The Hunter Killer...

Morpheus stood rooted on the spot as he saw the blue translucent screen notifying him about his awakening.

"What the fuck?! I awakened as a hunter so suddenly?

And what the hell is up with the Hunter Killer class?" spoke Morpheus with a shock running through his body.

His mind was discombobulated, and his voice of reason was no longer active.

A man just died in front of him, and out of nowhere, he was hit with this unexpected message.

[Prequisite Conditions for the Awakening met.

Kill a Hunter of D-rank or above by yourself.

Do not use Mana or Skills as assistance from hunters during the kill.

No witnesses should be present during the kill.

The final blow must be done by the person using physical touch.]

The status window displayed the conditions Morpheus met to awaken the Hunter Killer class.

"What the hell..." he spoke in disbelief.

But soon, Morpheus contemplated how he passed these conditions.

One, this was a C-rank hunter. Two, although he was using the hunter equipment he gathered to withstand the attacks till now... he hadn’t used any man or skill because he wasn’t a hunter in the first place.

The conditions didn’t mention him wearing hunter equipment, so he bypassed it by default.

Three, there was no assistance by another person, like a colleague or a hunter.

Four, there were no witnesses to the act because all of them had run off. Even his own people probably ran away to inform his gang and ask for reinforcement.

Five, the last blow... was simply Morpheus choking the hunter’s neck to stop the blood from the punctured wound. But it was deep enough to bleed out the man in a minute, and his hands were touching the bald hunter’s neck even at the moment he died.

So the system must have considered it as Moprheus landing the killing blow by choking the man to death.

"Pure luck! This is nothing but a coincidence!" spoke Morpheus as he stood up and watched the corpse of the hunter, now turning blue since the wound bled out the man’s entirety through the jugular vein.

It all made sense how he passed these conditions in the present circumstances.

[Do you wish to Awaken as a Hunter?]

[Yes/No?]

Reported the status window, giving Morpheus a choice.

Gulp!

Morpheus gulped, his voice hesitant. But for now, he needed to accept it because this was an opportunity that even 99.99% of the population of the world never got.

Despite the paramount presence in society, the hunters were flooding every corner of the world every single week.

Some hunters were awakened by accident or by methodically guided to awaken a certain class that were well-kept secrets between the hunter community and rich people who wanted their own kin to become strong.

Poor people and the bottom barrel of society like Morpheus, could only dream of awakening as hunters but never succeeded.

Despite the grim words such as ’hunter killer’... Morpheus knew that if he let go of this opportunity, he might regret it for the rest of his life.

"Fuck! I almost died today because this fuckwit was a hunter creating trouble.

If he were a B-rank or above... I wouldn’t have lasted this long to even defend myself, and probably dead if he was intent on killing me.

"You know what?... Fuck the consequences. I ain’t dying because some asshole wants to take away my position I worked so hard to achieve after 2 decades.

My life has already been a fucking nightmare since that night.

I promised Eomma, Appa (South Korean words for Mom and Dad), and myself that I would rule this city one day.

Never thought I would have to become a hunter myself to achieve that dream." spoke Morpheus with a bated breath.

His hatred for Hunters had only grown over the years. It was also one of the reasons why he never tried to become a hunter himself. To him, they were just hypocritical scumbags of the society that were portrayed as humanity’s only hope against those dimensional rifts and monster invasions.

Morpheus found that even thugs and gang members had more humanity than the hunters who acted like good Samaritans in front of the media, but committed all kinds of atrocities by using their awakened powers as hunters.

How did he know?...

Because the Jopoke (mafia) group he joined also covered up for hunters after they committed crimes, as a cleanup crew. That was a different division, while Morpheus was part of the money laundering division that used businesses, such as this casino bar, to make the black money white.

He had heard about all kinds of atrocities hunters commit daily, whether it was rape, murder, extortion, assassination, scamming and blackmailing people using their abilities, or even employing themselves in human trafficking.

Compared to them, normal criminals had a limited scope, while these guys were hailed in society as heroes by the media, the government, and the hunter associations and guilds across the world.

"At least I won’t be like one of those bastards who respond to the rift breaches only after a considerable amount of innocent people have died just so they could gain fame by hyping up the danger of the invasion and claim how they did their best to save the people." spoke Morpheus.

In the past 2 decades... Morpheus had become a very jaded man with great mistrust of humanity itself due to the kind of life he had lived so far.

Hope and Kindness were distant concepts to him altogether. But even then, his baseline humanity towards normal people hadn’t died.

Even as a gangster, he sometimes fed the poor, homeless elderly, or saved orphan kids from being tormented by others whenever he saw it.

By no means was he a good man. But he was at least human.

"Yes," said Morpheus.

Ding!

[Congratulations on your Awakening!] notified the status window.

BOOM!!

A dark red aura burst open from Morpheus’ body, and the status window expanded.

[Name : Morpheus

Race : Human

Class : Hunter Killer

Rank : F

Stats :

HP : 58/100, DEF : 60/100

INT : 18/100, STAMINA : 32/100

MANA : 5/100, ATTACK POWER (AP) : 17/100

Skills : None.]

The status window represented his current stats.

But what shocked him the most was the next message on the status window.

[Hunter Morpheus can absorb only one of the skills of the target he kills himself. And the skill must be of the same rank as his present hunter rank.

Conditions for Level Up...] reported the screen and laid out the conditions for Morpheus to become stronger.

[Kill a hunter of the same rank or above.]