Chapter 65

“Uhm...”

I carefully considered my words for a moment. Naturally, impatient Korean that he was, Kang Changho did not wait for me to speak.

“Well, in any case, your actual rank doesn’t matter all that much.”

“Uh, then...”

“It means even an F-Class can qualify.”

The requirements were surprisingly lenient. Kang Changho muttered this with his arms crossed.

My palms grew damp with sweat once again.

The conditions could be met at any time.

“Then why haven’t you done it before now?”

A question suddenly occurred to me.

With the power of an S-Class, taking equipment by force—or even killing another awakened person—should have been easy. So why had this man kept me alive?

“Well, that’s...”

At my question, Kang Changho raised an eyebrow, as though wondering whether something so obvious was even worth asking.

“An ethical issue?”

What was he talking about now?

“You tend to treat me as though I’m some kind of villain, but I do have morals.”

“......”

“How could I recklessly kill an innocent hunter?”

“Is that so?”

“When I use ‘Improvement,’ I intend to reach an agreement with the person involved whenever possible.”

Of everything I had heard today, that was probably the most reasonable thing he had said.

“And what happens if you try to reach an agreement, but the other person still refuses?”

As expected, raising the possibility of failed negotiations was the right move.

It immediately revealed the S-Class hunter’s true nature.

“I’ll have to give that some thought.”

Kang Changho never said he would give up.

“This is the first time I’ve experienced anything like this. Hmm. I’ve never coveted someone else’s skill before.”

“Even though you possess ‘Improvement’?”

“It actually has fairly strict limitations on its use. I have to choose carefully, so I’ve never paid much attention to ordinary abilities...”

In that case, there was no point in continuing this conversation.

I rose from my seat with a deep sigh.

“You’re leaving just like that? Then what’s your answer to my proposal?”

Despite the relaxed tone of the man sitting across from me, I ignored him, turned away, and left the café.

If you’re going to get angry, then go ahead.

I’m already staring death in the face. There’s nothing left for me to fear.

‘How long will Kang Changho’s admirable sense of ethics last?’

Leaving the unpleasant coffee shop behind, I pulled out my phone and began searching for available spaces in a charnel house.

Since it looked as though I might die soon, I might as well reserve a place in advance.

***

After Kim Kiryeo left, Kang Changho also stepped out of the café and stretched lightly.

It had been a long time since he had tasted coffee from that particular chain.

‘It really has been a while since I’ve visited a place like this.’

At times like these, he could not help but envy F-Class hunters.

Waiters did not tremble and drop his change. People nearby did not faint simply because he relaxed his control for a moment.

Was that why the hunter went around concealing his awakening rank?

“Ha.”

As Kang Changho reflected on their earlier conversation, a quiet laugh escaped him.

It was genuinely amusing.

Kim Kiryeo had calmly endured the pressure of an S-Class while stubbornly maintaining the guise of a low-ranking awakened person.

‘And not merely low-ranking, either. The lowest of the low—F-Class.’

A genuine F-Class hunter would at least have pretended to consider his earlier proposal.

Even if they feared an S-Class, they would never have dared to dismiss him so openly.

But Kim Kiryeo?

He had rejected the offer outright, without the slightest hesitation.

‘He truly has no fear.’

Kang Changho continued down the street, absorbed in thought.

To begin with, Kim Kiryeo unquestionably met the requirements for someone considered strong enough to qualify for ‘Improvement.’

The problem was...

If anything, he seemed to exceed those requirements by far too much.

‘He killed Grid, so he must be at least A-rank. But is that really the extent of it?’

Kang Changho silently replayed the man’s final actions in his mind.

—Whew...

—You’re leaving just like that?

The hunter, whose eyes resembled the stark branches of a withered birch, had answered his question like this.

—......

He had merely cast Kang Changho a dry glance, as though the question were not worth answering.

From that gaze alone, Kang Changho had realized something.

That man believed he could handle even an S-Class.

Otherwise, he would never have behaved with such arrogance.

Yes. It would certainly be troublesome if someone possessing ‘Improvement’ began pursuing him.

“Hmm.”

The more Kang Changho speculated, the more elusive the truth became.

What was Kim Kiryeo’s real rank?

‘He defeated Grid, yet he was also abducted by a group of nobodies.’

Was he above the threshold required for ‘Improvement’?

Or below it?

Perhaps he was an S-Class.

‘No. Surely that can’t be the case.’

Kang Changho decided, nevertheless, to consider the possibility that the other man might be stronger than he was.

***

How many days had passed since then?

“The repairs are finished already?”

I was inside the temporary shelter tent.

While making a meal out of baked eggs, I received good news for the first time in quite a while.

The repairs to the studio apartment building were finally complete.

It had taken less than a month to restore a building that had been split cleanly in two.

Earth’s magicians were quite capable indeed.

“Then I’ll move back in tomorrow. Yes! Please let me return, Elder Landlord.”

After ending the call, I quietly began sorting through my belongings.

Then a thought suddenly occurred to me.

‘In the end, nothing happened.’

An entire week had already passed since I rejected the S-Class hunter’s offer.

I had expected him to attack almost immediately, yet the past week had been completely peaceful.

But that silence did not make me happy.

Even now, Kang Changho was probably continuing to watch me.

‘It’s the calm before the storm.’

More frightening still was the fact that I had no idea how he was monitoring me.

First of all, it could not be a tracking skill like Seonwoo Yeon’s. The conditions affecting the target were unknown.

But if that was not the answer, then the situation became truly strange.

No matter how much weaker I had become, there was no chance I would fail to detect even the slightest trace left by a primitive magician.

‘I can’t sense Kang Changho’s magic anywhere nearby. And it isn’t only now. It has always been like this.’

If he was not approaching me in person, was he using some kind of device?

Listening devices.

Location trackers.

Surveillance cameras.

Several possibilities passed through Kim Kiryeo’s mind, but I shook my head.

“If he’d attached something like that to me, I would have found it by now.”

That left only two possibilities.

First, he was using some form of Earth technology unknown to me.

Second, the answer lay in the “Dragon’s Eye.”

“Hmm.”

Personally, I was leaning toward the latter.

Looking back on my first encounter with Kang Changho, there had been several clues pointing in that direction.

‘He must be “seeing” something through Kim Kiryeo’s body. That’s how he keeps determining my location.’

If that hypothesis was correct, then perhaps the invasion of privacy was not as severe as I had feared.

If he could determine my location only by observing me with his own eyes, then he was probably standing on top of some tall building at this very moment.

“Dragon’s Eye.”

Fold.

I struggled to fold one of my spare shirts.

“If only I could deceive it...”

For some reason, Kang Changho was hesitating to activate ‘Improvement.’

And I happened to know a useful spell for escaping pursuit.

Wasn’t this the perfect opportunity?

‘That settles it. I should run away!’

Having made my decision, I clenched my fist.

I would escape while the man with ‘Improvement’ still had his guard down.

There was, however, one major problem with that plan.

“Ah.”

Damn it.

Come to think of it, I had no magic booster left.

“Now my bones are starting to hurt again.”

Well, I had been drinking it every day without fail. It was only natural that I would eventually run out.

‘I suppose it can’t be helped.’

Still, there was no need to worry too much.

I had surplus supplies of most of the ingredients. There were probably only one or two that needed to be freshly harvested.

Unfortunately, one of them appeared to have gone extinct.

“What is this?”

My voice rose involuntarily.

The shocking result appeared when I searched for information through the Hunter Association app.

Every important gate used in potion production had already been cleared and had disappeared.

‘No! The medicine can’t be completed without a [Killer Bee’s Nest]...’

My heart sank.

However, the moment I changed the region setting to “All” and searched again, the information I needed appeared.

Phew.

‘What the hell? I panicked for nothing.’

The gates had disappeared from Seoul, but killer bee nests apparently remained in other regions.

Let’s see.

Where exactly were they?

‘Hadong-gun, Gyeongsangnam-do, and Gumi-si, Gyeongsangbuk-do. One in each location?’

Neither place was familiar to me.

Well, wouldn’t every place on Earth seem unfamiliar to an alien?

“Hadong... Hadong.”

For some reason, the name Hadong-gun stirred something in my memory.

‘I’m sure I’ve seen the word Hadong somewhere before. While I was searching for something...’

Even after thinking about it for a while, however, I could not recall where I had seen it.

In the end, I dismissed the feeling of déjà vu and continued packing my bag.

If I could not remember it clearly, it had probably been nothing more than some pointless browsing on the internet.

***

On the way back to Kim Kiryeo’s studio apartment.

Blink. Blink.

The traffic light flashed yellow.

‘I’ll cross when the signal changes again.’

I stopped without hesitation.

F-Class hunters were so fragile that they could easily die, which made exercising caution around cars absolutely essential.

“......”

As I waited for the light to change, a familiar face entered my field of vision.

“Hmm?”

Straight black hair falling all the way to her waist.

And that distinctive, immaculate outfit.

There was no mistaking her now.

‘Seonwoo Yeon.’

The Association employee.

Without thinking, I followed the Earthling with my gaze.

Then I noticed her behaving somewhat strangely.

On the opposite side of the intersection, she stood with both arms full of packages.

‘Ah.’

Seonwoo Yeon said something to the elderly woman standing beside her.

The woman nodded in response.

Seonwoo Yeon immediately bent her knees and allowed the elderly woman to climb onto her back.

What followed was, naturally, exactly what one would expect.

“I’m sorry. We should have repaired this sooner, but with the entire road dug up, it must be terribly inconvenient for you, isn’t it?”