Chapter 18: Different from Before (5)

Thanks to the favor of Chungram’s Hunter building, Jiho was the first to receive the results of the auction.

‘Looking at this, I can kind of see why I’m the evil of hunter society.’

Thinking about his nickname that he had, at some point, grown accustomed to, Jiho’s mood fell, but when he looked at all the items he collected, he cheered back up again.

After telling the worker to send all of the items to the guild and turning around to leave, Jiho stopped and asked the worker a question.

“By any chance, would I be able to know who put this staff up for auction?”

“That is…”

The worker, who was probably at a high position, looked conflicted and couldn’t answer easily.

Had it been any other hunter, he would have sternly told them that he couldn’t, but it seemed that he was troubled since the other hunter was Shin Jiho, one of the members of the family that owns Chungram Department Store.

Seeing the employee thinking hard, Jiho changed his question.

“Then can you tell me if this item was put up by Joo Yiwon or Chungram Guild?”

“No, it was not them. The item was put up by a guild with no connections to them. I apologize, but I am not allowed to tell the bidder who put the item up for auction…”

Because it wouldn’t be hard for Jiho to find out, the employee was able to tell him that the item wasn’t related to Joo Yiwon or Chungram Guild, but he couldn’t tell Jiho anything beyond that. Jiho wasn’t planning to dig deeper anyways, so he simply nodded.

“Yes, I know. Thank you for telling me.”

Jiho thanked the employee and went out.

Jiho had suspected that Joo Yiwon put the item up for a low price to sell to him since he had encouraged Jiho to buy it, but it seemed that that wasn’t necessarily the case.

Because the glove Joo Yiwon gave him before had also been made by ‘Rayleigh Aeisha,’ Jiho had had his suspicions but… Although it’s a bit unusual of a coincidence, it’s not impossible. After all, items that come out of the same dungeon often share similar characteristics.

Sci-fi items from sci-fi dungeons, medieval items from medieval dungeons.

Concern settled, Jiho looked out the dark window. 

The auction that had started in the evening ended late at night.

When he went down to the parking garage, Yiwon, who he had thought had left, was waiting in front of Jiho’s car.

“Jiho.”

“What.”

Jiho answered shortly, on high alert. Seeing Jiho react like a defensive beast with his hackles raised, Yiwon stifled his laugh.

“I’m not going to say something weird.”

“Then what?”

“Do you want to come sleep over at my house? It’s close to here.”

That was definitely something weird. Plus the way his voice sounded strangely suggestive made Jiho shiver. Jiho frowned. Yiwon’s voice was sweet, as though he was addressing a lover rather than a friend.

“Why would I go to your house? My house is closer.”

“Ay~ friends go to each other’s houses.”

“Next time. I’m tired today.”

“Should I massage your shoulders? I’ll buy you something good to eat.”

Yiwon tried to entice Jiho with sloppy tactics.

Does he think he’s five years old? Jiho waved his hand and chased Yiwon away.

“I’m good. Just go home and sleep. You’re busy.”

Joo Yiwon is supposed to raid an S-rank guild dungeon that Chungram is in charge of tomorrow. Because it was a dungeon they raided often, it shouldn’t be dangerous, but shouldn’t he still rest the day before? Even if Joo Yiwon is a skilled and strong SS-rank hunter, one moment of carelessness can still result in an accident.

Jiho wanted Yiwon to hurry home and sleep instead of wasting his energy here, but Yiwon continued to cling onto him.

“Even if I’m busy, I can be on standby for Jiho 24 hours a day.”

“Thank you, I don’t need that.”

If he keeps talking to him, he’ll fall into his pace. Before he could get swept up by the storm that’s Yiwon, Jiho avoided him and stepped into his car.

Right before the door could close, Yiwon grabbed it.

“Are you really going to leave by yourself? I’ll cook ramen for you.1 I can make a delicious ramen.”

“Why ramen… I can cook ramen too.”

Jiho argued back confidently.

Even if Jiho grew up pampered, would he really not know how to cook ramen himself?

Though he’s never actually cooked it before.2

“Let go while I’m still being nice. This is your last warning.”

As Jiho spoke coldly, Yiwon took his hand off of the door with a displeased look.

“I hope Jiho’s house gets destroyed. So you can come to my house.”

“Are you cursing3 me right now?

“I don’t plan to rely on something as unreliable as a curse. When the time comes, I’ll destroy it myself.”

“Crazy bastard.”

“If it’s destroyed, come to my house, Honey.”

Instead of saying goodbye, Jiho rained curses down on Yiwon–who continued to jinx him to the end–before closing the door. It didn’t seem that Yiwon had the plan to force the door open and drag him out, as he simply waved from the other side of the window.

Despite it being late into the night, the streets weren’t very empty. As he was driving, Jiho thought back to Joo Yiwon’s face when he left.

When he talked about destroying his house, Yiwon’s eyes looked a little too murderous to brush his words off as a mere joke.

He probably didn’t mean anything but…

Because Joo Yiwon was a person who could actually do these types of things, Jiho was a little nervous.

‘Still, destroying someone’s house is an act of terror.’

No matter how crazy Joo Yiwon acts, he’s still a highly respected hunter. He wouldn’t commit an act of terror.

“He was kinder in the past…”

Jiho thought back to how Yiwon was when they were still students. Yiwon used to take care of Jiho like he was his servant.

When they were in high school.

A few kids found out that Yiwon’s parents had died and that he was staying at Jiho’s house. With this, they began to bully him.

The kids didn’t make it obvious that they were bullying Yiwon. They played small pranks, like saying mean things to Yiwon when he was alone with them, secretly putting trash in his locker, or scribbling curses in his book.

Yiwon didn’t say much and endured everything silently.

Jiho finding out about the bullying was by chance.

When Jiho found out, he flipped. He picked up a chair, walked up to the bullies, and smashed it down on them. He also threw anything he could get his hands on, including a desk.4

Of course, the school went into a frenzy. That was because Jiho, who was known as a good student, had been the first one to incite violence.

Since Jiho’s body was weak and he wasn’t very strong, the others didn’t get hurt too badly; instead, Jiho was the one to collapse from his anger. Once it was found out that the others had been bullying Yiwon, the incident was simply covered up.

It was a good thing that nothing happened then; thinking about it now, he was definitely crazy. How could he smash a chair on a person’s head? 

This issue had also become a problem when Jiho was being cursed at on the internet.

The people who had bullied Yiwon and were hit by Jiho back then, released a statement about it on the internet. That Shin Jiho had a record of school violence.

At the time, thanks to the fact that Joo Yiwon–the nation’s hero both then and now–had explained the entire situation, it ended with the people who exposed the story being cursed at. But at the time, it was a very dangerous situation.

‘If it was now, I would have been much calmer.’

Instead of flipping out and using violence, it would’ve been better if he had gathered evidence of them bullying Yiwon and sued them for it. Because Jiho was the one to incite violence, the bullies got off easy; if he had used his brain, he could’ve sent them off for good.

His rash personality is the problem. Jiho was the type of person to not be able to tolerate any injustice.

Since he was an adult now, he was confident that he could take care of the situation better if something similar happens again.

He has to be careful moving forward. Because there’s a lot of people trying to get something bad on him, he’ll be in trouble if he acts without thinking.

‘Think rationally about everything. Don’t be rash.’

After reflecting on himself, Jiho turned his car from a boulevard into an alley.

The quiet neighborhood that Shin Jiho was living in appeared. 

‘Let’s just take a nice rest today…’

He’ll fill the tub up with water and release his fatigue as he takes a bath. After that, he’ll spread out on his comfortable bed. Thinking about the familiar, yet sweet feeling, Jiho felt excited, when…

BOOM. 

Stepping on Jiho’s resolve, an immeasurably loud sound echoed from not very far away.

“What was that?”

Jiho quickly stopped his car. The roar couldn’t have been made by a human. The sound came from the direction opposite of where Jiho was heading.

Before he could even stop and think, Jiho’s body was already steering the car towards the sound.5 The closer the car got towards the place the sound came from, the more Jiho was able to feel the stream of mana that only an awakened one could recognize.

“But there wasn’t a warning.”

Although this area was a little far from the area his guild was in charge of, because another guild could request help from them, Jiho checked fissure warnings for the southern part of Seoul and the areas nearby every single day. Even when he was in the hospital and resting today, he had still checked the warnings on habit.

Of course, the predictions aren’t 100% correct.

But wasn’t it off too often these days? Just a few days ago, a sunken dungeon’s gate had suddenly appeared instead of a fissure.

“They should do their work better…”

Even while complaining, Jiho’s car had reached the closest it could to the place the sound came from.

Looking at the fissure that spread above the alley and its mana input, the fissure was about C-rank. It was definitely dangerous for normal people.

From the corner of his eye, Jiho saw a person who couldn’t escape in time crouched on the ground. It was a male student with childish features and a uniform.

Jiho quickly ran over to the student.

A monster standing about 10 meters away from the student was slowly making its way over.

Six monsters. Another one was coming out of the gap in the fissure.

Although their movements were slow, substance was dripping from the long antennas on their heads, onto the ground, and melting it.

Jiho quickly checked the information of the monsters.

Status

NameLykyllRankDHP64MP52Strength81Agility7SkillMonstrous Strength (D)
Acidic Solution (D)
Adhesive Solution (E)

If it had only been one monster, it probably wouldn’t have been difficult to kill, but since there were multiple monsters grouped together, it was hard for the current Jiho to take care of them.

Although it wouldn’t be hard to kill them if he used his original skill, [Fortify]…

‘I can’t switch easily.’

When he tested to see if he could turn his [Stabilize] skill on again, a warning window had popped up.

System Announcement
If you use this skill, your body will suffer serious consequences. You will feel great pain and may lose your consciousness for a period of time.

He couldn’t switch between skills whenever he wanted to. If he tries to switch right now and falls unconscious, he will die.

Footnotes

1. This is like Korea’s version of “Netflix and Chill.” …Yiwon needs to learn how to flirt.

The line first appeared in a Korean film called One Fine Spring Day. It’s become an iconic pickup line. Whether or not it actually works, I have no idea. Here’s the original clip: . Since the video is short and I couldn’t find a translated clip, I translated it. Be careful of people who offer you ramen.

2. Bird cries in poor.

3. More specifically, a jinx.

4. Go Jiho!

5. Jiho, what happened to thinking before acting?