Tower... a sky-touching massive building clad in a dark aura that mysteriously appeared in this world many years ago.
A place where monsters run rampant, from the very first floor to the unknown floors where humans have never set foot.
Its emergence was simply a catastrophe.
A never-imaged disaster that took everyone by surprise, resulting in the demise of countless humans.
But during that grave moment, a ray of hope opened up in front of a few chosen individuals —the humans who had awakened certain abilities, later known as hunters.
Their abilities were ranked from F to S; no one appeared who had an ability that was graded higher than S.
Simply enough, those with lower rank abilities were weakest, who could only kill a few low rank beasts, while the ones with high ranks were revered as kings and queens.
"You are completely useless, can't even do a simple thing? You said you had an ability."
But a coin always has two sides. If there are kings then there must be losers too.
"You are fired. Get the fuck out of my store."
Even among the awakeners, there was one particular loser, who did awaken but what it was, he himself did not know.
It was none other than Evan. A 17-year-old guy who had awakened a year ago, but never knew what his ability was, nor did he know its grade.
Not only that, but something always hindered him from even levelling up, so he remained like a normal human even though he was technically supposed to be a hunter.
His cold and tired eyes stared down at the ugly, fat pig that was sitting on a chair before him; his eyes also wandered towards the woman who was clearly rubbing her body on that pig.
It wasn't hard to deduce what was happening here.
Evan was getting fired and was being replaced.
"What are you looking at brat? Are you going to beat me? A hunter attacking a civilian... You know what can happen to you, right?"
This was the only reason which had stopped Evan from doing anything.
It wasn't that a hunter had never attacked a civilian, they do, and nobody will do anything to the hunter... but that's when you are strong.
'Fucking hell... even a fat fuck like him can boss me around, what's even the point of calling myself an awakener?'
Evan turned around, anger still remaining inside his heart as he walked out of the store.
'Just you wait... the moment I get to know my ability... You will pay for this.'
But the reality was... he does not have any idea how to make it happen.
He glanced at his palm, and the only thing he could feel was powerless.
"Status." He murmured.
A blue translucent screen appeared before him with his name and his stats in display.
Among them, in the section of ability, there was the name of his ability... Unknown.
Yep, that was its name. An unranked ability. Because of that, he was neither able to get a rank as a hunter, nor was he able to level up.
"Will I remain this pathetic forever? Just one... just once, if I get to level up like others..."
He truly wished for that. Right now, if someone asks him for his soul to get the ability level up like others... he won't hesitate to take it.
"Sigh... let's go home now."
But sadly, there wasn't anything like that happening.
He walked through the crossway, people passing by him in the fairly crowded area, then suddenly,
Ding~
[Congratulations, the 50th floor of the tower has been cleared.]
A message rang inside the heads of everyone who lived on this planet.
The years-long effort finally paid off, the 50th floor of the tower... the hardest one to clear till now was finally cleared.
Everyone rejoiced and cheered when they got the message, but not Evan.
There was nothing for him to be happy about.
'And I stayed at the furthest back again...'
This message was like a mockery to him, who couldn't even kill a low-level goblin.
As he was grimacing at his powerlessness, another sound appeared from the direction of the tower.
*Boom*
The sound of something getting blown up, followed by the noise, everyone looked in the direction of the tower and from that direction, they saw two small figures flying away from the tower.
'Hunters?'
The two figures appeared closer and closer to Evan...
'Oh fuck...'
He cursed inside his head and moved away from this place.
Getting involved in a battle between hunters is the most dumb thing anyone can do, unless you are trying to get yourself killed.
The people around also ran away from this place, but some of them were a bit too late and were affected by this battle.
Evan also barely escaped and hid at a place that was close enough to see the battle and far enough to not get involved.
He watched closely... the battle of the hunters whose strength was unfathomable.
He didn't know why they were fighting, but from the shock waves that he felt, it was clear that they were no ordinary hunters; they might even be the S-rank hunters, the undeniable kings of this world.
As he watched more, his eyes locked onto a dark pearl in the hands of one of the hunters.
He did not know why, but he felt as if he knew what that was, as if the pearl was calling for him.
As his thoughts raced to figure out why he felt that, a notification popped up on his system screen.
Ding~
[A fragment of the unknown is detected nearby.]
This was the first time his system had ever done anything. Besides showing him his stats, it did nothing else.
'Fragment of the unknown...'
With the notification from the system, he knew why he felt familiar with the pearl just now. It was related to him, at least to his ability that remained unknown.
'If I can get that, then maybe I can...'
A ray of hope appeared before him, a chance that he had been looking for years was now before him, but the problem was... he was a nobody, and the ones before him were the strongest beings of this world.
'No...'
But before he could think of something to get his hands on that pearl... he saw the attacks from the hunters coming in his direction.
Their attack destroyed everything on their way and hit the area where Evan was hiding.
Result?
He was blown back from the attack, slamming hard on the concrete wall behind him.
He could feel every bone inside his body was crushed.
Blood tickled down from his body, forming a small pool beneath him.
'Just a shockwave of attack and I... is this the power of S rank hunters~?'
He couldn't open his mouth, and even his thoughts were slowed down because of the heavy injury.
'Am I going to die here... right after I saw a hope to get stronger?'
The hope that he saw just now seemed to have been shattered right there. He was on the brink of death even before he could see his growth.
Drowned in despair, he pledged in his heart... if he ever got a second chance, he wouldn't stop until he reached the sky where no one could even touch his might.
Then, as if the mother luck herself had heard his wish, another notification popped up before him.
Ding~
[The host is in contact with the fragment of unknown.]
[Do you wish to merge the fragment?]
[Yes / No.]
'What?'
He couldn't understand what had happened here, nor could he move his body to see the pearl which had rolled towards him after the attack just now.
He did not think for long and said "Yes".
He did not care if this was a good thing or a bad; if he could take a chance now, he would do it.
No matter what.
[Answer confirmed.]
[Fusing the fragment of 'Vessel' into the host's body.]
[Restricted!]
[The body of the host is severely damaged.]
[Searching for a suitable body for the host... suitable candidate found.]
[Asking to confirm the process of transmigration.]
[...]
[It is confirmed that the host is in no state to answer.]
[To protect the host, the process of transmigration has been confirmed.]
[Transmigrating the soul of the host to the suitable candidate.]
[Transmigration successful.]
***
Thanks for reading.