Chapter 10: THE PRELIMINARY LICENSE
The massive reinforced steel doors slowly ground open, scraping against the concrete floor with a deafening metallic screech.
Inside the dark abyss of the tunnel, two glowing, crimson eyes snapped open. A hot, foul draft blew out from the darkness, carrying the intense smell of wet dirt, rotting copper, and raw, violent monster mana.
The smile on every applicant’s face instantly disappeared. The heavy atmosphere pressed down on the room like a physical weight, making several teenagers step backward in pure panic. Even the arrogant young man from the reception hall felt his hands tremble as he clutched his expensive academy sword.
A shadow shifted within the dark tunnel. Then, the beast lunged out into the blinding floodlights of the arena. It was a low-grade mutated subterranean hound, but it looked far more terrifying than the standard versions shown in textbooks. The creature stood over six feet tall at the shoulder, its muscular body covered in thick, overlapping obsidian armor plates that rippled with dark purple energy veins.
"Growl...!"
The hound let out a deep, vibrating roar that caused the dust on the floor to dance wildly.
"This is the final test," Victor Hale’s voice boomed over the arena loudspeakers, completely cold and demanding.
"Combat Aptitude and Judgment. The beast before you is a real monster captured from a localized Rift. You will enter the arena one by one to demonstrate your ability to survive. First candidate, step forward."
The arrogant young man was called first. He swallowed hard, trying to force a confident smirk onto his face as he stepped across the red perimeter line.
"Don’t worry," he muttered loudly, mostly trying to convince himself. "It’s just a low-grade beast. My family sponsored my D-Rank fire affinity gear. This thing is nothing."
He drew his glowing blade, launching a fiery slash toward the monster’s front legs.
But he was too slow. Far too slow.
The mutated hound didn’t move like a normal beast. It twisted its heavy body with terrifying speed, completely ignoring the fire magic as its armored shoulder slammed violently into the young man’s chest.
BANG.
The sound of shattering armor echoed through the hall. The arrogant applicant let out a sharp gasp as the sheer kinetic force lifted him off his feet, sending him flying across the concrete arena floor.
He hit the ground hard, rolling several times before landing flat on his back near a shattered concrete pillar. His expensive sword clattered away uselessly. His face turned completely pale, his eyes wide with absolute terror as he stared blankly at the high ceiling, his entire body trembling from pure shock.
The monster growled, turning its massive head toward the fallen teenager, its jaw opening to reveal rows of jagged, serrated fangs.
"Next candidate, step in!" Victor Hale shouted from the observation deck, his hand hovering over the emergency containment matrix trigger. He wanted to see who would run and who would fight.
Before anyone else could even move, Noah Kurtz stepped calmly across the red line.
His dark coat shifted slightly in the drafty air as he walked toward the center of the arena, his movements smooth and unhurried. His messy black hair fell loosely over his gray eyes, hiding the deep, ancient calm that rested within them.
The remaining applicants watched him in absolute, breathless silence.
"Is he crazy?" someone whispered in the back.
"He’s an F-Rank! He doesn’t even have armor!" another shouted.
Noah ignored the voices completely. He didn’t pull a glowing magical weapon or call upon elemental elements. He simply reached into his coat pocket and slid out a cheap, steel utility knife that cost less than ten credits at a local convenience store.
The blade was small. Toothpick compared to the beast’s massive form.
The mutated hound noticed the new prey. It turned away from the trembling blond applicant, its crimson eyes locking instantly onto Noah’s lean, athletic build. With a fierce snarl, the beast dug its massive claws into the concrete, tearing the floor like soft clay as it charged forward with terrifying speed.
To the ordinary eye, the monster was just a blurry mass of teeth and armor.
But to Noah, the entire world suddenly slowed down.
Deep within his consciousness, the Memory Cabinet was working at maximum efficiency. The instincts he had inherited from the Basic Physical Postures and The Ash-Walker tier lit up his mind like a detailed combat blueprint.
He didn’t see a giant monster. He saw structural fracture points. He saw shifting balance lines.
Noah didn’t panic. He didn’t even draw upon the raw mana drifting through the air. Instead, he drew a deep, rhythmic breath, guiding the tiny, warm thread of cultivated Ki from the base of his spine directly into his right arm and feet.
The monster leapt, its jaws wide open, aiming straight for Noah’s throat.
Circulate.
Noah shifted his left foot backward by a mere three inches. It was a minimalist, elegant movement that looked completely effortless, yet it perfectly bypassed the trajectory of the beast’s attack.
The massive jaw snapped shut on empty air right next to his ear.
At that exact microsecond, Noah moved his right hand. He didn’t use brute force. He didn’t try to hack through the thick obsidian plates covering the hound’s skull.
He slid the cheap steel utility knife forward in a precise, geometric angle, slipping the small blade perfectly through the narrow, unarmored seam right beneath the monster’s lower jaw.
Puch.
A faint current of invisible Ki traveled from his palm, through the steel, and directly into the beast’s core neural pathway.
It was a single, fluid motion that left absolutely zero room for struggle.
The mutated subterranean hound froze instantly mid-air. The crimson light in its eyes flickered violently before dying out completely. Its massive, heavy body lost all momentum, crashing heavily into the concrete floor behind Noah and sliding several feet before coming to a complete, motionless halt.
Dark, sizzling monster blood slowly pooled onto the cracked asphalt from its throat.
Noah didn’t turn back to look at the dead beast. He didn’t look at the stunned applicants whispering in the stands. He simply pulled a clean cloth from his pocket, calmly wiping the dark stain from his utility knife before sliding the weapon back into his pocket.
The tiny thread of cultivated Ki slowly completed its loop, returning to a calm, dormant state beneath his skin.
DING.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[Preliminary Hunter Exam Concluded]
[Evaluation Results Matrix Generated]
Physical Assessment: Passed (Exceeded)
Combat Aptitude: Passed (Flawless)
Judgment Evaluation: Passed (Optimal)
[Final Status: Preliminary License Approved]
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
The silver system text floated quietly before Noah’s eyes, glowing faintly against the dark background of the arena before slowly fading away into glowing particles of light.