Day 33. Eight days until the Gate Break.
The Hunter Association's database was more secure than Soo-hyun expected, but not secure enough to stop someone who'd spent five years as an SSS-Rank hunter with clearance to access classified dungeon intelligence.
He sat in the abandoned storage building at 3 AM, his laptop screen casting blue light across his face as line after line of encrypted data scrolled past. Director Choi wanted this building cleaned by next week, but for now, it was still his sanctuary.
*Come on*, he thought, fingers flying across the keyboard. *Show me what you're hiding.*
The mana fluctuation reports were being classified as "routine monitoring" in public announcements. But the internal Hunter Association memos told a different story:
**[CONFIDENTIAL - S-RANK CLEARANCE REQUIRED]**
**Re: Gwanak District Dungeon Complex - Anomalous Activity**
**Date: Day 28**
**Reporting Officer: Chief Inspector Han Jae-won**
*Mana density readings in Dungeon C-47 (scheduled for Seoul Hunter Academy practical training) have increased 23% over baseline in the past seven days. Pattern analysis suggests potential rank evolution from C to B-rank within 2-3 weeks.*
*Recommendation: Postpone all scheduled civilian and training activities until stability confirmed.*
*Status: PENDING REVIEW*
Soo-hyun's blood ran cold. Day 28. That was five days ago. And the academy's dungeon practical was still scheduled for Day 41—right in the middle of the projected evolution window.
He clicked through to the follow-up reports:
**[Day 30 Update]**
*Mana density increase now at 31% above baseline. Faster than projected. Recommend immediate dungeon closure and B-Rank suppression team deployment.*
**[Day 31 Update]**
*Association Director overruled closure recommendation. Cited: "Economic impact concerns and lack of immediate threat evidence." Dungeon remains open for scheduled activities. Monitoring continues.*
**[Day 32 Update - URGENT]**
*Mana density spike to 47% above baseline. New pattern detected—possible spatial distortion forming. This is NOT a standard rank evolution. Request immediate—*
The report ended abruptly. No Day 33 update. No resolution. Just... nothing.
Soo-hyun leaned back, his mind racing. This wasn't just a rank evolution. Spatial distortion meant something was trying to breach from the other side. A Gate Break, but not the natural kind that happened when mana accumulated. This was forced. Deliberate.
He'd seen this pattern once before, twenty years ago in his original timeline.
Right before a Demon Lord created an artificial gate to bypass Earth's natural defenses.
*No*, he thought. *That's impossible. The Demon Lords don't attack for another ten years. Unless...*
Unless his interference had changed more than just small events. Unless by saving one student and altering one timeline, he'd somehow accelerated the entire invasion schedule.
The butterfly effect wasn't creating ripples. It was creating a tsunami.
His System window flickered to life, red text filling his vision:
**[CRITICAL ALERT]**
**[Timeline Corruption Detected]**
**[Your actions have created a paradox cascade]**
**[Original Timeline: 10 years until Second Cataclysm]**
**[Current Timeline: Partial breach detected - Minor Demon Lord attempting early manifestation]**
**[Threat Level: Demon Lord Rank 72 - "The Weakest"]**
**[Estimated Power: Low B-Rank equivalent]**
**[Target: Seoul Hunter Academy]**
**[Reason: Detected anomalous mana signature - You]**
Soo-hyun's hands clenched into fists. Of course. He was using his knowledge and experience to train Sera, and even with his stats sealed, his mana signature still carried traces of his SSS-Rank power. He'd been so careful to hide his identity from humans that he'd forgotten demons could sense things humans couldn't.
His presence had attracted attention from the other side.
And now a Demon Lord—even the weakest one—was trying to breach early specifically to eliminate him before he could interfere with their plans.
**[QUEST UPDATE - CRITICAL]**
**[New Objective: Survive the Demon Lord's Assassination Attempt]**
**[Secondary Objective: Prevent Class F casualties during breach]**
**[Tertiary Objective: Kill the Demon Lord without revealing your identity]**
**[Difficulty: EXTREME]**
**[Failure Penalty: Your death + Timeline collapse + Humanity extinct in 3 months]**
**[Success Reward: Timeline stabilization + Guardian's Arsenal unlocked]**
**[Time Until Breach: 8 days, 4 hours, 17 minutes]**
Eight days. The dungeon practical was scheduled for Day 41, but the Demon Lord would breach on Day 41 specifically because that's when Soo-hyun's "student"—the anomaly he'd created—would be in the dungeon.
The demon was targeting Sera to draw him out.
*Clever*, Soo-hyun admitted grudgingly. Demons were many things, but stupid wasn't one of them.
He closed his laptop and stared at the dark ceiling of the storage building. This changed everything. The simple plan of "train Sera to survive a C-Rank incident" had just become "stop a Demon Lord assassination attempt while protecting F-Rank students and maintaining cover as a janitor."
The absolute worst-case scenario he could imagine.
And he had eight days to prepare.
---
Day 34. Seven days until the breach.
Soo-hyun needed help, but asking for help meant revealing himself. Unacceptable.
So instead, he'd do what he'd always done: work alone and improvise.
First priority: equipment. Sera needed proper combat gear, not the training equipment Class F students were issued. But requisitioning advanced equipment would raise questions.
Solution: the academy's "lost and found" storage.
Every year, students lost or abandoned equipment. Most of it sat in storage, forgotten. Technically, it was supposed to be returned to students or donated. Practically, it collected dust because processing it was tedious work nobody wanted to do.
Soo-hyun had access to that storage as part of his janitorial duties.
At 4 AM, he entered the storage room and began cataloging items with actual value:
- One B-Rank mana crystal, partially depleted (student probably thought it was fully empty)
- Three decent quality combat knives
- A protective vest rated for C-Rank impacts (small tear, easily repaired)
- Various low-level potions (minor healing, stamina recovery)
- One interesting find: a damaged focus artifact that enhanced mana control
He "accidentally" set these items aside while "cleaning and organizing" the storage room. Then "discovered" them during inventory and filed a report recommending they be "repurposed for student use in upcoming practical training."
Director Choi approved the request without even looking at it. "Yeah, sure, whatever. Class F can use the hand-me-downs."
Perfect.
Soo-hyun would make sure Sera "found" these items strategically placed where she'd practice. A damaged vest left in the training room. A knife "accidentally" left on a bench. Each item with a small note in places only she would look:
*"Equipment appears functional. Recommend testing. - Maintenance"*
Not illegal. Not unauthorized. Just a helpful janitor making sure functional equipment didn't go to waste.
Second priority: intelligence. He needed to know exactly when and where the breach would occur in the dungeon.
He couldn't access more Hunter Association databases without risking detection, but he could do something else: physical reconnaissance.
That night, he left the academy and headed to Gwanak District.
---
The C-Rank dungeon entrance looked innocuous—a shimmering portal in an alley behind an abandoned convenience store, surrounded by Hunter Association monitoring equipment and warning signs.
Soo-hyun watched from a nearby rooftop, his enhanced perception picking up details normal observers would miss. The mana distortion around the portal was subtle but present. Like heat shimmer, except it was reality itself wavering.
Spatial instability. Definitely breach preparation.
A Hunter Association patrol passed by—two C-Rank hunters doing routine monitoring. They checked their equipment, logged their readings, and moved on. Bored. Complacent.
They had no idea what was coming.
Soo-hyun pulled out a device he'd constructed from spare parts and academy equipment—a makeshift mana frequency analyzer. Nothing fancy, but it would let him measure the distortion patterns.
He took readings from multiple angles, building a profile of the breach location. The pattern was clear: the breach would occur approximately 300 meters inside the dungeon, in what the academy's dungeon maps labeled as "Safe Zone Beta"—the exact location where Class F students would be resting during their practical.
*Of course it is*, Soo-hyun thought bitterly. *Maximum casualties. Maximum chaos. Maximum chance of drawing me out.*
The Demon Lord wasn't just trying to kill him. It was trying to force him to reveal his power by creating a situation where only someone at SSS-Rank could save everyone.
A trap, basically.
And he was going to walk right into it because the alternative was letting students die.
**[ANALYSIS COMPLETE]**
**[Breach Prediction Refined]**
**[Location: Dungeon C-47, Safe Zone Beta, 300m depth]**
**[Time: Day 41, approximately 2:30 PM]**
**[Demon Lord: Rank 72 - Malgrin the Corruptor]**
**[Specialty: Mental attacks, fear aura, corruption magic]**
**[Known Weaknesses: Physical attacks, holy magic, direct confrontation]**
**[Estimated Power: B-Rank peak, approaching A-Rank]**
Malgrin. Soo-hyun remembered that name. In his original timeline, Malgrin had been one of the first casualties of the demon invasion—killed by an S-Rank hunter during the opening battles.
But that was ten years from now, with proper preparation and S-Rank hunters ready for combat.
Here and now, with his stats sealed and no backup, Malgrin was a serious threat.
Soo-hyun needed an edge. Something Malgrin wouldn't expect.
He pulled up his mental inventory of techniques he could still use despite his sealed stats. Most of his SSS-Rank abilities required massive mana output he no longer had access to. But some techniques didn't rely on raw power—they relied on precision, knowledge, and experience.
*The Heavenly Dragon's Sealing Strike*, for example. A technique that disrupted mana flow in targets. Originally designed for SSS-Rank combat against demon lords, but the principle worked at any level if you knew exactly where to strike.
Against Malgrin's corruption magic, it might just work.
He had seven days to remaster a technique he hadn't used in years, with a fraction of his original power.
*Challenge accepted*, he thought, and disappeared into the Seoul night to find a place to train without being noticed.
---
Day 36. Five days until the breach.
Han Sera found the protective vest in the training hall, exactly where she always left her water bottle.
It looked old but functional. The tear on the side was barely noticeable, and someone had left a note: *"Equipment appears functional. Recommend testing. - Maintenance"*
She examined it carefully. C-Rank protection rating. Far better than the F-Rank training gear she'd been issued. But why would someone leave it here for her?
Unless...
She checked the inside collar. No name tag. No student ID number. Officially abandoned equipment.
*The janitor*, she realized. *He's still helping.*
That evening, she found a combat knife with the same type of note. The next day, a partially-charged mana crystal. Each item appearing in places only she would look, with the same impersonal maintenance note.
By Day 36, she had a full set of functional equipment that dramatically improved her survival odds.
**[EQUIPMENT UPDATE - Han Sera]**
**[Protection: F-Rank → C-Rank]**
**[Weapon Quality: Training Grade → Combat Grade]**
**[Mana Recovery: +40% efficiency]**
**[Survival Probability: 62% → 73%]**
She wanted to thank him, but she'd learned not to acknowledge their connection publicly. Instead, she left her own note at the statue dead drop:
*"Received equipment. Thank you. I won't waste this chance. - Student"*
The next morning, she found a reply:
*"Five days. Memorize evacuation routes. If things go wrong, priority one is survival. Priority two is protecting classmates. Priority three is following instructions. The practical will not go as planned. Be ready for anything. Trust your training. - The Janitor"*
Sera's hands shook as she read it. *Will not go as planned.* That was the clearest warning he'd ever given.
Something was coming. Something worse than the instructors expected.
She destroyed the message and spent the day mentally preparing. Five days. Whatever happened, she'd be ready.
Or she'd die trying.
---
Day 37. Four days until the breach.
Vice Principal Kwon reviewed the security footage from the past week, searching for any connection between Han Sera and whoever was training her.
He found nothing. The girl practiced alone. Checked out books alone. Walked alone.
But someone was helping her. He could feel it.
Then he noticed something odd in the footage: Kim Soo-hyun, the janitor, appeared in the background of multiple clips. Not doing anything suspicious. Just... there. Cleaning. Maintaining.
Always nearby when Sera was training.
Kwon pulled up Kim's personnel file again. Background still too clean. History still too vague. And now, spatial correlation with a student showing suspicious improvement.
Coincidence? Or evidence?
He made a note in his investigation file: *"Monitor janitor Kim Soo-hyun. Possible connection to Han Sera's unauthorized training. Insufficient evidence for action, but warrant continued observation."*
Four days until the dungeon practical. If anything irregular happened during that exercise, he'd have his answers.
And if Kim Soo-hyun was involved in anything unauthorized, Kwon would have grounds for termination and possible legal action.
He just needed to be patient.
The practical would reveal everything.
---
**[Day 37 Status Report]**
**[Han Sera Survival Probability: 73%]**
**[Class F Overall Survival Rate: 34%]**
**[Demon Lord Breach Countdown: 4 days, 11 hours]**
**[Kang Minho/Kim Soo-hyun Status: Preparation 68% complete]**
**[Vice Principal Kwon Investigation: Active, closing in]**
**[Threat Level: CRITICAL]**
Soo-hyun stood on the academy roof at midnight, looking out over Seoul's glittering lights. Somewhere in this city, a demon was preparing to breach into their world. The Hunter Association was either unaware or being deliberately obtuse. The academy was sending students into a death trap. And he was one janitor with sealed stats trying to stop a disaster.
Just like old times.
Except in old times, he had a team of SSS-Rank hunters backing him up.
Now he had one partially-trained F-Rank student, a mop, and sheer determination.
*Should be interesting*, he thought with dark humor.
Four days until he found out if twenty years of experience could compensate for ninety-five percent less power.
Four days until everything either worked out or collapsed catastrophically.
He cracked his knuckles and headed back to his apartment. He had training to do and techniques to perfect.
Sleep was for people who weren't trying to save the world from an early demon invasion while pretending to be a janitor.