"Report everything that happened since we lost connection to you guys"

Neatly standing in a line, white-clad individuals stood with their backs straight and with their hands behind their back.

In front of them, Thomas stood there looking at them solemnly.

Stepping up, a white-clad individual with a golden ring on his arm spoke.

"Reporting to Vice-Director, during the sandstorm some sort of radio frequency disruptor was installed preventing us from communicating with the outside world."

"We also couldn't communicate with each other, and because of the low visibility I ordered them to stay within one meter radius of the closest person next to them"

Nodding his head, Thomas took out a pack of cigarettes and lit one of them. Placing the cigarette in his mouth, he exhaled a cloud of smoke as he listened to the report.

Puff!

"As demonic energy was detected before entering the gate, using the energy detector we managed to locate the source of the demonic energy"

Pausing slightly, the captain looked around at his team members and said "the eye of the storm..."

"...Hm? The eye? Are you sure?"

"Affirmative"

Frowning, Thomas pinched the middle of his brows and contemplated.

'If the source of the demonic energy was within the sandstorm, then it can be confirmed that this was an artificially created sandstorm...but why create a sandstorm?'

Suddenly, as he was contemplating, a thought struck him, causing him to quickly focus his attention back on the alpha team captain.

"Did you enter the eye storm?"

Shaking his head, the captain spoke "Negative, by the time we arrived at the edge of the storm everything had already started dying down"

"..huh?"

Surprised by this information, Thomas's frown deepened.

"When everything died down, we managed to catch a glimpse of a black castle not far from where we stood"

Interrupting once again, Thomas thought of something as he asked

"...A black castle? Describe me its features"

"Here sir"

Taking out a tablet, the captain handed it over to Thomas who scrolled through the photos. Soon his face revealed a trace of astonishment

"This is the work of a Baron or higher ranked demon!"

"Pardon?"

Confused, the captain tilted his head.

How could a Baron-ranked demon or higher be able to enter an F rank dungeon?

"Here take a look at this"

Pointing at the castle in the picture, Thomas pinched his fingers and zoomed in. Soon the features of the castle became clearer revealing what seemed to be a small beacon.

"This!"

Nodding his head, Thomas's face darkened, and gravely said "Yes, it's a mana compressor"

A mana compressor was a device used by the demons to compress all the mana inside of a dungeon. In doing so, they could create a small bomb with a power equivalent to five atomic bombs. The force released by the bomb was so strong that it would cause the pocket dimension to crumble, resulting in monsters suddenly appearing in the human world. A dungeon overload.

Fortunately, monsters couldn't adapt to Earth's thin atmosphere. Else the consequences would've been disastrous.

Moreover, a mana compressor could only be utilized by Baron-ranked demons or above. That was because only Baron-ranked demons or above could withstand the power of the mana compressor without going insane.

Once a demon reached a noble rank, not only did they become stronger, but their mental fortitude increased by many folds. A mana compressor concentrated all the mana that was directed to it into a ball of thick dense energy. But in order for it to do so, it needed someone to direct mana into it.

This required an absurd amount of mental strength as one needed to direct all the mana in the atmosphere into a specific point. That's where a Demon came in. The Demon would send a clone of their body in the dungeon and through the connection they had with their clone they would direct the mana towards the mana compressor which would slowly condense all the mana that was directed to it. Only Baron-ranked demons or above could do so.

"I can't believe they were scheming such a thing from underneath our noses"

Staring at the tablet for a bit, Thomas looked at the captain and asked

"...Fortunately it seems like the mana compressor has stopped working. Did you find anything else?"

Nodding his head, the captain responded

"Affirmative. We have found a survivor"

"...Ah yes how could I forget that!"

He vaguely remembered hearing something about a survivor, but at the time he was too focused on making sure everyone was alright that it slipped through his mind.

Scrolling down the tablet in his hands, his finger directly paused on a photo.

Though when he had previously met him a mask covered his face, Thomas was instantly able to identify the person in the picture.

"It's him?"

...

Slowly opening my eyes, I blankly stared at the unfamiliar ceiling for a moment, then slowly I turned my head to the side. As my head cleared, a strong pungent smell of alcohol invaded my nostrils. The room was silent and apart from my heavy breathing, only the beeping sound coming from the electrocardiogram in the corner of the room could be heard.

A throbbing pain hit my head as I looked at my body which was covered in bandages. Aside from the bandages, long metal wires that connected to the electrocardiogram were attached to my body.

I tried to get up. But once I tried to move my upper body, it was instantly engulfed in pain, refusing to listen to me. Slowly, my body sank onto the large white mattress.

Laughing bitterly I could only lay there pathetically, hoping for the pain to disappear. Staring at the ceiling, illuminated with white fluorescent light, a myriad of questions emerged in my head.

How long have I been here? Where am I? What happened? Shutting my eyes, I tried to remember what had transpired prior to waking up in this unfamiliar environment.

-Clank!

But before I could reminisce, the door of the room opened, and a doctor wearing a blue short-sleeved scrub top with a white coat and similar blue colored pants entered the room.

Behind the doctor, a rough blonde individual sat on a chair with his legs crossed and a newspaper in his hand.

"Mr Thomas?"

"...hm?"

-Rustle!

Noticing something, Thomas, who had previously accompanied me to the gate, put away the newspaper in his hands and entered the room.

He looked the same as when I first met him, but differently from last time he was currently wearing a brown suit which was full of wrinkles.

"How are you feeling?"

"Alright, I guess?"

"That's a relief"

Sitting down next to my bed, Thomas loosened his necktie and took out a pack of cigarettes from his pocket.

"Do you mind?"

Shaking my head, I turned my head around and looked outside the window.

It was currently nighttime in Ashton city, and the city lights brightly lit the area around the hospital.

"Puff...Ah, just what I needed"

Puffing a cloud of smoke, Thomas leisurely leaned back and also looked at the brightly lit night.

"You did good kid"

"Hm?"

"Because of you, we managed to stop a possible dungeon desync, which would've resulted in a serious loss for us"

Pausing slightly, Thomas deeply looked at the star-filled night "...so after a brief discussion with the higher-ups a decision was made..."

Once again pausing, Thomas turned his attention towards me and couldn't help but let out a dry laugh as he spoke "Well...they decided to grant you a skill"

"A skill?"

Opening my eyes wide, I immediately shook my hands and refused.

"I haven-t nearly don-e enough to receive a skill!"

I was so shocked that I started stuttering as I couldn't help but be surprised by how generous they were.

My bewildered reaction was understandable as in this world if someone were to ask you what the most sought-after thing was, most wouldn't even think twice before answering 'skill'.

Even though monster parts, martial manuals, weapon manuals, cores were all things that held tremendous value, in the eyes of people their worth was far lower than skills.

Unlike martial arts, weapon arts, or anything that required some sort of mastery, skills could be learned instantly.

Typically a person would spend years learning a technique before they could proudly say that they had mastered it.

However, with skills all you needed to do was learn it and all the information would instantly be transferred in your brain. There was no need to train the skill, as once you learned it you were capable of instantly using it.

It was a total cheat.

In a matter of seconds, you could do things that would generally require someone years of training to master.

I mean who wouldn't want them?

Skills could be found inside of dungeons, and just like cores, you could get them from monsters.

However, the drop rate compared to cores, which was already quite low, was even slimmer, resulting in skills being extremely rare.

And thus once the first skill was discovered, similarly to cores, a huge uproar ensued as everyone started coveting them.

I mean who wouldn't want to become stronger without putting that much effort?

From that point on, whenever a skill was found, huge auctions would be established. A single skill could go up for at least a couple million U in the auctions.

"Hahaha, is helping us not lose a dungeon that earns us millions of U each day not something worth a skill? Plus we aren't really going to give you a high-ranking skill, just an F-ranked one."

"eh...I guess you do have a point, but an F-ranked skilled is still a skill..."

"Ah just don't fuss over such trivial thing"

'How can an F-ranked skill be considered a trivial thing?'

I thought to myself, as I once again realized how rich and powerful the black market was.

To call an F-rank skill a trivial thing just goes to show how powerful of an organization they were.

Although F-ranked skills were on the lower end of the spectrum, they were still worth a huge amount of money.

Seeing how they didn't think much about an F-ranked skill, I couldn't help but wonder how many skills they had with them...could they possibly be in possession of S-ranked skills?

If so, then I had really underestimated how influential the black market was...

Even as the author of the novel, I didn't know much regarding the black market as I never dwelled too deep on them in the story.

They were merely a convenient organization that the protagonist used to facilitate his growth.

I just knew the general layout of the organization, the identity of some of the higher-ups of the organization, but other than some other trivial information the black market was shrouded in a veil of mystery.

But it seems like they were a far bigger organization than I had made them out to be...especially if they were in possession of multiple S-ranked skills...which were far harder to find.

There were only 18 S rank dungeons known to mankind.

Which was a dramatic difference compared to F-rank dungeons which numbered over tens of thousands.

As the supply was lower, the number of skills that could be acquired was also lower. Moreover, S-rank dungeons were far harder than lower-ranked ones, making S-rank skills that much harder to acquire.

one S-ranked skill could pretty much allow someone to buy a small city. That's how expensive they were.

But it has to be said that, although S rank skills were indeed much stronger than lower-ranked skills, that didn't mean that low ranking skills were useless.

In fact, lower-ranked skills, depending on the person, could turn out to be far more useful than an S-ranked skill.

Take an assassin for example. If they were given the option to choose between D-rank skill [Shadow cloak], a skill that enables the user to hide under a shadow, or S-ranked skill [Tyrant's wrath] which was a mass AOE skill, they would obviously prefer the D-ranked skill which was better suited for their profession.

At the end of the day, it all came down to how compatible you were with the skill.

"Alright, you better rest now."

Standing up, and straightening his wrinkly suit, Thomas flicked the cigarette in his hand and lightly stomped on it with his foot.

"Once you recover, I'll guide you to where you can collect your skill"

Finished with what he wanted to say, Thomas turned around and left the room.