071 – A Father Like the Sky #2
“I’m Daedalus from the Design and Facilities Team. You’re Supervisor Jo Iseo, right?”
Imagine waking up from an uncomfortable sleep one day to find a tiger right in front of your nose. What would you do? Me? I’d go back to sleep. It has to be a dream. Probably a nightmare.
“Get up! There’s no time to dawdle!”
But this tiger even started shaking me vigorously. For a nightmare, it was weirdly diligent.
“Mr. Daedalus?”
In the end, I had no choice but to haul myself up. What time was it? 5 a.m. An hour earlier than my usual wake-up.
“What brings you here?”
I asked, my heart pounding. From what I’d heard, Daedalus had holed up in his workshop two years ago to work on the CEO’s special order item and hadn’t been seen outside since. So why was this guy standing in front of me? It was like a lightbulb snapping on in my groggy head. The one person I most needed to avoid had come looking for me on his own!
“How the hell did you get in here? This is private property! Get out!”
“That’s not important right now! This painting in the photo—is it in your possession?”
Daedalus Manager held out his communicator, showing a picture. That’s when I realized Hedone had posted a photo of us arm-in-arm on SNS. My first reaction was pure embarrassment.
If Melinoë sees this, she won’t let it slide. She hates Hedone!
But the real problem? Melinoë had liked the photo. Any lingering sleepiness vanished in an instant. Explaining my relationship with Hedone to her would take half a day of nonstop chatter.
“That painting! Where is it right now? I need it! It’s essential to finishing my life’s greatest masterpiece!”
“You’re joking, right?”
“Do I look like the type to joke? Hand it over! Now! You punk!”
Daedalus Manager pulled a hammer from his coat and lunged at me.
“Supervisor Jo, I looked into you before coming here. Impressive track record—true or not. But even you can’t dodge the hammer strikes of the man once called Crete’s Monkey Spanner!”
Sudden violence. A life-or-death crisis. Right then, the bracelet coiled innocently around my wrist sprang into action.
━Shhhht…!
Whirrrick! Whick!
The bracelet flew at Daedalus. The cranky inventor toppled over like he’d been bitten by a viper.
“Argh! What the—? What is this thing? Supervisor Jo! What are you doing to me? Not there! Kee-yaaaaah!”
…This was a disaster.
He didn’t even seem to realize my bracelet was attacking him. It reminded me of the time I fought the resurrected demon god Typhon. Back then, too, my bracelet had taken out the cockroaches, but Hedone and Crowzer hadn’t noticed and thought I’d done it.
Something I didn’t do turning into something I did—I’d been through this before.
Isn’t this just like Melinoi showing up?
Melinoi’s achievements had been credited to me multiple times already. From the looks of it, this bracelet had the same “Melinoi” property.
What a terrifying bracelet! Protecting me is great and all, but…!
Anyway, Daedalus went down thanks to the bracelet.
“To think you’d actually take me down! If I hadn’t been locked away developing new products, I wouldn’t have lost so pathetically!”
Daedalus, revived from his faint, was acting surprisingly meek. I’d half-expected him to charge again, but he didn’t. Still, this was giving me a bigger headache.
“I’m begging you! I need that painting to survive!”
Thud.
A man way older than me was prostrating himself before me. This was even more awkward than when he’d attacked. When someone begs like that, throwing their whole body on the line, any decent human feels pity and starts to waver.
Even those fearsome executives grant wishes if humans plead desperately enough.
Hold firm, Devil Jo! Cast aside your humanity!
But I wasn’t some ordinary pushover. I barely managed to keep my cold resolve and asked,
“If I give you that painting, can you finish the item Chairman Hades requested within a week?”
No way he could in a week, right? That casual thought was answered with a dagger in my spine.
“I won’t even need a week! I could finish it tomorrow!”
This hell—! I’m not one to curse much, but I couldn’t hold back this time. I’d grabbed what looked like the most useless sketch from Daedalus’s files. And it turned out to be exactly what he’d been desperately searching for?
“Manager, I’m the devil of the Audit Team. If you lie to me, you’d better fear the consequences.”
“Supervisor Jo, are you accusing me of lying? Even I wouldn’t have the guts to lie to an Audit Team supervisor.”
“How can you finish in one day something you couldn’t complete in two years? What’s so special about a crayon sketch? It doesn’t make sense.”
“Well, you see—”
“No. I don’t want to hear it.”
Daedalus was a genius inventor. He’d created the labyrinth to trap Crete’s bull, wings to fly through the sky, bathtubs, bulls, wheels, and even the colossal statue Talos, ancestor of androids. If a man like that said he could finish something by tomorrow, he would.
Great men don’t lie. That’s why I didn’t even ask why the painting mattered.
But one thing was crystal clear right now.
This cranky old man must never learn the painting is with Hedone!
I’d given the painting to Hedone. Yesterday, she’d taken an interest in it and tried to follow me home. Let a raging-bull Hedone into my house? Better to stick my head in an alligator’s mouth. So I’d handed it over. I figured it was useless anyway.
Who knew it was key to completing the CEO’s commissioned item?
If this guy got the painting and finished tomorrow? I’d have to claim the reward Melinoë promised!
“You! Need anything? Weapons, tools, magic items—even a girlfriend! I can make whatever you want! Just give me the painting!”
Whoa, anything? Tempted, I tested the waters.
“How about a teleporter that lets me freely come and go from the surface?”
“Anything but that!”
Damn it! Got my hopes up for nothing.
Anyway, I chased Daedalus Manager out and hurriedly got ready for work. But instead of heading to Audit Team HQ, I went to Happy World’s Penalty Execution Division.
As I entered the office, Crowzer greeted me.
“Supervisor Jo! You’ve come to see me, haven’t you? Look at this! Supervisor Jo is my one and only friend and soulmate! Believe me now?”
Crowzer was bragging about our connection to the new hires, who eyed me with sparkling admiration.
“Crowzer, I thought you were just an annoying senior, but you’ve got connections like this?!”
“Crowzer’s actually pretty amazing if you get to know him, right?”
“Senior C! I’ll respect you from now on!”
This was maddening. But that wasn’t the point.
“Crowzer, haven’t seen Hedone around?”
“Miss Hedone took the day off today.”
“Day off?”
“Something about an art exhibit. RUS, I think. I’ve seen his paintings a few times. Terribly bad, but that’s what made them fun. Inspired some wicked new tunes for once!”
What? Crowzer was a dead-end employee, but in life, he’d been the artist Orpheus. If a guy like that found inspiration in those crude paintings, it made sense why inventor Daedalus wanted it so badly.
I need it in my hands!
Just get rid of the painting, and it’s done. The moment I had it, I’d destroy it—
With that in mind, I tracked down artist RUS’s exhibition. Elysium’s flashiest new gallery, modeled after a temple. As I approached, a curator-looking woman was visibly flustered.
“From Audit Team?”
Audit Team folks get eyed suspiciously everywhere. But I clarified I was there as a guest.
“Are you holding RUS’s exhibition here?”
“No, today it’s artist Hegemony’s show on the theme of symbiosis.”
Not here? After half a day of legwork, I reached a rundown atelier in a remote corner of Happy World. A ramshackle log cabin. With tables in the garden, it felt like a vintage cafe. Sure enough, women sat sipping coffee and chatting, with crayon paintings on canvas displayed nearby—painfully familiar ones.
“Hedone. There you are.”
I spotted her sitting among the paintings, snapping photos nonstop. If she hadn’t posted on SNS, finding this place would’ve taken forever.
Of course, she was shocked to see me.
“Supervisor Jo! What brings you here?”
“Hedone, you still have that painting I gave you yesterday?”
“The sunrise one? Gave it to the owner here. He swapped it for two others! Thanks to you, I’m totally pumped! Woo yeah!”
I scanned the cabin interior for the owner. A handsome man in a sharp suit—less cafe owner or artist, more slick businessman.
But that right hand…
Before I could greet him, he recognized me.
“You’re Supervisor Jo, right? Living in the underworld, I get to meet celebrities like you. I’m Icarus, owner of Cafe RUS. Just indulging in art as an excuse for debauchery.”
“No way—the Icarus who made wings of wax and feathers and flew to the sky? The first human in history to—”
“The Icarus whose wax melted in the sun and plummeted into the sea? Yep. All I have to boast about is regret over my pathetic failure. Truly shameful.”
The name clicked the missing puzzle piece into place.
“So artist RUS is Daedalus Manager’s son.”
Daedalus wanted his son’s painting back. But Icarus scowled and shook his head.
“I cut ties with that old man long ago.”