Chapter 84: The Ace up the Sleeve is (1)
The semester came to an end.
Lair’s education department had their hands full with the after-measures of the end-of-the-year event.
They came into contact with the governments of various countries and received endless words of gratitude from the International Hunter Association, while also carrying out a joint funeral for the small number of cadets and guards that died during the event.
Then, they relied on the Promotion Team to spread news of their actions. Although the destruction of the fissure into the masquerade was brought from a disaster that no-one could have expected, Lair’s actions were deliberate demonstrations saying, ‘We are this responsible’.
Due to that, the school holiday began without even having any ceremonies. The event was serious to the point that Team Leader Yong of the PR team made a fuss about how the next year’s entrance ceremony might even be held in a simpler format.
“Is there anywhere you guys want to go?”
“No?”
Dragons, the territorial animals, had already recognised Unit 301 as their ‘home’.
The school holiday was a 2-month weekend for them.
*
That day, Yu Jitae took Bom and headed down to the underground labyrinth.
Even though it was her first time setting foot on the [Shallows of the Abyss (S)], Bom didn’t appear too surprised. As always, she had the expression that hid her inner thoughts as she walked side by side right next to him.
When the ‘Light of Paradise’ touches them, the baby dragons would feel uncomfortable. Because of that, Yu Jitae used a lot of money to buy a necklace at an underground auction in North Europe the day before.
[Unsightly Truth]
This necklace which was in the shape of a claw was a Level 2 artifact. It was composed of a special type of metal, and the wearer would be relatively freed from the influence of the ‘Light of Paradise’.
“Put this on.”
“Yes.”
They walked into the inner room of the underground labyrinth. The wide and tall cylindrical room as well as the large apartment-sized crystal [Fragment of Paradise] welcomed them.
However, there was a change that had happened while Yu Jitae was away. There were several large blocks of container storages placed in a line.
– Kiyoooooot!
– Kuhahahatt!
Bizarre sounds came out from the containers. It resembled a scream but also sounded like a shout.
What are they doing.
When he opened the door, blazing heat shot out and Yu Jitae and Bom quietly looked inside through the gap. Men and women of large builds were exercising.
“Haaat!”
A barbell that appeared to weigh around 1 ton was raised while arching like a bow while some did squats and deadlifts. Their entire bodies oozed out with heat as they carried out insane weight training sessions.
“…”
Bom looked slightly surprised.
“Are those people exercising…?”
“Looks like it.”
After carefully shutting the door back, Yu Jitae glanced across the inner room and searched for something. He then approached a container block that was especially noisy and slightly pushed the door open.
There, he found a dozen or so of large male and females standing in a circle as they cheered for someone.
“Push! Push! Press harder!”
“Damn it, don’t give up! You can do it! COME ON!”
“Good. Good! Push yourself! It doesn’t matter if you get injured so press it away!”
“Pull out all the stops!”
They made a fuss while swinging barbells and kettlebells like a tribe of ogres dancing in front of their food. And the ‘prey’ hidden from sight due to their backs was…
“Miss Ha! Let’sss goooo!”
“Le’ss goooooo!”
It was none other than Ha Saetbyul.
She was holding onto a barbell bigger than her own body and groaned. Her frowning face was flushed in deep red and her two cheeks were bloating out like balloons.
“A liiiittle bit moree!”
“Presss!”
The bulky people shouted with tight fists.
“Kuuung ahnahng kaaaak!!”
Letting out an eerie shriek, Ha Saetbul finally managed to press a barbell weighing 500kg.
“Uwaaahhhh!”
“Damn! Kiyoooot!”
“She did it! She really did it! Wahahahat!”
When the hulks jumped around in delight, the container began shaking. There was also someone who couldn’t withstand the joy as they banged their head into the wall and shook the container that way.
Putting down the barbell, Ha Saetbyul’s arms drooped low. She was wet with sweat and she turned her hazy gaze towards Yu Jitae and Bom.
She waved her hand which made the hulks turn their gaze behind.
“Aht! Our doctor’s here!”
“What? Ouuuh! It really is the doctor!”
Wearing bright countenances they ran in with thuds. Since each and every one of them was large, they appeared like a herd of oxen.
Bom had an indifferent expression on her face, but slowly placed herself behind Yu Jitae when they came closer.
“Holy sshit!”
“Doctooorrr!”
Kwang! Yu Jitae shut the door.
And when he held onto the knob and resisted against them, the metal door of the container building trembled and shook as the door dented in the shape of their faces.
Wahahahahat! Their laughter could be heard through the door.
It was a mess.
Was the name of the gym Happy Happy Fitness? It was a fitting name.
In any case, he had brought Bom here in case she could help Ha Saetbyul if she was doing nothing but dig holes in the ground, but Ha Saetbyul unexpectedly appeared to be doing fairly well. Perhaps there was something now that she could sincerely expect in her life.
Yu Jitae separately summoned Bell Baryon, the squad leader of the 30-man Special Force Team.
“33 in total. Currently 32 active, and 1 outlier. All clear.”
The female soldier with a particularly large build from the Philippines reported.
“…And the outlier?”
“The nurse, BM, had been drinking alcohol from last night to mid-day and fell asleep.”
When he opened the door of the workshop, there were countless bottles of vodka rolling around on the ground with no space to set foot in. BM was leaning powerlessly onto the chair.
“What’s wrong with him.”
“It seems that he was heartbroken from a failed experiment.”
It was perhaps an experiment related to mixing [Peace Invoker] into his body in the form of a chimera.
“Got it. Anything you need?”
“Nothing. Except for how everyone is wishing to go back home, life here is quite satisfactory.”
That was good to hear.
“By the way, ahjussi.”
“Yeah.”
“‘He’ is here as well right?”
In fact, that was what Yu Jitae had been looking for. The protector wasn’t inside the containers.
“If this is regarding the Magic Living Armour, Armata, let me lead the way.”
When they followed behind Bell Baryon, they found the protector hanging laundry at another smaller room inside the inner room.
Clink. Clank.
It carefully raised a large brasier and an even bigger brasier and pondered for a bit, before hanging them in the order of size.
“Armata alone is in charge of washing dishes, laundry and cleaning for the soldiers of the troop.”
A washing machine was rattling in the corner. Surprisingly, this place had electricity, water and internet thanks to BM bringing all of them in.
Clink. Pang. Clank.
The protector meticulously dusted the laundry.
Grrrrrng~ ? Kwagagagak~~ ?
Meanwhile, it hummed with a voice resembling the screeching noise of metals.
“Armata’s anxiety symptoms have reduced a lot recently and he either does housework or plays with the agents. According to the nurse, he is the fastest at recovering.”
“Mhm.”
“There seems to be a difference with humans.”
Yu Jitae nodded his head.
A living armour would also have a magic circuit drawn inside their body inducing composure. It was natural for it to be the first one to recover.
He might be able to bring the protector back soon before others.
***
Recently, Gyeoul began slowly shifting her gaze away from Yu Jitae.
In the past, she anxiously looked for him whenever he wasn’t present. Now however, she didn’t wait for him in front of the entrance when he left nor did she try to always stay next to him when together.
It was just that while playing in the living room, she would occasionally turn her head to glance at Yu Jitae. The bright smile on her face was a plus.
These days, she seemed to have learned how to hum from Bom.
“…… ? ”
She often hummed when she was in a good mood. It was a very soft voice that she carefully hummed with, and it suited Gyeoul very well.
Chirp chirp.
“…… ? ”
Right now, she was humming while chasing after the baby chicken.
Kaeul was outside on an errand. The baby chicken scanned the house once a day like a patrolling guard and that caught Gyeoul’s attention.
Gyeoul toddled her away after it. Passing through the corridor, the baby chicken entered the kitchen, while Gyeoul followed suit and circled around the kitchen.
After the kitchen was Kaeul’s room. The baby chicken checked the number of dolls and plushies after entering the room and Gyeoul likewise stared at the dolls.
Uiiing–
And when the robotic vacuum cleaner became moving itself, the baby chicken began hurriedly running below the table. Gyeoul also urgently followed it but didn’t take into account the height of the table and ended up bumping her forehead into it before falling down on her back.
“…”
It was quite a strong hit. He glanced at the child to see if she was startled or not.
But soon, Gyeoul stood back up and rubbed her forehead before once again chasing after the baby chicken with a wide smile. The baby chicken marched forward on top of the robotic vacuum cleaner but ultimately was captured by Gyeoul and was stroked.
Chirp chirp.‘Do not touch my nape.’
Chirp chirp!‘The nape is the pride of us males!’
However, the baby chicken was standing up and the best place for Gyeoul to pat was its nape. From the endless stroking, the baby chicken’s eyes began slowly coming to a close.
When the chicken fell asleep, Gyeoul carefully placed it down on the sofa. She then looked at Yu Jitae and placed her finger on her lips, going “Shh”.
Then, she sneaked a glance at him before extending her arms forward and asking for a hug. After he lifted her up, the blue-haired child soon fell asleep.
Her gentle breaths came from up close.
*
Whenever Kaeul was outside, the baby chicken occasionally disappeared. It was apparently going outside somewhere but always returned with a few injuries, probably from fighting the cat spirit beasts at the entertainment district.
Gradually its wounds reduced as time passed, but the issue was that Bom was always the one that had to heal it.
“You got hurt again?”
Chirp. Chirp.
“Why do you think you get hurt every time?”
Chirpp…
“If you always get hurt like that, do you think Kaeul would like it?”
Chirp…!
“I know you always go outside when Kaeul’s not home. How long do you think I’ll keep it a secret for?”
Chirp…! Chirp chirp…!
And so the baby chicken was scolded by Bom that night.
She had an expressionless face as well as her same old voice. Bom didn’t show any signs of anger and yet the baby chicken was extremely nervous as it rubbed its forehead on her clothes.
“Don’t get hurt. We’ll get angry.”
Bom carefully healed the small furry ball.
Meanwhile, Yu Jitae stayed still and watched over the children. Since it was now the holidays after he had taken care of Wei Yan, there was really not much for him to do.
He just read some books related to education after buying them at a bookshop.
“Educational Psychology? Are you going to teach someone?”
Bom walked to the sofa and sat down next to him.
“Thought I might need it soon.”
However he didn’t get any words back from Bom.
Yu Jitae turned towards her and found her blankly staring into nothing. Was she looking into Providence? After staying in that state for a long time, Bom suddenly turned to Yu Jitae with an astonished gaze.
He thought she was going to pull another prank but that wasn’t it. Bom abruptly raised her watch and checked something.
“What’s up?”
“…One second please.”
A blue website was opened on the screen and she typed something into the search bar. Her movements were quite rushed which also made Yu Jitae focus on her hands.
“Not here…”
Bom soon opened a yellowish site and began inserting a strange combination of letters.
But it was wrong this time as well. After pondering for a while, Bom went into a red website and once again laid down strange letters into the search bar.
?asvbvbnsp
What is that.
In any case, he was familiar with this site. It was one of the top three video platforms worldwide called YuTuV. He was wondering what it must be for Bom to be like this and was quietly staring into the display.
This time, a video with the same title as the search bar appeared at the very top.
[asvbvbnsp] (Uploaded a week ago)
The thumbnail of the video was an average image with a window and a wall. But unlike the thumbnail, it appeared to be quite a popular video and had a high number of views as well as several comments.
“…”
Bom looked at Yu Jitae with a slightly surprised expression.
“Why. What is that.”
“…You can’t get angry.”
“Why would I get angry.”
“Please promise me you won’t…”
“I won’t.”
Yu Jitae nonchalantly responded and soon Bom played the video.
…
When the video came to a silent end, Yu Jitae and Bom also went silent.
“…”
“…”
“…How do you think this happened.”
“I don’t know either…”
“What did you see through Providence.”
“Something I can’t tell you…”
“Something bad?”
“No? It’s not bad but…”
It’s nothing bad – after hearing that, Yu Jitae was relieved that it wasn’t the worst possible case scenario.
Nevertheless, something that shouldn’t have happened had occurred. But since it had already occurred, the priority was to have a clear understanding of the situation.
“Play it again.”
“Yes.”
What they first saw was Unit 301. The door to Yu Jitae’s room, the living room, TV, the wall, floor and the ceiling were laid bare.
Kaeul’s voice rolled like marble throughout the video while Gyeoul and the baby chicken flashed their faces once. Yu Jitae’s back also appeared for a second or so.
Before the video ended, Kaeul’s face also briefly appeared in it.
Right, that was the problem.
Kaeul’s face was too close and too clear.
“How many views did this have? It shouldn’t be a problem if there’s not that many.”
Bom carefully showed the screen.
[asvbvbnsp] (Uploaded a week ago) (#14 on Trending)Views: 292,135Likes: 8k / Dislikes: 141Comments: 999+
290 thousand, and it was a trending video at that.
At the very least, it didn’t have a crazy amount of views making it a problem. Yu Jitae opened his mouth while placing his hand on his temple.
“…Let’s have a look at the comments.”