The Black Nine-Tailed Fox's High Praise
This is the Black Fox speaking with high regard.
Early this year, when Chayeon entered the academy, she immediately began working as a work-study student in the library.
If nothing unexpected had happened, she would still have been working in the library right now, at the start of the new semester.
During her time in the library, she had made friends with one of the librarians.
At the university library where Chayeon studied, besides the work-study students, there were also librarians who worked there separately, and one of them was the librarian Seohee she had mentioned earlier.
Chayeon called her ‘Sister Seohee’—no, the librarian auntie.
Chayeon was currently in the bedroom of that ‘librarian auntie’.
“Don’t just stand there blankly. Sit down instead?”
The place Seohee had taken her to was a luxurious residential area behind the main building, connected to a vast estate. There were several gorgeous mansions lined up, the kind you would see only in movies or photos.
The place Chayeon had entered was the largest and most expensive-looking one among them.
Her jaw dropped, but there was still an urgent problem she had to deal with first.
“Sister Seohee, I came with a friend. We got separated, and something dangerous might have happened to them.”
She herself had been rescued by a completely unexpected person, but Namyeon might be in a dangerous situation.
“A friend you came with, you mean the handsome guy with blond hair and piercings?”
“Yes, that’s right. How did you know?”
She had been watching them before they parted, hadn’t she?
“If it’s that friend, you can relax. Nothing serious seems to have happened.”
Seohee looked into the empty air as if gazing at a distant mountain, then said so.
“He seems to have entered the academy before you.”
Several questions sprang to mind.
How did Seohee know?
And if what she said was true, how had Namyeon safely entered the academy?
Her thoughts were complicated, but she quickly erased them.
Complicated thoughts did not suit her temperament.
For now, she decided to trust her.
“Just to confirm, you’re Chayeon, right?”
Seohee leaned in close, her face near Chayeon’s.
A strange scent filled the air.
Chayeon’s body, which should have been completely opposite—male exterior, male behavior, male personality—suddenly stiffened with a heavy feminine undertone.
“Yes. I’m Jeon Chayeon. I turned into a girl yesterday.”
“Turned into a girl…?”
Seohee tilted her head.
Chayeon summarized the explanation she had given Namyeon and passed it on to Seohee.
However, because the Black Nine-tailed Fox had once again ordered ‘Don’t mention anything specific about me,’ she simply said ‘divine spirit’ without using the name.
When Seohee heard the story, she fell into deep thought.
“I see. Sudden possession by a divine spirit isn’t that rare. But it’s strange that the divine spirit told you about this place.”
Recalling the woman’s words from earlier, normally it was impossible to converse with a divine spirit.
Ever since then, this point had continued to nag at Chayeon.
‘The divine spirit can’t speak? Then who is she?’
‘It’s not that he can’t speak. And an outstanding divine spirit like me can communicate directly.’
‘I should believe it.’
Ever since arriving here, the Black Fox’s trust had been steadily declining.
She had never trusted him much to begin with, but still.
“Maybe it wasn’t the divine spirit’s voice at all, but someone else who directly sent messages into Chayeon’s mind, pretending to be a divine spirit. It’s definitely possible.”
Seohee muttered to herself as she sank into her own thoughts, then noticed Chayeon staring at her and snapped back to reality.
“Oh no, I was thinking by myself again. I’m sorry I didn’t bring you here properly.”
“No, it’s fine. You always do that, right, Sister?”
Even though they had just met in an unfamiliar place, she was still the librarian auntie Chayeon knew.
She was used to Seohee slipping into deep contemplation alone like this.
“Looking at how bluntly you speak, I’m sure you’re Chayeon.”
Seohee smiled faintly.
“What’s your real identity, Librarian Sister? Are you someone connected to this strange place?”
Chayeon asked the question she had been wondering about since earlier, staring straight at Seohee, who was sitting on the bed.
Seohee closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them slowly and began to speak.
“Chayeon can’t deny being human anymore, so I should tell you. I’m the ‘teacher’ of this place, Jindal.”
“‘Teacher’?”
“Yeah. Basically, I’m a teacher who works here.”
The Black Fox had said Jindal was an ‘academy for supernatural ability users.’
That meant—
“Then are you a supernatural ability user too, Sister? A divine spirit or a divine beast?”
“Well, half right, half wrong.”
Seohee raised her left hand and spun her index finger in a circle.
Then the documents on the desk floated up and flew toward the bed.
She had already known the person in front of her wasn’t ordinary while they were floating in the air, but seeing them up close again was truly astonishing.
“I’m a supernatural ability user, yes. My ability is, how should I put it… overall superhuman?”
“What does ‘overall superhuman’ even mean?”
“The superhuman powers people usually imagine—anything you want. Telekinesis, levitation, X-ray vision, clairvoyance, precognition, time travel. Oh, and instant teleportation.”
That’s… insane.
“But I’m not a divine spirit or divine beast myself. Strictly speaking, I only borrowed power from a divine beast and didn’t actually enter my body.”
Seohee grabbed the floating documents and handed them to Chayeon.
“Here.”
“What is this?”
When she took it, it said ‘Personal Information Form’ on the paper.
“Hold onto this just in case. Any other questions?”
Questions. There were plenty, but she asked what came to mind first.
“You said you’re a teacher here. Do you do both teaching and librarian duties?”
What a long commute. Did she really take the subway every day?
And originally, she had been curious why she was even working as a librarian.
“Hmm, librarian work. Actually, the librarian Chayeon meets every day… is my clone.”
“Now I’m even more bewildered.”
After superhuman powers, clones too.
At this point, she was close to omnipotent.
Looking for something impossible would be faster.
“Why make a clone and do librarian work?”
“Teachers here aren’t just teachers. One of the most important jobs is discovering and bringing in supernatural ability users who haven’t been identified yet or who have just appeared. Chayeon is the one we found before we even looked for her.”
Discovering a new supernatural ability user.
“I handle the southern part of Seoul, including the southern district.”
So she used a clone to create a fake identity and work here to find supernatural ability users in southern Seoul.
Why even bother with librarian work then?
Before Chayeon could even finish her thought, Seohee put her index finger to her lips, winked cutely, and answered.
“To other people, it’s a secret that I work as a librarian?”
…That was just a joke.
“But why do you even gather supernatural ability users?”
Chayeon voiced the next question that came to her.
“First, to monitor and manage them. Honestly, I should say to keep an eye on them. Supernatural abilities are, after all, unusual powers. If we just leave them as is, who knows what kind of negative impact they might have on society?”
Clearly, the thought of someone like Seohee having ill intentions causing danger was easy to imagine.
“Second, to protect supernatural ability users from demons.”
“Demons?”
Now that she mentioned it, one of the guys holding a sword earlier had talked about low-rank demons or something.
“Yeah. Beings that oppose divine spirits or divine beasts. They devour us supernatural ability users who have divine spirits or divine beasts dwelling in us or borrowing our power.”
This was a sentence she couldn’t ignore.
‘…Hey, fox brat, why didn’t I hear this for the first time.’
‘Those low-life creatures like demons are nothing but a mouthful to me, the Black Nine-tailed Fox. No need to mention them.’
No matter how she thought about it, this Black Nine-tailed Fox guy was full of arrogance.
She should have figured it out from the moment he said he was ‘the being who rules over others.’
‘It’s not arrogance.’
A protesting voice sounded, but she let it pass in one ear.
Soon it became so familiar that she no longer found it hard to ignore the voice echoing inside her head.
“So you’re the one who protects them from those demons. This academy.”
“That’s about right. At the same time, we help individual students cultivate the power to fight back against demons. Not long ago, a high-rank divine spirit was attacked. Because of that, the entire academy has strengthened its defenses. The rough treatment Chayeon received earlier is also due to those circumstances.”
Seohee stood up, walked over to Chayeon, and started stroking her hair without hesitation.
“Your hair is really beautiful. To think you’re actually Chayeon. How incredibly cute.”
“……”
Why couldn’t anyone around him stop from skinship just because he was now a girl?
Chayeon stood frozen in place, unable to move.
She was weak to the opposite sex.
It wasn’t that she felt attraction toward them. She simply froze up with tension the moment a woman approached.
Especially toward mature women who gave off that aura.
Chayeon was a tomboy.
“Amazing. I’ve never heard of any cases where someone received a divine spirit and became a girl. There have been cases where appearance or age changed, but never gender.”
Seohee scanned Chayeon from head to toe with curious eyes.
Her face got closer and closer.
Soon, her breath could be felt.
Closer.
Getting closer.
Too close.
Chayeon’s voice trembled with embarrassment.
“Please… step back…”
“Huh?”
‘……?’
Seohee, who had been stroking her hair, froze solid.
The Black Fox also felt puzzled.
‘……What? Why?’
‘It’s perfect, even in self-awareness. This is… good.’
The Black Fox muttered words she couldn’t understand.
“Wow! That sound you just made, Chayeon? Oh my, how adorable.”
“W-wait, wait a second! Why are you doing this?!”
As Seohee reached out with both arms to hug her, Chayeon quickly backed away.
Even as she desperately tried to push her off, Seohee kept clinging. In the end, Chayeon bared her teeth and growled, and Seohee pouted with regret.
“Sorry. Chayeon is just too cute, and I lost my rationality.”
Fortunately, she seemed to have regained her senses.
Chayeon let out a sigh of relief as Seohee returned to the bed.
“To continue the story, I’ve never seen a case where someone became a girl like you. Personally, it’s quite interesting. So, how about entering Jindal?”
Seohee pointed at the paper Chayeon was holding.
It was the ‘Personal Information Form’ she had mentioned.
“Of course, it’s not just my personal interest. As I said earlier, since Chayeon has become a supernatural ability user, the demons will start targeting you. For your own safety, I recommend staying at the academy until you can cultivate your power. What do you think?”
Chayeon looked down at the paper in her hand.
Below the basic information—name, age, gender—there were sections for family relations, job, affiliation, address, supernatural ability type, date of manifestation, and recommendation for enrollment.
Since she already knew about the unknown threat of demons, there was no other choice.
She trusted Seohee, who knew and was close, more than the Black Fox who had hidden important information.
“I’ll accept.”
“Then fill out the personal information. You can write my name as the recommender. Ah, and put your gender as female.”
She added that even if someone was male, no one would believe him.
“Librarian Sister.”
Before she could even ask if she could borrow a pen, Seohee cut her off.
“From now on, at the academy, you can call me Teacher Seohee. Or maybe Teacher Sister~ would be nice.”
“……Can I borrow a pen, Teacher?”
Chayeon inwardly vowed that she would never use the ‘Sister’ title no matter how cute that face was.