087 – A New Family Member! # 3
"The most important thing is testing aptitude—what kind of weapon suits you, what gear you should use. My classmate Kim Dan here is exactly the person for that."
Everyone's talents and aptitudes were different.
What if you charged into a rift where lives hung by a thread, lugging around a weapon you weren't suited for?
You could end up with serious regrets at the very moments when every second mattered.
Swish—.
Kim Dan led Lee Jina off somewhere.
Waiting there was a woman with a dusky, warm complexion—she seemed to be of Indian descent. Her skin had a reddish tone, and she was quite pretty.
"This is Polly, my assistant. Honestly, her skills are even better than mine. She's going to ask you all sorts of questions, so just take her hands."
Kim Dan's assistant, huh.
Lee Jina clasped both of the woman's hands, the one called Polly.
Before long, Polly spoke.
"Did you have breakfast?"
So she spoke English, just as you'd expect from a foreigner.
But Lee Jina looked badly flustered.
"What? What did she say? What did she just say to me?"
"She's asking if you ate breakfast."
"Yes, yes."
So Jina had a full-blown case of English phobia, apparently.
It was true that when a foreigner asked them something in English, more than seventy percent of Koreans felt a dizzying wave of vertigo.
Soon Polly asked again.
"What do you like?"
"What do I like? What do I like... What do I like?"
Lee Jina asked me as if begging for help.
She seemed utterly terrified of foreigners speaking English to her.
But come on, Jina—how am I supposed to know what you like?
"Well, tell her a food you like, or an ice cream. Something like that."
"Something I like. Drinks? I like drinking drinks. Cola. What's cola in English? Coke? I like Coke!"
"Oh...!? Wow! Really...!?"
Lee Jina nodded at the foreigner's question.
"Yes! It's very delicious!"
"Yeah! I think so too!"
The foreign woman named Polly beamed brightly, then gave Jina a quick once-over from head to toe. Then she turned her gaze on me, her companion—and that look was very, very suggestive.
Puahaha— laughed Kim Dan, my first-generation classmate.
"Haildo, is that blonde girl your girlfriend? Incredible, honestly. They say you shouldn't judge people by looks alone, but she's exactly what she looks like—a total bitch. Not that I'm one to talk—."
A bitch—.
Even I knew that was a nasty insult.
Had something Jina said come across as rude?
While I was still chewing on that, Polly spoke up.
"Glove."
A glove.
She was saying the weapon best suited to Lee Jina was a pair of gauntlets.
Combat armor for the hands, I supposed?
Swish—.
We were soon led to a corridor where combat gauntlets lined up one after another in a long row.
They looked like assassins' weapons—some bristled with claws, others were fitted with massive mechanical apparatuses, like the arm of a robot.
"Take your time and browse around here. I'll be going."
Polly and Kim Dan left.
It could be stressful when a shop assistant hovered around chattering next to you, but this store let customers wander freely on their own, which I appreciated.
"Hey. There's a ton of gauntlets here, so pick away."
Tap—.
I gave Lee Jina's shoulder a light smack—and only then did I notice her face had flushed an absolutely scarlet red, her whole body trembling.
She looked like someone bursting with rage.
"What's wrong? You don't like gauntlets?"
"You. Do you know what cola is called in English?"
"Cola in English is cola."
"I thought cola in English was 'Coke.' Which, in fact, it is. But looking back, I think that Polly woman heard me say Cock instead of Coke! God damn it! That's why she reacted like that!"
Bwoing—.
Now that she mentioned it, it sounded entirely plausible.
"How insane do I look to her?! I even went and said 'it's very delicious' on top of that! Ah, hell. What kind of situation is this? I can't believe this is real—can't believe this actually happened to me—."
Lee Jina seemed genuinely mortified, drowning in embarrassment.
Listening to her, it was honestly a situation worth being embarrassed about.
So I said to her,
"Still, if my classmate vouched for her, her aptitude testing has to be top-notch. She's probably a sensory-type awakener. She checked your bio-rhythm or something and recommended based on that, so go ahead and browse."
Gauntlets.
Combat gauntlets had real romance to them.
The ones that looked like robot arms came with boosters, which were awesome, and the big ones were cool in their way, and the small ones were cool in theirs.
What Jina ended up choosing was a gauntlet woven from special chain.
It was made of interlinked chain-mail, very much like the gauntlets knights wore.
"It looks kind of like the work gloves I used back when I hauled moving boxes."
I see, I see.
So she picked the design she was used to.
The price was around fifty million won.
Apparently it was so expensive because the chains were forged from the ground-down shell of the Bedrock Turtle, a creature that only appeared in A-rank rifts.
And for that price, it was supposedly tough and powerful to match.
Meanwhile, while Jina was picking out her gauntlets, I chose a weapon of my own.
A double-barreled shotgun in pistol size—easy to hang at your hip and easy to maintain, supposedly.
It was mana-round exclusive, priced in the ten-million-won range.
That was cheap for an awakener's weapon, so I was delighted with it.
"Good bye!"
Once we settled up with the awakener credit card, the shop assistant Polly waved her hands at us enthusiastically.
She seemed especially taken with Lee Jina, even shaking her hand.
Of course, Jina went red-faced, opening her mouth to say something and closing it again, over and over.
"Ah, hell, I should've studied English!"
While Jina scratched her head furiously, Kim Dan—the arms dealer who had so carefully packed my purchase into its bag—spoke to me.
"Heard you made B-rank? I was B-rank too, once. Be careful. Don't go losing your arms and legs like me. From B-rank on up, it's a whole different world out there. You'd better keep your head on straight."
Coming from a man who'd replaced both arms and legs with machinery, that warning carried some serious weight.
As I shuddered, Kim Dan said,
"We're planning a first-generation class reunion soon. You coming this time? You've been skipping every single one for years. Say you'll come this time, yeah? Want me to put you down?"
A first-generation reunion?
I felt conflicted in more ways than one.
Reluctant, I'd have to call it.
Just like Kim Dan said, I'd skipped out on the first-gen reunions many times over.
The reason was simple.
While I'd been wheezing along as a D-rank, my first-gen classmates had done pretty well for themselves.
Well—the ones who hadn't died, at least.
But then, reunions are for the living, aren't they?
Only the ones who'd made it big ever showed up.
So I lived like a ghost and never attended.
But, well—.
Would it kill me to go this time?
B-rank was at least the average for my first-generation cohort, I figured.
And seasoned as they were in all sorts of ways, it wouldn't be strange if some of the first-gen alumni knew about the Witch and her existence.
Alright—.
Let's go.
Let's gooo!
"When is it?"
"Soon-ish. I'll text you. Take care now."
Vwooom—.
Kim Dan waved his mechanical arm.
Vroom—.
I rode back home in Jina's car.
It was before dinnertime.
Soon, Yu Ari, who'd been playing with the nymphs in the yard, came out to greet me.
"Senior, you're back! You bought a weapon, right? Could I take a look too?"
"Sure."
Swish—.
Half to show off my brand-new purchase, I took the shotgun out of its case and showed it to Ari.
Ari accepted the shotgun gingerly, then said,
"Senior's weapon is even bigger and more impressive than I imagined! It looks just like an actual murder weapon!"
━Zzji...!
The Emperor ant Ang-ang-i nodded as if agreeing with Yu Ari's assessment.
Well, it was only natural.
It didn't just look like a murder weapon—it was one.
"I'm already looking forward to seeing how this baby performs at the C-rank rift tomorrow. I should bring Keongkeongi and Ang-ang-i along to get some exercise too. And—."
Swish—.
I lifted my head.
Because the huge tiger owl Kalinoi was staring down at me from the rooftop, our eyes met.
Of course, Kalinoi—who seemed to keep humans at arm's length—immediately whipped her head away.
"Could I bring Kalinoi too?"
Rifts were full of variables in all sorts of ways.
The ambient mana in a rift might actually be good for Kalinoi's mental health, right?
Though whether she'd simply come along was another matter entirely.
"Senior, could I come too?"
Ari?
Frankly, there was no big problem with Ari going to a C-rank rift.
She was originally a B-rank awakener, after all.
But could Ari—who'd retired from active duty and lived the life of a public official—really keep up with the pace of me, Ha Ildo, who'd spent ten years in the field and was now hitting my absolute peak?
That I couldn't quite promise.
"You think you'd be alright?"
"Senior, I'm even more impressive than I look! If I took off my doctor's coat, I'd love to show you just how impressive! I've, um, actually been working out again lately!"
Yu Ari rolled up her sleeve to show off her solidly toned arm.
Frankly, I had a hard time imagining just how impressive a coatless Ari could be.
Back when she was riding high as a B-rank awakener, I was still a D-rank—different worlds entirely, we were.
"Jina. Is it okay if Ari joins the rift your contact discovered? I don't think she'd drag anyone down. With Keongkeongi and Ang-ang-i and Kwang-kwangi along, our combat power is honestly overflowing."
A C-rank rift was, honestly, something I could clear solo by now.
Just let Keongkeongi loose and Keongkeongi would handle everything.
Total auto-hunting.
Auto-Hunter Haildo—.
I wouldn't even blame people for sticking me with a nickname like that.
By the way, when the hell were they issuing my official title?
I'd entered a T-rank rift and completed the mission, and still no word.
Did the Cassie situation gum things up and lose my paperwork?
Lee Jina shrugged with breezy cool.
"Doesn't matter if she tags along. It's not even a rift that needs fighting, to begin with. It does require quick reflexes, but eh, a doctor should be more than enough."
And so the three-person party of me, Lee Jina, and Yu Ari was formed.
We'd already cleared a rift together once before, so we weren't strangers to each other's company.
Lee Jina spoke up.
"The place we're going is a rift that opens before dawn. We'll have to leave at four a.m., so I'm sleeping over in this neighborhood. Doctor. You said your place has a spare room, right?"
Shhhhhhhh—.
It was a big shower room.
Big enough for two people to wash at the same time.
And in fact, two women were showering in it right now.
Yu Ari narrowed her eyes, glancing at Lee Jina's figure reflected faintly in the mirror beyond.
'Tch. She's younger than me and just a bit bigger. That's because I'm more active, that's all. But around the hips, I'm definitely—.'
Hehe—.
She was chuckling to herself when it happened.
Creak, creak—.
Lee Jina shut off the faucet.
Wiping the water from her body, she said,
"Hey, Doc. You've got a thing for Haildo, don't you?"
"Excuse me? What do you mean?"
A bright, beaming smile from Doctor Yu Ari.
Lee Jina, a towel wrapped around her body, spoke again.
"No use lying. When you've known someone as long as we have, you learn things you don't even want to learn. You can try hiding how you feel, but it always comes out in the end."
"……."
Yu Ari wiped the smile from her face and put on a cool, frosty expression.
Lee Jina was a sensory-type awakener, just like her—so she figured there was no point in lying any further.
"Hypothetically, if I were to tell Senior—."
"I'm not going to. Because you're the one who cured my sister's mana sickness, Doc. I'm genuinely grateful for that. Which is exactly why I'm saying this: stay out of tomorrow's rift."
Stay out?
Yu Ari decided this was just a young girl trying to fence off her competition.
Even without being able to read emotions, Ari could tell perfectly well that this younger girl was 'into' Haildo.
'Well, of course they are! Senior is amazing! It's only natural for the women around him to fall for him! Honestly, it'd be weirder if they didn't!'
In Yu Ari's philosophy, all women were destined to fall for Haildo. He was just that remarkable a man—and in practice, truly dashing.
So remarkable that even animals came flocking to him in droves!
"Sorry, but I'm not dropping out. I'm still on vacation, you see. And nobody's talking me out of it."
Vacation taken expressly to watch Haildo from up close.
Heading into a rift together? Icing on the cake!
There was no way she was letting an opportunity like that slip away.
Swoosh swoosh—.
Having toweled the water from her hair, Lee Jina said, "You've been warned," and then—whoosh—she was gone.
Ari didn't much care for that parting move.
"She's barely a few years younger than me, and she pulls that?!"