Dancing with Goblins
It had been a month since I became a Keeper.
A month since Keira crossed over from the other world.
I had entered mining Gates five times and earned fifty million won, bonuses included.
A monthly salary of fifty million won.
And that was after taxes.
Not tax-free, but Keepers paid relatively little. The trade-off was getting drafted whenever something urgent came up.
Anyway—fifty million won a month.
A month ago, that kind of money had been pure fantasy. The best future I could picture back then was scraping into a Grade 9 civil service post and collecting a measly million-five hundred thousand won paycheck. That salary barely let you date, let alone dream of marriage.
Now I was pulling fifty million a month and living with a beauty named Keira. She wasn’t officially my girlfriend, but we were doing everything that came with the title.
Still, people always find something to complain about at their own level.
“...I’m so sick of mining already!”
“Why?”
Keira looked up from the tablet she was reading while propped against the headboard. Her pronunciation was perfect. She had mastered Korean in just three weeks and was now vacuuming up every scrap of knowledge she could find.
“Sick of it means sick of it. You try bending and straightening your back all day in a mine shaft and see how fun it is.”
“Didn’t you say it was fine because Soyeon helped you?”
I always teamed up with Soyeon. Her telekinesis was the number-one reason the boring mining work stayed even remotely bearable. A real lifeline.
“Soyeon doesn’t help me the entire day. And even when she does, doing the same thing over and over is just tedious now.”
Mining was the easiest, most stable way for a Keeper to make money, so I had thrown myself into it. The average was three runs a month; I had done five. Inside the Gate I treated every tunnel like it was mine and gave it everything I had.
Maybe that dedication had backfired. Just imagining a pickaxe and hammer now made my head throb. I needed rest—or a change of pace.
“Then do something else.”
Keira delivered the correct answer with cool indifference. Her eyes were already back on the tablet.
“Is that okay?”
“Any reason it wouldn’t be?”
“I still don’t have any mana or magic power. Jumping straight in feels risky.”
I had been studying runes for a full month and still hadn’t finished the “Gather” rune. Keira’s prediction that I could do it in a week hadn’t exactly been wrong; the constant interruptions from diving into Gates every three days had kept breaking my flow.
I had planned to wait until I at least had a magic-power stat before tackling something like a goblin Gate. Having mana versus not having it made a huge difference. Without it, stamina got converted into magic power, and like every conversion there was loss in the middle. An already pathetic spell became even more pathetic, so I was scared to commit to real combat.
Maybe the metal dog from my first Gate still haunted me. I had handled the sudden crisis well enough, but it had also driven home just how weak I was. I wanted to get stronger—strong enough to swat every monster aside without breaking a sweat, if possible.
“Then focus harder. If random thoughts keep sneaking in like they are now, you’ll never finish the rune.”
“Is it really just a matter of focusing?”
I was still scratching out those snaking, twisted characters. Honestly, they were the root of all my boredom. Imagine staring at a single letter for three hours a day minimum, sometimes five. What could be more soul-crushing?
Keira, who had already finished learning Hangul, absorbed brand-new information every second. I stared at one letter. Whether she studied five hours or six, she never got bored—the internet was a bottomless ocean of knowledge. Me? Thirty seconds and I wanted to die of monotony.
Damn it. Was this the difference talent made? I wanted to move on to other runes already!
“Of course it is. But if you’ve built up enough, a change of pace isn’t a bad idea either.”
“Change of pace?”
“Use magic in actual combat. You haven’t cast a single spell in a real fight since that one time, right?”
“That one time” meant the metal dog—now provisionally called a Metallic Hound. After that, every Gate run had been nothing but uneventful mining.
“True. I’ve practiced plenty, though.”
“Then try the real thing.”
“You sure it’s okay?”
“Goblins should be fine. Even without mana the power is enough, and even if you don’t use magic you’ll still manage. You’ve been working out hard this whole month, haven’t you?”
Over the past month I had thrown myself into building my body. Soft belly fat had given way to the faint outline of abs—a dramatic change. Between mining labor and actual workouts I had worried my body would break, but it delivered results. Maybe because I had Awakened, or maybe because I was flexing my new paycheck and eating well.
Goblins were weaker than the average adult man. By that consensus I could win a bare-handed fight against one. Not that I had tried.
“Should I?”
“The decision’s yours. I’m just making a suggestion.”
“Alright. This time, goblins instead of mining.”
I folded the paper I had been practicing runes on. Once the decision was made, clinging to the already-boring runes was inefficient. I wanted to find a Gate and dive in as soon as possible.
But first I needed Soyeon’s okay.
I dialed her number.
“A call? To whom?”
“Soyeon. To ask her to hit a goblin Gate with me.”
“Hmm...”
Hmm?
I thought the dial tone had made me mishear. Outside of “that,” Keira was always concise. I had rarely even heard her breathe or clear her throat.
Rustle.
Sure enough—she was peeling off her T-shirt. A slim waist and her chest came into view. The simple bra cupping them was neither too big nor too small. We had measured at a lingerie shop: 75B. Definitely a cut above the average Korean woman on the street.
Swoosh.
She slipped out of her dolphin shorts next. White panties and white legs appeared. Her hips were fairly wide, so in just underwear she looked like a model—the kind of fitting model you occasionally saw online. Blue hair sealed the look.
“Didn’t you just shower?”
The body no longer stirred me the way it once had. A full month of constant exposure will do that. We had slept together maybe ten times, and even when we didn’t, sharing a studio apartment made familiarity inevitable. We had sat completely naked across from each other eating instant ramen more than once.
“I did.”
“Then why?”
“Because I’m going to.”
“Huh? Right now?”
“Yeah. Right now.”
Keira walked toward me. At the exact same moment, Soyeon picked up.
“Hello?”
“Uh, yeah...”
“Sunbae-nim, what’s up?”
“Well, about the Gate this time...”
I kept talking while waving Keira off with my free hand. She ignored me completely and closed in. I had to stand up and dodge around the studio.
“Have you decided on a Gate? Tell me which one and I’ll apply too.”
“No, it’s not that—this time instead of mining... Ah!”
Keira was relentless, and a studio apartment offered nowhere to run. She finally pinned me against the wall and yanked my pants and underwear down. My feeble resistance was crushed by her mana.
“Sunbae-nim? Are you okay?”
“Y-yeah, I’m fine... Just stepped on something. You know, like a Lego.”
“Ah... Legos hurt.”
The one mercy was that my little brother was completely dead. Even a pervert like me couldn’t get hard under these circumstances.
I shoved at Keira with one hand and pointed at the bed—later, after the call.
“Yeah, they do. Anyway, how about goblins instead of mining this time?”
“Goblins?”
“Yeah. I figure it’s about time we took the next step. If you’re okay with it...”
A sudden, fresh sensation from below cut my words short. My cock slid between something warm and wet—different from entering a woman’s pussy. Softer, wetter.
Keira was on her knees, taking me into her mouth.
“Hhk!”
I tried to jerk my hips back in shock, but she locked her hands on my ass and refused to let go. Then her tongue rolled once and a whole new world opened up.
“Nngh!”
My little brother instantly swelled to full size—bigger than it had ever been, honestly. This was my first blowjob.
“Sunbae-nim? Sunbae-nim? Is something wrong?”
And Soyeon’s voice was still pouring into my ear.
“Ugh, no, I’m fine...”
I could barely string words together. The stimulation from below was too intense. Only the circumcised head was inside her mouth, yet that alone was more than enough. Every time her tongue dragged across my cock I felt ready to blow.
“Your voice doesn’t sound fine...”
“I’m fine. Really... fine. So, goblins? You okay... with that?”
“Hmm... something’s weird...”
“Details later... Just answer?”
“I’m fine with it. I think goblins are about the right level by now...”
I didn’t even finish listening before I hung up. The urge to cum was already past the point of no return. I frantically tried to push Keira’s head away, but again she refused to budge.
She looked straight up at me with those mysterious, provocative blue eyes. My cock was trapped between the red lips beneath them.
The surreal sight plus the overwhelming pleasure racing from the head of my cock finished me. My cock twitched and pulsed inside her mouth, pumping out cum. The orgasm felt longer than usual.
Only after I finished did she pull off. She opened her mouth so I could see—white semen sitting on her tongue.
I lunged for a tissue, but she closed her mouth first.
Gulp.
“It’s fishy.”
Her tone was flat, yet the corner of her mouth curled up just enough to be dangerous for my heart.
“What the hell are you—”
“Stay still a little longer.”
Lick.
“Nngh!”
Keira dragged her tongue over my half-softened cock. It had to be the most intense stimulation possible right after climax. My hips jerked back on instinct, putting distance between us, but her tongue and mouth chased without fail.
Slurp.
This time she was properly sucking. She took me back into her mouth and vacuumed as if determined to drain every last drop of remaining cum. Was this the “cleanup blowjob” I had only ever seen in videos?
The soft stimulation and visual effect made my cock swell again.
Smack.
Keira kissed the tip, then stood. She slowly turned around. At some point her panties had vanished, and rain was already falling between the valley of her ass.
“...Come on. Hurry.”
She spread her cheeks with both hands and glanced back over her shoulder.
“Be honest. You’ve only ever watched porn online, right?”
“Is that really what matters right now?”
That teasing tone and the slight lift of her lips. There was no way I could ignore a provocation like that.
Thrust.
My cock sank into her valley and she arched her back with a moan.
“Ahhng!”
I grabbed her hips and slammed into her as hard as the taunt deserved.
“Ah, ah, ahhk!”
No matter how many times I heard them, those moans always tasted delicious.