The Tower.
Monsters similar to those from web novels, the so-called raid stories, appeared there. The balance was similar as well. On the 1st floor, as if it was the most natural thing in the world, as if nothing else could possibly appear here, there were goblins.
Most who heard this story thought one thing.
"Goblins are weak, aren't they?"
That was correct. The goblins that appeared on the 1st floor of the Tower, when considered individually, were laughable monsters. Their height was 130 centimeters at most, their weight around 30 kilograms.
They weren't muscular either; on the contrary, with their scrawny limbs and only a potbelly sticking out, their movements weren't fast. To the aspiring Hunters who had never experienced the Tower, the instructors would say: "Are you confident you can win a fight against a third grader?"
"Yes, I am."
"A goblin is about the level of a third grader. One who's learned Taekwondo for about three years."
The goblin's level was a child's level.
"But are you confident you can win if that third grader is foaming at the mouth, holding an axe and a knife, and charging at you?"
The problem was that, physique aside, a goblin was not a person, but a monster.
"What if dozens of them charge at you?"
Monsters that attack in a pack, at that. Needless to say, in the face of that question, no one could say, "Bring it on! I can take those little brats down with one punch!"
"It's tough, isn't it? So train hard. If you read some web novel and prepare to conquer the Tower thinking goblins are no big deal, you'll be fucked."
In any case, facing goblins on the 1st floor was by no means an easy task, even for Hunters who had received this kind of training, been supplied with items, and were fully prepared.
Kee-kee-kee-kee! Kiek! Kiek, kee-kiek!
So for prisoners who had been coerced into the Tower with nothing, the attack of a goblin horde numbering fifty was enough to instantly snap the thin thread of reason they had left.
"Ugh, uwaaah!"
All nine of them, stained with terror, began to flee without a thought of fighting back. Except for one man.
'Hmm.'
Park Jin-soo, rather than running, faced the approaching goblin horde. Truthfully, he had intended to run at first. Park Jin-soo, above all, valued his own life.
And he wasn't the type to think that if something wasn't working, it was because he lacked grit. He wasn't one to believe things could be accomplished with guts, effort, and perseverance. But the moment he saw the goblins, he could feel it.
'They're scared stiff, aren't they?' The charging goblins were extremely desperate. That was a rather important point for Park Jin-soo.
There was a vast difference between creatures that felt fear and those that didn't. Just as dogs, no matter how numerous, would tuck their tails before a tiger. Fear rendered the difference in numbers meaningless. Of course, even so, facing fifty goblins and doing something about it was no easy feat.
But in this, Park Jin-soo had one thing giving him confidence. To be precise, he had an ability. 'At this rate, I can probably take them.'
Park Jin-soo, he lived in a completely different timeframe than ordinary people. To put it simply, Park Jin-soo could see the world in slow motion whenever he wanted. That was the secret to how Park Jin-soo had been able to become a serial killer.
Criminals who claimed to know a thing or two about boxing or martial arts were nothing more than sloths in Park Jin-soo's eyes. The goblins were the same.
Keereereeree!
The creatures were charging with all their might, but the moment Park Jin-soo focused, the goblins appeared to stop in his eyes. In that stopped world, Park Jin-soo moved slowly. First, he approached the one closest to him and snatched the axe from its hand.
'It looks like a person, so its insides must be like a person's too.' He then took the stolen axe and struck down on the goblin's nape, the most vulnerable part where the vital blood vessels connecting the heart and brain were not properly protected by bone or muscle.
Pshwa!
Naturally, blood spewed like a fountain from the nape of the goblin struck by the axe. From there, Park Jin-soo began to repeatedly strike down on the napes of the other approaching goblins.
Keereeree?
By the time the goblins came to their senses, four of their kind were already on the ground, spouting blood like fountains from their napes. From the goblins' perspective, it was an incomprehensible and horrifying sight. In other words, they couldn't help but be terrified, and the terrified goblins froze in place.
Looking at them, Park Jin-soo smiled and said, "Hunting monsters is fun too." Ten Maybachs were lined up outside the abandoned factory. Leaning against one of them, Kim Jeong-bin took an e-cigarette from his pocket and put it in his mouth.
Fwooo!
Kim Jeong-bin exhaled a thick cloud of smoke. Just then, the two men who had been in the front seat of the car with him approached Kim Jeong-bin and bowed.
"Chief Secretary."
Kim Jeong-bin didn't offer any particular response to the title. He just stared blankly at the two men who had come.
"Is there any reason for you to come out personally, Chief Secretary? It's just a simple task of screening prisoners."
The faces of the men who spoke were filled with questions. And that was natural. To these men, the Kim Jeong-bin before them was someone they would normally not even get a chance to see.
Leaving aside his rank, even looking at all of South Korea, there weren't many powerful or skilled people who could say to Kim Jeong-bin, "Hey, let's meet up. I'm at a bar right now, can you come?"
But for such a man to personally come to a ridiculous event like screening prisoners—where if they die, it's good because it saves taxes, and if they live, it's good because we get more Hunters, a win-win either way? Wasting his precious time? To that question, Kim Jeong-bin answered calmly.
"I came here today for a personal reason."
"Pardon?"
"I'm a fan."
At the subsequent question, the two men looked even more bewildered. It was then.
"S-Sir! C-Chief Secretary!"
A man rushed out of the abandoned factory and came before Kim Jeong-bin.
"He, he's out."
"What?"
"He, he came out of the Tower!"
At those words, the two men waiting in front of Kim Jeong-bin spoke with expressions of disbelief.
"What are you talking about? It's been ten minutes, ten minutes! Didn't he go in ten minutes ago?"
"Hey! Who do you think you're joking with? Does this look like a time for jokes?"
They were agitated. Kim Jeong-bin, however, was different. The moment he saw his subordinate's reaction, Kim Jeong-bin checked the watch on his wrist. '8 minutes and 33 seconds.'
Then, he smiled and said, "He's certainly worth being a fan of."
"Excuse me?"
"Bring Mr. Park Jin-soo here."
Outside the abandoned factory. Inside a large camper van set up there, Park Jin-soo sat wearing the clothes he had been given inside the Tower. Kim Jeong-bin entered the camper van, and upon seeing him, Park Jin-soo's face brightened as he spoke.
"Hello?"
"Yes. We just saw each other a moment ago, and here we are greeting each other again."
"That's true."
They were sharing a conversation unbelievable for two people, one who had forcibly thrown the other into a Tower where people go to die and never return, and the other who had just emerged from it. But this conversation was, at least, within the bounds of common sense.
"How was the Tower?"
"It felt great to be able to swing an axe at a living thing's body to my heart's content without caring what others thought for the first time in 544 days and 13 hours. I feel refreshed."
"Is that so? I'm glad. How were the goblins? Were they not difficult to handle?"
"Ah, they were harder than I thought. I killed about ten of them by striking their napes with the axe, and after that, I made a show of striking their Achilles tendons with the axe, and they all got scared and ran away... oh, wait. It is the Achilles tendon, right? I mean that tendon on the back of the goblin's ankle."
"There's no agreed-upon nomenclature for the various tissues of a goblin's body yet, so please feel free to express it however you're comfortable."
"Ah, that's a relief. Anyway, after I showed them I was cutting that, they all fled, so I nearly died trying to chase them down. Fortunately, they weren't very fast, and their skulls were thin. So just throwing a stone and hitting them in the head was enough to make them fall, which made them a little easier to catch."
Park Jin-soo was excitedly recounting these tales that were far from common sense, as if he were a drunk man telling stories about playing soccer in the army.
"What happened to the remaining nine?"
However, the moment Kim Jeong-bin asked that question, Park Jin-soo erased the word 'joy' from his face.
"Can we not talk about that?"
"Did you perhaps kill them?"
"No. When the goblins came, they all ran away together. Besides, if I had killed them, there'd be no reason for me to be frowning. Anyway, I'm deliberately not paying them any mind. As you well know, I have a personality where I can't stand to see a criminal bastard who gets on my nerves breathing. I purposefully didn't even ask their names. You must have brought them here for a reason, so it would be a bit much if I killed them, wouldn't it?"
"Thank you for your consideration."
"This might be part of my appeal, but I'm not a psychopath who just loses his mind and kills people. I just can't stand to see criminals, or people who have done wrong, walking around proudly. I'm not the kind of person who would stick an axe in someone's head or a branch in their eye just because they spat on the street, told a little lie, or threw a cigarette butt on the ground."
After finishing his words, Park Jin-soo grinned and gave a thumbs-up.
"I'm confident I can do a good job. And after catching some goblins, I think it suits my aptitude. I'll work hard, so please look upon me favorably. Even a prisoner like me can be useful if used well, don't you think?"
At that sight, Kim Jeong-bin smiled and said, "I have never once thought of you as a prisoner, Mr. Park Jin-soo."
"Pardon?"
To the surprised Park Jin-soo, Kim Jeong-bin took out his wallet from his suit, and from within it, he pulled out a pure white business card and handed it over. And Park Jin-soo could see it.
"Comet Guild? Oh, is this made by the Comet Group?"
"Yes."
"You're the Chief Secretary here?"
"Yes."
The words read: Kim Jeong-bin, Chief Secretary of the 1st Secretariat Office, Comet Guild, created by the number one conglomerate in South Korea's business world, the Comet Group.
"Wow, you're a big shot. Oh, but wait. Does this mean I'll be working under the Comet Group? Am I getting a job at a major corporation?"
To that question, Kim Jeong-bin smiled and said, "No, not for now. First, you must pass a test."
"A test? Didn't I just take a test a moment ago?"
"That was an aptitude and personality test. To become a Hunter of the Comet Guild, you must now take a proper skill test."
"Ah, of course! Now that I think about it, that makes sense."
Park Jin-soo nodded at the answer.
"But, excuse me."
Then, with a more serious and concerned expression, Park Jin-soo spoke.
"Do you think I can pass the skill test? To be honest, I didn't graduate from college, I'm not good at studying, and I don't have any certifications... I only have experience with short-term part-time jobs and no career to speak of. Can I really do well?"
To that question, Kim Jeong-bin smiled and said, "It's alright.
Just like today, if you think of the goblins as a teacher who lured an elementary school student to their death, got only five years in prison due to mental illness, and was then released back into society, and you hunt them with that in mind, you will surely be able to pass the test."
At that advice, Park Jin-soo nodded his head.
"I'm suddenly filled with confidence! I'll do my best then!"