# Chapter 1
## 1. An Unexpected Hidden Card
It was a night with a steady drizzle of rain. Iyeon suddenly stopped in his tracks.
Something was sprawled between the alleyways not far from his home. The figure, barely illuminated by the reach of the streetlight, reflected only a very faint glow, but Iyeon recognized what it was at a glance.
It was a person.
“…What’s this huge thing…”
Collapsed there. His muttering was buried beneath the stinging sound of rain. After contemplating briefly, Iyeon moved forward. His pitch-black umbrella cast an exceptionally deep shadow as he entered deeper into the alley.
The alley was narrow. Pushing aside the surrounding garbage bags, Iyeon quickly squatted down in front of the mass. The man barely leaning against the alley wall exuded an intimidating presence just by his size, even when sitting on the ground where only the top of his head was visible. If he were to stand up completely, he would likely tower well above Iyeon’s eye level.
His limbs, carelessly strewn about, looked just like a wooden puppet that had been discarded after serving its purpose. However, if anyone knew the identity of the face revealed through the rain-soaked hair, they wouldn’t think such a thing.
Je Sano.
Domestic Rank 1, a superpowered individual.
Beep. The door opened after an agonizing wait. Despite his desperate desire to get home, Iyeon couldn’t immediately enter the hallway, struggling at the doorway. It was because of the load he had reluctantly brought with him.
The unconscious, limp body already felt like a thousand pounds, and the water-soaked clothes that hung heavily only added to his fatigue. I can’t tell if this is rain or sweat. Iyeon grumbled, completely drenched from head to toe. Thanks to this sudden act of charity, he had donated his umbrella to the street a long time ago.
From the moment he saw that thick chest, he had guessed, but the weight of the enormous, unconscious body was tremendous. Iyeon, who barely walked five thousand steps a day, let alone did strength training, had managed to drag this thing nearly 500 meters through sheer willpower and determination.
‘Now what do I do?’
Iyeon glanced at the massive figure, whose head barely poked into the house because he was too large to be completely crumpled in the entryway. Although concern had compelled him to bring the man home, now that he had, a slight regret washed over him that he might have done something unnecessary.
After all, it was Je Sano.
“…To think Je Sano would come to my house.”
Iyeon, muttering in a daze, looked down at his entryway again. Everyone in this city, Chohosi, knew the basic information about Je Sano. It was natural. Je Sano was a Mugunghwa 5th-tier, the highest grade among superpowered individuals who received national hero treatment.
Chohosi.
Located a bit south of the metropolitan area, this region was Korea’s only exceptional autonomous city.
One day, a large red vortex appeared in the low airspace of South Korea. The hole, resembling a black hole, stood vertically elongated, looking almost like some kind of passage when viewed from a distance.
The beginning of the catastrophe came when something like a beast’s hand emerged, tearing open a bright red hole.
It was not any creature from Earth, yet at the same time, it resembled various living things. It was strong, fast, and solid. Some called it a chimera. Although scientifically inaccurate, it was clear that it matched what the media had imagined as a “monster.”
It was humanity’s first encounter with mutants.
In an instant, the area around the hole became chaos. The streets were devastated with people crying, screaming, and running away. It was incredibly fortunate that there weren’t many mutant individuals.
Among the mutants, there were types that didn’t pay much attention if left alone, but there were clearly species that attacked humans first. After all the nearby police were mobilized, they barely managed to contain the hostile ones, but no one knew how to kill them. Mutants weren’t even injured by ordinary attacks, and some species even had regenerative abilities. While urgent discussions about whether to mobilize the military were happening during this disaster that defied common sense…
A young woman stood in front of the hole that intermittently spewed mutants.
Ignoring the police rushing toward her, the woman raised one hand, and suddenly frost began to appear around her. Taking advantage of people’s hesitation at this strange situation, a massive amount of ice erupted from the ground.
The ice wrapped around the hole with intricate patterns. The white frost turned toward the mutants circling near the hole. In an instant, the mutants stopped moving. Before the overwhelming silence, the woman spoke.
‘This is a temporary measure.’
Her decisive words were filled with strong conviction.
‘Soon, people like me will gather here.’
Her words were true. People who could handle something beyond the limits of human physical capabilities began to appear one by one. It was an ability that couldn’t be explained by modern science. The types and intensities of powers varied and manifested randomly. Despite never having seen such phenomena in reality before, everyone could understand what it was because it was such a common theme in movies, comics, and novels.
Superpowers.
Fantasy had become reality. It could only be explained as a miracle. Those with powerful abilities could face mutants alone, and especially those with strong powers could kill them. South Korea quickly summoned all domestic superhumans for special cooperation. All superhumans drafted at this time received military merit medals.
There was no way to eliminate the hole completely. Moreover, emergency research determined that the hole was a kind of focal point. This meant that simply sealing the hole couldn’t perfectly prevent the appearance of mutants.
Eventually, it was concluded that those with appropriate powers had to take responsibility and respond. The government set boundaries around the hole’s region, gave it a new name, authority, and obligations, and established an institution called the Superpower Management Office.
The city of superhumans, Chohosi, was created that way.
After decades of numerous trials, errors, and incidents, Chohosi became relatively stable with only minor disturbances. South Korea quickly accepted the existence of superhumans.
And most superhumans were encouraged to move to Chohosi, where the original red hole, the Red Void, was located. Superhumans living in Chohosi had various benefits, and the only obligation different from ordinary citizens was one:
To never overlook mutants that threaten the nation and humanity.
The main duty of superhumans was to handle mutants rampaging inside and outside the city. This inevitably made them more visible to ordinary citizens. Increasingly, superhumans were established as friendly heroes in the public consciousness, and many people began to admire them as objects of aspiration.
Superhumans who were strong or had distinctive abilities gained a lot of popularity. The number of famous superhumans gradually increased, eventually becoming so numerous that a list had to be created. Public interest exploded in everything from the companies they belonged to, their abilities, SNS accounts, and even the clothes they wore or accessories they carried. Superhumans had come to double as entertainers.
As this phenomenon intensified, debates about who was stronger became fierce.
They say it’s human nature to enjoy ranking things, and that was exactly right. Just when life seemed to be getting better, people heated up every day over things that were of no real help to their lives, and fights about why someone wouldn’t succeed or what someone else knew became everyday occurrences.
In this situation, a superhuman ranking category quietly appeared on a major portal site. Based on the tiers officially assigned by the government, it was a page that sorted individual domestic rankings up to 100,000.
The rankings were updated daily according to work performance and ability evaluations. Even though no one gave rewards for high rankings, everyone was desperate to increase their influence by proclaiming the strength or utility of their favorite superhumans.
Even among actual superhumans, more and more began to take interest in the rankings. In truth, it’s very difficult not to care about your own ranking when it’s prominently displayed on a major website. Especially if it’s related to your work ability.
However, for about four years, the first place had remained constant.
That was Je Sano. A superhuman with mineral transformation, operation, and synchronization abilities. The Mugunghwa five-flower tier, the very top of the five-tier system exclusive to national superhumans.
At present, there were only 9 people with Mugunghwa 5th-tier, including Je Sano. The number of registered superhumans nationwide was around 1 million. Of these, 800,000 were 1st-tier, and over 180,000 were 2nd-tier. Considering that there were less than 20,000 3rd-tier or higher ability users, it was a terrifyingly steep pyramid structure.
Je Sano rarely appeared in public, but occasionally an ordinary person would capture his work activities from a distance and upload a short video. Even with blurry quality, it looked more like a natural disaster than a human ability, and there was no one who dared to disagree in the face of that overwhelming force.
‘There are also many disturbing rumors…’
Suddenly feeling uneasy, Iyeon cast a suspicious glance at the fallen man again. Besides the basic information circulating among people, almost nothing was known about him, so there were far more rumors than about other superhumans.
That he was a sociopath, that he was incredibly wealthy and even owned a private jet, that he was immortal and nearly three hundred years old, that he was an illegitimate child of a chaebol family, that he was an artificial superhuman created by the government… People are instinctively drawn to sensational rumors, so even seemingly implausible ones didn’t easily fade away. Je Sano himself didn’t particularly respond to them, which made it worse.
But nothing major will happen. I’ll just let him sleep tonight and send him away first thing tomorrow morning. Iyeon thought lightly as he moved toward the bathroom. It was time to finally show mercy to his own body, which had suffered through sweat and rain.
