A Treasure Precious to Someone! #2
This was a briefing room that no one outside knew existed.
Codename "Madam" was tense in more ways than one. A divination reading had turned up a troubling card: China's black ops team, the Black Serpent Squad, was positioning itself to enter the massive T-Rank Rift in the Pacific.
Hoo—.
Madam let out a long sigh.
"Honestly, it might have been a blessing that Team A's operation failed. Can you imagine if they'd run into the Black Serpent Squad in there? Ugh, gives me chills."
Chinese awakeners were, by and large, like bombs with no telling where they'd go off.
This was the age of the 5th Industry. What the billion-strong continent worshipped now was neither communism nor its chairman, but the raw logic of power itself. Under the governing philosophy of the strong may do as they please, Chinese awakeners had become a global headache.
"If it had been Kang Cheolmin, the captain of Team A, he would have thrown hands with those Chinese bastards on the spot. Then all the world's attention would've turned our way… Ari? Are you even listening to me? Why are you staring at your phone like that?"
"No, it's— I don't think this is the time for me to be here."
Swish—.
At that moment, Yu Ari rose from her seat.
"Ari, where are you going? We have a ministerial-level meeting in a minute!"
"Yuhee, now is not the time for this! I have something important to do! I have to go right now! So please handle the rest yourself!"
"Something more important than a Patriot mission? Huh? Hey, Yu Ari! Ari!"
Codename "Madam" — Ma Yuhee — was thoroughly flustered.
Team A, under Kang Cheolmin's command, had caused a disaster inside the spatiotemporal rift, and cleanup had thrown everything into chaos — and now Yu Ari was trying to walk out mid-crisis?
But by the time Yuhee blinked, Ari had already vanished from her seat. In truth, Ari was already on her way to the factory, having received Ha Ildo's call.
Senior is calling for me! A secret and urgent matter, no less! What could it be? Could it… kyaaa…! No, it can't be that…! But still…!
She'd been swamped these past few days without a moment to catch her breath, yet the message Ha Ildo had sent made vitality surge through her whole body.
That brightened mood turned muddy in an instant, as if someone had dumped a bucket of mud over her head, the moment she laid eyes on Lee Jeonghun's face.
"……"
Yu Ari narrowed her eyes at him.
Lee Jeonghun stiffened immediately. The woman Ha Ildo had summoned, of all people, had to be that Yu Ari—.
Her gaze made his heart feel like it would stop, and the air around them seemed to freeze over cold and hard.
Lee Jeonghun desperately darted his pupils left and right. It was his wordless protest of innocence: I have told no one about Patriot or its secrets — that's beyond Level-Zero national classified information.
Once Yu Ari took in the situation, she calmed as if ice-cold coolant were pumping through her chest.
I have to keep the fact that I work for Patriot a secret, no matter what!
Yu Ari had no intention of letting her senior Ha Ildo know that she was an S-rank awakener operating as a black ops agent.
Her girlish heart wanted to be remembered by Ha Ildo, above all else, as the high school girl Yu Ari of those old days. If he ever learned she was a special forces operative who could tear steel plates apart with a custom scalpel, their relationship would inevitably change. That might not be a bad thing in its own way, but revealing it like this, now, was the last thing her girlish heart wanted.
And Lee Jeonghun — you and I will talk when this is over!
"Ari. Everything I'm about to tell you must remain a secret. Until the moment you die. Can you promise me that? Good. Understood. Then let me explain—."
I briefed Ari on what we needed to do: enter the largest T-Rank Rift in recorded history and rescue Lee Jeonghun's precious companion.
But before I'd even finished the mission briefing, Lee Jeonghun was trembling.
"Ha Ildo. Wouldn't someone else be better? It's true Yu Ari used to be talented, but she's just a doctor now, isn't she? She won't be any help in there."
I see—.
It had already been several years since Ari had been counted among the rising stars who could stand toe-to-toe with Seo Yerim. She'd rocketed up to B-rank, but for a number of reasons she'd since retired from active duty and become a public servant. He must have been uneasy about someone like her diving into a mission as dangerous and treacherous as this one.
"Lee Jeonghun. Are you calling me incompetent right now? Are you slandering me in front of my senior?"
Grrk—.
Yu Ari's brows furrowed darkly.
From what I remembered, Ari had a lot more pride than her sweet demeanor suggested. Lee Jeonghun seemed to realize it too, because he flinched hard and started flailing.
"No! That's not what I meant! This is something I have to do myself! Yu Ari, you're, well, how do I put this—I just think it would be better for you to rest…."
"No. Senior, I'm coming too. I heard it's a mission to rescue a comrade left behind — how could I possibly stand by? Every mission needs a medical team, no exceptions! Besides, Lee Jeonghun has a prior record of attacking you, Senior! I'll monitor him from right beside you — make sure he can't pull any dirty tricks or dirty moves!"
Fair points. With a medical team or without one, the survival rate itself changes.
She might not be a top-tier active hunter anymore, but she was unquestionably a brilliant doctor.
"So, Lee Jina — obviously you're coming too, right?"
I also turned to Lee Jina, who had been leaning against the wall in the corner, quietly listening.
She hadn't said a single word during the whole exchange between Lee Jeonghun and me, but at my question she slowly parted those heavy lips.
"You. You're a chaebol brat of the Ohsa Group?"
Shhh—.
Her eyes narrowed to slits as she swept them over Lee Jeonghun from head to toe. Something about the sight stirred up an old, old trauma in me. It was the atmosphere of a girl about to shake someone down for lunch money.
"You'll be paying generously, right? Fitting out B-rank equipment takes quite a bit of cash."
These days, Lee Jina was my rival aiming not just for A-rank — but for S-rank and beyond.
To awakeners, expensive equipment was life itself. For Jina, who'd come up from nothing, this mission was a golden opportunity to make one very big score.
"…I don't exactly have mountains of money to throw around! But if you get into the rift and bring back a few chunks of Mana Hydrolite, you won't have to worry about equipment at all!"
"What the hell is Mana Hydrolite? If you're trying to gloss over it with fancy words, I won't let it slide!"
Jina scowled and growled, so Lee Jeonghun added a few words of explanation.
"It's a room-temperature superconductor that reacts to mana. By now it's gone into everything — it's the next-generation power source! It's worth more than gold of the same weight! Nothing on Earth can match it, ounce for ounce!"
Seriously?
Even I was hearing this for the first time. What an incredible material.
And if we hauled back a few chunks of it and had custom gear made for Keongkeongi? We could upgrade Ang-ang-i's horns and put together a little present for Kwang-kwangi, too. It would even make a lovely gift for Kalinoi — an owl, technically, but a Daimax nymph at heart, and one who adored pretty jewels. And if there was plenty left over, I could have equipment made for myself as well.
After all, there was gear I'd been itching to build!
Anyway.
And so the party came together.
The vanguard: me, Ha Ildo, a perennial D-ranker, and Lee Jina, a former moving-company employee now clawing her way toward S-rank. Support: Yu Ari, an old rookie from the days when she was a celebrated prospect. And the main attacker: Lee Jeonghun, a third-generation chaebol heir with a dog-squirrel allergy whose powers had slid from former S-rank all the way down to A.
This lineup was, well—.
"Feels like a suicide squad."
Heh heh heh—, laughed Lee Jina.
Vivid vocabulary, but hey — she wasn't exactly wrong, was she?
With that, we piled into a car and hurried to the Well House to gather our equipment. And since I was home anyway, I asked Oinoi.
"Oinoi, remember that storm we saw on TV a while back? The typhoon you all said nymphs were probably living in? If we were to go inside it, what would be the best approach?"
In my opinion, Oinoi was a trustworthy friend.
She pondered for a long while, then spoke.
"So it is that the master of the house intends to enter the typhoon…! Then it is that this Oinoi must be taken along as well…! This Oinoi wishes to bottle that typhoon inside this glass jar…!"
Oinoi, coming with us?
I found myself worrying over it from every angle, but Oinoi looked tremendously confident.
"You need only trust in this Oinoi…!"
"You're bringing those little nymphs along? This isn't a school picnic!"
Lee Jeonghun gaped, telekinetically bristling every hair on his head in horror. Oinoi's delicate appearance clearly gave him no idea just how formidable a nymph she actually was.
Before long, Illinoi — who had by now wandered over to our house for a visit — scowled at him.
"Who is zis disgusting man, I am asking…? He smells quite strongly of money, dat is what it is…! And seeing how my honey fists are crying out, he is a guy I want to punch like crazy, dat is what it is…!"
Illinoi clenched her fists tight and trembled.
They say nymphs can instinctively tell who would harm them and who wouldn't — something like how wild animals sense dangerous creatures with their gut and keep far away.
"Zis atmosphere makes me thinking about one of ze heroes Illinoi knows…! But who exactly it is, I am finding it very difficult to remember, dat is what it is…!"
"This Coris thinks it is ambiguous whether he is nymph-friendly or nymph-phobic, and since this Coris cannot be sure, the conclusion is that we should just beat him up a lot first…!"
"Let's do it…!"
Doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo-doo—.
Coris, Illinoi, and Oinoi promptly beat the ever-loving daylights out of Lee Jeonghun.
"AAAGH~!"
"What in the world…."
"Impressive."
Yu Ari and Lee Jina looked rather taken aback. Apparently this was their first time witnessing the beating-up-the-guy ritual live and at such close range.
Every time I watch it, it still catches me off guard in a brand-new way, to be honest.
Anyway.
With that, the three nymphs joined our party as well.
"Mwehehe, this typhoon shall be bottled neatly into this jar, and that is the way of it…! No other nymphs in all the world could keep a typhoon alive inside a glass jar, but this Oinoi can do it, and that is the way of it…!"
"Illinoi is finding ze ore inside zat thing very interesting, dat is what it is…!"
"This Coris finds it joyful to be together with the nymph sisters, and that is what it is…!"
In every sense, ours had felt like a grim, suicide-squad sort of party.
But the moment the nymphs joined, that feeling morphed into something altogether indescribable.
"Zen let us start quickly, dat is what it is…!"