Colossus Hunter – Chapter 74

Ch 74: Fragment of the Rift（1）

After leaving the cafe, I couldn’t help but chuckle. Just that much. If I had my way, I would have slammed my head on the floor, but I’ve been through too much to let my emotions run wild over something like that. Still, the fact that I couldn’t completely hold back probably means I’m human after all.

It’s hard to say that I have a deep relationship with Syria right now. I was clearly drawing a ‘line’ myself. If I hadn’t drawn a line, I wouldn’t have left Syria with the Apocalypse Guild. Syria felt that too, so she didn’t burden me by saying, ‘I will follow you.’

We were giving each other consideration, though it wasn’t really consideration.

‘This kind of relationship is best for now.’

Especially, it wouldn’t be good for anyone to get too deeply involved with me. It’s awkward for me to say it myself, but I’m likely to bring danger with me in the future. Rather, Min-shik might continue to take such unconventional steps that he could be called orthodox. Just looking at a few ideas that come to mind, it was better for both of us to maintain the current distance.

I slowly walked down the street.

I can see countless people intertwined, walking their own paths.

‘One out of fifty people has awakened.’

As a result of walking around with my Mind’s Eye open, more people than I thought had already awakened. Well, Nachalsan Mountain wasn’t the only place where ‘doors’ had opened. It seemed like Min-shik was intentionally opening relatively low-level ‘doors’ continuously.

It was clear that not only Min-shik but also the Apocalypse Guild was dispatching personnel to do such things on their own. The condition for awakening is met just by touching a door. And not all doors were dangerous.

‘The average potential hasn’t changed.’

250. 300 at most. There were hardly any cases that exceeded that. It meant that even if the timing of awakening became faster, humanity’s growth potential didn’t increase. Instead, it was meaningful that they gained more opportunities and changes.

“Custom bracelets made for you.”

“Home appliances sold cheap.”

Speaking of these changes.

Awakened ones with production jobs were already active.

They were setting up stalls, or even hiring people with related jobs in stores to promote themselves and mention their differences from others.

Similar things were happening on the internet as well.

If the price is the same, it’s natural to look for better quality. They might only be 1~2Lv skills, but there was a clear difference from having none at all.

The world was changing rapidly. Those who couldn’t adapt to this change would be left behind, and only those who adapted would be able to achieve what they wanted in the future world.

‘Chicken…….’

Suddenly, I stopped when I found a chicken place while passing by. Change had begun, and so had my taste buds.

I couldn’t resist the urge and stepped into the chicken place.

A space of about 4 pyeong. A kind-looking ajumma looked at me and said.

“What would you like?”

“Seasoned fried chicken… no, half fried and half seasoned, to go.”

It was food I couldn’t eat while I was at Nachal Hall. After Korea was destroyed, I hadn’t had proper chicken. Why did I only think of it now?

It’s said that holding back can cause illness.

I waited for about 15 minutes, took the packaged chicken, and left the chicken place again.

My mouth was watering just from the smell.

‘To be so excited over a single chicken. It feels like I’ve gone back to my childhood.’

I don’t remember well, but when my parents came back from work, I was so happy just to have a chicken in their hands.

Nostalgia. It felt like a feeling I hadn’t felt for a long time was coming back to life a little.

Just imagining what it would taste like made a gentle smile bloom on my face.

The world was changing rapidly, but there were some values that I hoped wouldn’t change, and perhaps chicken was one of them.

‘As change has begun, people’s desires have also grown.’

I was walking normally, but I could hear their desires. Ancient One. My authority as an administrator was stirring, and it began to show me their memories and emotions.

━……I’ll succeed this time for sure.

━If I have this power, can I change?

━Even if others don’t, my talent is certain. I’m going to make it bloom! So that no one can ignore me.

Surprisingly, there weren’t many people with negative thoughts. They could see the abilities and talents given to them with their own eyes, and they even had the possibility of making them bloom.

These were scenes that proved that my assumption that I could only see strong past memories was wrong. A place where countless people gathered and emotions exploded. At least here, I could read them.

‘What’s that?’

But not everyone was positive.

━Money. Money. Money! I’m so sick of it. Why can’t I be happy?

I turned my head.

An enormous malice was emanating from one place.

I raised my hand and rubbed my eyes.

It was a woman. Black haze was rising around the woman.

‘I didn’t see it wrong.’

This was the first time this had happened. That haze was the woman’s ‘malice’ itself. But it was absolutely impossible for me to see such emotions with colors.

I stared at the woman quietly. Then.

━3:34 PM. Kim Han-myung-ssi, has passed away.

━Give me the money, you bitch. The money your father borrowed! You must have gotten the insurance money, right?

━I heard that your mom ran away with the insurance money? Thugs come and go every day…….

━Student loans, public loans, housing loans, loans, loans, as soon as money comes in, it all goes out. It’s not enough even if I work five part-time jobs a day. Is there any meaning to my life?

━Can’t you do your job properly? That’s why children without parents are no good.

━If you don’t have money, you should sell your body. Ptoo!

━It’s a stroke and an acute myocardial infarction. It’s a disease that doesn’t usually appear in young people, but fortunately, it’s not too late, and you’ll be fine if you have surgery. Don’t do anything that will be too much for you in the future.

Countless memories entered my head.

The woman was kind by nature. She was born with a hardworking disposition.

She tried not to give up even in the midst of her unfortunate family affairs.

But not a single happy moment was shown.

As time passed, her smiles disappeared, and when she heard the doctor’s diagnosis, she even shed tears because there was no hope left.

In the end, she became pessimistic.

And finally, her thoughts tickled my ears.

━I’m going to kill them all. Everyone who’s happier than me!

The woman had her hands in the pockets of her gray hoodie. But I realized that mana was rapidly gathering in both of her hands.

‘Explosion magic.’

The woman was a mage with the fire attribute.

The mana gathering in her hands. When all the mana was gathered, it would explode. She was planning to explode with all her anger.

The place where the woman was was near the station, a place where dozens, hundreds of people were intertwined.

Even if their ability scores were low right now, if they used a skill with the resolve of ‘self-sacrifice,’ they would have much greater destructive power.

I approached the woman.

And I stood in front of the woman and said.

“You’ll regret it.”

“……..”

“What you’re about to do right now is nothing more than a tantrum.”

“Who are you…?”

Her lips were chapped and flaky. Her face was already pale. It was clear that she hadn’t been eating properly for a long time. Her hair was disheveled, though it was covered by her hoodie, and her eyes were full of death.

“It doesn’t matter who I am. What you’re going to do in the future is more important.”

“What do you… know?”

“Your illness disappeared when you awakened. It’s just that you’re not getting better because you keep thinking you’re sick.”

That was one of the reasons why awakening was another opportunity.

Not everyone was like that, but there were cases where people with illnesses were sometimes healed when they awakened. The criteria for that hadn’t been revealed, but people who had suffered for a long time had a high probability of becoming ‘strong.’

The woman in front of me was the same.

Name: Kim Hye-yoon（value-Uncontrollable）

Job: Flame Mage

Title: None

Strength 11 Agility 10 Stamina 9

Intelligence 22 Mana 22

Potential（74/385）

Special Notes: None

Skill: Flame Explosion（1Lv）

I didn’t have her in my memories, but she awakened with great potential.

Her potential score was also high, and a magic user with an elemental attribute wasn’t an easy job to have. But there was a strange point.

‘Uncontrollable.’

I hadn’t seen it since Min-shik.

Was there some kind of standard?

But Min-shik didn’t have the same black aura as the woman in front of me.

‘This black aura rejects all power.’

What was certain was that it was like a bomb about to explode.

The woman glared at me.

“What do you know, what right do you have to say such things?”

“Do you think you’ll feel better if you kill innocent people?”

“……!”

Her shoulders trembled slightly.

I carefully reached out and grabbed the woman’s shoulder.

Then, the black aura climbed up my hand. Her extreme emotions were felt even more clearly.

“It’s not your fault either. Because you tried harder than anyone else. You deserve to be praised.”

I read her memories.

The woman had tried harder than anyone else, but no one recognized her.

Even though if just one person had properly recognized her, she wouldn’t have lost her smile.

Soon, the black aura completely enveloped me and the woman.

Tears welled up in the woman’s eyes.

“Then… whose fault is it? How long do I have to endure?”

“Don’t endure. But it’s certain that your current method is wrong.”

I hesitated for a moment, then handed the chicken bag I was holding in my left hand to the woman.

“Take a break for just today. With your younger sibling who’s waiting for you to come home. Then, everything will be different starting tomorrow.”

The black aura that was slowly rising paused.

In contrast, the woman’s trembling grew even more.

“Who are you…?”

“Just someone passing by.”

Then, I took a step back and said as I passed by.

“The fire you hold is still burning hot. If you can properly bloom that ability, you’ll be able to achieve everything you’ve wanted on your own.”

Honestly, I wasn’t sure if this was the right thing to do.

But it was clear that her will had been broken down a little.

“Wait… Wait a minute!”

Sseueuk.

I moved my feet. Into the crowd.

Soon, I was completely erased from the woman’s sight.

◈◈◈ * *

After that, I watched the woman from a distance. It was because I was so curious about the reason for the black aura and the Uncontrollable.

On the first day, she went back to her home in the shantytown and had a relaxing time with her younger sibling while eating chicken.

The next day, when she opened her eyes, her body was very light, unlike before. The headache that had been throbbing in her head had also disappeared. Just one day of rest had a definite effect.

She was amazed and started looking for a job again.

The place she found after that was a fairly large franchise chicken restaurant. I used the Dominator’s Authority to dominate the owner, and made him hire the woman right away.

It was something that had never happened before. She had always been rejected for living in a shantytown, for being physically weak, or for looking gloomy for some reason.

Good things happened one after another. A text message came from the loan sharks saying they were sorry and wouldn’t come again.

It was her father who had taken out the loans, and she had no obligation to pay them back after he passed away. But the loan sharks had been desperately trying to get the money for years.

I was the one who did that as well.

Since the loan sharks’ appearances and names were left in my memories, it wasn’t difficult to wipe them all out. If I dominated the leader last, there was no worry about any problems.

Then, the black aura that had been circling around the woman gradually faded.

Change had begun.

Feeling better, she bought another chicken on her way back from work. And she walked for two hours to the front of the station where she had met me.

Countless people passed by, but she didn’t move an inch.

The woman, who had been waiting for hours, finally walked back home late at night.

When she went home, she awakened the fire dormant within her. The more the fire burned, the weaker the black aura became.

She repeated that for several days, and on the fourth day, the black aura, which had been gradually fading, completely disappeared.

No…….

To be precise, all those auras were absorbed into me.

And when all the black auras were absorbed.

『The ‘Fragment of the Rift’ has been recovered with the authority of the ‘Administrator’.』

『You have acquired ‘1’ Potential Ability Score.』

The text appeared.

Fragment of the Rift!

The identity of the black aura was that.

‘The Uncontrollable is gone too.’

When the fragment was recovered, the ‘Uncontrollable’ that was with the woman had also disappeared.

And the aura filled with all kinds of malice was absorbed into me and at the same time, it created another phenomenon.

‘Potential Ability Score?’

I immediately drew a cross and opened the status window.

Name: Oh Han-sung

Job: Heaven, Earth, Human

Title:

● Oh Han-sung（All Ability Scores +1 per 10 Pure Mana）● The One Who Cleared the Twelve Trials（6Lv, Intelligence +9）● Noll Destroyer（5Lv, Stamina +7）Ability Scores:

Strength 53（48+5） Agility 50（40+10） Stamina 52（40+12） Intelligence 52（33+19） Mana 67（57+10） Potential（218+56/466）

Potential Ability Score: 1

Skills: Mind’s Eye（9Lv）, Dominator（9Lv）, Transfer（???）, Cold Blood（2Lv）, Jet-Black Hand（2Lv）, Cooking（1Lv）, Spirit Master（4Lv）, True Soul-Stealing Ruthless Sword（6 Star）, Hundred Steps Divine Fist（4 Star）, Diamond Body（5 Star）, Taeul Mugeuk Mind Method（2 Star）Equipped Equipment: Jörmungandr（2Lv, Intelligence and Mana +5）, Ascended One’s Mantle（Agility +5）, Black Wind Sword

Points: 182,200pt

『It is possible to increase the desired Pure Ability Score with the Potential Ability Score.』

『You can acquire Potential Ability Score by recovering the Fragment of the Rift.』

“……!”

I could raise the ability score I wanted as I pleased!

Even in the past, countless people had searched for a way and wished for it, but I couldn’t help but open my eyes wide at the phenomenon that had not been achieved.