Yuri's Office (2)
Who are you?
Seong Chaerin froze mid-sentence, the words slipping out in awkward Russian before she could catch herself.
Who the hell are you? The thought hit her like a slap. This was the Flame Guild headquarters. The guild leader’s office. No one would just barge in without calling ahead.
Turns out she was right.
“It’s me.”
The door opened, and there stood the familiar face—Soso, the raid team leader.
“No! She can’t see this!”
Yuri scrambled, shoving the romance guidebook beneath the pile of files. Anything else would have been fine, but this? With Soso involved, it was a disaster.
Yuri had known Soso for years. They’d spent the last two years grinding the guild up to S-rank side by side. She knew exactly what Soso felt for Lee Minsu—and how complicated those feelings still were.
“Hmph. What’s the matter?”
Soso slipped one hand into the pocket of her air-jacket, glanced at the open window, and tilted her head.
“Planning to turn the office into a freezer? Or did you try some fancy Slavic skin-care routine? Wait—why is your face so red?”
She had been staring at the guidebook moments ago, utterly humiliated by how wrong her instincts had been. Of course her face was burning.
“Ah… it’s a bit cold, isn’t it? I’ll close the window. If you need the heater, I can—”
“No need. It’s fine.”
And then Yuri felt it.
Right there, swirling around Soso, the mana was accelerating at breakneck speed. The Heavenly Demon Divine Art. The highest-grade cultivation method in the hunter world. The one Soso wielded without breaking a sweat, the way only the young master of the Heavenly Demon Cult could.
Soso’s entire body was radiating power. Yuri could feel it pressing against her own skin. Even with Soso’s collapsed mana threshold, that cold wouldn’t touch her.
“Soso didn’t have a limit-line problem, either,” Yuri murmured. “She would have passed the S-rank license long ago.”
“I asked something stupid, didn’t I?” Soso shrugged. “Anyway, what’s up?”
“Up? I’m the one responsible for mentoring this batch of interns. So I have to give you their mission report.”
She had already received it from Seo Duho. Yuri had been dying to hear the details.
“What did you think of the results?” Soso asked casually.
Yuri’s eyes lit up. The guild’s performance scores had been starving for good news. The interns had actually pulled their weight.
Most of all… it had been Minsu’s first mission back.
“I already got the formal report from the intel team,” Soso continued. “But I wanted to hear the field commander’s honest take.”
Seong Chaerin’s words were exactly right. No matter how impressive the records, the person who had actually fought the dungeon was the one whose opinion mattered most.
“And Soso’s battlefield intuition is top-tier.”
“My opinion?” Soso hesitated for half a second. “Maria is a fine operator, but Minsu’s superior in every way.”
“I agree. Maria admitted it herself.”
Yuri had always felt an unconscious pull toward Minsu. Even without the Vermilion Bird’s Egg, she still believed he could pull off whatever she threw at him—exactly as he had in their earlier real-world interviews.
“I already heard the details from the intel team,” Soso went on. “Tanks and healers only. Perfect score. No hesitation in the tactical orders. Anyone on the ground would have respected that.”
“Exactly.”
Soso’s words landed like a quiet confirmation.
Operators were a controversial role. Most hunters still saw them as glorified clerks. But Soso, the main dealer with an instinct that bordered on genius, had recognized Minsu’s value instantly.
“If even Soso thinks so, then my decision to bring him in was correct.”
“You’ve always been good at reading him, haven’t you?” Yuri smiled faintly.
After the details about the minor scuffle at the office, Soso leaned forward, eyes gleaming with curiosity.
“Want me to tell you more about that office incident?”
Yuri leaned back, genuinely interested.
“Go ahead.”
Soso recounted everything: the intern who had pushed Minsu too far, the way Minsu had remained ice-calm, and the quiet way the tension had been diffused.
“He handled it perfectly,” Soso finished. “No one got hurt, no guild reputation was damaged. It was actually… good.”
Yuri nodded slowly.
“Still, if anything had happened to Minsu…”
“He’s an operator for Flame,” Soso cut in. “He’s off-limits. No one in Red Lake is stupid enough to touch him.”
Yuri raised an eyebrow.
“You knew that?”
“Of course.”
Soso’s tone was calm, but her eyes held something deeper—something almost protective.
The memory of the Eins tragedy surfaced unbidden. Back when Soso had lost her first duel to Minsu, a crowd of her followers had tried to “lynch” him. Yuri had arrived just in time to see Soso’s supporters lying unconscious on the floor instead.
Minsu, still E-rank, had taken them all down without breaking a sweat.
“And the ones who started it all got expelled,” Yuri remembered.
Soso had quietly gathered proof beforehand. The moment the group attacked, the game was over.
“That was the first time I really understood him,” Soso said softly. “His temper is terrifying… but when it counts, he’s colder than any ice mage I’ve ever met.”
Yuri felt a strange warmth bloom in her chest.
“You’ve been working with him for two years now,” she said. “You’ve seen the real him.”
Soso’s gaze drifted toward the window, as if she could see through the glass straight to the man who was probably waiting for her back at the guild.
“That’s why I’m here,” she said. “I want to join the raids again.”
“Raids?”
“Yes. I’ve been stuck in the office long enough.”
Yuri’s expression darkened. Her own limit-line was hovering right at fifty. High-rank dungeons were still out of reach.
“I’ll be on detached duty for a while,” she offered. “I’ll handle the interns’ security patrol myself.”
“Detached duty?” Soso’s face tightened.
“With the interns,” Yuri clarified quickly. “It’s purely professional. I need to step back from the field for a bit.”
“Ah… I see.”
Soso’s shoulders relaxed, but the relief in her eyes was obvious.
“You’ve been overworking too,” she said gently. “Take a real weekend off sometime.”
“I don’t have time for that yet,” Yuri admitted. “But… maybe after this mission.”
“Then how about this weekend? One drink. My treat.”
Soso’s lips curved into a small smile.
“I’d like that.”
They spoke in unison.
“Bottle of vodka for me.”
“And I’ll bring some Jungyul-cheong.”
***
Weekend.
For ordinary office workers, it was a blessed break. For Lee Minsu, it was the exact opposite.
After the regression, weekends had lost all meaning. He had spent them hunting for gear, chasing elixirs, or recovering from the trauma of Eins.
Now the weight of five seals pressed down on his chest like chains. Each one broken would shave another year off his life.
He was about to open the reward box from the latest mission when the doorbell rang.
“Who could that be?”
The door swung open and in walked a nun in full habit, arms full of shopping bags.
“Eek! Sunbae! Why are you home already?”
Seong Chaerin.
Her eyes were wide with shock.