There are approximately 20,000 portals opening per day every day around the world, on average. A bit less than that outside of confluences, somewhat more than that during confluences, but that's the recent long term average.

(Actually, people's best guess is that it's around one dungeon per day per 400,000 population, given the trends over the decades. Somewhat more concentrated around cities, but not completely.)

Korea has around 130 portals per day. That's not actually all that many, all things considered. It's a big country. And when a portal appears outside Seoul proper or other big places like Busan or Jeju Island, Quasar almost always wins the bidding war to go cover it, since teleportation is cheapest for them. So, since this portal opened in Yeongju, population around 100,000, Quasar is sending the initial recon team to figure out what's up with it.

The truck arrives ten minutes after the first report and five after the confirmation that it's a real dungeon. It would've been quicker if it were an emergency but without a dungeon break or reason to suspect it's a very bad dungeon (the portal size suggests a first-timer), everyone's stretched thin as it is.

There are two teams for this initial setup. The bigger one, ten people total, starts setting up the yellow tape perimetre and the canvas tents for the support staff. Choi Soo-yeon is on the second, smaller team, just four people, whose job is to get basic information about the dungeon.

"Camera set up," she says, once she's set the camera at one end of a long metal stick and started the recording.

"Drone one set up," replies another team member.

"Drone two set up," says the third.

"Going in five," the team lead starts counting down, "four, three, two, one..."

Soo-yeon sticks her camera through the portal at the same time as the two drones autonomously fly in. She starts counting down from ten, and when she's done she pulls the camera back out and watches the recording.

It seems to be an alley in a cyberpunk setting. The camera angle doesn't allow for a very good view, but there's neon everywhere and flashing posters and a lot of black and chrome. It's night, and there's a low buzzing sound in the background.

Fifteen seconds after that, the first drone comes out. Basic readings: a bit chilly but not dangerously cold, normal pressure and oxygenation, no poisonous or toxic gases or particulates detected, no strong magnetic field.

"Calling D."

"It's literally the safest most boring answer," she complains.

"Well, it's usually right."

Drone two comes back out a minute after that. It has better video than the camera on a stick did, and reinforces its findings: cyberpunk setting, a city of some kind, eerily empty of people, but has the occasional highly-futuristic car zooming down the streets. No monsters can be seen (unless the cars are monsters), but the amount of exploration the drone can do with its onboard AI is pretty limited. Nothing attacked it, anyway.

"Soo-yeon, So-min, we're going in. Seung-mi, if you don't hear from us in five minutes, escalate the severity level."

"Yes, captain-nim."

The three of them are already mostly geared, so they just put their helmets on and grab their guns then go in.

It's slightly chilly, like the thermometer indicated, but not any chillier than a regular November evening in Korea. The low buzzing sound the camera caught earlier is coming from the various neon signs blinking and flickering. Nothing seems to respond to their presence.

"Check in."

"Condition normal."

"Condition normal." Seung-mi brought the drone with him, this time with the remote control so they can get an aerial view.

"On me," she says, and starts moving.

They move in formation, Seung-mi in the middle, So-jeong in front, and Soo-yeon flanking.

It continues to be eerily devoid of life. Some cars pass them by, and the windows are tinted too dark for passengers to be visible. The aerial view of the drone suggests an extremely dense city that extends for miles in all directions, but that is almost certainly fake, since the dungeon is probably new. They don't see any victims, either, and through the check ins don't seem to be emotionally or psychologically compromised.

At the four minutes thirty seconds mark, they walk back out.

The tents for the support team and yellow tape have been set up by the time they're out, and a low priority initial request for a sensor has been put in. They only have two kidnap reports so far, and Choi Soo-yeon was right, this is on track to be a regular D-rank dungeon.