I've Been Had
Queen Knight let her gaze sink and settle.
If Hong Yumin struck with a coldness drawn from that peculiar mystique of hers and the long weight of years, Queen Knight seemed to look down through a quiet nobility she had carried from birth, tempered now into frost.
He flinched.
A terrible pressure rolled off Hong Yumin, still working her way through the japchae he had served her. The way she cracked her fingers this way and that was frightening. How many seconds were left before those slender, delicate hands punched a hole through his forehead?
"Heh heh heh."
Dan Miryu gave a hollow little laugh, as if all of this were familiar, and shoveled food into his mouth by the heap. He was not a man given to overeating, but it seemed he had taken a hard dose of stress in that brief span.
"Hrngh."
"San-gun, don't look at me like I'm worse than a cockroach on the roadside. You're a tiger. How is your face that easy to read?"
"Hrrrngh?"
"Lady Pele, please don't stab me with the fork. Not the belt. My pants are coming down."
The meal had gone as cold as the glaciers of the Arctic. But who was he? Do Kyungsoo. If he were the sort to read a room, he never would have started.
"Seeing how silent you are, I take it TERA's Prophet is in no state to be active."
"………."
"You're wondering how I knew, when you hid it so thoroughly? It's because I'm a phantom thief. Phantom thieves are sensitive to secrets. If something is hidden, I can't bear not to turn it over."
"………."
"We can set aside the fact that I'm a phantom thief. I've laid that down for the moment. Turns out even I need a day off."
"………."
"But, Miss Queen Knight. Is the Prophet's condition truly that grave? Grave enough that you, who don't believe in gods, would ask Pele whether she is one?"
"………."
"It depends on the state she's in, but Pele will cradle just about anything short of the worst. What's truly severe is beyond anyone's help."
"Hey. You think I can't even treat one kid?"
Pele pouted. He popped a piece of sweet crispy chicken between those lips. Her eyes went round as she chewed, and the back of his neck stung. Hong Yumin's gaze had taken on physical weight and was raking his skin.
"Well, since we've gone to the trouble of sitting down together, let's speak frankly. We have things we want from TERA, and TERA has things it wants from us. Let's look after each other."
"………."
Queen Knight had turned to stone. He had talked his fill, and she had not so much as twitched. Was she even breathing? Her pupils had contracted to points.
He ate with tidy determination while he waited for a reaction. His left hand gripped a fork clumsily and inhaled spaghetti; his right was compelled to deliver pork belly straight into Pele's mouth. Using divine power for this? Use your own hands. Hong Yumin, close your eyes a second. I think my neck's about to come off.
"……Hoo."
Only when half the food on the table had vanished did Queen Knight open her sewn-shut mouth.
"Just as I was told. You are impossible to pin down."
"If a phantom thief were ordinary, he wouldn't be a phantom thief. He'd just be a thief."
"I wonder. The phantom thieves of the world are rather gentlemanly……."
"I can be a gentleman too."
Three people and one beast turned looks of pure disbelief on him. What? He could, if he tried.
"I am very curious just how much you know of the Prophet's existence. But this is a modest little gathering, and nothing impure ought to happen here."
Queen Knight released the killing intent she had been holding back. A ripple of force, faint enough to set the air trembling—killing intent that proved she, too, was a proper hero, a superhuman who had reached a realm of her own.
Smooth and orderly, that killing intent borrowed the shape of a knight and menaced his whole body. A knight in heavy armor waited with the sword at his hip half-drawn.
Hong Yumin's electric stare was pushed back by it. Her brow twitched.
She really is strong.
The second-in-command, indeed. Even in TERA, overflowing with talent that could boast of itself, there was a reason she held the number-two seat without yielding.
"And what would count as an impure reason?"
"Who can say. I've been too busy with work lately to look after myself, so something emotionally unfortunate might slip out of me without my meaning it to. I hope you'll understand."
"Ha ha. Of course I ought to understand. Someone as busy as you made time out of a precious day to come all this way."
He flicked the knight's helmet. The knight wrought of killing intent blurred, dissolving like something dropped in water. Queen Knight's forehead twitched. She gathered the scattering intent and set it upright again.
"That's enough."
Thud!
A dull impact rang out, like a hammer coming down on a skull. The knight's killing intent was crushed beneath something and vanished, and he rubbed the lump rising on the back of his head.
Queen Knight's eyes went wide as she looked at Pele.
Pele spat out the finger she had been gnawing and dipped her head a little.
"Child of the knight. If your mood was soured, I'll apologize for that. Our boy was never taught his manners, and he's caused you trouble. You went out of your way to invite us, and all we left you were ugly memories. I'm sorry."
A god's sincere apology. Pele even shut her eyes tight and lowered her face before a mortal far beneath her.
"……Pele?"
He was thrown. He had never imagined Pele would apologize.
"You apologize too, you brat. Or else."
"I—I'm sorry."
A bead of cold sweat slipped free as he folded at the waist into a right angle. Queen Knight let out a small sigh.
"No. I should apologize as well, for answering too harshly. I showed a guest an unsightly side of myself. I'm sorry."
Only after Queen Knight bowed her head did the air ease a little.
"You called her the Prophet? It's awkward to keep on about it after the Child of Man went and exposed her, but is that girl really unwell?"
Pele slipped the question in while the mood held.
"……Yes. One day she suddenly poured out a prophecy no one could understand, and collapsed. She hasn't woken since. Not even today."
Unable, it seemed, to ignore a god's apology, Queen Knight answered after a moment's hesitation.
"Was she always like that? Or is this time special?"
"This time is special."
"Hm."
Pele stroked her chin.
"A few reasons she might have fallen come to mind."
"……Truly?"
"Yes. I'm a god who lived through an age when prophecy ran wild. I've been on the receiving end of prophecy, and I've made them myself. Recently I tried one on the Heavenly Punishment."
Queen Knight's pupils widened sharply.
"A prophecy upon the Heavenly Punishment……? Then all of the Heavenly Punishment……."
"They're all suffering without end, just as the prophecy said."
"……."
"Well. That isn't what matters."
Pele raised her index finger and crooked it.
"I said there were several possibilities, but I think it's only one. The Prophet foresaw a fate she herself cannot bear."
As she said it, she glanced at him.
"You said she poured out a prophecy no one could understand? It probably rushed in all at once, without her knowing. She rambled terribly, didn't she?"
"………."
"What you heard won't be the end of it. When she wakes, there'll be more after. It's always like that."
"Then there is nothing wrong with her health?"
"Unless a prophet speaks of the moment of her own death, she's generally fine. The question is how long the collapse lasts."
"Haa……."
Queen Knight swept a hand over her chest, as if setting one worry down.
"That child…… she's all right……."
The cold expression melted, as if in sunlight.
"Let me make it up to you for the apology and go take a look. Depending on her state, I might even be able to wake her early."
"………."
Queen Knight opened her mouth, then closed it. A deep furrow cut her brow, and in the end she nodded.
"……Please."
"We were the ones in the wrong. Don't feel burdened."
Pele pushed her chair back with a scrape and stretched.
"Nnngh. Explaining wore me out. And I've eaten my fill, so I'll be getting up."
Ah.
"I'll take this sorry fool with me. I'll beat some manners into him properly."
"Pardon?"
Pele hoisted him like a bundle of luggage. He draped over her shoulder like laundry on a line.
"Then I shall as well."
Hong Yumin wiped her mouth with a tissue and rose. San-gun licked his nose a few times and trotted after her.
In a low voice, Pele took him to task.
"Read the person before you make a mess. Nothing else left to poke, so you poke someone precious? And an ally, at that."
"There was a pattern to the conversation I'd originally planned……."
"Oh, please. If you'd gone through with it, the table would've split in half, and a perfectly good meal would've been ruined. Try talking like a person. It's not as if you can't. Why do you have to needle people so unpleasantly? Every time I watch from the side, I worry myself sick."
"Mm……."
He had nothing to say. Pele had cast aside a god's dignity in his place. She had not needed to, and the weight of that feeling, meant for him, sat heavy.
"I'm sorry. I'll be careful next time."
"Not a word about stopping, I notice. Haa. Nothing to be done. That's who you are."
Pele gave a bitter smile.
"If you're sorry, grant me one favor. It's nothing much. That much is all right, isn't it?"
"Of course."
The moment he agreed, the corners of her mouth climbed as if they might split her face and ascend to heaven.
Huh?
This felt like he had been hooked wrong…….
"You said you'd grant it?"
"Yes?"
"You know what happens if one mouth says two things. They cut it off."
"Yes?"
Pele patted his backside. Her tongue licked her lips with open greed.
Had it been designed from the start?
Hong Yumin clenched her fist tight.
As expected, this was not going to be easy.