“Hey, what was your name again?”

The middle aged man grabbed his belly and let out a laugh.

Brandon’s face turned red.

“Heyy heyy come on man”

The man finally stopped laughing and let out a huge smile.

“Carter”

Bradon looked down on the ground, he clenched his fist.

“Thanks... Thank you Carter”

Bradon met eyes with Carter and looked towards Yura, she was looking away in the distance, keeping watch.

“And, thank you Yura”

Yura turned towards Brandon, her expression as cold as ever.

“Lets move onward” Brandon lifted his fist and exclaimed, he then felt awkward.

“Yes leader !” Carter shouted while saluting

Brandons face turned red again.

Carter grabbed his belly and laughed heavily

--

“The dungeon gate appeared right where I started”

Gray walked towards the gate, and immediately, a fresh breeze hit his face.

Many people looked at Gray with a surprised look, their hearts immediately trembled.

“A- Its a human monster !”

“Huh?”

Gray realised. He patted his head.

“Oh yeah, I am covered in blood”

There were stains of blood on his clothing and face. Moreover, an individual's first thought when looking at someone who just came out of a dungeon gate would be that they were a monster.

Gray stood still and wiped the blood off his face, but it was too late, members of the hunters association appeared immediately.

“You let out a single creepy sound, and I’ll kill you right now”

It was a young guy, he was holding a sword and looked very nervous. Among his group were several other people, they all were aiming their weapons at Gray.

Gulp

“Don't worry, I am not a monster”

The entire group felt relieved instantly.

“Thank god, we were told there were about to be several dungeon breaks”

“Dungeon breaks?”

“Well, you see, we’ve got information that after 7 days the monsters in a dungeon are able to come out, many dungeons over the city are getting close to that time”

In fact, many countries such as South Korea, Japan, Canada and New Zealand were experiencing a few dungeon breaks at this moment. It was a horrible situation, however, many awakened people stepped up and protected the civilians.

Gray was listening as the man was explaining in more detail before he stopped. He had a confused look on his face as he realised something.

“Wait a second, why did you go into that dungeon in the first place?”

“I am a hunter, well sort of” Gray said as he walked away into the crowd.

--

Gray reached his apartment, he immediately went into the shower, then he came out wrapped in a towel.

The water was hot, making the bathroom foggy. Gray stood in front of the mirror.

“When did I become so ripped?”

You could see clear definition in his pecs, arms, shoulders, and back. As Gray was checking himself out, he realised something.

“The stat points”

Recently, he had put six levels worth of stat points all into strength. This was what caused such a huge difference, he was even a bit bulky.

He then thought of a scenario where all his points were in strength, what would he look like?

“No way”

He would carry too much muscle, it was important to have a balance.

Gray walked out of the bathroom and turned on his phone to check the news.

Hunters succeed in their first dungeon raid !

“Oh, that slipped my mind”

He then read the entire story, Apparently, it took the raid about 2 hours to finish. Carter, Yura and Brandon had come out without any major injuries. There was also a post raid interview. Apparently, there was a boss monster in the dungeon that was a bit difficult to deal with, however, the team had worked together to easily defeat it. But there was something more interesting Gray was thinking about.

“I wonder what their levels are”

Gray didn't usually like comparing himself to others. Even so, he realised the benefit of realising your weaknesses and judging your progress. Also, he was just curious.

He then read the entire article. In the post raid interview, there were some interesting new things that were found.

“Mana Crystals and Magic Measuring stones?”

Apparently, the group stumbled across such objects inside the cave. They were very interesting and the government had ideas to use these newly found resources and so there was high demand in the market. In fact, many hunters around the world saw this opportunity to raid dungeons and collect such resources to sell them at a high price.

Gray moved on to the next article that was recommended.

New Guilds being formed around the world

Apparently several guilds were being formed around the country and in the world. Many awakened people were applying to these groups.

“Well it makes sense”

It would provide one with a raid team that they could rely on and work with. Furthermore, if the guild develops enough, the members would support each other.

As Gray was checking out his phone, his phone rang. He picked up.

“I’ve heard you've recovered, there is a lot of work pending. There's also the-”

Gray cut him off

“I’m quitting”

“Yeah….wait what did you say just now?”

“I’m quitting my position”

“What do you mean? You know how much work is pendi-”

Gray cut off the phone. That was his former boss, Gray did not need to work that job anymore.

“Well, guess I’ll have to apply to the Hunters Association now”

Being part of the Hunters Association would provide a stable income. Every country in the word was now shifting its military budget towards nurturing and supporting Hunters. Moreover, big corporations were forming their guilds and recruiting Hunters as a sort of business, this was because raiding dungeons was actually really lucrative, it provided hunters with items ‘out of this world’. This was only recently discovered because of the items the three hunters had received when completing the first dungeon raid and also what they found inside the dungeon. This caused big players to jump in.

Gray checked out the items he received from his last dungeon raid. It was two items that had a rating of D.

“Rating D ...well my theory is still right”

Although Gray received good items, it was nothing compared to what he had received beating a few goblins during the first dungeon raid, this further made him interested to understand what had happened then. There were four things that made that incident interesting.

First of all, there were only a few goblins. He had received a Rank B key for that? It wouldn't make sense, his last dungeon raid had many more monsters and even a boss monster, and he received rating D items for that.

Second of all, that dungeon gate disappeared right after Gray defeated the goblins, there were no boss monsters, or anything else. Usually, dungeon gates would disappear shortly after the monsters were defeated, but never immediately. Otherwise, no one would venture inside the gate if they could never come out.

Thirdly, how did the goblins even come out of the dungeon gate? The government had said that it would take 7 days for a dungeon break, however, it could hardly have been even a day at all since that dungeon had appeared

Lastly, the system message to ‘Eliminate all enemies’ was the most intriguing. Gray never received such a message during his recent raid, it was like the system was inviting him to raid that dungeon.

“It really was a unique scenario”

Gray got up and wore a white shirt and black pants. He checked himself out in the mirror and headed outside.