I sat atop a tall hotel building near COEX. Peace yawned quietly on my lap. Since no one could see us here, I deactivated my stealth skill and took a spoonful of orb ice cream I had swiped from the aquarium. Of course, I left money behind. It might look like someone just dropped it.

“You shouldn’t eat too much.”

As I dug my spoon back into the round ice cream mound, Noah nagged. I had to soothe and coax him a lot to bring even just one cup from the aquarium after he whispered that we shouldn’t be eating there.

“It’s not much. Here.”

Noah offered a spoonful to me too. These days, everyone’s being too strict about food. I know it’s better to cut back on snacks and have three proper meals, but still.

“The Sesung Guild Leader’s tank was impressive, but a full-sized aquarium really is something else.”

Come to think of it, where did Seong Hyunjae move to? The apartment was a temporary place, and his original house had completely collapsed. He probably owns a couple of spare mansions, though.

“There were so many fish.”

Noah said with a smile. We were busy avoiding other visitors, but there was still plenty to see. Dodging people was fun in its own way. When a crowd came rushing in, Noah grabbed me and flew up. Everyone looked confused when the wind suddenly picked up.

Just then, a text came in. It was from Min Sohwan.

[Can I do a part-time job? While still attending school.]

Acting like she wasn’t interested at all before.

[Yes, you can. Did you change your mind?]

[The conditions are good, but it keeps bothering me.]

Bothering her, huh. Is she talking about Noah? Maybe she’s worried I’ll get scammed or something. Either way, a part-time job is fine. I replied telling her to contact Haeyeon Guild’s HR team and turned to look at Noah.

“Min Sohwan will be joining the Breeding Facility too.”

“That person from earlier?”

“Yes. I think it’s more because of you than me.”

She says she finds it troublesome, but she actually likes taking care of people. Along with her response agreeing to join, Min Sohwan asked if part-timers also get housing. Of course they do, and she said she wanted a small place because cleaning is annoying. I told her to just keep the floor clean and run a robot vacuum. We’ve got good appliances. I’ll make sure there’s a dishwasher and a food waste disposer, and tell her to move somewhere that makes recycling easy.

My place is a bit inconvenient for putting out trash, and when I complained, Yuhyun once tried to burn it. These days, dungeon waste has mostly solved the garbage issue, but we still have to recycle.

“She said she’ll keep attending school and just work part-time. Speaking of which, her school has a Hunter track. Noah, are you thinking of going to college next year?”

When it came up before, something had happened, so I never heard his answer.

“…I don’t know. I, kind of dropped out before.”

“You went before awakening though, right?”

Noah nodded slightly.

“Then it’s fine. High-ranking Hunters can substitute with dungeon contribution. We can’t ask people who stood on the front lines during chaos why they missed class. Yuhyun also barely went to school after awakening. Protecting the country was more urgent.”

Still, I was curious whether he’d go to school, so I checked several times, but we never ran into each other. Unlike now, dungeons used to break out often, and no way would they sit an S-Class Hunter down for class. During the first year dungeons appeared, schools often shut down, and there was even debate over whether the college entrance exam should proceed. I remember some kids got flamed online for posting that they wished a dungeon break would happen near the exam site the day before the test.

“You don’t go to class much either now. It’d be nice if you did.”

“…What about you, Yujin?”

“Me?”

“The Breaker Guild Leader said it’s good to get a diploma. Are you going to college next year?”

“Uh… I think I might at least enroll.”

Even if I don’t, someone will probably force me into it. Especially Seok Gimyeong.

“If you go, I’ll go too.”

“But I’m only aiming to get the diploma, so I probably won’t actually attend classes.”

I was suggesting it because I hoped Noah could enjoy a normal campus life. If Noah goes, Kang Soyeong will follow too, and if Sohwan goes to the same school, she could help her out too. Where did Minui say he was attending again?

“If you start attending, the Haeyeon Guild Leader might show up too.”

“That…”

W-Would he really? But if Yuhyun enrolls, I’d be his junior. Not that he’d expect me to treat him like a senior… What do people even do in college? I know there are festivals and stuff. Club activities, maybe.

“I’m going to enroll, so I’ll mention special admission for you too, Noah.”

Soyeong will like that. If those two go to school together, it’ll be like a picture. The ice cream ran out after just a few bites. Noah checked the time and took a thermos out of his crossbody bag. I should’ve eaten the medicine before the ice cream.

“This isn’t something I’m insisting on, but… it seemed like you might be interested, so I’m bringing it up.”

I accepted the medicine and continued speaking.

“What do you think about meeting with Team Leader Seok Gimyeong?”

“Team Leader Seok Gimyeong, as in the Haeyeon Guild member? Seok Hayan’s uncle?”

“Yes. From what I saw before, he pays attention to support-type Hunters. Honestly, trying to take on support Hunter work all by yourself would obviously be difficult. It’s bound to feel overwhelming.”

It’s a kind of social movement, so of course it’s not easy. Even with long efforts by many to overcome discrimination based on race, gender, status, religion, and more, there were still many problems. There are even places where social class systems still remain.

On top of that, it’s a fundamentally difficult problem to fully solve. Unless every person becomes a mentally perfect saint, the more obvious the differences in ability, the easier it becomes to unconsciously discriminate. So the goal is to keep raising awareness and to keep trying to make things better.

“So rather than starting something right away, wouldn’t it be better to take time and learn slowly? Like Sohwan said, Noah, you have a lot of time. You’re still at an age where you need to learn.”

“…I’ll think about it. I still don’t really know what I truly want to do. I think I might just be being greedy because I want to be someone important, someone great. Like, if I pull something like this off, people will praise me. …It sounds childish.”

“Come on, that’s how it usually starts. Nobody dislikes praise. Everyone likes to hear ‘well done,’ or ‘you’re amazing.’”

If it’s Seok Gimyeong, he’d treat Noah very well. I’m a bit worried he might try to sweet-talk him into joining Haeyeon permanently.

“…If you do decide to meet with Team Leader Seok, please make sure to tell me first. He’ll be kind, but he’s got a dark side. If you can, don’t go alone. Take me, or Myungwoo or Hamin with you. Or one of the people you met today—Seo Kyunghun, Lee Yushin, or Min Sohwan.”

I need to give a warning in advance. Don’t go seducing the kid into doing something dumb. It’s unlikely he’d do something to mess things up with me, but you never know.

As planned, the new Breeding Facility staff will be handled by Haeyeon Guild’s HR team, with Seok Gimyeong taking charge. After their training, they’ll be transferred to the Breeding Facility—more precisely, the building side. We already prepared a spacious office in the building.

[Honestly, I was pretty worried, but my first impressions of everyone were good.]

You can’t really know someone just from one meeting, but Seok Gimyeong said they all seemed solid. Well, they’d endured a long time by my side. Being strong-willed is just the baseline, and they’re not gullible or easily swayed by outside voices.

There’s no special definition for talent. These people are the rare talent.

‘If I hadn’t gone through it myself, I would’ve just thought of them as ordinary people.’

If we hadn’t shared such hardship, if we hadn’t lost what we did, I would’ve never known. Memories that only remained as pain came back to me like this. It made me feel strange.

“Sorok’s grown up a bit, hasn’t she?”

I stopped walking down the first-floor hallway of the Breeding Facility and rubbed the fluffy white belly of the sprawled baby reindeer. Sorok preferred roaming the building over the exercise yard that was decorated like a forest. She didn’t walk around much, but she seemed to like the tap-tap sound of her hooves hitting the floor.

– Meee.

A black, fluffy lamb bounced around Sorok. It leapt like a small ball. Though a monster, maybe because they were both even-toed ungulates, the two got along pretty well. Or rather, the lamb just kept pestering Sorok to play.

“Still no word from your dad. He must really be busy these days.”

– Meeeaa.

“Should I just barge in?”

– Meeng.

With the dungeon status changing and work at the lab, it made sense that he was busy, but he’s barely been replying to messages. The matter’s already been finalized with the Association. They even suggested doing a live broadcast of the Monster Mounts handover ceremony, but Chief Song declined, saying it couldn’t be accepted for personal use.

“With Chief Song’s personality, if we don’t specify that it’s for exclusive use, he’ll just try to dodge it again. Maybe I should push harder.”

Once he takes something on, he’s not the type to ignore it. I’ll have to barge in when things settle down a bit.

As I forced Sorok to her feet, I sensed someone approaching. It wasn’t time for medicine yet, so it probably wasn’t Yuhyun. Who could it be?

“…Huh?”

The face that appeared was someone I truly didn’t expect. A dazzlingly handsome face smiled at me.

“Hello, Yujin hyung. Long time no see, right?”

“Ah, yeah, hi.”

“Please speak comfortably.”

Park Hayul smiled. …I had completely forgotten. He went to China, but I guess he’s back now. The person with Park Hayul was an A-rank Hunter from the Sesung Guild. This week’s assigned Breeding Facility security detail—but why did he come in with Park Hayul?

“They said he was close with Director Han, so I came along. Looks like it was true.”

“Huh? Uh, well, I suppose so.”

I looked at the A-rank Hunter, a bit flustered. Wait, he brought him in just based on that? That’s not okay. Unless someone lives here, they’re supposed to be stopped at the building’s secured entrance and contact me first.

“Thank you for your help~”

Park Hayul thanked the A-rank Hunter. The A-rank Hunter shook his head with a bright smile, saying it was nothing. …Is he a fan of Park Hayul or something? His reaction was overflowing with goodwill. Still, you can’t mix personal feelings with official work. I watched the A-rank Hunter walk away with suspicion. Seems like someone with issues to be handling security. I should contact Sesung about this…

“Hyung, I’ve heard so much about you lately!”

“Uh…”

Park Hayul stepped closer and spoke. Wow, he really was handsome. I don’t remember him being this striking before—maybe the environment in China suited him well. On top of that, he just gave off a genuinely likable vibe.

“I felt a little hurt since you didn’t keep in touch.”

“Ah, sorry about that.”

“No, it’s fine. There’s no one else expected to come today, right?”

“Huh?”

“You have a lot of S-Class Hunters around you. Is anyone supposed to be coming by?”

Park Hayul looked straight into my eyes as he spoke. His eyes were pretty, sparkling strangely like they had pearl dust in them. Was he wearing contacts? His ash-blue dyed hair suited him too.

“My younger brother’s coming in about two hours.”

“Really? But I guess you’re usually alone, huh?”

“There are a lot of people protecting me. Several high-ranking Hunters, and there’s Noah too. And though he didn’t come with me today, there’s also Peace.”

“Peace was an S-Class monster, right? Do you always stay with him?”

“Almost always. But when I’m caring for baby monsters, I sometimes leave him at home since # Nоvеlight # the little ones can get scared.”

I paused mid-sentence and tilted my head. Should I really be sharing all this? But it didn’t seem like something that would cause any issues.

“Hyung.”

Even his voice sounded nice. Park Hayul’s eyes curved into gentle crescents.

“Can I come visit again?”

“Sure, of course.”

“But I’d prefer if you didn’t tell anyone else I came. It’s kind of burdensome. There are a lot of scary people around you, hyung.”

Is that so? Well, I guess S-Class Hunters would be intimidating to non-awakened people. I guess… I don’t really need to tell anyone. Just someone I know dropping by.

“Got it.”

“Thanks.”

He looked so happy that I couldn’t help but feel happy too. I felt a little guilty for forgetting about him, but this much should be fine.

“Want some tea?”

“No. I can’t stay long today. I’ll come again.”

Leaving behind a request to keep his visit a secret, Park Hayul turned to go. For some reason, I felt a bit reluctant to see him leave. Still, it was nice seeing him again after so long.

– Beeyang.

I snapped out of my daze at Sorok’s cry. She had gotten up at some point and was nibbling on the hem of my clothes. The lamb joined in and tugged on the other side.

“…Feels like I’ve been possessed by a ghost.”

Something felt strangely off. But I hadn’t said anything until now, and he didn’t seem like a bad guy. If anything, he was the opposite… Right? Just then, my phone rang. It was Yerim.

[Mister! I finished the raid!]

“Already?”

[Yep! Blue’s safe too.]

[Kyauw!]

I figured it would be quick, but she really was fast. I showered her with praise.

[There’s an interview and some other stuff, so I’ll be back tomorrow morning. Nothing happened, right? Is Han Yuhyun taking good care of you?]

“Of course. Everything’s fine. I’ll come meet you tomorrow.”

[You don’t have to.]

She said it was fine, but I could picture her smiling. We exchanged a few more words and ended the call. The air in the hallway suddenly felt cool and quiet.

Something definitely felt off, but I couldn’t figure out why.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep