Hwayeon's Return, and... (1)
Poke, poke.
...Huh? Morning already? Too bright...
Gah—?!
The moment I realized what that painless prick at my wrist meant, I shot upright and switched on the Certifier.
Sure enough, a message had come in. It was Hwayeon!
"She seems safe. What a relief."
"Yeah, yeah."
Jumping up like that must have woken Franc too. Behind me, she was watching the hologram of Hwayeon's message, a smile of relief on her face.
Oh. There was another one. A subject line of three dots? Curious, I tapped it—and it was another message from Hwayeon.
"...I want to call her. I'd just be in the way if I did, though, wouldn't I?"
"Why not send a message, at least?"
At Franc's suggestion I hid the flutter in my chest and wrote one on the spot.
Every letter I typed felt like another needle driven into my chest.
I was glad Hwayeon had come back safe, and glad I'd see her this afternoon. Glad as I was, the Madam's situation worried me past the point of mere nerves, sharp enough to twist my stomach. She hadn't sent a single message since that day, and the silence only made it worse.
I knew better than anyone, after living as an outcast from my first year of high school through my third, how badly I'd wanted attention from anyone who wasn't family. Not the polite notice of someone who sort of knew me. Attention from a person I could actually give my heart to, and receive one back. So I could guess, if only faintly, the blow of having someone you cared for turn cold on you. Which was why the Madam's refusal to make even a single call, or send a single text, felt like something I already understood—and the burn in my gut doubled.
She didn't want me to hate her. That had to be it.
"......"
The lonely figure she'd cut when I arrived at the mansion that day—try to think any deeper about any of it, and my thoughts snarled until my head ached. I sighed, worked the Certifier, and fired a message off to the Madam anyway.
I could feel Franc's appalled stare on my back.
"This whole no-contact situation might be one of the Madam's schemes, but... am I an idiot?"
"Dear me. You are too kind, Seoha, and that is the trouble."
"Ahahaha."
Kind? As if. I couldn't bring myself to agree or deny it—and then that poking sensation found my wrist again.
"...Yeah. Just as I thought."
"So it would seem..."
Franc read the message and gave a bitter smile. Either way, it would be decided today.
...I was a little afraid, after all.
I'd spent the whole morning grinning, then scowling and sighing, then grinning again, over and over, until my sister—dressed for campus and on her way out—pressed a hand to my head and asked if I was sick somewhere.
"Hwayeon texted me."
"Isn't that a good thing? Then why the sighs?"
"I have my share of worries too, you know?"
She tilted her head at that, told me to come to her anytime if I needed to talk something through, ruffled my hair, and left.
"Son? Your father and I have an appointment at the medical office of Hangang General Hospital today, so we'll be late."
Hangang General Hospital. That was where Dad had first worked, wasn't it?
"Who are you going to see?"
"A friend of mine from the medical office called to say she's getting engaged. We're going to see that."
"Got it. I'm stopping by the Time River Building too, so I'll probably be a little late."
Dad and Mom were both dressed up, suit and formal wear, so they were likely heading straight from the hospital to the venue. And if she was Mom's friend, she was thirty-six—an engagement, not a wedding. Impressive, in its way.
"Let's go."
"Yes."
I watched Mom and Dad leave, grabbed my phone, and headed out myself.
Knowing I'd see Hwayeon in eight hours, expectation and excitement and tension all hit at once. A strange feeling. Not a good one.
"Hello, sunbae?"
"Yeah. Hey."
"Jung Seoha-sunbae, hiii~!"
"Oh. Hi."
I'd thought getting dragged into that violence incident might cool people's interest a little. It hadn't cooled at all. Greeting me and then bolting seemed to have become a fad; I walked the road to school on my own, fielding hellos from kids who scurried off the moment they were done, and even spotted a few in the distance snapping photos with DSLRs before they fled.
Judging by the color of their name tags, second-years. The newspaper club, maybe?
Ugh.
Once, a naked Franc drifting around me would have made me snap at any creepshot or camera. These days she actually cared about fashion and dressed properly, so I decided to let it go. Speaking of which, I glanced at her walking beside me like any ordinary person.
Today's Franc wore a thin white T-shirt patterned with blue waves, black shorts, and over-the-knee socks, and without a shred of exaggeration she looked like any girl my age. Seeing her like that, no one would ever think she was a ghost.
Passing through the school gate, I spotted Student Council President Lee Yu-mi standing with the student affairs teacher, her twintails swaying softly. I bowed to the teacher and meant to walk right past Yu-mi. She came running, caught the hem of my uniform, and hung off it.
"...Let go."
"Eeeing. Sunbae-niiim."
"Yu-mi."
"Yes, yes?!"
Calling her name softly turned her exposed ears red.
"You've heard the rumors about me too, haven't you?"
Honestly, having a cute underclassman cling to me like this did make me happy. It was just that annoyance, and the girls I actually liked, had shoved her a long way down the rankings.
"Yes! Blue Geniu—mmph?!"
I clamped a hand over her mouth the instant she tried to break the taboo, and her eyes went round. Then I leaned in and whispered into the ear of the damned little brat, whose eyes had gone even rounder with shock.
"Huuing."
I glared at Yu-mi's tearful face. Kids passing by startled and started gawking, but dealing with this damned brat came first.
"My name's been all over the news, hasn't it? Even if I don't join the student council, I'd say our school's already famous."
"But."
"Sure, if I joined, the student council's name would get around too. But even if I don't, your council is competent enough to advertise itself on my name alone, isn't it?"
"You're right, sunbae. But!"
Yu-mi flailed hard enough to send her twintails flying, and said it with that cute face of hers.
"Having you actually here and only using your name are completely, completely different! The student council can support you in every way so the rest of your school life is comfortable! So...!"
"I don't need it."
"Eek!? D-does Seoha-sunbae not like the title of the first sibling student council officers!?"
Her face said it plain: I know how devoted you siblings are!
"I like it."
"Then!"
"Joining the student council is still a pain. Ah— I said what I actually think."
"Eeeing?!"
At the word pain, Yu-mi recoiled in full shock, twintails shaking. I left her there and walked on. Every time I looked at her, Jung So-hee came to mind, and it stung. Maybe because they were the same little-sister type...
Thinking the flood of love letters was about to render the shoe lockers useless, I headed up toward the classroom, and from all around came the click of camera shutters and the fake shutter-sounds of phones. Where had my right to my own face gone? Dropped on the floor somewhere?
"Welcome, Seoha."
The afternoon before last, Su Yu-ri had smiled and said Blue Genius, and I'd blown up at her. I'd apologized afterward to the Yu-ri who'd frozen in shock, and since then the nickname had been taboo in our class. If I kept shutting it down bit by bit like this, maybe someday it would vanish from the face of the earth.
I returned her greeting and sat. Kim Chang-hyun, already there, turned, said, "Welcome," and went straight back to his tablet.
It wasn't just Chang-hyun. A studying mood had settled over the whole class. The kids from other classes who always occupied the windows had thinned out considerably, and the fourth floor itself was calmer and quieter than usual. With exams coming on, everyone seemed to be behaving and buckling down.
"Seoha, you're not studying?"
"I memorized the textbooks, for what it's worth. I'm about half given up."
"Nooo. If you just study from the textbooks, your scores will come out fine. The teachers take the questions from the textbooks."
"They don't just take them. They twist them. Math especially is just... haah."
Thanks to a vastly improved memory I'd memorized the textbooks cover to cover, so aside from math and science I'd manage above the basics. Which was another way of saying I needed to worry about failing math and science.
At the conversation between me and Yu-ri—sitting in Kang So-ra's seat—Chang-hyun sighed and turned his chair around.
"Aren't our school's exams seriously too much? Seventy percent short answer, and essays on top of that? This isn't even a university exam."
"Ahaha. In exchange, there are only three exams a year, all together, right?"
"Fewer chances to make it up means we have to study ourselves to death even harder! I hate the chairman!"
"I hate him too."
In more ways than one.
I'd meant to handle lunch with the recommended menu, but on Han Go-eun and Kang So-ra's forceful recommendation I ordered the mushroom seafood kalguksu.
"...This is incredible."
The mushrooms and the water parsley were springy and crisp, the seasoning soaked through just right, and the knife-cut noodles in that spicy broth—boiled separately, maybe—had none of the usual pasty, clinging taste. It was too good to slurp down in a rush, so I was eating at roughly the same pace as the others when Go-eun, mouth still working, asked:
"Seoha, you looked like you were in a good mood today. Something good happen?"
"My girlfriend came back."
The whole table went dead silent.
Right. Almost half past twelve. I picked up the pace, inhaled every last drop of broth in an instant, and stood first.
"I'm heading out. Gonna try calling my girlfriend."
"Ah. Yeah."
I stood, pushed in my chair, grabbed my tray, and as I left, the popular five's conversation drifted after me.
"Seohaa~. Isn't he gonna be a real big shot in like ten years~?"
"Isn't he already?"
"Nooo~. Right now he's just like the rest of us our age, who haven't actually felt where they stand~."
"Ah. I feel that. Other ability users give off that 'I'm an ability user, you know' air whether they mean to or not, but Seoha doesn't have any of that. Mm-hm."
"If he didn't go around leaking blue light from his eyes, I don't think anyone would even know he was one."
An ability-user atmosphere. What did that even look like?
Turning over the ability users I'd seen so far, I moved to a corner of the rooftop garden where kids were scarce. I'd told the others I needed to make a call, but when it came time to actually dial, I hesitated. Franc, watching with her hands clasped behind her back, asked with a faint smile:
"You are not going to call?"
"...No."
Right. She'd only gotten back this morning. She'd be busy handling things. Sorting through my feelings with a cooler head, it seemed I was just restless from not seeing Hwayeon for a week, with the Madam's business piled on top. I shut off the Certifier and started back toward the classroom.
I forced down a mood that refused to settle, got through classes, pulled my heavy heart together, and headed for the Time River Building—and the closer I got, the more scrambled I felt. It felt like the decisive moment was closing in, and I couldn't calm down for anything.
"It is all right. Please calm yourself. This is only my expectation, but Hwayeon will understand you."
"Really?"
"Yes. You are the victim, are you not? Even if Hwayeon grows angry, that anger will turn toward Miss Yu Youngeun, not toward you."
That comfort was no small thing, and it did ease me. But I didn't want it to end at mere understanding. She would understand. I just didn't want Hwayeon left holding onto the feeling.
I arrived at the Time River Building, hung my pass around my neck, and went in through the main entrance to find the lobby busier than usual. Through Spatial Perception, the basement showed countless people and—exaggerating only a little—a small hill's worth of Aberrant byproducts, with workers shuttling freight elevators to haul the stuff away.
Was that the haul Hwayeon had brought back from her raid?
Dozens of Phase Stones sat in sealed boxes, coated without a gap in something dark crimson. Scales, bones, and hides were piled high, and in special cylindrical glass bottles, things like clumps of cells, eyeballs, and brains floated in culture fluid. My attention drifted naturally to the stones. Was this the sealing measure my sister had mentioned? Not a shred of Phase Power was leaking out.
The largest of them had 210,000 Phase Power condensed inside. So that was a High Grade Phase Stone. Right now those carried a distribution margin—a premium of about sixty percent—and traded at around 1.6 million won per TP. Which meant that one stone was worth 336 billion won.
Ex—expensive. The other Phase Stones were mostly between 1,000 and 5,000, and only that one was obscene. Just the stones together—five hundred billion won in income? The byproducts were pricey too, so this was no joke. If I were the one out there, money like that would be nothing. Right?
Remembering Director Lee Hyeryeong once saying my contract fee was about the income from a single trip to the Phase World, I went looking for Hwayeon.
She was in her office on the nineteenth floor, with Director Lee Hyeryeong and my sister. A pile of hundreds of documents on one side, bundles of dozens on the other, the three of them writing hard and talking—they looked thoroughly occupied. Not interrupting at lunch had been the right call after all.
I was waiting for the elevator to come down when a woman's voice, clearly having lain in wait, rang out behind me.
"Daarling~~!"
Sophia.
Darling? Crisp in a white office-lady look—back from an outing, maybe—she ignored every greeting at the entrance and came charging in a straight line, blonde hair flying. Did Sophia have a boyfriend? I whipped a look around, and the Sophia who'd sprinted over threw her whole body at me, like she meant to take me down.
I was the darling?!
"Don't hug me! Let go!"
"Aaang~! You're so cold, darling!"
"Who is your darling?!"
Was she insane, saying that where people could hear? They weren't just shocked. They were about to get furious. Ah, seriously—stop groping me!
"I said let go! You old lady!"
"Kyaa~!"
Those sly hands had been roaming my back, my waist, my ass. I shoved her off in a panic, and she went down in an exaggerated collapse, bit her handkerchief like the heroine of a tragic romance, and welled up with tears.
"Sob! So mean~! Not on Monday! Not on Tuesday either! You didn't even come see Sophia!"
Argh... She'd smelled better than I expected, and it had startled me. Sweat seemed to be breaking on my forehead. I pulled out a handkerchief, wiped it away, and glared at her.
"Don't say weird things. I've got a mountain of things to take up with you, so for now, come with me to the boss."
She was whining in the pose of a tragic heroine under a spotlight. I caught her arm and hauled her up, and she blinked those big eyes with perfect innocence.
"Hm? Why?"
More importantly, the looks aimed at me were vicious. Dating the boss, and putting your hands on Miss Sophia too? You beast! That was the shape of it.
"What exactly are you taking up with Sophia?"
Those oversized eyes blinked with exaggerated cuteness, and it was unbearably irritating. I wanted to hit her.
"I'll say it in front of the boss, so—! Stop leaning on me and stand on your own feet!"
"Aaang~. I think I hurt my ankle when I fell earlier. It huuurts."
"If you're hurt, heal it with your own ability!"
"Ah— you called me your own. How embarrassing~."
"......"
My blood pressure felt ready to spike. I grabbed the back of my neck and took a deep breath, and from behind Sophia two women and two men—each with about a million Phase Power—approached, wearing bitter smiles.
One of them was the bagel girl I'd seen not long ago, side-tail tipped faintly red. One of the men was the physical-reinforcement guy in the heavy metal getup I'd met before. All four wore the same gray suit-like clothes. Was that the Time River uniform?
"Hehe. The boss's lover, and you've reached for Miss Sophia as well?"
The woman I'd never seen before spoke first. Her loose long hair, falling to her chest, was curiously tipped in pale green, and everything about her—body, face, clothes—was demure, giving off a thoroughly mature air. Age, roughly... mid-thirties, maybe? She was looking at me with open admiration, but the bagel girl was glaring like she meant to kill me, same as last time. And yet, same as last time, I couldn't sense any actual hostility or enmity, which was strange.
I complained to the green-tipped woman.
"This blonde airhead latched onto me on her own."
I glanced at Sophia, who kept trying to lean on me, and let go of her arm. She wobbled, balance breaking for a moment, then caught herself quickly, puffed her cheeks, and protested.
"Airhead?! And this from a boy who only chases real women!"
What did that have to do with anything... Dealing with her any further would only give me a headache, so I ignored the Sophia hopping in place and bowed at the waist to the four of them.
"It's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Jung Seoha, the special-type detection ability user who joined on a provisional basis last time."
"Oh my, thank you for such a polite greeting. I'm Kim Ga-min, leader of Team 2."
Smiling with her eyes, the green-tipped woman offered her hand. I hesitated, then took it lightly and shook.
"Hmph!!"
The bagel girl, watching from behind Kim Ga-min, snorted so hard I worried snot might fly, and whipped her head away. As Ga-min looked a little flustered and started soothing her, the men stepped forward as if it were their turn.
"Ahaha. We met once before, didn't we? Good to see you. I'm Kim Chung-shik!"
A third of his hair was still braided into rows like dreads, the rest left hanging the other way, but the piercings in his nose, lips, ears, and brows were gone. The ordinary clothes made him look like someone who'd simply be good at hip-hop. I returned the greeting and turned to the man beside him—another physical reinforcement user, a little over 1.2 million, same as Chung-shik.
A handsome man in his mid-thirties with a short sports cut, the sort of air you'd expect from a martial artist of that age, dipped his head in silence.
"Ah, this is Team Leader Kim Tae-poong of Team 6. I'm the leader of Team 4. Team Leader Kim is under a vow of silence, so please understand that he doesn't speak."
Team Leader Kim Tae-poong of Team 6, bowing his head, was nearly expressionless and said nothing, which made him seem quite unsociable—but his good looks seemed to cover all of it...
Anyway, they were all team leaders, as expected. Once I'd exchanged greetings with the men, Team Leader Kim Ga-min dragged the bagel girl over by the arm.
"Goodness. Mr. Jung Seoha? This child is Yoo Min-hee. She's the leader of Team 3. She's a diehard fan of the boss, and she's reacting this way because of the story that you're dating the boss, so please be understanding."
Ah. So that was it.
"So you're the ones the boss saved?"
"Oh my. You heard that story too? Hehehe, that's right. The two of us, plus the Park Cho-rong and Hyun-ji sisters from Teams 1 and 10—four of us in all."
Once Team Leader Kim Ga-min stepped forward and started talking, Team Leader Kim Chung-shik and Team Leader Kim Tae-poong withdrew to where Yoo Min-hee was standing. The naturalness of that told me she held considerable authority among the team leaders. On top of that, the people who'd been waiting for the elevator with me quietly drifted over to the line beside us, exactly like junior employees avoiding a ride with the vice presidents. Even so, their gazes were mixed with the kind of admiration you'd give a superstar, so the team leaders had their share of goodwill too.
Once we were inside, Sophia—crowded into a corner by them—kept grumbling and muttering. That childish behavior irritated me, and I frowned as I spoke to her quietly.
"Deputy Commander Sophia. You spread rumors about me and the boss not just inside the company, but all the way outside, didn't you? I heard everything from Hyeryeong-noo— no. From Director Lee Hyeryeong."
At that, not only the two men but Kim Ga-min and Yoo Min-hee too went wide-eyed.
"You called Hyeryeong-unninoona?! What in the world— kyap!"
"That's not the important part. Why, how, and for what reason did you go spreading that story everywhere?"
"M-my cheek is stretchiiing!"
She'd been trying to yank the subject sideways, so I caught her cheek and punished her for it. Her face crumpled, and she slapped at my hand.