Speak of the Tiger
I stepped out of the house in my puffy jacket, with Elpinire at my side wrapped in a black coat.
The weather was still biting cold, my breath puffing out in white clouds.
Elpinire seemed fascinated by the steam rising from her mouth, blowing out breath after breath.
"This place is really cold."
"Doesn't Elcid get cold?"
"Mother's presence keeps it always warm. Winter and summer never truly come."
What kind of paradise is that?
I wanna live there too.
"Bundle up properly. You'll catch a cold if you suddenly get chilled."
"Got it, Master."
I turned away from Elpinire, who was clutching the hem of her coat tight, and shoved my hands into my jacket pockets.
"It's gotta be around February now, but who knew it'd be snowing like this."
Truth be told, I had no clue about the exact date.
I'd grabbed my wallet and phone when I headed out, but the phone wouldn't turn on—battery must've died. So I snatched a portable charger in a rush, but figuring from the time I'd spent in the tower, it was probably early February now.
As I trudged through the snow, I noticed the footsteps trailing behind me had stopped. I glanced back over my shoulder.
There was Elpinire, crouched down for the first time in her life, fiddling with the snow.
"It's cold."
Even though her hands were flushed bright red, she kept playing with it like she was having the time of her life, humming a little tune.
She didn't match the elf image in my head at all, but maybe an elf was still an elf.
Objectively speaking, Elpinire was a stunningly beautiful woman. That alone was enough to draw eyes—people passing by started slowing down, stopping to stare at her messing with the snow.
"Elpinire."
"Yeah? What?"
"If we keep hanging around here, we won't get through everything today."
"Oh, right."
Pat, pat.
She clapped the snow off her hands and came trotting over to me.
Shivering as she stuffed her chilled hands into her pockets.
"The world you live in seems awfully peaceful, Master."
"...Peaceful, huh."
"Hm? It's not?"
"Eh, who knows."
I shrugged at her words.
From her perspective, maybe it was.
But to me, Earth wasn't exactly a bed of roses.
"Well, no mutants popping up or monsters suddenly attacking, so yeah, peaceful in that sense."
Elpinire tilted her head at that but didn't press further.
Once we hit the main road, her jaw dropped at the sight of cars zipping by.
"Wh-what's that? How's it moving so fast without any mana?!"
"Cars."
"Cars?"
"Told you before. Mana didn't exist in our world until 26 years ago."
"So that thing was made before mana even appeared?"
"Pretty much."
"Whoa..."
Elpinire stared at the moving cars like she couldn't believe it.
The light turned green, and I nodded at her, eyes still darting nonstop to follow the traffic.
"Light's green. Let's go."
"Oh, okay."
Crunch, crunch.
And so I wandered the streets aimlessly.
Even for me, walking Seoul after so long felt refreshingly new.
I wanted to show her something cool or interesting, but what could I do? This neighborhood didn't have much going for it.
As we walked side by side, I stopped when Elpinire suddenly halted.
"What's up?"
"...I hear kids laughing over there."
I followed her gaze.
Sure enough, some elementary-school-aged kids were giggling and playing in the schoolyard, building a snowman.
"Kids running around freely like this. This place really is peacef—"
"They're from an orphanage."
"... "
Elpinire clamped her mouth shut.
I pointed out the sign behind the playground where the kids were messing around.
It read Saem Bit Orphanage.
"Says it right there. Oh, but can you even read it?"
"I can read it. Even though it's a new script, reading and communicating are all possible."
Her eyes darted around in surprise.
I chuckled, hands jammed in my pockets, watching the kids start a snowball fight with the snowman in the middle.
"Brings back memories."
"...You miss it?"
"I'm an orphanage kid too. Orphans are more common on Earth than you think."
I used to play like that when I was little.
Thinking back made me nostalgic.
Well, until I remembered how it all ended—not so much then.
"...What was it like?"
"What do you think? It went bust."
I shrugged and plopped down on a bench after grabbing two cans of soda from the park vending machine.
I handed one to Elpinire, who sat naturally beside me, popping the tab for her. Sipping mine, I watched the kids dive headfirst into their snowball war.
"You said Earth was peaceful, right?"
"...Yeah."
"It is. For now."
Yeah.
Earth is peaceful right now.
Or at least, it's pretending to be.
"Did I ever tell you about gates on Earth?"
"You mentioned it at home."
"There's something I left out. Gates come in two main types."
I wet my throat with the fizzy soda and held up my index and middle fingers.
"Regular gates and Sudden Gates. That's the breakdown."
Of course, there's one other rare type.
But it's unique and so special, no need to get into it.
Excluding that, it's basically just those two.
"Regular gates first."
Regular gates are, well, regular.
They form slowly with precursors like mana buildup or space distortions, and they stick around permanently.
As long as the monster population inside doesn't overflow, nothing comes out.
Sudden Gates, on the other hand, pop up out of nowhere, no warning.
Suddenly the air warps, and unlike the usual blue, a red gate appears.
It swallows nearby buildings right away and sucks in every living thing around it to the other side.
Anyone caught gets scattered randomly inside.
And if you don't clear all the monsters within 48 hours, the gate collapses, spilling everything out.
That's why Sudden Gates are classified as natural disasters like typhoons or floods—unstoppable by humans.
Humanity lives in fear of when the next one will hit, pretending everything's fine.
That's the world we have now.
"And 25 years ago—in 2000—the Great Cataclysm."
"...Yeah."
"Thousands of gates appeared all at once across Earth. And... they were all Sudden Gates."
"... "
"Would've been nice if we could fight back, but back then, not a single person on Earth could wield mana."
"Not one?"
"Nope. Nobody even knew about the system or mana back then."
The catastrophe hit without warning.
Nobody knew how to survive it.
Even as the sky split and monsters poured out like waves.
Humans had no power to resist.
"People died in droves. No real fight—just monster chow."
All the civilizations humanity built over millennia crumbled in moments to the monsters.
Guns barely made a dent; there were too many.
Doom.
The apocalypse so many prophets predicted for 2000 actually arrived.
Just as everyone despaired and accepted the end.
"The system appeared, and people who could handle mana emerged."
"Ooh."
"They were called the chosen by the heavens, and they hunted monsters."
To protect people, they hunted monsters.
Hunters.
That's when hunters were born.
"Thanks to the first hunters and the hordes that followed, the world stabilized fast—but the aftermath was brutal."
Uwak!
A little kid screamed and toppled over, snowball to the face.
The thrower freaked out and rushed over.
"Tons of people died."
"...That's why there are so many orphans."
"Bingo."
Humanity's got this thing called parental instinct—even dying, parents shield their kids.
Even strangers can't pass by a crying baby.
So after the world normalized, orphan numbers exploded.
I was one of those kids, born in the chaos, no parents, a 2000s baby.
"Never knew my folks. No one I'd call family."
"Didn't the orphanage people become family?"
"If it'd stayed afloat normally, maybe."
But it didn't.
I gave a bitter smile and chugged the flat cola.
"Orphanages are limited, but orphans? Endless. What happens then?"
"...Build more orphanages?"
"In a normal society, sure. But back then, society was a mess from the sudden disaster."
Orphanages full?
Stuff 'em in anyway.
Government crammed kids into overflowing places.
And funding? Same as before.
No—less.
"That's when our director turned to shady sources."
"Shady?"
"Corpses."
Every summer, kids suffered the heat.
Every winter, the cold.
Director couldn't just watch—borrowed money off bodies to keep us going.
"Butterfly effect. Debt snowballed, and the place went under... Boring story."
Crunch.
I crushed the can and tossed it at the trash bin.
Thought I'd nailed it, but it bounced off the rim.
Tsking softly, I got up, picked it up, and binned it properly.
"What happened after?"
"What do you think? Bounced to another orphanage till adulthood."
Not welcomed with open arms, treated like baggage.
That's why I dreamed of my own cozy place young.
Hanjang view apartment became my goal; started part-time jobs in middle school, saving steadily.
Realized early: in this world, money's everything.
Hit adulthood, started construction gigs.
"That's where I met the brother and sister-in-law who first felt like family."
"The humans you told me about? Wanna meet 'em sometime."
"Would've been possible if they weren't both missing."
"... "
Elpinire shut her mouth tight again at my last words.
Come to think of it, my phone should've charged enough by now.
It's been a while; bet there are messages.
I pulled it from my pocket and held the power button.
"Oh. Turns on."
A little vibration, screen lighting up.
Battery must've juiced up some.
Right as the phone booted.
"...Master."
"Yeah."
I had to lower the phone.
Thanks to the World Tree fruit, my body was hypersensitive to mana—it reacted instantly.
I turned and looked up over the playing kids.
The sky cracked open the moment my gaze hit it.
Red light and violent mana leaking from beyond.
The kids froze in panic at the sudden chaos.
I knew what it was.
So I tsked and pocketed the phone.
"Speak of the tiger..."
"That's a Sudden Gate..."
"Yep."
"Feels seriously ominous. Different from ma gi."
Our luck sucks.
Back on Earth not even a day, and boom—Sudden Gate.
I sighed deeply and activated Black Dragon.
Phone check would have to wait.