I Am Not a God
"We need to throw everything we've got at him and kill him now! Otherwise everyone will start looking down on the Daehan Group!"
The second son — president of the Daehan Guild — slammed his fist down on the dining table, his face flushed crimson with rage. His voice boomed, every bit as imposing as his burly frame.
"Hmph! At least get your words straight. You mean they'll start looking down on your guild, don't you? You make a mess and then you have the nerve to shout about it."
"You... you finished? I heard your company's numbers are in the red, too."
The figures assembled around this table, trading vicious barbs, might as well have been the Daehan Group itself.
"Is that thick skull of yours just for decoration? Did you even watch the footage? Your eyes still work, right?"
The third daughter, president of Daehan Insurance, glared at her older brother with open contempt. How on earth could a man's brain be packed that solidly with muscle?
"Of course I watched it. I'll give him this — the bastard's strong."
One of the reasons he had been able to take charge of the Daehan Guild, the conglomerate's armed wing, was that he himself was an A-Rank awakened.
It gave me chills.
Even through a recording, watching someone of his own rank — A-Rank — get dismantled in an instant had sent goosebumps racing across his skin and left his back slick with cold sweat. He understood Karen's strength better than anyone else in this room.
"We've still got Changcheon, the S-Rank in our guild. And if we push it, we can pull in S-Ranks from elsewhere. With that kind of firepower..."
"Brother! Think, for once! That's not the problem! The problem is those vials he was carrying!"
Everyone in the room nodded slightly. That was precisely why the Daehan Group family meeting had been convened ahead of schedule. No matter how formidable this man Karen's combat power might be, Daehan was still Daehan.
"Both of you, be quiet for a moment. We have an expert here, so let's hear from him. Did you find anything?"
This time the eldest daughter, president of Daehan Materials, looked toward the far end of the table. The vice president of Daehan Pharmaceutical rose from his seat, cold sweat beading on his forehead.
Careful. One slip and I'm finished.
Blood is eternal — like a hidden family motto of the Daehan Group, everyone at this table was bound by powerful blood ties. Every last one of them was a monster grown from a seed the chairman had sown.
On any ordinary day, the title of vice president of Daehan Pharmaceutical was a sweet one. Right now, he would have thrown it away in a heartbeat if it meant walking out of this room.
"After analyzing the president's condition, we found something unusual."
"Unusual?"
"It may not be a contagious disease."
"What do you mean?"
"Yes! So we can crush him now, right?"
"Then what is it?"
Her younger brother clenched his fist and pumped it beside her, but the eldest daughter's gaze never wavered. She regarded the vice president with a stillness that was almost unnerving.
Damn it. They said the eldest daughter — the president of Daehan Materials — was the scariest of all the chairman's children...
Her voice and manner were gentle, but meeting her eyes made his body shrink on instinct, like a frog staring down a snake.
"They say it could be poison."
"Hahaha! Then we can go after him now, right? Father!"
The second son shouted excitedly toward the chairman seated at the head of the table, but the white-haired old man had not touched the food in front of him. He sat like a statue, eyes closed.
"Vice President. What are the odds?"
"We couldn't determine the exact probability even with our technology... but poison is the more likely explanation."
"Understood. You may go."
The vice president bowed at a rigid ninety degrees and fled through the door. The room had been cool, but he had sweated so much his body felt heavy, as if his clothes had been wrung through with water.
"It was a bluff, I'm telling you! The bastard was scared of Daehan, so he put on a show about it being contagious!"
"And if, by some chance, it really is a plague?"
"...Well, that's possible, but..."
"All of you, be quiet. Your youngest brother is lying there, and not one of you has a word of concern. Tsk, tsk."
"I'm sorry."
"I'm sorry."
The chairman finally broke his silence, clicking his tongue. His hair had gone completely white, and the muscle of his younger years had wasted away, but everyone in the room knew the power and the will that still radiated from that frail frame.
"Honestly. All you do is fight."
The youngest son, who had been president of Daehan Pharmaceutical, was deteriorating by the day. They had sealed him in a cryogenic capsule, frozen solid. Until a treatment was found, he was as good as dead — and even if they found one, there was no guarantee he would wake up intact.
"Father, we have to avenge the youngest."
"I'm telling you, we need more time to assess the situation."
As his children argued back and forth once more, the chairman, who had been watching in silence, finally made his decision.
"Understood."
"Father!"
The eldest and third daughters dipped their heads in agreement, but the second son alone raised his voice in protest. One of his own guild members had died at that man's hands, and they were just going to let it go?
"...Think you've grown up, do you? Raising your voice in front of me?"
The chairman turned a low growl on his second son, and his shadow rippled, fixing the younger man with its gaze.
Damn it. What the hell is that thing? Even as an A-Rank awakened, staring into that shadow felt like peering into a bottomless, bone-chilling abyss. The second son's neck retracted like a turtle's.
At first, when he hadn't known any better, it had felt like he was the one running the Daehan Guild. Then he realized that no matter what he did, a report always found its way to his father. That was when he understood. He was a well-dressed figurehead, a puppet dancing on strings.
"N-no, sir. I'm sorry."
"The potential risk far outweighs any gain. We'll wait for another day."
"Understood."
"The Daehan Group could lose face, so bury every scrap of information about him."
His own family had been left half-dead, but the chairman remained ice-cold. History had taught him well. Even the mightiest nations and corporations could crumble through the smallest crack.
"All of you, stand down. I'll keep an eye on him myself. For now, just determine whether it's actually contagious."
"Of course it isn't."
"Kku-ing, it's not a plague? Really? It looked so convincing in the footage!"
Regardless of the storm brewing outside, I was sprawled lazily across a plush sofa, watching a drama with Samsaek.
"Have I lost my mind? If that thing spread and mutated later, even I couldn't handle it. It has to look that real, or people won't take me for a genuine lunatic and they'll keep coming after me."
"Still, I thought you'd actually do it, Master."
"I'd rather die than use a plague!"
Samsaek, startled by the sudden hardness in his usually unflappable master's face, asked carefully.
"Kku-ing... did something happen in the other world?"
"...A kingdom fell because of a single plague. That's enough of that. Let's just watch the show."
Memories I had forgotten — or rather, had been trying to forget — surfaced unbidden.
"...please, save me. It hurts so much."
"Please... deliver us..."
I exhaled hard, as if I could physically drive the memories out, and forced myself to focus on the drama. The Great White Tower — a medical drama about doctors that had aired in 2007.
The surgery had seemed successful when the pulse suddenly stopped, and the doctors scrambled into emergency treatment.
The pulse still wouldn't return. They tried again, harder.
The patient's condition was hopeless. Then the protagonist, a surgeon, stepped forward in white surgical gloves and shouted.
To the drama's signature urgent score, the protagonist seized the instrument and worked his hands in a blur — and then the sound everyone had been waiting for filled the operating room.
"Kku-ing!!"
The iconic scene of a heart starting again. Samsaek bounced with delight, but watching it left a tightness in my chest.
If I'd been just a little stronger... could I have saved them?
I had thought the long years had buried it. Only now did I realize the memories had merely been sleeping in some deep place.
Ding-dong.
"Hm?"
When the episode ended, a doorbell rang out of nowhere. Samsaek and I both turned toward the front door at the same time.
It was the first time I had heard that sound since moving into this house. Delivery drivers left packages at the door, and there was no reason for a salesman to come all the way out here.
"Karen-nim! It's Director Kang!"
The camera that automatically displayed visitors activated, and the caller's image appeared as a hologram on the watch linked to the door. Director Kang was waving, wearing that good-natured smile of his.
"It's so quiet out here, just like the countryside I grew up in. I love it."
Samsaek, reading the room, slipped upstairs. Director Kang grunted his way inside, lugging a huge box.
"Oof — this really isn't much, but I couldn't very well show up empty-handed."
The box opened, releasing a rush of cold air that revealed its contents.
"Best gift I could ask for, Director Kang."
The box was a portable mini-fridge. Inside, it was packed with drinks he had personally hunted down from famous cafes all over Seoul.
Director Kang clenched a fist in quiet triumph, careful not to let it show.
Good thing I bought these.
He had agonized over it. Karen already had plenty of money, and an expensive gift could easily backfire if he misread the man's tastes. So he had gone with the safest option — and it had been the right call.
"Sit down and have one with me. So what's this about? I already gave you the formula last time."
"Come on, I didn't come here looking for anything. The weather's just getting hotter, so I thought I'd bring you something cold."
"Hahaha. Well, I'm glad you did."
Of course, wanting to stay in my good graces was probably part of Director Kang's motivation. Still, I found his earnestness endearing — even a little cute.
"The company's already in an uproar, you know. The 30% mana potion had barely hit the market, and now a 50% one shows up."
It was only F-Rank, but the number itself was historic.
"The researchers are thrilled. They're studying the formula you gave us, and they're already talking about hitting 60, even 70 percent someday."
"Fifty percent is the factory ceiling."
Unfortunately, anything above 51 percent required a person to personally infuse mana by hand, with extreme precision. Technology had come a long way, but one look at how factories operated told you it wasn't happening.
"Then we should be grateful for 50 percent. And we owe all of it to you, Karen-nim. People are still the best, after all. Hahaha."
Whether it was years of corporate life or just his nature, Director Kang had a gift for saying the right thing and putting people at ease.
"Um... Karen-nim, may I ask you just one thing?"
Director Kang's expression suddenly turned serious, and he dropped his voice to a near-whisper.
"Sure. What is it?"
"You are the greatest alchemist there is, correct?"
"That's right."
Alchemy as a discipline had all but vanished from Earth. Research had only resumed after the Gates appeared, and it hadn't been going for long. Of course I was.
What could be so important that Director Kang looks this grave?
"Then... do you happen to make hair-loss medicine as well?"
Director Kang looked at me with such desperate hope that my gaze drifted, unbidden, to his head.
Hmm... now that I looked, his crown was a little thin, and his forehead did seem a bit wide.
"I do. A full cure is possible, even."
"Oh! Then perhaps..."
"But the side effects are pretty severe."
"Existing hair-loss drugs can cause erectile dysfunction in rare cases, but compared to a complete cure, that's..."
"It doesn't work. At all."
"Pardon?"
"The function. It stops working."
"Hup! F-function failure?"
Director Kang's face went pale, and his hands instinctively moved to cover a certain area.
"Th-there would still be demand, wouldn't there?"
"Can't sell it. There are other side effects too. Blindness, heart attacks... there's even a country that plunged into civil war after a king took it and dropped dead."
"...I see."
Even the world's greatest alchemist couldn't fix hair loss... Director Kang stroked his own head, looking a little dejected, but he quickly bounced back to his usual energetic self.
"Ah! That's right — we found the person who left that review. It was Oh Yeongjun, an F-Rank hunter."