I'm Free These Days
Kim Ho's Bullet Time lectures were still going strong, but at the same time, there was next week to prepare for.
Next week was the dungeon conquest week.
Which meant, as always, we'd be heading down into the underground floors.
So I sent Shin Byung-cheol a message.
His reply didn't come back until ages later.
That was odd, considering he usually answered within seconds, sharp as a blade.
His tone was off, too — none of his usual "Where might you be, valued customer~" and somehow stiff instead.
I figured something must have gotten him down today, and let it slide without a second thought. Who was to say he hadn't pulled another wooden teacup out of a random box?
When I got to the store, Shin Byung-cheol hadn't arrived yet.
Instead, a familiar face caught my eye — Dang Gyu-young, waving with a grin.
I gave a small bow.
"Hello, sunbae-nim."
"Noona."
"Hello, noona."
"Heheh."
After trading light greetings, I stood in front of the store and gazed off into the distance. Dang Gyu-young sidled up beside me.
"Who are you waiting for?"
"I was supposed to meet Shin Byung-cheol here."
"Byung-cheol's not coming."
"?"
When I shot her a questioning look, she smiled sweetly and repeated herself.
"Byung-cheol's not coming."
"……Did you have him eliminated?"
"Eliminated? Why would I do that to him? I came in his place. You were going to put him on an errand, weren't you?"
"Hardly something that warrants the club president showing up in person."
"I know, obviously."
Apparently she had a rough idea what kind of request I'd be making. True, aside from underground floor guiding, I'd never asked her for anything else.
Dang Gyu-young grabbed my hand and tugged me along.
"Let's sit and talk. What do you want to drink?"
"I'll take anything, really."
I'm not the type to refuse what's offered.
So I ordered my usual coffee, and she ordered a latte drowning in syrup and cream. I'd noticed it before, but she seemed to have a hidden weakness for things sweet and soft.
Drinks in hand, we settled onto the second-floor terrace. We traded a few bits of small talk before Dang Gyu-young got to the point.
"You're going down next week, right?"
"That's the plan."
The Treasure Map pieces I currently held were A and C — still incomplete. I needed to find the last piece and finish the map before I could put my conflict with the Swordsmanship Club to bed.
"Where are you headed?"
"Dungeon 410."
Dang Gyu-young flipped through her notebook for a moment, checking the dungeon's info.
"Sealing the Demon, D-Rank. How long does this one take to clear? Last time it took you a whole night, wasn't it?"
"This time it'll be quick."
Story-wise, it connected to the Guard Bureau and Guard Branch dungeons we'd already cleared, but the big difference was that the rules this time weren't [Escort].
Meaning we could just go in, clear it fast, and walk right back out.
Dang Gyu-young nodded readily and took a sip of her latte.
"Then we'll just stick Byung-cheol on as your guide for that one. What else? Is that it?"
"I'll probably do one more."
"That one too, with the pretty boy?"
"I'd imagine so."
Underground floor runs were always with Go Hyeon-woo, so this time would be no different.
But Dang Gyu-young seemed to have thought of something, and tilted her head slightly.
"Kim Ho, I've been wondering about something."
"Yes, noona?"
"Why do you only take the pretty boy, and never the pretty gray-haired girl? You two are joined at the hip every other day of the week."
Why did I keep running the underground floors with Go Hyeon-woo while leaving Seo Ye-in behind?
Honestly, from my standpoint, bringing Seo Ye-in along would have been nothing but a plus. Among the underground floor's countless dungeons, there were plenty beyond the story dungeons we'd already cleared — ones heavily influenced by luck.
Take my lucky charm into those, and the clear difficulty would drop while the rewards ballooned.
But the reason I couldn't—
"Her family put their foot down."
"Ah."
When Seo Ye-in had asked, Ahn Jungmi had objected with utter finality, layering warning upon warning.
"Can't I come too?"
"Absolutely not. You will only conquer dungeons for which you meet the qualifications."
"……"
"Young Miss, I mean it. If anything were to happen to you down in the underground floors, a great many people — myself very much included — would be heartbroken."
"So as far as I'm concerned, it's off the table until I can get permission."
"Heheh, is that so."
Dang Gyu-young rested her chin on her hand, looking thoughtful for a moment. Then some idea seemed to strike her — the corner of her mouth curled up, and she threw me a sly glance.
"Kim Ho, won't the pretty boy get worn out, running dungeons back to back like that?"
"That is a concern."
If he took on Sealing the Demon in next week's conquest period, that would already make it two dungeon runs in a single week. Add one more, and it'd be three in a row — Go Hyeon-woo could say he didn't mind all he wanted, but the fatigue would pile up all the same.
The moment I agreed, Dang Gyu-young asked, ever so casually:
"Then how about, instead of the swordsman, a thief with skillful hands?"
"You want to come down with me?"
"Mm-hm. I've got a lot of free time these days."
It was true that the past month had been utterly hectic for Dang Gyu-young. Third-year academics went without saying — there'd been Thief Club activities, preparations for the Black Market, and mentoring on top of all that. Ten bodies wouldn't have been enough.
But now the Black Market and the mentoring had both wrapped up successfully, and her club workload had shrunk considerably.
Hence her wanting to spend her spare time heading down to the underground floors with me.
For a while, she and I just stared at each other.
"……"
"……"
When the silence stretched on, Dang Gyu-young narrowed her eyes, reached over, and yanked my cheek.
"Hey. Quit staring and answer me."
"Shorry, noona— I'd be honored, really, but I doubt the labor costs would even cover it."
The rewards from the dungeons I was targeting probably wouldn't even register in the eyes of a third-year club president. And I had no intention of artificially inflating the dungeon tier just to pay her properly.
But Dang Gyu-young waved it off like it was nothing.
"Who cares. I just want to go because I want to go."
"Then I'd be glad to have you."
"Where are you headed?"
"Haven't decided that part yet."
"Now that's a first."
Dang Gyu-young looked genuinely surprised. Me — the guy who had a plan drawn up for everything — hadn't picked a dungeon even after sending out the request.
"I've picked what I want. I just can't find where it is."
"What are you looking for?"
"A Dungeon Crow."
Dungeon Crows — also known as Dimensional Crows — were monsters with full sentience, classified as NPCs.
There were all kinds: Crow Adepts, Crow Merchants, Crow Sages. The one I was after was the Crow Tailor.
About time I started paying attention to my gear again, anyway.
The catch was that Dungeon Crows weren't something you could meet just by entering a specific dungeon. They wandered freely from dungeon to dungeon with no fixed home, and only ever appeared in one place at a time.
For example, if a Crow Adept showed up in the Black Snake Gang, it couldn't be found in any of the other 999 dungeons. And if you missed your window, it simply moved on from the Black Snake Gang to the next dungeon.
Dang Gyu-young asked, "And how do you plan to find it? I've only seen one a handful of times myself."
"Analysis."
I might not know where the crows were right now, but once I set my mind to tracking them down, finding them was more than possible.
Back when I was playing Dragon Slayer Academy, every player in the community pooled their big data and ran the numbers, and they discovered that the dungeons where crows appeared followed a definite pattern.
The Crow Sage, for instance, roamed multiples of 6 among magic-themed dungeons, in ascending order — 36, then 72, then 84, and so on.
And every one of those patterns was stored away in my head.
Which meant—
"So all you need is to figure out where it showed up last."
"Exactly."
I nodded.
Pinpointing the previous appearance site wouldn't be difficult either. Somewhere in the replay data of recently cleared dungeons, the crow was bound to have been caught on record.
It would cost a fair number of points, but wasn't that exactly why I'd been hoarding them?
"Then let me know the moment you find it. I'll get ready right away."
"Yes, sunbae-nim."
"Noona."
"Yes, noona."
Dang Gyu-young beamed happily — then another question seemed to occur to her.
"By the way, Kim Ho, how do you even know all this stuff?"
"I graduated over 200 times."
"Invincible logic, that."
Dang Gyu-young pouted her lips. Apparently she'd decided that whenever I couldn't be bothered to explain, I just whipped out the 200-graduations shield.
It's true, though.
"Rock, paper—"
"—scissors."
Flash!
Seo Ye-in's gray eyes took on a razor-sharp gleam.
She blocked my swinging toy hammer by a hair's breadth. A dull thud rang out from the dented pot.
The rock-paper-scissors that followed — Seo Ye-in won.
The instant I raised the dented pot again,
Flash!
Seo Ye-in activated Bullet Time a second time. Her hammer swept past the pot by a hair, grazing the side of my head on its way by.
She stared at me, dead serious.
"……?"
"Fine. I'll count that as one win for you."
It hadn't been a clean hit — just a graze — but her Bullet Time timing had been excellent, and I gave her full credit for it.
After days of running the Toy Hammer Game, the results were plain: Seo Ye-in's Bullet Time proficiency had improved enormously. My toy hammer's hit rate, once a flawless hundred percent, had dropped to roughly half, and her attacks were landing on me regularly now.
Which brought her cumulative win total to eight.
Then, a few rounds of rock-paper-scissors later,
"……?"
Seo Ye-in turned her gaze to the side, staring at empty air. A notification had apparently popped up.
I checked, just to be sure. "Did it go up? Your rank."
"Mm."
"Good work. Use the Rank Up right away."
The moment Seo Ye-in pulled out the Rank Up (E) and used it, brilliant light flooded the Special Training Room.
Fwaaash!
Bullet Time — D-Rank achieved.
Thanks to my own steady use of Bestow in the gaps between sessions, I had managed to raise my rank as well. I pulled up the notification that had appeared a few days prior.
The rank of 'Bestow' has increased. (F → E)
Using 'Rank Up (E)'.
The grade of 'Bestow' has increased. (E → D)
Barely half a week had passed, and both Seo Ye-in and I had already hit our targets.
Which meant the next step was—
"Now let's go take the PvP assessment."
Time to put the grown-up Bullet Time to the test in a real fight.
But Seo Ye-in slowly shook her head and pointed at the toy hammer and pot sitting on the desk.
"……Still eight wins."
She needed ten wins for a Wish Ticket — meaning she wanted to grind out the last two before we went anywhere.
With Bullet Time now at D-Rank, this kind of repetitive training had lost most of its value. Her proficiency was already exactly where I'd intended to take it.
But I couldn't exactly declare no Wish Ticket for you! either. Two or three wins might have been forgivable, but if all eight wins' worth of her hard work evaporated into nothing, the sloth's motivation would crater straight through the floor.
Keeping trust intact mattered too.
After some deliberation, I offered a compromise.
"Then since this week's PvP is a Three-way Battle — every first-place finish counts as one win. Deal?"
"……!"
Click.
Seo Ye-in loaded her mana pistol.
Already, the fire of determination was burning in her eyes.
"Going to win."