"Your grandfather was a good man. I went with him on many dungeon trips. In fact, when all of this Enlightenment stuff began, and the monoliths appeared, and I was one of the unlucky few to get a trash talent, he was the first to help me get settled into portership. We were good friends. I was sad when I heard about it all."
With his arm around the shoulders of Nagi, he spoke encouraging words about his grandfather. This man was an old-time friend of his grandfather. And in this funeral home, he was the only one besides Nagi to show up.
"Thank you for coming... Old Man Jay." He said in a respectful and thankful tone.
"Ah... don't mention it. It's the least I could do. Though... I do wonder where your father is. I saw him, once or twice. But the last I heard of him, he was just a teen, and then a few years later, you came about, and he was nowhere to be found."
Nagi clenched his jaw at the thought of his father. He didn't even want to bother with the man. Cassius Clover. He wouldn't dare forget the name, but neither would he let it worry him to death.
"That man is dead to me. Always had been. I don't plan on groveling at his feet if I do meet him. And neither do I expect open arms. I don't even want him to speak to me." His vocals strain as he grows frustrated. He then sighed to let out the tension in his voice.
"Sorry, I'm getting all worked up over nothing. Ah. Again, thank you for coming. It truly means a lot, Jay."
Jay smiled, giving him one of those friendly pats on his shoulder. Jay opened his mouth like he had more to say.
"No. Thank you."
With that, he left. And Nagi went back to looking at the happy photo of his late grandfather.
--
2 weeks have passed since.
Nagi has been going through some disputes. Some land renovators have come to buy the land. The money they brought was hefty, but Nagi deemed the farm priceless and turned them all away. He thought he would later come to regret this, as he truly did need the money.
With his grandfather's passing, he felt he could finally spread his wings. He knew his grandfather would be smiling at his choice. He wanted to finally journey from the farm and head into the city. Hopefully, awaken a good talent and become a renowned Slayer.
The problem was, his pockets were empty. Enlightenment was achieved in two ways: manually or automatically.
[Manually.] One must buy an Enlightenment potion. Enlightenment potions aren't common. They're only dropped from B-S Rank dungeons, and their chances of dropping aren't even all that high. They go for $15,000 a pop, and it's not guaranteed you get a good talent.
[Automatically.] In the name, at a certain age, usually around 12 or 15, you hear the call of the dungeons, and automatically awaken a talent. The chances of it being a B-A Rank talent are higher than if one simply took a potion and tried to get a high-rank talent. Though this process was beyond a person's will, and was by chance, not by hard work or a person's progress. Unfair, it is, but who can complain?
Now, Nagi was back to the real problem at hand.
'How can I get so much money in such a short time? I'm not going to go around looting stores; most cops are Enlightened. Well... there is a dangerous way. I'd be an idiot to do it. But it's all I have."
Portership. The act of carrying luggage, or in this case, monster carcases, corpses, and dungeon crystals. Even a low-ranked dungeon is a gamble on one's life if they aren't Enlightened. Meaning most porters die, either from Dungeon's Lung or monsters themselves, before they even make real cash.
"Ah. Gramps should have some equipment out back in that old shed," Nagi told himself before he put on his shoes and went outside. The shed was in the woods near the farm, meaning you had to traverse deep forestation and bushes. Nagi pushed past the thorns and whatnot, even cutting them down along the way.
Then he made it, overrun with vines and forest weeds, the rusting shed made of brick and tin looked like it was years old. Nagi went over, coughing as dust flew up upon the door opening. He wafted around, sneezing and coughing.
"Jeez... this thing is that aged, huh?"
But what he saw next was nothing normal. Or anything like equipment. But a Monolith. It looked damaged, but beamed with an ethereal glow like all the others. Floating above the black stone masterpiece was a crystal that never seemed to dwindle in energy.
In utter disbelief, Nagi exclaimed, "A... A dungeon?!"
He couldn't believe his eyes. He questioned if it was real, if his mind was making it all up. But as his finger slid down the side of the rough, hard-shaped stone of an unbreakable monolith, and as the dust gathered and settled on his fingers, he knew it was all real.
"This is... insane. Why is there a dungeon here in all of the places? And why did Gramps never tell me about it? Did he know himself? He had to, there's no way, right?"
He swirled with confusion and absolute curiosity. From what rank the dungeon may be, and if he should attempt to go inside. He quickly shook off that thought, deeming himself worse than an idiot if he dared to step inside.
"But what if... it isn't even an active dungeon? Some dungeons end up being too weak to be cleared, and just become an active dungeon for public use." He then disproved the thought.
"Nah, those are usually managed by large Guilds and let off a faint blue hue. This emits a green hue, telling me it's an active dungeon. So then how... how hasn't a dungeon break occurred?"
There were so many questions, and not a single answer came. His feet inched forward, and then what followed were his hands. He wanted to punch himself, but really wanted to play with fire. To see if curiosity was capable of killing the cat. A dumb move. But he just had to see.
Besides, in his mind, he thought that if he ran to the GSA(Global Slayer Association), they'd come and claim all land in a 50-mile radius as theirs, including the dungeon. He couldn't do that, not after he basically discovered a gold mine in his backyard.
"I'm worse than an idiot."
Nagi then uttered the command to enter a dungeon.
"Ingress."
And within that shed, he was gone.