“Name, Ji Suyeon. Age, seventeen. According to internal Hunter Alliance HUMINT, she took the Awakened test at the Alliance one month ago.”
“Hmm….”
“At the time, she failed to register as a hunter because she could not verify her combat capability. There is a record that she claimed in an on-site interview to have awakened as the blacksmith class.”
A mana barrier ring that functions crudely, at best.
Securing quantity through tower farming would be impossible.
As expected, it was the work of a blacksmith Awakened.
‘By the way, she awakened just a month ago?’
Two Awakened blacksmiths had appeared at the same time, when none had emerged for thirty years.
I can’t rule out the possibility of other cases besides Ji Suyeon and me either.
“And she was reported missing the day after Friedwen’s announcement. Apparently, the orphanage did not file a separate report.”
“An orphan and a kidnapping victim—quite an eventful life.”
“Currently, Ji Suyeon's residence is an officetel two hundred meters from the market. Naturally, she is in a semi-confined state, but the surveillance is not particularly strict.”
That was how Lee Minyeong’s briefing concluded.
Lee Minyeong, who had briefly shown her professional side, immediately scrunched up her face.
“I looked into her just in case... No, how could this be? Does she have no human heart?”
“I knew it, Awakened are all just fucking bastards.”
“…Am I a fucking bastard too?”
“You’re generally pretty fucking bad too, but… Haah, if everyone was at least on your level, the world would be at peace.”
Pyo Yeojeong shook her head and replied.
“So what are you going to do? Infiltrate an officetel in the middle of the city with special operatives to extract the girl?”
“Identifying Ji Suyeon was possible as part of intelligence gathering, but any operation beyond that is out of the question.”
Ji Suyeon’s dwelling was a one-room complex.
It was too much to ask a skilled agent to do something like this. Not only was it shameless, but if anyone were to witness the scene, it would be a catastrophe.
In the end, there was only one method.
“Shouldn’t we make her come out on her own?”
“On her own?”
“Representative, could you disable the CCTV near the convenience store for a while?”
“Vice Commander! I don’t know why you think we can do all of that!”
“So you can’t?”
“We can do it.”
***
Not long ago, when an awakening message had appeared in Ji Suyeon’s field of vision, she had considered it a blessing.
To settle her boring orphanage life.
To throw off her miserable poverty.
She had thought she would live as a hunter envied by all.
She never dreamed she would have to live through a hell worse than not awakening.
These past few days, Ji Suyeon’s days had flowed by similarly.
In the morning, she went out to the market and sold rings while singing.
When night fell, she made rings all day long.
She was called a blacksmith, but these were hands that had never even held a hammer. Naturally, she didn’t know how to make rings.
All she did was stuff mana into the tin-can rings that Gu Cheonhwan’s gang had brought in droves.
Half of them were defective, and the quality was uneven, but there was nothing she could do.
When her mana was depleted from making rings all night, she would collapse into catnaps.
The guards under the guise of protection ensured her fatigue never fully lifted.
At least she didn’t get beaten like when she was first brought here, and if she simply obeyed, they didn’t even swear at her—so she counted herself lucky.
Then, again, tomorrow’s day.
“One ring, please.”
At the order, Ji Suyeon snapped out of her thoughts.
A man with a solid build.
He was a customer who had visited steadily since the first day of business.
He was also the one who had gotten her hit by Gu Cheonhwan for no reason.
“Here you are.”
“Thank you.”
Whenever she handed him the ring, a credit card and a slip of paper always came with it.
The content was always similar.
Telling her to come out somewhere at a certain hour before dawn.
Saying he would rescue her, and so on.
She didn’t believe it.
Did he not remember the first day? They were clearly accomplices.
He was probably a person planted by Gu Cheonhwan to test her.
If she followed, she would be beaten up by burly men lying in wait.
From some point on, she didn’t even read the notes.
“Oh, did I give you the right card? I think I gave you a dual-purpose card; please check.”
“You gave me the right one.”
“It seemed like you weren’t checking.”
“I’m doing fine.”
“The light source is unchanged.”
“……What an unnecessary meddling. If you’ve bought it, go.”
Light source…!
To anyone listening, it would have been a contextless conversation, but she could understand the man’s meaning.
Ji Suyeon carefully put the paper note into her pocket.
While doing business and making new rings, all her mind was focused on the note.
Only when she finished all of today’s work and finally escaped the surveillance—
‘Where… where is it…!’
She rummaged through the trash can and collected all the notes.
She pieced together the torn papers and arranged them in the order she had received them for a long while.
The flow aligned.
[The barrier spread as if coating the skin—how did you do it?]
[I figured it out. You injected mana into a finished product. That’s normally impossible, but fascinating.]
[There’s a light source that plays the role of forming the barrier, right? The second one from the bottom, the slightly faint one. If you’re going to do this, you need to pour mana more sharply into that spot. Like injecting mana with a syringe? Right now, you’re projecting it blurred around the area, so it only rises above the skin.]
[I asked around, and they said it’s possible at first. Still, try to use your mana more consciously. The barrier ring uses a total of four light sources. Any more than that is excessive. I’ve attached the production diagram on the back.]
She skimmed the diagram. The mana flow that she had seen and felt was captured exactly as it was.
The mana she had only connected with instinctively was now organized systematically.
She realized with an indescribable thrill.
This man is real.
A blacksmith like herself, free enough to visit her every day…!
Ji Suyeon’s hands trembled as she read the rest of the note.
[If you’re curious how I know, come out of the officetel and turn right. First corner, turn left. Across from the kimchi jjim delivery restaurant is a convenience store. 4 AM. The watchers will all be asleep by then.]
[I’m out of time. The convenience store part-timer is giving me hella hints to leave.]
She checked the clock.
The current time was 2:40 AM.
Outside the window, two guards were smoking cigarettes.
Her heart would not easily calm.
She couldn’t sit still.
She paced around the room like a madwoman.
‘I have to meet him.’
That thought alone was firm.
But how.
What if the guards didn’t fall asleep?
She could only stamp her feet anxiously.
3:30 AM.
She turned off all the lights in the room and pretended to sleep.
She worried she might doze off, but it was an unnecessary worry.
Her heart pounded as if she had drunk plenty of coffee. She couldn’t fall asleep even if she wanted to.
4:10 AM.
She surveyed the outside through the window.
She couldn’t sense any sign of people.
If the man’s words were true, the watchers would be asleep at this hour, too.
She quietly opened the front door.
She moved her steps carefully, lest even the sound of her footsteps be heard.
The moment she tried to pass the management office with its lights on, a rough voice called out.
“Hey.”
“……!”
“Where are you going?”
“T-to the convenience store… I’m hungry….”
“Tch, I don’t need to follow you, right? If you run, you’re dead.”
“Yes, I understand.”
Was it divine intervention?
She had luckily escaped the surveillance.
It was brief, but an opportunity like no other.
Ji Suyeon hurried toward the convenience store as if running.
***
In the end, she was kicked out of the convenience store.
To be precise, she had moved to the outdoor table because loitering inside without buying anything had grown awkward.
“He’s late….”
At this rate, I’ll freeze to death.
Did he stand me up again today?
It seems Gu Cheonhwan’s gaslighting is stronger than I thought.
Don’t they call it learned helplessness?
“U-um… Excuse me, customer?”
At the time when I was worrying about what to write on the next note, someone called out to me.
It wasn’t the part-timer’s voice.
“Ji Suyeon?”
“Huh…! How do you know my name…?”
“That’s not important. Sit here.”
“Wha?”
For now, I had Ji Suyeon sit in front of me.
I had a lot to ask.
“About the ring. How did you make it? Did someone teach you?”
“No… They just showed me a video and told me to make the same ring. So I tinkered here and there….”
“And it just worked?”
“I-I’m not lying! I really felt the light source, just like the customer said… I made it purely by instinct.”
A hollow laugh escaped me from the very first answer.
She said she just made it by instinct.
Judging by the way she utilized the nodes, she handled mana crudely and clumsily.
But she had instinctively felt how the light source functioned?
Is that even possible?
It was no different from naturally interpreting the meaning of a writing system seen for the first time.
She was an incredible one, more than I thought.
“Did I do something wrong…?”
“No, not at all. Then, would you take a look at this?”
I showed her the dark iron I had trimmed into a cuboid in advance.
“How many nodes… no, light sources do you see?”
“Just a moment, um… I think about twenty.”
As she spoke, Ji Suyeon pointed to each spot with her fingertips.
They were the locations of the largest and clearest nodes.
“Then how do you think it would be if I connected these five here?”
“……It feels very ominous. I don’t know what it is, but I feel like I shouldn’t do it. It’s completely different from when I make rings.”
“Oh, that’s right. If I made it like this, it would become a bomb.”
The points I had just indicated were the core nodes used when making a self-destruct ring.
She hadn’t figured out that combining them would make a bomb, but she had sensed the aura of the resulting product.
I quietly opened the Gallery.
└Python: Can’t see many nodes and her mana handling is crude, but she instinctively understands the role of each node. What is this?
└└Chupgeibeum: That’s fascinating.
└└Yoiyoi: That’s a very good talent, yoiyoi! There are kids who can’t grasp it even after years of learning, yoiyoi!
└└Dangeomjwa: (flinches)
└└Yoiyoi: Connecting light sources isn’t like mixing white and black to make gray that comes out perfectly, yoiyoi! Sometimes unexpected results come out, yoiyoi! If you hone that ability, you can create new possibilities, yoiyoi!
└└Dangeomjwa: It’s just that I have no idea whatsoever how to do that, jwa!
In any case, it was a talent different from mine.
At this level, the interview is sufficient.
“You pass.”
“Huh?”
“Originally, I was going to kidnap you, smuggle you somewhere, and roughly release you.”
“Th-that would surely….”
“But you turned out to be more capable than I thought. You have talent. How about working with us?”
Of course, the talk of releasing her was a joke.
I handed her my business card.
The business card had no name, no position, no phone number, and no email.
Only Friedwen’s logo was engraved luxuriously upon it.
“This is…!”
“Meals and lodging provided, vacation guaranteed, no need to sing, no need to make sales yourself, no overtime, four major insurances, a family-like company, and also—”
“I’ll do it! As long as it’s not here, I don’t care.”
“You don’t need to hear more?”
“Yes… But please give me just one day. I’ll come back tomorrow.”
“No.”
It was an offer I could not accept.
I had given out a lot of information to win her heart.
I had even shown her my un-disguised appearance now.
If Ji Suyeon returned like this, it would be obvious that Friedwen had tried to steal a hunter’s asset.
Before long, it would be revealed that I, the Mercenary Bureau, and the Claymore Mercenary Corps are involved too.
I couldn’t take that risk.
“Please….”
“You know too much now. I might have to eliminate you.”
“They said they’re coming tomorrow evening to pick up the rings.”
“…….”
“Gu Cheonhwan and two guards. These three said they’re going to mine magic stones… They told me to have the highest-grade rings ready.”
Ji Suyeon spoke while looking at the dark iron I had taken out.
I could understand what she meant.
“You don’t need to dirty your hands. We’re not so desperate that we need to borrow a high school student’s hands.”
“Still… Please leave this as my part.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes.”
I couldn’t persuade her any further.
I simply pressed three rings into her hand as she returned.
I had taught her the nodes, so she could have made them herself, but isn’t it better to share the load?
When Ji Suyeon's figure disappeared, I pressed my hand to my ear and spoke.
“You heard that? That’s what she said. Let’s withdraw here for today.”
—For now, Gu Cheonhwan’s climbing schedule is true. But Vice Commander, can we trust her?
“What can you do when a beaten wife wants to poison the rice?”
—Sigh, alright. But just in case, Vice Commander, you don’t have those kinds of tastes, right? I don’t like pain….
“What?”
—Nothing. Hehe.