Chapter 187

"What? Leave the guild? Why, out of nowhere?"

The words came out before I could help it. Inho dropped his eyes to the floor and answered in a voice that barely made it out.

"It's just… I don't have the confidence to keep living as a hunter anymore."

I was thrown.

Anyone else, sure — but Inho?

He'd been the one who was more grateful than anyone for the chance to live as an Awakened again.

The stubborn bastard who'd fitted a metal prosthetic, gritted his teeth through phantom pains that felt like the arm was ripping off and through muscle spasms, and been the first of them to power through that horrific rehab.

I'd only let him go along with the kids on today's gate run because he'd asked for it so hard.

And a man like that was suddenly saying he wanted out.

Something about his manner struck me as off in an instant.

"Inho."

He was still avoiding my eyes.

"Inho. Look at me."

At the firm summons, he finally lifted his head a little.

The brown eyes — usually shining, packed to the brim with drive and energy — were shaking helplessly now, as if an earthquake were going off inside them.

"I got the gist from the kids. They said you ran into some old teammates in front of the gate — did something happen there?"

Under my questioning, the muscles of Inho's face twisted, and his trembling lips parted.

"I… I…!"

Unable to force out the words, breath coming ragged, he suddenly dropped his head deep.

"I'm sorry, Deputy Guild Master!"

"Inho—!"

Leaving that one line behind, he took off down the corridor as if he were running for his life.

"Haah… honestly, what on earth is going on."

If he really wanted to leave the guild, I'd send him off gladly — but the look I'd caught in his eyes at the end weighed on me the whole time.

That wasn't the look of a man who'd lost his will.

It was the face of a man crushed under extreme guilt and pain, as if something were hunting him — a face in horrific agony.

I'd better dig into this properly.

I pulled the device from my coat and started firing off a message to Number One right away.

After that big fight with Cha Yul, the little ones' routines took a turn.

Suho and the twins started refusing to go back to their own rooms.

"If your eyes hurt, Director, I've got to be right here to fix them!"

Suho at least had his ability as an excuse — but what on earth had gotten into the twins?

"We'll stay right next to you!"

"Yeah! If Yul-oppa cometh in, we'll chashe him out!"

By day they'd hang around the Director's office and play, and once training was done and the sun went down, they'd come storming in dragging pillows and blankets nearly as big as they were.

"Direektuh! Sleep togetheh!"

"Me too!"

However many times I told them to head back to their own room, they wouldn't budge.

"No way! Not the Sunshine Room! We're sleeping with the Direektuh!"

"Yeah!"

Puffing out their round cheeks and shaking their heads no-no-no, they'd dive under the blankets they'd brought and burrow out of sight.

Faced with that adorable protest, I couldn't bring myself to push them out.

I couldn't put them on the floor, so in the end we compromised: all of us piled into the wide king-size bed together.

Except that turned my sleep schedule completely inside out.

I'd carefully lay the little ones on the safe inside and take the edge of the bed for myself, but by morning the situation was always different.

Ngh, can't breathe…

Both my ribs, and — however they'd managed to climb up there — my neck too, would end up with them stuck on like burrs, and I'd lost count of how many times I woke up before dawn.

By now, though, I'd fully adapted to the weight.

The problem was, this burr-mode wasn't just plain clinginess.

If Cha Yul's shadow so much as brushed past, the little ones would grip my clothes tight and huff, openly.

Since that fight, the rift between the little ones and Cha Yul had clearly cracked open pretty deep.

Hold on, I was the one who fought with him — why are you the ones huffing?

Baffled and gut-twisted at once — even the mood between the kids was in knots now.

Thankfully, Sea-ah and Sihyeok were the same as ever, but Cha Yul — who'd actually caused the whole mess — refused to exchange a single word with me.

"Haah…"

Replaying the memory of Cha Yul's back turning on me — how many times now — I sank into the sofa and let out a long sigh.

Bwoong—.

At that moment, warm mana seeped in around my eyes.

"Director, do your eyes hurt a lot?"

Smiling gently, I carefully took Suho's small hand — mana still humming through it — in mine.

"No, Suho, my eyes aren't bothering me — you don't need to use your ability."

"But your face looks so bad."

At the near-tears note in Suho's voice, the twins — who'd been drawing next to him — snapped their heads up in alarm and came piling over.

"Direektuh, doesh it hurt somewhere?"

"Pleashe don't be sick—"

Tiny hands started patting frantically over my face and arms.

Faintly smiling, I gathered the little ones into a tight hug.

"No — I'm really not hurting. I'm just a little tired."

That wasn't a lie.

More than my body, my head was worn out.

Holding the small bodies wriggling into me tight, I leaned into their warmth and let it quietly comfort me.

Hugging the kids and steadying my breath — before I knew it, their training time had come around.

"Have a good session, and don't get hurt."

Once I'd seen the kids off, I sank into the sofa alone and stewed.

If I can patch things up with Yul soon, the little ones will settle back down too. And on top of that, Inho's a whole other worry…

As for Inho, who wanted to leave the guild, I'd barely managed to hang on to him by pulling out the year-long employment terms he'd signed on to. But that was a stopgap and nothing more.

Ugh… nothing's coming loose, and everything's just tangling up worse.

Just as I was starting to slide into helplessness —

Slap! Slap!

I slapped both cheeks hard and forced myself back into gear, then shot up off the sofa and headed for the desk.

Do something! Sitting here isn't going to solve anything.

I pulled out my notebook and started listing the headaches I had to deal with, one at a time.

[To-do]

1. Patching things up with Cha Yul

→ Wait until he cools off.

2. Julia Morgan's naturalization pitch

→ Look into Veritas Guild. (Ask Han Jewoon!)

3. Chae Junhyeok's awakening ability

→ How the hell do I use it…? I've got to practice, but I don't know the method OR the ability.

4. Inho

→ Look into what happened with his old teammates.

5. Getting a refined Chaos Mana Stone for the kids

→ ….

"…Why is my to-do list a mountain?"

A groan slipped out just looking at the crowded page, but I gathered myself back up.

Don't overthink it. Just knock them out one at a time, starting with what I can actually do.

For a start, 2 and 5 were out of reach for the moment.

Han Jewoon had gone straight into another gate raid right after our meeting — until he came back out, there was no way to ask him anything.

Item 4, Inho, also needed patience.

I'd already quietly asked Number One to look into it.

I'll have to buy Number One something really good later on…

That left 1 (Cha Yul) and 3 (my ability).

Number 1 was hands-down the most urgent.

Honestly, I have no idea what to do.

For someone whose only experience was with kindergarteners, getting inside a ten-year-old boy's head wasn't easy.

Whatever — just have to face him and see.

I tore the page into tiny scraps to destroy the evidence, steeled myself, and left the Director's office.

"How's training going, everyone?"

Every one of the kids at their drills turned to look at me as one.

Cha Yul was among them.

Red eyes that had gone cold and heavy.

After a beat of silence, Cha Yul turned his head away without a word.

I swallowed a small sigh and moved carefully toward Cha Yul, who was trying to slip out.

"Can we talk for a minute."

Cha Yul's step hitched.

I kept my voice steady, aiming it at the stiff, small back in front of me.

"I know why you're worried. I still can't even use my ability — I'm only half of what I should be, so of course you don't trust me to hold up."

"…"

"But if I train and get my ability working, I can go into gates with you, right? I can protect—"

That was when.

"That's exactly what I'm not okay with!!!"

Cha Yul spun on his heel, rough, and shouted with the force of a thunderclap.

…!

The kid was always aloof, always grown-up — it was the first time I'd seen him blow up like this. I sucked in a startled breath.

"How many times do I have to tell you I don't need your protection! Do you even know how many times you've been hurt already?!"

Cha Yul's voice, thick with fury, came out trembling in short bursts.

His clenched fists had gone bone-white, and around his reddened eyes, every ounce of the fear he'd been holding back was written plain.

"You scrape together some half-baked ability and step up again — then what?! What if you almost die again?! What if you collapse right in front of me?!"

That wasn't anger.

That was the raw terror of someone shoved to the edge of a cliff, watching something precious about to slip away.

Watching him teetering there, I realized it all over again.

Cha Yul was still just a ten-year-old.

Between his role as the original's protagonist and how composed he usually was, I'd forgotten — but this kid was in a bad place, gnawed at by the fear that his guardian might get hurt again.

Pressing a hand to my aching chest, I forced my voice gentle.

"But I want to protect you, too."

At the honesty of it, Cha Yul bit down on his lower lip.

After a breath of silence, the kid glared at me with venomous eyes and declared:

"If you want to protect us that badly, prove you've gotten strong. Show me you can pull your own weight, and I'll stop trying to stop you."

"How am I supposed to prove that?"

"Beat me."

"…What?"

"Beat me, and then I'll accept it."

An impossible condition.

Beat the original's protagonist, an A-rank prodigy Awakened?

I could die a hundred times and come back to life, and I still wouldn't graze the hem of his shirt.

But.

If this is what it takes to give the kid some faith in me, so be it.

I clenched my fists and nodded.

"…All right. I'll figure out what my ability is, and I'll beat you."

At my declaration, the kids around us cried out, aghast.

"Direektuh, no! Oppa's shuper shtwong!"

"Right! Director, don't push yourself!"

Stroking the little ones tugging at my pant legs, I put on a brave laugh.

"It's okay. I had to get stronger sooner or later anyway. In return, you've all got to help me out — deal?"

From that day on, one more crucial goal was added to my routine.

Namely: [Find my ability, get stronger].

Sitting down in the training hall, I walked back through the memory, slow.

The possession inside Sea-ah's illusion, prying the gem off Oh Taejin — those might all have been coincidences.

But there was exactly one thing, driven deep into my head — a clear, unmistakable sensation.

That explosion, that day. Something felt like it shot straight out of my body. Which means the odds are highest that my ability is explosions.

For the time being, I decided my ability was explosions and set out to trigger one somehow.

Now let's see — how did Cha Yul do it when he used his ability?

Right, he always shouted the technique name at the top of his lungs.

I stood in the middle of the training hall, planted my feet apart, and thrust both hands out.

"Blow! Explosion!"

"…"

Dust rolling across an empty training hall.

In the cold silence, both my arms hung there in midair, awkward, with nowhere to go.

"…Direektuh."

"What are you doin' talkin' to the air…?"

The little ones watching stared up at me with round, round eyes.

Just as heat was climbing up my face and I was hunting for a hole to crawl into, a tongue clicked behind me.

"Tsk, tsk. Most Awakened, from the moment they awaken, know instinctively what their ability is and how to use it…"

Teacher Kim Sunja's brutal factual drive-by left me stone silent.

"Well… what's to be done. Since you haven't got the faintest instinct for it, I've no choice but to teach you the long way round. Come with me."

She led me over to a corner of the training hall and sat me down cross-legged.

"First things first — you have to feel the flow of your mana. There should be something moving along your veins. Close your eyes and put yourself wholly into that flow."

Following her instructions, I closed my eyes and dropped into meditation.

Teacher Kim Sunja sat down behind me and began pushing her own mana into my body.

For the first few days, nothing much happened beyond my back warming up like I was sitting by a heater.

But after about a week of stubbornly repeating the mana infusions —

Thump—.

Huh…?

Something alien stirred inside my quiet veins.

A strange sensation, like carbonated bubbles fizzing up through my bloodstream.

!

I put every nerve I had into not letting that faint stirring get away.

Pulling that strange sensation drifting around inside me together, I pushed it out through both hands, holding one word alone in my head with everything I had — explosion.

Blow. Please, blow…!

At that exact instant, something that had been quietly coiled in my belly rushed heat through my whole body and shot out through my fingertips.

Pop—!

Along with a flash of light, a crisp burst rang through the training hall.

About the power of a firecracker, leaving a shallow scorch mark on the dummy's chest at best — but this was, unmistakably, the first explosion I'd produced by my own will.

"Whoa…"

I stared dumbly down at my two hands.

Chae Junhyeok… really was an Awakened. And an explosion user, no less…!

"Whoooaaa! Direektuh, sho cool!!"

"That was an explosion, right?! It went bang for real!"

The little ones, who'd been watching quietly from a distance, jumped up and down, cheering.

Only then did my dazed head clear, and a giddy joy came surging up through my chest like a tidal wave.

I did it! I finally know what my real ability is!

I was no longer a useless non-Awakened.

The thought that I could finally protect these kids with my own strength swelled inside me like I'd been handed the whole world.

Thanks to the kids, who celebrated my first ability like it was theirs, it was a rare, perfectly happy day.

…At least, until the horrific pain came, that night.