I Stole the Number One Ranker's Soul

I felt like bowing in every direction to a god I did not believe in.

Thank you. Thank you so much.

You didn’t abandon me.

I don’t think you’ve ever even glanced at me, but thank you so much.

With a trembling heart, I opened the status window.

I just awakened, but I already knew how to do it.

It was common sense because every evening on TV, rankers would come out and rookie hunters and everything would appear in shows like ‘This Month’s Hunter’ to tell us about their awakening experience.

Ba-dump, ba-dump, my heart fluttered as I faced my awakening status……

It was appalling.

No, wait.

What’s this?

Doesn’t your physical strength increase when you awaken?

I thought I’d be able to easily lift a car with one hand.

[–Stats–]

[No stats bonus.]

[–Skill–]

[F-Rank, 〈Collect〉(Active)]

[Hidden, 〈Nothing, Something〉(Passive)]

Is this it? Is this all?

Each awakener has slightly different stats but I swear I have never seen such a shabby and simple stat window.

And why don’t I have any stat weight?

What the– give it back, my stats.

No.

No, there must be something else.

This can’t be it.

Yeah, I’m certain it said hidden skill. It’s really good to have a hidden skill.

Let’s stay calm, the explanation……

[Hidden 〈Nothing, Something〉(Passive)]

[Details: The best collection is always possible.]

Excuse me? Is this all? I’d like to know more details.

Well, do I have any combat abilities that can help me in my current situation?

I’m asking if the best thing I can do with my awakened abilities is pulling out grass.

Hidden was what it said.

It said hidden!

For a moment, I was lost about what to do so I hit my head against the wall, forgetting where I currently was.

What am I supposed to do with this?

Pluck out the best grass, season myself as if they were herbs and let myself get deliciously eaten by the chungwang?

Wait, did I awaken as a collector because I pulled out grass?

So if I lunged at the chungwang that was passing by, I could’ve awakened as a combater?

The sudden realization made me even more frustrated.

If only I hadn’t rashly plucked grass!

Damn it!

Even if I gained a hidden skill, it was trash.

Without luck, there’s nothing I can do.

Anyhow, it’s all hopeless now.

I’ll search for a poisonous plant in my vicinity so that I can die as comfortably and relaxed as possible.

Feeling like crying, I activated my only skill, collect.

At the same time, a delicate golden glow fogged my hands.

This was something I actually saw on TV a lot.

In order to obtain items from the monster you attacked, you need to use this skill to collect them.

That way, you can acquire mana stones or rare items in good condition.

This was a skill so basic there was no one who didn’t have it.

Wow, I awakened but all I have is one basic skill.

I can’t even talk about this anywhere.

Anyway, it’s amazing to be able to use what I saw on TV with my own hands.

Moving on, I put my hand on evitanis’ stem and the entire plant along with its roots disappeared with a crunch sound.

Unlike the evitanis from before, which had its stem bent when I tried to rip it out, the one in my inventory was clean, intact and perfectly mended.

Petals, stem, leaves, root and evitanis’ core.

Like this, they were sorted into five different items in my inventory……

Wait, evitanis’ core?

This was very rare and expensive.

If you ask what is the most valuable byproduct you can get from a dungeon, everyone will answer mana stone.

Mana stones are something you can get by hunting monsters and they drop very occasionally, they can be used for a variety of purposes so it’s difficult to just list one.

And if monsters have mana stones.

The non-combat living creatures in dungeons have cores.

Evitanis’ core was so rare you have a chance of getting one in 1000 evitanis roots.

The price was at least 50 million won.

Not just evitanis, but the core of about all plants were that price.

Even though it was very expensive, there were few of them to sell so the core often sold out.

I couldn’t believe it so I pulled out evitanis’ core from my inventory.

[Evitanis’ core (Rank: S)]

What do you mean, S-Rank?

Up until now, the best core item in the market was A-Rank.

And just a D-Rank cost 50 million.

Woah, oh my god.

My hands are holding a jackpot. Oh my god.

Now my life is blossoming.

If I take this and sell it well, I can quit the company right away.

If I get out……

I was excited for a moment, but after recalling my reality I was disappointed again.

Whether it’s a core or something else, what’s even the point.

What’s the use of becoming a billionaire?! In this place where I don’t know when I’ll die?!

I was disappointed for a while, but in the end, what I could do was fixed.

Evitanis and unidentified plants all in front of me.

Let’s collect them.

The only skill I have is collecting, so what else can I do? I reached out to a plant next to evitanis.

It looked like a bluish-violet mugwort. If I saw something like this in the wild, it’d 100% be poisonous.

Now, let’s use the collection skill.

Then, four items entered my inventory.

Pimtofis’ leaf, pimtofis’ stem, pimtofis’ root, pimtofis’ core.

Wait, core again?

Wasn’t acquiring evitanis’ core the result of raking all of my luck in this world before I die?

Are cores this easy to get?

I opened the skill description window again.

[Hidden 〈Nothing, Something〉(Passive)]

[Details: The best collection is always possible.]

The best collection.

The best collection, it said.

No way, this……

At that moment, I had a hunch.

If I’m right, then the hidden skill was much greater than I thought.

I activated the collecting skill and collected the countless evitanis’ in front of me.

The result was as I expected.

[Evitanis’ core(Rank: S)×22]

[Evitanis’ root(Rank: A)×22]

[Evitanis’ petals(Rank: A)×22]

[Evitanis’ stem(Rank: A)×22]

[Evitanis’ leaf(Rank: A)×22]

When I checked my inventory, I felt goosebumps run down my spine.

The core, which was said to appear with a 1 in 1000 chance, appeared 22 times when I collected it with a 100% rate.

It was only possible by thoroughly scouring a dungeon for a few days to pluck out 1000 evitanis’.

That’s why cores were expensive.

However, with this hidden skill, the only skill I have, the word ‘rare item’ doesn’t even exist.

Whatever it is, I can get it with a 100% chance.

Clank, clank.

My body, which was shaking with joy, froze.

My flushed cheeks cooled down and my happiness disappeared as if someone had washed it away.

Instead, fear appeared.

I heard the faraway chungwang’s footsteps.

I hastily hid behind a rock.

The sound of regular steps, which I’ve already heard many times, slowly approached.

So far, I was able to survive without getting caught, but there was no guarantee I’d survive again.

If only I had awakened as a combat hunter, I wouldn’t need to hide like this.

Well, even if I awakened as a combat hunter, there’s no guarantee I’ll fight well right off the bat so I might’ve died at the same time I awakened.

While holding my breath, the chungwang grazed by the rock I was hiding behind and slowly entered a passage of the dungeon.

Fortunately, it seems like I wasn’t fated to die now.

After having overcome my crisis, hunger and a sense of listlessness surged in.

Right.

Now that I think of it, I was hungry so I plucked some grass to find something to eat and then awakened.

I took out evitanis’ leaves from my inventory, which contained its petals and stems, and began to chew them.

The taste was the worst.

It was like chewing a permission leaf.

It’d be really nice if there was something like a berry.

Berry.

I took out evitanis’ core from my inventory.

The core was about the size of a cherry and emitted a delicate light.

The texture was hard like a mandarin.

I’ll die anyway, so should I eat one?

I threw a core worth at least 50 million won into my mouth.

It had a fresh scent and a sweet taste that was hard to describe and felt a little astringent.

Like a mango with lots of water?

Anyhow, the texture was better than the leaves.

However, I’m sure of it. It’s not expensive because of its taste.

I was rummaging through my inventory because I wanted to eat some more before a notification window popped up in front of my eyes.

[Agility has been temporarily increased by 1 due to the ingestion of evitanis’ core.]

That’s why it’s expensive!

I knew evitanis’ core was expensive but I wasn’t sure of the exact reason why.

I only vaguely knew it was used as a material item in the production of some products.

A production hunter might know more about it, but the hunters I’m in charge of are mostly combat hunters……

Anyway, I just ate it without fear and suddenly I’m more agile. If I use this to make a stat increase potion, will it be more efficient?

If I make a potion, will it go up by 10?

I opened the status window.

[–Stats–]

[Agility 0+1 (+1 Evitanis’ core – 4 minutes 59 seconds remaining)]

Agility stats, which weren’t there earlier, were added.

The time limit looked to be 5 minutes.

It was shorter than I thought.

Just in case, I ate one more and my agility increased by 1.

The stats were applied by overlapping each other.

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[–Abilities–]

[Agility 0+2 (+2 Evitanis’ core – 4 minutes 59 seconds remaining)]

Unfortunately, eating multiple didn’t increase the time limit.

But eating another core seemed to have reset the time limit to 5 minutes again.

The plan I was thinking of vaguely started becoming concrete.