The marble with the distinctive yellow tinge gradually changed its hue to red. Kim Dae-ho shot up from his seat after noticing the item emitting light and magical energy all on its own and stumbled several steps away from it.
“What’s happening right now?”
“We’ll find out soon enough,” Su-hyeun said as he took a step closer to the marble.
And right at that very moment, the reddish light coming off from the marble began taking on a blurry and indistinct silhouette.
Not too long after that, a man smiling awkwardly while scratching his head appeared from the red light. The man laughed, “It’s been a while!”
“It hasn’t even been a day for me yet, though?”
“Really? It’s been 10 days on my side, you see. I guess the flow of time is really different here.”
It was Luslec, and he literally popped out of the marble itself. The item was supposed to allow one to communicate by shortening the distance between dimensions, but to think that one could even move through dimensions like this.
“What brings you here?”
“I was curious about the world you live in, Mister Su-hyeun. Ah, but I ask of you not to think of it as a troublesome matter. I can only stay here for a few days, after all.”
“Is that some kind of a restriction?”
“Yes, correct. Anyways, wow, this is really that place? The workshop of uncle Kim Dae-ho? And that gent over there is Mister Kim Dae-ho?”
Luslec’s sparkling eyes landed on Kim Dae-Ho.
He didn’t seem to have any special business for being here nor did he emit hostility. Instead, his current reaction was similar to a child filled with curiosity.
Su-hyeun could only hold his head. With how things have developed, it seemed that he now had no choice but to stick very closely to Luslec for a day at least.
Although the chances of this happening were low, if he really got into a fight somewhere and decided to go on a rampage, there would be no one strong enough to stop him other than Su-hyeun.
“When you say you were curious, are you thinking of doing something similar to a sightseeing tour?”
“Yes, correct again. I’m a tourist.”
“Please behave yourself and wait for a little while. The crafting should be over soon.”
“Yes, got it. But, uh, is it alright for me to take a quick look around here?”
“Please don’t go too far.”
Suddenly feeling rather exhausted, Su-hyeun groaned deeply and waved his hand dismissively.
With an overly excited face, Luslec replied with an energetic, “Yes!” and quickly stepped outside the workshop. Su-hyeun glanced to his side and noticed Kim Dae-ho making an uncharacteristically confused face.
“Who was that guy?”
“Mm…” Su-hyeun wasn’t sure how to answer that, so he mulled over his answer for a bit before saying something, “He’s apparently my fan.”
* * *
Kim Dae-ho returned to his work.
Su-hyeun quietly waited so that he wouldn’t be a bother. Kim Dae-ho hardened the liquefied steel and then weaved some hard and sturdy threads to create a necklace.
While watching the master blacksmith do his thing from behind, Su-hyeun couldn’t help but notice Kim Dae-ho’s hunched back.
“His back has gotten more crooked these days,” he thought.
Kim Dae-ho’s back was gradually bending lower, and his shoulders were shrinking slowly as he got older; only his voice remained loud and sharp, while his age was already creeping into the border between “uncle” and “grandpa.”
It was only obvious that his lifespan would decrease by spending the whole day inside the boiling workshop to hammer away while sweating profusely like this.
“And I can’t even dissuade him.”
Su-hyeun knew very well why Kim Dae-ho was acting this way: he was feeling the weight of responsibility.
It was the responsibility of knowing that even a single piece of equipment he crafted could save the life of an awakener, who would go on to save countless many others in the process.
And that was why Kim Dae-ho couldn’t stop. He was fighting alone inside this narrow workshop.
“Uncle,” Su-hyeun quietly called out to Kim Dae-ho. “Thank you.”
“About what?”
Kim Dae-ho turned around to look at Su-hyeun after getting thanked out of the blue. However, the latter wasn’t planning to say anything else, so he simply kept his mouth shut and expertly hid his smile.
The blacksmith stared at Su-hyeun for a bit before turning around to focus on his crafting instead.
“Silly kid,” Kim Dae-ho muttered softly and got back to work, but Su-hyeun still discovered Kim Dae-ho’s lips quivering into a smirk as he stood behind him. The blacksmith usually had almost no discernible changes to his expressions, so something like this was a noticeable change, indeed.
Not too long afterward, the necklace was completed. In total, the job took about two hours.
“I’ve added additional functions of increased strength to prevent it from getting ripped off, as well as weight reduction. I thought that adding too many functions on it might disrupt the flow of the marble’s magical energy, so I didn’t make it too complicated.”
“I’ll use it well.”
“Okay, so, are you heading out along with that punk from earlier?”
“Yes. He’s very hard to figure out, so I need to keep an eye out on him before he causes an incident somewhere.”
“Are you two talking about me?”
It was at that moment that Luslec abruptly descended into the workshop. He didn’t seem to have used the steps but floated in the air and rapidly dropped down.
“Yes. I wanted you to hear it, actually. As such, please try not to start a fight somewhere.”
“Of course I won’t. Saying something so obvious.”
“Especially murder. That’s completely off-limits.”
Su-hyeun still vividly remembered Luslec’s smiling face as the latter killed Kang Mu-hyeok.
Although Luslec seemed genuinely nice to Su-hyeun, the fact that he was a dangerous individual still hadn’t changed at all.
“I know. I’ll be in trouble if they find out, you know.”
“You’ll be…in trouble?”
“Yes. They’ll scold me real good if I go around blabbing my mouth everywhere. The things about me and the tales I told you, they are all top secret, you see. That’s why you don’t have to worry so much,” Luslec replied confidently while grinning mischievously. It was hard to imagine that this face also made that chill-inducing expression when murdering Kang Mu-hyeok back then.
“Well, he did help me out a lot, so…” Su-hyeun inwardly considered.
Since he couldn’t exactly chase this guy away, he figured it would be better to simply show this guy around the world for a day or so.
“Is there a particular place you wish to see?”
* * *
The place Su-hyeun took Luslec to was the middle of Jongno.
Despite the late hour, quite a few people were still out and about in the vicinity of the Jongno Tower even now. This was the very first place Luslec wanted to see.
“Oh, ooooh…”
Luslec’s wide-open eyes were looking around their surroundings.
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Those eyes were sparkling away like an excited kid’s as he took in the sights of the brightly lit streets of Jongno.
“So that’s the Jongno Tower? Wow, it’s seriously tall.”
“Is it that amazing?”
“Well, it’s a building I’ve only ever heard about in stories, you know. To think that one day I’d actually come here…”
Luslec seemed rather moved by this experience.
He insisted on seeing the Jongno Tower first, and it seemed that his reason for that had something to do with the mythical tales he heard about in the past.
His eyes remained wide open as he continued to stare around like some kind of a tourist from a foreign country, and Su-hyeun observing that from the side could only chuckle softly.
It didn’t feel like Luslec would start a commotion or something just as troublesome. Su-hyeun wondered why he even bothered to come here, but it seemed that sightseeing really was his purpose for this trip.
“Where is Mister Lee Ju-ho, though?”
“You even know about brother Ju-ho?”
“Of course I do. He’s one of the heroes who has saved the world alongside you, after all.”
“Their meeting is taking longer than expected, it seems.”
“I guess so. Wait, maybe he’s already asleep, what with the late hour and all?”
“I don’t think he is. Besides, I heard that he’d be hosting a business dinner meeting until well into the night.”
It was currently around three in the morning.
Although it was definitely late, Lee Ju-ho wouldn’t be asleep at this hour.
From what Su-hyeun had heard, Lee Ju-ho took residence in a studio apartment close to the Jongno Tower and only signed off from work at around four or five o’clock in the morning. He usually slept for around two to three hours and went back to work around nine in the morning.
It certainly was an unforgiving schedule, yet Lee Ju-ho handled it without a single complaint. He barely had any break after becoming the association president.
“Even then, will it be okay to call him at this hour?” Su-hyeun contemplated as he fidgeted around with his phone.
No matter what, it was still late, so he thought that calling someone now would be just too inconsiderate.
His dilemma didn’t last long; Su-hyeun shook his head and said, “It’s quite late now, so let’s meet him tomorrow if you’re so dead-set on seeing him. I also need to think about how to introduce you to bro.”
“Got it. Can’t be helped since it’s already so—”
“Su-hyeun!”
It was right at that moment that someone in the crowd of passersby in the distance called out Su-hyeun’s name.
Su-hyeun turned to find the person that called him and was surprised by what he saw—it was the person he planned to see after sunrise a few hours later, Lee Ju-ho, waving his hand and walking closer to him.
“It’s Su-hyeunnnn—!”
And Thomas sticking close to Lee Ju-ho also discovered Su-hyeun and, in the blink of an eye, bounced toward where Su-hyeun was. Before Su-hyeun could figure out what’s what, he had to catch Thomas with both of his hands.
“What’s this? What’s wrong with your face?” Su-hyeun asked.
Thomas could only chuckle and repeat, “It’s Su-hyeun…”
Thomas’s face was currently deeply flushed. Judging from how dull his eyes were, it seemed that he had consumed some alcohol not too long ago.
He was smelling quite heavily of booze, too.
Lee Ju-ho walked over with a slightly faster pace than before. Just like always, Su-hyeun lightly pried off Thomas who was sticking to him like a piece of gum and asked Lee Ju-ho, “Bro, did you let this kid drink?”
“Yeah. And he drank quite a lot, too.”
“Please tell him to snap out of it already. He’s seriously drunk right now.”
“He’s not gonna listen just because I said so, you know? He doesn’t want to sober up since it feels great to him, so what can I do? If it’s you, then maybe he’ll listen.”
“It feels great?” Su-hyeun let out a groan and shifted his gaze back to Thomas.
For sure, Thomas’s foolishly grinning face while calling out Su-hyeun’s name made it seem like he was having a good time right now.
To Su-hyeun, who didn’t enjoy drinking booze and found the sensation of being drunk more tiresome than enjoyable, this sort of behavior is incomprehensible.
“Even then, if he likes it, then well…”
Rather unexpectedly, it seemed that Thomas was pretty good with alcohol.
If so, there really wasn’t a reason to forcibly sober himself up through magical energy. Besides, an awakener on the level of Thomas should be able to snap out of a drunken stupor all on his own pretty soon, anyway.
“By the way, did you already finish your dinner meeting?”
“Yeah. I wanted to teach Thomas how to drink today, you see. This guy told me that he had never drunk before. In any case, what brings you here?”
“Ah, well. The thing is…” Su-hyeun trailed off and sneaked a glance at Luslec. He pondered for a bit on how to introduce the guy before finally saying something, “He’s a younger acquaintance of mine, but he really wanted to say hello to you, you see.”
“H—hello there! My name is Luslec,” he introduced himself with a loud and energetic voice, prompting a weird expression to form on Lee Ju-ho’s face. While still looking a bit awkward, the latter extended his hand for a shake.
After the handshake, he turned toward Su-hyeun next. “You had a younger acquaintance like this guy? And he’s a foreigner, to boot.”
“Is it a problem for me to know some people?”
“Well, no, but it’s not like you have plenty of friends, you know. Besides, this person, he’s really fluent in Korean, isn’t he?”
Lee Ju-ho stared at Luslec as if something still felt weird to him.
Su-hyeun was currently sweating buckets internally. On the other hand, Luslec was grinning brightly even though he was the one making the request to keep his identity a secret.
Maybe he was too much of an airhead?
Vrrrr—
It was right then that Lee Ju-ho’s phone, which should’ve been staying quiet due to how late it was, began noisily ringing.
He turned around while reaching into his pocket. “Ah, sorry about this. I need to take this,” he said.
He confirmed the number on the screen and hurriedly answered the call.
After fully turning around, he began whispering into the device’s receiver. Of course, doing that didn’t prevent Su-hyeun from eavesdropping on the conversation itself.
“What was that? Sons of b*tches! Did they lose their damn minds? Yes, yes. No, wait. Even if that’s true…Also, why did such things happen at the same time…?” Lee Ju-ho let out a pained grunt before holding his head. He then glanced in Su-hyeun’s direction and nodded theatrically. “Alright, I got it. We’ll try to send some reinforcements from our side somehow. Yes. I’m hanging up now.”
Lee Ju-ho ended the call a little abruptly.
Su-hyeun, who had listened to the contents of the phone call, groaned exaggeratedly, “I’ve more or less heard about what’s going on.”
“It seems that the Germans were trying to raid an indigo-colored dungeon by themselves and botched it. They were trying to keep it a secret and dragged everything out, only for an outbreak to happen about 10 minutes ago.”
“And there’s been an act of terror in Argentina?”
“Yeah. The timing of those two things have coincided way too closely, and it has become a bit of a headache now. If neither of them is resolved quickly enough…”
Two incidents happened at the same time in two completely different locations.
The reason why Lee Ju-ho was holding his head was quite simple. If it was Su-hyeun, then it wouldn’t matter which location he went to; he’d take care of the issue quite easily, but the other one would still remain a significant problem.
“Since it’s an emergency, we’ll have to send Thomas, but I’m not sure if he alone can handle it. It sounds like some big shots are behind the act of terror, you see.”
“Hmm…”
Su-hyeun pondered for a bit before shifting his gaze over to Luslec.
When their gazes met, Luslec blinked in confusion and asked back, “What, me?”