My Alt Account Became the World's No. 1 Hunter
Chapter 32: Shopping! (1)

Chapter 32: Shopping! (1)

After a long walk back to the mall, alone.

He sucked in a breath and rolled his shoulders once, the payout chit pressing into his stomach like a slap.

He muttered under his breath, "Alright, Zero Drip 2.0, let’s see if we can buy enough black fabric to keep people from calling me the Discount Ninja for at least a week."

Just to be safe, he fished the chit out and triple-checked the balance, squinting like the numbers might’ve somehow dropped just because he looked too long at a pair of tactical gloves earlier.

"Still there," he whispered, nodding like a stressed-out accountant. "Definitely not a hallucination. Probably."

He shoved it back in his hoodie pocket like it was radioactive and tapped the spot twice for good luck.

Lanz finally stood at the front door of Velmordop’s biggest mall like he was about to storm the gates of some high-level fortress. Well, if you look at it from the perspective of a broke idiot, this mall was a "high-level fortress"

"Sheesh, this looks insane," he muttered, eyes glancing all over the building.

"And people say that this isn’t the biggest mall in world? Then what the actual f*ck does the mall in Galdara look like." As he said that, he could feel the payout chit burning a hole in his belly, pressed so tight to his stomach it was like a second organ.

He almost wished he’d stashed it in his sock after all, at least then he wouldn’t keep tapping it every ten seconds to make sure it hadn’t evaporated on the train ride over. "But nah, that’s doing too much,"

The sliding doors whooshed open, and he was hit with that sharp, cool blast of indoor AC and the smell of floor polish mixed with overpriced cinnamon pretzels.

’This place smells richer than my actual existence... nah, I’m a valuable individual. I’m definitely worth more than a building...’

He was in fact, worth more than the building. Even you. Yes you, the reader, is worth more than a building.

’Sure narrator, keep telling them that. But anyways, wow this place looks awesome!’

Inside, Velmordop’s crown jewel mall was exactly the kind of place that made his wallet shrivel up and try to crawl out the exit on its own.

Shiny tiled floors stretched out in every direction, polished to a mirror sheen that caught the flicker of ceiling lights.

At the center, two escalators rolled lazily upwards and downwards like they were mocking him for needing to ride them instead of just manifesting wings like a proper AA-Rank flexer.

Behind them was the main lobby, a wide lounge area scattered with tiny, fancy café tables where people in coats worth more than his entire closet pretended to sip overpriced coffee and argue about Hunter stocks.

’F*cking hell, I hate how rich they look.’

To the left of the entrance, he clocked the market section, normal folks pushing carts stacked high with meal kits, cheap detergent, bulk snack boxes. Even that side made him wince at the prices.

To the right, a row of brand stalls hawking overpriced perfume, flashy phone accessories, and fancy hand-massager things no one really needed. A line of lockers stood behind them, so the truly sophisticated shopper wouldn’t have to carry their bags around like some common donkey.

"’Truly sophisticated shopper’ is a nice way to say lazy f*cks. But keep cooking narrator!"

... (Author: What the hell am I doing here bruhh✋😭🤚)

Upstairs, though, that’s where the real bait was. The entire second floor was split like an easy moral dilemma: the left side was the gear store, and the right side was a legit clothing shop so shiny he’d probably have to fight the urge not to drool on the display glass. "Gear first, dumbass," he whispered to himself.

A pair of students in clean school uniforms strolled past him, laughing way too loud about a Hunter they followed on stream, the kind that wore gold-trimmed armor and never fought anything above CCC-rank.

One of them waved a smoothie cup around while the other pointed toward the second floor like they already knew which set they were buying.

Neither of them looked like they’d ever budgeted a single coin in their lives.

Just behind them, an older man in a crisp blazer was typing furiously on a tablet while pushing a shopping cart full of pre-packed survival rations — the premium kind with fancy branding and vacuum-sealed meat cubes.

Lanz raised an eyebrow. "Bro’s either prepping for a gate dive or the apocalypse," he muttered.

He then took a breath, then shuffled toward the escalator with the exact confidence of a stray cat trying to sneak into a five-star restaurant.

On the side of the escalator, a Hunter store clerk was standing by a podium with a tablet, clearly trying to make quota. She had one of those fake cheerful smiles that said "I will sell you shoes or die trying," and she immediately perked up when she saw him.

"Hi sir! Are you—"

Lanz swerved hard to the left, pretending to read a sign about mall WiFi like it held the secrets of the universe.

"Not today," he whispered, body angled at a perfect 45 degrees away from eye contact range. He waited until she turned to talk to a rich couple before creeping past like a low-level rogue avoiding aggro.

The handrail was smooth and suspiciously sticky in spots, and for a second he almost tripped stepping onto the first moving stair. He caught himself with a jerk, then jammed his hands into his hoodie pocket like he meant to do that.

"Yeah, smooth. Real f*cking smooth, dumbass," he muttered under his breath. A mother and her kid behind him gave him a side-eye like he’d just confessed to a felony.

The slow crawl to the second floor gave him the perfect vantage point to look at the display windows on either side.

The mannequins in the clothing store window were dressed in glossy hunter outfits, all matte black layered jackets and clean-cut combat pants, tactical boots that cost more than a month of his dad’s overtime pay.

One mannequin had its plastic arm outstretched in this perfectly heroic angle, hand curled around a prop blade that looked sharper than anything he owned.

"God," Lanz breathed out, eyebrows twitching. "Even the f*cking mannequins look smug."

He spotted another one — some blank-faced dummy standing in a ready-to-sprint pose with its head cocked just so, like it knew Lanz was the only loser on this moving staircase wearing a discount hoodie, and it wasn’t wrong. He flipped it a tiny, petty middle finger from inside his pocket. "F*ck youuuuuu," he whispered under his breath.

Fortunately, but unfortunately at the same time, no one saw.

The escalator dropped him off with a gentle lurch at the second-floor. For a heartbeat, he just stood there, feet planted awkwardly while people streamed around him like he was a piece of lost luggage.

To his left, the gear store loomed — wide glass doors, neon sign flashing "GEAR ZONE" in blocky letters that made it look more like an arcade than a shop.

He could see the racks already, rows of helmets lined up like eggs waiting to hatch, gloves in tidy display boxes, boots stacked in precise pyramids that probably cost more per pair than his whole kit combined.

He sucked in a breath and rolled his shoulders once, the payout chit pressing into his stomach like a slap. He muttered under his breath, "Alright, Zero Drip 2.0, let’s see if we can buy enough black fabric to keep people from calling me the Discount Ninja for at least a week."

And with that, he pushed the door open, the blast of cold store AC and blinding showroom lights greeting him like a VIP. Which, technically, he was not — but today, he could pretend.

And with that, he pushed the door open, the blast of cold store AC and blinding showroom lights greeting him like a VIP. Which, technically, he wasn’t — but today, he could pretend.

Or at least until someone walked up and asked him where he was from.

End of Chapter 32.

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ALT SYSTEM — USER PROFILE: ZERO

Level: 11

EXP: 82 / 110

Next Reward: 10 Available Stat Points

Global System Tracking: DISABLED

World Rank Association: UNLINKED

Stats:

STR: 8 | AGI: 8 (Affinity) | VIT: 3 | DEX: 1 | INT: 7 | WIS: 0

[Available Stat Points: 3]

[Derived Stat — MANA: 35 / 35]

Skills:

[Crimson Slash Lv. 1]

[Phantom Stride Lv.1]

[Blade Control Lv.1]

[Parry Timing Lv.1]

[Reflex Sync Lv.1] (Passive Skill)

[Combat Awareness Lv.2] (Passive Skill)

[Skill Fusion Menu: Active]

[Dev Tree: Tier 0 Access Granted]

[Developer Node – Fusion Core Anchor: Active]

[Skill Slot Available — Unassigned]

Equipment:

Aged Blade Fragment (??? Rarity) (Bound)

Goblin Dagger

Spiked Boar Tusk Shard

Lightweight Chest Padding

Boots of Basic Mobility

Fingerless Gloves (Basic)

Starter Cloak: Faded Black

Training Ring (+1 VIT)