Chapter 94
—Lick lick lick lick lick
“Yeah, yeah, Gomi. Good boy.”
—Lick lick lick lick lick
“But could you put your tongue back in?”
Gomi had been licking my head for a while, apparently happy to see me.
It was a bit unpleasant having his drool make me sticky.
Thinking that, I gently pushed Gomi’s head aside.
It really moved.
Come to think of it, normally when I pushed him, Gomi would sense my rejection and be pushed away a beat later.
Maybe because our physical abilities had reversed, he moved easily in one go.
“Grr.”
Gomi seemed mildly displeased that his display of affection had been stopped.
“Yeah, yeah, I know. But let’s show a little restraint. I can’t exactly wash my hair with your drool.”
“What do you mean, what I did to you after I got drunk?”
Hmm.
I’m at a loss for words.
To think he could mount a rebuttal this logical.
“You’re not a bear.”
“Goom?”
As he said that, Gomi tilted his head, then let me ride on his back.
This guy was just a person, wasn’t he?
* * *
For now, I headed to the White Tiger Guild without calling Sera.
Actually, there wasn’t much difference between going by car and riding the wind.
The slight problem was that a passing Hunter might mistake me for a monster and shoot me down.
Since nothing like that happened, I smoothly barged into Sera’s office.
There was basic security in place, but I’d seen Sera enter the password once before.
She must have thought she was safe because I was a little ways away, but these were eyes Adrian had personally enhanced.
Memorizing something like that was easy.
When I entered, I saw a Hunter with black hair and a white shirt.
“Excuse me.”
I substituted for a greeting by slightly bending at the waist and touching the edge of my hand to my forehead.
Sera’s eyes widened.
“What the hell? How did you get here?”
“There’s always a way.”
I picked up one of the snacks lying around and ate it.
It really was delicious after not having eaten it in so long.
I should buy a whole box to take home.
“Are you using the sword well?”
“Yeah. Though I was surprised because its performance was much better than I expected.”
I felt inexplicably pleased that she was putting it to good use.
As expected of Swordmillia.
Maybe I should have a sword forged there too.
Tier 2 wasn’t exactly a terrible sword, but just as with my wand, I was worried it wouldn’t withstand dragon mana.
“So what brings you here?”
“Do I need a reason to see a friend? Let’s go get a drink.”
“Really?”
Sera’s expression brightened.
She was the type who relieved stress with alcohol too, so she always liked it when I suggested drinking.
“But I do have a reason.”
“What is it?”
“I’ll tell you after we go. After.”
Of course, she would be the one making the reservation and paying the bill.
I explained the situation.
“You found a house and need furniture?”
“Yeah.”
“Where?”
“In another world.”
“You’ve really become a resident of another world.”
Sera said it with a sigh.
I felt wronged.
I go back and forth to the modern world too.
I’m a modern person to begin with.
“But if you’re buying appliances, wouldn’t your Inventory be enough?”
“Ah, the Inventory doesn’t have enough capacity.”
Apparently, things that large wouldn’t fit.
Washing machines, microwaves, robot vacuums, electric kettles, and so on.
Even if things like sofas and beds could somehow fit, the others were the problem.
Of course, I wasn’t sure whether I could carry them in myself.
But the knot hole itself was smaller than me.
Since I could travel through it, perhaps even larger things would work.
“Help me choose and move everything.”
Honestly, I didn’t even know what I should buy.
Sera lived alone, so she ought to know.
And she could swipe her card while she was at it.
“I have a feeling I’ve been taken advantage of again.”
* * *
“This way is the home-appliance section.”
The employee led us to the appliance section, sweating profusely.
And he kept glancing nervously at us.
“You can go.”
At Sera’s words, he left with stiff steps.
“As expected of an A-Rank Hunter. The treatment is on another level.”
The moment we entered the department store, we were treated like VIPs and showered with excellent service.
“You could get that too, couldn’t you? You just have to take the test.”
“There’s a written test.”
What a hassle.
Honestly, I had no idea why the Hunter promotion exam included a written test.
“Even a real blockhead could memorize it in an hour, and that’s too much hassle for you…?”
“I don’t study. That’s just how I am.”
Unless Aris stayed on my case to study, I was the type who never studied anything outside my fields of interest.
Well, I did have to get promoted as a Hunter eventually.
Actually, you only had to take the written test once; after that, you didn’t need to take it again all the way up to S Rank.
So it was worth getting it over with.
Sera suddenly wondered and asked,
“How on earth did you get into college? You have to take exams in every subject, don’t you?”
“Huh? I got in through an essay-based entrance exam. I ranked first overall.”
I had just ground away at math.
I didn’t even know anything about Korean language and literature.
If I hadn’t, how could I possibly have kept up with Karnarof’s classes?
Even a mathematician specializing in magic squares would find the class extremely difficult at a fundamental level.
“That’s the first I’ve heard of it!?”
“Because I never told you.”
“Why does something new keep coming out no matter how much I dig…?”
“You don’t have to praise me that much.”
“I’m not praising you!?”
For now, I looked at the essential appliances first.
A refrigerator.
A refrigerator was essential.
Even with the Inventory’s 20x time multiplier, frozen food would eventually thaw if I forgot about it.
I had to buy at least a small refrigerator.
After settling on a refrigerator, I looked into vacuum cleaners, induction cooktops, dryers, and so on.
An air purifier was pretty pointless since Reinhart’s air was cleaner than that of most mountains.
“But.”
“This thing’s power consumption is insane.”
Even without going as far as an air fryer, just having a microwave would massively improve my quality of life.
But this thing used 1,000 watts by default.
Leaving aside whether the power strip could handle it, the generator itself couldn’t.
“Can’t you just not turn on the air conditioner?”
“Don’t you use a heater in winter?”
There was a fireplace there, but I wasn’t crazy enough to use a fireplace.
Even if heating costs skyrocketed, I had to use a heater.
I might as well get a humidifier too.
“What about using solar power?”
“I’ve thought about it, but realistically, it’s not feasible right now.”
Installation was one problem, and more than anything, it was unstable.
It would be fine as a backup, but it was impractical for immediate use.
“Then can’t you just run one more?”
“Huh?”
“You can increase the capacity. Want me to look into it?”
Come to think of it, Upperclassman Chloe had said something like that.
She’d told me to let her know if I wanted to expand the generator.
She’d said she could make it as long as I had the materials.
“Then could you contact the researcher over there and ask if they could send us just the materials?”
“I’ll try.”
Sera called the White Tiger Guild.
Before returning to Reinhart, I absolutely had to buy Upperclassman Chloe a gift.
* * *
I could hear the entire conversation.
Sera’s senses were pretty sharp too, so she tended to use her phone with the call volume turned down.
But my senses seemed to be even sharper.
I could hear everything.
[Hmm, the generator materials are going to be damn expensive.]
[Can’t you get a budget?]
[The guild master says no.]
[Why? We have plenty of research funding.]
[Because I spent all the research funding?]
[Why are you saying that so proudly…]
Hmm.
Looks like I need money.
“Isn’t this enough?”
I showed her my bank account.
It was the money I’d made from selling the sword and wand last time.
There were certainly quite a lot of zeroes in it.
I could save up a little more and buy something like a supercar.
“She says it’s still not nearly enough.”
Even this wasn’t enough?
“Want me to cover the rest? I’ll put it down as a debt.”
Hmm.
Considering Sera usually just gave away ordinary sums, the fact that she was calling this a debt meant it must be much more than I’d expected.
I looked at the number displayed.
I wondered if I should go all the way to Reinhart and bring back an artifact.
“I could earn that much.”
“Where? There are barely any Gates open right now.”
“Obviously, the Tower.”
Artifacts were rare.
That was still true even now, decades after the Tower had been built.
* * *
“It gets drastically harder from the eleventh floor onward, so be careful… Though I’m not sure something like that has any meaning for you in the first place.”
Sera said it with a sigh.
I wondered if I could beat Sera if I fought her now.
Sera was on the verge of clearing Very Hard difficulty.
But it didn’t seem impossible.
In the first place, I had cleared the tenth floor before the final exams.
But the me from before the final exams was a weakling who couldn’t even use dragon mana.
Things were different now.
[You are entering Floor 11, [Heaven-Demon War—Faction Selection]!]
[For the next five floors, you must fight on the side of the Apostles of God or the Servants of Demons!]
[You are free to choose which faction to join.]
[This choice may change your future.]
“Hmm.”
[Take the side of one faction and kill the other!]
I stood on a square marble platform.
Even though there were no lights, the space was filled with light.
It seemed like a space created solely for battle.
An Apostle of God stood to the right.
He wore silver armor and a feathered helmet that hid his eyes.
He raised his sword and shouted.
“Naturally, you’ll choose the gods! Girl who possesses the power of dragons!”
On the left stood a gaunt man covered in black tattoos.
I could sense demonic energy.
“Heh heh heh, gods always deceive and exploit humans. In that regard, wouldn’t we who are at least reliable when it comes to contracts be the better choice?”
Hmm.
An Apostle of God and a Servant of Demons.
I sensed different energies from each of them.
“What do I get if I choose you?”
“If you choose me, I will have you defeat that vile demon and give you the weapon he stole.”
“Heh heh heh, do you desire power? Then I shall give it to you! If you defeat that fellow, that armor will be yours! And you’ll have the demons’ fervent attention as well!”
“Hmm.”
No matter which one I wrecked, I’d get something tasty.
The balance seemed well designed.
These guys weren’t actual Apostles of God and Servants of Demons, after all.
According to research into the Tower, these guys were no different from monsters.
‘Karnarof said as much in the first place.’
Gods weren’t fundamentally any different from demons, either.
If so, I had only one choice.
“I’ll wreck both of you and take the artifacts.”
“—Wha…”
“Casting, Bullet.”
My eyes and arms glowed red.
Everything in the surrounding area was blown away as if it had exploded.
[The Apostle of God and the Servant of Demons have both died!]
[Floor 11 cleared! Your reward will be issued!]
“Ow, ow, now that I think about it, I wasn’t supposed to use it.”
A faint red current sparked across my arm.
I guess I have to show this to Adrian again.
[You have chosen an option that was not among the choices!]
[Due to your abnormally high authority, the system accepts the result!]
[Your alignment will be determined!]
[Alignment: Chaos]