Chapter 6
Recompense
"Hold onto this."
He offered me a brand-new, snow-white business card.
As a human I had no reason to imagine he would need one, yet...
Let the small things go.
I felt a strange flutter in my chest as I took the card into my hand.
[Name: Dominion’s Invitation]
[Grade: EX]
[Description: Use to teleport to Dominion’s realm.]
It was no ordinary card. It was a one-time teleportation item.
The destination, Dominion’s realm, was almost certainly his true home.
Images of breeding farms flashed through my mind—countless she-tamed cryptids waiting for their masters.
“This… is it a one-use item?”
“Not at all. Unlimited uses, no restrictions. You can visit my realm anytime. And if you bring the cryptids you’ve tamed with you…”
“Even better.”
Somehow I already knew this lord of breeding wanted our meetings to continue.
Continued meetings would naturally build favor.
I wondered whether this being was the kind of NPC that handed out rewards and information once you hit a certain favor threshold.
That explained why he had given me the card and nothing else.
“By the way… you were heading toward the room ahead of us, weren’t you?”
I gave a light nod at the man’s question.
“Yes. I was just checking what was inside.”
“Then I’ll be off. I’m already looking forward to how much this ‘variable’ of yours will shake things up here.”
Before I could even finish nodding, he had vanished into the shadows as if he had never been there at all.
Just a faint click.
When he disappeared, the only things left were Han Seah kneeling in happy doggy style beside the entrance and her fallen pistol lying beside her.
And then the notification popped up, as if it had been waiting the entire time.
[Hell’s Causality is reacting.]
“…”
I stared at the familiar window without much expectation.
So far it had only shown me her mind-imprint progress.
But this time the message was different.
[Hell Condition: Survive after encountering a superior being.]
[Progress: 1 / 5]
[Reward: Knot of Causality x3]
…What?
I blinked.
Superior being.
Without a doubt, the man I had just met.
Yet… 1 / 5?
That meant I would have to encounter something like that four more times.
“Insane difficulty.”
A curse slipped out before I realized it.
Come to think of it, the skill had been called Hell’s Causality from the start.
I really had been a fool to expect an easy condition.
But one thing was clear.
If the being who had just tamed a woman into a cryptid could be called a monster, then the other three I was destined to meet would almost certainly be the same.
I sighed and turned my gaze toward the passage ahead, then started walking.
At the end of the corridor, the view of the vast space finally opened up.
“What…?”
An empty sound escaped me.
I had honestly expected at least a mountain of treasure or legendary relics.
Yet what I saw was nothing like that.
A vast room.
Dozens of display cases.
Floor-to-ceiling shelves.
And on them, countless ordinary objects.
Cups.
Watches.
Fountain pens.
Picture frames.
Candlesticks.
Files.
Keys.
Ornaments.
It looked exactly like someone had simply dropped off their entire warehouse.
“…A museum?”
I stepped inside slowly.
Not a speck of dust.
Everything was as clean as if someone had been using it only moments ago.
Suddenly I saw a familiar window on my HUD.
[Analysis failed. Only partial information is displayed.]
[Name: Nameless Cup]
[Grade: Unanalyzable]
[Description: A cup used by some being.]
“…What? It’s nothing special.”
Next.
[Name: Old Fountain Pen]
[Grade: Unanalyzable]
[Description: A fountain pen used by some being.]
Next.
[Name: Black Key]
[Grade: Unanalyzable]
[Description: A black key.]
“…”
The descriptions were completely empty.
Or rather, they looked like the system simply didn’t know anything at all.
Up until now it had analyzed every hunter’s body and soul.
Yet these objects refused to even read their basic stats.
Like that man’s status window had done.
I stared down at the black key in my hand.
Hold on.
If they were truly ordinary items, why store them here?
A superior being who couldn’t even read status windows.
Things from his own space.
Even if I didn’t know what they were yet, the odds of them being worthless were actually slim.
Just because the system couldn’t analyze them didn’t mean they were trash.
Maybe it was the opposite.
Items too high-ranked to measure or outside human classification.
I hesitated for a moment, then lifted the key.
And immediately stowed it in my Four-Dimensional Pocket.
Perfect.
No issues with storage.
I began checking every object around me and tossing them into my inventory one by one.
Space was unlimited, so I could decide later whether to keep anything.
After I had cleared over half the shelves, I noticed a faint blue glow coming from the deepest wall.
“…?”
Closer, it wasn’t a wall at all.
A massive cluster of crystals stretching for dozens of meters.
Like the entire cave had been carved from crystal.
The blue light pulsed from within the enormous gems.
Softly.
Endlessly.
“…Pretty.”
That was my honest first impression.
The scale was immense.
Even bigger than any jewel I had seen before, and more overwhelming than any sculpture.
But that was it.
Just a giant crystal to me.
Nothing more, nothing less.
“…What is pretty about it?”
I turned at the voice behind me.
Han Seah had finally pulled herself together and was staggering toward me.
Ah.
I had left her at the entrance.
I hadn’t planned to bring her inside anyway, but now it looked like Dominion’s departure had released her from her trance state.
“That.”
I pointed at the crystal cluster without a second thought.
“It’s pretty, but it doesn’t look special at all.”
At that moment, Han Seah froze.
“What did you just say?”
“Pretty… but…”
“Wait a second.”
She cut me off urgently.
And stared at the crystal cluster.
One second.
Two seconds.
Three seconds.
Her eyes widened.
“Impossible…”
“Why?”
“Why is that here?”
“Huh?”
“No… there’s no way…”
She kept switching between the cluster and me, completely stunned.
“You don’t know what that is?”
“Yes.”
“…”
“Is it famous?”
Han Seah’s lips trembled.
“That is not just famous.”
“What do you mean?”
She fell silent for a moment, then spoke in a shaky voice.
“That is Divine Crystal… so rare that even the executors use only a microscopic amount in their equipment.”
***
“Who discovered it?”
A short question cut through the air.
In the conference room, a silver-haired woman flipped through documents while waiting for an answer.
“New explorer Seo Jihoo.”
Every pair of eyes in the room turned toward the speaker.
“You said new?”
“Yes.”
“This is his first mission.”
“Correct.”
“…”
She remained silent for a moment and looked at the crystal cluster on the screen.
“The part that worries me most is that he found this crystal cluster before anyone else.”
All eyes in the room shifted to her.
“How did a new hire discover something no one else has seen after it was investigated dozens of times?”
The room fell completely silent.
No one could answer easily.
That question was exactly what everyone in the room was wondering.
After a moment, the report handler spoke carefully.
“According to the discoverer’s own statement, he felt a strange sensation on the wall, checked it out, and discovered a hidden passage.”
“…By chance.”
The silver-haired woman murmured.
The doubt in her voice was clear.
“How many times has that area been surveyed?”
“Exact numbers are still being compiled, but it’s estimated to be at least dozens of times.”
“Dozens of times…”
She let out a short sigh.
“And during all those dozens of explorations, a new hire found a space no one else had discovered on his very first mission.”
It sounded unbelievable no matter how you heard it.
“Could it be because of some special constitution?”
The head of the Research & Development team, seated to one side, spoke up.
A woman with neatly combed dark hair tapped her tablet lightly as she continued.
“Seo Jihoo’s constitution is still not fully researched.”
“Perception Inhibition.”
“Correct.”
“He can enter women-only dungeons with a man’s body and is unrecognized by traps and monsters inside. Beyond that, there is nothing known.”
“That’s right.”
The R&D head nodded.
“If that constitution is not just about avoiding perception but actually neutralizes concealment magic in specific spaces…”
She left the rest unsaid.
But everyone understood.
“That means…”
The silver-haired woman narrowed her eyes.
“Seo Jihoo will keep discovering such things in the future.”
The atmosphere in the conference room shifted subtly.
Divine Crystal.
Of course, it was a huge discovery.
But the result itself was not what mattered most.
What truly mattered was the person who found it.
The golden goose that laid the eggs.
A being named Seo Jihoo.
After a moment, the silent woman spoke.
“Reward?”
“Huh?”
“The reward for discovering the Divine Crystal.”
The report handler looked momentarily flustered.
“It hasn’t been decided yet.”
“Then decide it now.”
The silver-haired woman rested her chin on her hand and looked at the screen.
The enormous crystal cluster glowing blue.
And beneath it, the discoverer’s name.
Seo Jihoo.
“That new hire… never let him slip away.”
The air in the conference room suddenly grew heavy.
“Whether it’s a promotion or—”
“Special pay or—”
“Dedicated support or—”
She continued slowly.
“We will use whatever means necessary to make him one of our people.”
No one objected.
Because everyone already knew.
A Divine Crystal might be luck once.
But if the person who found it could create a second miracle, then luck would become talent.
And companies could never afford to let talent like that go.