Chapter 421: Duckling (1)
I didn't want to go in. There was no avoiding it, but I still wanted to stall for at least a little longer. But there was nothing good about staying outside too long either. Were Yoohyun and Mr. Noah still asleep? It didn't seem like there was any need to wake them on purpose. Even if I put it off, it was something I would have to face in the end.
Swallowing down a sigh, I looked at Manager Song's back as he walked ahead of me. Seeing that stubborn back made me think of it again. It had been all but settled, so it was too much of a shame to give up like this. I'd only just managed to make him decide to take him along!
"Are you really not going to take him with you? Even though you promised? Just because he'll grow?"
"The value of a juvenile and an adult is different. If it were simply a young lamb, I could protect it myself. But a high-rank kiseungsu is difficult for me to handle."
His voice was blunt, cutting clean through. I wanted to accept that, but if that was the issue—
"A little earlier, I was, well, trying to persuade you too emotionally. But this time, I'll speak as the director of the kiseungsu rearing facility. Emotional responsibility can't be helped, but I will absolutely take legal responsibility. I don't send those kids off that easily. Isn't that right, Guildmaster of Seseong?"
"The contract certainly was thick."
Back when I had discussed the breeding contract terms with Seok Simyeong, we had also set terms about how the kiseungsu would be treated. After that, it had been supplemented even further, becoming longer and more detailed. Character copyrights and dungeon profit distribution had not been included in the contract with Seseong, but kiseungsu welfare had been added.
"To speak frankly, kiseungsu don't exactly live safe lives, do they? At least they're monsters, and they usually show combative tendencies, so it's manageable. If I had to force them to fight, I probably couldn't have gone as far as creating a rearing facility either. Using animals for military purposes is common enough, but once it became my position, it felt different."
At first, I hadn't thought much about it. But as I raised the kids, I couldn't help but grow attached to them. People came before kiseungsu, and protecting this world came first, but still—if Peace or Blue had hated going into dungeons. If the other monsters had been the same. I might have given up on the rearing facility, if only because I wouldn't have been able to bear it.
…Sorok worries me a little, though.
"That's why I don't treat kiseungsu breeding contracts casually. You can't just send the kids off and let them be run ragged. The contract includes all of it—working conditions, breeding environment, penalties in case of injury or death, regular inspections, and so on. I don't go easy on anyone. I've even scolded my own little brother for slighting Peace."
Even now, I liked Ms. Soyoung's attitude much better than Yoohyun's, but thankfully Peace unexpectedly got along well with Yoohyun. How should I put it—if Yoohyun doted on him the way Ms. Soyoung did, I felt like Peace would actually dislike it.
"Right now, I'm alive and well, so I'll draft a proper contract with you too, Manager Song. If you're worried the Association or other riffraff might interfere, then we'll line up plenty of guarantors. Haeyeon, and Mr. Sung Hyunjae?"
"Of course I should."
"And I'll ask Myeongwoo too. I'm sure Ms. Hyuna will accept as well. There is only one thing you need to do, Manager Song."
Song Taewon stopped dead at the hotel entrance and turned to look at me.
"Please cherish him to the very end as his partner."
"Mr. Han Yoojin."
"Not just Songi, but the other kiseungsu and the other Hunters too—we all have no choice but to part someday. Right? We do. Lower-rank Hunters live even more dangerous lives, so a lot of them kept wills written."
"…I recommend that to the Hunters in the Awakened Person Management Office as well."
"Judging by your expression, Manager Song, you haven't written one."
"..."
"Would you like to write one together while we're at it?"
"…Pardon?"
"I've felt like writing one."
Before the regression, I had been that precarious, yet I had never written one in the end. After the regression too, I had thought I should probably write one, but I kept putting it off.
"What about you, Mr. Sung Hyunjae? If you don't have a will, I'll let you join our team."
"Come to think of it, I must have unconsciously thought there was no need to write one."
Sung Hyunjae said, tilting his head slightly. Had he been sensing the fact that he couldn't meet death?
"Perhaps I should try writing one this time. It will likely be my first."
"How about, 'To my dear partner Han Yoojin, I leave Seseong Guild'? It's quite the hot will phrase these days."
"Hearing Han Yoojin-gun declare his ambition to outlive me makes me want to grant it."
"…No, I think that might be a bit difficult. Even when I'm having my sixtieth birthday banquet, I feel like your face, Mr. Sung Hyunjae, would still be exactly as smooth as it is now."
Once twenty years passed, I'd probably look older than him. Maybe when that time came, I should suggest we determine forms of address by physical age. Why don't you try calling me hyung.
"Anyway, Mr. Song Taewon. Take him with you. And besides, I do trust you, Manager Song, but if you neglect Songi, I'll snatch him right back according to the contract."
He wasn't the type to deliberately mistreat a young lamb just to aim for that. Song Taewon let out a long sigh.
"First of all, once we get out. After returning to Korea—"
"You're saying you'll take him?"
"There is such a thing as procedure, isn't there?"
"No backing out this time! Mr. Sung Hyunjae, you heard that clearly, right?"
"I heard it quite clearly."
I had barely, barely succeeded. And I really did need to write a will too. Now, if for no other reason than because of the young lamb, I would have to.
"What are you brats doing."
Just then, the hotel door opened and Young Chaos stuck their head out.
"Get in here this instant."
We hurried inside the hotel. Sung Hyunjae set me down and properly draped Silekia's wings over himself. His upper body was all but naked, so it did feel a bit awkward for him to throw on a coat right away.
"Nothing happened, right?"
"Other than the first one nearly having his heart drop out of his chest."
Ah… Yoohyun had been brought here, on top of the fact that my condition had looked awful. I'd have been horrified too, if I were him.
Though that was me.
"Is Yoohyun with him? And what about Yerim and Yoon Yoon?"
"They went out."
"…What?"
Wait a second, what?
"W-went out? The two of them?!"
"The second one said you lot would be a mess too, so they went out to bring more clothes."
"You should have stopped them! It's nighttime! There isn't even a crescent moon anymore!"
Seriously, why are these kids so fearless! I told them not to go out after sunset!
"There shouldn't be much of a problem yet. And the two of them can probably look after themselves better than you can."
Young Chaos said sullenly. Yerim and Yoon Yoon might be S-rank, but still!
"The clothes could've waited until morning… that brat Yerim, seriously! Ah, could it be that? Hunter Spring. Or do they not call it that now?"
Spring—carrying the meaning of both the season and a coil spring—was a phenomenon mainly seen in upper-rank Hunters in their first year. More precisely, it was something that often appeared in those who had made their way through dungeons rather easily, without much hardship.
"Yerim did grow smoothly as a Hunter, didn't she? She was already bold to begin with, and now she's even more overflowing with confidence. Upper-rank Hunters who've never failed a raid and never lost a teammate can start taking dungeons too lightly."
Their vigilance drops, and their attitude toward raids loosens as well. As though basking in warm spring sunlight, they slacken, and like a spring, they start doing impulsive things whenever they feel like it.
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And then, eventually, a major accident happens.
"I see what you mean. It may be early, but the possibility is not nonexistent."
Sung Hyunjae nodded, and Song Taewon's expression stiffened slightly.
"It seems there may be a need to warn her, but usually they do not listen."
"Right. That's the problem."
"Kids grow up causing trouble."
"Elder!"
People's lives are on the line in dungeons!
"You only really understand things after you experience them."
"Isn't that way too Spartan! And besides, they can grow without suffering—and with less suffering too. Do they absolutely have to go through hardship? Yerim's already had a hard enough time!"
Can you really leave a kid with him? I was starting to get uneasy.
I was worried, but I couldn't go out looking for Yerim and Yoon Yoon right now. The two of them had gone together, and they had teleportation and spatial movement skills, so technically they hadn't broken the precautions, but still….
"The moon has set, but I hear the dragon is already asleep, so it won't wake again tonight."
Young Chaos said that as they crossed the lobby.
"Once the moonlight disappears completely, nightmares will start roaming around, so don't even think of going outside."
"You mean you're telling us to guard the door?"
There was still a little moonlight left, but really, when were those kids coming back?
"As long as it isn't the dragon, they won't be able to invade the hotel."
We would still need a doorkeeper, but it was a relief to know we could at least rest safely until morning.
"I'll go wake Yoohyun and Mr. Noah. The two of you wash up before the kids get back."
I took the elevator up to the guest room floor. The moment I stepped into the carpeted hallway, my heart started pounding hard. Let's see, Mr. Noah's room was this one, and that room was….
Honestly, I wanted to wake Mr. Noah first, but it would be better to get the difficult thing over with first.
I took in a deep breath and opened the guest room door. In the not particularly spacious standard room, there was the bed, and lying on it, my little brother—
"You're here."
—and me, glaring at me with murderous hostility.
"You said he was sane."
"Well, it's a bit… hard to call that sane…."
Thunk!
The dagger that grazed past my ear buried itself in the wall. Haha. And that bastard's even got Eunhye right now.
"What the hell did that bastard do to turn Han Yoohyun, who could clear even S-rank dungeons easily, into that?"
"…I'm sorry."
"Fuck, I've never once seen him covered in that much blood."
"I'm the bastard who deserves to die. But the TV— no, never mind."
If his condition had been bad, the broadcast would have been censored, but Yoohyun probably wouldn't have had much reason to get badly hurt from clearing a dungeon. …Wait, did I actually make him get hurt more after the regression? Yeah. This really was my fault.
The me from before the regression rose from the chair and strode toward me in large steps. He grabbed me by the collar in one motion, then sharply furrowed his brow.
"What's this now. Silekia?"
"My top got burned clean off. Ah, and during the ranking tournament, Sung Hyunjae decided not to use Silekia either."
"That was a good decision. Assuming he doesn't disappear again this time."
Sung Hyunjae disappeared, and Yoohyun never left the country, so the number one spot in the next ranking tournament had gone to the guy who'd been overwhelmingly stomped by Sung Hyunjae. Because of that, people still said Sung Hyunjae was basically still number one anyway. And then that number one, pissed off from hearing that sort of talk, had challenged Yoohyun—who had fought Sung Hyunjae more evenly than anyone in the past preliminaries—and got crushed.
Thanks to that, people had even started saying they should make a special rule that, for the Haeyeon Guildmaster only, matches must absolutely be held in Korea. In fact, in the last ranking tournament before I regressed, they had accommodated Yoohyun as much as possible, and he'd made it all the way up to fourth place.
"The first ranking tournament really pissed me off."
"The first one held preliminaries by country, remember? Hearing people say I didn't even make it through preliminaries, damn it."
Each country held preliminaries, and depending on how many S-ranks they had, they could send anywhere from one to three people. Korea had only sent one person to the main event. That had been Sung Hyunjae, but anyway, since it was technically a preliminary elimination, the Haeyeon Guildmaster got bashed for it.
After that, instead of dividing by country, they roughly split up the stronger people and mixed them together before selecting. In the second tournament, since Sung Hyunjae had overwhelmingly taken first place in the first ranking tournament, he advanced straight to the quarterfinals, while Yoohyun ended up only at 32nd, with a full sweep and one forfeit loss. That was because it had been decided that the round of 32 match would be held in the other contestant's country. Sung Hyunjae took first again that time too.
"He didn't go overseas because he was worried about us, so this time he'll probably sweep through everyone."
"Just in case, try stealing that damn chain too."
"You might as well say we should lock him up so he can't compete at all."
"For the first one, that'd be fine, wouldn't it? There's a difference in experience. It's unfair."
"That's true."
I was right. On top of that, Sung Hyunjae's actual experience might have far exceeded several hundred years. So of course it was unfair. Wasn't that the kind of career history where he ought to retire and become a referee? But how was I supposed to catch and lock him up? If right before the match I said, Manager Song is thinking of retiring and joining Seseong! would he follow along? Or maybe I could drag him out by saying, Fight me instead of Yoohyun! I can recreate Crescent Moon's power!
"Still, it looks awful, so take it off."
"Yes, sir."
I held out the shirt the kids had brought along as an extra, saying it was for when I got Yoohyun changed. It was huge.
"I do want to punch you once, but if I do, Yoohyun will only worry."
"Yeah."
"Then bringing you back was worthwhile after all."
"Go on, say it plainly."
"Still, he nearly died. I'll hold back this one time."
I had brought some clothes too, but they were nothing compared to that. There was no helping it. S-rank men were huge. Really, that younger version of me had a noticeably bigger build than I did too. He'd probably fed himself properly.
"When you wake him, are you going to tell him that everything's okay?"
"I have to."
"Then I'll get the clothes from Yerim and Yoon Yoon when they come."
With an annoyed frown, the me from before the regression went outside. The door shut, and silence sank over the bedroom lit only by indirect lighting. As I approached the bed, dark crimson stains came into view. The wounds had been treated, but the traces remained.
"Yoohyun."
The moment I reached out my hand—
Smack!
A red lizard sprang out and slapped the tip of my fingers away with its tiny front paw. Then they bounced in place as if furious.
"Sorry, Irin."
I held out my hand, telling them to come here and say that, but Irin whirled around and vanished. They must have been really sulking. I touched Yoohyun again and gave his shoulder a slight shake.
"Hyung's here."
As expected, that wasn't enough to show any sign of waking him. Since it was my skill, could I withdraw even a little of it? Borrowing the power of the mana imprint, I slowly traced through Yoohyun's body for the remnants of the Lullaby skill. It wasn't easy, but I succeeded in pulling out a small trace of it.
Han Yoohyun's eyes snapped open. The hazy focus quickly fixed on me.
And the very next instant—
Thud!
My body was slammed down onto the bed. Yoohyun's hand clamped tightly around my throat, and Irin reappeared and came down onto my shoulder.
Let's swallow him, Yoohyun.