Not Yet
"Haaah~ Almost done."
To anyone watching from the side, it would have looked like nothing more than fingers stirring empty air. But if stirring empty air was the work of moving a world, who would ever believe it? Know who stood there, though, and the belief would come easily enough.
The being before them was none other than an Administrator.
"...Ugh. I want this over with."
The Administrator quickened the motion of her fingers, careful to the last degree, as if she were handling a thing that might shatter the instant it was mishandled.
"—Ah."
Even an Administrator was bound to slip when she moved a world with an impatient heart. An Administrator was only an Administrator. She was not a god.
"D-damn it. Ah, no. That's not it. Calm down. I can do this."
She understood that losing her temper here would get her nowhere. For now, she had to quiet her heart.
"Hoo."
Her fingers began to stir the air again. Working a world that already existed, and doing it in real time, was exceedingly difficult—so difficult that making one from nothing, or stopping a world to tear it open and rebuild it, would have been easier. By an Administrator's authority, creating one out of zero was simple. Creating two out of one was anything but.
"......Ah."
The Administrator stopped her moving hand and stared down at her palm. There was no making sense of it. Even so, it was plain enough that this had something to do with what had happened recently.
Something that should never have occurred—that never even could have occurred—had been made real by an Administrator's authority. Ordinarily, an Administrator who did such a thing would be met with sanctions. That was an absolute law no Administrator could break. And yet the Administrator standing here had received no sanction at all, because she had been given a promise by a god. Promised by the very god who had written the absolute laws, she stood outside every sanction. All of it, according to the will of the god.
A hollow world. A world with literally nothing in it.
Correction. It wasn't hollow. There was, at the very least, a sofa conjured out of power.
"Hoo."
There had been a small mistake, but the work on the world was nearly finished. Once this task was done, she would probably never have cause to seek this place out again.
"......Ah."
Her head understood that it was almost over. Her body refused to follow. The feel of it, the warmth lingering in her palm, kept rising to the surface. How in the world was she meant to forget something like that?
"I really shouldn't have met him..."
Even once would have been enough. She had wanted to see him. But she couldn't, not now, so she endured. The first time, she got through it that way. The more she endured, the harder endurance became. She held on and held on, and at the very end—just once. Telling herself that once would be enough, she met him after all.
She had thought that would settle everything. It didn't. What happened then. The things they said then.
"...Nn."
It had been too good. Too happy. But she shouldn't have kept him so long. And at the end, looking into his face, telling him they could meet again—!
She should never have met him at all. The state she was in now was worse than before. She wanted to see him this instant. She wanted to cling to his side all day and never peel herself away.
"......"
An uninvited guest had arrived.
"Is the work finished?"
"Not yet."
"Then what are you doing here?"
"Don't go leaking killing intent like that. You're scaring me."
They pressed a hand to their chest and forced their heart to settle. Bad things had happened because of the Administrator standing in front of her—that bastard—but it was also because of that bastard that she had been able to meet her partner. She couldn't tell whether she ought to thank them or take them to task.
"Right. So, the work? You still haven't finished."
"I've got more experience than you do. I only came to check for a moment."
"While you rank lower than I do?"
"...Let's not talk about that."
Arguing over who stood higher or lower would change nothing. What mattered now was something else entirely.
"So. The work?"
"I'm almost do—! I nearly got hu—!"
"If you don't want to get hurt, then hurry up."
"I g-get it, so stop!"
She had truly wanted to land the blow. But this sort of thing was a useless act, and a waste of time.
"...Ha. You did make it perfect, though."
"—Obviously."
"...Right. Well. You do outrank me."
"If your business is finished, go do your job."
"Before I say I understand—one last thing. You're interfering a little too mu—aaaaaagh!"
"Watch your mouth."
"I'm seriously dying! Dying, I said!!"
It would have been nice if they actually died. An Administrator, however, was a being that did not die. Still, pain could be given, and that was something.
"Haa... haaah... You really meant to kill me, didn't you?"
"Whose sake do you think I'm interfering for?"
"Ignoring me, are you...? Ha. Fine. Even so, you crossed the line way too far, didn't you?"
"Shall I give up on the entire thing?"
"...Sorry. Please don't give up. If you give up, I'll actually die."
"You know it well."
"...Ha. Yeah, yeah. I don't know anymore. Then I'll really get going."
"Go and finish it."
"Yeees~ Don't you worry."
The uninvited guest departed. In truth, she had known she was being watched even before the visit, yet she had neither called out nor driven them off. She had no wish to let things sour with this Administrator, either. But that hardly mattered. What she truly wanted now was only this: to meet, as soon as she could, the partner whose hand would cover hers.
The work she was doing now had to be done, no matter what. Pressing down the feeling welling up in her heart, she raised her hand and set her fingers moving once more.
A hunter license.
The identification that certified a hunter had finally come into my hands. Now I had the right to say, head held high, that I was a hunter too.
An autograph?
Did hunters sign autographs the way celebrities did? Being a hunter alone was enough to make you famous, so maybe autographs really were a thing.
These idiots who called themselves my friends looked at me as nothing but a way to make money. I was starting to suspect they weren't friends at all, but ghosts already dead and buried for cash.
Anyway, I'd posted it because I wanted to brag. The autograph could wait until I was actually famous. Then I'd give them a real one.
Pretty sure that hadn't been a joke.
Drinking in the middle of the day was strange, but I'd been going along with it all this time, so I was in no position to complain. I was about to send back that I was in, when a notification chimed.
"Huh?"
I left the chat where it was, backed out of the messenger, and answered.
"Instructor Lee Muo?"
"Ah, I'm no longer an instructor, though?"
"Ah!"
The hunter license exam had ended the last time we met. I wasn't supposed to call him Instructor anymore. The title had simply grown too familiar.
"I believe it will be fine if you simply call me by name. Hunter Kim Haseong."
—Hunter!
Now that—what a magnificent ring it had.
"Hunter?"
"Ah, yes. So, what is this about?"
"I'm calling about the affiliation you said you were still considering last time. Have you, by any chance, decided where you'll go?"
Last time, I'd been told I had to belong either to the Hunter Association or to a guild. My answer had been that I would think about it more. One way or another, a choice had to be made. From the explanation then, even if I couldn't use my ability, that was a problem for a hunter team—not a problem of where I belonged.
"I still can't use my ability... Would it be all right if I thought about it a little longer?"
"Yes. Understood. Then, one more thing. Hunterzine contacted us. They would like to interview the hunters who obtained their licenses this time. Might you be inclined to accept?"
Hunterzine was famous enough that I'd heard of it long ago. A magazine house that dealt in nothing but hunters. The problem was that they had reached out to me. Aside from the Hunter Association, my parents, and the friends I'd just bragged to about becoming a hunter, nobody else should have known. Wasn't that only natural?
"Has it gotten out that I became a hunter!?"
"Pardon? No. Disclosing information without a hunter's consent is prohibited. They called after seeing the list of newly registered hunters on the Hunter Association website."
"Ah... right."
When they took my photo, I'd definitely been told that word of a new hunter's registration would go up on the site. Personal information was all private, of course. It only announced the fact that someone had been registered.
"So, what will you do?"
A hunter interview. With Hunterzine's name and the way they ran their interviews, my face, and the fact that I was a hunter, would spread in an instant. If I wanted to become famous as a hunter, taking the offer was the right call. If I didn't, refusing was.
"...I'm sorry, but would it be all right if I thought over both the affiliation and the interview for now?"
"You may do as you wish."
"Thank you. I'll call you again later, then."
With that, I was able to hang up.
An affiliation and an interview. The list of things I had to agonize over had grown. I'd wondered at first whether I ought to start with the Hunter Association, but the more I thought about my own temperament, the more a guild seemed like it might suit me better, and I was badly torn between the two. The interview troubled me as well, for the simple reason that it would put my name out there.
Turn it over as I might, both of them came back the same way. Not yet. What mattered to me now was getting my ability to activate. That came first.