Leveling up increased all stats by one point each.
Unless it was an extremely unusual case, there was no such thing as gaining a level without receiving stat increases.
And unlike anything else, leveling up was always possible.
Elixirs were different.
Once a stat passed a certain threshold, elixirs stopped working.
Someone who boosted all their stats with elixirs from level one and someone who didn't—
The gap between them would become unimaginably wide.
That was exactly why Kim Min-woo was heading toward the auction house.
The first stat cap is fifty. I need to raise everything to that point using elixirs, no matter what.
Raise stats as high as possible with elixirs first, then use leveling and other methods afterward.
That was the true royal road.
Of course, it wasn't a path just anyone could walk.
Who could casually chug down elixirs worth tens of millions of won each right after awakening?
Only a select few Awakened could afford such a strategy.
People like Kim Min-woo, who could practically print money.
Or promising talents backed by governments or major guilds.
[Awakened Auction House — Korea Branch]
A massive building towered above the city skyline.
Every country had one.
In Gate Hunter terms, it was best described as a mysterious byproduct created by the System itself.
And because the System operated it, it held an overwhelming advantage.
Aside from equipment, most items couldn't be resold.
There was no need to worry about scams, and purchased goods were sent directly into one's inventory instantly.
No shipping delays.
Even with the outrageous fees, at least there was some justification for them.
Min-woo stepped inside.
A hologram materialized before him.
[Select an item to buy or sell. Commission fee: 10%.]
[1. Skill Books]
[2. Equipment]
[3. Elixirs]
[4. Monster Materials]
[5. Miscellaneous]
"Elixirs."
[Connected to Elixir Marketplace.]
[Warning: Once an item is listed for sale, it cannot be withdrawn until the listing expires.]
Thousands of listings filled his vision.
Elixirs of every type and price range.
After refining the search conditions, the ones he wanted appeared immediately.
[Lowest-Grade Mana Pill ×200]
[Price: 100 million won each]
[Seller: Alchemist Choi Yu-na]
[Listed: 3 hours ago]
[Lowest-Grade Strength Pill ×200]
[Price: 80 million won each]
[Lowest-Grade Agility Pill ×200]
[Price: 70 million won each]
[Lowest-Grade Vitality Pill ×200]
[Price: 70 million won each]
"Oh? There's more than I expected."
Min-woo let out a whistle.
Even with money, elixirs weren't easy to obtain.
They required time, labor, and materials to produce.
On the other hand, selling them wasn't easy either.
Each one cost anywhere from tens of millions to hundreds of millions of won.
With that kind of money, an F-rank Awakened could buy a full set of decent equipment.
Naturally, ninety-nine out of a hundred people chose gear instead.
Looks like something went wrong somewhere.
Whenever someone placed a large order and then went bankrupt—
Massive quantities of elixirs would flood the market like this.
At this very moment, Choi Yu-na was probably losing her mind.
"Miss Choi Yu-na, today is your lucky day."
Click.
[Warning!]
[Elixirs cannot be traded or transferred to others after purchase.]
[Would you like to purchase all 800 lower-grade elixirs for 64 billion won?]
Click.
[Final Warning!]
[Commission fee: 6.4 billion won. Are you certain you wish to proceed?]
He had seven years to stop the Foreign God.
Time was something money couldn't buy.
So take your click and shut up.
Click.
[Purchase complete.]
[6.4 billion won has been deducted as commission.]
[Items stored in inventory.]
[Would you like to share your information with the seller?]
Click.
[Your information has been sent to Alchemist Choi Yu-na!]
Now she would receive his name and identity.
Choi Yu-na is a very useful character.
Chief researcher of the Alchemist Guild.
High social standing.
Her father was the guild master.
She was capable.
As long as she got paid, she produced high-quality elixirs quickly.
When the time came to purchase even higher-grade elixirs in bulk—
Having a prior connection would make things much easier.
She would also learn the identity of a wealthy client.
A mutually beneficial exchange.
"Those bastards at Geumseong Group!"
These days, Choi Yu-na felt like her head was splitting apart.
Because of Geumseong Group.
One of Korea's top hundred corporations.
As an alchemist who needed to chase business opportunities, they were normally clients she would treat like royalty.
But not anymore.
"You place an order for elixirs and then go bankrupt?! What the hell is that supposed to mean?!"
They'd bragged nonstop about raising Awakened and conquering gates as part of some new business venture.
Then they crashed and burned.
Overnight, eight hundred lower-grade elixirs lost their buyer.
Hundreds of billions of won had been frozen in limbo.
And that wasn't all.
Those lunatics had also ordered huge quantities of even higher-grade elixirs.
Considering that, the amount of money tied up was almost unimaginable.
"I told you we should've taken a deposit first. Their sales numbers were inflated, and their operating profits were terrible—"
"The hell are you talking about?! Who would've expected a top one-hundred company to collapse?!"
Yu-na glared fiercely at her junior.
If they'd demanded a deposit?
The order size would've shrunk dramatically.
People already whispered that she'd only gotten her position through her father's influence.
What mattered most to her was performance.
So she'd gambled.
And failed spectacularly.
"...Did anything sell on the auction house?"
"...No."
Her expression darkened.
"My hair..."
She couldn't afford to go bald.
She stared helplessly at the strands falling from her head.
She'd tried using every connection she had to find buyers.
Nothing worked.
In the end, she'd listed everything on the auction house through tears.
So far, not a single item had sold.
Even if they do sell, I'll still lose money...
The profit margin on lower-grade elixirs was usually around ten percent.
The auction house commission was ten percent.
Factor in labor costs, and she was operating at a loss.
"What if the listings expire without selling?"
"...I'll ask my dad for help."
What choice did she have?
Even if she got scolded, she'd have to use her emergency cheat code.
"Please. Let some superstar Awakened show up and buy everything."
"Come on. Even then, they'd buy maybe a hundred or two. No one's taking all eight hundred unless another company like Geumseong appears—"
Just then—
[All Lowest-Grade Mana Pills listed on the auction house have been sold.]
[All Lowest-Grade Vitality Pills listed on the auction house have been sold.]
[All Lowest-Grade Agility Pills listed on the auction house have been sold.]
[All Lowest-Grade Strength Pills listed on the auction house have been sold.]
[Ninety percent of the 64 billion won sale price, after commission, will be deposited.]
"...Huh?"
[The buyer has shared their information.]
[Buyer Information]
[Name: Kim Min-woo]
[Status: Eldest Son of Ilseong Group]
"Uh...? Uhh?!"
"What's wrong? What happened?"
"It sold."
"How much?"
"All of it. But... was this Kim Min-woo guy an Awakened?"
"Kim Min-woo? That delinquent heir from Ilseong Group?"
"Yeah."
"I've never heard anything about that."
[Lowest-Grade Mana Pill absorbed.]
[You feel no changes.]
[Lowest-Grade Agility Pill absorbed.]
[Agility has increased slightly. Additional absorption may produce noticeable effects.]
[Lowest-Grade Strength Pill absorbed.]
[Strength increased by 1.]
.
.
.
One by one, he absorbed the elixirs like spinning a slot machine.
Damn, these rates are brutal.
He wasn't even close to the level fifty stat cap.
His stats were barely around thirty, yet so many attempts failed.
Even Min-woo was dumbfounded by the terrible luck of this body.
Thank goodness he'd personally played the game for six years.
If he'd started from scratch with a body like this, he might've died of frustration.
Next thing I need to buy...
While continuously absorbing elixirs, he opened the next marketplace.
[Connected to Skill Book Marketplace.]
[Search parameters: Level 1–5, Class: Necromancer.]
[Summon Skeleton (F)]
[Requirement: Necromancer, Level 1+]
[Price: 2 million won]
Summon Skeleton was the foundation of every summoning skill.
Quite a few available.
Skill books dropped randomly from gate clear rewards and monster hunts.
Necromancers weren't exactly popular, so there was decent supply.
He bought every copy he could find.
[Purchase all 42 skill books...?]
[Multiple copies of the same skill book detected in inventory.]
[Two identical skill books can be combined to enhance them.]
[Success Rate: 95%]
[Proceed?]
This system really drove people insane.
But there was no way he could ignore it.
"Keep going until you can't anymore."
[Auto-enhancement initiated!]
Flash!
[Summon Skeleton (F)+1 created.]
[Summon Skeleton (F)+1 created.]
[Summon Skeleton (F)+1 created.]
[Unfortunate. Two skill books have been destroyed...]
.
.
.
Two +1 skill books combined into a +2.
And then two +2 books combined into a +3.
You can enhance these all the way to +9.
Even with perfect success rates, reaching +9 required 512 copies of the same skill book.
And the higher the enhancement level, the lower the success chance became.
It was a money pit.
Still, the rewards were worth it.
At +9, a skill's effectiveness nearly doubled.
Which meant there was only one answer.
Do it.
[Enhancement Result!]
[Summon Skeleton (F)+4]
[Insufficient skill books. Enhancement cannot continue.]
Not nearly enough.
There were no more low-level Necromancer skill books available.
But that didn't matter.
The real spending spree was about to begin.
He still had around twenty billion won left.
"Buy every F-rank skill book under level five and under five million won."
[Purchasing 6,124 listings.]
[Purchase complete!]
[21.234 billion won deducted.]
[10% commission deducted.]
[You possess a large quantity of skill books.]
[Combine two different skill books to create a random skill book of the same rank.]
[Proceed with synthesis?]
"If Summon Skeleton appears, set it aside. Fuse everything else."
[Conditions set.]
[Auto-synthesis initiated!]
Flash!
Let's see.
With six thousand books, he should get around three hundred copies.
The more synthesis attempts he made, the higher the chance of obtaining the desired skill book.
The game had some probability correction built in.
Looking at it that way, maybe the system wasn't completely evil.
...Or was it?
Was he just a sucker?
No way.
This was romance.
And a perfectly rational investment.
One fully enhanced +9 skill.
And he still had one more trump card.
Death Lord.
A passive skill that applied to all skills.
If it enhanced them twice—
Min-woo was certain.
His skeletons would become unstoppable.
He pulled out his phone and made a call.
"Father, it's me. Min-woo. I called because I've nearly used up the first investment fund."
"Already?"
"I've never been physically strong. Low stamina and all that. So I ended up spending a lot on elixirs."
"Even so, with a hundred billion won, you should've easily pushed your stats to fifty."
"I'm almost there. The real problem is skill books."
"Don't tell me you're trying for +9 enhancements?"
"I have to. Death Lord is an incredible skill. It deserves to shine. Besides, it's only a level-one basic skill. The burden isn't that high."
Assuming his luck held out.
A brief silence followed.
Then Chairman Kim answered.
"...Very well! What's family for? I'll send you another two hundred billion won. Buy some equipment while you're at it. But I need you to do your father a favor."
"What kind of favor?"
"Min-woo, I want you to become Ilseong's advertising model."
"An advertising model?"
"That's right. EX-rank is too eye-catching, so we'll just say you awakened with an S-rank achievement and let you build some fame. What do you think?"
"Not a bad idea."
"Right?! That skeleton army you mentioned—use it to promote the company. We'll throw in plenty of product placement too. Deal?"
"Product placement with a skeleton army? Is there even anything that fits?"
"When people become famous, they'll applaud even if they take a dump."
"...Fair enough. So the transfer—"
"I'll send it immediately. Oh, and you need more skill books, right?"
"Yeah. I've been clearing out the auction house, but supply is running low."
"I'll have our people buy up everything outside the auction house too. It'll go faster if we gather them together."
"Thank you."
"Ahem. I'll hang up now. Your old man's busy."
"Understood."
The power of blood ties was truly incredible.
Or perhaps the real credit belonged to Lord Death.
As he consumed another elixir, Min-woo pondered.
An advertising model, huh...
He'd never done anything like that in the game.
It actually sounded fun.
Besides, people are going to find out eventually.
Quite a few people at Sword Sea Pavilion had witnessed his awakening.
The strange light display had been impossible to ignore.
Sooner or later, rumors would spread.
An S-rank achievement awakening was enough to earn someone the title of super rookie.
Attention was inevitable.
He didn't mind.
S-rank achievement awakenings weren't exactly common, but they weren't unprecedented either.
Unlike EX-rank, which was a world first.
No assassins would come after him for being S-rank.
If I'm going to attract attention anyway...
Getting ahead of the curve as a rising Necromancer star didn't sound bad.
Just then—
Flash!
[All stats have reached the level one growth limit of 50.]
[Title acquired: "Promising Talent."]
[Title acquired: "Elixir Slayer."]
Finally...
Before he could savor the moment, more messages appeared.
[Partially fulfilled the requirements for Death Lord's First Trial! (1/2)]
[The Call of Death Lord is blocked until the remaining conditions are met!]
[You currently possess no undead summoning skills!]
[Acquire a skill!]
"...Huh?"
Unexpectedly, he'd discovered one of the requirements.
So that means...
If he learned an undead summoning skill, would he get dragged off to some ominous place?
Yeah, no thanks.
He'd learn the skill after reaching +9 enhancement and finishing all his preparations first.