Attention Seeker (1)
Yang Siwu used her connections to get Park Jihun’s phone number so she could meet him.
“Tsk. Never thought I’d be the one begging for a favor.”
She really didn’t like the feeling of coming in from a position of weakness, but she had already made up her mind.
So she dialed the number and called Park Jihun.
“......”
No matter how long the phone rang, Park Jihun showed no sign of picking up.
“What the hell? Why isn’t he answering? Is he still sleeping?”
The clock already read 11 a.m. Even considering that high-ranking hunters could go days without sleep and still feel fine after just three or four hours, he shouldn’t still be in bed.
‘He’s probably just ignoring it.’
Since unknown numbers called him all the time, it seemed he had simply stopped answering altogether.
“...Tsk. Celebrity syndrome much?”
Yang Siwu clicked her tongue in clear displeasure, hung up, and sent him a text instead.
‘He’ll at least read a text, right? It’s from me, after all.’
Park Jihun had been out of the gate for a while now, so he would definitely know her name.
She was sure of it. Before his dramatic return and shocking announcement, she had been the hottest topic in Korea.
Hi, Hunter Park Jihun. This is Yang Siwu. I’d like to meet and talk. Please call me when you see this.
She sent the short message and set her phone down, expecting a call or reply any minute.
But…
“......”
Thirty minutes passed. An hour. Two hours. Still no response from Park Jihun.
“That son of a bitch! He’s not even reading the text?! Does he not look at his phone at all? Is he a caveman?!”
Unable to hold back any longer, Yang Siwu called him again.
Click—
Finally, the call connected.
‘That’s right! Even he couldn’t ignore my name!’
Yang Siwu, who had been fuming just moments ago, now wore a triumphant expression as if she had already won. She opened her mouth with clear satisfaction.
“Ah, is this Mr. Park Jihun? You saw my text, right? I’d like to meet and talk.”
The moment her confident voice rang out—
(Whoa! This is amazing! A person’s voice is coming out!)
(Hey, Kar! I told you not to touch the phone!)
(Kyaaang~! S-sorry, Master!)
Click.
Only those bizarre voices came through before the call was abruptly cut off.
“......”
Yang Siwu stood there in stunned silence, unable to process what had just happened.
“That… that bastard!!”
Crash!
Once she finally understood the situation and realized Park Jihun had completely ignored her, she hurled her phone against the wall, smashing it to pieces.
#
Eventually, Yang Siwu couldn’t take it anymore and headed to the building where Another Guild’s office was located.
But when she got there—
“Is Hunter Park Jihun here?”
“I heard this is the guild office…”
“I just want to see his face once!”
Thanks to Park Jihun’s recent bombshell statements, a massive crowd had gathered in front of the building.
Reporters looking for interviews.
Guild scouts with recruitment offers.
Hunters curious about his abilities.
Even ordinary people who just wanted a glimpse of his face.
There were quite a few foreigners mixed in among them too.
“......”
The moment she saw the scene, Yang Siwu’s attention-seeker instincts kicked in. She deliberately walked forward in a way that drew everyone’s eyes.
“Ahem.”
“Huh?”
“Hey, that’s Yang Siwu.”
“No way, is that really Yang Siwu?”
All eyes instantly turned toward her.
The officially recognized strongest hunter in Korea.
On top of that, her looks were on par with a top celebrity.
She had the classic Korean beauty that would suit black hair perfectly, yet her bleached platinum blonde straight hair looked stunning, and the blue colored contacts she wore complemented it beautifully.
Paired with skinny jeans that highlighted her lovely figure and a simple white t-shirt, she looked absolutely gorgeous.
“Hunter Yang Siwu! What brings you here?”
“Are you here to see Hunter Park Jihun?”
“What’s your relationship with him?!”
The second the reporters spotted her, they swarmed like vultures, bombarding her with questions about her connection to Park Jihun.
‘Seriously? No matter how much you love a scoop, isn’t this too much? Why would someone like me be linked to a completely average guy?’
Yang Siwu was genuinely dumbfounded by their questions.
She was Korea’s strongest hunter, possessed celebrity-level beauty, and managed her image flawlessly. She was, without question, a woman at the absolute top tier.
But what about Park Jihun?
In terms of sheer buzz and ability, he might be on par with her or even surpass her, but his plain appearance and lack of star quality left him at best as “a guy with good skills.”
‘At my level, I should at least be linked with someone like Eagol. I heard he’s pretty handsome and has that dandy vibe.’
With that thought in mind, she pushed through the reporters and walked straight up to the office entrance.
“We have no special relationship whatsoever. I simply came to offer a few words of comfort to Hunter Park Jihun, who recently got caught up in an unfortunate incident.”
It was a half-hearted excuse, and of course no one believed a word of it.
Words of comfort could be delivered without showing up in person like this.
And why would she even offer comfort in the first place?
Didn’t that mean they were close?
Or perhaps there was something even more special between them?
That was exactly what Yang Siwu had intended them to think.
By subtly tying herself to the current hottest topic—Park Jihun—she was deliberately drawing attention back to herself.
Of course, she found the idea of trashy dating rumors annoying, but she figured it was something she would just have to endure.
‘Can’t be helped if I want to gather people’s attention.’
That was how seriously Yang Siwu took having all eyes on her. It was genuinely important to her.
Anyway, she walked up to the office door and spoke.
“This is Yang Siwu. I called earlier. I’d like to meet Hunter Park Jihun in person and talk.”
The office door had been firmly shut to prevent reporters and other hunters from barging in and causing a scene.
Of course, someone of her caliber could easily break it down, but that would be a crime.
Nevertheless, the tightly closed door slowly creaked open at her words.
And then—
“I-it’s Park Jihun!”
“It opened because Yang Siwu showed up!”
“As expected of Korea’s number one hunter, huh?”
The crowd began murmuring excitedly at the sight.
‘Heh. See? You couldn’t keep it shut after all.’
Yang Siwu’s expression grew even more smug—until an utterly unexpected line came from Park Jihun’s mouth.
“Hey, everyone out of the way. We need to leave.”
With an incredibly curt expression and tone, he spoke while completely ignoring Yang Siwu, sweeping his gaze over the entire crowd.
“......”
“......”
Both Yang Siwu and everyone else present could only stare at him in blank silence.
#
‘Who’s that? A foreigner?’
Park Jihun and Shin Jiyeon had been checking the gate reservation schedule to head to the next gate soon. Deciding it was time to head home, they left the office.
But right in front of the door stood some woman.
Platinum blonde hair and blue eyes.
For a second he thought she might be a foreigner, but on closer look, it was clearly bleached hair and colored contacts.
‘Too bad. If her eyes were red, her skin a bit paler, and she had sharp fangs, she’d be exactly my type.’
Of course, to Park Jihun, the beautiful woman in front of him and all the reporters and onlookers were exactly the same—nothing but obstacles blocking his path.
“Hey, everyone out of the way. We need to leave.”
The moment Park Jihun spoke with clear annoyance, the people who had been standing there blankly began to slowly step aside.
Park Jihun and Shin Jiyeon walked through the gap and left the building.
“Wait, wasn’t that woman the one we were just talking about?”
At that moment, Shin Jiyeon tilted her head and spoke from beside him.
“Who?”
“You know… the hunter who revealed her stats recently and officially became Korea’s number one. Yang Siwu, I think?”
“Oh, really?”
Even after Shin Jiyeon explained who she was, Park Jihun’s face remained utterly indifferent.
“They say her average stat is over 800! She’s supposedly in the top three in all of Asia!”
Shin Jiyeon seemed genuinely surprised that someone like Yang Siwu had come looking for them, but—
“Hmm, is that so?”
Park Jihun still looked completely uninterested.
And that made sense. First of all, Yang Siwu wasn’t a monster girl of his preferred type, nor was she a special human case like Shin Jiyeon.
Her stats might be 800-something now, but if he kept going, he would eventually overwhelm her anyway. So it was only natural he felt no interest.
“W-wait!”
But then—
From behind them, a sharp voice called out to Park Jihun and Shin Jiyeon.
“?”
When he turned his head, there was Yang Siwu—bleached hair and blue colored contacts—running toward them. The very person they had just been talking about.
“Don’t you think that’s a bit much? Completely ignoring me and just leaving like that?”
Now that there were no prying eyes around, Yang Siwu’s expression and tone instantly turned sharp.
It was a completely different attitude from the polite demeanor she had shown earlier.
Of course, since Park Jihun genuinely didn’t care, he wasn’t particularly surprised by the gap.
“...Do I have to pretend I know you, then?”
“No, what the…”
Yang Siwu was completely taken aback by Park Jihun’s utterly disinterested attitude.
“D-do you even know who I am?”
“Yes, I do. You’re Yang Siwu.”
“Then why…”
Yang Siwu couldn’t understand why Park Jihun was acting this way even though he knew who she was.
Even if she wasn’t quite at Eagol’s level, she was estimated to be in Asia’s top three and held the number one spot in Korea.
Honestly, she was just as famous as he was.
Yet there was no envy, respect, jealousy, or even the slightest hint of lustful interest from him as a man.
In other words…
‘He has zero interest.’
Yang Siwu was extremely flustered.
This had never happened to her before.
In her entire life, she had never met a person who showed her this level of complete indifference.
Ever since she was young, her outstanding looks had drawn attention everywhere she went.
She excelled at everything, which brought her even more attention.
And when she awakened as an S-rank hunter with an average stat over 800, she became convinced that she had been born to receive the world’s attention.
Yet here she was, being completely and utterly ignored.
‘Th-this can’t be happening.’
Yang Siwu stood there in shock, completely frozen.
Park Jihun simply turned around and walked away.
“Um… well…”
Shin Jiyeon looked back and forth between the two with a slightly troubled expression before quickly following after Park Jihun.
“...Ha, haha.”
After being ignored until the very end, Yang Siwu let out a hollow laugh and thought to herself.
‘That bastard… I’m definitely going to make him pay attention to me.’
No matter what it took, she would draw Park Jihun’s interest.
It was a very strange train of thought, but to Yang Siwu—who believed receiving people’s attention was only natural and that it was the greatest joy in her life—this was more important than anything else.
And so she began running after him, determined to capture Park Jihun’s attention by any means necessary.