Junhyuk was back from the Dimensional Battlefield, and it was still Friday when he walked out of his room. Sarang was walking out of her room as well, and when they met, she smiled.

“Big brother!”

Junhyuk took her to his room and asked her, “Did you bet on the Champions’ Battlefield?”

“I placed a bet on the humans’ team.”

“How much?”

“All of my victory reward money.”

Junhyuk was surprised to hear that, so he said, “You shouldn’t have. Bet smaller amounts. What if you lose all of it?”

“You are right as well, but if the humans don’t make big mistakes, they’ll be able to win. Their enemies have a better record, but the humans have better powers. Jeffrey is really strong.”

Jeffrey was certainly strong. His summoned A-ranked monster sp.a.w.ned with lower stats than those on the Dimensional Battlefield, but he could buff it and make it go berserk. Because of that, Jeffrey could kill a champion with a snap of his finger.

“Don’t go overboard like that again. You need to save money so that you can get better items.”

“OK.”

Junhyuk was supporting Elise, so he could claim half of what Elise made. For that reason, his situation was completely different from Sarang’s. Nevertheless, he wouldn’t forget about Sarang’s needs, planning to support her with the gold he made from Elise.

Sarang opened the fridge, grabbed a can of c.o.ke and said, “By the way, there are very few monster cadavers.”

Because they had used core bombs, there weren’t many bodies left over in what had been the monster areas. Junhyuk hadn’t thought about that problem before.

If he had slowed down the destruction of the areas, he would have followed Eltor’s plan. If that had been the case, many novices and experts would have died.

Eltor would have even killed champions to make more heroes. It would have meant that the managers would have gotten their wish.

Junhyuk knew that heroes weren’t made in a day. If someone became a hero in a day, that person would die easily and quickly in the Dimensional Battlefield. He had fought brand-new heroes during team selections. Some could only be killed by him using powers. Others had died from regular attacks.

Being a hero didn’t only mean having four powers, but also having the basic const.i.tution to match other heroes.

Junhyuk wanted to gather all existing champions and head to South Korea quickly. He would train them to increase their basic stats. Some champions were making use of the training facility, but fighting monsters was different from sparring with a hero.

He too could learn from sparring with champions with different powers. Junhyuk had learned a lot from his spars with Sarang.

If Junhyuk trained the champions, they would be ready when Eltor put his new plan into action.

Eltor had taken the cores back, but the manager was planning on triggering monster waves. Junhyuk needed the champions to grow stronger in order to avoid ma.s.sive casualties.

He replied to Sarang, “A-ranked monsters probably won’t sp.a.w.n in the champions’ training facility.” Then, he added, “We’ll use the bodies we’ve collected so far and research the cores. Elise has a refurbished core, and she’ll need to reengineer it so that she can refurbish the other cores as well.”

Elise had bought a set of the highest quality intelligence runestones. Because of them, she had improved a lot, and Junhyuk harbored great expectations for her.

“Core refurbishment is very expensive. On top of that, there’s no guarantee of success.”

“That’s right.”

Things weren’t easy. They would need at least 16,000,000G to refurbish all the cores they owned. If they were successful, they could earn 1,000,000G per 200,000G they invested.

Junhyuk would be able to buy legendary items, and so would Sarang and Elise. Therefore, Junhyuk had to support Elise without holding back. He grabbed the c.o.ke from Sarang’s hand and drank it himself.

“Let’s return to South Korea. I have to meet with Elise.”

“OK.”

Sarang got up from where she had been seating, and both of them went to see Johnson. Junhyuk gathered the champions, and Johnson told him a helicopter was ready. After that, Junhyuk took the champions and Sarang along with him. He also took volunteers from the experts with him.

Junhyuk relaxed while being transported. The pilot and co-pilot were older, so they wouldn’t be summoned to the Dimensional Battlefield mid-flight. There was no danger.

He was conversing with Sarang while relaxing when someone approached him. It was Helen, and she sat next to him. She had been under a different a.s.signment when she had been an expert, but she had just become a champion, so she would join him for now.

Junhyuk turned to Helen, and she asked, “What’s your plan?”

“You’ve got three powers, but activating a fourth won’t be easy.”

Junhyuk and Sarang had been killed multiple times before activating their fourth powers, but dying wasn’t the only thing necessary. Some beings activated their fourth power after dying countless times, but doing things that way didn’t help much.

Looking at Helen, Junhyuk said, “We’ll help you, but for us to train you, we need more powered people. Each one of you has to learn how to use his or her powers and weapons.”

Helen agreed, “Sure.”

The powered people had base stats that went well beyond those of ordinary people, but they still had to learn armed combat, be it with swords or spears, and so forth. Doing that would increase their combat prowess significantly. The only way they would become heroes would be if they bettered their foundations on the basics.

“My superiors want me to let you know that they’ll support you.”

“Is that right?”

Thinking about it, Junhyuk had a complex relationship with Charles. Things had happened very quickly, and Junhyuk had had to use the core bombs. He had had to erase metropolitan areas of major cities. Nevertheless, Charles had supported him through it. The monster areas were gone, but there were troubles that still remained.

Helen was one of Charles’ subordinates. She was a champion now, but she still worked for him.

Junhyuk had wanted to know why Helen had started the conversation with him, so with that, he smiled.

“Helen, have you been to the Champions’ Battlefield?”

“No.”

“You need to be a leader there. Once you go to the Champions’ Battlefield, that perspective will help you.”

“Thanks for the advice.”

Helen walked away, and Junhyuk turned back to Sarang. While Helen went elsewhere, Sarang asked, “Who does she work for?”

“The Rockefeller family.”

“Ah…” Sarang thought about Helen, who was now sitting with the other champions, and said, “She’s beautiful.”

“Is she?” Junhyuk said, chuckling as he leaned back against his seat.

Sarang shrugged and closed her eyes. The plane took them safely to South Korea.

—

Guardian’s HQ.

Delegates from all over the world greeted them. The amount of casualties and collateral damage was high. Nevertheless, the powered people had destroyed the monster areas. Even so, the number of casualties between powered people was also high. In situations like that, the powered people needed more support.

Junhyuk greeted the delegates and entered the meeting room. Everyone gathered there, and he expressed his concerns, “We need three more heroes, but I don’t know how to get them. While champions aren’t fighting monster waves, I’ll need to train them in South Korea.”

Eunseo fixed her gla.s.ses and asked, “What kind of training will that be?”

“It’ll be personalized training, designed to benefit each champion and maximize that champion’s power. It’ll also contain traditional fighting techniques, martial arts, armed combat and other methods of fighting. The champions need the basics of everything.”

Junhyuk turned to Eunseo and said, “Gather masters in all of those arts to train these champions. We also need a training facility.”

Guardians could do it all alone, but if each country helped, things would go more smoothly.

Junhyuk turned to the delegates and announced, “I’m forcing all of the champions to partic.i.p.ate. On top of that, experts can volunteer for the training.”

All of them agreed, and Junhyuk asked, “How’s it going with the cleaning?”

Eunseo said, “I’ll tell you privately. Do you need anything else in the agenda?”

After some thought, Junhyuk said, “If the monster waves get triggered, the level of destruction will be greater than ever before. Have you positioned my teleportation devices as I’ve asked?”

“Yes.”

“I’m sure you chose well. I trust you.”

They were all anxious about the monster waves, and there was a silent war between the delegates about positioning the teleportation devices in their countries to better respond to the waves. However, Junhyuk couldn’t interfere with that.

Looking at them, he said, “Our problems aren’t over. Don’t forget to we have to meet and solve our problems together.”

Everyone nodded, and when he was about to leave, Steve got up and said, “I have an official question for you.”

Junhyuk looked at Steve, and Steve asked him, “Up until now, we’d all thought of you as a champion. That was how we presented you officially. So, my question for you now is: are you a hero?”

Junhyuk had already talked to the champions about that, but the delegates wanted an official statement from him.

“I’m a hero.”