Chapter 32: Population Control

Arriving at the branch of the Hunter Department in Hone City, Keon saw a lot of people entering and exiting the building. Some of them were even wearing a huge backpack filled with various items

As the Hunter Department is an extremely important department of mankind, they didn't dare make any branch of it a lousy one. This place was literally bustling with a lot of people

"Let's go" Keon said after recovering from astonishment and they finally entered the building

Inside was a wide hall filled with hundreds of people. There are many staffs and cleaning robots around since this can be considered as a landmark where many people gathered

Keon searched for a line that has the least people and found one that only has five people in line. The four walk towards the line and waited for a few minutes before their turn finally arrives

"Hello, we want to sell our items" Keon said to the woman responsible to deal with the customers

"Alright, let me see your badge first to check your records and then I will appraise the items to check their price"

Keon touched his watch and projected a virtual version of his Hunter Badge and the woman scanned it

"Hmm, I see, you are a new Hunter. Base on the record, you entered a Level 3 Realm while you're still a Level 2 Mystic. Hence, for this transaction, the 50% selling rule will only apply in the range of Level 2 Mystics which is at 1,000 Credits. If you sell items to us for 1,000 Credits, you can only gain half of that. But pass the 1,000 credits cap, we will give you the full price for your items"

1,000 credits, which is only 500 credits lower than the cheapest Level 2 materials. Add that to the 2 energy cores the Hunters need to pay for the teleportation fee, the final prices are really quite high for a Level 2 Mystic

No wonder that a Mystic needs to spend weeks or even months on a single trip for them to earn money. The weak Hunter would find earning money hard despite the danger but for the strong ones, it was too easy

Level 2 energy cores were typically priced at 3,000 Credits. In other words, a Level 2 Mystic needs to have items like the energy cores with a price exceeding 7,000 credits to finally earn some money

That is almost equivalent to two items that have the highest price a Level 2 material can be sold. Fortunately, aside from the monsters themselves, the realms also have other resources. Even if the Hunters don't hunt monsters, as long as they can bring back those resources, they will still gain some money and they can also use those resources as the teleportation fee

Keon took out the cores of the crystal slimes from his bag. They decided to sell the cores and distribute them equally although that is only on the surface. Aside from Nath's share, the rest would be in Keon's pockets since Gabe and Mady said that they don't need their share

Looking at the shining cores, the attendant's face flash with surprise. crystal slimes are rare compared to the other slimes but it is not like they are extremely rare

A lot of realms have slimes as inhabitants and in a normal realm, there are millions or billions of inhabitants. There should be Crystal Slimes here and there

Keon entered a wild realm but he only explored an extremely small part of it. At most, the distance from the fortress was just around fifteen to twenty kilometers. That size is not even a tenth of a whole realm

Thus, seeing cores of the crystal slimes aren't that rare. But for it to be sold by youngsters that only became Hunters, how can this not shock the attendant?

What kind of luck is this?

Looking at roughly fifty shining slime cores, the attendant knew that Keon's group struck a gold mine. At least compared to other mystics at their level

"I-I will appraise it now" the attendant said after recovering from her shock and she used touches something in her eyeglasses before checking the cores one by one

Except for the 'boss crystal slime,' the other slimes didn't really fight with Keon and the others because of the masked man's influence. Thus, they managed to preserve the cores in perfect condition. This would make the price even higher than before

After some time, the attendant threw a virtual screen to Keon's group containing the price of their goods

"There are 53 cores in total in perfect condition and each of them has a market price of 3,500 Credit Points. But one of them has a much higher quality than the others and it can be sold for 3,900 Credits"

"The worth of the cores is 185,900 in the market price and we will buy it for 80% of the market price totaling 148,720 Credits. From that, we deduct 500 for the 50% rule and you will be left with 148,220 credits and 14.8 Glory Points"

Nath and Keon almost got dizzy with that number. For orphans that don't have money, to earn this huge amount is overwhelming. Even if you divide that by four, it was still a bit more than 37,000 credits for each of them

For a few seconds, none of them reacted before the attendant cough and the two returned back to reality

"What is your plan for the credit and glory points distribution. Should I split it into four?"

Keon nodded his head at that and the other three projected their Hunter Badge too. Although Keon will own Mady and Gabe's share, it would still be suspicious if the money and glory points were sent into his account

The prices were once more adjusted since the other three are now part of this transaction. The 50% rule will also be applied to them

"Keon, we're rich!" Nath said happily. 37,000 might not be much for the real rich people but for orphans like them, that was really a huge amount already

Money is really miraculous, it enabled Nath to recover a bit but before he can even fully recover, a loud sound of alarm entered the ears of every citizen in Hone City

"ATTENTION HONE CITY CITIZENS! ALARM LEVEL 1, ADVANCE GRADE IS RAISE! PLEASE EVACUATE IN THE EVACUATION SHELTERS IMMEDIATELY. FOR THE POLICE NEAR THE WEAK POINT IN THE BARRIER, PLEASE HELP THE CITIZENS TO EVACUATE!"

That alarm continuously rang in Hone City and Keon can't help but frown. He already fought monsters from a wild realm but he was still uncomfortable when monsters enter the Hombre Realm

A bit of Keon's childhood trauma is still there and although it sounds silly and more dangerous, he would prefer to fight monsters in other realms than to fight them in Hombre Realm

"Another alarm was raised. I wonder how many people will die today?"

"Sigh... the city will be damaged again"

"These damn monsters, why do they keep appearing in our realm?"

The Hunters around naturally don't like the monsters appearing in their homes but... none of them were doing anything. No one tried to come to the weak point and kill the monsters that will appear from it

Suddenly, Keon gained a bad feeling about this. Just like what he expected, Nath was seething with anger at seeing how the Hunters were acting

"IF YOU ARE MAD AT THE MONSTERS THEN WHY IS NO ONE OF YOU TRYING TO HELP?!" Nath shouted to all the Hunters around and Keon had a headache. Why is this simpleton friend of his trying to anger all these Hunters?

"Heh... another righteous brat has appeared!"

"Hahaha, he looks like the type of person that will die early"

"Another greenhorn thinking they can always do the right thing"

Contrary to what Keon expected, the veteran Hunters didn't become angry. In fact, it looks like seeing someone like Nath is a common thing and is a source of entertainment for them

"Y-you! Cowards!" Nath roared and decided to help the civilians into safety

"Wait, where are you going?!" Keon pulled Nath's wrist to stop him from going out. The reaction from the veteran Hunters was too abnormal

Keon doesn't believe that all of them don't care about innocent people. However, despite that, no one wants to help. Keon won't believe that there is nothing fishy about this

"Why are you stopping me?! We need to save those people!" Nath said with a furious look. He was really a stubborn one when it comes to matters like this

"W-wait... p-please don't go. I-It wouldn't be good if you help in killing the monsters!" The attendant pleaded and sure enough, there is a reason why no one is willing to help

"What are you saying? The bad thing is if we don't help the innocent people immediately!"

Keon is really having a headache. Nath is a good friend but sometimes his own kindness is too much

"Miss please explain why we can't help"

The attendant looks as if she was debating whether to speak or not before she motioned Keon's group to inch closer to her because of how impatient Nath looks

"Please don't say I said this to you but the g-government and police won't like Hunter's help"

"And why is that?" Keon asked with a creased forehead

"T-there is an unwritten rule among the professional mystics. A-aside from the Police, n-no professional mystic can help the civilians in times like this b-because..... t-this is the g-government's way t-to prevent.... o-overpopulation" towards the end, the woman's voice turned as quiet as a mosquito but Keon and the others still heard her words

Just based alone on her words, Keon already have a gist of the real reason why no Hunters decided to help the citizens