' monsters leaking out of the frequently opening D- to B-rank Gates aren't enough to make money off of.
But then, if a big guild doesn't participate when an open Gate blows up? A guild with several powerful Hunters gets hammered by the public, accused of not caring about civilian safety, and dragged through the mud.
Even if Union gets daily abuse from the public about being slow to respond and the like, that doesn't mean it just leisurely moves along and never changes that policy for no reason. Nova, which organizes a whole raid team's worth of high-rank Hunters into patrols to protect the area, is a pretty unusual case even by global standards.
“Living the dream. No patrol duty?”
“Exactly. The Eve Project saves a lot of lives.”
“What’s amazing is that they really are saving lives.”
Posts about owing their lives to the Eve Project's golems are already popping up all the time on internet communities and social media.
[ㅇㅇ : Shit, if the Eve Project hadn't been around, I'd have died today
A Gate blew up on the expressway, but the problem was I had to take a shit so badly it was killing me. Cars were just sitting there up ahead, my guts were all in knots, my face looked like crap, and then the Eve Project golems came along, wiped out the monsters, and even neatly cleared the corpses aside, ㅇㅇ...
Thanks to them, I got to take a comfortable dump at home
(Poop photo)
This is the shit I took today. Golden banana, how's that look?]
-ㅇㅇ : Fucking mod!!!!
-ㅇㅇ : What the hell is this poop-pic derailment, asshole?
-ㅇㅇ : I saw a poop pic... it smells...
Even when you browse SNS short-form videos, clips of ordinary people with Eve Project-related proof keep popping up from time to time.
-Kyaa~ I finally got to meet the Eve Project today~! I went out after eating lunch at work today, and then, gaspㅠㅠ;; there was a Gate open right on the main road in front of meㅠ?
-But the Eve Project showed up all cool with a snap!! handled it super fast, and left~
-I'm so glad I live in Seoulㅠㅠ!!
As for the regional big cities and neighboring cities that unfortunately fall outside the Eve Project's coverage area, their reactions are just as enthusiastic.
[DOSp : Mayor of Cheonan, listen up, you fucker
Deliver three tons of walnut pastries to the Eve Project every month and let Cheonan be protected too. I got hit by a goblin with a club while walking down the street today and broke my arm. This is fucking bullshit]
-ㅇㅇ : I support this
-ㅇㅇ : Free the salt-farm slaves too
ㄴ DOSp : That's Sinan, fuck
-GetInsurance : Hunter insurance agent << Search online for Gate-related treatment coverage, 100% coverage
ㄴ ㅇㅇ : Don't ads get blocked here?
ㄴ Helleureung : All the mods here are dead.
ㄴ Mangrangro : ?
Thus, as the Eve Project's fame rose day by day, Eve, the one behind the Eve Project, was...
* * * * *
“Nine days...? That's longer than last time.”
“That's right.”
“It's been forever..!”
I decided to take about two weeks off school. If you ask why, it's because I have to go abroad..! But this time, I'm not going to England.
“Unnie, is there anything you absolutely have to do when you go to Japan?”
“Hmm, I don't know since I don't go outside much.”
“Come to think of it, that does seem like you.”
This time, we're going to Japan! Ahem, yours truly is going there to work as a model. How long has it been since my last modeling gig? Almost half a year, I think?
“I’m actually a pro model, you know!!”
“Plamo..?”
“No…. Look at this. I'm in this magazine here, right??”
“Ah, a model.”
I'm going to be on the cover of the August issue of Japan's famous Hunter magazine, ‘HUNTERS,’ coming out this summer!?
Of course, it's only one of five cover variations, but still, that's huge. This is a total jackpot. HUNTERS is super popular even in Japan.
It seems to do well as Hunter-related merchandise and the like, and Utaha unnie is also set to appear in HUNTERS' August issue, so she'll be heading back to Japan with me for a bit to handle our shoot schedule.
Utaha unnie also had a slight spat with her agency and is going over to talk about that too, and since her schedule overlaps with mine, we're going together, go-go!
But apparently there's one problem.
“W-why..?!”
“It seems to be a request from the Japanese Hunter Administration Bureau.”
“Oh my God. Then I won't be able to show off how insanely awesome I am….”
“Since you’re not going there for monster-subjugation activities, it shouldn’t be a big issue.”
The Japanese Hunter Administration Bureau had imposed a limit for civilian safety, allowing only three golems to accompany me while I was in Japan.
But Ophelia is an actual person in Korea, with a passport and everything, so she isn't really a big problem as a regular companion. One golem can just be Daengdaengi for now, and maybe Minyum later. Come to think of it, the captains all have IDs, so that shouldn't be a problem, right?
“Then can't I just call them with the summon skill whenever there's danger?”
“No. Rather, having ID cards is what could become a problem.”
“Huh, why? They're not treated as golems, are they?”
“A high-rank awakened registrant with Korean citizenship would be summoned inside Japan without any immigration records. That could actually become an even bigger problem. If things go wrong, it could even turn into an issue between countries.”
“Ah, I see.”
“Oh my God, then if something happens I'd have to power up Daengdaengi and bring Minyum along..? Or maybe even Suri? That would make exactly three. Ophelia will go through the proper entry procedures, so she's fine.”
“Hmmm....”
Putting those issues aside for now, on the surface that's basically it.
“Heehee. Unnie, so we're going on a trip to Japan together.”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
“I want to see your place too.”
“M-my house..?”
Utaha pictured her own home in her mind and thought to herself.
‘If it's my house....’
To think she had to show her house to a child like Eve, who had spent her whole life living in a spotless, spacious home, eating meals made by maids and wearing clothes laundered by maids.
“I-if possible….”
“Yahoo!”
‘Eve at my house..?’
Utaha's mental simulator got worse and worse with each run.
ㅡWhat is this!!!!! This is!!! Daeng!!daeng!!i!!!'s house!!!!!
‘This won't do... I’d better come up with a good excuse….’
Of course, Eve’s life was completely different from what Utaha imagined, so there was no chance of that happening.