Later, I sat on the curb, bloody and bruised, watching the Hunters finish cleanup.
A medic approached, but I waved him off. "I'm not in a critical situation. Check the others first."
The ex-soldier gave me a nod of respect and hurried off, while taking care of some other civilians.
People were being carried out on stretchers. I recognized some of their faces.
A few stray goblins had killed two of the people who were on the bus with me. Sadly, there was nothing I could have done.
A couple approached me—the ones from the car.
"You saved our lives," the woman said, bowing low.
The man pulled out a card. "Please take this. We owe you." He was clearly desperate to reward me. I needed money, but money was not the reason I wanted to become a Hunter.
I pushed it back. "No. Spend it on a doctor, get your wife checked out." Hospitals were expensive nowadays, and I doubted they had good insurance since they lived in this zone. They were going to need all the money they could get.
"But—"
"Please. Just go." I was calm, yet firm.
He hesitated, then slowly nodded, giving me a grateful glance before leaving with his wife.
Looking at them limping away, I felt something warm in my chest. Even a half-baked Hunter like me could still be useful.
A government officer approached me. Clad in a black suit, with an American flag pin on his chest, he was a member of the Association "You held them off until the rescue team arrived. That's... not something just anyone could do."
"I did what I had to."
"Don't sell yourself short. When the Gate opened in District 72 five years ago, half the block was wiped out before hunters could intervene. You stopped a disaster." He patted me on the back and left to coordinate with a group of paramedics.
I didn't answer. My arms were shaking. Not because of fear, but from shame and helplessness.
I was truly happy that my meager skills had helped lower the damage and allowed more civilians to escape. But this also made my limits that much clearer.
At that moment, if help had not come, I would have died, ripped apart by a group of hobgoblins, nothing but lower E-rank creatures.
Meanwhile, Helen and others my age, trained by the Guild were busy clearing D-rank dungeons. Helen, in particular, was a true monster.
"Haha…" I let out a helpless laugh.
The city was still smoking in the distance, yet the citizens who had not been involved were already going back to their routines. Some were filming the scene, or looking on with mild interest.
That was typical Abyss City. A place at the forefront of the war against the invaders from another world. Here, the people were already used to death and loss.
I remained seated, head tilted back against a broken lamppost, letting the polluted wind sting the open cuts on my face. My jacket smelled like burnt leather and monster blood, and I didn't have the strength to care.
"Impressive work," came a voice—low, steady, and clear, despite the chaos surrounding us.
I looked up.
A tall man stood a few meters away, adjusting his glasses. His red robe, embroidered with a coiled dragon, fluttered slightly in the heat waves rising from the pavement. A long staff rested across his back, its tip etched with glowing runes.
"You must be the first responder," he said, walking closer. "Cain Bishop, right?"
I nodded, slowly getting to my feet. "And you are?"
"Zhou Weiren. C-Rank fire mage, Rising Dragon Guild." He extended a hand, firm and professional. I took it after a pause.
This was not a name I recognized. C-rank Hunters were mid-ranked. They were the people who had broken through the limit of humanity, and most of them were most likely Climbers as well.
However, although I did not know his name, I recognized his guild. It was a newly created Guild, established by an A-ranked Hunter. They were making a name for themselves, but were still far from the level of other Guilds, like the Queen's Army.
Zhou Weiren glanced over the scorched asphalt, charred goblin corpses, and collapsed storefronts. If he noticed me scrutinizing him, he said nothing. "They told me what happened. Frankly, I didn't believe it until I saw the bodies myself. Holding the line against hobgoblins without support? Not bad at all."
"I didn't hold the line," I said quietly. "I stalled, and then you burned them. That's all." I didn't even have the time to fight them. He had killed them too quickly.
"Still, more than most could've done. Many in your place would have fled." He nodded, then adjusted his glasses again. "It's a pity, what happened to your stats." Though he said so, he did not give me a look of pity, which I appreciated.
I said nothing. The weight of those words cut deeper than any wound.
Zhou didn't press. "Well, though the situation is a little complicated, I have great news for you."
I turned toward him.
"You were the first Hunter on-site," he said. "That means you have the Right of the Gate."
"…What? I thought that law only applied to official Hunters." The government gave many advantages to the Hunters who actually fought against Gates. After all, few would risk their lives without adequate rewards.
"First responders, if they survive the initial wave, get one week of exclusive entry into the Gate once inspection clears any potential dangers and gives an accurate rank to the Gate. This law applies to all Awakened, official Hunter or not. At first glance, this might be a low-level gate with only a goblin variant, but that's still a small goldmine in Abyss City."
I blinked.
"You can farm the monsters inside, collect cores and materials, or you can sell your rights to a Guild. After that, the Gate goes to the Association." He gave me a gentle smile. His words were truly encouraging.
I knew that inspection for such a low-level gate would only take two or three weeks at most, and that was mostly because the number of Gate openings had been on the rise lately.
I struck the jackpot.
I clenched my fists in quiet joy. Even if I couldn't enter the gate myself, I could sell it for a good profit.
The good news helped me chase away some of the stress that had been building up, and as such, I could look at my surroundings.
A few meters away, two young Hunters were whispering together. I noticed the young woman first. She wore basic reinforced gear, light armor, and carried a standard-issue dagger. She had black hair and delicate white skin. Her gaze drifted toward me and froze.
It was Sofia.
We had dated years ago—back when I was still a teen. After we had both Awakened, and people still thought I'd become someone great.
Our relationship had lasted just under a year. The hype surrounding me—the youngest dual-class prodigy to appear in a decade—had drawn her in. We were young and chasing ambition, not love. When my decline began, when the truth about my locked stats and losses in power spread, she left.
Strangely, I didn't hate her.
There had been no betrayal. No drama. Just a quiet understanding that I could no longer offer the future she wanted.
She didn't look shocked—just… wistful. She took a half-step toward me, then stopped.
She didn't sneer, didn't say anything cruel. Just offered a soft smile and a small nod—more melancholy than pity. Like seeing an old dream you'd once held close, now blurred by time.
I nodded back. I didn't hold anything against her. We were both just trying to survive in our own ways.
The boy beside her placed a hand on her shoulder. Tall, slightly younger than me, well-kept in appearance. His gear was new—a fresh Awakened, probably. Her current boyfriend or someone courting her, if I had to guess from the way he was acting.
Zhou followed my gaze. "You two know each other?"
"Yeah," I said. "We got together after we Awakened. It was... a different time." I had no reason to hide it. I was sure he could easily dig up my past if he wanted.
"She is our newest recruit. She doesn't seem like a bad person," he said.
"She isn't," I replied. I had no reason to say bad things about her."She's just clear about what she wants." I joked and stopped looking at her.
The past was the past. I understood why she did what she did, and it was why I didn't hate her. But I had no intention of coming close to someone who had left me at my lowest point, either.
We stood in silence for a moment.
Then Zhou exhaled and handed me a card. "We're not recruiting. But if you survive the week and get stronger, contact the Rising Dragon Guild. We like underdogs."
I pocketed the card without a word. I thought he would ask to buy the rights to the Gate, but it was out of respect for me, or because he was uninterested in the Gate, he made no such offer.
I left out a sigh of relief. There was no way I would have accepted to sell it.
The reward of such a Gate was simply too precious.
But as I was now, clearing a Gate alone would be hard.
I need more money.
This made the cleaning operation even more important. I needed to get as much money as possible during the inspection period and arm myself to the teeth.
If this was a low-level Gate, with enough patience and equipment, I might be able to clear it.