Doll Jo-ah (2)
Around the time Mark One started bringing Jin Yeo-ul back to the officetel, I was sprawled on the floor, rolling back and forth as I tried to think of something — anything — to do. I just kept tumbling until I fetched up in front of the fridge. I yanked the door open, pulled out a few of the snacks Kim Gunwoo had left behind, and stuffed them in my mouth.
"Mmph, mmph... hmm... huh. Hrm. Oh, for fuck's sake!!"
Whack—!
This tasted like garbage. How did a chocolate bar taste this bad? It was so foul I actually jumped, and without so much as glancing around I just chucked it.
Of all the places it could have gone, that chocolate bar slammed square into the head of Ibella, who was sitting right next to me watching YouTube on the computer.
"Kyah!! Guek!"
"…?"
Hit in the head by a chocolate bar, Ibella made another of those bizarre noises, then drove her face into the floor and passed out cold. I froze for a second at the sight — equal parts absurd and alarming — then snapped out of it and scrambled over to her.
"What the hell! This is too much, Ibella!! Are you a killifish or something? You try to die every time you get tapped!!"
"Ugh... ueh... Master, my head... my head is spinning like crazy. I feel like I can see my mom."
"What are you talking about! You don't have a mo— wait, no, that's not right. You said your mother died four hundred years ago!! You told me she passed before you even met me!"
"What does that have to do with anything... I think Mother came to take me away in a dream. I'm going to follow her now...."
"You can't follow her!!"
The thought that she might actually kick the bucket for real sent me into a panic. I poured Pitch-Black Mana into her heart in a frantic rush, and I made sure to keep talking the whole time so she wouldn't slip under.
"That is not your mother!! That's just Mark One... no, that's the Grim Reaper — if you follow him, you die!! Snap out of it!!"
"Oh... Mom. Ibella missed you so much."
"Ibella, nooooo!!!"
After shooting that little sitcom-grade soap opera and barely finishing Operation Save Ibella, I gasped for breath and logged onto the community.
I almost sent an undead to the afterlife with a single chocolate bar just now.
WTF?
"Ah, seriously, ahaha!!"
I was so dumbfounded I couldn't even get the words out properly. All I could do was laugh. Part of me wanted to track this one down the way I had with S-RankSlime — no, with Kim Gunwoo — and give them a proper re-education. But the bastard was anonymous, and unlike Kim Gunwoo they apparently had a functioning brain, because they didn't leak an address before bailing.
"Haha... haha. Hahaha!!!"
In the end, with nowhere for this rage to go, I conjured a Dokkaebi Club and headed for Alkerniman's laboratory.
"...Master? What brings you here?"
Alkerniman, who'd been in the middle of his research, stopped what he was doing and slowly approached me. But once the distance closed enough for him to see my expression clearly, he froze mid-step.
"M-Master? Why are you looking at me like that? And why do you keep licking your lips? This humble Alkerniman is terribly frightened, if I may say so...?"
"Frightened...? Why would you be frightened? I haven't done anything. Yet."
"Yet...? Then that means you intend to shortly, does it not?"
"...That's right. Get down."
The color drained from Alkerniman's face in an instant.
"M-Master... please, a moment. I don't know what this is about, but perhaps we could resolve it through convers—"
"Con. Ver. Sa. Tion?"
I turned the club's handle very, very slowly against my wrist. Click — the handle locked into the central axis. Alkerniman took one look at that and did not get down. He dropped to his knees instead, and shouted.
"If it is my lord's command, I would leap into the jaws of death itself! However!! Even between an absolute being and her vassal, conversation is absolutely essential! This Alkerniman desperately wishes to know the reason!"
"Hmm... that's actually a pretty fair point. Conversation does matter. Even if I'm your king and your master, I can't just handle you however I want for no reason at all."
"I am truly grateful for your consideration!! Alkerniman is moved by a heart as vast as the sea...."
"The reason's simple. I got pissed off while posting on the forums, and you were the only one around to hit."
"...I see. I shall get down."
He placed both hands neatly on the floor and pressed his forehead to the ground, lying there as meek as a lamb.
Tap.
I gave the air a light smack with the club. The pressure of the swing alone made the air shudder.
"Alright, Alkerniman."
"Yes... Master...."
"Be honest with me. I'm allowed to act a little cute on the community, right? I'm actually cute."
"An entirely correct observation, of course. Who said otherwise? If someone did, this Alkerniman shall hunt them down and thrash them personally."
"I'd really love to know who it was too... but they're anonymous, so even Ibella's abilities can't track them. That's why I came to you."
"...I see. I understand perfectly, in every particular. So in the end, no matter what I say, I am destined to be struck upon the buttocks?"
"See, this is why I like you, Potion-Phile Geezer. You look stupid and oblivious sometimes, but when you're sharp, you're really sharp. Anyway, I'll make sure to hit the ass properly, okay?"
"That is an enormous leap of logic?! Aaaah!!!"
THWACK!!
A sound like a drumbeat rolled through the entire laboratory.
THWACK! THWACK! THWACK!
Alkerniman's screams were something that could barely be classified as human language.
"GYAAAAAAH!!!! M-my buttocks!!! This humble one's, this humble one's buttocks!!!"
"Shut up. Keep screaming and I'll gag you. You should've done it right from the start, huh? If you hadn't gotten liquidated for three hundred billion, do you have any idea how much I would have adored you?"
"I can earn it back...."
"That's why I'll only hit you until you earn it back... Don't worry. Once you start making money, I'll summon a dedicated punching bag of my own...."
THWACK!!
And so, in the middle of that heated physical conversation between me and Alkerniman, Mark Two and Mordane eased their heads through the gap at the laboratory gate. They took in the situation at a glance. Then, at the exact same time, they clamped both hands over their own rears.
"I don't know exactly what's going on, but... if we get caught now, our backsides will be in danger as well."
"Agreed. The moment we enter her field of view, this becomes a danger zone."
The two undead met each other's eyes, gave a small nod, and withdrew from the gate.
About forty seconds later.
Clack—.
Mark One had returned. And behind him stood a high school girl with a rather cute face, a little taller than me. Her expression, however, was anything but ordinary. It was a face drowning in pure terror.
Jin Yeo-ul. Eighteen years old. She looked like she was begging for her life with her eyes alone.
Mark One glanced at her — at DollLover — for a moment, then walked into Alkerniman's gate as if none of this were remarkable in the slightest.
"My lord. Mission complete. I have brought DollLover as commanded."
"Okay. Nice work. You did good, but... hang on a sec, I'm in the middle of something important! Get the guest a cup of tea or something."
THWACK!!
"GHHHHRK!!!!"
"………"
Jin Yeo-ul, who had followed Mark One through the gate, took one look at the scene unfolding in front of her and lost the ability to speak. A girl with the build of a middle schooler — far smaller than she was — stood there holding a pitch-black club as tall as herself, wildly thrashing the backside of an old man who looked at least five times her age.
She stared, vacant, for a second. Then she collected herself and opened her mouth very, very carefully.
"...Um... excuse me."
At the frail little girl's voice behind me, I lowered the club for a moment and looked at DollLover. Her eyes were shaking uncontrollably.
"Hm?"
"Um... uh... that is... um... if I may ask... why are you hitting that elderly gentleman?"
"This geezer? Because he did something worth hitting for?"
THWACK!!!
"AAAAAAGH!!!! I am reflecting!!!!"
"……."
The way I said it — like it was the most obvious thing in the world — sent Jin Yeo-ul into full cognitive dissonance. She walked slowly back over to Mark One and quietly took hold of his wrist.
"Um... d-did I... maybe... come here to get beaten like that too? As punishment for lying?"
"I cannot give you a definitive answer, but... the probability that you will not is higher."
"So I won't get hit...?"
"Correct."
Jin Yeo-ul covered her own backside with both hands.
And then Ibella, who had passed out and only barely been revived, crawled in through the gate, still sniffling.
"Master... you're so... so cute today too..."
"Ibella... you are in no position to be talking right now."
I slowly raised the club again.
"AAAAH PLEASE FORGI—"
THWAAACK!!!!
Mark One watched the whole thing without changing his expression by so much as a degree, and said, quietly:
"A peaceful day, no different from usual."
"This is... peace...?"
Jin Yeo-ul looked back and forth between Mark One and me several times. Then, as if she had simply given up on thinking, she put on a resigned little smile and settled in to watch my disciplinary show.