226. Deal (2)
226. Deal (2)
'Wait, this little shit?'
A vein bulged on Rina's forehead as she listened to Jin Yu-ha with a shocked expression.
It was absurd.
In the first place, if this bastard Jin Yu-ha hadn't come here and messed with things on his own—
this Ice Palace would have functioned as a hot spring until the Fire Dragon reached the end of its lifespan.
And how had he smashed those walls, which wouldn't budge under any ordinary force, into such a wreck?
He was truly an outrageous punk.
And after doing all that, what?
He wants me to turn the Fire Dragon into an elixir for him?
This was basically the equivalent of breaking into someone's house, completely trashing it, and then demanding the homeowner pay him a labor fee because wrecking it was such hard work.
And she hadn't even asked him to do it!
Truly, she could confidently say that this guy was the first and last person who would ever be so brazen right in front of her.
So, it was utterly dumbfounding...
Rina couldn't bring herself to say no.
'Has there ever been a guy who grasped the essence so precisely...?'
No. There hadn't.
When people around the world were asked to name the strongest hunter, they would pick Rina without hesitation, yet they believed her power must have limits.
So whenever a serious crisis broke out somewhere, they assumed that the reason Rina didn't intervene was because she was too busy and didn't have the time to get involved.
Even Baek Seol-hee, who was closest to her, merely guessed she must have something pressing to do; she never thought Rina 'couldn't' step in.
But Jin Yu-ha saw the essence.
That she couldn't use more than a certain amount of her power.
Because the more power she used, the more this world would be destroyed.
Even she herself didn't know the reason, but it felt like an immutable proposition.
If she could use her power freely?
Why would she have bothered to establish the academy?
Though it would take time, all the gates, monsters, and villains in this world would be utterly crushed by her hand.
'What on earth is this guy...?'
So, should she make the elixir according to the deal this guy proposed?
She had to make it.
Though it was pathetic and bitter to be threatened by a young brat and reduced to an elixir-making machine.
Nothing this guy said was wrong.
Rina had also secretly been expecting that Utopia would eventually act as her proxy.
Yes, refining the Fire Dragon into an elixir and giving it to them would certainly help her future.
It would, but...
'But, but, but...! It infuriates me...! If you wrecked my vacation home without permission, you should at least bow your head and apologize! You shameless son of a bitchhhhhh!'
This cheeky bastard grinning at her with that greasy face.
Rina bit her lip tightly and glared at Jin Yu-ha.
As expected, to just tuck her tail between her legs like a defeated dog and hand over the elixir was something the lofty pride of the Magic Emperor could not permit.
'Anyway, useless work has doubled lately... Ah?'
That work.
It was all because of these guys, wasn't it?
So, what if she told these Utopia brats to solve it?
A thought that flashed through her mind in an instant.
But it wasn't bad.
"Yes, you asked me to make an elixir. Fine. I shall make it for you."
"As expected! Chairwoman!! Thank you—mmph!?"
"However."
At the words that she would make the elixir, Jin Yu-ha had jumped up to celebrate, but Rina magically shut his mouth and cut him off.
Grin—
"If you grant me one simple request, that is."
"...Mmmmph, mmph!?" (A simple request?)
* * *
After finishing the meeting with the Chairwoman like that.
I called the party members to my room.
And I explained what had happened inside.
"What? What did you say? We have to appear on a TV program...?"
Shin Se-hee asked, as if she'd just heard something ridiculous.
The others were the same.
The look in their eyes asked if they had heard correctly.
I slowly nodded.
"Yeah, it couldn't be helped. That was the deal."
"What kind of deal did you make to end up with something like that...?"
"I asked her to make an elixir from that Fire Dragon we caught. I wanted to boost your Mana a bit."
I scratched my head with a complicated expression.
"I could have someone else refine a Mana Elixir from the Fire Dragon corpse, but nobody can match Chairwoman Rina in this field."
"Ah..."
The party members had been about to each throw in a word at the sudden news of a TV appearance, but the moment they heard the word 'elixir,' they all shut their mouths as if on cue.
An elixir made from a Fire Dragon.
And a Mana Elixir personally prepared by the Magic Emperor!
Honestly, it was too tempting a reward to refuse.
"A TV program... It's startling, but following along might be okay. Do you happen to know what kind of program we'll be on?"
Sofia, who had some broadcasting experience among them, spoke up.
"Yeah, Chairwoman Rina said she'd narrow down a list for us. We can probably pick from that. I heard we'll do one live broadcast and one pre-recorded one."
I let out a deep sigh.
"Haah, but this is a field I don't know well either... so I can't say much."
"But, hoobae. How did the TV program topic suddenly come up?"
Im Ga-eul asked.
"Well, you see... Our Utopia got a bit famous doing all kinds of stuff—wave strategies, taking down Demonized Humans, right?"
"Yeah."
"We got that fame, but when we don't have work, we're mostly just at home or in the academy, and we do all our traveling through spatial movement formations. So we have zero external exposure. So it seems that all sorts of demands related to us keep coming in from the outside. Enough to interfere with work."
"Huh? We run a separate YouTube channel too, don't we? Isn't that exposure?"
At Lee Yu-ri's words, I shook my head.
"Actually, that might be the bigger problem. When we uploaded the video of the U.S. Monster Subjugation Request this time, interest spread worldwide, and since then, there's been absolutely no news. Honestly, if we don't have outside activities, we don't upload videos often, right?"
"Even so, it's hard to increase our upload frequency..."
Shin Se-hee picked up the thread in a serious voice from beside me.
That was true.
Because it was impossible to film inside gates where electronic devices don't work at all.
So videos were usually uploaded to the Utopia channel only when a Gate Break occurred or when we were active outside a gate.
But to reduce our gate clearing time just to upload another video?
That would be putting the cart before the horse, complete nonsense.
"Anyway, that's why the request came in. For us to show our faces in front of the public, do some interviews, and satisfy people's curiosity a bit. Then the academy has something to say too, like 'We sent them.'"
"...If we can get the elixir in exchange for a broadcast appearance, it's definitely... a very cheap price to pay."
Shin Se-hee pursed her lips and fell into thought.
"Tch, originally we could have gotten it for free... That mean, spiteful brat... If she was gonna give it to us anyway, why tack on a condition like that?"
"But, hoobae. Isn't this just like filming our YouTube stuff? If it's that, it shouldn't be too hard—"
"No. It's different."
It was Sofia who cut into Im Ga-eul's words.
"If you step into broadcasting with that kind of sloppy mindset, you'll get unimaginably cursed out. Jin Yu-ha. You said one of the things we have to film is a live broadcast, right?"
"Y-yeah."
"Then we'll need to be fully prepared."
Her eyes grew serious.
* * *
「 Meeting Hunters. 」
It was one of the variety programs professionally produced by the broadcasting station. It mainly invited hunters active in Korea to promote parties or guilds and to talk about the hardships of hunter work.
In this era where more attention was focused on hunters than on most celebrities, it could be called a program perfectly targeted at viewer needs. Befitting that attention, 「Meeting Hunters」 boasted the hottest popularity of any currently airing program.
But even for such a program, there had never been a single instance in its history of an academy cadet appearing.
That was because those who appeared here were usually veteran hunters trying to raise their value through publicity.
The broadcasting station had the perception that no matter what, cadets were greenhorns compared to active-duty hunters. And the academy side also had the perception that raising one's name value through means other than requests implied a lack of skill. For the first time in that program's history, academy cadets were invited.
Utopia.
Could they really be called greenhorns?
No. They had already proven to the entire world during the U.S. Monster Subjugation Request that they were academy cadets yet capable of competing on equal footing with active-duty parties.
And did the academy side think their skills were lacking?
Absolutely not.
Within the academy recently, joining Utopia had become so recognized that it was ranked number one on the cadet bucket list.
When such a group announced they would appear on broadcast, chaos naturally erupted at the broadcasting station as well.
"Is it really true?! Jin Yu-ha is coming this time?!"
"Yes! We just got confirmation from the academy!!"
"Ha, insane, those secretive guys are really coming on our show...?"