After conscription, life was so much different for Rowan.
He had to live in the apartment they set up, follow the routine they laid out, and enter dungeon gates whether he wanted to or not.
The only motivation was simple, this or die.
Rowan started to adjust. Arguably the fastest of anyone, because he had always idolized his father.
His father died in the first Human Liberation War. He was one of the select few who had awakened power back then and gave his life to help take back the human world.
Time passed.
He still vividly remembered his mother begging and crying, even trying to convince him to run somewhere safe and never look back.
But Rowan saw what he was capable of. And knowing what people suffered inside those gates, he chose to stay.
To fight. To protect his country and everyone in it.
There was a time when things started to look up.
And there was a time he wished he had chosen to run away.
The only time he regretted his decision was the apocalypse.
Gates no longer just acted as dungeons but as portals, and monsters could instantly invade Earth. Even with conscription, humanity got overrun by powerful enemies.
There were no dungeon ranks anymore so they all fought a mixed bag ranging from E to A and got killed off quickly.
Chaos ensued as well as bloodshed, and by the time he returned home.
His mom had already become discarded food for the monsters.
{Helen Ashburn, who raised the man who would save the world.}
Ding dong.
As the bell rang his heart nearly leapt out of his chest. Rowan stepped back and took a deep breath.
'Calm down. I faced the end of the world and won. This is nothing.'
He tried his best to steady himself.
She was the only family he had for most of his life, which made her more precious to him than anything.
But he could not make her suspicious.
The hunter situation might need to stay hidden too, at least for now.
"Coming!" A gentle voice carried through from inside, then the door slid open.
A mature woman with grey hair tied up neatly. She wore a modest dress and her face was kind and warm, with the wrinkles of someone who had endured a long time as a single mother.
"Rowan!" His mom, Helen, came in for a hug. A welcome home.
"H-hi mom..." His voice stuttered as a sudden warmth tightened his chest. His knees felt weak. He could not breathe even though his SP was still holding.
"Hm, what is this smell? Heh~ Did you go to a girl's house and change your clothes?" Helen sniffed, catching a different detergent than the one she used, and pulled him into a tight hug as she teased.
"No. Mom, I—" His voice came out muffled as his thoughts began to blur, a ringing sound hissing in his head as memories of pain and suffering came flooding back.
"Come on~ You are already 25 Rowan, it is about time you had a girlfriend. Maybe even a baby~ Mama gets lonely you know."
Since Rowan had started working she had already retired, living off his father's death pension and Rowan's salary, which left her quite lonely at home.
"Tell me, who is it? Who is the lucky girl?" His mom was eagerly curious. At this point in time Rowan had never once had a girlfriend.
Raised by a single mother, living a modest life, he had never really thought about it.
But if he were to think of one... A certain smile framed by white hair flashed through his mind. He shook it off and took a deep breath, pushing back against his mother while holding himself together with everything he had.
"Mom! I did not go to anyone's house. I just... dirtied my clothes and changed."
"Really? And what are these bags?" Helen looked down at the two plastic bags he was carrying. They were not clear bags fortunately, so she couldn't see exactly what was inside.
'Oh!' Rowan had been so focused on thoughts of his mother that all planning had gone out the window. He had completely forgotten to hide them first.
"A.... work! From the office." He quickly stepped inside before she could ask more, which she absolutely would have, but he moved fast enough to get upstairs and shove everything into the closet.
"I am making dinner!" His mom called up from below as he closed the door.
Rowan locked his room and sat down on the floor.
"Ha...." His chest heaved as emotion poured out of him. His eyes watered and a single tear ran down his face. Only a whisper in the dark familiar room he had known since childhood.
"I miss you mom..." The words he wanted to say, to the person he wished to saved the most.
But while Rowan was calming himself down upstairs, Helen simply sighed as she opened the valve and reheated the chicken soup she had been preparing since the afternoon.
"That boy, thinks he is so smart." While waiting for the soup she walked over to the picture frame on the wall.
Inside was a little Rowan with his front teeth missing and his arm already in a cast, and beside him a youthful Helen and a two meter tall man built like a wall, dressed in army uniform.
"All grown up now and think he is slick. Thinks he can lie to his own mother. " She smiled faintly, fond of the memory even as the familiar fear quietly settled back into her chest.
{In memory of Roland Ashburn}
Beside a framed letter bearing the president's signature lay a purple medal, and alongside it sat a safe.
Helen carefully unlocked it, revealing a pulsing glow from inside. A Mana Core, nearly the size of a bowling ball, while the ones Rowan had brought home were no bigger than a pinky nail.
Its energy was so strong that even a non-awakened person like Helen could feel it radiating outward.
And so, she knew what was inside those bags Rowan had been carrying without needing to look.
"Looks like our son chose to become a hunter..."