The Hobgoblin didn’t scream. It only managed a wet, bubbling gurgle as Arkan twisted the rusted iron spearhead deeper into its throat.

He didn't pull the weapon out immediately. A careless yank would send highly acidic blood spraying across the cavern, ruining the monster's hide—and his only payday. Instead, Arkan braced his boots against the slick stone, using his entire body weight to pin the thrashing beast against the damp wall. He held his breath, ignoring the burning strain in his shoulders, until the violent twitching finally ceased.

Three minutes. Arkan exhaled, a plume of white mist rising in the freezing, ozone-scented dungeon air. He ripped the spear out and quickly crouched beside the carcass. His hands, wrapped in cheap, blood-caked bandages, worked with mechanical precision. A horizontal slice beneath the ribs, a sharp twist of his hunting knife, and a sickening, wet squelch echoed in the hollow cave.

He extracted a marble-sized stone that pulsed with a clouded, sickly green light. A low-grade Mana Core.

"Market value... maybe four hundred credits," Arkan muttered, his voice raspy. He wiped the core on his worn-out cargo pants and tossed it into the canvas bag slung over his shoulder. "Not enough for the good suppressants. I'll have to buy the generic brand for Elara this week."

This was a Dead Zone. An unranked, unstable Gate that the official Guilds deemed 'unprofitable.' It was highly illegal for an unlicensed scavenger to be here. If the Gate Regulators caught him, he’d be thrown in military prison without a trial.

But military prison didn't terrify Arkan. What terrified him was the hospital bill sitting on his kitchen counter back home.

BEEP. BEEP.

The cheap digital watch on his wrist vibrated. He had been inside for exactly forty-five minutes. The Gate’s mana signature was destabilizing, the cavern walls already groaning as the spatial laws began to collapse. If he didn't leave right now, the portal would snap shut, burying him in this subspace forever.

Arkan grabbed his iron spear, ignored the screaming ache in his muscles, and sprinted toward the shimmering blue tear in the air.

He dove through the portal just as the cavern ceiling behind him began to cave in.

FWUMP.

Arkan hit the wet asphalt of a dark city alleyway. The cold, biting rain of the real world washed over him. The blue Gate behind him shrank into a single point of light and vanished with a quiet pop.

He leaned back against the rough brick wall, gasping for air, sliding down until he hit the ground. He was alive. He had the core.

As he reached into his pocket for his phone to call his black-market buyer, his fingers brushed against a thick, high-quality parchment. He slowly pulled it out.

It was an envelope. Pristine, white, and sealed with a glittering gold crest of a sword and shield. It looked completely out of place in his filthy, blood-stained hands.

Arkan stared at it. It was the letter that had arrived this morning.

[Apex Warrior High School]

[Status: ACCEPTED]

His eyes didn't linger on the shiny crest. They drifted down to the bold, red ink stamped across the bottom of the letter.

[Department Assignment: DUNGEON RAID & LOGISTICS]

Not the Hero Department. Not the golden children who received corporate sponsorships, flashy custom armor, and roaring cheers from the public.

The Raid Department. The scavengers. The bait. The ones who carried the heavy bags and dug the muddy trenches just so the Heroes could shine.

Arkan tightly clenched the low-grade Hobgoblin core in his left hand, feeling its faint, residual mana sting his calloused skin. A sharp, icy smile crossed his face.

"Raid Department," he whispered into the empty alley. "Perfect. I hate the spotlight anyway."

---

Announcement / Author's Note:

Welcome to Abyssal Raider! If you're a fan of gritty underdog stories, dungeon hunting, and MCs who actually use their brains instead of plot armor, you're in the right place.

This is just the beginning. The real academy survival starts soon. Drop a comment and let me know what you think of Arkan's debut! Don't forget to add this to your library! - itsYurtzy

Apex Warrior High School didn't look like an academy. It looked like a military fortress wrapped in a five-star hotel.

Arkan stood at the massive wrought-iron gates, adjusting the collar of his stiff, tactical-black uniform. The fabric was heavy—designed to resist low-level monster claws and acidic blood. It felt suffocating compared to the worn-out gear he usually wore in the Dead Zones.

Next to him, sleek black sedans and imported sports cars pulled up to the drop-off zone.

Students stepped out wearing pristine white uniforms lined with gold trim. Their armor pieces—shoulder guards, gauntlets, and chest plates—gleamed under the morning sun, enchanted to perfection. They laughed, waving at hovering camera drones broadcasting the "First Day of the Future Heroes" to the local news networks.

The Hero Department. Arkan ignored them and joined the thin line of students wearing the same heavy black uniforms as him. The Raid Department didn't get camera drones. They got directed to the side entrance.

"Look at them," a voice sneered from the Hero crowd. "I didn't realize Apex was accepting charity cases this year. Do they even know how to hold a sword?"

Arkan didn't turn around. He just kept walking. In the Dead Zones, pride got you killed. The only thing that mattered was surviving long enough to cash in your mana cores.

"ALL FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS—PROCEED TO THE MAIN COURTYARD FOR THE ORIENTATION ASSEMBLY."

The mechanical voice boomed from the PA system, vibrating in Arkan’s chest.

As the two lines of students merged toward the massive courtyard doors, the hallway grew crowded. The scent of expensive cologne and ozone mixed with the nervous sweat of the Raid students.

Suddenly, a loud clatter echoed through the hall.

A Gold-trim student—tall, broad-shouldered, with a customized greatsword strapped to his back—had dropped a silver mana-measuring device. It rolled perfectly to stop at the tip of Arkan’s standard-issue combat boots.

The hallway went dead silent.

The Gold student crossed his arms, a smirk playing on his lips. "Hey. Logistics boy. Pick that up."

A few of the Hero students chuckled. The Raid students behind Arkan instinctively took a step back, lowering their heads. It was an unwritten rule—never antagonize the Golds. They had guild sponsorships before they even graduated.

Arkan looked down at the silver device. Then, he looked up at the Gold student.

Stance is too wide. Center of gravity is resting completely on his heels. His greatsword is strapped too tight to his back—it would take him exactly 1.4 seconds to draw it. He's dead meat if a Goblin jumps him. "I said," the Gold student took a step forward, his aura flaring. A heavy, suffocating pressure filled the hallway, making a few nearby students gasp. "Pick it up."

Arkan didn't release his aura. He didn't need to. He simply shifted his weight forward.

In a fraction of a second, Arkan closed the distance. He didn't draw a weapon. He just walked past the Gold student, his shoulder brushing against the larger boy's chest plate.

It wasn't a hit. It was a precise, calculated shift of leverage.

CLANG.

The Gold student gasped as his feet were swept out from under him by his own displaced weight. He crashed hard onto the marble floor, his heavy greatsword pinning him down like a turtle on its shell.

Arkan didn't even break his stride. He kept walking toward the courtyard doors, his hands casually stuffed in his pockets.

"If you drop your gear in a dungeon," Arkan called out without looking back, his voice completely flat. "The monsters won't pick it up for you. They'll just eat you."

The entire hallway stared at Arkan’s retreating back in stunned silence.

Up on the second-floor balcony, leaning against the railing, a man in a rumpled suit watched the whole exchange. He took a long drag from a cigarette, exhaling a cloud of gray smoke.

"Well," the man muttered, a predatory grin spreading across his scarred face. "Looks like a stray dog managed to sneak into the kennel this year."

---

Author's Note

And so the academy life begins! Arkan isn't here to make friends with the elites. Who do you think the scarred man on the balcony is? Drop a comment, and make sure to add Abyssal Raider to your library so you don't miss the entrance exams! - itsYurtzy

"Hero Department, please proceed to the Main Hall of Light. Raid and Logistics Department, please proceed to Sub-Level 4."

The mechanical voice from the PA system sounded cheerful when announcing the Hero Department's destination, but suddenly shifted to a flat, monotonous tone when mentioning the Raid Department.

Arkan separated from the glittering crowd of white uniforms. Along with about fifty other students in black tactical uniforms, he descended a dimly lit concrete staircase. There was no red carpet here. The further down they went, the colder and damper the air felt. The smell of hospital antiseptic mixed with the scent of rusting metal hung in the air.

Sub-Level 4 wasn't a hall. It was an underground bunker with steel walls half a meter thick.

At the front of the room stood the heavily scarred man who had previously watched Arkan from the balcony. He wore a rumpled suit, his shirt half-unbuttoned, and a clove cigarette dangled from the corner of his lips—completely ignoring the academy's strict no-smoking rules.

"Sit," the man's voice was raspy, like two rough stones grinding together.

The Raid students quickly took their seats on the cold iron chairs. They looked tense. Most of them were kids from ordinary backgrounds who had failed the high-level combat aptitude exams.

"My name is Vance," the man extinguished his cigarette against his own bare palm without blinking. Tsssh. "I am the Head of the Raid Department. And there is no welcome speech for you."

Vance paced back and forth in front of them like an old wolf. "You probably think you're here to be the heroes behind the scenes. To be the ones gathering materials, paving the way, and making sure the Golden-Armored Young Masters up there can shine on television. Right?"

A few students nodded hesitantly.

"Bullshit," Vance spat on the floor. "The official Guilds and the Government are lying to the public. They say Gates are a blessing, a resource mine gifted by the universe to humanity."

Vance leaned forward, his dark eyes staring directly at the students. "A Gate is not a mine. A Gate is a rotting wound. And you, the Raid Department... you are the maggots sent to eat the pus."

A chilling silence enveloped the room. Arkan didn't move, but his eyes narrowed slightly.

He knows, Arkan thought.

"The Heroes up there deal with sterilized monsters and stabilized Cores," Vance continued. "But you? Your job is to enter the zones where the boundary between our reality and the Abyss begins to thin. You won't die from a Goblin's claws. You'll die from..." Vance smiled grimly. "...madness."

Arkan looked down, staring at his left palm hidden inside his pants pocket. The same hand he used to crush the rotting Hobgoblin core this morning.

Ever since he walked out of the Dead Zone, Arkan had felt something was wrong. His palm wasn't just burning. Beneath the skin, his veins occasionally throbbed with a pitch-black hue. And every time it throbbed, Arkan could hear a whisper.

A very faint whisper, as if coming from the bottom of the deepest ocean. A language incomprehensible to human reason, yet somehow, Arkan’s soul understood its meaning: Hunger.

What a beautiful fantasy world, Arkan thought cynically. They think magic is holy energy. When in reality, it's poison from another dimension.

When the collapsing Gate nearly swallowed him this morning, Arkan realized one thing that made his blood run cold. The blue tear in the air didn't just close. It blinked. Like a giant eye staring at him before shutting.

"For your first orientation test," Vance's voice shattered Arkan's thoughts. The scarred man kicked open a large metal crate beside him.

Inside the crate sat a chunk of purplish-red monster flesh that was still pulsing slowly, emitting a thin black mist that made the air around them feel heavy and suffocating.

A few students in the front row instantly went pale. Some covered their mouths, holding back nausea.

"This is a contaminated Troll Heart from a C-Rank Gate," Vance said coldly. "The surrounding mana has been tainted by Abyssal corruption. Your task is simple."

Vance pointed at the chunk of flesh.

"Step up, touch this heart for five seconds without losing your sanity, and return to your seat. If you pass out, cry, or start rambling... you'll be expelled from Apex today."

Vance swept his gaze across the room, and for some reason, his eyes locked perfectly with Arkan's. The man's predatory smile returned.

"Who wants to go first?"

Arkan let out a long breath. He pulled his hand out of his pocket. The black veins in his palm throbbed, as if responding to the black mist of the Troll Heart. Not with fear, but with thirst.

Arkan stood up from his chair. The iron seat let out a loud squeak, breaking the silence.

"I'll do it," Arkan said flatly, walking forward with a calm stride as if he were just strolling to a vending machine.

---

Author's Note:

Slowly but surely, the dark side of the Abyssal Raider world is being revealed! It's not just about hacking and slashing monsters; there's a massive mystery and madness waiting behind the Gates. How will Arkan handle this Abyssal corruption test? Leave your thoughts in the comments and don't forget to add this to your library!