The Summoner's Rebirth: Awaken, Milady

Chapter 3: A Strange Gate

Seoul, Year 2377.

"Shit! Bastard Yoo! Get up if you want to continue living!" A man with a gruff voice picked up the one he called 'Bastard Yoo' by his collar, narrowly evading an incoming attack from a vicious wolf.

It was not a normal wolf.

Its fur was azure blue, with golden eyes and fangs that stretched out like a saber-tooth tiger.

"Hyung, behind you!" One of his comrades shouted.

"Aack!"

There was a perfect word that can be used to describe the current situation.

Chaotic.

They were in a dire situation. Their life was not guaranteed. Heck, it would be a miracle if they could escape with their lives intact.

At first, they thought that this was a blessing. A godsent gift.

The trio had been friends for more than seven years. They had immersed themselves in fun and pleasure. Eventually, their peers grew up to have a normal job, but they ended up being left with nothing. They didn't finish their education, and their skills were also lacking.

They would occasionally land a part-time job, but those only lasted for a short while.

After skimping off literally everything for years, the Mother Earth changed. Gates appeared out of nowhere. Their locations were random. The ones that appeared outside the building were equal to those inside. The phenomenon obstructed almost every business sector, and left everybody terrified for a period of time.

The ones who solved the problem were the humans that proclaimed themselves as 'Hunters'.

They appealed to the public, saying that they have been given these strange stones called 'runes' that gave them power akin to those of superheroes.

Most were skeptical at first. However, once they saw the hunters charge in inside the gates and close the gates one by one, the hunters began to be hailed as heroes.

The situation was contained by them with ease, leading people to worship the saviors as the ones who granted them hope.

With time, the dungeons started to grow. From the originally weak dungeons, stronger realms started to appear.

Hunter Associations began to be formed worldwide. Each nation had its own, hosting credible Hunters under their wing.

Compared to them, the military was a joke. The rune stones held power no one could defy without being a rune stone user themselves.

As such, the market for runes were undoubtedly, priced at a high amount. So high that mere civilians would not be able to pay even a hundredth of the stronger runes.

Rune gave them skills. The skills pertained to those of fantasy stories, in which they would be able to suddenly manipulate magical energy just because they used up a rune.

The runes were scarce.

Dungeons appeared here and then, but the amount of people who aspired to be hunters compared to the actual dungeons themselves didn't reach an equilibrium. For each dungeon, a party had to be made to ensure a hunter's livelihood.

Not to mention, one dungeon could only give out one rune, whereas you needed a whole squad to successfully clear one. The rune was rarely given to a single member. Hunters opted to sell the rune and store that same money to hopefully garner enough savings for a good rune purchase.

The trio had been in a series of lucky events.

First, their older brother who traded his life savings for a small rune, was able to obtain a body fortification skill and a simple sword. This was enough to clear an F-rank dungeon, although their lives could be put at risk.

The three wagered on their lives and entered an F-ranked dungeon, in hopes of obtaining another small rune, becoming stronger, and obtaining even more runes...

What a nice dream it was.

The three weren't impatient, they knew to proceed slowly and take their time. After hard work and continuous efforts were spent on clearing small dungeons, selling runes that would not be of use to them and taking the useful ones, they managed to gather enough funds to buy better runes.

The oldest brother, Kim Jun-su, bought a stronger body fortification rune as he liked to fight with his body.

The second brother, Kim Il-hoon, was Jun-su blood - related younger brother. He bought a fire magic rune that provided him with small spells like fireball, fire arrow, and so on. Although he couldn't use too much of it, the team had great coordination and was able to gather the enemies to one place. The group of enemies would then be incinerated by Il-hoon, and later cleaned up by the rest.

The third brother, Lee Seong-Jin, was their childhood friend and sworn brother. His precision and accuracy was rather good, so he bought a rune that would allow him to reinforce his arrows and even speed up his drawing speed. He worked in the sidelines, taking down enemies that Jun-su couldn't handle and finishing those who still held on to their lives.

It could be said that the trio was steadily growing to success.

However, the day after they bought those three runes and passed the test for attaining a D - rank in their hunter association, they encountered something they thought was also a lucky chance they couldn't pass up on.

Namely 'Bastard Yoo' was a 'homeless boy' they encountered in the streets, someone who drew their attention.

The boy was the one who discovered an unauthorized dungeon gate, the one who introduced them to the current situation.

Jun-su knew that what they were doing was wrong, but he couldn't help himself. He couldn't stop himself from wanting to chase that beautiful dream. Sadly, that lack of control was what led to the tragedy they were in right now.

In the first place, it was a stated rule that you had to report an unlisted dungeon to the association.

The main reason was that a dungeon's rank could only be determined by special Analyzers who worked at the association. Not only will the difficulty be assigned, but the minimum number of people required would also be given.

However, reporting it to the association would cut down their profits by at least 85%.

Just by the feeling, they knew that the dungeon before them was at least D - rank. The profit they could get by clearing this unlisted dungeon would be enough to buy them 7 or more small runes that they recently acquired.

If they reported it, the association would obtain a good 40% of the total share as a guarantor, another 20% would be lost from splitting up the monster's intact carcasses, and the last 25% would be from the rune's value.

A D - rank dungeon.

They had great teamwork, was equipped with decent equipment, and had been promoted to a D - rank hunter.

Looking at each other, a risky agreement was made.

The rash decision the trio took was undoubtedly, what led them to their demises.

"Brat, we'll take care of it, but you have to follow us inside," Jun-su was smarter in terms of the current world's laws.

What they were doing was illegal. That was a fact.

However, if they used Yoo Jin, things would come up to be different.

If they failed, they could bail out and cooperate with the association. If they were asked, they'd just say that they saw Yoo Jin entering the unguarded dungeon without any preparations and thought that something must've gone wrong. Upon entering, they just needed to say that it was too late, with Yoo Jin dead presumably from the monsters' ambush.

If they succeeded, they could slip out without telling anybody. The only explanation they'd have to do would probably be to their marginalized guild, but the main Association wouldn't care about a simple D-rank dungeon anyways.

To the Association, it was a miniscule thing. But to them, this was a chance that could potentially overturn their whole life.

And they wanted to take that chance badly.

Who would've known... That they identified the dungeon wrongly, that they were currently in a C-rank dungeon.

The difference between a C-rank and a D-rank dungeon was phenomenal. It wasn't something you could overcome with adding numbers.

Recalling back to the decision he made back then, and comparing it with the danger he was facing right now, he felt like he wanted to turn back as fast as he could and smack the hell out of the past him.

Thus were the sequence of events that led up to the current mortal danger the group was facing.

___________________________________________

The Summoner Aria, on the other hand, was in a different peril.

The place she woke up in was far from the crowded places, but she was still dead naked. Her clothes had long been disintegrated by the Unity flame, and she was left with nothing.

"Space," Aria called out, wanting to deploy her personal space.

Nothing responded, the brightly lit status window was still glaring at her.

"..." She felt distressed. Should she risk everything and enter the city, with the high possibility of being spotted?

Aria sighed. She decided to take a detour from the main area, going down to the dark and secluded areas in hopes of finding anything to shield her body with.

As she approached closer to a certain alley, she felt her instincts twinge at the direction of the gate.

'..Mana disturbance.' Unlike the place she saw just now, with someone being able to stretch their voice far and loud to the ends of the city without any signs of mana disturbance, this was a real sensation.

The feeling made her stomach churn in discomfort.

The source of it was probably the high disparity between her current strength and the disturbance.

Although she was struck down with thirst and hunger, she didn't think much and headed towards the direction she felt the energy from.

Her current priority was making sure that magic still existed. Who knew how much time had passed?

Exactly because she had lived for God knows how long, she was able to disregard her life in entirety, not minding if she would collapse in the next second.

Of course, she had some attachments to the world, feeling like her goals weren't yet accomplished, but the lovely comrades she once had were now completely gone.

All the spirits, monsters, and even humanoid souls, the ones who used to accompany her vanished without a trace.

If there was no way of getting them back, she'd rather die.

She just needed magic. It was fine to gain back her cultivation bit by bit from the beginning. She did it once, she believed that a second time was possible.

'..This?' Aria arrived at the gate Jun-su and the rest had entered.

Extending her arm to feel the membrane that was oddly placed in the air, she punctured the spiral hole, only to find that her hand could go through it, disappearing on the other end.

'But this is certainly made up of magical substances.' A smile was finally drawn on her face. Hope was not lost.

'Like a barrier. No, a teleportation gate? How strange,'

'Why would anyone create this? The space it connects to is... far. The mana that is needed to do this..' Aria pursed her lips.

Even she would have problems creating a gate like that.

'There's no restriction.' Aria rummaged around to find no blockages. She could go through the thing without anything preventing her.

Aria thought for a while and decided to risk it.

No matter how weak she was, the memory she retained was undoubtedly that of the former best summoner in the world.

Not only did she excel in the arts of summoning, her close combat capabilities were also not bad, leading to a deadly combo of versatility in both close and ranged fighting in addition to her summons that provided support.

'Don't know what the numbers entail, but we'll see.'

Whatever laid behind here would mark her first action in this world.