Transferred to an SSS-rank Production Class

The thatched house wasn’t the only thing that appeared suddenly. A cluster of winter trees, their branches bare and skeletal, encircled the house like a fence.

The butterfly that had alighted on the porch transformed into a human figure with long, flowing hair. Seemingly unaware of our distant presence, the woman soon opened the sliding door and entered the house.

“I’ll go check it out first.”

Yun Su-ho, after setting Han Cha-hyun down, glanced at me as if seeking permission. Though my Explorer’s Eye couldn’t detect any traps, it was better to err on the side of caution.

The moment I nodded, Yun Su-ho took a step forward.

And in that instant, there was a crisp, crackling sound of something hard breaking.

‘Did he step on a stray pebble?’

Awakened individuals unintentionally damaging natural objects wasn’t uncommon. However, contrary to expectations, what emerged from beneath Yun Su-ho’s boot wasn’t a stone fragment, but a glittering shard.

‘A metal piece? No, a mirror?’

I leaned forward to examine the unidentified fragment. Catching a glimpse of my reflection, it indeed seemed to be a mirror crafted from metal.

“Gaho-ssi, shall we take a closer look?”

“Yes, that would be best. Yun Su-ho, stay where you are for now.”

Exchanging glances with Han Cha-hyun, we moved towards Yun Su-ho. Wondering if there might be more such objects among the flowers, we carefully scanned the ground as we moved.

Crack, crunch.

But our efforts were in vain. After just two steps, the same sound came from beneath my and Han Cha-hyun’s feet. When we moved our feet, sure enough, there were mirror shards.

‘I’m certain there was nothing there when I checked!’

I crouched to examine the fragments, but couldn’t find anything unusual.

“Gaho-ssi, look over there.”

“We’re completely trapped. Yun Gaho! Come this way quickly!”

Hearing the urgent voices of the two, I lifted my head and bit my lip hard. Yun Su-ho was right. We had already fallen into a trap with no means of resistance.

‘All the flower petals have changed!’

The flowers between us and the thatched house had shed their disguise and revealed their true form.

Though not a breath of wind stirred, the mirror petals swayed as if mocking us. The images reflected in hundreds, thousands of mirrors seemed to ripple along with them.

Then, abruptly, my vision went dark.

◆◇◆◇◆

My sight, stolen without warning, returned just as unexpectedly.

The stark white space that greeted me was so bright that I had to squeeze my eyes shut before opening them again. And in that brief moment, the scenery reversed once more.

The blank space vanished as if it had never existed, replaced by a sky painted in soft pinks and purples. Looking around, I couldn’t spot my companions anywhere.

“They must have deliberately scattered us.”

As if waiting for my reaction, rough lines began to scrawl across the pastel background. After a brief performance, an old-fashioned schoolyard materialized.

And before it, a black dot appeared. A few brushstrokes later, and a human figure took shape.

“Hello.”

It was a truly strange and unbelievable sight. I pinched my cheek, wondering if I had fainted and was dreaming, but nothing changed.

The short-haired woman perched on the school gate pillar burst into laughter at my reaction.

“No need to doubt. Your guess is correct.”

Her face was eerily similar to mine.

“I’m Yun Gaho. I’m you.”

I couldn’t deny it. This was me from when I had just started my life as a hunter.

The short hair barely touching the nape of the neck, the cheap bow chosen just to have one, the earrings I had stopped wearing after my earlobe was torn at a job site, even the voice half a tone higher than my current one. The unnecessarily high fidelity of the recreation left me disoriented.

‘Judging by the casual sportswear, this must be from less than a year after I started working.’

With the timeframe roughly estimated, I could also identify this place. The emergency field, “Master’s Favor.” I remembered it vividly even after years, having struggled so terribly here.

The younger me, who had been looking down at me with a smile, jumped off the pillar.

“Well, to be precise, I’m more like a mirror reflecting your inner world. So, tell me, how do you like it here?”

“Is that supposed to be a joke?”

The younger me, who had been mocking my stiff speech as if it were a future trend, suddenly struck a deep chord.

“I guess you can’t be expected to speak kindly. After all, I’ve dredged up your most horrific memory.”

I bit my lip hard. In this field, I had first learned the fear of death that rose to the back of my throat.

‘Honestly, it was sheer luck that I made it out alive.’

Even after that, I had to spend nearly a month in the hospital. The voices of the medical staff, saying there were many dangerous moments when I would have died if I weren’t an awakened, echoed in my ears.

As if to prove that the talk of my inner world wasn’t just nonsense, the younger me continued to remind me of memories related to this place.

“I never thought Kwon Si-hyeong would throw just me into the field. Or was I the fool for believing him when he said to wait inside the gate because support would come from another party?”

Kwon Si-hyeong had even set up a barricade outside the gate without the Anomaly Management Bureau knowing. It took several attempts to pass through the gate before I realized this fact.

The reason Kwon Si-hyeong went to such lengths was simple. If I escaped this field, he wouldn’t be able to collect the labor costs. And…

‘He judged that to be worth more than my life.’

That casual weighing of my worth stung as much as the severe injuries I sustained while conquering the field. For a while after, my hands would shake every time I entered an emergency field.

But I had long since overcome all of this.

“If I break the mirror, this ridiculous reenactment will end, right?”

“You’re going to break me? Good idea, but can you really do it?”

I drew my bow without hesitation and aimed at my younger self.

“Of course. If you thought I couldn’t lay a hand on you just because you look like me, you’re gravely mistaken.”

As I finished speaking, I released the bowstring. My younger self dodged it easily, but I wasn’t fazed. I hadn’t expected a head-on shot like that to hit anyway.

Generating another arrow, I glanced at the clock on the front of the building. There was still time before “break time.”

“Let’s end this before it gets annoying.”

I had worried that perhaps only the appearance was modeled after me, and the core was entirely different, but these concerns were unfounded. The younger me was identical to me in appearance, abilities, and even habits.

My younger self, after a somersault, landed on top of the fountain and drew the bowstring with the pinky finger raised.

‘Planning to use Attribute Bestowal, I see.’

Back when I wasn’t used to the bow and skills, I would always raise my pinky like that when tensing up. Seeing this old habit I had long since corrected made me chuckle.

Considering the attributes I had memorized that day and the current situation… she would probably use Scatter now?

As I charged at my younger self as if initiating close combat, the arrowhead pointed skyward as expected.

“Applying Scatter! Release!”

A magic circle for raining down arrows etched itself against the oddly colored sky. In the blink of an eye, arrows densely pierced the ground around the fountain.

However, none of those arrows managed to inflict even a small scratch on me. I had already fired a grappling hook and taken shelter under a pergola with a stone roof.

“‘Scatter’ is a useful attribute, but it easily becomes useless in places with terrain features like this. So unless it’s an extremely urgent situation, I’d advise using it together with ‘Bow Assistant.'”

“Huh, are you giving me advice now?”

“Let’s call it a suggestion.”

Not long after the battle began, the confrontation between me and my younger self had become more like a demonstration match. I couldn’t help but laugh at the frustrated expression my younger self couldn’t hide.

“It’s good to have a backup weapon besides the bow. For example, like this.”

I approached my younger self, pulling out the staff I had prepared for Enchant practice. She tried to distance herself from me, but stopping her was surprisingly easy.

‘If you really wanted to give me trouble, you shouldn’t have copied my stats.’

The moment my past abilities were exactly replicated, the outcome was decided. Although my S-rank trait from the hidden quest was production-based, that didn’t mean my combat skills hadn’t changed. Not to mention the experience I’d accumulated over time.

Losing to a mere one-year rookie, and my past self at that, would have been absurd. My younger self seemed to have a different opinion, though.

“You just got lucky that time. It’ll be different if we do it again!”

“Then why don’t we try again?”

I released my younger self, whose arm I had been restraining, but the result was the same. My younger self, pinned under me for the second time, glared at me while breathing heavily.

“Knowing how to accept results is also a hunter’s virtue.”

“Aren’t you me? Then why is there such a big difference?”

“Well, it’s nothing special. I just lived diligently.”

My younger self squinted one eye as if she had heard nonsense. It was quite a fierce expression, but I shrugged it off and continued speaking.

“And I still have a lot to do right now.”

I gripped the upper part of the staff with my free hand and shook it, causing the sheath covering the lower part to slide off. Seeing the sharp blade that appeared, my younger self swallowed hard.

Looking into those golden eyes identical to mine made me feel oddly unsettled. Trying to ignore that feeling, I plunged the sword into my younger self’s chest.

“I should be getting back now.”

Just as the silver blade was about to pierce my younger self’s heart, black lines suddenly began to appear all over the world. These black lines multiplied rapidly, soon covering my entire field of vision.

It was the second blackout.

And after a moment of feeling nothing, I went through the same series of processes I had just experienced, and once again, my younger self appeared.

“Hello.”

After that, it was a continuous cycle of challenges and blackouts.

I tried aiming for places other than the heart, and even attempted to persuade my younger self. After the fifth blackout, I tried to elude my younger self and search for an answer that must exist somewhere in this field.

But the situation kept, kept reverting to the beginning.

“Damn it, what’s the problem here?”

Even as I cursed, I moved my feet again. This time, I thought of using “class time” to make my younger self self-destruct. After all, breaking the rules would reset everything.

‘Wait a minute. Reset?’

Come to think of it, haven’t I experienced this situation before?

Memories from a few years ago flipped through my mind like pages of a book. In that moment, I realized I had misjudged many things.

“There was a different way to clear this.”

I let out a chuckle as I watched my younger self chasing me with an innocent face.