The Convenience Store Part-Timer

"Hoo."

I smacked my lips and peeled the lid off the cup ramen. Steam curled up in soft ribbons.

"Is there truly a reason you must eat this inside the convenience store? I worry it will only invite needless suspicion."

This much risk I can stomach. What are you, a coward?

"..."

I blew on the noodles to cool them and side-eyed the part-timer sitting in the chair behind the counter.

Even if she does get suspicious, what's she gonna do about it? She's wrapped up tight.

Her face was sealed away under a black cap and one of those black celebrity masks. What she couldn't hide were those doe-like, bewitching eyes, the sharp bridge of a nose the mask failed to cover, and skin so white it looked as if it had never once met the sun.

The mask kept twitching. She was chewing gum.

Pretty as that, why hide behind a mask instead of walking around with your face out?

"The world contains all sorts of people."

I really can fuck that woman, right?

"Do not doubt a hypnosis item imbued with divine authority."

Grrrgle.

Right. Even the view from Mount Geumgang comes after a meal — that's what they always said. I tore open the chopsticks and buried my face in the cup ramen.

I want to take the powder out without her seeing.

"Even if you produced it in plain sight, I doubt it would raise any particular suspicion. Are you a coward?"

Talking inside my head while I crammed noodles down my throat — and just like that, the ramen was gone.

I peeled the wrapper off a hot bar and checked the time on my phone.

Twenty minutes already, since I'd walked into the store.

I bit into the hot bar and looked toward the part-timer again.

Kim Yuna.

The name clung to the tongue as neatly as the hot bar. And Hankuk University, of all places? The academic pedigree was good too. Back when I was in the service, that school had been tier one. Enough said.

Figures. She was destined to be my first woman.

"That is a stretch."

I moved on to the rest of the information. The line that snagged my eye first was, inevitably, this one.

Virgin or not, so long as she was pretty, I was golden.

If I had to pick between the two, the outright promiscuous type might actually be better.

"Is that your preferred taste, Master?"

No, not that. It's the helper effect that's nagging at me.

"You mean the First Experience Helper?"

I took the powder from my pocket. A game-like window I'd already grown used to floated up over it.

So this hypnosis ability is basically just complete-obedience hypnosis for a little while.

"You will only grasp its utility once you use it yourself. It was designed solely for your first experience, Master, so even I do not know it well."

What I want to know is this. It's a trial version, right? I fuck her senseless for twelve hours. Then what? She loses the memory, obviously?

"Obviously."

Thinking about actually doing the fucking myself makes me weirdly cautious. Hoo. Anyway, that's why the promiscuous type is better. So when the hypnosis ends and she wakes up in a motel, she doesn't find it all that strange. Imagine waking up and your virginity's gone. Wouldn't you report it? If she plays around loosely to begin with, she'll just figure things like this happen.

"Ah... not a bad line of thought. I am surprised you have already considered that far."

Right. Learn from me. This is ten years of veteran delusion-lord experience. Oh, but there's been one thing bugging me. Under her special notes — Natural Beauty? What's that?

"A trait attached to women who have never had plastic surgery, provided their average appearance score is Beauty rank or higher. The all-natural you were hoping for, Master."

Vocabulary I can hardly believe came from an AI. Not bad. Next.

Feeling the chewy give of the hot bar, I dropped my eyes lower.

And this is?

"A trait that attaches when the share appearance occupies in a person's relationships exceeds a certain value."

So this... isn't a good trait?

"Were your own appearance outstanding, Master, it would be an advantageous trait, but..."

Okay. Stop there. So that part-timer is a woman who discriminates against people by their faces?

"That is correct."

That won't do. I'll teach her a lesson with hypnosis—

In that instant her gaze, sharp as a blade, swung my way, and I looked aside on reflex.

"..."

That startled me. Can she hear what I'm thinking?

I swallowed the hot bar in one gulp and pulled a medicine packet from my pocket.

First Experience Helper.

I read the description. Then I read it again.

This is all good, but there's exactly one part I don't like.

"Which part would that be?"

Here. The target has to consume all of the powder. She's not some junkie. How am I supposed to get her to eat the whole thing?

"There is also the method of dissolving it in a liquid."

That's hard too. She's a woman who judges people by their faces. Hand her water or coffee and she'll have a fit.

"A plausible conjecture."

Won't even throw me an empty compliment and say I'm wrong.

I propped my chin on my hand and sat with it, and all that came of the thinking was a sigh.

Ugly or not was beside the point. What woman, really, would drain a drink some stranger handed her without a shred of suspicion?

I bit the last stub of the hot bar clean off and shoved the powder back into my pocket.

The only powder I could actually buy, the Powder of Goodwill, was a chicken rib anyway — neither worth using nor worth throwing away.

In the end I have to use the First Experience Helper somehow...

"What if you offered a dry snack along with it, something that sticks in the throat? So she could not bear to leave the water undrunk."

There's still no way to confirm she drinks all of it. Half of it down and the rest in the trash, and the powder's wasted. I need something much safer, and certain.

I checked the time on my phone.

What had I even done, that thirty minutes were ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠already gone?

Staying any longer risked stamping ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠my face into her memory, and that wasn't desirable. I picked up the cup ramen, broth still in it, and stood.

Trickle.

Grrrgle.

I was pouring the broth into the food-waste bin when my stomach chimed again.

"You must have been quite hungry."

Yeah. I was starving even before the coma, so it figures. Might as well buy another hot bar. I did just get a lump sum from the hospital.

And I could get another close look at the part-timer's face. Two birds, one stone.

I cleared every trace of where I'd eaten, took a hot bar off the shelf, and set it on the counter.

She put the phone she'd been using down on the register with a sharp tap.

"Card."

Radiating pure annoyance, she got up from the chair, punched it into the card terminal, and held out her hand.

Absolutely no manners.

I fumbled my card out. Maybe because it took me a second, she frowned and snatched it from my hand like she was grabbing it off a thief.

"Take your card."

The moment the sale went through she tossed the card onto the counter, sat back behind it, and crossed her legs.

I awkwardly gathered the card with the hand I'd been holding out.

Jingle!

The moment I stepped out of the convenience store, the cold sank into me. The anger I'd been pressing down began, little by little, to lift its head.

Normally, bottling it up? As if. I wouldn't have spared it a thought. But once I thought of her as prey, it felt like she was climbing above her station without knowing her place.

"She is digging her own grave."

Basically advertising to be handled rough.

I glared at the part-timer through the window.

At first I'd figured it was just one unpleasant moment. This had crossed the line.

Now I understood exactly how much of a bastard that Lookism trait was. Come on — someone like me is at least average, right?

"..."

Even the last scrap of guilt vanished on the spot.

I found a bench along a nearby walking path and sat. Only a few trees stood between me and the convenience store.

"..."

So this was how a sniper felt, waiting for the target to show. I didn't think my focus would slip even if I sat here motionless for hours.

"What are you intending to do here?"

What do you think. I'll wait, then follow her home.

"An excellent choice."

Three hours passed. Just as my hands and feet were freezing solid and the feeling was draining out of them, the part-timer came out of the convenience store in her regular clothes.

"...!"

I'd been blinking blankly. I shot up off the bench.

Still in the black cap and mask, she headed into the warren of ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠one-room studios deeper in the university district.

What?

"She appears to live nearby."

That's what I'm saying. If she goes that way... she's practically a next-building neighbor.

I shifted my slightly swollen cock and hurried after her.

The distance was precarious — close enough that I could just make out which alley she vanished into, and no closer.

Not far from the convenience store, she slipped into a small apartment building and was gone.

I immediately memoed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the building's address and location on my phone.

Hands in my pockets, I started for home.

"At this point, it would not be unreasonable to call it fate."

You're telling me. She was closer than I thought.

Strange as it was, cross a single main road from her place and you were at my studio.

Beep. Beep.

The moment I got inside, I collapsed spread-eagle on the floor.

...Why was today so damn busy. Hit by a hit-and-run, meet some old man up in heaven, get a hypnosis ability, use the system and the status window, even make a lump of money.... And all of it in a single moment.

"Please include your meeting with me in that list as well."

Was the AI lonely, too?

A snort of laughter escaped me.

Yeah, Chio. Let's do well from here on.

"It will be a short existence, only until your first experience, but I look forward to working with you as well."

I closed my eyes, smiling, feeling good.

Dawn, still dim.

The road toward Kim Yuna's place.

"Wow. Getting up this early — it's really been forever. Has it been three months?"

"Why three months?"

"It's been three months since I was discharged."

"Ah."

Sochok... sochok...

A scops owl was calling somewhere far off. A scops owl's cry also meant the air had warmed that much.

"Spring is coming."

I'd layered two cotton tees under my turtleneck on the way out, and they'd turned out to be useless.

I reached Kim Yuna's villa and hid behind a pillar in the parking lot. Then it hit me, all at once, that I looked like a criminal.

"You are only realizing that now?"

"What?"

"Nothing. Nothing at all. Be careful not to arouse suspicion. From here on, this is live."