The Pink-Haired Evidence
I broke out in a cold sweat at the sound of the news blaring from the monitor. Where the hell had the information leaked from? If it wasn’t an inside job, there was absolutely no way for it to get out.
At that moment, Jeon Nando turned the news off and shifted his gaze toward us. His eyes were sharp as blades. I flinched and unconsciously straightened my posture.
“Continue with the explanation.”
…Tch. Stay calm….
Jeon Nando’s heavy tone left me completely tense. I let out a short breath and slowly opened my mouth.
“…While interrogating the terror suspects Kim Jigon and Yoo Sangjae, the two suddenly began shedding tears of blood and died.”
“Explain in detail.”
I swallowed hard and pulled out the details I had memorized.
“…Two of our section chiefs were performing an electric interrogation. The unconscious terrorists suddenly woke up, shed tears of blood, and… their bodies literally exploded.”
Jeon Nando let out a low groan before casually asking,
“Terrorism?”
“No, sir. The autopsy revealed nothing unusual inside the bodies. However….”
“Hmm?”
I nudged my junior standing beside me and gave him a look. The dazed junior hurriedly handed Jeon Nando a thick stack of documents.
“This is….”
I watched Jeon Nando holding the papers and continued my explanation.
“…It was discovered during the autopsy of Yoo Sangjae’s body.”
Jeon Nando gave me a puzzled look.
“Isn’t that just a tooth?”
It was. But not just any tooth.
“Yes, sir. Please turn the page. It’s explained in detail.”
Jeon Nando quietly read through the documents, then suddenly looked up at me in shock.
“What about Kim Jigon… No, Jeong Ho-moon?”
Jeong Ho-moon was the perpetrator of the previous Association terror attack.
“The autopsy is still in progress, but we expect the same evidence to appear.”
“…Those crazy bastards have no limits.”
He clicked his tongue and went back to reading. I understood why he was surprised. I had been utterly bewildered when I first received the report.
The terrorists had pulled out their own lower molars and replaced them with fake teeth. And these weren’t ordinary fakes—they were hollow. Inside them….
“…It seems the owner of this hair is that ‘Lady.’”
Each one contained strands of pink hair.
Monday morning arrived without fail. After falling into the habit of sleeping and waking late, the early hour felt distinctly unpleasant. On my way to school, I fiddled with my phone and was startled by the flood of articles dominating the internet.
Huh? The two terrorists who had broken into the Academy were dead. I’d heard the Investigation Bureau had taken them in, so there was no way those vicious bastards had killed themselves on purpose. It must have been an accident.
Come to think of it, Jeon Nando had suspected at first that I might be working with the terrorists. He had mentioned something about the Gujae Church, that cult….
Well, he’d handle it. I had my wife to look after and Soyeon to take care of. Besides, I wasn’t even part of the Association anymore. The esteemed leaders of this nation and the old-timers at the Association would sort it out.
I put my phone away and kept walking in a daze.
“…”
I felt an unidentifiable gaze from somewhere. I glanced around, but naturally saw nothing. Hmm… I could probably find it if I pushed myself. Spreading my mana wide might catch something. But while it would have been easy in my original body, doing it with this one was far too inefficient.
After a brief moment of consideration, I decided to ignore it and continued on my way. If there had been any hostility I might have acted differently, but I had no desire to waste energy first thing in the morning.
The mysterious gaze followed me all the way until I entered the Academy. The moment I passed through the school gates, it vanished as though it had never existed.
…All sorts of things happen first thing in the morning.
I shrugged it off and kept walking.
When I reached the classroom, I immediately noticed the atmosphere was slightly different. Students kept stealing glances at me. Some stared openly. It was the first day back after the terror incident, so it made sense that I was drawing attention.
I casually ignored their stares and headed for my usual spot in the corner. As I sat down and looked around to see if Min Soyeon had arrived yet….
Huh? My eyes met Gong Haeseon’s as she entered the classroom. The moment she spotted me, her eyes widened in surprise. She quickly approached and greeted me warmly.
“J-Jihwan! Are you feeling better now? You’re coming to school again?”
“I’m fine now. Thanks for worrying about me.”
“A-and Soyeon? She w-was with you, right….”
“Yeah. She’ll probably be here today.”
She was even concerned about Min Soyeon. What a genuinely kind girl.
As I chatted with Gong Haeseon, the empty seats around us gradually began to fill.
…Should I say something?
“S-so after the exam, we’re supposed to go on a field trip….”
Gong Haeseon didn’t seem interested in returning to her friends. She had always sat with them before, but at this rate there might not be a seat left for her. Still, she looked so happy that I couldn’t bring myself to interrupt her.
While I was wondering what to do, she spoke again.
“…You don’t know the exam scope well, do you? I-if it’s okay, I could go over it with you…?”
An unfamiliar word slipped from her lips.
“…Exam?”
“Yes. The midterms are coming up soon….”
“…What?”
M-midterms…?
I asked her to explain further and learned the details. Since we were first-years and still unfamiliar with handling abilities and mana, there were only two practical exams: illuminating a mana stone and measuring combat proficiency.
Neither was particularly difficult. The first simply required pouring mana into a mana stone until it lit up. The second involved knocking down a training dummy—and not even a combat model. As long as you landed valid hits, it was over.
If you had trained consistently, even lazily, it wouldn’t be that hard.
The real problem came after that.
There were written exams for Hunter Theory, Korean Language, and History—subjects I had always looked down on. I knew nothing about Hunter Theory, and since Korean and History seemed useless, I had never taken them seriously. But written exams? Did I really have to study at my age?
“…I-it won’t be that difficult…. The scope is large, but the content is easy, so you can get through it quickly…!”
I comforted myself with Gong Haeseon’s words. That’s right. At most it was high-school level. How hard could it possibly be? With a little effort, I could knock it out in no time.
I was in serious trouble.
“The red-tipped gaper is classified as oviparous and lays ten eggs at a time….”
This was supposed to be Hunter Theory class, yet the teacher was covering material I had never heard in my life. I knew what a gaper was—a monster that lived in shallow streams and looked like a feathered frog. It only appeared in low D-rank Gates, had almost no aggression, and I had never paid it much attention….
“This species has a distinctive red coloring at the tip of its tongue, unlike other gapers….”
But now I had to memorize all of this? Most students started at low ranks, so it made sense. For someone who had cleared C-rank Gates with his wife from the beginning, however, this was completely foreign territory.
“…Next, let’s look at the brown lantern butterfly.”
I had spaced out for a second and the lesson had already moved on. Where were we? While I frantically searched for the right page, Gong Haeseon leaned over and whispered.
“Jihwan, page sixty-five.”
I gave her a grateful smile and quickly flipped to the correct page.
“Now, this brown lantern butterfly…”
Whew… Thanks to her help, I caught up right away. As I listened to the teacher and underlined key points, I glanced at the girl beside me. The way she had prepared three-colored pens and meticulously organized her notes showed this wasn’t her first rodeo. Cute face, sweet personality, talented at baking, and now this—she really was the perfect daughter.
Whoever her parents were, they had raised her well.
…Though of course, not as well as ours.
At that moment, Gong Haeseon noticed my gaze and looked up. Our eyes met. She gave me a shy, bashful smile. The sight was so adorable that the corners of my mouth lifted on their own.
She set her pen down, flipped to the back of her notebook, and began writing something. Then she slid it toward me.
Is the class bearable?
I wrote a short reply and passed it back.
I don’t understand a single thing.
Gong Haeseon let out a small giggle at my answer, then wrote again and slid the notebook over.
You usually don’t listen to class much, huh?
Her handwriting was perfectly round, just like her personality.
It’s not that I don’t listen—the class is just hard!
We kept passing the notebook back and forth until class ended without me realizing. I had barely paid attention to the lecture, but I had secured a promise that she would lend me her notes later, so it was still a net gain. She even offered to let Min Soyeon see them too. In this harsh world, she was a truly rare person.
During the break I went to the bathroom, took care of business, and stood in front of the sink. Just as I was about to wash my hands, something on my left wrist caught my eye.
“…Huh?”
A long, curly strand with a faint pink tint. It looked like Gong Haeseon’s hair.
I brushed it off, rinsed my hands, and headed back to the classroom.