‘Well, didn’t find anything of value, just like expected. At least the auction wasn’t all that bad.’ Victor said in his mind as he proceeded towards one of the exit places.historical

Unbeknownst to Victor, a new rumor had begun spreading about him around the underground scene, about the legend of Crow. To him, he was a bit confused why every guard and even others that attended the auction, people who were supposed to be big shots had began giving him some level of respect. Guards guide him towards the paths he already knew, and the big shots gave him the nod of respect when their eyes crossed. Victor couldn’t quite put his hand on it, but he chugged it down to Mark’s doing. It was all very possible that he had made it known that he was the one who supplied the most priced item that day. ‘I’ll have to talk to him about it later. He shouldn’t have done something like that.’ Victor said in his mind as he left through the teleportation mechanism and appeared in a familiar alley.

..

A day after the auction was held in the underground scene, the authorities seemed to have become very busy. It was as if they had received some kind of vital information that made their asses hot and unable to sit still.

“Hey you! Come over here and help me with this!”

“Blaize, get that document for me. ASAP.”_.

“Get ready boys! We..”

The entire place was bustling with many different things going on all at once, unlike normal. The man walking in couldn’t help but wonder what exactly was going on. For starters, this was not the place where squads were assembled, there’s a different section for that, and what was the old looking thing the other two were carrying? That thing looked like some pandora’s box lost in ages. What exactly caused all these? The man asked himself as he slowly walked through the rowdy department space trying to get to the office where his second in command would be.

As the man entered the office, he noticed that the people inside did not even register his presence, “hey! Can someone tell me what the fuck is going on here? Why those the entire place look like a fucking ant colony going to war?”

Hearing the gruff voice, the three people inside the office turned immediately to face the door where a burly man with rough beards and a muscular build stood. Seeing the man before them, they quickly straighten their backs and greet him, all in unison “President Great Sir!” to which he just waved a hand and from his eyes they could tell he wanted answers fast.

Seeing the eyes that threatened to feast on him, the second in command who compared to the president was still a young man in his early thirties spoke swiftly. “Sir, a possible suspect has been found.” That was all his second in command needed to say, no further explanation was needed.

“So? Who is it? Show me.” The one case that had been troubling the entire Hunter Association for what seemed like an eternity was the one case where many hunters disappeared in some dungeons, and if anything was to cause such commotion, it would be that one. Nothing else.

“Sir.” The lady standing a bit behind the second in command spoke, to which the president gave permission to talk. “We got the information from one of our informants, and the suspect’s name is Crow, at least that is what he is known as. He is said to be a high levelled hunter and is estimated to be at least S rank. But as of now we don’t have any pictures of him, but we were provided with a means to track him.” The lady said.

“Good, putting out the 50 million Zen bounty was worth it. I was thinking we would have to increase the amount.” The president spoke, with a small smile appearing on his face.

(A/N: I don’t know if I’ve mentioned the currency used in this world yet. If I have, disregard the previous one. The official currency here is Zen, worldwide.)

“But that name..” The expression on the man’s face changed slightly into a more serious one.

“Yes sir, We also suspect the same thing” The lady responded with a little frown on her face as everybody in the room now wore an even more serious face than they had a second ago.

The made up name Victor chose on the fly when asked to provide his name had actually turned out to be an infamous one in this world. Of course he didn’t know about this, and wasn’t even aware of the bounty that the association had placed on his head. At this moment, he was the most wanted man in the entire city. Before, the association had no description of how he looked or what his name was, and just placed a notice here and there for anyone that had any information to report to them and if the suspect reported was the person they were looking for, they that person would become a very rich man or woman over night. Now that they had a description and a name, it was way easier. This time the price tag was one million, and every single low life in the city was out to get Victor.

Mark and his brother had heard about this, but then there was no way for them to contact Victor. Now of all times, he hadn’t even appeared in the underground market, which also made them think he had gone into hiding, and that lessened their worries. Honestly, they just knew the guy and had no reason to be all jumpy about the topic, but then after hearing his name, Mark knew that such a legend would not go down so easily, and helping him now in his time of need would greatly help their relationship, which started out on the wrong side of the track.

.

It had been days, maybe even approaching a week since Victor left to hunt in more powerful dungeons he had found, and as though destiny, he managed to find one dungeon which was almost at the level of the one he was birth in, and then there was a gate not too far off. He had never been in a gate before, so he could only imagine how different the experience would be. He had also used this time to check the results of his experiment, and to say the least, it went according to plan.

The dungeon Victor found had 30 floors, and from it he got a new subordinate and even collected some evolution materials, something that seemed to have been scarce these days. The gate, which was the most anticipated experience he wanted to have was much more different, just like he expected. Really, if he had a working heart, it would be beating with much excitement the moment he entered the gate. To put it simply, it was a different world entirely.

If he had to describe it, he would say that it was like a small part was cut from another world and was turned into gate. He came to this conclusion after seeing end of the gate where there were boundaries to stop one from going further. It was like facing space at the end of these boundaries as he could very much compare the experience with staring at a game’s skybox, something similar.

Unlike the dungeon where he only needed to defeat the final boss for the dungeon to close, in the gate it was different. He had to find the core of the core of gate and destroy it, and after doing that a portal would open where the core was and through it he could leave the gate. Also, the creatures in the gate didn’t respawn like in the dungeons, once killed that was it. The only thing was that gates were more unpredictable.

With a dungeon, it was always a cave setting for the most part, and if it changed much it would be like some underground pathway built with stones and all. One could go into a dungeon an be prepared for at least some things he would expect. Now Imagine Victor’s surprise when he entered the gate and found himself in a snowy forest.. Thank God he had resistance to cold, if not things would have gotten though; it wasn’t like he could live the gate after entering like the dungeons.

He didn’t even bother summoning his legion, and just did a one man army through the whole thing. As for his experiment, the first one failed, or at least didn’t go exactly how he wanted it to, while the second one was a complete success.

After evolving Konda using Human evolution material, the snake monster gained some level of intelligence, but it was only enough to classify it as an ancient barbaric specie that had just started evolving and developing some sense of basic human civilization. (Perhaps this is how much advanced races like aliens look at humans.. so sad. Well that’s for those that believe in aliens.)

The second experiment where Victor fused two of his legion was the bomb! If he had to classify the creature that was birthed from his fusion, he would refer to it as a kind of Weretiger. It had all the animalistic features of Gurok, though it stood on two legs and had more human limbs, but it was just as smart as a human.

The creature was a completely different being from Gurok and the human. If Victor wanted to simplify it, he would call it similar to the fusion that happens in an anime he used to watch when he was still on earth, Dragon Ball. A totally new being was created and he even had to grant it a new name. Victor went with Gurok in the end. To him, there was no need to over simplify things.

The new Gurok had an increased level higher than both of his former selves, but it wasn’t too much, just a little. As for his skills, Victor was very much pleased to see that he retained all of them, and some even evolved a little to be stronger.

With this, Victor had developed a foundation for his next experiment, as he liked to call it, and to say the least, he was very eager to try out his idea. As for Konda, Victor was not done yet. He thought of a possible way to make the creature better, so he was also going to be experimenting on her.

Really, there was absolutely no reason for him to be doing all these, but right now there wasn’t much he could do to somehow move his dead mind. Doing something like this seemed to create the tiniest bit of excitement deep in his soul, so it was like a fun thing in a way.

Even as his emotions were not as bottled up as they used to be, they were still very much suppressed.

After five days of constant grinding, Victor finally returned to the city. Of course, there was no need for him to walk all the way back, as with his MAX level teleportation skills, appearing right in his own living room from whatever distance was as easy as taking a shit.

If only someone had told him about what was going on in the city..