Home Sweet Home
“Ahem, ahem…. I’ve no idea what sort of misunderstanding you’ve been nursing this whole time, but if you insist on putting it that way, I’ll gladly make use of this whenever the need arises.”
“Haaah, you don’t even have to say that. I’ve no intention of breathing a word of this to anyone else. You want to keep it buried for as long as you can, don’t you…? Sigh…. Coming back after so long only to dump this kind of worry on me—you really are a terrible man.”
…There was no longer any doubt.
If it had been the stubborn Smile of old, no amount of coaxing from her would have made him accept such an expensive reinforcement suit so readily.
…Which meant his condition had truly deteriorated to the point where, before long, he would be unable to operate without relying on something like this.
“Well then, I’ll be on my way. Let’s meet again once the reinforcement suit is finished.”
“…Heh. Right. I was happy to see you after so long, but that good feeling’s about to fly right out the window.”
“Mm, I’m not sure what’s going on, but hang in there, all right? You’re one of the key personnel of the Management Department, after all.”
“Hmph. I already said I got it. Even in a situation like this you can say something like that with a straight face—you’ve gotten pretty shameless, haven’t you?”
…Watching Smile’s retreating figure, Choi Na-yul deleted every scrap of data that had just been recorded on her computer.
…She had said it half in jest earlier, but the real reason Smile had dropped by the facility today under the pretext of using the training grounds was almost certainly to see her.
For the past several years, every ability test required for his license renewal had been conducted at her institute, after all.
Haaah, just in case anyone else sees them, I should overwrite the measurement records to match last year’s. If you’re that determined to hide it, then I’ll help however I can…. My whole life is a debt I owe you, after all.
…Yet the very same Smile who, thirteen years ago during the arrest operation against the infamous Doctor Hetra, had displayed skill that left even the top-ranked heroes of the world in stunned silence and announced to every living soul who the new generation’s strongest truly was… had now been driven into such a wretched state that he had no choice but to seek secret help from someone like her.
She had always watched him push his body to the brink while saving everyone else, and somewhere deep down she had quietly fretted that one day he might simply collapse from exhaustion.
But now that the day had actually arrived, the reality delivered a far greater shock than any vague fear she had ever entertained—enough that the carefully composed, nonchalant expression she had just worn in front of him nearly cracked.
“…Haaah. Just what… just what is going on? A future Smile can’t protect…. That’s something no one—not even me—has ever imagined….”
And only then did the fear and anxiety she had not felt once in over a decade since the day Smile saved her entire life begin to quietly gnaw at her insides. It was the same ominous sensation that had settled over the emergency summit held a week earlier—when Eternox’s dying words had plunged the whole world into chaos and every key government figure, including the Minister of the Ability Management Department and herself, had been gathered. Even then she had vaguely thought, like everyone else, that with Smile around there was nothing to truly worry about.
“Hehehe! I don’t know the details, but once Na-yul finishes that reinforcement suit, it means I get to wear it around, right?”
I leaped for joy—
“And since she said my movements would become research data that helps her work, the institute will probably cover the repair costs too…!”
Ahh, my mood had suddenly skyrocketed.
Of course a reinforcement suit was something I needed about as much as a winter undershirt at a jjimjilbang, but still—there was something cool about the idea of wearing one and blasting lasers like the hero of some Hollywood movie.
Honestly, money had always been the only thing stopping me. Every time I watched Ravi or the other heroes strut around in theirs, I’d thought… just once, even for fashion, I’d like to try one on.
By the way, I never expected that damn status window to show flexibility in a place like this. Since my data will improve the performance of the suits other heroes wear, I guess that just barely scrapes past the rules?
Well, it wasn’t like a villa or a luxury watch I was buying just to make myself feel good. Every hero wore the things as a matter of course.
(Plenty of villains even acquired them through illegal channels.)
…And since the system forced me to spend most of every day doing hero work anyway, wasn’t a modest wish like wearing a cool-looking suit once in a while something I should be allowed to fulfill?
“Hehehe, my cramped goshiwon room won’t even have space to store it, so once it’s done I’ll leave it at Na-yul’s institute and put it on whenever I feel like treating myself…!”
Ahh, maybe when misfortune piles up long enough, a person’s happiness threshold just sinks lower?
Despite the grim reality of being forced to play hero like a slave against my will, the mere addition of a stylish uniform to that forced activity was enough to lift my spirits this high!
Wait…! Hold on! While I’m wearing it, I won’t have to worry about this gray tracksuit ripping, which means every bit of money I used to spend replacing ruined clothes can go straight into my snack budget…!!
…Good heavens! How had I overlooked something this important?!
That meant my monthly allowance could soar from a mere thirty thousand won all the way up to fifty thousand!
Hehehe, perfect! I’ve been depressed ever since I blew an entire bag of cheese at dawn, but now I’m rich enough to buy as much of that stuff as I want!
And so, genuinely delighted that my monthly pocket money had graduated from elementary-school to middle-school levels, I finished another night of hero work that left me watching plenty of smiles yet feeling almost no sense of accomplishment. With a heart far lighter than it had been that morning, I put on my usual oversized mask and sunglasses once I neared home.
(If my address ever leaked and fans started sending gifts, I’d have to return every last one of them, which would only cut into my sleep even more.)
Then I returned to my room, where a narrow but cozy bed awaited me.
.
.
“…Huh? What’s going on with my place?”
What the…? Am I being haunted by a ghost right now…?
…No, that was impossible.
My body treated even mental-type abilities like hypnosis or mind-reading as a form of “harm” and nullified them completely—an utterly absurd set of specs. Even if real ghosts existed in this world… there was no way one of them could cast the kind of filthy, vile sorcery that would corrupt my mind.
Then what the hell is that…?
…But if that was the case, then what exactly was this shocking transformation of a goshiwon whose only selling points had been unlimited ramen and slightly cheaper rent than the places nearby—changes so dramatic that the sudden appearance of a ghost next door would no longer have seemed strange?
…The outer walls that had looked ready to peel off at any moment had been refurbished until the building looked like a luxury apartment complex. Honestly, that part I could accept.
Painting a building wasn’t that expensive, and cities sometimes handed out subsidies for rundown places like this. A clean exterior would attract more prospective tenants, so from the owner’s perspective it was a reasonable investment.
Wait…. They completely tore out and rebuilt the bathroom and the shared shower room—drains, interior walls, everything…?
…But considering the monthly fee was only around four hundred thousand won, remodeling the shower room I used to use at dawn while constantly fretting that someone might see my face (it didn’t even have proper partitions) and the bathroom whose tile grout had been thick with mold into something that looked like a department store or high-end hotel was, even to someone who knew nothing about running a goshiwon, clearly an over-investment that would cost far more than it could ever earn….
And more shocking still was the fact that every single one of these changes had taken place in the short span of a single day—while I was out from dawn until late at night—as if every construction worker in Seoul had been called in at once.
…So even someone like me, who could pull all-nighters for an entire month and only end up filthy tired without ever seeing hallucinations, couldn’t help but wonder if a ghost had somehow possessed me.
Murmur, murmur—
“Whoa! Look at this! There’s even lobster…! What on earth is happening…?! Did the owner win the American lottery or something?! Is that angel of a person sharing the winnings with us…?!”
Munch, munch!
“Kehehe!! I’m on my fourth year of civil-service exam prep—Mom already cut off my allowance! Lately I’ve been surviving on nothing but ramen every day…!! If I can eat like this every day, I’ll happily lick the landlord’s feet!!”
“Ubuububub! The meat…! The meat is melting in my mouth! Ahhh, so this is what ‘delicious’ means…!”
…And as I stared at the cramped communal kitchen that had once held nothing but ramen and kimchi—now fitted out like a miniature hotel buffet where the impoverished (well, richer than me, at least) goshiwon residents were stuffing food into their mouths as if possessed by nomadic elves—and at the utterly absurd sign hanging beside it that read “Free for Goshiwon Guests,” I became certain that some powerful ghost capable of breaching even my “Invincible” trait was using an arcane method beyond human comprehension to show me this illusion.
Free of Charge for Goshiwon Guests
What is this, a dream or something…?
.
.
Click—
“Hehe, so that idiot still treasures this thi—eep!”
Clatter—
…Well, the proof that this was neither hallucination nor dream, and certainly not the work of a ghost, came the moment a beauty whose pure-white hair had been slightly mussed—as if she had just bumped her head under the bed—looked up from where she knelt among the fallen glass bottle of paper cranes and the room so narrow that two people would already feel short of breath.
“H-hmph! You’re back? It’s not like there’s anything worth stealing in this room, but still, you should lock the door. What if someone walks in?”
…I’m pretty sure I locked it when I left at dawn.
The instant I saw her sitting cross-legged on my bed with her face flushed bright red, acting as if nothing was wrong while saying something like that, I understood everything.