Chapter 6

The Unbreakable Castle

When we arrived at the indoor gym’s door, the man knocked as if he was following a certain rhythm.

After hearing a rattling sound from the inside, the door opened.

“You’re here, Uncle Su-il. Wow, looks like we’ll eat some meat tonight...”

The gatekeeper, who was holding a spear made of sharpened stone, stopped talking and stared at us. He started to look at us one by one, but then nodded as if he understood.

“Survivors?”

“Yup. Where’s Mr. Woo-do?”

“He should be inside.”

Woo-do Choe. It’s a familiar name. When I was at the indoor gym previously, I remember helping him with various tasks. At the time, I was using my Unique Skill to wander about outside and was indifferent to those who stayed inside.

As we followed Su-il, various people greeted him. They also exchanged kind words with the twins who were energetically dragging the hairy insect’s corpse.

While they looked tired, it wasn’t a hopeless scene. There seemed to be about fifty people in the indoor gym. They were divided into sections, and it was impressive to see them distributing food and doing what they needed to do in their respective areas.

Every now and then, there were armed people who looked at us quietly, and in rare instances, young children that were playing house together. It was a sight that was hard to see amidst this Gate.

The man named Su-il Park led us to the tent that was the furthest away from the door. It was quite big compared to the others. While the other tents could only fit two people, this tent was sturdy and could fit ten people.

“Not everyone needs to come in. Just one... or two representatives.”

At this, Seongmin instructed the group to sit down and rest. As everyone had been walking a long time with heavy bags, they all let out a deep sigh and collapsed in a heap.

“Seoha and I will go in first.”

There were no objections. They were all tired, so they wanted to rest now. With a nervous expression, Seongmin went inside the tent.

I had a strange feeling of nostalgia. While my time at the indoor gym was short, I had honed my basic combat skills here. And the one who trained me at that time was Woo-do Choe.

It was not because of privilege that he lived in the large tent. Here, around ten people gathered together to devise strategies on where to do recon and protect. It was like a war room.

“Welcome. You must’ve gone through a lot to get here.”

A hoarse voice welcomed us. Seongmin momentarily seemed surprised. I understood as Woo-do Choe was an elderly man with sparse gray hair.

“I’m Seongmin Kwon.”

“I’m Woo-do Choe.”

He naturally told us to take a seat.

“You’re young. Amongst the survivors, how many young people do you have?”

“Not very many. Most of our group is middle-aged.”

“The journey must’ve been difficult.”

In South Korea, leadership positions are usually held in order of age. There are, however, exceptions like the present where people’s lives are in immediate danger.

It goes without saying that young people in their prime have more strength, even if their judgment is up for debate. While age and wisdom aren’t always proportional, they are thought to be somewhat correlated. But in such a modern society, there is only one instance where a young person is the leader of a group of mostly middle-aged people.

That instance is when power is needed more than wisdom.

It wouldn’t be wrong to say this since those with more power have led such groups so far. Woo-do had determined this fact with a simple look.

“If I had gone with Su-il, I would’ve met you, but... we’re running low on supplies. We somehow made it this far, but the hairy insects don’t really come around these parts. It has been quite a headache. Since you came from the mart, you must’ve brought a lot of supplies. I’m grateful to you.”

“Please don’t mention it. We saw firsthand as we were coming here how the indoor gym is an amazing fort. If you’ll let us live here and have us do our part, we’ll be more than grateful.”

Right now, it was more important to obtain favor and stability rather than try to bargain. If we clumsily tried to negotiate with this extraordinary man and trade supplies for something, we could end up on the shorter end of the stick. In that sense, Seongmin’s approach was a good decision.

“For now, I’ll let you all rest for the night in a section that’s not currently occupied. I think it’d be good to talk about specific allotments tomorrow.” Woo-do paused for a moment. “I’m curious about... what you saw as you were coming here. How many casualties did you have?”

“There were none.”

At that response, Woo-do gave a rare look of surprise. It wasn’t every day an elderly person, who had experienced all sorts of hardships, revealed his emotions.

“None?”

“Yes, none.”

“How...? Didn’t you say that you crossed the bridge after leaving H Mart?”

He must’ve heard the basic details from Su-il. He could not hide his shock as he put on his worn-down glasses and spread an old map on the table that had probably been looked at countless times. It was true that the distance we traveled was quite far, especially in the current situation.

“So about that...”

Seongmin glanced at me as if to read my face. It was as if he was asking me if it was okay to tell him what happened.

So do you think I’m hiding my true identity by saying that I’m not an Academy student or an aspiring Hunter?

When I silently shrugged my shoulders, he seemed to get the hint.

“Our group has some people with Unique Skills, including Reconnaissance, so we were able to avoid monsters a couple of times.”

“Oh ho, Reconnaissance you say. We have two people with that Skill.”

It was probably the twins as Reconnaissance was a basic Skill for Assassin and Ranger-type Hunters.

“Great talents have arrived here.” Woo-do let out a satisfied sound. As a natural-born strategist, he was the type to show his true worth when he had more chess pieces to move around.

With the addition of our group, he now had a more abundant amount of human resources than before my transmigration. That meant the probability of the indoor gym collapsing was lowered even more.

I hope that’s true this time.

Before I transmigrated, Woo-do... did not survive the Gate. He died in the midst of internal conflict, and the indoor gym struggled as it had lost its foundation. That’s why the twins had to survive on their own.

While the indoor gym was known as the unbreakable castle, that nickname was used more as sarcasm.

The physical building may have been unbreakable, but all the people on the inside and outside ended up dying.

***

Unlike that future that hadn’t come to pass—or might not even come—the indoor gym at this point in time was an ideal fort. Led by a wise strategist, Skilled Awakened ones received step-by-step training with great care here. As I had also spent my years as a beginner under him, I knew just how excellent he was at nurturing talent.

It’d be better for Taebyeong and Minjoon to stay here to improve their Skills.

Since those two possessed the unique characteristics for their respective specializations, they’ll become quite useful with training.

Dajeong should be a blacksmith, but... I don’t know if she can develop that Skill here.

At first glance, Dajeong could be trained to become a clumsy Tanker given that her Strength and Stamina were high. That might not be a bad choice in a situation where there’s a shortage of workers, but it’d be a waste of her rarer Skills.

Since Seongmin doesn’t have a particular specialization and his high stats make him an all-rounder, it might not be a bad idea for him to develop his strategist characteristics under Woo-do.

While being good at everything was good in the beginning, it’s better to be specialized, as it has more advantages and clearer limits. Since Seongmin’s natural leadership, negotiation skills, and situational awareness skills were better than his physical abilities, he may be better off supporting in the back rather than actually fighting in the field.

If Chansong and Haeyoon are trained well, they’ll do their part, but right now, it’s ambiguous.

Haeyoon’s Agility was pretty high, but since she had been supporting the rear, she didn’t have combat experience. If she’s trained well, her Reconnaissance Skill may bloom, but I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Chansong said that his Charisma was higher than his Agility. There may be occupations such as bards that specialize in buffing, but it would be difficult to specialize in such a luxurious occupation in this poor environment.

Now that I’ve thought things through, the current situation was a relief. We finally had gotten a break. The sky was blocked by the ceiling, and there was little chance of monsters invading. And since the roles hadn’t been distributed yet, it wasn’t our responsibility to keep watch. It really was a situation where we could just sleep.

But...

There’s somewhere I need to go first.

I got up secretly.

***

Equipment—that is, items—were always an important matter.

While they said a master calligrapher wasn’t picky about their brush, a Hunter was choosy about their equipment. An excellent item that suited your occupation could bring incredible synergy. That’s why top-tier Hunters had expensive equipment all over their bodies.

In light of that, my weapon was terrible.

[Verifying item.]

<Sharp Jackknife>

Grade: F

Attack Power: 10~20

Description: A sharp-edged jackknife. A deep stab can cause a fatal injury.

Before transmigrating, I also had a weapon that was like my soulmate. And I acquired it while in this Gate.

When the Gate clears, the system checks your contributions and presents a sufficient reward.

Before I transmigrated, I was first place in contributions when this Gate cleared.

It was a Gate that Hunters hadn’t been able to clear for three years. It wasn’t a secret that the reward was going to be amazing. But since I couldn’t clear the Gate right this instant, I needed to find another item that I could use temporarily.

While there were instances where items came out after killing monsters, there were also hidden items.

An item could be gained when certain conditions were met. This was also called an Easter Egg.

From what I remembered, there was such an Easter Egg near the indoor gym. It’s not equipment that I had personally acquired, but rather someone in reconnaissance. Up until that point, we had thought equipment could only come out of monsters, so it was a hot topic when this happened.

From what that person said, if I went northeast of the indoor gym, an animal hospital would appear.

Found it.

One Heart Animal Hospital. Although it was now in ruins, there were still traces of its cute interior design.

When I entered, there was a stench. It smelled like rotten animal corpses, and I was probably right. At a time when humans couldn’t save themselves, no one thought of freeing the animals that were trapped in the animal hospital. The monsters must’ve sensed the smell of meat and came to rampage it.

Sure enough, as I entered the treatment room, I saw rotting flesh between the viciously crushed iron bars. It was heartbreaking to see the names like “Choco,” “Lovey,” and “Mango” engraved on the bars.

As I went further inside, I came across the director’s office and then saw the staff lounge next to it.

When I opened the door, there was a corpse that had died from starvation. It was a young puppy that had somehow survived by itself, but then died because there was no one to feed it. I carefully lifted the corpse and went outside.

I hope you go to a better place.

I prayed that it would enter Nirvana and buried it in the ground. It was a small puppy that couldn’t have been older than a few months.

[Notice: Conditions are met!]

[Providing a small reward.]