Somehow Familiar (2)

Contrary to Hyeonseong’s expectations, the owner of that strategy video was not someone she could dismiss as irrelevant.

“Damn it……”

After accessing the video platform, Hyeonseong played the recommended video featured on the main screen and ground her teeth.

The Yongmun-dong B-rank dungeon was the very one Hyeonseong had missed on the recruitment board a few days earlier. It had been a strategy team looking for a porter, and she had lost the chance by a hair.

At first, she played the video thinking coincidences like that just happened. But once the video started, it turned out the cameraman’s role in the strategy team was a porter.

‘Don’t tell me this bastard snatched it up?’

Confirming that fact made her feel as if a position that should have been hers had been stolen.

Of course, it would be a stretch to say it had truly been taken from her. It was a first-come, first-served position, after all.

Still, watching the cameraman clear the dungeon in the porter role inevitably stirred such petty feelings.

What made it worse was that the cameraman’s dungeon-clearing method closely reproduced the very strategy Hyeonseong had been idly thinking about herself. Given that, wasn’t it only natural for her to feel that way?

‘It’s not completely identical, but…….’

Naturally, it could not be exactly the same. Many of Hyeonseong’s strategies were built on the premise of having the Infinite Corridor skill.

As a result, the parts that could not be handled by Infinite Corridor’s abilities were replaced with other items or skills.

Even so, despite those differences, the core of the strategy was effectively the same.

Rather than bulldozing through with overwhelming power or perfect counters, it was a stingy, meticulous approach that made use of every available means.

That aspect was exactly the same as Hyeonseong’s own style.

‘……This isn’t just me feeling annoyed and imagining things, right?’

That doubt surfaced in Hyeonseong’s mind after she finished watching the entire video.

Lately, every time she tried to find a strategy team on the recruitment board, she kept missing out on good opportunities right in front of her eyes.

It could have been chalked up to bad luck. But Hyeonseong felt something more unsettling than that. Was it really possible to miss every single promising run in that manner, again and again?

‘……I’ll know after a few more days pass.’

With that thought in mind, Hyeonseong pressed the channel’s subscribe button. Whether it was just her imagination or not would become clear if she waited a few days.

And a few days later, Hyeonseong confirmed through the video channel that her unease had not been mere imagination.

Whenever a new video was uploaded to the channel, Hyeonseong checked it immediately. She always started with the title.

‘They’re all places I was about to poke at!’

Every single video was of a dungeon Hyeonseong had just barely missed out on.

She then played the videos to check the cameraman’s role and strategy. Every time, it was similar to the previous video: entering as a porter or gatherer and clearing the dungeon in a stingy, penny-pinching manner.

‘This is seriously pissing me off.’

Hyeonseong could not suppress her irritation. What made it even more irritating was that it was the kind of annoyance she could not complain about to anyone else.

If she said anything, wouldn’t it sound exactly like paranoia?

‘Who the hell is this guy, anyway?’

After watching the videos uploaded over several days, Hyeonseong decided to look into the channel owner’s identity.

In all the uploaded videos, the cameraman’s name and Awakened information had been cut out. But if she had joined that many strategy teams, at least one person should have leaked his information on an online community.

After all, he was the owner of a channel whose popularity had recently skyrocketed.

There was no way only one or two people would be curious about his identity. Someone greedy for attention was bound to have posted information somewhere.

‘I don’t need to look far. I’ll start with the comments.’

She skimmed through the video comments first. There was nothing useful in the top comments sorted by likes, so she immediately switched to sorting by newest.

‘Looks like his name is Kwon Seojin. Rank is…… probably A.’

By combing through recent comments—as if glued to the channel 24/7—she managed to gather some fragmentary information. As she did, a question arose.

‘What kind of trait does this guy have to be A-rank and still keep aiming for porter positions?’

Hyeonseong herself had no choice but to live as a porter despite being S-rank, given her stats and skills.

But judging from the videos, Kwon Seojin did not seem to be an odd case like Hyeonseong. His movements and physical abilities were squarely A-rank, and he used a variety of skills directly.

‘So no matter how you look at it, he doesn’t need to be doing porter work, yet he keeps going for porter slots.’

He would enter the least profitable porter position and then scatter items recklessly throughout the strategy. Anyone could tell it was a crazy act, like throwing money into thin air.

Hyeonseong could understand doing that herself, but for someone like that, there seemed to be no reason. It made no sense to her.

‘That’s about all I can get from the comments…….’

The comment section did not yield anything beyond fragmentary details. To find out more, she would need to dig through Awakened communities.

Hyeonseong logged into one of the Awakened communities she often browsed. As soon as she entered, she checked the best posts.

‘With that level of attention, there should be at least one post on the best list.’

She scanned the list quickly. Sure enough, the post she was looking for stood out immediately.

[Is the next K Strategy Log video going to be the Nangok-dong dungeon?]

The name Kwon Seojin did not appear in the title, but the abbreviated channel name—presumably referring to his channel—was there.

To be precise, the channel Kwon Seojin ran was blandly named “K’s Dungeon Strategy Log.”

Hyeonseong opened the post and quickly read through both the main text and the comments.

The poster claimed to have met Kwon Seojin at the dungeon they went to the day before. Only initials were used for the name, but given the mention of the channel, there was no chance it was anyone else.

Scrolling down revealed all kinds of idle chatter. Among the largely useless comments, there were a few worthwhile questions and answers.

‘……Not sure how useful this really is.’

Hyeonseong frowned after reading all the comments.

It wasn’t that she got nothing. For one, the inconsistent descriptions of Kwon Seojin’s appearance. That could happen if he had an item or skill that deceived people’s perception or appearance.

‘Only S-ranks are forced to publicize their face and personal info on the Interstellar Network. If you’re A-rank or below, you can hide your real face like that.’

From that, Hyeonseong could tell that Kwon Seojin was deliberately hiding his face for some reason.

Then there was the other piece of information. At the very least, he did not possess a normal swordsmanship-type trait.

As the poster said, with an ordinary swordsmanship trait, it was typical to struggle with other weapons. Even without such limitations, there was no reason to use so many different weapons.

‘Specializing in one thing is way more efficient. So why bother?’

Among Awakened traits, there were composite traits that combined two or three base traits. A simple example was the magic swordsman trait.

And such composite traits had a fatal weakness that anyone could easily guess.

‘It’s basically impossible to fully master all the traits you have.’

Thinking about it, it was obvious. A composite trait meant you had more than one trait to develop.

Even someone with a single trait took ages to hone it, so what about two or more?

‘That’s why even if you awaken a composite trait, most people focus on one as the main and develop the others only as auxiliary tools…….’

In the end, Hyeonseong could only furrow her brow again.

If the comments were true, Kwon Seojin was developing his abilities in an extremely inefficient way. Unless he had some twisted personal preference, there had to be a reason.

‘Restrictions tied to his trait or skills? Or maybe a Constellation quest?’

Those were the only plausible reasons for someone to act inefficiently from an outsider’s perspective.

‘……Though it’d be hilarious if he really were just some kind of freak.’

That speculation was not entirely useless.

If an otherwise perfectly fine A-rank insisted on such bizarre dungeon-clearing methods, what else could he be but a freak?

‘I should see if there’s any more useful info.’

Hyeonseong returned to the post list and searched for more posts about Kwon Seojin.

But no matter how much she dug, she could not find anything more detailed than what she had already seen. The information in other posts was all roughly the same.

‘If I want to know more than this…… do I have to meet him in person?’

There were a few closed-off Awakened communities, but she was not a member of any of them, and even if she were, there was no guarantee they would have the information she wanted.

Honestly, it would be faster to just hope to run into him by chance during a dungeon run.

‘No, wait. I don’t have to rely on chance to meet him, do I?’

Hyeonseong logged back into the video platform and entered Kwon Seojin’s channel to browse the video list.

‘This guy only does B-rank and A-rank dungeons. And almost always as a porter or gatherer.’

Combining the information from the video titles and content, a way to meet Kwon Seojin quickly came to mind.

‘I should ask Hyeonyeong to help with this.’

It was hard enough to secure a strategy team just by browsing the recruitment board. Even if she managed to snag a spot, there was no guarantee Kwon Seojin would apply to the same team.

‘But if I already have a team and post a recruitment ad…… that would raise the odds of running into him.’

When running A-rank or B-rank dungeons with Hyeonyeong’s guild members, she could pretend they were short a porter or gatherer and post a recruitment ad.

For now, that seemed like the best way to maximize the chance of encountering Kwon Seojin.

Having made up her mind, Hyeonseong immediately typed out a text message to Hyeonyeong. She explained the idea she had just thought of, and although she sounded puzzled, she replied that she should go ahead and do it.

‘Alright, got permission. I’ll put up a recruitment post.’

Hyeonseong put down the phone she had been holding the whole time. She had decided how to deal with the thing bothering her. Now it was time to prepare for the dungeon run scheduled for tomorrow.

After filling in all the necessary fields for the recruitment post, Hyeonseong did one final check before uploading.

‘Location, rank, time, conditions, number of people…… all set.’

With that, she pressed the upload button. A recruitment post seeking a gatherer was uploaded under the name of the Ten Thousand Swords Guild.

‘I’ve posted it, but the real question is whether he’ll bite.’

After waiting several days, Hyeonyeong’s guild managed to secure a chance to join an A-rank dungeon strategy. As soon as the schedule was set, Hyeonseong borrowed the Ten Thousand Swords Guild account from Hyeonyeong and wrote the gatherer recruitment post.

Up to that point, there had been no difficulty. The real concern was whether Kwon Seojin would respond to the post.

‘Now that I think about it, this plan feels kind of sloppy.’

So far, all the videos Kwon Seojin had uploaded showed him acting as a porter or gatherer in B-rank or A-rank dungeons.

But that did not guarantee he conducted all his hunter activities that way. Whether the videos represented everything or only a tiny fraction was something only he would know.

And even if he truly did operate exactly like in the videos, there was still a problem.

What if Kwon Seojin simply did not see the recruitment post in the first place?

‘……He’s human, after all. It’s not like he can monitor the recruitment board 24/7. I didn’t think of that.’

It was an oversight caused by how quickly she always snatched up recruitment posts.

‘Ah well, I’ve already gone this far.’

After a brief moment of hesitation, Hyeonseong shook her head. There were so few leads on Kwon Seojin that she could not come up with a better way to make contact.

‘I even thought about trying a direct invitation, but apparently he doesn’t accept those.’

As Kwon Seojin’s channel gained popularity, quite a few strategy teams had tried direct invitations.

But there were no stories of him accepting them—only endless accounts of rejections.

‘I would’ve tried anyway if direct invites were still open, but he closed even that yesterday or the day before. Anyway…….’

Her phone had been buzzing with notifications for a while now. Inquiries were flooding in about the recruitment post.

‘Guess it’s because the Ten Thousand Swords name is on it. They’re swarming in.’

Between Hyeonyeong’s personal reputation and the guild’s name value, the response was immediate.

‘But it doesn’t matter how hot the response is if the person I’m looking for isn’t here…… Huh? Wait.’

As Hyeonseong scrolled through the names of those who had sent inquiries, one name caught her eye: Kwon Seojin.

‘Is it really him? Or just someone with the same name?’

On a whim, she opened the message. Beneath the brief inquiry, the sender’s Awakened information was attached.

‘A-rank, and trait set to private…….’

In the message itself, the sender stated he had a swordsmanship-type trait, but the trait field linked to the Interstellar Network system was marked as private.

This recruitment board app was also a service provided by the Interstellar Network. As such, all Awakened information registered upon signing up was linked directly to the Network.

‘If nothing else, falsifying information registered on the Interstellar Network is extremely difficult. So between the rank, the disclosure settings, and the self-introduction, it really does seem like it’s actually him.’

The message also mentioned that he could bring a separate large-capacity bag for gathering materials. That sealed it—this was neither an impersonator nor a namesake.

Having made her judgment, Hyeonseong sent a reply to Kwon Seojin, informing him that he had been accepted as a gatherer. A message of thanks came back shortly after.

‘Well, I’ve managed to set up a meeting, at least.’

After changing the recruitment post status from open to closed, she sent replies to the remaining messages stating that recruitment was complete.

‘So now the problem is…… what do I actually do when I meet him?’

She switched the account used on the recruitment board back to her personal one and closed the app.

‘I got annoyed and just pushed ahead, but I didn’t think about what comes next.’

She had only been acting on the impulse of wanting to see what kind of guy he was, but now that the meeting was set, the next step was unclear. What exactly was she supposed to do when they met?

‘Hmm…… Maybe I’ll just keep some distance and observe him for now.’

It sounded irresponsible, but there was nothing else she could realistically do.

‘Alright, I should start getting ready for the dungeon run.’

Putting down her phone, she took out her hunter-only terminal to check the information the advance team had input.