Despite the many challenges, Euijae successfully registered as an Awakened, creating an alibi and solving Lee Sayoung's request. Now, however, Euijae faced a new problem.

His automatic kimchi and side dish self-service bar, which devoured mana stones instead of electricity, had terrible cost-efficiency but gave Euijae a little extra free time. All the Hunters needed to do was stack their empty bowls by the bar, grab some kimchi, radish cubes, and hot peppers after ordering hangover soup. Euijae would cook the soup and serve them a bowl of rice from the warmer. The Wave Guild’s engineers supposedly worked themselves into the ground, like peppercorns in a grinder, to make this ultimate self-service bar, and it showed.

So, what did Cha Euijae do with his newly freed time?

“...”

Euijae sat at the counter, scratching his temple with a pen. Normally, this was a scene typical of him managing his prepaid tabs, but today, his calm face, usually devoid of expression, was noticeably etched with frustration. In front of him, instead of his tab ledger, a stack of thick books towered like a hill.

The Hunters slurping their soup began murmuring among themselves.

“Does anyone know why our part-timer looks like he’s ready to murder someone?”

“No kidding. I want another bowl, but he seems so pissed, I don’t even dare ask.”

“Screw it, should we just cook it ourselves?”

“Bleugh... nmff...”

“What are you even saying? That’s gross, finish eating first before talking.”

One of the newer Hunters chimed in. “The part-timer’s been attending basic Hunter education classes and is studying for the qualification exam.”

At this, the faces of the surrounding Hunters turned pale. A bearded, middle-aged Hunter muttered in disbelief.

“Wow… they still haven’t scrapped that shitty basic education?”

A Hunter in his mid-twenties scrunched his face in sympathy.

“He’s already so busy… That must be a pain in the ass. How many mandatory hours is it nowadays?”

“Sixty, I think. Thirty offline, thirty online. If you're really busy, you can submit a form to the Department of Awakened Affairs and convert it all online, but even then, you still have to pass the exam. And if you score less than 70%, you keep retaking it until you pass.”

“Gross. They should just get rid of it. What a nightmare.”

“Look, I’ll confess something—I failed the Hunter exam four times.”

“Four times? That’s not even bad. Anyone who passes it on the first try is nuts. Don’t worry about it.”

“Hey, everyone, keep it down. Let’s create a good study environment for our part-timer.”

The Hunter who confessed to failing four times gagged a little, and Euijae, who had been listening to their conversation the entire time, also felt like throwing up. The words on the page in front of him looked like squiggly worms drawn by Haeun.

In recent days, Euijae had come to fully understand why Haeun doodled worms on her homework.

In Korea, all Awakened individuals must go through registration procedures at an official center in accordance with the Special Law on Awakened Individuals. Once registered, they receive a card that lists their name and rank.

Euijae, too, had received a shiny, new D-rank registration card and felt oddly proud of it. Sure, it was four ranks lower than his real level, but after enduring all sorts of hell and high water, the D-rank card felt especially precious. He even bragged about it to some of his regulars, something totally out of character for him.

However…

“Oh wow, you got your registration card, part-timer. Congrats!”

“So, now you need to study for the exam… Good luck. I have some old practice test books if you need them…”

For some reason, the congratulations were always accompanied by pitying looks.

It wasn’t a look that disrespected his D-rank. The regulars at the hangover soup joint weren’t the type to discriminate based on rank. So what exactly was behind those lukewarm, pity-filled glances? Euijae couldn’t figure it out, but since he had to head out to Incheon Port every morning for investigations, he didn’t have time to dwell on it.

After the Incheon Port case was wrapped up, though, rumors must have spread. On his way out after finishing a meal, Baewonwoo handed Euijae a worn-out test prep book, his face deadly serious. Euijae took the book with a confused expression.

“What’s this?”

“It’s not a gift. It’s your human right, part-timer.”

“Huh?”

“You’ll understand soon enough. The soup was delicious as always. I’m out.”

The next day, Honeybee also showed up early in the morning, dropping a thick, spiral-bound textbook onto the counter.

“I heard the news, Cha Euijae. You’re preparing for ‘it,’ huh?”

“What ‘it’?”

“Eh, no one can blame you for wanting to escape reality. I get it. Anyway, I talked to Manager Han and brought you some HB Guild’s training material. Make good use of it.”

“Honeybee! The reporters are gathering at the dungeon entrance!”

“Damn it, those bastards are fast. I’ve got to go handle the raid.”

After incidents like these happened several times, Euijae’s patience began to wear thin.

Based on what he gathered from the Hunters' conversations, it seemed that nowadays, after getting registered as an Awakened, you had to take some sort of separate exam to officially become a Hunter. Registering had been hard enough, and now there was an exam? What kind of test? When he worked as J, there had been no such strict registration process or tests!

That night, after closing up shop, Euijae turned to the internet.

“Nexbi, search for information on the Hunter qualification exam.”

—Searching for information on the Hunter qualification exam.

—The Hunter exam is bullshit.

—When’s the next Hunter exam?

—I Awakened but still can’t become a Hunter because I keep failing the exam.

—Who wrote question 30 on the January exam? That bastard.

└It’s Nam Woojin, who else?

└Nam Woojin, fight me fair and square.

—Eight-time exam taker here, ask me anything.

└At that point, just give up on becoming a Hunter, man.

—The Hunter exam sucks, sucks, sucks…

The results of his search were shocking. Cha Euijae, an 11-year veteran of the Hunter world, couldn’t believe his eyes.

‘Wait… I’m not a Hunter yet?’

Exactly. Euijae had only received an Awakened registration card. He wasn’t officially a Hunter yet!

The registration card he’d been so proud of only certified that he was an Awakened individual. It didn’t grant him the right to work as a Hunter. Euijae, like many others, had assumed that once you received your card, you could start working as a Hunter. But no—thanks to a change in the law, that card was essentially useless without passing the qualification exam.

‘I went through all that shit for a worthless card?’

Euijae stared blankly at his shiny new D-rank card. But then, the next revelation hit him even harder.

In order to become a fully certified Hunter, he had to complete the “Basic Hunter Education Program” and pass the “Hunter Qualification Exam.” Only after passing the exam could he receive an official Hunter license and start using things like the Hunter Market. It was all so unnecessarily complicated!

And the worst part? The written portion of the qualification exam was notoriously difficult. It was widely known as the Hunter equivalent of the national college entrance exam or the bar exam. Just typing “Hunter exam” into a search engine immediately triggered autocomplete suggestions about its brutal difficulty.

Euijae grabbed his head in despair.

‘Why is becoming a Hunter so hard?’

The basic education program had been implemented five years ago. Initially, the program wasn’t this strict. It was introduced to provide newly Awakened Hunters with survival knowledge, focusing on the behavior of low-level monsters and the ecosystem of dungeons.

However, as the number of Awakened individuals grew, so did crime rates among them.

“Rising crime rates among the Awakened—is public safety in jeopardy?”

“Abuse of power by Hunters—when will it end?”

Despite the Department of Awakened Affairs' best efforts, incidents of Hunters abusing their power continued to rise. As a result, the government scrapped the system that allowed newly Awakened individuals to immediately become Hunters and replaced it with a mandatory education program and qualification exam.

After finishing his search, Euijae clasped his hands together and cursed.

‘Why couldn’t those assholes just hunt monsters instead of bothering normal people…?’

To make matters worse, Hunters who were scouted by guilds could submit certification documents from their Guild Leaders to skip the exam. It was all about connections. Disgusting.

Among Euijae’s limited connections, there was only one Guild Leader he knew.

Lee Sayoung.

But there was no way Euijae would ask him for help. It was a matter of pride. If Korea’s number one Hunter couldn’t pass a simple qualification exam on his own, what kind of reputation would he have left?

‘Fine. I’ll study for it.’

And so, Cha Euijae found himself, for the first time in his life, hitting the books.