Copying Runes to Become the World's Strongest - Chapter 4

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 4
Hyeonjun pressed in tight behind the Rune Rabbit.
He meant to use the kitchen knife, but he was afraid he’d lose his grip if he swung it.
‘I have to catch it.’
Hyeonjun reached out.
The distance was agonizingly close, close enough to touch and yet not quite.
‘Please!’
He kicked off the ground with even more force.
In that instant, the gap closed.
Hyeonjun stretched out his hand and seized the creature.
The moment he did, he lost his balance and fell.
His momentum had been considerable, and he rolled several times.
“Ugh!”
He nearly lost the Rune Rabbit, but he managed to tighten his grip just in time.
‘I… I got it.’
I actually caught it.
Far more easily than I’d expected.
‘I caught it.’
It was his first successful hunt.
Hyeonjun’s heart began to pound for an entirely different reason.
“I really did it!”
Hyeonjun burst into laughter.
Even with the rune serving as an objective indicator, he had never fully shaken off his doubt.
That doubt was now completely dissolved.
‘I can work as a Hunter, too.’
The past five years flashed before his eyes like a revolving lantern.
The nights he couldn’t sleep, worrying over hospital bills.
The days he couldn’t even look his younger sibling in the face, ashamed before them.
It felt as though all that bitterness was being washed away by the single fact that he had succeeded in the hunt.
“Hff… hahaha!”
It was the moment he finally grasped the hope that had been shimmering just out of reach.
Something seemed to surge up violently from deep within his chest.
His eyes stung, but this was no time to be weeping like a fool.
“Eek! Eek!”
The Rune Rabbit thrashed wildly in his grip.
Hyeonjun set aside his overwhelm and drew his weapon.
“How dare you interrupt such a moving moment.”
“Eeek!”
“Die!”
Hyeonjun lunged at the Rune Rabbit with fierce momentum, but froze halfway in an awkward crouch.
“Eeeeeek!”
The Rune Rabbit’s struggling was nothing short of violent.
If he wasn’t careful, he could end up hurting himself while trying to kill it.
‘I have to kill it in one blow.’
I have to stab its throat.
If by mistake it’s still breathing, the Rune Rabbit will thrash even more violently than it is now.
‘What do I do?’
Like this, there’s no answer.
Hyeonjun thought hard, dredging up memories from the past.
The Rune Rabbit’s clearing method.
There had definitely been something about it in the clear guide videos made for novice Hunters.
‘Rune Rabbits are hard to kill in one blow under most circumstances. So you’re supposed to use traps or herd them to capture them first.’
Capturing it, at least, had succeeded.
And then?
‘I need to knock it out.’
It depended on how many people were involved in the hunt, but the guide had recommended that a solo hunter knock the creature unconscious before finishing it off.
Hyeonjun grabbed one of the Rune Rabbit’s long ears with his free hand.
Then he slammed it hard against the ground, as if flinging it down.
“Eek—!”
The Rune Rabbit’s cry cut off abruptly.
Both the thrashing stopped at once.
Hyeonjun raised his arm and lifted the Rune Rabbit to eye level.
“Knocked out cold, huh.”
The Rune Rabbit hung limp.
Hyeonjun carefully used the Kitchen Knife to cut its throat.
“Phew, now it’s finally quiet.”
Hyeonjun flopped down flat on the grass.
With the thing he’d worried about most finished without a hitch, the tension drained out of him, leaving his body limp.
A giddy grin leaked past his lips.
“I’m a Hunter too.”
No longer a useless Awakened.
Now he could walk up anywhere and introduce himself as a Hunter with pride.
“F-Rank Hunter Ko Hyeonjun.”
It was the lowest rank there was, but it didn’t matter.
It wasn’t because of the Copy skill.
Simply being able to call himself a Hunter was enough to satisfy him.
“Heh-heh-heh.”
He lingered in that afterglow like someone who’d just had a good dream, then jolted upright.
“Time to get to work.”
Now came the settlement.
Hyeonjun began collecting the spoils.
First, he pried the Rune Fragment lodged in the Rune Rabbit’s forehead.
Next, he separated the Rune Rabbit’s hide.
He knew a fair amount of theory and had a few rounds of hauling experience behind him, so he didn’t hesitate much with the blade.
“Hides fetch a decent price, too.”
Rune Rabbit hide has an unusual color, so there’s quite a few people looking for it.
And finally, the F-Rank Magic Stone nestled near the heart.
“Let’s leave the meat.”
You could sell it, but compared to the trouble of hauling it, the price isn’t much.
So, skip it.
“This much is plenty.”
Magic Stones are a major energy resource.
Even F-Rank ones fetch a decent price.
Rune Rabbit hide also trades for a considerable sum thanks to its distinctive dark hue.
The highlight is the Rune Fragments.
Gather ten of them and you can craft one Rune.
“I wonder how much this’ll come to.”
Hyeonjun roughly calculated based on the market prices floating around in his head.
Having worked at the Exchange, he arrived at a figure in no time.
“Should come to somewhere around thirty-some thousand won.”
Hide prices vary with quality, but since this one’s in good condition, it’s worth aiming for ten thousand won.
“Good thing I captured it first.”
If I’d chased it down and gone straight for the blade, the hide would’ve taken serious damage.
It wasn’t a choice I’d planned, but the outcome was good.
“Next up, the Magic Stone and the Rune Fragments. F-Rank Magic Stone is ten thousand, and F-Rank Rune Fragment is fifteen thousand.”
F-Rank Rune Fragments aren’t really expensive, considering their rarity and the effort involved.
There are dozens of kinds of runes, and the result of crafting a Rune from Rune Fragments is random.
“There’s a gambling element to it, so this price is actually about right.”
That’s why many people call hunting Rune Monsters a waste of time.
Rune Monsters are already harder to catch than ordinary monsters.
It’s more efficient to farm Magic Stones from ordinary monsters and sell them instead.
“But me? I’m different, see.”
Since I can take down a Rune Rabbit this easily, why bother fighting other rabbit monsters?
And those things even attack you, too.
“As long as your Agility is high, this is the perfect setup.”
Hyeonjun looked at the spoils in his hands and let the corners of his mouth lift.
From a single hunt, he’d secured at least thirty thousand won.
A laugh slipped out on its own.
“Say it takes about five minutes to catch and butcher one. That’s 360,000 won an hour…”
An enormous income that could make a person lose their mind.
Hyeonjun was struck speechless.
“It’ll drain your stamina, so in reality it’ll be less than half of that…”
Less than half? That’s a stretch.
At this rate, he’d earn a full day’s wages in an hour.
“No wonder Hunters make so much money.”
Hyeonjun stowed the loot in his bag.
“So what now?”
He’d already achieved his goal for entering the Dungeon today.
Still, leaving now felt like a waste.
“And I’m still in good shape.”
Earlier, the tension had drained him, and he’d felt weak for a moment.
But he’d recovered, and now he felt no different than usual.
“Hmm…”
He didn’t take long to decide.
“Let’s catch more.”
The moment he felt sure about his future as a Hunter, the path ahead of him was set.
‘More power. More money.’
A strong Hunter earns that much more.
Hyeonjun had no intention of standing still, not even for a moment.
‘First, I need to secure runes.’
F-Grade runes for Copy.
To grow stronger, he needed to obtain runes for each stat first.
***
“Argh!”
Baek Jejung, who would turn twenty soon, exploded in frustration.
Behind him, his two friends stood with dazed, deflated expressions.
All three of them stared at the same spot.
Rune Rabbit was there.
“Squeak-squeak-squeak!”
Right in front of them, the Rune Rabbit wiggled its rear as if to show off.
Unable to hold back, Baek Jejung lunged, but it hopped nimbly away, leaving him in the dust.
“Aaaaaaargh!!!”
Baek Jejung collapsed onto the ground with a futile thud and let out a furious roar.
They had surrounded it, laid traps, and tried every trick they could think of to catch it, yet they’d failed every time.
“Why won’t it work?!!!!”
His two friends came over and rested their hands on his shoulders.
“Even though you, me, and that guy have only been Hunters for a week, I think we all know this is the kind of thing only idiots would do.”
“Let’s just give up. Stupid stunts like this are something we should stop already.”
Their faces were caked with dirt, a testament to how grueling the Rune Rabbit hunt had been.
Baek Jejung shot back at his friends immediately.
“Give up here? No way!”
How much time and money had he poured into this?
He’d emptied his allowance to buy a Rune of Agility, then bought and set traps and snares that sold at a premium.
He’d even hired a sprinter as a tutor to help with coordinated herding.
And still, every attempt ended in failure.
They’d been hunting for hours, and not a single one had been caught.
“Jejung, what’s the point of this nonsense?”
“We catch it and make runes!”
“Wouldn’t it be faster to just buy them?”
Baek Jejung shook his head at his friends’ remarks.
“That’s no fun at all.”
To grow stronger with runes you earned from Rune Fragments with your own hands.
What the world called the pinnacle of inefficiency, Baek Jejung considered romance.
“Think about it. Everything others get by paying money, we gather and make ourselves, one piece at a time, through real effort. Isn’t that cool?”
“Cool my foot. It’s just a lot of pointless suffering.”
“Ugh, how did I end up with a friend who lives and dies for romance, and makes all this fuss?”
“Tch, you idiots don’t know anything. Do you have any idea how many experiences are disappearing because of the value we place on convenience? We’re not just losing experiences, we’re losing the new perspectives that discomfort could have given us…”
Just then.
Swish!
Something shot past them like an arrow.
It was a Rune Rabbit.
“Wh-what! Chase it⋯⋯”
Swoosh!
Before Baek Jejung could even shout for someone to give chase, something else blurred past.
A figure even bigger than the Rune Rabbit.
A person.
“W-what’s that thing so fast?”
The speed of someone with 99 Agility was startling to Baek Jejung, a Hunter who’d only been at it for a week.
‘I’ve absorbed a fair number of Agility Runes too, but he’s several times faster than me.’
-Screech!
The distance between the Rune Rabbit and the man kept shrinking by the second.
It didn’t take long before the Rune Rabbit was caught.
“Wow.”
The three of them stared with their mouths hanging open at the man who had stopped.
“Wait, that’s actually possible?”
“No way, where did the Rune Rabbit’s evasive maneuvers go?”
At first, a Rune Rabbit flees in a straight line, and once enough time passes, it swerves left and right to execute its evasive maneuvers.
But this time, the Rune Rabbit was caught before it could even attempt those maneuvers.
It meant the Rune Rabbit couldn’t keep up at all.
“Who is that guy?”
“How many Runes has he absorbed?”
Jejung got to his feet.
“You three wait here. I’ll go over and ask him.”
Questions filled his head to the brim.
Jejung was determined to satisfy that curiosity himself.
-Screech!
But just then.
Another Rune Rabbit darted right past the man.
“H-hey, wait⋯⋯!”
Before Jejung could even call out to him, the man kicked off the ground in pursuit of the Rune Rabbit.
“Haa⋯⋯.”
Jejung didn’t even think to follow; he just watched the man’s back grow smaller.
Complicated feelings lingered in his eyes.
Baek Jejung had always chased romance in his life.
Following his parents’ wish that he do whatever he wanted, he had lived like a free spirit, never once pressed by anything.
That was exactly why he valued romance above everyone else.
“Runes⋯⋯ should I buy some⋯⋯.”
But today, for the first time, that conviction had cracked.
To cling to romance now, the gap he had just witnessed firsthand was simply too vast.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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