It was either 6 or 5 years ago. I couldn’t even remember. Anyways, it must have been sometime during that period.
There was a time when the name ‘Rude’ didn’t even exist yet, a time when Nari wasn’t even aware that her skill had such a negative impact on other people’s minds.
It was during the days when she couldn’t control the power she had suddenly gained, so following the Ruler of Chaos’ suggestion, she created a sub-avatar, put it on, and secretly entered empty gates to practice her skill.
A gate had opened inside a school, and because it was late at night, no one could report it, so Nari was able to be alone at the scene.
Since it was a school in the middle of the night, there likely wouldn’t be any survivors, so the Ruler of Chaos specially detected it and informed her so she could enter the gate alone and try controlling her power.
Rude, who was currently ‘Nari’s sub’, was wandering around the tunnel-shaped gate, arbitrarily slicing monsters to test her strength when she encountered a boy lying quietly inside.
He wore a neatly dressed black vest with a blue tie. The name that should have been engraved on the nameplate was covered by the jacket he was wearing, making it invisible.
“What, is this a corpse? Am I seeing a kid’s corpse as soon as I enter the gate?”
As the black-clothed man, Rude, cautiously approached thinking it was some kind of corpse, the boy’s eyes suddenly fluttered open.
“Ack!! Oh my god. Shi- you scared me half to death!!”
The man who had let out a scream leaned against the wall, clutching his heart. The boy stared at him blankly.
He was a male student with striking blue eyes visible beneath his pitch-black hair, but for some reason, he exuded a gloomy and dreary atmosphere.
“What are you, Snow White? Why are you like this?”
Rude, who had wiped his face once saying his heart had almost dropped, spoke as if sighing. The boy was still staring at him blankly.
“If you found a gate, you should report it and run away, what are you doing? Are you lacking sleep because you’re a high school senior? If you want to sleep, go home and sleep. I’ll send you back.”
“I don’t really care if I die here.”
The male student spoke in a steady, monotonous voice as he tightly closed his eyes again.
“I don’t see the reason to keep living when it’s this hard, and I don’t know why I was born. So that’s how it is. Don’t mind me.”
Rude narrowed his eyes. Clicking his tongue, he frowned and scratched the side of his head.
“You think anyone knows that and lives? Just live.”
“No, I just think I was born wrong.”
“Why?”
“All the adults say so. They say I need to be fixed. But they say they don’t know how to fix me. So I must definitely be fundamentally flawed.”
It was clearly an adolescent voice, but the hollow voice echoed around the cave. Clattering, the shadow of a giant soldier ant fell behind Rude in time with it.
Swarms of soldier ants were thrusting their sharp jaws forward, staring at the two. The boy tightly shut his eyes as if sensing his impending death.
“So being discarded is the answer. I’m sure everyone will be happy. Be- Because if I die in the gate, not even a body will remain…”
Even though he said that, he seemed scared of actually dying, and Nari could see the boy putting strength into his two hands placed on his stomach. Moreover, his voice trembled as he uttered his last words.
It was because the thought of meeting his end by being eaten by a swarm of soldier ants was terrifying.
The boy applied so much force that his fingertips turned white as he thought about how painful it would be to die with his upper body separated from his lower body with a clang.
‘Huh?’
The boy, who had slightly opened his eyes to check the situation, abruptly sat up. When the black hunter he had never seen before unleashed his mental power, the soldier ants had been sliced to pieces.
The boy stared at the man with blank eyes. The man, who was wiping the black half-scissors covered in ant bodily fluids with a cloth, looked at the boy.
“You’re a really good kid.”
“Yes… Huh? Yes? Yes?”
The boy’s expression, who had assumed the man was a support-type hunter based on his physique and skills and was convinced he wouldn’t be able to help him, wavered for the first time. The man’s indifferent eyes pierced through him.
“I haven’t lived long, you know. But in the 19 years I’ve lived, I’ve realized something. Ah, of course, I’ll be twenty soon though.”
“You’re nineteen?”
The boy blinked in disbelief because the man looked like he was in his early to mid-twenties at face value.
He thought he was an adult, but he was actually the same age as him, a high school student. The man made an annoyed expression.
“Have you committed a crime?”
“No.”
“Have you cursed at or hit anyone?”
“No… I’ve never done that.”
“Then just ignore what others say and live. You seem to have a good enough personality, what’s this about a flaw.”
The boy just blinked a few times at the man’s straightforward words. Then he hurriedly continued.
“No, it’s not just that. It’s just… Everyone says that! How can I ignore it?! They’re adults!”
“Then what do you want to do? You said you can’t change it. Do you want to kill all those jerks who say that? You don’t seem capable of that.”
“…Kill them? No, not to that extent.”
“If you’re not going to do that, then just ignore them and live. Out of the 7 billion population, there will be people who like you. If you live righteously, standing firm with the right mindset…”
“Those words are so powerless. It’s just a mental victory.”
The man, who had been trailing off in thought, sighed and grabbed the boy’s arm to make him stand up. The boy, who had been made to stand up in a daze, looked down at the man.
“If you look closely, the people who say others have flaws, they all have them too. But they say theirs are ‘different’ and mine is a ‘flaw’. Does that make sense? People aren’t factory products for them to arbitrarily label defective or genuine as they please.”
The man’s eyes looked into the distant void. He absentmindedly muttered as if recalling something, frowning.
“From what you said, it seems like you’re being treated as an annoyance by others for trivial reasons, so I’m telling you this, but there are more people in the world who don’t know me than those who do. Don’t let a few dozen people out of 7 billion define your life. Yeah, just a few dozen people’s words…”
The man’s teeth gritted. Anger boiled in his eyes, then as if realizing something, he regained his composure.
“…I appreciate your words. But that doesn’t mean I can find a reason to live.”
“That’s not my problem.”
The boy let out a disgruntled sound at the cool and indifferent words. He thought it was just empty comfort, a pointless conversation, and put his bag on his shoulder with a sulky expression.
“Right. You don’t really care, do you? I just want to go home. This just made me feel worse.”
“I don’t know why I live either. But I decided to just not think about it.”
The boy, who was about to leave, looked down at the man. The man was checking his wrist by rolling up his coat sleeve.
“…Because if I thought about each and every one of those things, there would be no choice but to die.”
But it was scary when I actually tried, the man laughed emptily and put his hand down, then turned around. A dimensional rift gate opened in front of the boy’s eyes. The school entrance, an empty subway station could be seen.
“You go home too. And just live without thinking about anything. That’s much better.”
[This is the timeline separator]“The atmosphere was way too different.”
Rude folded his arms, deeply recalling that memory. After sending Hunter Min Jaewon back in a cursory manner and thinking about it, it seemed he hadn’t remembered because the impression was so different.
[Nari, you just realized now? The Ruler of Chaos grins at you, sticking out his tongue.]“The face was the same, so why didn’t I remember? Who would think a low self-esteem gloomy guy would turn into a kind and gentle sunny guy overnight? You didn’t know either, right?”
[No, I knew though? The Ruler of Chaos says mischievously.]“No, if you knew, you should have told me! You really enjoy this kind of thing, I see when I look closely?!”
Rude abruptly stood up and grumbled. Seeing the Ruler of Chaos giggling, saying it’s more fun that way, he dismissed the indirect message with his finger.
As he was grumbling like that, the office door flung open again with a bang.
“Rude!”
“Ah, you startled me! Did you boil a train steam engine?! Why are you so late?!”
Kang Ihyeon, his face flushed with excitement, flung the door open with a tumbler in both hands.
As his partner entered, Rude started to make it seem like he had been diligently working until now, not playing around. Kang Ihyeon screamed with joy, paying him no mind.
“We passed!! The guild master just called a moment ago saying this is good enough, so I was late!!”
“What!”
Rude abruptly stood up. At the news that the annoyingly strict report they had to submit to the national agency had passed, the domestic ranking #1 and #2 began hugging each other in joy.
“Let’s go home, Rude. We have afternoon shift tomorrow. Let’s sleep at home!”
“Yeah, let’s go home. Let’s go home…!”
The new recruits to society, feeling the utmost pleasure at being able to leave work on time starting tomorrow, immediately began preparing to go home.
After clocking out and saving the work log, they turned off the computer and power strip, and finally turned off the office lights.
“Rude, then I’ll get going. See you tomorrow!”
“Yeah, see you in the afternoon tomorrow.”
Rude opened a dimensional rift while Kang Ihyeon went down to the parking lot. In the pitch-black office with the lights off, Rude, who had opened a dimensional rift, suddenly froze with a smile on his face.
It made no sense at all, but a memory that clearly happened flashed through Nari’s mind. Rude turned around and stared down the corridor where Kang Ihyeon had disappeared.
[Nari, you just realized now? The Ruler of Chaos grins at you.]“…What the.”
Anyone who sees her skill suffers a mental blow. Except for Kang Ihyeon, who has ‘complete immunity to evil-aligned mental attacks’ due to the ‘influence of the constellations’.
Black-haired Kang Ihyeon, at that time, witnessed Rude’s skill with his bare eyes without any impact.
And Kang Ihyeon said his hair turned blonde when he contracted with the constellation Raphael.
Then, how was Kang Ihyeon able to directly see Nari’s skill and remain unaffected before contracting with Raphael?
[This is the timeline separator]‘What is with this person…?’
Dimensional movement wasn’t something just anyone could do. Moreover, there wasn’t a single hunter that Ihyeon knew of who could open warp gates this easily.
The seventeen-year-old boy, black-haired Kang Ihyeon, stared at the black-clothed man.
If he was this strong, Ihyeon should definitely know about him. Because Kang Ihyeon was the person with the most connections to hunters in the country.
Feeling suspicious, he asked the black man.
“Um, what’s your name?”
“I don’t have one yet. I’m thinking about it. I’m really bad at naming myself.”
‘He hasn’t registered yet.’
Convinced that it made sense he wouldn’t know then, Kang Ihyeon looked at the man. Among hunters, there were occasionally some who made their registration card under an alias.
In this information society, their real name would come out with just a little investigation anyways, but it was for the impact. The man in front of him must be that type too, Kang Ihyeon thought and said.
“Usually people incorporate it with their attribute. What’s your attribute?”
“Lucid Dreamer.”
“Then intuitively, how about Rude?”
“Rude?”
The man propped his chin with his hand and pondered for a moment. It seemed like he had a constellation, as he was whispering to someone and getting annoyed.
Well, if he had that level of skill, he definitely must have a constellation, Kang Ihyeon surmised and continued staring at him.
His attribute seemed to be on the evil-aligned side too, and Kang Ihyeon thought that if his close grandfather found out a new evil-aligned hunter became an S-rank, he would make a fuss again, when the man’s bright voice reached his ears.
“Nice, Rude. Let’s go with that.”
The man, no, ‘Rude’ abruptly turned his head and looked at Kang Ihyeon. Then he grinned. Kang Ihyeon blinked.
It was 10 minutes. Out of his 17 years of life, it was a mere 10-minute conversation.
Out of the countless smiles he had seen, only that smile, just those 10 minutes changed Kang Ihyeon’s life. Kang Ihyeon, who had been looking at him, spoke as if entranced.
“Can I see you again?”
“Whatever, I won’t save you next time.”
“Yes, then I’ll make it so there’s no need for that.”
Kang Ihyeon brightly smiled and headed towards the dimensional rift, watching Rude mutter that he was a strange one.
A few months later, ‘Rude’, who seemed to have registered as an awakener, rose to the indisputable domestic ranking #1, and beyond that, world ranking #1.
And Kang Ihyeon, as if chasing after him, immediately ascended to the domestic ranking #2 spot.
From that day on, Rude was #1, and Kang Ihyeon was #2. Always, and forever.
[Touch the gear icon in the bottom right corner of the screen to move to the next chapter if you want.]
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Daily Life of a Scumbag Man Giving Birth (Female-dominant)
One-line summary: The way for a promiscuous scumbag man to atone for his sins is to let him get… pregnant.
Synopsis:
Meng Huan, a scumbag who has dated countless girlfriends, scammed countless women, transmigrates to a female-dominated country.
Day 1: Whether it’s female dominance or not doesn’t matter. The beauties here are passionate and amorous. Isn’t it easier to scam them than in modern times?
Day 2: After a night, Meng Huan discovers the differences in the female-dominated world. Men here actually have chastity locks and menstrual cycles. This hinders his ability to perform, damn it!
Day 3: What’s wrong with sleeping around? I don’t want you to marry me. I’m meant to be a playboy. I don’t care about male virtues… What? You want to drown me in a pig cage? Marry, I’ll marry!
Day N: Meng Huan inexplicably vomits and receives the shocking news of his life… He’s pregnant.