Chapter 66
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 66
Chapter Title: Anonymous Rabbit
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The anonymous Hunter 1, presumed to be Jahwa-yeon.
No.
She'd simply requested a visit tomorrow.
[Anonymous Hunter 1]: ...Can't it be today?
She seemed eager to come right away, but...
Regrettably, the cake that had just emerged from the oven and entered the fridge hadn't ripened into something delicious.
- Ding.
- Ding.
And from now on, consultations with other clients were lined up back-to-back.
Messages were flooding in continuously.
I pondered for a moment before placing my hand on the keyboard.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: Regrettably, it's just a lump of plain dough right now.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: I can't serve an unfinished treat to the Heavenly Demon. If you could endure just one day...
In response, Jahwa-yeon sent a message saying she understood.
[Anonymous Hunter 1]: Hmm, refusing loyalty to one's lord isn't proper conduct for a subject either. Understood.
My reply must have pleased her quite a bit.
Hold on.
What if she actually had other concerns?
[Yoo Seon-woo]: By the way, Heavenly Demon, do you perhaps have any other worries?
I suddenly felt a pang of carelessness.
She might only want to say certain things behind the anonymous mask.
Maybe I'd been too hasty in stripping away her facade.
[Anonymous Hunter 1]: Nothing like that. I just tried it out of boredom.
"Ah."
Fortunate, I guess.
Rather... fortunate...
No, you never know.
I quickly pinned Jahwa-yeon to check her real status.
Jahwa-yeon[PINNED]
💭 Current Status:Sitting on the jade throne, kicking her feet impatiently. Saliva is pooling in her mouth as she keeps staring at the photo on her tablet screen.
🎯 Main Stance:I hope tomorrow comes quickly. For now, planning to send Geumgang on a bread shuttle run.
Yeah.
Fortunate.
She'd really just messaged out of boredom.
She was simply excited thinking about the cake tomorrow.
I nodded, feeling a twinge of sympathy for Geumgang, who was about to become an impromptu bread shuttle.
Then I tapped at the keyboard.
Time to wrap up the conversation.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: Is it alright to end the consultation?
The principle of obtaining the client's consent before ending a session applied here too.
[Anonymous Hunter 1]: Yes. Good work for today as well.
With her crisp, cool farewell, Jahwa-yeon's status switched to offline.
And just like that, she ended the consultation with her high-calorie spoils of war.
The first consultation...
Success?
Is this even a consultation...?
Anyway, I downed the coffee beside me and opened the next chat window.
[Anonymous Hunter 2: Requesting consultation.]
"Another anonymous."
The next non-face-to-face client was anonymous too.
No issue for me.
It was a good thing that hunters lacking confidence in in-person sessions applied...
Hold on.
Suddenly, pure curiosity struck.
"Friend."
[Yes! You called?]
[☆(ω)v]
"By any chance... do you know who the person on the other side of the screen is?"
The status window that knew no unknowns.
Could it identify the client beyond this perfect anonymity system?
Probably not.
No information on the target at all.
[Hmm....]
[( ˘︹˘ )]
As expected, tricky.
I had no real desire to know, but out of pure curiosity...
[Initiating hack of Association Central Database firewall!]
[1st firewall... neutralized!]
[2nd vaccine program... neutralized!]
What?
What the hell is this?
"Hey, what are you..."
[Final security protocol neutralized!]
[Hacking complete! ( •̀ ω •́ )✧]
[Anonymous client #2's identity: Union Guild S-rank Hunter Luna!]
[Praise me!]
[(≧∇≦)]
No... what...
Who told it to neutralize anything?
1st, 2nd, final, my ass.
In my view, the entire process scrolled up in just a few seconds.
No chance to block or anything.
The highest-grade security got utterly shredded before the system.
In the end, the anonymous client was outed as Luna.
Very much against my intentions.
I'd had zero intention of finding out.
"Ah... shoot..."
Unlike Jahwa-yeon, Luna didn't seem the type to consult over something trivial like boredom.
Moreover, choosing the anonymous mask over coming to me directly suggested her worry was the kind hard to voice to others.
'What do I do.'
By the book, I should end this consultation right here.
I'd learned the client's identity before it even started.
But flat-out rejecting now felt pretty awkward too.
Luna didn't seem like she'd ever bare such masked worries to anyone else, not even me.
Which meant that worry would just keep piling up inside her.
I squeezed my eyes shut tight, then opened them.
[......]
[Sorry....]
The system window fidgeted anxiously before my eyes, glancing at me.
It seemed flustered by my unexpected reaction.
"No, it's not your fault."
I figured it was my mistake for asking in the first place.
In the end, I decided to prioritize caring for Luna over strict counselor ethics.
Acting like I absolutely didn't know.
Besides, suddenly rejecting now left me without a good excuse.
'Sorry, but my system hacked the Association's internal database and forced a peek.'
No way could I say that.
Wasn't like confessing to a crime.
I steadied my resolve and placed my hand on the keyboard.
To begin the consultation.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: Hello? Client? This is Counselor Yoo Seon-woo.
Light start.
Hit send, and a reply arrived soon after.
[Anonymous Hunter]: Hello. Counselor.
We could proceed slowly.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: Did you have breakfast?
Normally, I'd suggest a sweet snack for icebreaking, but that wasn't possible here.
So I tossed out a different icebreaker question.
A short while later, a curt reply came back.
[Anonymous Hunter]: No.
I nodded.
The message tone was quite different from the Luna I knew.
She seemed to be acting thoroughly to conceal her identity.
The problem was that I knew everything.
Suddenly, my conscience stung...
[Yoo Seon-woo]: I see. I hope you have a hearty lunch.
No sign she wanted icebreaking.
Just push forward quickly.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: What worries have been on your mind lately, Hunter?
Straight to the main point.
I waited silently for her response from across the screen.
[Anonymous Hunter]: I hope the counselor can clearly define this emotion for me.
[Anonymous Hunter]: I'll explain everything in detail about what I'm going through.
She dove straight into the main topic too.
Defining an emotion?
Still no clue what she meant.
[Counselor]: Yes, speak freely. I'll do my best to inform you within my knowledge.
A brief pause followed.
She seemed to be typing it all at once to send.
[Anonymous Hunter]: First off, I'm a woman.
[Anonymous Hunter]: Bluntly put, lately one man keeps circling in my head.
[Anonymous Hunter]: I constantly want to see his face, and just thinking about him makes me happy.
...Huh?
I tilted my head at the message.
Just those two lines, but I could already tell what emotion those symptoms pointed to.
I started to reply...
But paused as more messages followed.
[Anonymous Hunter]: And whenever I see him with another woman, my heart suddenly feels all unsettled and fluttery.
[Anonymous Hunter]: I know rationally it's unavoidable with work... but my heart... um...
[Anonymous Hunter]: And... and... every time I see him with another woman, my lower abdomen... trembles. A small, vrrr kind of tremble.
"......"
Lower abdomen trembling...?
This one's beyond me...
[Anonymous Hunter]: For now, that's about it.
I tapped my fingers on the desk.
The single emotion her experiences pointed to was crystal clear to me.
'Love.'
Even if not some grand "love," it was unmistakably romantic affection.
Nothing else explained it.
I had no clue about the lower abdomen trembling, precisely.
For confirmation, I asked.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: I see... Is the target perhaps a workplace colleague?
[Anonymous Hunter]: Yes, we're connected through work.
Seems like a colleague after all.
Meaning Luna had overcome her trauma and found someone new to like.
Not a bad development at all.
Closer to a positive sign.
Now was the time to reveal the truth to her.
I began typing carefully.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: In that case, allow me to share my honest opinion as a counselor.
[Anonymous Hunter]: Yes, please be honest.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: Emotions can't be pinned down by just a few feelings alone.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: So, I've cautiously inferred based on the situation you described.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: To cut to the conclusion: You seem to like that man. From a romantic perspective, especially.
Sent.
I'd considered beating around the bush, but she was a busy person.
Blunt seemed better.
Yet no reply came after.
Realizing one's own emotions can take time.
I gave her a little space.
A few more minutes passed before a message arrived.
- Ding.
[Anonymous Hunter]: Counselor. There's something I didn't mention earlier. Will you hear it out and judge once more if that's really the emotion?
After that, she sent a stream of messages.
[Anonymous Hunter]: I want his things. And I want to bury my face in his chest and smell his scent.
[Anonymous Hunter]: And... sometimes I get the urge to bite his nape. Not hard. Just to leave my mark...
Ah.
This was really something I shouldn't have known.
This consultation was not meant to have the other party's identity revealed.
I snapped my fingers into the air.
[Ow!]
The system let out a yelp.
A flick aimed at the system.
[Anonymous Hunter]: He's someone from whom I receive many teachings—could this maybe be admiration???
Luna was desperately denying the emotion.
But her belated confession only made it even clearer.
The direction was a bit unusual, but...
"Doesn't seem like admiration..."
No admiration in the world ever voiced a desire to smell their target's scent.
[Yoo Seon-woo]: It seems highly likely to be love.
I finally typed out the message.
This was my diagnosis.
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