The Gate
Day four of being a Keeper.
Day four since Kayla crossed over into this world.
I was still doing the same thing I'd been doing for the past three days.
Which is to say, I was still writing the Gather rune on paper.
Write the rune, write it again, draw mana in with black magic, then catch the mana as it tried to scatter.
I didn't feel like I was making any progress.
Just like on the first day, there wasn't a scrap of mana in my heart.
Still, what else was I supposed to do?
I only had one master, and all she kept telling me was to keep at it and have faith.
And she, for her part, was putting that same faith into learning Korean.
Only three days had passed, and already the way she wrote Hangul—the form, the handwriting—looked completely natural.
Unlike a certain someone, she was actually improving at an alarming rate.
At this pace, was she going to master Korean in a week?
"Kayla, have you ever been inside a Gate?"
Kayla lifted her head a fraction and looked at me.
Judging by the tiny shift of her pupils, the message was something like: Why are you interrupting my studying instead of doing the work you were told to do?
I shrugged. She glanced at the clock and answered.
Today was the day I was supposed to go into a Gate, and I was scheduled to leave the house in about an hour.
"If you mean the Eternal Gate."
"I think I've heard of that. What's the Eternal Gate?"
"A Gate that's always open. Open to everyone. Even non-Keepers can go in."
My eyes went wide on their own.
If something like that existed, wouldn't everyone and their mother be flooding into it?
I would've run straight there myself.
"There's something like that?"
"In the history of my world, they started appearing about a hundred years after the Gates first showed up. You said it's only been thirty years here? Then it's not something you need to worry about yet."
A hundred years. So that was a story for my grandkids, then.
I was jealous.
That meant they wouldn't even need to become Keepers, right?
...Though as someone who'd already become one, I didn't exactly have room to be jealous.
"What's it like inside an Eternal Gate? Different from other Gates?"
"I heard it's not that different, aside from the size."
"You 'heard'? You've never been inside any other Gate?"
"No. I'm not a Keeper. I thought I might become one this time, though."
There was a faint note of regret in her voice.
It hit me all over again.
Kayla wasn't a Keeper.
She was just an otherworlder I'd summoned into this world.
I felt like I'd won something.
I'd lost at studying, but still.
"I'm a Keeper."
"So?"
Huh? That wasn't the reaction I was going for...
For all her earlier regret, I couldn't feel a single flicker of envy in her gaze.
Was she just that good at separating work from personal feelings? Or was she simply the type who didn't care about other people's business?
Either way, there was no fun in teasing her. Tch.
"I'm heading into a Gate now. Any advice?"
"You never know what can happen inside a Gate. Always be careful."
"Textbook answer."
Textbook answers were always right, and in moments like this they had to be.
I needed to stay careful instead of getting carried away just because this was the Gate I'd been dreaming about my whole life.
"Any advice for me? For the next three days."
Kayla would have to stay here alone while I was gone for three days.
She was smart and adapted fast, so I wasn't worried about her causing some disaster.
Still...
"Go easy on the ramen. If you eat until you burst, you're going to suffer for it."
For the past two days, Kayla had eaten almost nothing but ramen.
She liked other food too, but nothing came close to how hard she'd fallen for ramen.
She'd been eating it until she was ready to throw up.
"A food that perfect only gets better the more you eat it. There's no suffering involved."
I was so floored I almost laughed out loud.
She was reacting more strongly to this than she had to not becoming a Keeper.
Where had a ramen zealot like this been hiding?
What would she have done if she'd never crossed over into this world?
"You'll get fat. Your figure will go to hell."
"Figure? Why would I care about that?"
"Huh? Well, obviously..."
It looks good, it makes you popular, it's attractive... I ran through a list of reasons and then stopped.
Would any of that even mean anything to Kayla?
She seemed like the type who'd been alone researching magic without family or a master. Popularity probably meant nothing to her.
"I'm not a noble or anything... Ah. If my figure goes to hell, does that make it harder for you to prepare?"
"Huh? What are you talking about?"
Out of nowhere, Kayla grabbed the hem of her sweater and pulled it up.
Her pale stomach came into view.
"Well?"
Well what?
She was wearing my clothes right now.
Top and bottom were both huge on her, so until a second ago there hadn't been anything remotely suggestive about it.
But the moment I saw her belly, just a little puffed out from breakfast, something in me threatened to flip on.
"No... right now..."
"Here. Touch it."
Before I knew it she was standing in front of me, taking my hand and pressing it to her stomach.
A smooth, completely lean belly was nice, but a belly with just a little give to it was nice too.
With Kayla's face, everything got covered anyway.
As long as her figure didn't actually go to complete ruin.
In the end, the switch flipped.
She must have noticed, because her eyes dropped between my legs.
"Let's do it."
"Huh? No, this is just a physiological reaction... I have to go into a Gate right now..."
Kayla ignored me and pulled my pants down.
My other self seemed to know its fate and stood there looking very pleased about it.
"So let's do it. Now that I think about it, this is the most important thing."
"What is?"
She turned her back to me and stripped off her pants and panties in one motion.
The oversized sweater left only a glimpse of plump undercurve visible.
There was no way she even knew what an undercurve was, so how could she look that seductive?
"I'm going to be alone for three days, right? I might end up using mana in some unexpected accident."
So she needed to charge up just in case?
Flawless logic.
"Th-that part's true, but hold on..."
I still hadn't awakened any mana of my own, so the only way to pass mana to her was through sex.
But was it really okay to do it like this?
Mixing bodies under the excuse of transferring mana...
"Come on, we don't have time. You said you have to leave."
But the sight of Kayla with her pale legs stretched out, pushing her ass back toward me, blew every useless thought clean out of my head.
I grabbed those springy cheeks and pressed myself against her cleft.
It was already hot and flushed with heat... or rather, it wasn't.
"Hold on, you're not ready ye—"
"It's fine."
Slick.
Before I could do anything, she dropped her hips and swallowed me whole.
"Hahng."
She was softer inside than I'd expected.
Not as bad as I'd been worried about.
Still a little tight, so I hesitated—but she started moving first.
Thud, thud, thud.
It was erotic.
Watching her from above as she gripped the desk, bent at the waist, and pushed her ass against me and pulled away again, more blood rushed south on its own.
"Haaang..."
Thud, thud, thud, thud.
Kayla let out heated little moans as she kept slamming her hips back into me.
I matched her rhythm with my own hips and reached around to stroke the little bud at the end of her cleft.
"Hauk!"
Her moans changed immediately.
Inside her, the heat came flooding in.
And the room, too...
Is it really okay to burn this much energy before going into a Gate?
The thought crossed my mind for a second, then vanished.
The feel of those springy cheeks smacking against my pelvis was just too good.
"Haeung!"
A small auditorium inside the Gate Keeper Association.
"Hahap..."
I yawned without meaning to and hastily covered my mouth.
Thankfully, nobody around me seemed to notice.
Sex really did take a lot out of you.
Or maybe it was because she'd drained my mana.
I was exhausted.
"The two people here are B-class Keepers who will be protecting us for the duration of this operation."
The man on the stage pointed to the man and woman standing beside him.
The two of them, dressed in sharp suits and armed with all kinds of weapons, looked impressive.
Exactly the image that came to mind when you thought of Keepers.
Clap, clap, clap.
After a short introduction and a round of applause, the man spoke again.
"We'll be departing immediately. Everyone, please pick up your gear."
The man was the organizer and person in charge of this operation—Kim Sangki, the owner of the Gate.
The eight of us below the stage each shouldered two of the large backpacks he'd prepared, one in front and one in back.
A single Gate Keeper could bring along objects totaling about the volume of their own body.
The two backpacks had been sized to fit that limit exactly.
Whether they'd been packed efficiently or not, they were heavy as hell.
It was only natural, but Kim Sangki and the two escort Keepers were carrying far less than the mining team.
The eternal sorrow of the underlings.
"Please take my hands."
Kim Sangki came down from the stage and raised both hands.
Two members of the mining team each took one, and the rest of the team linked up by grabbing the shoulders of the person in front of them, connecting everyone into a single chain.
The two escorts stood behind Kim Sangki and took hold of his shoulders.
Bodies had to be linked like this for people to follow a Gate's owner inside.
How many people a Keeper could bring at once varied from person to person.
Ten was about average.
Some people could bring hundreds.
There were even Keepers who could bring objects of that same total volume instead of people.
How many people you could bring, and how much cargo—along with what got discovered inside the Gate—were major factors in determining a Keeper's standing.
Kim Sangki could bring ten people into a Mithril mine, which was why he could stand there looking so confident even as a C-class Keeper.
A completely different world from someone like me, who couldn't bring anyone in at all.
Then again, I could bring someone out, so that was a different world too.
"We're going."
Kim Sangki looked over at the other people in the auditorium—the Association staff.
They nodded, and a blue light flickered above Kim Sangki's head.
A moment later, that blue light wrapped around the entire party.
Fwaaah.
I closed my eyes against the blinding light. When I opened them again, the auditorium was gone, replaced by a wide-open blue sky.
No matter which way I looked, I couldn't see an end to it.
So this was the inside of a Gate.
It was a whole other world.
"It'll be a little heavy, but it's only a ten-minute walk. Let's move."
Kim Sangki took the lead, and the mining team followed.
The backpacks front and back were heavy, but the Gate itself was so fascinating I barely noticed.
We'd landed on a mountainside.
Grass and trees filled the surroundings, and I could see insects and small animals.
I'd expected something barren, but the inside of the Gate was overflowing with life.
It was no different from Earth at all.
About ten minutes later, we reached the foot of the mountain.
"Here we are. Split up and head in as briefed beforehand."
Several caves had been cut into the base of the mountain.
Tunnels leading to the Mithril veins, and caves being used as lodgings.
I went into the cave on the left and set down my backpacks.
Inside, there was nothing but a few small pieces of wooden furniture.
Those pieces had been made on-site from materials found inside the Gate.
Anything else brought in would vanish all at once the moment the Gate's owner left.
That was why a garbage-dumping business inside Gates had been popular for a while.
It died out because the labor costs didn't even cover it, though.
I pulled my tools out of the backpack and headed back outside.
People were gathering in front of the larger cave—the mine tunnel—each holding their own tools.
"If everyone's here, let's head straight in. Time is money."
Kim Sangki strode into the dark tunnel.
Time to work.
I took a deep breath and followed him in.