Do You Not Know Me?
The store was much quieter than usual after the evening rush of hunters had swept through like a storm.
Nine o’clock at night.
‘Just one more hour and I can go home.’
Normally I would have been off the clock long ago.
But today I had to stop by the police station because of the doppelganger incident, so the manager had covered for me.
I told him I would stay until closing to make up the time.
Got to rack up some points when I can.
I really don’t want to lose this cushy part-time job.
“Ughhh…… Still, the morning shift was absolute hell.”
I hadn’t noticed it when the manager was around, but once I was alone the customers just kept coming.
I almost made several mistakes in the chaos, but somehow managed to get through it.
“Hey, part-timer! Is this mana potion zero sugar? I’m on a diet these days, so I’m really sensitive about calories!”
A beastkin who had piled their basket high with snacks yet still grabbed several zero-calorie drinks.
“Excuse me, do you have any flame-resistance masks? I need them right away! Why are you so slow?”
A female flame mage frantically grabbing an armful of flame masks.
“What do you mean you don’t accept mithril coins? Just calculate the exchange rate and give me the change in bills!”
Even a shameless goblin trying to exchange mithril coins.
Every time one of those difficult customers appeared among the flood, I swallowed a sigh.
After surviving rush hour, my entire body felt drained.
“Still, when you think about the hourly wage, there’s nowhere better.”
The day’s work was almost over and closing time was near, so everything in front of me looked pleasant.
Humming to myself, I started sweeping the floor in front of the counter with a broom.
Ding!
With the clear chime of the bell, someone stepped into the store.
“Welcome.”
I greeted them out of habit and looked at the woman who had entered.
She wore a black cap pulled low, a black mask covering more than half her face, and a loose gray hoodie.
The black tail sticking out from behind her pants suggested she was a beastkin.
The way she kept glancing around nervously looked suspicious.
‘There’s no way she’s here to rob the place……’
I decided it wasn’t worth worrying about and went back to sweeping.
This was Taepyeong City, after all.
We got orcs smashing counters, doppelgangers copying memories, and drunken elf elders causing scenes.
A customer wearing a hat and mask?
Practically a gentleman by comparison.
If she were a thief, she would have made a dramatic entrance in some way I couldn’t even imagine.
Like suddenly casting magic.
Or binding me instantly with spider webs.
Something like that.
‘She’s being quiet, so she’s probably just a regular customer, not a thief.’
The suspiciously dressed female customer glanced at me.
Judging by the tail, she looked like a wolf-type.
‘Do wolf beastkin usually go out at night? I don’t think I’ve seen any in the morning.’
While thinking that, I continued tidying the store.
“……”
When our eyes met, she quickly looked away and flinched.
What? Was she actually a thief?
‘Should I call the manager for backup?’
This was bad.
The woman who had avoided my gaze flinched again, then began drifting between the shelves like a ghost.
Fine.
Since there were no other customers anyway, let’s see who wins this staring contest.
She was clearly waiting for me to look away so she could steal something.
Not happening.
I stared straight at her.
After wandering around for a while, she picked up a can of soda from the refrigerator and a tuna-mayo triangle kimbap, then approached the counter.
She hadn’t stolen anything.
“I’ll help you check out. That’ll be 2,700 won.”
I scanned the items and told her the price, but she simply stared at me without reaching for her wallet.
Her golden eyes, faintly visible between the cap brim and mask, rippled strangely.
“Miss? Are you not going to pay? Or do you need a bag?”
“Excuse me.”
“Yes?”
“Do you really not know me?”
“What?”
What was that supposed to mean?
Did I actually know someone in this city?
Or was this some kind of hidden camera prank?
No way.
Flustered, I stared at her face.
There were only two reasons someone would ask that question at a convenience store.
Either an upset regular who got carded, or a genuine problem customer.
“Are you a regular? If you’re a regular here and I failed to recognize you, I’m sorry. I’m still a new part-timer who hasn’t been in this neighborhood long.”
“Seriously, you don’t feel anything at all? You really don’t know who I am?”
“Well, you didn’t pick up anything that requires ID verification. Do you need cigarettes?”
The woman’s golden eyes widened for a moment.
And then—
“How about this?”
She took off her cap and pulled her mask down to her chin.
Jet-black wolf ears and an exotic, strikingly beautiful face were revealed.
Golden eyes peeked through her messy, unkempt hair, softly curving under the store lights.
She really was pretty.
That was my only thought.
Other than that……
I still didn’t recognize her.
“I’m sorry. I’ve never seen you before.”
“Huh, really?”
“Yes. Should I know you?”
“N-no, that’s not……”
She blinked at me repeatedly.
Her eyes looked flustered that I didn’t recognize her.
Tsk. Maybe she was someone I shouldn’t have provoked.
There were people like that.
People whose rank was so high that touching them the wrong way could cause big trouble.
I wondered if I had accidentally provoked someone like that.
This was a world full of different races, including the Elf Queen herself.
I couldn’t assume there was no hierarchy.
Just as that thought made me a little uneasy—
“Ha, haha……”
A weak laugh escaped her lips.
“Sorry. You just looked like someone I know…… Ah, and I don’t smoke.”
“??”
“It’s been a really long time since I met someone who doesn’t know me.”
Was she some kind of celebrity in Taepyeong City?
Honestly, I had no idea.
I still needed a lot more time before I could truly call myself a resident of this city.
After all, the only part of the city I really knew was the inside of this convenience store.
She seemed to relax, leaning comfortably against the counter.
“Please ring me up. I won’t collect points.”
She handed over a black card, paid for her items, then sat at the table in the corner of the store and took a bite of the triangle kimbap.
Until she finished the kimbap and drank all of her soda, her gaze never left me.
“Thank you. I’ll come again next time.”
What was that all about?
Was this really Taepyeong City?
***
Ding-!
After the convenience store door closed, the cool night air brushed against her cheeks.
“Huuu……”
Sonya pulled her cap down low again and took a deep breath.
The city’s night air felt especially refreshing today.
The atmosphere that usually felt suffocating now seemed pleasantly cool.
She walked into the darkness of the night streets.
Her body felt lighter than it had when she left the studio after breaking the Tower’s record.
‘No one’s ever treated me so normally before.’
She was one of the Seven Heroes, the most celebrated superstar in Taepyeong City.
Wherever she went, people’s gazes poured over her.
Admiration, cheers, sometimes jealousy and awe.
She had always lived a life where she could never escape other people’s eyes.
Even when she hid her face completely with a hat and mask, there were always limits.
Sonya was a wolf-type beastkin, a race famous even among beastkin for being wild.
The unique, rough mana characteristic of wolf beastkin was well-known throughout Taepyeong City.
Especially the presence of a hunter as strong as her—it wasn’t something that could be hidden just by wearing different clothes.
She was the only wolf beastkin with such powerful presence.
Anyone even slightly sensitive to mana, or even those completely insensitive to it, would immediately recognize her as “Kuroaki.”
But that part-timer just now had been different.
‘Did he really not know? Or was he pretending not to know?’
At first she had been suspicious.
There were plenty of cunning people who pretended not to know her just to get close.
But the way he had stared at her the entire time she was in the store—
That wary look, as if he was genuinely worried she might steal something, couldn’t be faked.
Even after she revealed her face, he hadn’t treated her like some underage kid trying to buy cigarettes.
‘He really doesn’t know who I am.’
It was amazing.
There was actually someone in this city who didn’t know her.
Did he not watch TV?
Or was he an elf who had just come down from the mountains?
No, that couldn’t be it.
He didn’t have elf ears……
If he were an elf, he would have recognized her from her presence alone.
He really didn’t know her.
He didn’t even feel that she was special.
Along with the wonder came a sense of relief.
Sonya felt the breath she had been holding finally loosen.
Being a superstar meant never being free from other people’s gazes.
It meant always having to show a perfect, carefully constructed image.
If she ever showed even the slightest lapse—
Arrows would rain down on her, the center of everyone’s attention.
But here, she didn’t need to do that.
Because he didn’t know her.
Because he wasn’t someone who would judge her.
That was why, instead of quickly paying and taking the triangle kimbap home like she usually would, she had sat at the corner table for the first time and opened the plastic wrapper.
The entire time she drank her soda and chewed the kimbap, her eyes stayed on the part-timer sweeping the floor.
She wondered if he would suddenly recognize her later.
If he would suddenly brighten up and act like he knew her.
But the part-timer remained indifferent to her the whole time.
He just stood at the counter with a face that clearly wanted to finish his shift and go home.
It was so comfortable.
The fact that she could be quiet even with someone nearby.
That was why, even after finishing the kimbap and soda, she stayed at the table for a while longer, watching him.
She felt a little annoyed.
She had even taken off her mask on purpose so he would look at her, yet he didn’t spare her a glance.
‘He was staring so hard before I bought anything.’
She was surprised at herself for thinking such things, and at the same time intoxicated by the comfort this space gave her.
A faint smile spread across Sonya’s lips as she walked beneath the streetlights.
The black wolf tail peeking out from her pants swayed happily.
Hidden in the darkness, Sonya looked back at the convenience store and thought—
‘I should come here again.’
A hum escaped her lips.
***
“Good work today, Manager~!”
“Yeah, you too. See you tomorrow.”
After greeting the manager, I headed home.
When I returned to my lodging, the first thing I saw was the flashy display case sitting prominently in the most visible spot in the room.
The manager had somehow set it up with all kinds of lighting inside an acrylic case.
The limited-edition figures were waiting for me on top of it.
“Whoa, that looks awesome.”
Every time I saw it, I was reminded how much more impressive it was compared to when it had been in my old studio apartment.
Back then it had just been carefully placed inside a regular display case.
And next to it, leaning against the wall, was the World Tree branch I had received from Priella.
Seeing it reminded me of what Priella had said today.
— If you haven’t brewed the World Tree branch I gave you yet, I recommend buying a pot this time and trying to grow it.
— It’s a real World Tree branch, so if you can grow it, something good will happen.
She said something good would happen if I grew it well.
Hadn’t she also said it was good for stamina if you brewed it?
“This little branch is worth four million won?”
It was something I wouldn’t have believed before.
“She really must be the Elf Queen…… She wouldn’t lie about something like this.”
There was no way the Elf Queen would lie about something like this.
I took out the empty pot that used to hold succulents—now dead.
Something a little bigger than my fist should work, right?
“I’m not confident about growing plants, though……”
Still, it was better than doing nothing.
I stuck the branch deep into the pot and sprinkled some water over it.
“Will this work?”