“You little bastard, always using that crooked foreign talk… Better to die than to suffer. That’s a Korean proverb.”
The brat, calm as ever all by himself, irritated him. So he meant he belonged among monsters like that, did he?
Even in a situation where he wasn’t using any power at all, he always made you feel the difference in class like this. Miserably.
‘But listen here. No matter how much of a monster you are, you missed something, you bastard.’
There were more than a hundred mannequins planted throughout the resort. That meant it would be difficult for Serhi to check every single one of them.
Na Ohyeong had taken advantage of that opening and planted one of his eyes in a mannequin.
He couldn’t control it completely, and could only put a suggestion on it so that it would listen to him, but that was enough.
Seeing the brat calmly playing games, it seemed he still hadn’t noticed.
‘I wonder if he knows it’s darkest under the lamp.’
If he could seize the chance and recover one decent item, it would be a profitable trade.
He had prepared the mannequin so that it could search for a high-grade item.
Whether it was an auction item, or an item belonging to one of those many Hunters. Anything was fine, as long as it could add to his strength.
‘I’ll kill him. That blond bastard.’
He couldn’t forget the expression he had worn, as if he were catching a rat. Had there ever been a time since his reawakening when he had been so humiliated?
‘I’ll have to teach this little bastard a lesson someday, too.’
If things went well today, he might be able to teach this young brat some adult discipline as well.
Just then, one of the mannequins stopped beside a noisy group.
It peered around as if checking something in front of a small child, then headed toward a quiet terrace.
Soon, the mannequin’s voice came through his earpiece.
—I have discovered an unmeasurable item.
Na Ohyeong watched Serhi’s reaction as he checked the mannequin’s vision. What the mannequin had confirmed was a platinum-blond little girl.
*
The special lenses fitted into Serhi’s mannequins were a Gnosis specialty made to detect items.
It was only moments ago that something strange had appeared in his field of vision.
If it was a high-grade item, it would be somewhere among the upper-rank Hunters, so he had moved toward the place where mana was condensed.
In his vision, he saw a child being held by an old man.
And “it” was inside the child’s bag.
An item that registered no information whatsoever in lenses that should have been linked to data on nearly every item currently in existence.
He could not identify it, but this was a result worth reporting.
The mannequin stepped out onto the terrace to contact its master.
“I have discovered an unmeasurable item.”
And as it waited for a reply—
For an instant, hazy smoke obscured its vision.
“…?”
A man had appeared on the terrace, where there had clearly been no one before.
The man had one hand in his pocket as he drew on a cigarette. When he exhaled, smoke billowed thickly through the air.
With slow, unhurried movements, the suit tailored perfectly to his body shifted like flowing water.
A danger signal rang out. To the mannequin, the man looked like a beast dressed in a suit.
Suddenly, the man let out a low laugh. Beneath his cold, sunken black eyes, the tear mole briefly drew the gaze.
“You look surprised.”
“Wh-when did you…”
The man, standing with his back against the terrace railing, curved his eyes gently as he looked at the mannequin’s tense face.
“Who’s that?”
He tapped his ear and indicated the in-ear device.
“It wouldn’t be the host.”
“…”
“You’re slow to answer.”
He took his hand out of his pocket and checked his watch.
The mannequin, seeing the glove on his left hand, had a premonition of nightmare and bit its lip.
Its whole body stiffened as if caught in his gaze, unable to move.
The man approached in a single step, cigarette held between his long fingers, and placed his palm on the mannequin’s head.
Thud!
The mannequin collapsed straight to the floor.
Jurim turned the fallen body over with his foot and tilted his head.
No matter how much he searched through its head, it was empty.
“Hmm…”
A mannequin that looked exactly like a human.
Jurim picked up the earpiece, seeming rather intrigued. If he couldn’t find any traces from the mannequin, he intended to find the owner of the mannequin connected to the earpiece.
But there was only silence beyond the earpiece. It seemed the connection had been cut the moment the mannequin broke.
When Jurim clenched his fist, the earpiece scattered into dust.
‘An unmeasurable item, huh…’
The place where the mannequin’s gaze had last landed. There were Hyeonak’s raid team and Geuru.
Jurim was briefly lost in thought.
Then a notification appeared on the watch on his wrist.
[Gidan: Hyung, when are you coming?]
[Gidan: Geuru’s here too, you know?]
It was a message from Gidan.
The first time he had received contact from Gidan was two hours ago.
He had said this resort was strange. No matter how he looked at it, there were things all over the place that weren’t human, but the other team members didn’t seem to sense them.
Normally, he would have ignored it, but at the words that even these upper-rankers couldn’t sense them, Jurim had no choice but to move.
And after seeing them himself, he understood.
With this level of craftsmanship, it was only natural they couldn’t sense them.
‘At this point, they’re practically human.’
They had even implemented emotions. Mannequins that acted as if they were truly people.
Gidan and he only managed to detect something off because they possessed super senses.
Jurim had been watching from concealment, wondering what the mannequins’ purpose was, and whether they might be after Malikian’s byproduct.
‘But to think Geuru would have come here…’
Jurim’s lips curved as he thought of the little troublemaker.
She had said she was going to play with a friend, and yet she had come to the auction house. And not only that, she had come with his father.
As expected of his daughter, she knew exactly how to land the strongest blow on him.
Jurim drew on his cigarette.
Along with the smoke, On Suhyeong’s words defending him from Gu Sinhu faded away.
He thought of the mudskipper and let out a small laugh.
Jurim’s gaze shifted briefly toward On Suhyeong.
On Suhyeong was holding the child’s hand and moving toward the opposite terrace, where there were fewer people.
Jurim slowly took a step in the direction they had gone.
As soon as he entered the banquet hall, gazes rushed toward him.
“Jurim hyung!”
“Guildmaster!”
The raid team approached first, and the murmuring of those who had spotted Jurim grew louder.
Gu Sinhu inhaled, looking at Jurim with startled eyes.
“…Guildmaster On Jurim.”
At Gu Sinhu’s call, Jurim smoothly lifted the corners of his lips and replied in an unprecedentedly affectionate voice.
“Yes, Sinhu.”
Gu Sinhu’s face instantly stiffened.
A pfft of laughter burst out from the raid team.
Gu Sinhu stepped close to Jurim and spoke through gritted teeth in a whisper.
“Guildmaster On, what kind of manners are these, with all your decency thrown out?”
As he said, there was a seven-year age gap between them. Even if they had been close friends—which they were not—it was an insolence that could not be tolerated.
At that, Jurim also lowered his head and spoke by his ear.
“Sinhu. I don’t care what you go around saying behind my back, but mind your manners in front of my daughter. You wouldn’t want to see me lose mine in front of your daughter, would you?”
Instead of saying, Aren’t you already being plenty rude right now, Gu Sinhu wet his lips.
It was true that, in a brief fit of anger, he had crossed a line. But Jurim’s reaction was quite unexpected.
He wasn’t originally like this. From the moment he brought a child along, Gu Sinhu had thought it unlike Jurim, but this was even more…
“Are you serious?”
Gu Sinhu asked with the meaning of, Have you really become attached to the child you adopted? Jurim laughed aloud as if he had heard an amusing question.
“I know. On Jurim has gone crazy over his daughter, hasn’t he? So who knows what I might do because I want to keep my daughter’s spirits up. Even I don’t really know myself.”
Having warned him as if giving kind advice, Jurim turned his head and stroked Gu Huiyeon’s hair. Then he patted Gu Sinhu on the shoulder, whose face was twisting.
“Then, Sinhu, I’m a bit busy right now, so let’s talk next time.”
With that, Jurim headed toward the terrace where On Suhyeong and Geuru had gone.