Prologue

The Gate. The tunnel that connects the other world to ours. 10 years ago, after the gate appeared, the world experienced many bizarre events. One example is the Hunters. Their level of power stayed the same - even after becoming hunters. Those who received the power to cross the gate to destroy monsters, and did this as their career was called "Hunters".

My name is Riynsu Kurusu. C-Rank Japanese hunter. Japan Hunters Association. I only know 3 skills and have barely any mana, as I get exhausted after a few skills. I use a spear but, it is a novice spear as I don't have that much money to afford a high-quality one.

I was currently going towards the site where the D-Rank gate would be. Someone then spotted me.

"You there! Over here!" A voice called.

I then followed the voice, which belonged to a man in his thirties and had a muscular body, charcoal black hair, and beard. He told me he was Furukawa Hiroshi and that he was the leader of the raid party.

Currently, Including me, there were 6 D-Ranks, 8 C-Ranks, and 4 B-Ranks attending the raid, making an even 18.

(Timeskip)

Riynsu was now in the Dungeon with the rest of the raid team. They were venturing in a cave-like setting with hostile goblins coming at them. There were fighters with spears and swords stabbing away using their weapon skills, while the mages were using fire, water and wind spells. There was no summons from the mages.

Riynsu was dealing with a couple of goblins at a time. He was saving his mana for the boss by not using any of his skills. Furukawa was a tank and killed the most goblins out of the raid team. After a while, all the Goblins were finished and the 2 healers were healing everyone. The team was trying to look for the entrance to the boss room but they kept finding a dead end.

"Hey over here!" A voice shouted. Everyone turned to see she had found a hidden entrance in the cave wall.

"Good job Ayumi!" Furukawa congratulated. The team went over and there was a dark tunnel. Furukawa threw a torch to check if there were any monsters.

Seeing it was all clear, they went through the tunnel and was met with

a huge red door with a gold design on it.

"I've never seen a room with a door like this..."

"Are we sure this is the boss room?"

"It should be. You know of any other room in here?"

Furukawa went and opened the door. It opened easier than he expected. Inside, lit torches were surrounding the room with a pinkish flame. There were a couple that had fallen to the ground and yet were still burning. There were cracks on the walls some, with moss in between. There were also chunks of the wall that had collapsed, which led to debris across the room.

There was also an empty, colossal stone throne down the centre against the wall. Who was big enough to sit on such a throne?

There were stone statues that had cracks and moss in them. Some of the statues had limbs or chunks of their body that had fallen off.

"Look up there." someone said pointing to the ceiling.

On the ceiling were crystal claw-like things that first went down then diagonal with spiked ends and together they looked like a crystal hand. They were all pointing to the centre.

"What's with the spikes on the ceiling?"

"I don't even want to know. It gives off this weird vibe," replied Furukawa.

Riynsu looked around and found some sort of tablet with some text on it. "Ano... Hiroshi-san there's some tablet over there."

Furukawa then turned and looked closely at it. Since he couldn't read it he called over Minako Matsuzaki.

"It's runic text," Minako said reading the text. "Avetanon temple's commandments. First, worship the Lord. Second praise the Lord. Third, prove your faith. Those who do not follow these commandments will never return alive."

After Minako finished, the room suddenly got quiet and then the statues lit up.

"Huh? What just happened." Ayumi questioned.

"What is this? You guys are all talking nonsense! There's not even a boss here! I'm going. The boss treasures. There's not even going to be any." Someone scoffed and went to the exit and as he did Furukawa's eyes widen in realisation.

"Stop! Don't try to leave!"

But it was too late. One of the statues that were next to the door, despite having lost its arm, rammed its axe on the guy's skull. It then retreated to how it started.

"WHAT THE HELL!!!"

"Do we have to fight those statues?!"

Everyone was in shock and the statues then started to come towards them, so the raid team kept backing up until one of them bumped into one of the statues' shields but then got squashed. Most of the team started to panic. 3 of them didn't even see 2 of the stone warriors behind them and got killed.

Thirteen of them remained. However, they managed to not notice that they were standing on a magic circle that was painted on the floor. The same number of people alive was the same number of claws on the ceiling extended its arm and started to glow. The raid team didn't seem to notice this and they were too focused on the statues. However, some of them died by the statues. Minako then looked at a statue as it was about to attack but then it came to a stop holding its pose.

A light bulb in his mind turned on as he realised the statues would stop moving if they were looked at. "Hey, Guys! If you look at them they'll freeze!"

Everyone tried to look at the statues, switching when one came to close. Seeing the opportunity, one of the members ran to the exit and got out. "What the! He got out!"

One of the arms retracted and stopped glowing.

3 other members tried to run out but only one of them managed to get out as the statues got to them. The others were panicking and some were even crying. Now even more of them tried to escape with very few getting free. As the members in the circle were decreasing, so were the arms that were glowing and extended. There were now 3 of them left. Furukawa, Riynsu and another. The other person managed to escape by only a slither. Furukawa then turned to Riynsu.

"Kurusu, go. I'll try to stop as many statues as possible."

"I ain't leaving without you!"

"Are you stupid! YOU'LL DIE!!"

"Is dying all that scary?" Riynsu asked with a monotone voice.

"WHAT TYPE OF QUESTION IS THAT?! DON'T YOU GOT ANYONE WAITING FOR YOU!!" Furukawa questioned not believing he could ask that.

Riynsu looked at the man and said, "No. Not really. And unlike most of the people in the raid team. I'm not a hunter for money, power or fame. I'm just a hunter for fun."

Furukawa was shocked he then sighed. "Fine. Be like that." He then started to cry. "I g-got a girlfriend waiting for me at h-home and I promised her I'd come back. I can't take this anymore." As he was about to leave, he took one last look at Riynsu and said. "Hey Kurusu-san, if I make it out alive. Thank you."

Furukawa bolted out the door as fast as he could trying to avoid any statues that weren't frozen by Riynsu. He managed to get out the door and with that, the door closed. Riynsu was left alone by himself.

Riynsu eyes narrowed as he looked upon the statues approaching him. He stated, "Well it looks like I'll die here. But... I'm not going down without a fight!"

Riynsu charged at the statue that was coming right at him and he used his skill Dragon Soars and aimed his spear at the stone warrior and a blue dragon made of mana came out the tip of his spear and went through the statue. unfortunately, only a bit of the statue was damaged as its body crumbled a little.

He was about to do another skill to all the statues behind him. But then the last glowing claw that was extended went down and impaled into his back making him cough out blood and drop his spear. Holding him by his back, the claw retracted and lifted him to the eye-level of the statues.

Riynsu, who was all bloody and in pain, looked towards the statues with only his left eye open.

"Huh. They say your life flashes before your eyes when you're about to die. But I don't see anything. Maybe I had no life. Hehe, it's funny, that even though I'm about to die, I had fun..." He said as he closed his eyes and smiled. One of the statue's tridents came towards him. But then a sound was heard to which he opened his eye and he saw that all of the statues were frozen in place and a blue screen was in front of him.

[You have completed all the necessary requirements of the secret quest 'No Fear'.]

'What is this? Completed all the requirements? for a secret quest? Wait who is even saying this.' He thought.

[You have earned the right to become a player. Will you accept?]

'Accept? Player?'

'What is happening?'

[You do not have much time remaining.]

[If you refuse, your heart will stop approximately 0.06 seconds later. Will you accept?]

'If I accept then I won't have to die?'

'Then yes... I'll take it.'

[Welcome, Player.]