Infinite Evolution Hunter - Chapter 18

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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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18
I cleared the sixth Gate of the day and stepped outside. Winter’s short daylight hadn’t yet faded, so the sky remained bright.
With Sang-hun and his father handling the recovery, our hunting pace was incomparably faster. Though the workers were all exhausted, their work was always meticulous and their fees lower than other companies.
“At this rate, I could run eight Gates a day, couldn’t I?”
The moment I resolved to increase the number of Gates I cleared daily, my ears suddenly itched intensely.
“Someone’s cursing me.”
“Thank you for your hard work.”
A Hwagok Recovery Company employee was waiting at the Gate entrance for me to emerge.
“I’ve scattered twenty-five trackers. The rest are here.”
Scattering twenty-five trackers meant I’d thrown corpses and items into twenty-five different locations for collection. I handed over the pouch containing the remaining trackers to him.
“Thank you.”
“Starting tomorrow, I’d like to run eight locations, so could you ask the manager if that’s possible?”
“E-eight locations in a single day?”
The employee was shocked by my unexpected request.
“Yes, just ask for me.”
“Y-yes… I understand.”
The employee’s face turned ashen as he bowed his head deeply in response.
* * *
“Are you alright?”
Sang-hun was waiting at the Gate entrance like a half-zombie.
“How are you fine with this? You’d be the first Awakener in Korea to clear eight Gates in a single day.”
“Really? Since I’m already doing this, should I push harder and make it ten?”
“Ugh. Sir, it’s not that I’m struggling—I’m genuinely worried about your health. Wouldn’t it be better to pace yourself? Take tomorrow off. And I didn’t want to bring this up, but my father seems to be suffering greatly as well.”
Sang-hun desperately tried to persuade me.
Sang-hun pointed to Manager Yang unloading cargo from the truck behind him. His face had grown so gaunt and darkened that he clearly looked exhausted.
Money was good, and rapid advancement was good, but at this rate, my father figure in this new life seemed headed for death by overwork.
Initially, I’d considered using other companies, but I’d never heard of any as honest as Sang-hun’s family. Other companies routinely skimmed profits—if not for them, I’d have had no choice but to use them—but now I had no intention of switching.
“Then I’ll run five locations a day from now on. I’ll spend the remaining time training at home. Monday through Friday, five runs daily. That works, right?”
“Yes! That works! Father will be pleased.”
“Good. And you—train with me.”
“Pardon? I didn’t catch that?”
“Come to my house after recovery work. Let’s train.”
“No, I usually rest after recovery….”
“No. I’ll supervise your training. Come starting tomorrow. If you’re weak, I worry about you. If you run into someone like Choi Mi-ran again, or get beaten by a guy like Choi Chul-min, how could I face your father?”
I simply issued the order to Sang-hun, who was reluctant to comply.
* * *
“Come at me with your weapon and use your skills.”
I stood facing Sang-hun in the House Front Yard.
“Huh? You’re not using a weapon?”
Sang-hun drew his sword, then looked at me standing motionless and asked. He seemed reluctant to attack someone he knew—especially an unarmed person—with a weapon.
“I’ve seen how you fight. Don’t worry and come at me.”
“But still… Ugh!”
I rushed at Sang-heon, who continued to hesitate, and swept his legs out from under him.
“Ow.”
Sang-heon whimpered as he picked himself up off the ground.
“If you don’t attack, know that you’ll just take hits until sunset today.”
“Phew… Then I’ll go.”
Having steeled himself, he rushed at me and brought down a sword wrapped in luminous light. It wasn’t even full power—just a predictable, easy-to-dodge trajectory. On top of that, he swung the blade at a distance where my skin would barely be grazed even if I didn’t dodge.
I wasn’t sure whether to call this a soft heart or a weak spirit.
I stepped forward and reached out my hand toward the blade of light.
Seeing my hand reaching to grab his sword, he tried to stop in surprise, but suddenly halting a sword mid-swing isn’t easy.
Thanks to my Agility stat being several times higher and my hands honed by rigorous physical conditioning skills, I caught his blade barehanded without difficulty.
“Wh… Hyung! Are you okay?! Wh… What?”
My hand, which should have taken light-attribute damage, was unscathed, and my palm, which should have been cut by the blade, didn’t have a single drop of blood on it.
I swept his legs out from under him, and Sang-heon tumbled down with a strange cry.
“Hyung, did you really need to trip me just now?”
Sang-heon got up from the ground with an indignant expression.
“Taking hits is also training. If you’re upset, then dodge. And you’re thinking about this wrong right now. First, you can’t assume that Awakeners without weapons have no means of fighting. My bare body is stronger than most guns or blades. Skills are weapons.”
“You’re right, that was too naive of me.”
“Second is skill application. Considering your mana pool and skills, instead of wrapping your light broadly around the blade like you’re doing, it’s better to concentrate and compress it more sharply. Make it so thin it’s barely visible.”
“Hyung, skills are automatic. How would an Awakener adjust them?”
Seeing him look at me with an expression asking why I was asking something so obvious, it seemed he hadn’t taken enough hits yet.
“No, skills change rank depending on how the user wields them. Your skill doesn’t have low potential.”
This becomes widely known only later. Currently, it’s believed that skills and stats increase randomly through leveling up or use. However, it’s revealed years later that if you concentrate and train to develop that skill, its rank can increase. The growth is usually so minimal, and since most people don’t know the exact method, it simply wasn’t known.
Of course, my growth through the Regeneration skill is explosive, so my growth rate is incomparably larger than other Awakeners.
Despite my explanation, doubt filled Sang-heon’s eyes.
“You don’t have to believe me. Just take the hits for now. You’ll understand as you get hit.”
“W… Wait a moment! Ahhh!”
I chased after Sang-heon as he screamed and fled. It wasn’t easy to hit him gently with finesse, but I’d bought potions just in case I failed and broke something. What else would I spend money on?
It’s all for my brother. Since he travels with me, I can’t have him getting hurt out there. It’s absolutely not because I want him to experience the same harsh training I do.
* * *
At first, I just rushed at him and pummeled Sang-heon, but that didn’t serve as training for me.
Finally, when Sang-heon, filled with malice, began to counterattack, I closed my eyes and sensed his presence to attack and defend.
I focused on my hearing and touch, sharpened by my keen senses skill, and my intuition.
When I closed my eyes, Sang-heon, growing timid, slowed his attack speed again. Sensing the general direction, I kicked his ribs, and only then did he finally become truly fierce and attack me.
I could sense roughly where his attacks were coming from, but I couldn’t feel the trajectory of the blade, so it wasn’t easy to dodge with minimal movement.
I could leap far away to dodge, but since I wanted to raise my keen senses skill, I deliberately stayed close and concentrated on discerning the blade’s trajectory.
Eventually, I took a hit on my arm with a sharp sound. It didn’t cut, but since a Hunter swung it with full force, there was impact. Still, the moment I was hit, I moved my arm in the opposite direction to cushion the shock and counterattacked.
After fighting with my eyes closed, Sang-heon landed many effective hits, but since I couldn’t see, I misjudged distance and took harder, more frequent blows.
“Sang-heon, this training ends only when your attack power increases enough to leave scratches on my body.”
I rushed toward Sang-heon, who was beaten and gasping for breath, and spoke.
* * *
After that, my days fell into a rhythm: Gates during the day, training in the evening.
After reaching level 15 at the Orc Gate and finding further leveling impossible, I eventually brought Sang-heon into the Gate to join the combat.
On his first day of training, Sang-heon could barely defeat a single orc, but now he could handle two without difficulty, and if he pushed himself, even three in one go.
After clearing several Gates together, Sang-heon—who had been on the verge of promotion from F-rank—was elevated to E-rank, and I was promoted to D-rank.
Then, until my new Awakener registration certificate arrived, I suspended Gate expeditions and devoted my time to sparring with Sang-heon. As a result, Hwagok Recovery Company found itself on an unexpected vacation.
As I continued my relentless training, there came a sharp *crack*—Sang-heon’s blade sliced across my chest. The power was still modest, and I evaded by sensing the sword’s trajectory instinctively, leaving only a shallow wound. But the fact that I was wounded meant Sang-heon had compressed his light blade to increase its force.
“I did it!! Oh no! Are you alright?”
Sang-heon, whose entire body was battered from taking so many hits from me, was thrilled at having wounded me, but suddenly snapped back to awareness and checked if I was unharmed.
“Don’t worry. It’s already healed. And you did well. Your skill rank went up, didn’t it?”
“Yes! It rose one grade to D. I never imagined skill ranks could increase like this. Though I can’t say the process was easy by any means.”
Sang-heon trembled. There aren’t many people who could teach this. If experience graphs were visible like in a game, effort would feel worthwhile. But people who endlessly run toward a finish line they can’t see—neither its distance nor its direction—are rare indeed.
“Um… can we stop here?”
Sang-heon glanced at me cautiously.
“What are you talking about? This level of power won’t help much. You need to compress it more. And you need to improve your swordsmanship further.”
Sang-heon retreated reluctantly, but the training continued.
After that, his light blade didn’t compress further, but having gained confidence that he could wound me, his movements gradually improved.
[Keen Sense skill has risen from C to B.]
And after our training session ended, my skill had also improved, allowing me to now evade even blades swung from behind.
“Shall we call it here? From now on, let’s refine it in actual combat.”
Two weeks of intensive training had ended. Sang-heon lay sprawled on the ground, breathing heavily, unable to even respond.
“I’m going to wash up, so you clean yourself and rest.”
I left him there and headed to the bathroom to wash away the grime from training.

When I emerged from my bath, Sang-heon was collapsed in front of the refrigerator, trembling violently with foam at his mouth. Scattered around his collapsed form were bottles of the poisoned water I kept at home.
“Hey! Hey! Are you okay?! Come to your senses!”
I struck his cheek hard several times, but he didn’t respond.
My poison resistance had grown so high that I’d been drinking increasingly concentrated doses lately, and it seemed he’d drunk some. Since it was undiluted, the paralysis was severe. Fearing cardiac arrest if I left him, I immediately poured a potion into his mouth.
His complexion improved somewhat, but since this was poison rather than injury, the potion couldn’t provide complete detoxification.
I loaded him into the car and pressed the pedal all the way to the Hospital.

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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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