Reward
The moment we stepped into the streets of Seochon, the savory smell of jeon—those crisp, pan-fried pancakes—set my mouth watering.
The narrow lane was crammed with everything at once. People jostling shoulder to shoulder, the smell of food, laughter spilling out of every doorway. How long had it been since ordinary life felt like this? The everyday scenery that had once seemed so foreign didn't take long at all to settle back into me, as if it had never left.
Up ahead, Hana and the Team Leader stood side by side, their backs to me. They looked like sisters. A high-school girl and her little sister from elementary school?
I pushed through the crowd toward them, set a hand lightly on the Team Leader's head, and dropped my voice into a tease.
"You lost, little one?"
The Team Leader let out a long sigh. Already used to this, she turned with a look that said she was thoroughly sick of me.
"No, I'm fi—"
Her eyes met mine. I was fighting for my life not to laugh.
"Han... Jaehee..."
Whoa. This is actually dangerous. Her expression was more murderous than I had ever seen it.
"You little brat!!"
A kick came flying at my shin and cut nothing but air.
I dodged? No. I wasn't supposed to be able to dodge that. I looked down at my feet. I'd reacted without even thinking. The Team Leader looked more than a little startled, and so did Hana beside her.
And that awkward silence, of all things, dragged yesterday back up between us. Yeah. Everyone's thinking about it.
I reached for food, anything to break the airless quiet.
"Uh... I'm starving. Let's eat first."
"R-right, then. You brats are paying. You hear me."
The Team Leader was flustered clean through.
"We're Senior Librarians now... so we ought to treat, right?"
Hana, why are you saying that to empty air? Don't you start too. Help me.
"Why did you all come out so fast!!"
Just as my brain was about to melt, a savior appeared. She threw her arms wide and gathered every one of us—standing there stiff and awkward—into a single embrace. I hadn't known a hug could be that warm.
Thank you, Observer Seoyoung.
"Why is everyone sweating like this?"
Seoyoung looked from one frozen face to the next.
"It's a bit hot today..."
The Team Leader wiped her brow and set off down the street.
"Huh? It's three below out here?"
A perfectly reasonable question. None of us answered it. We just hurried our steps.
"Excuse me!! Let's go together—are you discriminating against me because I'm an Observer?!"
No. It's not that.
The world is full of things that defy understanding, but the greatest of them had to be the situation in front of me. I was freezing to death, and we had been walking in circles for thirty minutes.
"Let's just get hamburgers, then."
"Hamburgers are a little lacking, don't you think..."
"Okay, then what do you want?"
And silence again. Why is your mouth sticking out like that? I knew it. Absolute child.
"Seoyoung, what would you like?"
"Ah—"
"Don't say anything!"
"...Hmph."
"I'm really fine with whatever..."
Her voice shrank away, just as it had back in the hospital room. No—why can't people this lively manage a single answer? Hana's been like this forever, so fine. But you too, little ma'am? This was harder than the time we'd gone up against Hide-and-Seek. I could feel my mind coming apart at the seams. I couldn't take another second of it.
"Agh!! Just follow me!!"
"Ma'am, four pork-and-rice soups—"
"I—I want sundae!"
Hana blurted it out in a panic. So she had wanted something after all: sundae, the Korean blood sausage.
"Three pork soups and one sundae, please."
"Jaehee, order a plate of boiled pork as well..."
For crying out loud, say it all at once. No. My fault. I should never have come out today.
There were complications, but once we tore through the meal in a blur, a heavy fullness settled over us. Food always tasted better after suffering. I was still soaking in it when the Team Leader spoke.
"Congratulations, once again."
Hana waved it off with a gesture that said it was nothing worth making a fuss over.
"Seoyoung, will you be sitting the Grade 3 Observer exam as well?"
"Yes! I can't fall behind either."
The way the Team Leader looked at her was strange, somehow—an emotion I couldn't name. Probably just me.
"Then it's time we went to collect the reward, isn't it."
"How much do you know of the Senior Librarian reward?"
The Senior Librarian reward. I knew the outline, not the details.
"Not the details—please tell us!"
Hana asked it bright with anticipation.
"From Grade 5 on, one is treated as a Senior Librarian. The reward that begins at Grade 5 is—"
The change in librarian uniform and combat uniform was a given. Beyond that came high-grade gear you could actually tune, a step out of mass-produced equipment. From this point on, a weapon could hold data. In short, a temporary exclusive weapon.
"You build that data up, and later, when you pin on Grade 3—"
The Team Leader's weapon came to mind. It had carried a presence that was anything but ordinary—the kind of thing anyone could tell had been made for her alone.
"—you receive an exclusive weapon forged from all of that data drawn together."
"Which is to say, the two of you have now been acknowledged as a core force of Pandora."
She paused to catch her breath, and a proud warmth showed through her smile.
"As for what comes after, we shall see once you have Grade 3 upon you."
A core force. It meant we had stepped out into a slightly wider world. That small circle of sky I had looked up at from the bottom of the well that day—had it grown a little? On a heart that had been nothing but light, it felt as if someone had set a few more weights on the scale.
"Seoyoung, are you off home now?"
"Yep! I don't have any business at headquarters!"
She looks ridiculously full. Come to think of it, I had never spent this long with Seoyoung before.
"Seoyoung-unnie."
Hana spoke to her across the table.
"Yes?!"
"Is it all right if I call you Seoyoung-unnie?"
Seoyoung answered while patting her stuffed stomach.
"Sure! You can talk however you like."
"Then can I just call you noona, too?"
"Of course, Jaehee."
She adapts fast. I'll give her that.
"You rascals—in the middle of combat, you—"
"Oh, come on, that's obvious. Just finish your boiled pork."
Hana stuffed another piece into the Team Leader's mouth. A smile pulled at me before I knew it. This is the everyday we fought to keep.
Which reminded me—what had become of Ha Yerin? The thought surfaced out of nowhere. But today I wanted to stay with what lingered. I could ask later.
The heart of a forest in the middle of the city. Climb the granite stairs watched over by haetae statues—those lion-bodied guardians of old Korea—and a vast roof ridge lifted its head. A moment later the pillars dropped away in a clean, open sweep. The instant they met the broad granite court, the full majesty of the hanok stood revealed.
This was the headquarters of Deungbul, the Korea Branch of Pandora.
Unlike the traditional exterior, the inside was thoroughly modern. Floors of pure white marble, glass everywhere you looked. The elevators never stopped running, and neither did the people. Dress ran to modern librarian uniforms or suit-cut work clothes, and I liked the friction between the two.
There was one exception.
"Hello. You must be the librarians of Team White Night?"
"I'm Kim Yeonsu, the administrative officer assigned to guide you."
Officials who carried out public duty, like her, wore hanbok. A modernized one, granted.
"A pleasure. Never mind me. You need only guide these two."
"You said you had other business, Team Leader?"
I stood and offered the officer my hand.
"Yes. Let us part here."
We traded our goodbyes. Work that someone of the Team Leader's standing had to handle at headquarters in person—the work of a Special-Grade librarian who had been granted a True Name. I was getting curious.
From a distance, someone who looked important came out to receive her. The Team Leader shoved both hands into her pockets. The other person kept bowing. Right. Once you reach her level, you can get away with that. Or is she just special?
"Well then, shall we?"
The officer indicated the elevator with a hand.
It descended for a long while before we reached the underground. The ceiling opened to a breathless height, and only dim lanterns glowed around us. What touched my skin wasn't the cold of the day, but the chill of a cave.
The 0th Archive.
Officer Yeonsu led the way and showed her government ID to the sentry. The soldier saluted, then cleared the path.
Identity verification complete. Opening the entrance.
A moment later the great door of the 0th Archive opened, and the whole of it spread out before us. People in lab coats were sprinting every which way. Mechanical noise and electronic tones never let up. Some sections were sealed tight; others were walled in glass. So this is where they research the technology.
We walked a little farther and came to a place where the noise had thinned.
"You've arrived. A pleasure. I'm Ko Junhyeok, with Supply."
"We'll be in your care."
The quartermaster, kindly-faced, tapped a pad, and a door opened. What lay beyond was a trove of equipment. We were still taking in the gear stretching on without end when he reappeared, librarian uniforms in his arms.
"The outfits first."
A Senior Librarian dress uniform and a combat uniform. Two sets. I stole a glance at Hana. She looks like she can't stand not putting it on this second.
"Would you like to change into them?"
Officer Yeonsu, you read people fast.
"Um... is that allowed?"
Grinning wide open like that, anyone would have said yes.
"Yes. Go ahead and change."
The officer turned toward me.
"Librarian Jaehee, would you like to change as well?"
"Sorry?"
Guess I was broadcasting it too. Before my face could go red, I made straight for the changing room.
"Ha. You look splendid."
The quartermaster regarded us with open admiration. White and ivory carried the whole palette—a clean cut, like a school uniform. I'd heard they had borrowed the design on purpose: a reminder not to grow arrogant, and to keep striving. I had only ever looked at it before. Wearing it myself, the growth finally felt real.
I turned my head and met Hana's eyes. She startled, then smiled, awkward and a little shy. Pretty cute. She had the beret on, too. My gaze lingered a moment on her knees, faintly flushed a pale pink, and Hana eased half a step back.
"Choose your weapons as well, Librarians."
The quartermaster gestured toward the armory.
"Shall we?"
"...You look good, Han Jaehee."
"Hm? What was that?"
The officer turned the question on Hana.
"Nothing!"
Hana tried to mumble past it. Yeonsu, left a step behind her, grinned and dropped her voice.
"The truth is, I heard every word."
Junhyeok, finished with his work, pulled off his goggles and held the weapons out.
"Imprinting is complete."
"From here, you need only let your data accumulate in these weapons."
"So the more I use imagery power, the more it gets recorded?"
I looked up along the sword. Light glanced off the blade and into my eyes.
"That's right. Once a certain amount of data has built up, you can have it modified as well."
"You keep receiving those modifications, keep stacking data, and at last, when the weapon's narrative is complete—"
Junhyeok pointed past us, at a single weapon farther in.
"—it is born again. As your own Terminal Armament."
"You do cut a figure, Librarians."
The officer said it with the faintest smile.
"Hehe. Thank you."
Hana had been one breath away from melting with happiness since we walked in.
"Then I'll look forward to the day we meet again."
Quartermaster Junhyeok held out a fist. We met it with our own.
Yeah. We'll be back. No question.
"So why are we all crammed in here?"
Hwaran stood leaned against one end of the enormous room.
"Hwaran. Still angry?"
At the far end, Genshin was leaning too.
"Chief Librarian. Lady Hwaran. This is terribly awkward. Won't you both just sit?"
Caught between them was a woman with green hair swept into an elaborate updo, one long lock left to fall beside her face. Jang Yeonhee, Branch Director of Deungbul. Her expression was mild, but she pressed a hand to her brow as if the whole thing pained her.
"Wouldn't you be furious? You tell me to raise a team, and then it's the power of purification, the Lazarus Project, the Seoul Entry Disaster on top of it all..."
Hwaran's feelings were climbing.
"So you hate it?"
"..."
"You know now. There really was no one but you."
Hwaran held her silence a moment, then spoke.
"Enough. Why'd you call."
Genshin straightened and turned to face her.
"Hwaran. Did you think White Night came together by chance—you included?"
His eyes moved over Hwaran and Yeonhee, and he laid the words down with weight.