Chapter 13 : Yi Sun-sin’s Three Gates (1)

Gates are classified into six levels, from E to S, based on their danger level.

E-rank hunters attack E-rank gates, and D-rank hunters attack D-rank gates.

If you break it down further, each level is subdivided into danger ratings from 1 to 10.

However, underestimating a D-1 gate could lead to disaster.

After all, the world inside a gate was a place where anything could happen.

C-rank hunter Yoo Cheol-min was paying the price for his overconfidence.

“Damn it! Why is there a warrior goblin in a place like this…!?”

“Screech, screeeech!”

Yoo Cheol-min, who had underestimated the D-1 gate and entered alone, was now panicking as he encountered a group of mutant goblins that shouldn’t have appeared in this area.

“Screeeech!”

Clang!

Yoo Cheol-min grimaced as he blocked a goblin’s descending sledgehammer with his sword.

‘This bastard… is that a hardware store sledgehammer!?’

Goblins were typically thought of as cowardly creatures that shot poison darts from a distance, but that was old news.

The monsters that took over the northern regions of the Han River scavenged modern objects and used them as weapons.

The goblin group that Yoo Cheol-min encountered seemed to have raided a hardware store, as they were wielding various tools.

Moreover, they weren’t just ordinary goblins but warrior goblins.

These creatures were supposed to appear in D-8 gates, yet they had shown up in a D-1 gate.

Although unusual events sometimes occurred inside gates, Yoo Cheol-min was exceptionally unlucky.

It was extremely rare for a group of tool-wielding warrior goblins to appear in a D-1 gate.

“Screeeeech!”

At the leader goblin’s cry, four warrior goblins charged at Yoo Cheol-min.

He blocked an incoming goblin armed with a chainsaw and stepped back.

Even as a C-rank hunter, dealing with four warrior goblins at once was overwhelming.

‘I took this D-1 gate way too lightly.’

Realizing the situation was too risky, Yoo Cheol-min decided to retreat to the safe zone.

To exit a gate, one had to move to the designated safe zone first.

Just as he was about to turn and leave, he heard something dragging along the ground.

‘Dragging?’

Curious, Yoo Cheol-min tried to identify the source of the sound.

“Excuse me, I’m just passing through.”

A young man walked past him, dragging a massive greatsword along the ground.

The dragging noise was the greatsword scraping against the floor.

‘What kind of sword is that…?’

The greatsword, which appeared to be at least 3 meters long, seemed far too unwieldy for any normal hunter.

As proof, the man didn’t even try to lift it, instead dragging it along like a broom.

As Yoo Cheol-min stared at him in disbelief, the warrior goblins charged in.

“Watch out!”

“Screeeech!”

Whiiirrr—!

A warrior goblin swung a revved-up chainsaw at the man.

The man belatedly swung his greatsword, but it was more of a feeble, limp motion than a proper strike.

‘Damn it!’

Seeing the sword move like a wiggling worm, Yoo Cheol-min shut his eyes tightly.

It seemed inevitable that the man would be sliced apart by the goblin’s chainsaw.

Splat!

A gruesome slicing sound echoed.

Yoo Cheol-min’s eyes widened in shock.

“…W-what…?”

With just a weak swing of the man’s greatsword, the upper body of the warrior goblin disappeared.

And as if that wasn’t enough, the force of the sword continued on, completely shattering a tree in the background.

Thud!

“Phew, that was tiring.”

Watching the man casually wipe his forehead as if he had just finished an exhausting workout, Yoo Cheol-min was dumbfounded.

“Heave-ho!”

Despite his energetic shout, his sword swings remained weak and wobbly, almost jelly-like.

Whooosh!

The sheer force of the slash sent a gust of wind through Yoo Cheol-min’s hair as the goblins were obliterated.

“A h-high-rank hunter…?”

His voice wavered with uncertainty.

There was no doubt the man was powerful, but something about him felt off.

‘Why is he using a sword like that?’

As a swordsman-type hunter himself, Yoo Cheol-min prided himself on his knowledge of swordsmanship.

But he had never seen a hunter wield a sword in such a flimsy, erratic manner.

‘Is this some kind of new sword style?’

Perhaps it was a technique that relied on relaxation and elasticity…

As Yoo Cheol-min tried to analyze the man’s swordsmanship, the mysterious hunter finished off the goblins and dragged his greatsword straight toward the boss room.

Driven by curiosity, Yoo Cheol-min followed him inside.

And upon witnessing the scene before him, he swallowed hard.

“Heave-ho!”

—Kiyaaa… Thud!

The boss of the D-1 gate.

Hobgoblin.

The creature was sliced apart by the man’s feeble sword swing.

That day, Yoo Cheol-min posted about his experience on the large hunter community forum, HuntWeb.

[Today, I went to Olympic Park and saw a weird high-ranker dragging a sword around.]

ᄂWhy was he dragging his sword?

ᄂIt looked like it was too heavy for him. But damn, he was insanely strong. He swung it all limp, and the goblins just disappeared.

ᄂHow do goblins just disappear from a limp swing?

ᄂThis isn’t a lie. I saw him at Hangang Park yesterday too.

ᄂᄅᄋ? Isn’t this just some kind of gimmick??

Rumors about the “Sword-Dragging Monster” started spreading on HuntWeb.

“Phew, my arm’s gonna fall off.”

I set my twin dragon sword down on the shop counter and massaged my overworked arm.

For a week, I had been roaming Seoul’s gates to get used to wielding the twin dragon sword.

And as for the results—

It was still heavy, but I could at least swing it to some extent now.

Whether you called it “swinging” or just “flailing wildly” depended on who was watching…

‘But I think I’m handling it pretty well, right?’

This wasn’t baseless confidence.

After all, I had cleared every gate from D-1 to D-7 with an SSS rank.

It might sound easy in words, but it was an incredibly difficult feat.

When a gate is cleared, a completion rank is given, and achieving the highest grade, SSS, was nearly impossible—even for lower-ranked gates.

It was still hard to wield the twin dragon sword freely because of its weight.

‘If things get dicey, I can always use Napoleon’s rifle.’

The twin dragon sword wasn’t my only relic, so I felt reassured.

Even so, safety was my top priority, so I never went near anything above a D-rank gate.

I didn’t have two lives—recklessly swinging a sword around could easily get me killed.

Cautious hunting was a hunter’s greatest virtue.

“The rewards aren’t too bad either.”

The low-grade mana stones from D-rank gates didn’t sell for much.

But small amounts added up, and after clearing every section from Area 1 to Area 7, I was making a decent profit.

In just a week, I had collected 2 million won worth of low-grade mana stones.

However, I couldn’t stay stuck farming D-rank gates forever.

Twin Dragon Sword’s Fate (1)
Special Gate: Myeongnyang

• Liberate the Joseon navy.

[Difficulty: D]
[Status: Stable]
[Clear Condition: Twin Dragon Sword]
[Available Time: 168:28]
[Reward: Yi Sun-sin-related relic]

==

“I guess I have to clear this one.”

As soon as I returned to the modern world, my status screen threw a twin dragon sword-related quest at me.

Several gates related to Admiral Yi Sun-sin existed on the Korean Peninsula.

‘Noryang,’ ‘Myeongnyang,’ ‘Hansan.’

These were the so-called Three Gates of Yi Sun-sin.

Among them, Hansan had already been cleared, while Noryang was an unstable gate that had to be periodically re-cleared.

However, Myeongnyang was a “unclearable gate”—no one had ever successfully conquered it.

Even the Three Great Guilds of Korea—Samdocheon, Star of Dawn, and Cheonmumun—had given up on it, and even the government had abandoned any attempts to clear it.

Inside the gate, skeletal soldiers—presumably the remains of those who perished in the Imjin War—roamed endlessly, while whirlpools churned in the surrounding seas.

Myeongnyang Strait had become a death zone that no one could approach, all because of the Myeongnyang Gate.

That was why I had been hesitant to attempt it until now.

If even the government had given up, what chance did I have of clearing it?

And yet, my resolve wavered because of one thing—the difficulty level.

[Difficulty: D]

D? How does that make any sense?

D-rank gates were nothing more than free-pass zones where you could clear them just by swinging a sword.

And yet, Myeongnyang was classified as a D-rank gate.

On top of that, the reward was a relic related to Yi Sun-sin.

Ideally, I wanted to get stronger before attempting it, but considering how the time limit on the quest was decreasing, it was clearly a timed event.

“If that’s the case, there’s no reason not to go.”

Maybe I could just step in for a moment and check it out?

If it looked too dangerous, I could always run.

I pondered for a while, but the decision was made in an instant.

‘Let’s just get a taste of it first.’

Kim Hayun, who had finished second in the Trial of the Coffin, looked grim.

‘Snow Stone…’

She had lost the first-place reward, the Snow Stone.

If this had been just a personal loss, she wouldn’t have felt this much regret.

But the Snow Stone was crucial not only for her but for all of South Korea.

To clear the gate “Noryang,” which the Star of Dawn was currently attacking, Kim Hayun had to become stronger.

Or she needed to find a relic that could aid in the conquest.

“Yun ha, calm down. I’ll find a way to get an Imjin War relic no matter what.”

Ha Jin-woo, the leader of Team 1 in Star of Dawn, tried to console Kim Hayun.

But his expression was just as troubled as hers.

And for good reason—Noryang was an unstable gate.

An unstable gate meant that it would eventually “go berserk” if left unchecked.

This was called a Gate Break.

When a gate broke, the monsters inside would spill out into the real world.

Records of past Noryang Gate Breaks showed that they were catastrophes, surpassing even A-rank gate breaches.

The problem was that only water-attribute hunters could enter Noryang, and the core of the attack squad was Kim Hayun.

But Kim Hayun had failed to clear the Noryang Gate three times in a row.

The media was already criticizing Star of Dawn, calling them incompetent for failing to clear the gate.

‘I need to find a water-attribute relic, no matter what.’

If not, Star of Dawn would be held responsible for the disaster caused by the Noryang Gate Break.

Special Gate: Noryang
Status: Highly Unstable
[Difficulty: A]
[Time Remaining: 76:28]

===

Only three days remained before the gate would break.

As Ha Jin-woo anxiously searched for relics in the artifact market—

“Leader! The Myeongnyang Gate has been cleared!”

“What?! Myeongnyang?!”

Startled, Ha Jin-woo immediately opened his status window.

His eyes widened in disbelief.

[Myeongnyang Gate Cleared]
[Clear Rank: SSS]

‘Who the hell…?!’