The Proposal (5)

After the meeting with the brigadier general ended, Hanseong called Phantom, the Collector, and the Vampire Tree back to base. He meant to set them on standby before he entered the Mage's Tower.

Phantom, though...

That one he stored separately in his Inventory. There was something he wanted to test once he was inside the tower.

He summoned Jihye to the base as well. He would be away for some time, and he intended to share his blood with her before he left. She accepted the invitation readily, and before long the work began.

A blade nicked the tip of his finger.

He was used to it by now, and the pain barely registered. Jihye was used to it too. She bit down on the finger at once.

A tongue cold as a snake's slid across the wound. That much was fine. The trouble came after.

"Ugh, the blood's already stopped again."

Barely ten seconds had passed, and the cut had already closed. The elixir he had taken had raised both his recovery and his healing, and that was the cause.

Jihye looked up at him with a sulky face, so he opened a fresh cut on another finger.

Only after he had wounded all ten did he manage to slake her thirst.

"Haa. I feel like I can live again."

She smiled, thoroughly satisfied.

Hanseong turned the question on her.

"Say."

"...?"

"Hasn't the amount gone up since before?"

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"I mean, at first a few drops seemed to be enough. Lately it feels like you're drinking quite a bit more..."

Even granting how fast the wounds closed, it shouldn't have taken cuts on all ten fingers.

He asked again, puzzled, but Jihye only shook her head. She herself didn't seem to feel any difference.

Then she spoke up.

"More importantly, Mage."

"Yeah? What?"

"Will it take about a week again this time?"

"Mm. It shouldn't be that long."

The first time he had visited the tower, there had been too much he didn't know, and it had eaten a great deal of time. Clearing three trials all at once had stretched the stay even further.

This visit was different.

Two goals.

Break through the trial. And once he reached the 5th Tier, stop by the Plaza and buy lesser runes and skill books.

The latter wouldn't take nearly as long as one might think. What would decide when he returned was how quickly he cleared the trial.

Jihye let out a breath of relief.

"Whew. That's good."

"What is?"

"If you'd said it would take as long as last time, I was going to drink a little more blood in advance."

There it was. She really was taking more than she had at the start. Watching her savor the taste, Hanseong narrowed his eyes.

At any rate, that finished what he had to do here.

Next he would look over the spoils from the Steel Machine Golem, then enter the Mage's Tower.

Or so he was thinking, when—

"...Ah."

A memory he had forgotten came back to him.

The operation he had briefly discussed after his talk with Brigadier General Lee Jongpil. He turned back to Jihye.

"When did you say the Rescue Operation starts?"

"Thursday. Three days from now."

The Rescue Operation she had just named was the Suwon Provisional Government's first major objective: a large-scale military operation.

Its purpose was to sweep the zombies and monsters out of Yongin, Osan, and Gunpo, the cities around Suwon, and to rescue the survivors stranded there.

There was one more goal, and it mattered just as much.

Securing food.

Roughly fourteen thousand survivors currently lived at the Suwon Air Wing, and the food they consumed in a single day was staggering.

The air wing held a considerable stock of its own, of course, but if they grew lax about securing more, it would be gone in no time.

So while the operation expanded the safe zone, seizing every store of food in the region was one of its chief aims.

"The one mercy is that there are no champion-grade monsters in the operational zone. The Special Mission Battalion alone should be more than enough."

Jihye smiled, full of confidence.

Hanseong, looking a little worried, asked in return.

"You can ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠manage even without Seo Haeun?"

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"I ran into her a little while ago. It looked like she was planning to enter her tower soon."

He relayed the conversation he had had with Haeun. Jihye looked briefly startled, then nodded.

"I see. Level 30 already..."

"So? Will you be all right?"

"Yes. Even without Sergeant Seo, I'm here. You might not realize it, Mage, but I'm not who I used to be."

She smiled and drew her sword.

It was loot from the elite Baekmyeongwi, the sword Hanseong had given her.

He remembered its special effect well enough: a wraith bound to the blade that taught a unique sword art. Even as the old memory surfaced, Jihye swung.

A high-speed thrust ripped through the empty air, and the movement that followed was anything but ordinary.

She was plainly stronger than when they had stayed together in Jamsil. Her level sat at 28 as well, not far behind Haeun.

"So you don't need to worry."

"All right. I get it."

Hanseong smiled too, telling her that with skill like that he could leave the matter in her hands. Once the talk was over, he turned to the work he had meant to do.

The champion that had held Uijeongbu.

He was going to look over the spoils from killing the Steel Machine Golem.

What the Inventory released was two skill books and an iron sphere the size of a watermelon.

Of the three, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the skill book Steel Golem Crafting was restricted to alchemists. Hanseong handed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it to Jihye without hesitation.

"This one's yours."

"Ah—thank you, Mage."

She bowed her head and took the book.

Next was the second skill book. The moment he reached out and touched it, its details appeared.

It didn't even consume mana, and it stayed active at all times.

On top of that, simply learning the skill meant he would take only half the damage of a physical attack.

No reason not to learn it.

Hanseong acquired the skill at once.

Then he set his hand on the iron sphere, last of the three. From the name alone, he had no idea what the thing was for.

A moment later, its identity was revealed.

Magic-engineering devices...

The moment he read that line, Lee Minjae came to mind—the enchanter from Uijeongbu. No surprise there. Minjae's job was Magic Engineer.

He would know what could be made with this as a material.

He said he'd be coming to Suwon soon.

Hanseong would ask him then.

Finished with the thought, he stored the golem's power source back in his Inventory. Just as he was wrapping up everything he needed to do before entering the tower—

"Oh, right, Mage."

Jihye spoke up out of nowhere, and the subject was unexpected.

"Have you seen the Information Strategy Board? There's quite a debate going on about you."

"Huh? About me? Why?"

"A VIP auction was held recently, and there was one big spender there. A lot of posts are guessing that it was you."

That caught his interest.

If there had been a big spender at the VIP auction, no one but himself came to mind. Curious, he went straight into the Information Strategy Board.

Not long after, Jihye's words proved true.

She wasn't kidding.

The board had turned into a heated forum.

Reading through the posts, he realized that most of the people writing them had taken part in the VIP auction themselves.

Two opinions were colliding. One side claimed that the person who had bought Eden's Arrangement was the Fire-Lightning Mage. The other denied it.

The side saying it was me...

Their grounds were simple: no one but the Fire-Lightning Mage could possibly have gathered that many coins.

The opposition argued that it didn't have to be him at all. If the leader of some group simply borrowed every member's coins, that would explain everything.

He was watching with a curious eye when he tilted his head.

But is that really worth fighting over?

So what if the VIP auction's big spender was him, and so what if it wasn't? He was wondering why anyone was so determined to expose the buyer's identity when a post suddenly caught his eye.

Crow...?

A face came to him at once.

The presence who had sat beside him at the VIP auction.

A woman of strange appearance, wearing a crow mask. The Crow Shaman, Kurogane Kotori. Interested, he tapped the post at once.

Short and plain.

She wanted to buy it for two hundred thousand coins, which meant she had gathered still more in the meantime. Of course, there was no chance her wish would come true.

He'd already used it.

The high rune he had won at the auction had become the Rune of Range, etched into his wrist. There was nothing left to sell her.

He burst out laughing—and then the comments came into view.

Huh. Now that they mentioned it, that was true.

Korea and Japan might be close, but that had only been true before the Cataclysm.

After the Cataclysm, with aircraft and ships all but unusable, getting to Japan was no simple thing.

Not that he had any reason to cross over in the first place.

He was turning that over when he saw the reply Kotori had written.

Somehow it sounded meaningful.

They'd meet soon? Did she mean the next VIP auction? That seemed the likeliest. She probably wasn't saying she would cross the sea to Korea.

But can you trade coins as a consciousness-body?

An auction was one thing. He had never tested whether survivors could trade with one another that way, so he didn't know.

He looked through a few more posts, then left the Information Strategy Board at once. Jihye was wearing a curious face, so he told her what had happened at the VIP Auction Hall.

"Wow. So that's what happened."

After hearing the whole story, she murmured it with a startled face, as if she had never imagined any such thing.

Anyway, with this...

Every task was finished.

He had checked the spoils and shared his blood with Jihye. He had also gone over what would be happening while he was away.

Only one thing remained.

Entering the Mage's Tower.

"Oh—and if Yuna gets in touch while I'm gone, handle it for me, will you?"

"Yes. Be careful, Mage."

With Jihye seeing him off, he touched the enter button.

The familiar notice was the last thing he saw. His vision went black.

Then came the sensation of his consciousness being pulled somewhere, and the darkness before his eyes slowly brightened.

A dreamlike scene opened around him.

A deep blue night sky, thickly set with stars. He was looking up at it when—

"It has been some time, Mage."

A quiet voice.

He turned. There stood a figure in a pumpkin mask, a brightly shining lantern in hand.

The tower's guide. J.

"Then I shall lead you to the tower."

J walked on ahead.

Something about the attitude was off.

Unlike the last time they had met, J was keeping a certain distance. Thinking it might be his imagination, Hanseong closed the gap—and J moved quickly farther ahead.

...Not his imagination.

Why the sudden change?

Had he done something wrong? No. That couldn't be. He had only just entered the tower.

For a while, only silence hung between them.

Then J, still walking at the front, spoke.

"You have accumulated a great deal of ■■■ since we last met."

"What? What do you—"

"Ah. Forgive me. In your dimension, it appears to be called karma."

After correcting the word, J went on.

"Karma is the fruit of cause and effect, changed by acts of good and evil. In time it manifests as a karmic result called alignment."

"Alignment..."

"Put simply, unlike the last time I saw you, you have stained your hands with a great deal of blood."

Hanseong did not deny it.

It was the truth.

Not long ago, in Daejeon, he had slaughtered the militia. As a result, he had received a notice that his alignment had changed.

"The change is slight for now, but do not grow accustomed to it. Karma piled up in excess will crush you down into a bottomless abyss."

"..."

"Should that happen, it will become the cause of defeat in the decisive battle that will one day come. So please, do not forget my advice."

As J finished speaking, a tower of familiar appearance revealed itself.

The Mage's Tower. J then bowed slightly and vanished. Left alone, Hanseong turned the words over again and again.

And then—

With a heavy groan, the tower's door swung open.

A figure of familiar appearance emerged at once. A being draped in a deep blue robe. A strange form with no face.

"Welcome, Mage."

The tower's administrator, Awin Umbra.

The one they called A had appeared.