Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Justice

"So. There's no reason to tell you that. Yes?"

[Hey! Who are you to talk like that! Do you know who I am!]

"Whoever you are, ahjussi, what does it matter. If you're going to talk nonsense, I'm hanging up."

Right now I was handling the contacts coming into Saebit Guild without a break. Do that, and now and then a problem customer appears like this.

-Ring ring.

"Hello. Saebit Guild Team 1 Director Lee Si-u."

If you simply use the title manager, there are guys who look down on you for no reason. So, with Lee Mi-seon's agreement, I was calling myself director.

In fact, the work is the same.

[Deungcheon Guild Hunter Support Team, Team Leader Kim Chang-hun.]

"What business do you have calling?"

I furrowed my brow and asked the person beyond the phone, bluntly.

A same-year hire from when I belonged to Deungcheon Guild, and a guy who picked fights over every little thing, so there was no way I had good feelings.

[What. You moved to Saebit Guild? Anyway, a guy with luck disgustingly good.]

"What did you say?"

I don't endure like a sucker anymore. The me who used to take it quietly is gone. So, answering Kim Chang-hun with a sharp remark, then.

"Si-u. I'll take it."

At the request of Lee Mi-seon, guild master and employer, I quietly handed over the receiver. Even if I hold an EX-rank skill, the one who pays is the senior party.

I have to eat too.

"Saebit Guild Master Lee Mi-seon."

The distance was a little far, so normally you couldn't hear the call. But I'm a hunter. Even a supporter post, I'm not an ordinary person, so I could hear well enough.

[Ah, yes. Deungcheon Guild Hunter Support Team, Team Leader Kim Chang-hun. I contacted you to request cooperation related to Hunter Kim Eun-ji, who killed the demon.]

Certainly a clean way of speaking, enough to hold a team leader post. His reputation inside the company was good except toward me, so it might be natural.

"I'll refuse. To cooperate with Hunter Kim Eun-ji, close coordination with Director Lee Si-u is needed, and Deungcheon Guild can't do that, can it?"

[Ah... could I adjust that part separately with the director?]

"No? I said I'm refusing. Do you not understand me?"

I opened my eyes round and looked at Lee Mi-seon. What is our guild master. Why is she covering for me like this?

Meeting eyes, Lee Mi-seon gave a small wink, and I could only be moved.

Had there been anyone in my life who looked out for me like this.

[Don't be like that. Director Lee Si-u and I were same-year hires at Deungcheon Guild, so we got along quite well.]

"I know that's not true, so don't be a bother. I'm hanging up."

[Just a moment...!]

-Click.

Lee Mi-seon, setting down the receiver, met my eyes. Her face was pleased, as if saying I did well, right?

"Heh heh. Thank you, Guild Master. I feel so refreshed."

"For Si-u, Saebit Guild's top force, this much is easy. I've never seen someone perform like this on their first day."

Only a day since I joined, and she looks after me this much, so loyalty wells up for no reason. Then, answering the inquiries pouring in, the sun began to rise beyond the window.

-Ring ring!

"Shall we pull the phone line?"

The two of us had taken calls all night, but there was no sign it would be resolved. And Lee Mi-seon looked at me with a pitiful gaze.

"It feels like work might come in for the first time in a while?"

She had quit the Association holding a shining dream and made a guild anew. But reality was harsh, and days of going hungry continued day after day. Then today, at last, contacts seeking Saebit Guild had flooded in.

As guild master, she would want to take every call. But.

"We're short on hands, and we can't accept every inquiry anyway. When Eun-ji wakes, we have to ask what conditions she prefers too."

"That's true..."

I didn't bother say that I was tired and wanted to leave. Then, with the guild master's permission, I pulled the phone line and stretched. Ow. Tired.

"Ngh. Shall we leave now? It's the weekend, so sleep well and handle the rest Monday."

"Thank you for helping. If it weren't for you, Si-u, I'd still be stuck to the phone."

"That's why you hire staff."

If the boss does all the work alone, why would staff be needed. I had said an obvious fact, and yet Lee Mi-seon's expression changed strangely.

"What? Something on my face?"

Stuck to the phone all night, I wouldn't know if something was on my face. I rubbed my face and headed for the mirror set on one side of the office.

"No. Nothing's on it, I've just never met someone who talks like you, Si-u. Everyone slacked off and snuck out early."

"There are people like that. There are more who aren't."

"Huht. Is that so? It's my first time seeing one. Let's go out first."

-Creak.

Opening the rusted door, poorly maintained, and coming outside, bright sunlight greeted us.

"If this goes well, we can move the office somewhere better too, right? My dream is to build a bigger headquarters across from the Hunter Association!"

"Mine is Saebit Guild growing bigger than Deungcheon."

I wanted to do better than the guys who had ignored and despised me. Someone might curse me as petty, but that was my honest heart.

At least I didn't want to keep grinning like before. I want to return as much as I received.

"Good. Shall we make our first goal Deungcheon Guild?"

Lee Mi-seon wore a surprised face for a moment, then smiled and pointed at the sky with a finger.

"Let's go! The goal is Deungcheon!"

Watching her lively figure, a smile formed at my mouth. An everyday life that had been the worst until not long ago was, before I knew it, turning into days full of smiles.

"I'm this way."

Then, at the fork, about to head each to our own home. An alarm sounded from Lee Mi-seon's phone.

Everyone has a private life, so I meant to pretend not to notice and head home, but.

"Yes?! Of course! It's possible now...?"

Turning my back at a strange unease, Lee Mi-seon was looking at me with a pitiful face. When do I get off work?

-Tuk.

Lee Mi-seon, putting the phone in her bag, approached me with her brow furrowed, as if sorry. I looked at her and let out a shallow sigh.

"Si-u. I'm really sorry. They say they want to book Eun-ji and you as substitutes on <​I Am a Hunter> today?"

<​I Am a Hunter>. A national broadcast hosted by Park Jin-ho, who turned from hunter to celebrity. In times like these, a 30% rating and five million Nutube views are the baseline it hits.

A dream program any new hunter or celebrity wants to go on.

A place like that, of course you go.

"Originally Hunter Kim Seol-yeon was set, but they say she canceled today over a condition slump."

And a substitute for Kim Seol-yeon, at that.

"I'll wake Eun-ji and go right away."

"But Eun-ji is a total klutz at that sort of thing, so help her well from the side, Si-u."

"I've been on a few times, so I'm used to it. Don't worry."

In fact, when Kim Seol-yeon was rising fast, I had gone on with her. A couple's hunter awakening in an extreme situation. The interest from that had once made the whole country noisy.

A story that doesn't matter now.

"Oh. Eun-ji. Are you up? Yes. A booking for <​I Am a Hunter> came in, so we have to go right now. Huh? But Si-u already left for your lodging? Yes. Got it."

The moment I said I would, Lee Mi-seon called Kim Eun-ji, then put the phone in her bag with a strange expression.

"At first she said she wouldn't go, but when I said she'd go with you, Si-u, she said all right?"

"Wouldn't it be that she doesn't want to be a bother even to me?"

"Hmm..."

Pushing the room full of my photos, seen at the lodging, to one side of memory, I played dumb. Even so, I needed preparation too to accept the sight of that room right now.

"I'll be off, then."

"I'm sorry. Still, I'll make it up as much as I can with a performance bonus...!"

"I'll look forward to it."

Then I headed for the lodging. As Kim Seol-yeon's substitute. To appear on TV with Kim Eun-ji.

**

"They killed a demon?"

World rank 1. America's guardian. An unbending conviction. Justice. A handsome man with dark gray hair swept neatly back furrowed his brow and glared at his secretary.

"I held off because they said not to announce it officially yet, and that got taken?"

At the earnest request of the American government, he had set aside for a while the honor of the world's first demon subjugation. And suddenly a small country in the East had snatched it.

A vein popped on Justice's forehead, and a storm of intense mana began to sweep the surroundings.

-Kwoooo.

Then a man in his twenties, barely holding his center against the mana storm, shouted with all his strength.

"W-we tried to handle it as best we could too...!"

"Your best! You worked hard! Don't say things like that, and handle it! Well! On your own!"

The man who had been reporting to Justice was trembling, unable to control his body. Unlike the public assessment, Justice regards a human life as an insect's.

The man knew that fact better than anyone.

"I'm sorry. Forgive me just once..."

Toward the man bowing his head, cold sweat running, Justice's hand was about to rise, when.

-Ding.

An alarm sounded from Justice's phone.

"Hm?"

Rolling his eyes and turning his gaze to the phone, Justice then loosened his expression. A rather interesting text had arrived.

"The demon matter is done. Lee Si-u, was it? This man."

Justice lifted the phone and showed the man the screen. There was an East Asian man with a kind impression.

"Yes. Shall I bring him here?"

"Yeah. He holds an EX-rank skill? If it's a lie, I'll have to kill him."

"Yes."

Justice's skill rank is SS. He does not forgive there being a grade above his own.

"Even if it's real, he's scheduled to die."

Watching the handsome man with gray hair singing to himself, the white man muttered curses inside.

'Crazy bastard.'

A guy like this, the world's strongest hunter guarding America. Something is wrong. With that thought, the man quietly bowed his head.

Submitting to the strong is a fact that does not change, regardless of the era.