Teaching Chief Park a Lesson
"You little shit. You turned my toy into a rag."
Elise looked down at Chief Park as if he were an insect, crushing the limp weight of me against her chest. Every line of her body screamed the same message: This is mine. I licked it. Touch it and you die.
"Discipline? Education?"
She let out a hollow laugh, as if the words themselves were an insult.
"You're the one who needs to learn your place. A B-rank, of all things, daring to—"
BOOOOM!
One stamp of her foot flipped the lobby floor. Marble melted like magma and heaved in sluggish waves—a spectacle so grotesque it was almost impressive.
"Eek! P-please, spare me!"
Chief Park scrambled backward in the most undignified retreat imaginable.
"You broke my air conditioner. So you're going to pay for it."
Elise clenched her fist on empty air. A colossal hand of flame seized Chief Park by the throat and wrung him upward like a wet rag.
"You'll pay with your body. Down to the last pinch of bone dust."
"Gyaaaaaah!"
Chief Park dangled in midair, thrashing. Fire caught on his uniform and roared up the fabric; he flailed and shrieked like a man possessed. In front of an S-rank, though, he was nothing more than a moth batting at a furnace—no more, no less.
"Inmate 001! Stand down! We will open fire!"
The rapid-response team leveled their muzzles, but Elise didn't so much as blink.
"Go ahead and shoot. I'll burn the lot of you."
She meant it. The killing intent rolling off her was an advertisement in pure bloodlust: I'm the crazy bitch of this block.
"Aaaagh! My arm! My leg!"
Chief Park's screams filled the lobby. The stench of burning flesh thickened the air. Whatever swagger he'd carried as a B-rank hunter, whatever dignity he'd claimed as a senior—it had already crumbled to ash and blown away.
"S-spare me! Inmate 001! I was wrong!"
"Wrong?"
Elise tilted her head. Tightening her hold on me, she closed the distance to Chief Park.
"Do you even know what you did wrong?"
"Th-that is… I may have gone a little overboard with the new-hire training…"
"Wrong answer."
Crunch.
Her bare foot came down on the back of his still-intact hand and ground it into the floor.
"Aaaagh!"
"You put your hands on my property without my permission. And then you broke it."
Her crimson eyes burned with a vicious light.
"I'm the only one allowed to break my toys. And some clueless nobody thinks he can play disciplinarian?"
A massive fireball bloomed in her palm again. This one wasn't a threat. This was the real thing—killing intent, pure and final.
No.
I clawed at my fading consciousness. If Chief Park died here, Elise would pick up another murder charge, and I'd take the full blame for failing to control her.
"…Stop."
A hoarse whisper scraped out of my throat. With everything I had left, I lifted a hand and caught the hem of Elise's clothes.
"Elise, please stop."
"Why? Trash like that is better for the environment once it's ash."
"You'll get dirty ash on your clothes. You'll have to throw them out."
My completely unhinged reasoning made her freeze. She looked down at me—and then snorted out a laugh.
"Ha. You really are something else…"
She was just about to dismiss the fireball when—
Crack—!
The air in the lobby froze solid in an instant. White frost raced across the floor that had been boiling under Elise's heat. Every breath came out as a plume of white.
"How noisy."
The elevator doors parted, and the sharp click of heels rang across the marble.
Cold silver hair. Intelligent glasses. Absolute, crushing chill.
The ruler of the Abyss—Director Seo Jisu.
"D-Director!"
"Please save me! Inmate 001 is rioting!"
Chief Park crawled toward her like a man who'd found his savior, reaching for her leg. Seo Jisu didn't even glance at him.
Shing!
Ice spikes erupted at her feet and barred his approach.
"Keep your filthy hands to yourself."
Her voice was colder than Elise's. She pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose and surveyed the wreckage of the lobby. Then her gaze found me—soaked, torn, exhausted, and cradled in Elise's arms.
"Warden Kang Jinsoo."
"…Yes, Director."
"Report. What happened here?"
I barely had the strength to answer, but I wrung every last drop out of myself.
"Chief Park Minseok… locked me in the C-Block pump room and released the inmates."
"That's a lie! I only sent him to inspect the facilities—he got himself trapped by accident!"
Chief Park screamed his denial. Seo Jisu simply drew a tablet from her coat.
"An accident?"
She turned the screen toward him.
CCTV footage. Crystal-clear 4K of Chief Park locking the pump-room door from the outside, snickering as he worked the control panel.
"Th-this is…"
"Attempted murder. Abuse of authority. Incitement to destroy facility property. And…"
Seo Jisu added the last charge in a voice like ice.
"The crime of damaging my valuable asset."
Her blue eyes looked down on Chief Park.
"Park Minseok. You're fired. And under Article 7 of Abyss Law, you are to be imprisoned immediately."
"What?! I-imprisoned?! I'm a B-rank hunter! If I report this to the Association—!"
"The Association? You think those old men can meddle in my jurisdiction?"
Seo Jisu extended a hand.
BOOOOM!
A massive block of ice slammed over Chief Park's body. He didn't even get a scream out before he was frozen solid from the neck down.
"Drag him away. Throw him in solitary on Basement Level 8."
The rapid-response team hauled the frozen Chief Park off like a piece of luggage. His eyes were rolled back in pure terror and despair.
Once the situation was settled, Seo Jisu's gaze shifted to Elise.
"Inmate 001. Return to your cell. I'll treat this as self-defense."
"Hmph. Acting like you're doing me a favor."
Elise snorted. Even so, she seemed unwilling to go head-to-head with Seo Jisu and turned away without further protest—still carrying me like a sack of cargo, of course.
"Wait."
Seo Jisu called after her.
"Hand over Warden Kang Jinsoo. He needs to go to the infirmary."
"No."
Elise refused flat out. She clutched me tighter and glared at Seo Jisu.
"He's mine. I'll fix him."
"He is staff. Treatment belongs in the infirmary—"
"Shut up. I'm taking care of my own air conditioner. What business is it of yours?"
Fwoosh.
The temperature around Elise climbed again. The temperature around Seo Jisu dropped. Heat and cold collided, and a vast fog bloomed through the lobby. Caught between two whales, this particular shrimp was getting crushed.
"…Haa."
Seo Jisu sighed first and stepped back. She glanced at me with a peculiar look in her eyes—something like, Survive this on your own.
"Do as you like. But if you kill him, you'll be paying damages."
"I won't kill him. He's my air conditioner."
Drunk on victory, Elise carried me away. Over her shoulder, I watched Seo Jisu recede into the distance. Her lips moved, shaping words almost too small to catch.
Bonus. Deposited.
Oh.
In that instant, every ache in my body seemed to vanish. Financial therapy really was the best medicine. Long live capitalism.
"Nngh…"
I opened my eyes. Something heavy pressed on my chest. Thinking it might be sleep paralysis, I rolled my gaze sideways—and found a cascade of red hair filling my entire field of vision.
"…"
Elise. She was sprawled across my chest like it was a pillow, dead to the world. Whether she was using my heartbeat as a lullaby or pinning me down so I couldn't run, I couldn't say. What I could say for certain was that her body heat had gone well past warm and straight into scorching.
She's a human hot pack.
I tried to sit up carefully. Even that tiny movement got a reaction.
"Don't move."
A sleep-rough voice. Without opening her eyes, she tightened her grip on my collar.
"It's hot. Stay still."
"Uh, Inmate? I need the bathroom…"
"Hold it."
"Bodily functions aren't exactly something you can just hold."
She cracked her eyes open in irritation. Messy hair. Unfocused pupils. Not the sharp-edged witch I usually dealt with—more like a little sister throwing a tantrum about getting out of bed.
"Go. One minute."
"Give me three."
"One minute thirty."
After some haggling, I walked away with a minute and a half. I carefully pried her arms loose and slid off the bed.
My body felt light. Yesterday every inch of me had been screaming; now I felt like I could fly. The bathroom mirror showed a decent complexion, too. The dark circles under my eyes even looked a little softer. Expensive potions, probably.
I finished my business and came back out to find Elise sitting up against the headboard. In her hand was a half-peeled apple—or more precisely, a roasted apple, the skin blistered off by the heat at her fingertips.
"You're back? Open up."
She held out a piece of apple. I accepted it without protest.
Knock, knock.
"Come in."
At Elise's permission the door opened, and a man in a white coat stepped inside. The chief medical officer. The moment he saw Elise he flinched, then edged toward me with the air of a man walking a minefield.
"Ah—Warden Kang Jinsoo. I've come on rounds to check your condition, but…"
"Don't come any closer."
Elise put herself between us. Her eyes turned vicious.
"He's mine. I already fixed him."
"Even so, a professional examination is necessary. There could be internal injuries, or issues with his mana circuits—"
"I said it's not necessary."
Fwoosh.
Sparks leapt from her fingertips. The chief medical officer's face went paper-white.
"Eek! U-understood! Visually, you look perfectly fine! I'll just be going, then!"
He fled without so much as touching a stethoscope to me. I managed a bitter smile.
"Inmate, you can't just chase the doctor off like that."
"What do those quacks know? Searing you with my mana works way better."
She snatched my hand again and rubbed it against her cheek. Pure possessiveness—she wouldn't tolerate even another person's touch. It was oppressive, sure. But somewhere underneath, it was also strangely reassuring.
Then another knock sounded at the door.
"Who is it. Another quack?"
Elise scowled at the door in irritation. But the person who opened it wasn't a doctor.
"It's me."
Director Seo Jisu.