The guide who had been burned at the stakeβjust a few hours earlier, she had promised us a separate reward if we defeated her nemesis, the blue giant.
Until now, I had assumed the promise would naturally be honored, since it had been made directly by a resident of the Gate. There was no need to rush.
Fortunately, even though the fairy who made the promise had died, our agreement remained valid.
"Here, here! Take this."
The fairies in the plaza soon spread the reward the guide had mentioned across the grass.
A small cube that fit neatly into one hand.
It was an object no Hunter could possibly fail to recognize.
"An item box?"
A magical storage container capable of holding equipment infused with mana.
Who would have thought they would suddenly hand over something like this?
It was only Common-grade, the lowest tier among item boxes, so its internal capacity was modest compared to higher-grade models.
But that hardly mattered.
No matter how small its storage space was, a magical tool like this still started at hundreds of millions of won.
Naturally, we discussed what to do with the item box.
It didn't take long for everyone to reach the same conclusion: the reward should go to the S-rank Hunter who had taken the lead during the raid.
That's right.
I had just stumbled into an enormous windfall.
"I originally came here hoping to get an EX-grade item and become stronger, but with something like this, I'll gladly take what I'm given!"
Alright.
Now that I'd seen the scenario through to the end and gotten what I needed, it was about time to leave this feeding box.
"The sky's getting brighter."
I looked around at the survivors.
Everyone wore a different expression.
Some were simply relieved to be alive.
Some Hunters still looked disturbed by the bizarre custom of the fairies killing one of their own.
But the most common emotion among them was something close to sorrow.
A few people, including Seonwoo Yeon, stood in silence as they stared at the charred corpse of the executed fairy.
"It's dawn."
Clap.
I lightly clapped my hands to gather the raiders' attention, then pointed toward the route we needed to take.
"The vines blocking the passage should have shrunk by now. Let's go check."
Soon afterward, we returned to the forest.
Sure enough, the obstacle that had sealed the exit was gone as though it had never existed.
***
A little later.
Korean Hunter Association.
"Hmm..."
Seonwoo Yeon tapped away at the keys of a cheap membrane keyboard before leaning back in her chair for a moment.
The missing people who had been swallowed by the white Gate had all returned safely.
It had been about two days since the incident came to an end.
The past few days had been hectic.
She had witnessed, for the first time, a dungeon creature capable of speaking human language fluently.
She had also remained in the fairy kingdom for an additional four hours, working alongside Association personnel who had entered with her.
Since a dungeon would not collapse while survivors remained inside, they had used that fact to preserve the raid site for as long as possible.
But now even that was over.
In the end, the Association had failed to discover any way to enter through the one-way exit.
"Still, I really tried because I wanted to be useful. It's a little disappointing that we didn't get any results."
Seonwoo Yeon, the last person to return, placed her hands back on the keyboard and endured the fatigue spreading through her body.
Now she had to finish the report before her memories of the raid started to fade.
Honestly, why was society so cruel to its worker ants? π
πΕα»ΠΔsΜ
"Phew..."
Still, this time the higher-ups had acknowledged her efforts and even granted her special leave.
She only had to make it through today.
With that thought in mind, Seonwoo Yeon's fingers began moving rapidly across the keyboard again.
"I want coffee."
But thenβ
"E, excuse me..."
She had only thought it.
Yet before she knew it, a refreshing iced Americano had appeared beside her desk.
"Investigator, it's still lunchtime. Could we have a quick chat? Maybe over a cup of coffee?"
Incidentally, "Investigator" was Seonwoo Yeon's current official title.
She stopped typing and looked up at the voice addressing her.
As expected, the person standing there was a colleague she frequently encountered at work.
"Yes. Let me just save this first."
It was Chief Lee, the C-rank Awakened who had been trapped with her in the fairy kingdom.
They normally had little reason to speak privately, so it was somewhat strange that he had suddenly shown up carrying coffee.
.
.
.
A moment later.
"So that's what the coffee was for."
The moment Seonwoo Yeon stepped onto the rooftop, she realized her guess had been correct.
Chief Lee had already bowed his head before the conversation even began.
"I'm really sorry about what happened last time!"
"Um."
"T, that... Like I said back then, I couldn't think straight because I genuinely believed I might die within ten minutes."
"Yes."
"I, it's just... we'd only just entered the dungeon, and then our team leader died like that..."
The leader of the investigation team had mistaken the fairy for a monster and attacked first.
He became the first victim.
Come to think of it, the funeral is on Wednesday.
Seonwoo Yeon frowned slightly as the schedule surfaced in her mind.
Then the man who had taken over after him continued.
"Really... I'm sorry. If I hadn't done something like that, Investigator Seonwoo Yeon wouldn't have gotten hurt."
But there was something she needed to correct.
Seonwoo Yeon lowered her coffee and spoke.
"I'm fine. If anything, shouldn't you be apologizing to Hunter Kim Giryeo?"
After all, this employee had definitely passed the mark to an S-rank Hunter.
"Haha, Hunter Kim? Yes. Of course, I don't think that quick apology when we left the Gate was enough. But..."
The Awakened man standing on the rooftop gave a bitter laugh as he reflected on what he had done.
"How could someone like me possibly dare to approach an S-rank separately?"
He said that, then took a sip from his coffee.
"To be honest, right after I did it, I didn't even dare imagine that Hunter Kim would forgive me."
"_ _"
"I thought he'd be furious. Or maybe... I thought he would just pass the tag right back."
"Is that so?"
"With someone like Kim Giryeo standing right in front of us, what else could we do? We simply left the decision to the S-rank Hunter. Honestly, if someone became the tagger through their own actions, at least it wouldn't feel quite as absurd or unfair."
As the C-rank Awakened explained how he had felt at the time, his voice gradually grew quieter.
What he said next only weighed more heavily on his conscience.
"...But I never imagined he would keep the tagger role himself."
Seonwoo Yeon remembered that moment too.
When Kim Giryeo refused to pass the role on to anyone else, her heart had genuinely sunk.
Especially because she had already witnessed the gruesome fate of the humans taken away by the fairies.
"That was to reassure everyone..."
If Kim Giryeo had not willingly taken the bomb upon himself, the raid team would have endured ten minutes of absolute hell.
The previous balloon game had already conditioned them to believe that the loser would die soon afterward.
Under those circumstances, anyone chosen as the tagger would have done almost anything to escape that fate.
Perhaps someone would have attacked the weaker members of the group.
Maybe brutal acts such as breaking another person's leg just to avoid being caught would have become commonplace.
"We were able to leave the dungeon without seeing anything like that because of him."
The black-haired woman agreed with that conclusion.
"No, but seriously... looking back, how did he manage not to pass on the tagger role? Did he actually intend to hunt the fairies or something?"
As Chief Lee muttered thoughtfully, Seonwoo Yeon answered before she even realized it.
"Yes?"
"That's just the kind of person he is."
He had always been like that.
Kim Giryeo sometimes did astonishingly bold things while wearing an expression that showed neither hesitation nor any sign that he understood how reckless they looked.
Knowing that, Seonwoo Yeon had taken the mark from him.
Because she felt that if she hadn't, he truly would have kept the tagger role until the very end.
"Is he always like that? Ah, come to think of it, Investigator, you're fairly close with that Hunter, aren't you?"
"Only a little."
"Still, that's incredible. I had no idea he was such a kind person. Wow... how does he manage to look after everyone even in a situation like that...?"
The C-rank Hunter continued praising the blond man.
For some reason, however, Seonwoo Yeon's reaction to that particular description was vague.
"Kind?"
Somehow, the word did not seem to fit him.
Cold-hearted.
Without realizing it, Seonwoo Yeon felt that word suited him much better.
Even after everything he had done during the game of tag, that impression had not disappeared.
If anything, Kim Giryeo had shown that side of himself even more clearly during the later stages of the raid.
"_ _"
Seonwoo Yeon still remembered it vividly.
The expression on Kim Giryeo's face as he watched the fairy burn.
"Tak, tak..."
Giryeo had shown no sign of distress whatsoever as he looked at the guide who had been burned alive after trying to help them.
If lingering anger from the tag game had caused him to resent the wingless fairy, that would at least have made sense.
But what Kim Giryeo showed was neither disgust nor satisfaction.
It was simply devoid of color or emotion.
A stiff, ordinary reaction.
How could anyone expect compassion from a man who looked like that?
"_ _"
There was a saying that even butchers avoided looking animals in the eye when slaughtering them.
Somehow, Kim Giryeo seemed like the sort of butcher who could carve meat apart without blinking once.
Because of that, every time Seonwoo Yeon experienced his kindness, she was left with an uncomfortable feeling she could never quite shake.
She wanted to believe he was kind.
She truly did.
But that overwhelmingly capable Hunter kept inspiring a strange, chilling sense of awe in her, making it difficult to trust him completely.
"No. Don't overthink it. He's a good person who willingly put himself in danger for everyone else."
Seonwoo Yeon tried to think positively, but she could not entirely suppress the unease in her heart.
"Really..."
When she had collapsed from the fairy's punishment, what kind of expression had that Hunter been wearing?
"This is such a pointless thought."
Perhaps even then, he had looked at her with the same gaze he had given the fairy lying in the ashes.
If not for that lingering anxiety, perhaps she would not have felt such an invisible distance between herself and Kim Giryeo.
***
"Yahoo! I don't have to walk around with my pockets stuffed like some traveling peddler anymore!"
On a quiet afternoon, in Kim Giryeo's one-room apartment, I sat in the corner enjoying my happiness.
For quite some time, I had secretly envied the people who carried item boxes around.
And now I had finally obtained one of those luxurious magical storage containers myself.
"And who would've thought I'd get such an expensive magic tool for free!"
Even after storing [Hydra] and [Surprise Box] inside, the item box still had plenty of room left.
I hummed happily as I checked the remaining space.
"It's perfect--"
And as the saying goes, the item box had come into my hands at exactly the right time.
In truth, I still hadn't given up on obtaining dragon lungs.
For that reason, I was planning to challenge another Dragon Raid.
To be honest, even now I possessed power that was somewhat excessive for an F-rank.
"After being pushed around my whole life, now I'm overworking myself again..."
Still, I decided to become a little greedier.
And perhaps around ten percent of that decision had been influenced by yesterday's Gate.
An entity that imitated intelligence had appeared.
The emergence of a scenario-type Gate like that was hardly a good omen.
Anyway, returning to the original topic, I intended to attempt another dragon hunt whenever the opportunity arose.
I wanted to increase my chances of obtaining dragon lungs by even one percent.
Of course, unlike what had happened in Japan, the survival of an entire nation was not at stake this time.
So there was no reason to rush.
It would be better to prepare slowly and begin with thorough research.
The problem was that dragons always appeared in high-ranking Gates, and such Gates were rare to begin with.
There was very little reliable information available online.
"Hmm."
So I decided to meet someone who specialized in that field and prepare in advance for the dragon's nest that would eventually appear.
And surprisingly, this was one situation where I could actually make use of my personal connections.
The greatest dragon slayer in Korea.
And the first person in the world to possess a [Dragon's Heart].
As luck would have it, that famous individual happened to be a distant relative of one of my acquaintances.