Chapter 2: Da Capo

[No, why?]

[Why is she dying here?]

[She is someone who absolutely must not die.]

Someone who absolutely must not die.

If Ha Seong-ha was supposed to be happy just because she heard such words from an unidentified notification window while she was already on the verge of death, then yes.

She was happy.

Even if it was merely the fact that there was still someone who regretted and mourned her death, she was genuinely glad.

Even if that someone was nothing more than a sky-blue, translucent notification window that had appeared before her eyes.

I really must be dying if I’m seeing things like this.

Ha Seong-ha wanted to let out a hollow laugh, but she could not make her body obey her.

Moving the muscles in her face, which had already stiffened from massive blood loss, was incredibly difficult.

With her cheek pressed against the ground soaked in her own blood, Ha Seong-ha slowly closed her eyes.

[No! Don’t close your eyes! Open them!]

[Open your eyes!!]

[If you die here…!!]

Until the very moment her eyes closed, the notification windows flashed frantically, as if desperately trying to cling to even the slightest remnant of her life.

But Ha Seong-ha gradually felt the strength drain from her body.

It was a death she could not resist.

Power suddenly returned to the consciousness that had flickered out for an instant.

Without opening her eyes yet, Ha Seong-ha took a deep breath.

…Is this heaven?

She did not know if she had lived a particularly good life, but at least she had never lived a particularly bad one.

So she did not think she would have ended up in hell.

Before looking back on her short life, Ha Seong-ha listened carefully to the sounds around her through the darkness.

The rustling of leaves as a breeze blew from somewhere.

The clear cries of mountain birds coming from far away.

And the pungent, metallic smell of blood stinging the tip of her nose.

…The smell of blood?

Following the flow of her thoughts and identifying each sensation one by one, Ha Seong-ha suddenly felt something strange.

Her eyes flew open.

And the moment she opened them, she screamed reflexively at the countless bright-blue notification windows filling her entire field of vision.

“…Aah!! W-What is this?!”

[Ha Seong-ha!]

[Ha]

[Seong]

[Ha]

[Get up already.]

[Oh, you finally woke up.]

Despite being terrified, Seong-ha began reading the notification windows that filled her vision so completely that she could barely see the background behind them.

More than half of them were calling out to her.

Even as she checked the short strings of text, the pale-blue notification windows continued updating in real time.

[Do you have any idea how worried I was that you were actually going to die?]

[This absolutely isn’t supposed to happen, but because you’re a special existence, I decided to let you live this once.]

[If it weren’t for me just now, you really would have died.]

The messages written in neat fonts were incredibly serious.

Ha Seong-ha calmly read through the notification windows while checking her own condition.

Even though I died and came back, maybe I awakened some kind of new ability…?

As Ha Seong-ha slowly clenched and unclenched her fists while examining her body, her excitement gradually settled.

For a brief moment, she had hoped that something might have changed because she had died and returned to life.

Now she felt foolish for expecting it.

She was still the same useless S-rank Hunter.

It specially saved me because I’m an important person?

What nonsense.

A cold sneer appeared in her brown eyes, which had briefly flashed with interest.

“Who are you to bring me back to life?”

[What?]

“There must be a reason you saved me. What are you planning to take from me in return?”

“Unfortunately, I’m a Hunter who has nothing but a high rank and no abilities whatsoever. The only thing you could take from me is my body.”

Her legs moved perfectly, as if her earlier inability to feel anything below her waist had been nothing more than a lie.

Sitting in the pool of blood she had shed, Ha Seong-ha muttered toward the notification window that claimed to have saved her.

[What do you mean, you have no abilities?]

“What do you mean? I’m the one who wants to ask you that.”

Ha Seong-ha stared at the window for a moment before turning her gaze away.

Arguing with whatever existed on the other side of that notification window was not important right now.

She had been certain she had died, but in the end, she had survived.

Regardless of how it had happened, she was alive.

Which meant she had to live again.

She needed to find a way out of this situation, where she had been left alone inside the dungeon.

So even though her entire body was covered in blood, Ha Seong-ha stood up.

There was not a single part of her body that felt stiff or painful.

She was standing exactly where she had collapsed after the sudden appearance of the dragon.

Apparently, Ha Seong-dan’s team members had thrown down their weapons while fleeing from the dragon, because arrows and daggers were scattered here and there.

Better than nothing.

In a hurry, Seong-ha picked up the weapons around her.

A sword with a broken blade.

An arrow with damaged fletching.

And a dagger covered in dirt.

She also picked up the dagger she had been clutching in her hand until the moment she died.

As she busily gathered the weapons, the notification window that had been motionless for a moment appeared again in her field of vision.

Come to think of it, what exactly is this notification window?

She had thought it was a hallucination because she had seen it right before dying.

Apparently, it wasn’t.

[…This is ridiculous. Who told you that you have no abilities?]

“What?”

And that hallucination had now begun spouting nonsense.

[I went through so much trouble to bring you here. There’s no way someone like you could possibly be useless.]

The notification window displayed a chilly message.

[You have no abilities? That’s the most creative piece of bullshit I’ve heard yet.]

“…I have abilities?”

[Of course.]

“Then what are my abilities?”

[Well, that’s…]

[…Huh?]

The notification windows, which had been appearing nonstop until just a moment ago, suddenly stopped.

I knew it.

Whatever the identity of the notification window was, it had nothing to say now.

Of course.

Ha Seong-ha knew better than anyone that she had no abilities whatsoever.

The former and current Guild Masters of Zodiac had adopted her because they wanted to make use of her S-rank status.

They had tried everything they could think of.

But in the end, even they had given up on her in exasperation.

Because she truly was an S-rank Hunter who possessed absolutely no abilities and was barely any different from an ordinary person.

There had even been a time when she studied dungeons, gates, and the monsters and various creatures living within them, desperately hoping that she could at least accomplish something.

But it had all been pointless.

What good was gathering all that information?

She could not even enter a dungeon because she had no abilities.

So…

[Have you really never used a skill even once?]

“…”

[To have blocked your ability to use skills this thoroughly… Whoever did it was rather malicious.]

She had to have no abilities.

She was supposed to be powerless…

[All right. Since you’re connected to me right now, I’ll help you.]

[Normally, when you awaken, you instinctively become aware of your abilities.]

[But I’ll show them to you in an intuitive way that’s familiar to you.]

[Name: Ha Seong-ha

Rank: S-Rank

Titles: ????? (Locked), ??? (Locked), One Blessed by the Anvil, Sacrificial Lamb, Key to Closing the Rift

Skills:

<New!> Lv. 1 Weapon Crafting (S-Rank)

<New!> Lv. 1 Weapon Enhancement (S-Rank)

<New!> Sleight of Hand (S-Rank)

<New!> Appraisal (S-Rank)]

Ha Seong-ha stared blankly at the enormous status window that had appeared before her eyes.

She read it several times.

It looked just like the status window of a game character and contained all kinds of information about her.

And aside from her name and rank, every single piece of information was something she had never seen before.

Looking at her own abilities as though she were a character in a game, she could not feel any sense of reality.

Even the Weapon Crafting and Weapon Enhancement skills had levels attached to them.

Her throat tightened as she stared at the skills marked with New! as though to indicate that she had just acquired them.

“What… What the hell is…”

[Ha Seong-ha! There’s a monster coming from behind you!]

“What?!”

[Perfect. We can jump straight into practical training.]

“Are you crazy?! Even games give you time to do the tutorial!”

But reality did not allow her the time to slowly process and digest what was happening.

Terrified by the words appearing on the window, Seong-ha turned around.

A group of monsters was rushing toward her, their footsteps making the ground tremble with a thud-thud-thud-thud.

“…Rasts?”

Back when she had refused to give up hope that she might one day gain a skill like everyone else, she had studied dungeons and the creatures that lived inside them.

She never imagined that knowledge would prove useful now.

Seong-ha immediately shut her mouth.

Any more noise would be dangerous.

Rasts were monsters famous for their excellent hearing, thanks to their rabbit-like ears, as well as their incredible speed.

Even when I was studying them, I could never understand how something made from herbivores ended up becoming a carnivore.

The pair of front teeth she had only ever seen in photographs and illustrations protruded sharply from its mouth, looking as though they could pierce straight through her neck at any moment.

Every time the Rasts’ long, upright ears twitched sensitively, her nerves became taut.

And there were twenty of them moving together in a pack.

If she were caught, there was no doubt she would be brutally torn apart by their razor-sharp incisors.

In the past, she had possessed neither a proper weapon nor the strength to kill creatures like these.

But things were different now.

[Weapon Enhancement (S-Rank)

Level: Lv. 1

Description: Uses the caster’s blood to enhance the rank or durability of an existing weapon, as well as the abilities bestowed upon the weapon.]

After checking her newly awakened skill, Seong-ha looked down at both of her hands.

The hands of someone who had returned from the brink of death were covered in fresh red blood.

She had enough material.

Seong-ha decided to try using her Appraisal skill on the dagger she had been clutching until the moment she died.

[Old Dagger (C-Rank)

Description: An old dagger with a dull blade, covered in dirt and dust.

Owner: Ha Seong-ha

Durability: 64/100]

Now, if I just use my skill on this weapon…

Seong-ha raised her head.

And as luck would have it, one of the Rasts had turned its head toward her.

Their eyes met.

“Oh.”

[Oh.]

“Oh, damn it…!”

[You’ve been spotted.]

“How can you say that so casually right now?!”

[There’s no way the person I chose could possibly fail to kill something like that.]

—Kiiiiiiiiieek!

The moment it spotted her, the Rast charged toward her like a mad beast.

Seong-ha threw herself in the opposite direction to avoid it.

As she leaped away, the junk weapons she had hurriedly gathered tumbled to the ground.

Crunch!

The Rast scraped its hooves violently against the dirt as it came to a stop.

It glared at Seong-ha, who had barely managed to evade its attack.

Seong-ha tightly gripped the only weapon left in her hand—the blood-covered dagger—and swallowed her dry saliva.

At this rate, I’ll die.

…Anything.

Anything is fine.

As long as it can kill that thing.

Gritting her teeth, Seong-ha stared at the Rast as it charged toward her once more, mouth wide open.

She thrust the dagger forward.

If the notification window wasn’t lying.

If I really did gain skills.

If the skills I saw in my status window were real.

If I really have an S-rank Weapon Enhancement skill…

I should be able to make something capable of killing this thing.

For the first time, her desperation grasped hold of a miracle.

A hot energy that seemed to flow from her heart seeped into the dagger clenched tightly in her hand.

[I told you.*

*You can do it.]

She thought she heard a low chuckle coming from somewhere.

The instant she realized the dagger had become hot, brilliant light flashed across the pitch-black darkness behind her tightly shut eyes.

“…Ah!”

[Congratulations on your first successful skill use.]

As the light subsided, Seong-ha’s eyes snapped open.

The moment she read the notification window, she looked down at the dagger in her hand.

What she held was no longer a shabby, bloodstained dagger.

[Dagger of Hellfire (A-Rank)

Skill: Flame Explosion (A-Rank)

Owner: Ha Seong-ha

Creator: Ha Seong-ha

Durability: 100/100]

Just as Ha Seong-ha had desperately wished for, she now held a weapon perfectly suited for slaughtering monsters in her hands.