197. US Monster Extermination Request (1)
197. US Monster Extermination Request (1)
Chirp chirp─
Warm sunlight through the window filtered past the curtains, casting faint shadows.
And the sound of birds chirping through the gap.
In bed, Lee Yu-ri slept looking quite content.
"······!?"
In an instant, her eyes flew open.
Lee Yu-ri shot upright and looked around wildly, her expression stunned.
"This is, my room······?"
A plain, sparse room—she had no real interest in or knack for decorating.
It was her own room, familiar as could be.
'Ah, I must have blacked out after the test.'
A light of realization dawned in Lee Yu-ri's eyes.
The previous day's memories surfaced one by one in her head.
—Give it up.
That blunt, infuriating woman. Jin Yu-ha's master.
She'd thrown herself at her all day long.
You have no talent, give it up. She just kept repeating herself like a parrot, so in a flash of anger, she'd charged at her one last time and······.
And.
And.
"······Ah."
A regretful sound slipped from her lips.
"I······."
Flop—
She let her raised body fall back again.
The soft pillow sank deeply, cradling her head.
"Failed."
Right, she'd been knocked out blocking that attack, so there was no way she'd passed.
As soon as she grasped the situation, a sense of emptiness and despondence filled her chest.
To think that the result was failure after all that, after she'd thrown herself at it so desperately.
"So now, I can't be with everyone anymore······?"
The moment she said it out loud,
it hit her with full force.
Kang Do-hee, always confident and overflowing with a self-assurance that made you want to be like her.
Shin Se-hee, whose first impression was a little gloomier than the image she'd had, but who had impressed her with her flawless work and clean support.
Ga-eul, her sunbae, who sometimes seemed a little lacking but always showed her kindness with a warm smile.
Sofia, who had melted into the party without any awkwardness, with her signature cheerfulness and a disposition as bright and sunny as her hair color.
And even Ichika, who had become the party's new member.
She wouldn't be able to be with them anymore.
And······
"Jin Yu-ha."
The moment she spoke the name aloud,
tears welled up.
"I, I really wanted to stay with you until the end······."
She couldn't do that now.
Of course, Jin Yu-ha won't give up on me.
Even when I tell him the test results, he'll give me an awkward smile, say it was a shame, but tell me we'll still be together from now on and encourage me.
Because he's that kind of idiot.
But, she doesn't deserve that kindness.
Swish swish─
Lee Yu-ri wiped her tears away with her forearm, rubbing her eyes.
"Let's get ready to leave as quietly as possible, like I was never here."
That seemed like the only way she'd be able to go.
If Jin Yu-ha tried to hold her back, she had no confidence in not being held back.
"······Haa."
Lee Yu-ri turned her eyes and slowly looked around the room.
She'd received so much from Utopia all this time.
"I'll have to return everything I got here······."
Because she'd have to pass them on to the next Tank who comes in as her replacement.
"Then, first I'll find a place for my family to move, and start moving my stuff out bit by bit. And······. Is there a way to give back the Subspace Tattoo? And the items inside it too······."
It was as she was mentally sorting out everything she'd have to leave behind here and had opened her Subspace Tattoo.
"Huh······?"
As she peered into the subspace that had opened in the air,
there was a strange awkwardness, different from usual.
"What the······?"
Lee Yu-ri tilted her head to the side.
"Where is it······?"
As if she couldn't believe it, she started rummaging around inside the subspace with her hand.
Her searching hand grew increasingly hurried and agitated.
Rattle rattle rattle rattle rattle─
Thump. Thud. Thump. Thump. Thump.
Eventually, Lee Yu-ri flipped the Subspace Tattoo and dumped everything out.
"Why, why isn't it here······?"
Hunter supplies: emergency kit, rope, hunting knife, fire steel.
And all sorts of Lee Yu-ri's personal odds and ends.
But the thing she was looking for was nowhere to be found, no matter how many times she glared and searched.
It was really gone.
The most important, and the most expensive.
An object almost like her very life.
Polished to a mirror shine from being wiped down several times a day—Lee Yu-ri's Number 1 treasure.
"My, my shield is gone!!! Where did it go!!!!"
The moment she cried out, flustered, a scene suddenly flashed through her mind.
BOOOOOM—!
The sound of heaven and earth splitting echoed as Instructor Baek Seol-hee's sword slashed against the shield.
And at the same time.
Crick crack crack─
An ominous sound that should never have been heard.
And the hairline cracks that appeared on the body of the Cross Shield.
SHATTER—!!
The scene of the shield shattering completely into tiny fragments replayed in slow motion in her head.
"AAAAAAAH—!!!!"
Lee Yu-ri clutched her head and screamed.
"Th-that thing was, was crazy expensive─!!!!!"
So.
She.
While her family was still in debt,
without a home or anything to her name,
was being kicked out of Utopia,
and now had a massive new debt in the hundreds of millions······?
"······."
That was when it happened.
Slam─!
Jin Yu-ha, who had come running at the sound of the scream, threw the door open, his face urgent.
"Gukbap! What's wrong!"
"J-Jin Yu-ha······."
Lee Yu-ri looked at him with eyes that had lost their light.
"Th-the shield. The shield······. Wh-what kind of work do I even have to do now to pay all that back······."
Thinking she was now being kicked out of Utopia, and on top of that, saddled with a massive new debt,
Lee Yu-ri, as if a wave of grief had suddenly burst out, scrunched up her face and started sobbing.
"Wh-what do I do now······!!!"
* * *
'······Huh?'
Listening to Lee Yu-ri's lament, I could only make a baffled face.
'What in the world is she talking about?'
I'd heard a sudden scream from Lee Yu-ri's room,
and came rushing in, half-afraid the unexpected Star Promotion had caused some kind of physical abnormality······ but the things coming out of her mouth were something else.
"I, I really was going to just quietly disappear······. But now, now I can't even quietly disappear······. Now we'll be meeting not as comrades but as debtor and creditor······."
Hic─
Hic─
Lee Yu-ri hiccupped, her voice soaked through with sorrow.
"D-don't tell me······. We were comrades once, so are you going to charge interest too······?"
Man, even in the original game you could only barely see Lee Yu-ri's tears in the latter half of her personal story, and here I was seeing them two days in a row.
This really is a rare······.
No, that's not it.
"What do you mean disappear. And what's this 'were comrades once'?"
When I picked up on her words like that,
Gukbap bit her lip tightly and pulled a face on the verge of tears again.
"Y-you······. Yeah, you'd say that. I knew it. I knew it······."
"Tell me. Why would you disappear?"
Lee Yu-ri flipped over onto her side on the bed.
Wrapping the blanket tightly around herself and curled up like a grub, Lee Yu-ri's back was to me.
"······Because I failed."
She said it in a tiny, crawling voice.
"What······?"
"I said I didn't pass!! On that instructor test, I'm the only one! I'm the only one who failed! So now I have to leave Utopia, and I broke that crazy expensive shield!"
When I asked again, Lee Yu-ri squeezed her eyes shut and shouted as if she was confessing everything.
"How am I supposed to eat and live now? Can I go back to that life of making minimum wage at manual labor part-time jobs? Ah, no way. But still, I have the name value of having been in Utopia. If I work as a mercenary Tank, there'll be places that'll take me······. Yeah, if I just put on a thick face, then it'll be okay······!"
Confusion, anxiety, and impatience started to mingle thickly in her voice as she spoke rapidly, as if at a confession.
As I listened, a light of realization dawned in my eyes.
'Ah, Gukbap. She still doesn't know she passed, huh······?'
So right now, Lee Yu-ri had pulled off the sheer absurdity of a Star Promotion all on her own,
and she was thinking she'd failed.
Watching her trembling form, I felt a slightly dark emotion creeping up inside me.
'This is crazy fun······.'
I immediately hardened my expression seriously and patted her on the shoulder.
"Hmm, I guess so. You couldn't pass Master's test? Then I guess we can't be together anymore."
When I cut things off with knifelike finality, Lee Yu-ri turned back toward me, her expression dismayed.
Seems she'd thought that if she said she was leaving, I'd try to hold her back a few more times.
"······Jin Yu-ha?"
I put on a grave face and nodded.
"······And on top of that, you went and broke the shield I gifted you. Haa······. That thing is expensive. Hmm, yeah. You're right. Even between the closest friends, money matters should be strict."
"······."
"But still, given the time we spent together, I won't charge you harsh interest. Something around the statutory rate would be fair, right?"
"······St-statutory rate."
Lee Yu-ri's pupils started quaking, as if she'd never expected me to say something like that.
"Ah, right. Then how about this? Instead of outright leaving. How about working as the Tank of our Sub Party, unpaid?"
"S-Sub Party······?"
Now even her voice was trembling.
"Yeah, as Utopia gets bigger, we'll end up running a second party too. You'd be taking the Tank spot there. Unpaid, in exchange."
"Th-the Tank of the Sub Party······. So, I'd be getting pitied by the others every day while I'm working······. And even unpaid······."
"Still, the treatment and pay would be way better than being a Tank somewhere else. We're Utopia, after all."
Lee Yu-ri's eyes went dead, like a new grad who'd just gotten a taste of modern society's cold bitterness.
I patted her shoulder once more.
"But still, you have to pay back the debt."
I tapped at my phone, pretending to search something.
"Let's see, the price of a Cross Shield······."
"······I-I'll do it! I'll do the Sub Party!"
"Yeah, okay. Good thinking. Then there's somewhere we need to go now. Get ready."
I straightened my collar as I stood up.
"Where are we going······?"
"Because I have to report the recent roster change in Utopia to Chairwoman Rina too."
"······The Chairwoman?"
"Yeah, our Utopia gets some pretty special treatment. When something like this happens, reporting it is mandatory. Ah, Ichika joined recently too, so let's take her along."
"······."
Lee Yu-ri looked at me resentfully, as if asking what kind of situation called for bringing both a new recruit and someone being kicked out.
'Well, in reality I'm just going to go pick up Lee Yu-ri's shield and Ichika's tattoo.'
The reactions Lee Yu-ri was showing right now were way too entertaining,
so I just laughed inside, turned my head pretending not to notice.
"Let's go. Hurry up and get ready. Lee Yu-ri."
I spoke in a voice that was cold and flat.
"······!!!"
At the form of address that seemed to draw a clear line, Lee Yu-ri bit her lip, looking deeply upset.
"Gu-Gukbap is one thing, but Lee Yu-ri······."