Chapter 93
I naturally agreed to Patria’s request.
If he wanted to be self-sufficient, then of course I’d be happy to help him out.
Besides, I was curious how much Saessak’s leaves differed from those of the previous World Tree.
It was still a young World Tree, so making high-grade potions out of it might be a stretch.
Once this project was done, I’d have to clear the quest right away.
He’d said any living animal would do, so I could just gather up whatever I could get my hands on.
“Huh?”
After leaving the Sanctuary, I headed straight back to the Dazol building.
I was there to meet up with Han Jin-hwan again.
What greeted me that day, however, was a crowd from the Hunter Association and the police.
The fact that they were here wasn’t strange in itself.
Han Jin-hwan had contacted them and told them to take the Dazol Guild members away.
It was only natural that the association and the police had set up a cordon and were keeping the sightseers back.
What made me tilt my head was the fact that a few people who looked like officials had mixed in with the association and police personnel.
“Did they come just to see Han Jin-hwan…?”
He wasn’t exactly easy to catch a glimpse of, so maybe that was it.
But that only applied to the police.
The association people could get to see him more easily than most.
He was close with Choi Hee-seok, who belonged to the association.
As could be seen from the way he used other people’s offices like they were his own living room, Han Jin-hwan dropped into the association surprisingly often for an A-class hunter.
“You can’t go any farther.”
“Huh? Oh.”
A young police officer held out a hand to stop me.
He probably mistook me for one of the onlookers.
I was in plain clothes because I’d gone grocery shopping and then stopped by the Sanctuary, so I wasn’t wearing armor.
In my right hand, instead of a weapon, I was holding my smartphone with Saessak and the elves displayed on the screen.
I didn’t exactly look like a hunter, so it made sense he’d get the wrong idea.
I’d become somewhat famous lately because of Kim Mu-yeon, but even then, Do-hee and Tae-cheon drew more attention than I did.
It was only natural he didn’t recognize me.
“I’m-”
“Oh! It’s fine! Let him through.”
A police officer about ten feet away cut in.
The officer blocking me looked flustered and turned to stare at his colleague.
Judging by their ages, they seemed more like senior and junior than peers.
“What? But…”
“I said it’s fine. We got a call in advance.”
“Ah….”
“You’re Baek Do-woon, right?”
The senior officer smiled faintly at me.
When I nodded, he lifted the barricade as if to tell me to go on through.
“Director Jin-hwan is waiting. Please head over to the temporary tent over there.”
“Thank you.”
They even set up a tent? Why?
Once the Dazol Guild members were taken away, everything here would be over.
That was why I’d suggested we move straight on to Chiaksan.
And yet the fact that they’d put up a tent and brought in officials meant something had happened.
“Did Gong Woo-jae run away or something?”
I snorted.
A laugh slipped out before I could help it.
It was a ridiculous thought.
Gong Woo-jae, stripped of all his power and reduced to a helpless nobody by me, running from Han Jin-hwan?
It was more plausible to say a World Tree had sprouted from my smartphone.
Still, I’d just ask him directly.
“…Huh?”
As the officer had said, Han Jin-hwan was in the tent.
But Choi Hee-seok was right beside him.
His body was over six and a half feet tall, so the tent hid his face, but it was unmistakably him.
There weren’t many people in Korea built like a rock outcropping that size.
Han Jin-hwan was talking with the others wearing an uncharacteristically serious expression.
I’d never seen that sort of polite face on him before.
So he could make that expression too, huh?
Just then, Han Jin-hwan turned his head and looked at me.
The weighty look vanished as quickly as it had appeared, and a grin spread across his face.
“Baek Do-woon! Over here, over here!”
Han Jin-hwan spotted me and waved.
Choi Hee-seok, hearing my name, leaned his broad torso sideways to look at me too.
He waved as well, but a tall body didn’t look all that graceful doing it.
He somehow looked like a bear rummaging through a beehive….
“Did things wrap up smoothly?”
“Yes. Thanks to you.”
“I didn’t do anything, so don’t thank me.”
“Why are you here?”
“Ah, well-”
I asked Choi Hee-seok as we stepped into the tent.
He was about to answer when Han Jin-hwan jumped in first.
He leaned in close and started sniffing at me.
“What’s this? You came after eating?”
“Can you smell that?”
“Can I? It’s practically leaking off you. Hanwoo beef?”
“Yes.”
“If you were going to eat, you should’ve asked me to come along.”
“I had people to eat with.”
“Oh, right. You said it was a gift, didn’t you?”
“Yes. More importantly….”
I turned my gaze away from Han Jin-hwan.
The people around us had become one great, unified face, all of them looking at us.
It was like they were saying, “Enough with the pointless chatter. Get to the point.”
Honestly, I never expected to see those faces in a place like this.
To me, they were faces I knew extremely well.
Familiar enough that I could easily tell what they were thinking.
Faces like the ones I’d seen on Do-hee and Han Jae-im when they watched Tae-cheon and me talking through meeting time at Baekwooncheon?
I tapped the smartphone screen and asked, “What happened?”
“Something did. In the United States-”
“Hold on.”
A young woman stopped Choi Hee-seok before he could continue.
The others looked at her in surprise.
The man standing beside her even looked uneasy and called out, “S-Section Chief….”
That was understandable.
To hunters, Choi Hee-seok wasn’t just an ordinary A-class hunter.
He was someone to admire. Someone to look up to.
Now imagine Ji Sang-wook were here.
He would’ve been seething, saying something like, “How dare you interrupt when our senior’s speaking…!”
“Hunter Baek Do-woon does not have the authority to hear this information.”
But the woman didn’t care one bit.
Her attitude was haughty, as though she were the one in charge.
Since she’d been called section chief, she was clearly not from the association but from the government.
If her words were to be believed, only people with that level of authority were gathered beneath this tent.
“Should I step away?”
“Please do.”
“What? No, it’s fine.”
Both the woman and Han Jin-hwan answered at the same time.
The two of them turned and looked at each other.
Han Jin-hwan with one eyebrow raised.
The woman staring back at him without an ounce of expression.
Did those two not get along?
Even Choi Hee-seok didn’t try to mediate; he just shook his head.
I could tell this sort of thing must have happened all the time in the past.
“Look, I honestly don’t care.”
It was true.
I wasn’t especially curious about what happened.
Patria’s quest was more important to me.
Besides, if this had happened in the United States, then it was exactly the sort of thing that had nothing to do with me.
The woman pointed at me and said smugly, “He says he’s fine.”
“I’m not fine, so that’s that.”
“What kind of nonsense is that?”
The woman frowned.
Right. I said I was fine, so what did she mean by saying she wasn’t?
Han Jin-hwan grinned at me.
His smile had both corners of his mouth pulled high.
I knew that grin very well too.
It was the same look he made when Tae-cheon had no intention whatsoever of following Do-hee’s advice.
Which meant it was also the same grin I often gave Tae-cheon for the very same reason and in the very same situation.
Han Jin-hwan had no intention of obeying the woman’s opinion.
“Somebody from the U.S. is arriving tomorrow.”
“Director Jin-hwan!”
“Tomorrow? Someone’s coming?”
“That’s what I’m saying.”
“Stop talking! If you say any more, I won’t let it slide!”
Just who was coming that they were acting like this?
Wasn’t I told I didn’t have the authority to hear?
And now I was being told they wouldn’t let it slide?
“Alading Miller.”
It was a name I knew.
I’d never seen her in person, but I’d seen her in photos and videos countless times.
She was one of the most famous people in the world.
And yes, in terms of sheer name recognition, she was even above the Han Jin-hwan standing right in front of me.
Alading Miller.
The name of one of only four S-class hunters in the world.
“Really…?”
I asked Choi Hee-seok.
He didn’t answer right away, but instead glanced toward the woman who’d tried to stop Han Jin-hwan from speaking.
The woman shook her head firmly.
Don’t say it.
Was I imagining the look of pity in Choi Hee-seok’s face?
He seemed to be sympathizing as another person being tossed around by Han Jin-hwan.
“It’s true.”
That was Han Jin-hwan.
Choi Hee-seok had kept quiet at the woman’s request, but it didn’t matter.
Han Jin-hwan had no intention of clamping his own mouth shut.
Alading Miller was really coming to Korea?
Why?
This was no ordinary matter.
I could understand perfectly well why they said I wasn’t authorized to hear it.
It meant a nuclear-level deterrent was on its way.
A being like that, practically a human weapon, was coming to Korea.
“Why is that person suddenly coming to Korea?”
“Well, I just heard myself, but apparently it’s because of a dungeon?”
“A dungeon?”
“To be precise, it’s because of Seoul World Cup Stadium, Baek Do-woon-nim.”
A man joined the conversation.
He was the same man who’d been fidgeting nervously beside the woman.
The woman snapped her head around.
When her sharp stare landed on him, the man gave an awkward smile and pressed both hands downward, as if trying to calm the whole thing.
“Mr. Tae-seok!”
“Now, now, calm down. It’s too late to gloss over it anyway.”
“…….”
“It’ll probably be better to hear it from us than from Director Jin-hwan.”
“…You’re right. That’s fair.”
“Then shall I explain?”
“…….”
The woman didn’t answer, only let out a long sigh.
Her free hand made a rough, dismissive motion.
That meant I should go ahead and explain.
“It’s been a while, Baek Do-woon-nim.”
“…Huh? You know me?”
“Oh dear, you don’t remember me? We met near Hongjecheon.”
“Near Hongjecheon? If that’s the case….”
That was where Jae-i’s Blacksmith was.
The person I’d seen around there once before.
Was that why it sounded vaguely familiar?
He had a face that looked to be in his early thirties.
Cheekbones that stood out sharply against his gaunt face.
Among the people I knew, there was only one with cheekbones that pronounced….
Oh?
“Ah!”
“Oh, you remember?”
“Yes, yes. I remember now. You were definitely from the Hwayeomsan investigation team, so….”
“I’m Kim Tae-seok.”
He bowed his head as he said it.
I bowed back, acting apologetic.
Kim Tae-seok.
He was the man who had sprinted through the alley in front of Jae-i’s Blacksmith wearing a suit.
If I remembered right, he was both part of the Hwayeomsan investigation team and a hunter from the district office?
If someone like that was here….
Then I understood why Alading Miller was coming to Korea.
“The Hwayeomsan dungeon investigation… is the reason?”
“Yes, that’s right. A dungeon returning to its original state… it’s unprecedented worldwide.”
“…It is.”
“So the United States put together an investigation team and sent them to our country. As escort for that team—”
“Alading Miller was chosen…?”
“That’s right. Ah. From what I’ve heard, it wasn’t exactly chosen so much as volunteered. Even for an S-class hunter, this would be their first time seeing anything like it, so it makes sense they’d be curious.”
“I-I see….”
In other words, it was because of me.
The reason an S-class hunter was coming to our country.
Because I was the one who had restored the Hwayeomsan dungeon to its original state.
I had no idea things would snowball this much….
“…….”
“Hmm? What’s wrong? You look troubled….”
“N-no, nothing.”
“……?”
Kim Tae-seok tilted his head.
Han Jin-hwan and Choi Hee-seok, watching from the side, seemed to notice something odd about me too.
“When does she arrive?”
“It sounds like she’ll land around 5 p.m. tomorrow. She’s planning to enter quietly through a U.S. military base in Pyeongtaek.”
That was fast.
When had she even left if she was arriving already?
And quietly, too…?
Well, of course they couldn’t publicly broadcast the current whereabouts of an S-class hunter.
Not politically. Not militarily.
“That’s why I came looking for Jin-hwan in such a hurry.”
“He asked me to provide security when he goes out to welcome her.”
“Security?”
“Yeah.”
“…….”
Just as a D-class hunter couldn’t beat a C-class hunter,
just as there was a clear difference between the strength of a B-class hunter and an A-class hunter,
there was also an obvious gulf between an A+ class hunter and an S-class hunter.
Could Han Jin-hwan really stop Alading Miller?
“Hey. You were just thinking I couldn’t stop that woman, weren’t you?”
“Well… she’s Alading Miller.”
“Hmm. Fair enough, but….”
Han Jin-hwan grinned.
“Still, I don’t think I’d lose if we fought.”
“…….”
The confidence on this man.
If anyone else had said that, I would’ve told them not to talk nonsense.
But… as the saying went, blood flowed inward.
Somehow, with him, it felt like it might actually be true.
And I wasn’t the only one who thought so.
The others let small smiles surface too.
Even the woman who had been so prickly toward Han Jin-hwan did the same.
“Especially if you’re with me, I think it’d be even easier to stop her.”
“Huh? Me? Suddenly?”
“Exactly. So, what do you say? Want to come with me too?”
It was so abrupt that my thumb, which had been tapping the smartphone screen, froze for the first time.
Why me?