Chapter 17
The day after becoming the owner of the Dokkaebi Club.
Kang Yul really, truly didn't want to go back.
But to deliver the coal and learn how to use the Dokkaebi Club, he scheduled a visit to the workshop.
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[Perverted Blacksmith]
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▶ [Blacksmith, would it be all right if I came by to deliver the coal today?]
▷ [Ah, Esteemed One! I'm making a new item right now…(abridged)… Anyway, I'm free, so come by whenever it's convenient for you!]
▶ [Understood. Oh, you know the Dokkaebi Club you gave me last time?]
▷ [Is something wrong with it?]
▶ [No, it's nothing like that.]
[I finished the Dokkaebi Club, but it suddenly disappeared.]
[I was wondering if you might know anything about it.]
▷ [What??????]
[You finished the Dokkaebi Club????]
[Come to the workshop right now!!!!!!!!]
[Right now!!!!!!]
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"What's wrong with her…?"
There were so many question marks and exclamation points that he couldn't even begin to guess how surprised she was. If draining someone's energy this much through text alone was a talent, then she certainly had it.
Anyway, now that he'd arranged a visit, Kang Yul quickly got ready to head out.
Crunch-! Crack-! Chomp-!
"Mmm~! Nothing beats a hearty breakfast of milk mixed with coal and dirt."
Only after he'd filled up on a nutritious(?) breakfast did he head for Nowon Station, where the workshop was located.
After taking the subway for about thirty minutes, he arrived at Nowon Station. From there, he walked for another ten minutes until he reached a quiet alley.
If he kept walking straight along this path,
Ripple—!
At some point, with the sensation of crossing some kind of threshold, a dirt road like one in a hanok village appeared.
And after walking along that path for a few more minutes,
[Dokkaebi Workshop]
A massive gate and a signboard reading [Dokkaebi Workshop] welcomed visitors.
'Sigh… I really didn't want to come back here….''
Seeing it, Kang Yul's breath caught in his throat, and he let out a sigh.
He couldn't believe he'd walked right back into this hell of his own free will,
and he hated his own incompetence for leaving him with no other choice.
'…Let's go in.'
But denying the world and hating himself wouldn't change anything.
Kang Yul stepped over the threshold and entered the workshop.
And the next moment.
"Ah, you're finally here, Esteemed One."
As if she'd been waiting for him, the blacksmith stood in front of the gate, ready to greet Kang Yul warmly.
"Were you waiting for me?"
"Of course. It would be rude not to come out and greet the Esteemed One."
"You really didn't have to go that far…"
"Come now, how could I not, when the Esteemed One is coming?"
Kang Yul knew that too.
If an esteemed person were coming, he would have acted the same way.
But still.
'It's so uncomfortable having a woman who clearly looks older than me treat me with such deference…'
To Kang Yul, who'd spent twenty-three years as a dirt-poor orphan, this kindness was deeply uncomfortable.
It felt like being forced into clothes that didn't fit.
Honestly, he would have preferred it if she treated him like a subordinate, the way Team Leader Myo did,
but the blacksmith standing before him couldn't do that.
Whether she thought of Kang Yul as an endangered animal she had to protect or an incredibly precious gem, her gaze was filled with goodwill and creepy desire.
'Ugh… Team Leader Myo's contemptuous gaze would be a hundred times better.'
Anyway, as he shuddered at this far-too-generous treatment,
"Was the trip here all right…? Hmm? Wait a moment, Esteemed One."
The blacksmith suddenly sensed something was off and began staring intently at Kang Yul.
'Wait, hold on. Didn't this happen to me last time…!'
Sensing the oddity, Kang Yul quickly stepped backward to put some distance between them, but it was already too late.
"Excuse me for a moment?"
Before he could get away, the blacksmith reached out and subdued him in an instant,
and he had to endure the same humiliation all over again.
"Aaargh! Let go! I said let go!"
Kang Yul fought back fiercely.
It might have looked a little pathetic to anyone watching, but he struggled with all his might, determined not to repeat the humiliation from last time.
But…
"Esteemed One, it'll be over soon, so please stay still. If you keep struggling like this, it'll take even longer, you know?"
…The result was the same as last time.
A mage who'd only done a little mining couldn't match the strength of a blacksmith who hammered iron for a living.
If Kang Yul and the blacksmith were compared to animals, the difference in their strength would be like that between a fawn and a leopard.
And so, in the end,
"No! You already felt me all over last time! Why are you doing this again?"
Having given up resisting, Kang Yul demanded to know why the blacksmith was feeling him up again.
The blacksmith's answer was shocking.
"Hmm… That's right. I definitely did… Esteemed One, how did you become a dokkaebi while I wasn't looking?"
"Pardon? What do you mean… Ah?"
Wait, come to think of it.
[You can now use the power of the dokkaebi.]
Didn't he gain the power of the dokkaebi yesterday?
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As he wondered whether the blacksmith might be right after all,
he muttered, "Just what kind of power of the dokkaebi did I get…?"
"Right? I'm not imagining it, am I, Esteemed One? What on earth happened?"
The blacksmith heard him muttering, leaned in as if she'd known it all along, and
began interrogating him about it as though she were ready to devour him at any moment.
Under that pressure, Kang Yul had no choice but to tell her the truth.
"But, to explain, it's a bit of a long story…"
"Oh, then shall we talk over some refreshments?"
"…Sure."
Kang Yul accepted the blacksmith's offer.
He didn't think this was the sort of thing they should discuss standing up, but he also needed time to organize his thoughts if he was going to hide the parts related to the Gate.
As he gathered his thoughts while they walked,
"Come along~ Head inside~!"
The blacksmith ushered him across the courtyard,
"Come along~ A little farther inside~!"
past the supernatural artifact storeroom he'd visited last time,
"Come along~ Even farther inside~!"
"…Farther in?"
"Yes! We have to go farther in!"
until they reached a room that felt unmistakably lived-in, tucked away rather far inside.
After silently looking around the room, Kang Yul asked in a puzzled voice,
"Um… this doesn't look like a guest reception room…?"
"Well, of course not. This is where I live."
"Don't people usually avoid bringing guests into their rooms…?"
"Come now, what's the harm between us, Esteemed One?"
A scream rose to the tip of Kang Yul's tongue: "What kind of relationship do we even have?!"
But the blacksmith was the only person he could ask about dokkaebi, so he swallowed it with great patience.
'If things get dicey, I'll have to bring out Worm…'
Trembling with anxiety, Kang Yul wondered when the predator before him might devour him,
and steeled himself to unleash even a tactical nuke (Worm) if things came to it. But that was only for a moment.
"There's not much, but please help yourself."
"…Ah, thank you."
Kang Yul's mouth watered at the sight of the high-end-looking sweets in front of him and the delicate fragrance rising from the tea.
After rationalizing, 'Food can't be blamed for anything,' he let down his guard a little and reached for the tea.
The moment he took a sip, Kang Yul's eyes widened in surprise.
"This tea tastes really good…?"
Looking down at the tea he'd just sipped, Kang Yul thought to himself.
Even Kang Yul, who'd always eaten anything as long as it was edible, could tell how refined this tea was after just one sip.
Besides, he felt a strange vitality spread through him and yesterday's mining fatigue fade, so these definitely didn't seem like ordinary tea leaves.
"One of my regular customers is really passionate about plants. These are special tea leaves they grew themselves in a Gate."
"They must be incredibly expensive."
"I hear you can't buy them even with money. Well, they keep begging me to make them some equipment, so they send me these pretty often. Ah, would you like me to set some aside for you?"
"…"
…Kang Yul answered with silence, politely refusing the tea leaves.
He wasn't nearly important enough to accept something that expensive without hesitation.
He couldn't be sure he could handle it if she later asked him to pay her back.
'Come to think of it, what exactly is this blacksmith?'
For a while, Kang Yul silently stared down at the tea in his hand, lost in various thoughts,
then decided to ask one rude question, even though he knew it was impolite.
"By any chance, are you someone important, Blacksmith?"
For the record, asking one another for personal information was considered taboo in the Hunter industry.
Naturally, it wasn't because they wanted to protect people's privacy.
It was a more fundamental matter, one of survival.
'Plenty of people have paid the price for saying the name—the true name—of a supernatural phenomenon out loud.'
As a result, the longer a Hunter's career, the more sensitive they became to the act of 'directly revealing their information,'
and to prevent that, a culture of using 'fake names' or referring to Hunters by a word that represented them—a practice known as being 'Named'—took root.
So, despite knowing this, Kang Yul had never once asked Team Leader Myo or the blacksmith for their names.
But…
"I know it's rude, but we already have an awkward relationship. I feel like if I keep vaguely knowing you're someone important, it'll only make things more uncomfortable between us."
Kang Yul decided that he needed to know exactly where the person before him stood.
Since they would be trading coal regularly from now on, he thought it would be better to know her identity and be uncomfortable about it than to keep up this awkward relationship.
So he'd just blurted it out without thinking, but…
"Does that mean you'd like to form a 'deep connection' with me?"
…For some reason, a chill ran down Kang Yul's spine, and he realized one thing for certain.
Just now, he had
made a very serious mistake.
"I, um, I'm really sorry, but…"
So Kang Yul tried to take back his question and end the matter by bowing his head and apologizing at once.
But unfortunately… he couldn't.
Because…
"Esteemed One, my name is 'Kim Chaeryeong.' It is my honor to form a 'deep connection' with you, the Esteemed One who is both an Earth Dragon and a dokkaebi."
"W-wait a moment! I'm really sorry, but I'm neither an Earth Dragon nor a dokkaebi, okay? I'm just an ordinary human, so I'd like to take back what I just said…"
Ding-!
[You have formed a deep connection with 'Kim Chaeryeong.']
"…Huh?"
A baffling notification window that appeared before his eyes confirmed the deep connection between Kang Yul and the blacksmith, Kim Chaeryeong.
Ding-!
[Your divine power wishes for 'abundance' for the being with whom you have formed a deep connection.]
[Your divine power wishes for 'success' for the being with whom you have formed a deep connection.]
What's more, the notifications that followed said his divine power wished for Kim Chaeryeong's abundance and success.
'No… seriously, what is this…?'
Why does a human like me have something like divine power?
And what does it mean to wish for abundance and success?
At this rate, it really does seem like… I'm an Earth Dragon or a dokkaebi…?.