Leveling Up By Surviving Alone - L.U.B.S.A Chapter 1

 

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Humanity’s peaceful life on Earth began to fracture in the summer of 2024.

 

Cracks (or “rifts”) started to appear, pulling in nearby objects. Then, 20 days later, monsters would pour out of them… resulting in countless casualties.

 

But once Awakened individuals—Hunters—emerged, many things changed. Modern weapons barely worked on the monsters, yet the Hunters’ attacks proved highly effective.

 

So humanity began slaying monsters and even venturing inside these rifts to clear them. The by-products acquired from these rifts bestowed all sorts of benefits on humankind. Before long, instead of closing the rifts, people purposely left some in an unstable state to create “hunting grounds.” Rifts were categorized from F-rank to S-rank, countless Hunters rose to stardom, and so on and so forth…

 

Thirty years have passed since rifts began appearing.

 

It is now 2054.

 

You could say rifts are no longer mysterious. That is what people believed.

 

At least, until they saw the rift right in front of them.

 

“…”

 

Taebaek Mountains in South Korea.

 

Where cold mountain winds should be howling, there was no breeze at all, as if nature itself had been overwhelmed by the rift looming before it.

 

Two women stood before the rift, similarly overwhelmed.

 

Sung Yumi—an S-rank Hunter and the foremost authority on rift research—was staring at the rift with a conflicted expression. Next to her was Kim Ina, newly assigned this month, clinging to Yumi and trembling with fear.

 

“What on earth is this…?”

 

“It’s a rift.”

 

“I know that, but still…”

 

The rift was an I-type, commonly called a “cat’s-eye” rift among Hunters because it appeared like a vertical cut in midair.

 

Normally, cat’s-eye rifts are huge. They typically start at around 10 meters in height, and S-rank cat’s-eye rifts can reach over a kilometer tall.

 

But this rift was strange.

 

It measured only one meter—an utterly meager size for an I-type. Nothing like it had ever been recorded before.

 

If that was all that was odd, there would have been no need to send an S-rank Hunter like Sung Yumi to investigate. The reason for her dispatch lay in another “first.”

 

“I’ve never seen a rift with this color before…”

 

Magical energy (mana) radiates in waves, and humans perceive those waves as colors. In that sense, a red, blood-like rift is relatively benign by comparison. But if the rift’s color goes all the way up to violet, signifying an S-rank, it’s considered a disastrous threat. It’s well-known that when an S-rank rift tore open in the United States, five entire states were devastated.

 

The rift before them was a color never before recorded in history. It was black—a color sometimes described as “impossible for light to produce,” since it would require the total absence of light to be visible in that manner.

 

Could this rift be safer than a purple one? Or could it be even more frightening than a violet, S-rank rift?

 

When the U.S. failed to contain its S-rank rift, it lost five states. South Korea’s entire land area is smaller than a single one of those states.

 

Under such circumstances, even a small-scale rift feels threatening. It’s not small because it’s weak; it seems almost unnaturally compressed. And that ominous energy…

 

‘It’s enough to make my head swim.’

 

It was overwhelming even to Sung Yumi, an S-rank. Her body was screaming that this rift was anything but harmless—absolutely, positively not something trivial.

 

In fact, readings showed that this rift’s mana wave levels exceeded those of the American S-rank rift by a factor of ten, which is why Sung Yumi and her not-so-reassuring assistant had been sent here.

 

Even so, that assistant, Kim Ina, didn’t seem entirely serious.

 

“Are… are we going to die…?”

 

It wasn’t that she failed to grasp the seriousness; she simply wasn’t physically sensing the overpowering aura. She was afraid, but only of the unknown in general, not from being overwhelmed by its menacing energy.

 

Perhaps that’s because she’s still low-level.

 

Sung Yumi let out a small sigh.

 

“We’re not dying yet. The rift is currently closed. At least until it reopens. And after it reopens, there would still be 20 days before monsters emerge. So, not yet.”

 

“So… does that mean someone went inside?”

 

“More precisely, someone was pulled in.”

 

Rifts appear randomly but tend to avoid areas with high mana density. That’s why they’re rarely found in big cities like Seoul, where many Awakened individuals live.

 

Of course, there are times when a colossal rift can force itself into a dense urban area. But this one opened here, in the Taebaek Mountains, far from Seoul.

 

That much is fortunate. The area the rift affected is small. Usually, rifts are like typhoons, flinging away everything around them. An A-rank rift would have leveled the Taebaek Mountains, scattering people, animals, and plants in its vicinity and causing countless casualties.

 

By contrast, this rift pushed away everything within only a ten-meter radius. That, too, was a first in recorded history.

 

“Maybe a roe deer got sucked in? I heard there are ‘armored roe deer’ around here…”

 

“Armored roe deer” are adaptive monsters that poured out of a rift 12 years ago and have since settled on Earth. Humanity had the power to annihilate them but instead converted the area into a hunting ground, managing the population while harvesting their tough, iron-like hides.

 

“Haven’t you learned that rifts only take in humans or human summons?”

 

“I-I did learn that, but…”

 

“And we’re outside the hunting grounds. It’s more likely a Hunter got pulled in.”

 

“But there’s a lodging village nearby, right?”

 

Walking down the mountain takes you to a cluster of lodges that Hunters use. So why would anyone be on the summit to get caught up in a rift in the middle of the night?

 

‘Actually, that’s entirely possible.’

 

If her young assistant better understood how Hunters operate, she wouldn’t ask such a question. Sung Yumi merely shrugged, not bothering to correct her.

 

“The important thing is that the rift hasn’t opened yet. That’s what matters.”

 

The rift before them is presumed to be above S-rank. A day has passed since it appeared, and it still hasn’t opened. That means, for whatever reason, the person who got pulled in is still alive.

 

“So whoever it was… is still alive, right?”

 

“Haha…”

 

The recommended level for hunting armored roe deer is E-rank, which means most of the local Hunters are, at best, C-rank. Would a C-rank or lower survive inside a rift beyond S-rank?

 

“Wouldn’t it be nice if they could clear it from inside somehow… right?”

 

“…”

 

Sung Yumi sighed at her assistant’s carefree remark, wondering if the girl had an MBTI with a capital “F.”

 

Given her abilities, Kim Ina likely isn’t here due to skill. Maybe nepotism or her attractive features got her in? Regardless, Yumi couldn’t fathom why the higher-ups stuck her with such a partner—perhaps just to drive her crazy.

 

“Anyway, I just hope whoever’s inside can hold on as long as possible.”

 

“That’s so mean!”

 

If the occupant dies, the rift will fully open, and 20 days later, monsters will come pouring out. At that point, with a rift of this scale, South Korea might be wiped off the map.

 

Sung Yumi spoke with earnestness:

 

“Please, at least survive for a week… no, three days.”

 

All the while discreetly selling off her Korean stocks on her smartphone.

 

* * *

 

Hunters make good money. But a starting F-rank Hunter cannot earn much. True, a “gold-spoon” Hunter might rapidly rise through the ranks, but a “dirt-spoon” Hunter with no backing must scrape by, clinging to the faint hope that their license might change their fortunes.

 

Armored roe deer hides sell well. Ji Yeonwoo came to the Taebaek Mountains to hunt them for profit. But the Hunter community can be chaotic. After a falling-out over loot distribution, Ji Yeonwoo got booted from his team. He didn’t even receive proper pay before being kicked to the curb in front of the Taebaek lodging village.

 

The bus to Seoul arrives only twice a month, and the next one is two weeks away.

 

That means Ji Yeonwoo is stuck here for at least 13 days, whether he likes it or not.

 

However…

 

“What? 800,000 won per night?!”

 

The prices here are outrageous due to the location. Ji Yeonwoo, who came to earn money but ended up empty-handed, couldn’t afford additional hefty expenses.

 

So he headed straight to a large supermarket.

 

He planned to go backpacking.

 

…

 

When Hunters are out hunting and night falls, they often camp if visibility becomes too poor. Having camping gear is standard. Rather than worry, Ji Yeonwoo saw this as a chance to actually use the expensive gear he’d bought. Part of him was half-excited, like he was going on a trip.

 

A decade into living on his own, he was fairly confident in his cooking skills.

 

He planned to descend from the mountain a few times over the next 14 days. Estimating two meals a day, he stocked up on ingredients.

 

For vegetables, he bought only what was essential—green onions, garlic, and ginger. Since he’d be in the mountains over ten days, he chose unprocessed produce to keep it fresh longer. He even thought of planting the green onions so they could regrow during his stay, hoping in two weeks they might sprout enough to harvest.

 

In other words, Ji Yeonwoo was methodical. He didn’t just choose whole produce because it was cheaper—definitely not.

 

He saw plenty of ready-made meal kits, but splurging on them felt silly when he was already saving on lodging by camping. Instead, he purchased a simple five-pack of ramen. He also bought water. Concerned about weight, he considered just one 1.5-liter bottle but found a “2+1” deal and took advantage of it.

 

He even got some fruit for dessert.

 

“You can’t leave out alcohol when you’re trying to soak up the atmosphere, right?”

 

That might contradict the “natural vibe” of camping, but skipping soju (Beverage) altogether felt too bleak. He grabbed one bottle.

 

Thus, he began hiking into the mountains, searching for a good campsite.

 

But there was something he overlooked: more people than he expected were in the same predicament or shared the same idea.

 

“This is my spot! Get lost!”

 

That kind of curt remark was actually easier to deal with—he could just move elsewhere.

 

What really rattled Ji Yeonwoo were the friendlier-sounding folks:

 

“Oh my, so you came all the way up here? That must’ve been tough… If you like, would you care to join us for a meal? What did you bring? Heh heh, shall we… share?”

 

He declined.