Chapter 49
Chapter 49
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 49
Chapter Title: A Two-Step Distance
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“I'd prefer an underwater base, if possible. It would be even better if the ceiling opened up by pushing the ocean away. A spaceship should emerge from it, but considering reality, I'll have to settle for a jet.”
What part of that was supposed to be realistic?
Min Ha-na couldn't hold back and asked.
“Is there a reason it has to be an underwater base?”
“A river would be fine if not the ocean. A lake would be good too.”
“So, is there a reason it must be underwater….”
“Because that's how it's supposed to be.”
The two women listening looked completely baffled. But Han Young-im quickly composed herself.
“This sounds far more expensive than I anticipated.”
“I was actually curious about getting an estimate. I was vaguely thinking of just earning a trillion won.”
“That might not be enough to part the sea and rise up.”
“Then should I go with a lake after all?”
Though they were discussing an astronomical sum of money, the conversation flowed as naturally as friends chatting.
This was because Han Young-im had accepted Wang-sik's absurd goal.
‘It doesn't matter if he's joking or not.’
What she needed was a friendly relationship with Wang-sik.
“Are there any essential features for this secret base?”
She even encouraged Wang-sik's dream further. At that, Wang-sik's tone began to change.
Until now, no one had taken this story seriously, but Han Young-im was showing interest, even asking questions.
“An operations room with monitors watching over every country in the world. And individual rooms for each member of the Defense Force. The lounge should be department-store quality, with a game console you can enjoy on a 200-inch screen. A self-sufficient power generator is a must, and it would be nice to have an organic food production facility too.”
Wang-sik went on and on.
Min Ha-na just stared blankly, while Han Young-im smiled with what looked like genuine interest.
When he had finished, Min Ha-na thought to herself.
“Crazy bastard. He wants to move a space station underwater. That man is definitely not normal.”
Suddenly, all eyes were on Min Ha-na.
“Oh, did I say that out loud? I meant to think it….”
“You don't respect other people's tastes. I'm disappointed.”
“I'm sorry.”
“Besides, I don't think I need to hear that from a pervert who gets excited by fireballs.”
“A pervert?”
Their eyes met.
The two, who had gotten along without major issues until now, had their first clash over personal tastes.
Fortunately, before the rift between them could deepen, Han Young-im stepped in.
“Isn't everyone in the world a little crazy and a little perverted?”
Her provocative words drew both their gazes to her.
“I'm a pervert who gets excited by numbers. The money isn't even in front of me, but seeing high numbers on a document gives me a thrill and a sense of satisfaction. They're just numbers. And if I don't like the figures, I become a crazy bitch.”
Han Young-im shrugged.
“No matter how unique your tastes are, I doubt they're as bad as mine, are they?”
Her smile was so full of confidence that Wang-sik and Min Ha-na had no choice but to concede.
Once the atmosphere had settled, Han Young-im spoke to Wang-sik.
“That secret base you just mentioned. Shall I draw up a design and an estimate?”
“Is that possible?”
“I'll give it a try. I promise it'll be better than what you could find on your own. I'm starting to get interested myself.”
“I knew you were someone I could talk to. I should have brought this up sooner.”
“It feels like we've gotten a little closer now. It seems my Yura's wish might come true.”
“What's Yura's wish?”
“When I told her to give up on getting married, she said she wanted to be your friend.”
“It's every child's dream. To be friends with a superhero.”
“Then I'll be the one to sketch out that superhero's dream.”
After that, Han Young-im truly just made small talk as they finished their meal.
She avoided any burdensome topics until it was time to leave and parted with a light farewell. The sedan she rode in quickly left the port, followed by a truck carrying the mana stones and items.
As the car started moving, the smile vanished from Han Young-im's face.
Lost in thought for a while, she asked the man in the front seat.
“Secretary Kim. Why would a secret base need to be underwater?”
“I've been wondering the same thing. To be honest, I also don't understand the need for an organic food production facility. The 200-inch screen and hundreds of monitors also seem inefficient….”
It was the first time the chief secretary, known as a top elite in his mid-thirties, had answered that he didn't know.
His pride wounded, he mumbled.
“I will research it.”
As he bowed his head, Han Young-im's eyes fell on the driver, a man in his late fifties.
He had been a driver since his youth, first for her father, the previous chairman, and now he worked for her. He was a taciturn man who never spoke unless spoken to, but this time, he had let out an unconscious smile.
“Mister.”
Having known him since she was a child, Han Young-im still called him by the familiar term.
“My apologies, Chairwoman.”
“No, it's fine. Please, say whatever is on your mind. You seem to have a thought.”
“A secret base is underwater because that's how it's supposed to be.”
Han Young-im was shocked by his words.
The driver hadn't even been present during the conversation with Wang-sik, yet he gave the exact same answer.
“Tell me more.”
“It's not cool if a secret base just appears out of nowhere. It has to emerge, parting the waves, to defeat the enemies. How cool is that? Whoever said that must have thought it was cool.”
“So it's for the cool factor. No special reason.”
“It's not entirely without reason. It's a secret base, after all, so it needs to be in an unexpected place. Hidden from the enemy's eyes, and being underwater, it's unlikely to be discovered. But if that's all there is to it, that fellow isn't a true connoisseur. A true master would develop their imagination in a more feasible way, but he seems to have stopped there.”
“A more feasible way? Do you mean a base can actually part the sea and appear?”
The driver kept his eyes on the road as he spoke.
“A submarine would do the trick. If you equip it with fighter jets capable of vertical takeoff, you don't need a long runway. A nuclear submarine would be large enough to house various facilities.”
The driver's smile deepened, as if he were lost in a pleasant fantasy.
“Mister. I'm going to need you to tutor me for a while.”
“How could I be of help?”
“He's someone I absolutely must win over. He's moved by personal relationships rather than profit, so I need a bond that goes beyond mere trust. The first personal vulnerability he's shown is this secret base.”
The topic was childish, but its significance was anything but small.
“I will do anything I can.”
“Then what should I do first?”
“You need to watch the source material. I recommend ‘Earth Hero Video Man.’ The base that fellow is talking about appears in it.”
There are always hidden masters everywhere.
* * *
On the boat back to the deserted island, Min Ha-na was silent.
Wang-sik didn't interrupt her thoughts. Their silence was broken only after Wang-sik had arrived on the island.
“A crazy bastard and a pervert. Well, it's not a bad combination when you think about it.”
“I am not a crazy bastard, for the record.”
“And I'm not a pervert.”
“Let's say that's true. What's not so bad about it?”
“Being friends. We've been living together for over five months. Even if we're not lovers, shouldn't we at least be friends?”
“Living together… so that's what this is. We've been living together.”
“We collapsed from exhaustion every day, but we lived under the same roof, so it's living together. Don't get the wrong idea. I know we're not each other's type for romance. Still, at this point, it would be strange if we weren't friends.”
“How about soldiers who served at the same guard post and slept in the same barracks?”
“They'd probably be closer than friends, wouldn't they?”
“That's true.”
Wang-sik was suddenly lost in thought. Min Ha-na frowned and spoke.
“Seriously? Just a moment ago, you looked ready to be best friends when she offered to estimate the cost of your base, but now you're hesitating after we've fought for our lives together for five months?”
Her conversation with Han Young-im had prompted Min Ha-na to bring this up.
“As I've said, I'm not the type to befriend just anyone.”
“And I'm asking if I'm still ‘just anyone’ to you.”
“Hmm. You're certainly not just anyone.”
Min Ha-na couldn't lie, and Wang-sik didn't lie.
For different reasons, they always spoke honestly.
“Alright. Then shall we try talking like friends?”
“Alright. Hey, Wang-sik, want a beer?”
“That was easy.”
“What's so hard about it? I don't have friends because I never had the chance, not because there's something wrong with my personality. And technically, you should be calling me your elder, but I'll let it slide and just be friends because of everything you've done for me. You're getting the better end of the deal.”
“That's strangely persuasive.”
“See? I'm right. So you can talk to me casually too.”
Wang-sik nodded and replied.
“I refuse.”
“Ah! Why? I-I mean, why?”
“This isn't how friends talk to each other. I see why you don't have any.”
“What on earth did I do wrong?”
“The fact that you don't know is why you don't have friends.”
Wang-sik took a beer from the fridge and tossed it to Min Ha-na.
“Drink up and get some sleep. We have two months left.”
“Just tell me what I did wrong!”
Wang-sik ignored her and went into his bedroom.
Fuming by herself, Min Ha-na eventually soothed her temper with the cold beer.
“That bastard. What's so hard about being friends? Fine, I won't be friends with you either!”
Once again, there was no reply to her shout.
* * *
Having triumphed in the Stage 4 area, they moved on to Stage 5.
It was a region where S-rank monsters occasionally appeared.
The Stage 5 area they entered with heightened tension was a land where dense deciduous trees blocked the sun, casting deep shadows.
The atmosphere was like early dawn or just before nightfall, which naturally slowed their pace.
When the first battle occurred, they realized just how much they had grown.
Wang-sik's growth into a B-rank hunter was a given, but Min Ha-na's firepower, enhanced by Elia, was powerful enough to obliterate S-rank monsters.
“This is actually easier.”
Min Ha-na said after an hour of fighting, pulling a mana stone from a monster's corpse.
“Don't let your guard down. Death can come in an instant.”
Wang-sik took a potion from his inventory.
“Huh? Are you hurt?”
Only then did Min Ha-na notice the red line drawn below Wang-sik's elbow.
It was a wound from the Iron Creeper she had just extracted the mana stone from.
The Iron Creeper, a three-meter-tall humanoid monster, possessed a body of steel yet had speed rivaling that of a Shadow Puma.
It had no stealth skill, but the power of the steel vines that extended from its fists was immense.
When the Iron Creeper's abnormally long fists reached their limit, shrapnel would burst out like a grenade, and simultaneously, five bladed vines would extend, slicing through everything they touched.
Wang-sik had blocked the shrapnel, but one vine had wrapped around his wrist, piercing his armor and leaving a wound.
Only then did Min Ha-na feel the reality of facing an S-rank monster.
“I'm sorry.”
“It's nothing to be sorry about. It's not a serious wound.”
The wound, reacting to the potion, healed quickly, and Wang-sik prepared for the next battle as if nothing had happened.
‘I was the only one who didn't know.’
No matter the area, Min Ha-na's pattern was similar.
The difference between Stage 3 and Stage 4 was merely a matter of adjusting the power and speed of her magic.
‘It was the same here.’
The one who changed was Wang-sik.
He always made sure the dealer could attack from the safest possible position.
‘Why didn't I realize?’
She had taken it for granted.
Her job was to defeat monsters, after all.
She was grateful for Wang-sik's leadership, but she hadn't considered that he was putting himself in increasing danger.
Realizing this, Min Ha-na changed her pattern from the next battle onward.
She focused beforehand to attack faster, and when there were many monsters, she moved toward his shield so Wang-sik could protect her more easily. In the past, she would have trusted him and focused on gathering her power to wipe them out in one go.
There were times when their teamwork faltered as she occasionally drew aggro first, but Wang-sik made no comment.
“Let's call it a day here.”
Even with S-rank monsters, the number they had dealt with was only about half of their usual count.
The change in her pattern had slowed down their monster clearing speed.
One day turned into two, and after ten days, they began to grow accustomed to the various new patterns.
Their hunting speed picked up again, and their clearing rate recovered. Even so, it was only at about 70 percent of their previous pace, but they didn't push for more.
‘I have to protect the tanker.’
It wasn't just the tanker's job to protect the team.
The team members also had a duty to the tanker, and Min Ha-na was fulfilling it splendidly.
As their hunt in the Stage 5 area entered its first month, Wang-sik spoke as they returned to the lab.
“Perhaps we could be friends after all.”
“I admit it. I was the problem.”
Min Ha-na gave a bitter smile. She had lived without knowing such an obvious fact.
“To think I'm only learning about consideration at the age of 23.”
Behind her confidence hid a self-centeredness. The behavior that her fierce life had stripped away was consideration.
“I've only ever been on the receiving end.”
Wang-sik had shown her great consideration. Though she had thanked him, she had never clearly defined his actions as such.
“Ah, so embarrassing.”
Unable to bear the shame, Min Ha-na quickened her pace and walked ahead of Wang-sik.
Wang-sik didn't hurry, simply following while maintaining a defensible distance. Then, Min Ha-na, realizing this was still a battlefield, slowed her steps.
And so, the distance between them narrowed to two steps.
It was a distance created by their mutual consideration.