Chapter 121
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 121
Chapter Title: Cow Girl
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Jin Sea first sensed the presence of something not long after she learned about Yoo Seon-woo.
There are people like that sometimes.
Commonly known as... those who can hear spirits.
She was an S-Rank Hunter who wielded electricity to its extremes.
And spirits or souls were, in a way, nothing more than scattered electrical particles—mere fragments of data.
So at first, Jin Sea perceived Yoo Seon-woo in that light.
Something... incomprehensible clung to him.
A faint, hazy signal emanated from him.
She dismissed it as part of his abilities or some pathetic tagalong ghost that came with the price of his power.
But from the moment she fell in love with him, her interest deepened.
What is it?
If it was a threat, it needed to be eliminated.
If not... she wanted to know if it was aware, at the very least.
She wanted to talk to it.
So she did.
One night, after returning from a mission, she lay with her head in Seon-woo's lap by the campfire.
She was savoring the sensation of his hand gently stroking her hair.
As she listened to the sound of his heartbeat, she suddenly made up her mind and spoke.
"Seon-woo."
"Yeah?"
His voice was languid.
"Did your family... have any shamans?"
"Shamans?"
He blinked in surprise at the out-of-the-blue question.
"No? Why?"
"Just... I sometimes feel this energy."
She traced circles on his chest with her finger, acting casual.
"Haha. I never believed in ghosts... Well, now I do."
Ever since the Dimensional Transfer, the world was full of unbelievable things.
"I see..."
The topic dropped there.
Still, a corner of her heart remained curious.
Then one day.
She was sitting on the guild lounge sofa with Seon-woo, chatting about nothing important, just like always.
"Sea, do you... have a System too?"
He'd heard that some Hunters had Systems, some didn't.
Revealing abilities was something even Hunters had to be extremely cautious about, so he hesitated before asking.
"Yeah."
She answered curtly without hesitation. She did have one.
Though hers was prickly and rude, limited to skill cooldown alerts and status effect warnings.
But his follow-up story left her quite flustered.
It gives directions... and keeps talking to you?
Privately, even?
It defied common sense.
"...Really? It talks to you that much? That's... unusual."
Jin Sea reacted with bewilderment.
At her response, Seon-woo paused.
"...You don't, huh?"
"Not just me... Most don't. Yeah."
That was when Jin Sea vaguely realized.
It wasn't a ghost.
There was something with his System.
Seon-woo never brought it up again after that, but Jin Sea grew deeply curious on her own.
With no way to pursue it, her interest began to fade—until that moment.
The moment she became the Thunder Empress.
The Lightning Empress, mastering every current in this world.
Seon-woo had been badly injured saving her.
Jin Sea stayed by his side for 24 hours straight.
"...Is there anything you want to eat?"
As she changed his damp towel and asked softly.
[Jin Sea][Mes...sage...]
[User... is very wor...ried about your in...jury...]
[Suitable Res...][??%]
[You. You want to eat.]
She saw it then.
What had only been a faint energy before.
It took form.
Blue electrical particles faintly gathered in the air beside Seon-woo's head, forming shattered text.
She couldn't make out all of it—everything was broken.
Seon-woo's gaze lingered there for 0.1 seconds before returning to her.
With a faint smile, he replied.
"I'm the patient here. I can't eat, remember?"
"......"
Jin Sea loved that answer.
But Seon-woo didn't elaborate.
"Me?"
"Ahem."
He coughed awkwardly in surprise.
"Just kidding."
Jin Sea laughed lightly and let it pass.
That evening, after everyone had fallen asleep.
Jin Sea sat in front of Seon-woo's hospital room. She closed her eyes.
Her ultra-electric charge created another pair of eyes.
In her senses, that energy around Seon-woo prowled the bedside like a guardian watching over the sleeping man.
Jin Sea reached out to the unfamiliar presence in the form of her own charge.
"Hello?"
And greeted it for the first time.
[...Eek!]
"?"
With eyes still closed, Jin Sea furrowed her brow. A sharp, feminine scream pierced her senses.
A girl?
Electricity conveyed voice as well.
[Wh-who are you? No way... Jin Sea?]
It even knew her name.
"Who are you?"
[Ugh... I really got caught...]
But the energy didn't answer—instead, it slumped dejectedly and burrowed deeper beside the sleeping Seon-woo.
"Hmph..."
It was already annoying enough now that she knew it was female.
It wouldn't answer properly.
And it had been glued to Seon-woo's side the whole time.
Jin Sea's golden eyes gleamed beneath her eyelids.
"I'll invite you."
To my inner world.
With her charge, Jin Sea perfectly manifested her own mental space.
There, her image—identical to herself—sat in a chair.
And she dragged it there.
It wasn't really an invitation; she forced it.
All charges were under her control, after all.
Screeech.
The door to her inner world opened. Someone entered hesitantly.
"......"
A pretty woman.
No, not quite a woman. Very young.
A girl in cow-print pajamas clutched a cow doll tightly, fidgeting at the door.
"Who are you?"
At Jin Sea's cold voice.
"Boo... boo..."
The girl only whimpered.
Shiver, shiver...
She just trembled.
She looked ready to burst into tears at the slightest prod.
"......"
Even Jin Sea felt awkward.
It was like bullying an elementary school kid—undignified.
So, with her anger somewhat subsided, Jin Sea rose from her chair and approached the girl.
She knelt to match the cow-pajama girl's eye level and spoke in a soft, gentle voice.
"...Would you tell me? Who you are, and why you're by Seon-woo's side?"
But.
"Boo... I can't... I have a duty to keep the user's secrets..."
"......"
This was something.
Surprisingly firm.
Jin Sea felt continuing the conversation was pointless.
She coaxed and soothed, but got no answers.
Finally, she gave up and changed topics.
"Then, about earlier."
That feeling of exposing her innermost thoughts.
"Can't you just... stop showing Seon-woo my inner thoughts?"
She was planning to confess soon anyway.
But having it all spoiled beforehand was too embarrassing.
She figured this much would be accepted.
"Boo... I can't do that either..."
Shiver, shiver...
She trembled but spoke her piece.
"I have to provide the user with high-quality information..."
"No, just... block mine somehow..."
"Miss Jin Sea is especially dangerous—a total slut, pent-up with desires, like a ticking time bomb that could explode anytime..."
"...?"
This little?
"...Haha. Me? No way."
She forced a relaxed smile.
"'Confessing is too embarrassing. Can't I just pin him down and XX him and XX him? Press our bodies together skin-to-skin...' "
The girl recited Jin Sea's constant thoughts verbatim.
"......"
Jin Sea's face hardened.
It didn't end there.
"'My breasts are so huge, why doesn't Seon-woo look...'"
"Stop."
The cow-pajama brat didn't halt.
"Boo... slut..."
"Enough. Just go."
From all the "user this" and "user that," it seemed to exist for Seon-woo's benefit anyway.
And being so young, it didn't seem like much of a threat.
"Boo...?"
The cow-pajama girl brightened as she sensed Jin Sea's killing intent ease—right then.
Jin Sea snapped her fingers.
Snap!
"There. How's that?"
The girl tilted her head up at Jin Sea.
Then her eyes widened.
"It's gone...?"
Jin Sea's thoughts, readable until moments ago, were now blocked.
She had severed the charge connecting to her.
"You slut! No! I need to gather info for the user...!"
The girl tossed her cow doll and lunged at Jin Sea, but Jin Sea lightly pressed down on her head with her palm, dismissing her.
If it wouldn't cooperate, just subdue it.
"Come back when you're older, got it?"
"Nooo!! User, help!!"
With a scream, the cow-pajama kid was expelled from Jin Sea's inner world.
There were a few more skirmishes after that, but ultimately, the kid couldn't breach Jin Sea's firewall.
But.
Now.
The door to her inner world opened.
And someone stepped out.
"Wow... It's been a while."
Before her stood a woman in the same cow-print pajamas.
"Told you to come back grown up?"
The problem was.
She'd grown a lot.
In height.
In face.
And... in chest.
Completely different from when she clutched that cow doll.
A perfectly mature woman.
"I'm here."
The girl was no longer a girl.
"Sea?"
The woman before her smiled leisurely.
