I died on a Tuesday.
Not exactly how I'd planned to spend my evening, but life—or in this case, death—has a way of surprising you. The truck came out of nowhere, or maybe I just wasn't paying attention. Either way, the result was the same: one very dead software engineer and a growing pool of blood on Seoul's rain-soaked asphalt.
I remember thinking it was almost funny. Twenty-eight years of playing it safe, following the rules, being the responsible one, and this is how it ends? Hit by a delivery truck while crossing the street to buy convenience store ramen.
The darkness that followed wasn't peaceful like they say in movies. It was just... empty. No bright lights, no life flashing before my eyes, no profound revelations about the meaning of existence. Just nothing.
Until the voice spoke.
**[CANDIDATE LOCATED]**
**[SOUL COMPATIBILITY: 97.3%]**
**[INITIATING RECRUITMENT PROTOCOL...]**
The words echoed in that endless void, mechanical and cold. I tried to respond, to ask what was happening, but I had no mouth, no body, no way to interact with whatever was speaking to me.
**[DESIGNATION: MULTIVERSAL HUNTER]**
**[PRIMARY FUNCTION: ELIMINATION OF ANOMALIES]**
**[SECONDARY FUNCTION: MAINTENANCE OF UNIVERSAL BALANCE]**
**[ACCEPT TERMS? Y/N]**
Images flooded my consciousness then—flashes of other worlds, other realities. I saw people with impossible powers, beings who could level mountains with a thought, individuals who seemed to know things they shouldn't know. And I understood, somehow, that they were all wrong. Out of place. Dangerous.
Defects in the natural order.
The system—because that's what it was, obviously—wanted me to hunt them down. Travel between worlds, eliminate threats, preserve some cosmic balance I didn't fully understand. In exchange, I'd get a second chance at life. Power. Purpose.
I thought about my old existence. The dead-end job, the empty apartment, the crushing mediocrity of a life half-lived. What exactly was I giving up?
**[TERMS ACCEPTED]**
**[BEGINNING INSERTION PROTOCOL...]**
**[TARGET UNIVERSE: SOLO LEVELING]**
**[ESTABLISHING COVER IDENTITY...]**
**[WELCOME TO THE HUNT, AGENT ADRIAN CROSS]**
The last thing I remember was falling—not through space, but through reality itself, tumbling between the cracks of existence toward a world where monsters crawled out of dimensional gates and humans fought back with supernatural abilities.
I should have been terrified. Instead, I felt something I hadn't experienced in years.
Excitement.
---
I watched the technician's face as she called my number—847. She looked at me like I was already a failure, like she'd seen a thousand hopefuls walk through those doors only to test as E-rank nobodies. Not that I blamed her for the assumption.
At twenty-six, I was ancient by awakening standards. Most people discovered their abilities in their teens or early twenties. Late bloomers like me were either incredibly weak or incredibly unlucky. Usually both.
"Adrian Cross?" she asked, not bothering to look up from her clipboard.
"That's me."
I followed her down the hallway, passing the glass booths where other candidates were getting their dreams crushed in real time. The measurement stones barely glowed for most of them—weak yellow lights that screamed E-rank mediocrity. A few managed decent blues and greens, but nothing spectacular.
The technician gestured to the booth with all the enthusiasm of someone directing traffic. "Hand on the stone. Don't pull away no matter what happens."
I almost laughed at that. If only she knew what was about to happen.
The measurement stone sat there innocently enough—a crystal sphere about the size of my fist, clear as glass and cold to the touch. Around it, monitoring equipment hummed quietly, waiting to record whatever pathetic reading I'd produce.
**[UNIVERSAL BALANCE SYSTEM ACTIVE]**
**[DIMENSIONAL RIFT ABILITY: READY]**
**[ESTABLISHING COVER IDENTITY...]**
I placed my palm against the stone's surface.
The explosion of light made everyone in the facility stop what they were doing. Not the gentle glow they were expecting, but a violent eruption of silver and purple that had people covering their eyes and stumbling backward. The monitoring equipment went insane—needles spinning like they were possessed, screens flickering between impossible readings before half of them just gave up and went black.
I felt it then. The power flowing through me like liquid lightning. Not just strength or speed, but something far more fundamental. The ability to bend space itself, to tear holes in reality and step through them like doorways.
The technician stared at her broken instruments with wide eyes. "This... this can't be right."
I wanted to tell her that her equipment was fine. The readings were just beyond what normal hunters could produce. But Adrian Cross wouldn't know that, so I kept my mouth shut and tried to look as confused as everyone else.
A commotion erupted behind us. The head examiner came running—literally running—with three assistants trailing behind him like he was leading some kind of parade. He looked at the still-glowing stone, then at the fried monitoring equipment, then at me.
"S-rank," he whispered.
The facility went dead silent. Even the other candidates in their booths had stopped their tests to stare through the glass at our booth. S-rank wasn't just rare—there were only a handful of them in all of Korea. And the readings on these broken machines suggested something even beyond that.
I saw the head examiner reach for his phone with shaking hands. His conversation was brief and urgent, something about emergency protocols and getting the Association President involved immediately. Not exactly subtle, but then again, subtlety probably wasn't their strong suit when dealing with a potential National Level awakening.
"Sir," the technician said, her voice barely above a whisper, "we'll need to run some additional tests. This reading... it's beyond our standard measurements."
I nodded like I understood, like this was all as shocking to me as it was to them. Inside, the system was already feeding me mission parameters.
**[DEFECT DETECTED: "THE SHADOW'S RIVAL"]**
**[CLASSIFICATION: RANK B THREAT]**
**[ESTIMATED LOCATION: SEOUL METROPOLITAN AREA]**
**[MISSION PARAMETER: INFILTRATE HUNTER SOCIETY, LOCATE TARGET]**
**[WARNING: TARGET POSSESSES STOLEN SHADOW ABILITIES]**
So there was someone out there pretending to be the next Shadow Monarch. How original. I almost felt bad for whoever it was—they had no idea what was coming for them.
The head examiner finished his call and approached me with the kind of reverence usually reserved for visiting dignitaries. "Mr. Cross, I'm Director Park. I apologize for the... excitement. Readings like these are extremely rare events. We believe you may be... beyond the standard S-rank classification."
National Level. He didn't say it directly, but that's what he meant. The kind of hunter who could single-handedly change the balance of power between nations.
"I can imagine," I said, playing the part of the overwhelmed civilian.
"We'll need to conduct some additional evaluations, if you don't mind. Nothing invasive, just some combat assessments and ability demonstrations. The Association will want to understand the full scope of your capabilities."
I nodded again. Combat demonstrations would be perfect, actually. I needed to establish my abilities publicly, create a reputation that would get me invited to the high-level raids where I was most likely to encounter my targets.
"Of course. Whatever you need."
Director Park smiled like I'd just made his entire year. Which, considering the political implications of having a potential National Level hunter in Korea, I probably had.
I caught a glimpse of myself in the booth's glass reflection. Adrian Cross looked back at me—average height, dark hair, unremarkable features that wouldn't stand out in a crowd. The perfect disguise for a hunter.
The irony wasn't lost on me. I was here to hunt people exactly like myself—beings who didn't belong in this world, who threatened its natural order simply by existing. The system had made me the ultimate hypocrite.
But as I watched the facility staff scramble to accommodate their new EX-rank discovery, I realized something else. I was good at this. The acting, the deception, the careful manipulation of expectations.
Maybe I'd found my calling after all.
The hunt was about to begin.