Chapter 8
A two-million-won used car I’d bought because there was no way I could manage my job without one.
Still embarrassed to give anyone a ride, I was surprised when Ms. Gyuseon got in without any particular reservations and bowed her head.
“Thank youuu...”
“No need to thank me. Where do you live?”
“Oh, I’ll enter the address.”
I was startled when I saw the address she entered.
Dongtan?
Well, Dongtan had a certain image... No, what was I thinking?
It wasn’t strange that she lived there, since it was close to Hwaseong, where she worked.
“Ahem...”
“Does your throat hurt? Should I turn on the air purifier?”
As she spoke, she took a small air purifier out of her handbag.
Despite its appearance, it was an expensive product that combined magical technology and easily outperformed the old commercial-grade air purifiers.
“You carry that around?”
“N-No. I usually leave it in the lab...”
“Oh.”
Silence stretched on for a while after that.
Breaking it, I asked her,
“Have you thought about what you’ll do after leaving your job?”
“N-No. I’ll have to think about it now.”
“You’re not planning to continue your research?”
“I’m not sure... For one thing, the bacteria are company property...”
“The company doesn’t seem to think that property is all that valuable.”
Gyuseon pursed her lips and started to tear up.
No, I didn’t mean to make you cry.
I pulled out a tissue and handed it to her as I said,
“That, uh, dog sh... I mean, the waste that supposedly contains Elixir.”
“Yes, Luminarion pellets.”
“Lumi... what?”
“It’s a name made by combining Luminar, meaning to emit light or shine, and Lion. It literally means a shining lion. That waste is made by grinding up a Luminarion’s corpse, extracting the Elixir, and compressing what remains into pellets.”
“Luminarion... So that’s the name of the monster from the Stage 57 dungeon.”
A glowing lion, huh.
I wondered if it was less a glowing lion and more a berserk one.
“But if the bacteria could be controlled, how would you extract the Elixir from those pellets?”
“If they could be controlled, it’d be very easy.”
As if she’d never been on the verge of tears, she excitedly pulled out her notebook again.
Seriously, where did she keep that notebook?
“This is the bonding structure. You just have to break the chains here. Basically, we need to find an enzyme or bacteria that can target and sever this chain structure, but the chains are packed so tightly that it’s not easy.”
“I see.”
It was hard to look while driving, but I caught a glimpse of the structure.
“This is real alchemy. You can turn trash into something worth more than gold.”
“How much Elixir do you think you could get from a piece of waste this size?”
“From the same weight of a Luminarion corpse, you get about one gram of pure Elixir per kilogram. But there’s roughly as much bonded Elixir as pure Elixir, and the pellets are dried and compressed. So there might be two grams in one kilogram of pellets?”
I’d have to see if my bacteria could extract it, but if they could, that would be twice as much as from the same weight of a Luminarion corpse.
Waste that people paid to have hauled away could be worth twice as much as Luminarion corpses imported from France for tens of thousands of euros per kilogram.
Even though I was driving, my heart was pounding.
Could it really work?
Unable to resist, I discreetly opened my inventory and projected bacteria toward the pellets in the back seat.
Then, recalling the chain structure I’d just seen as clearly as I could, I gave them an order.
‘Break down every last chain.’
Before I knew it, we’d arrived at an apartment complex in Dongtan.
“Oh, you can drop me off at the entrance to the complex.”
“You have a lot of stuff. Are you sure you don’t want me to carry it to your door?”
“I-I’m fine. It’s more than enough that you drove me this far.”
She looked uncomfortable, so I didn’t press her.
Letting a strange man into her home was worth thinking twice about in times as dangerous as these.
Instead, as I took her things out, I glanced at the pellets in the back seat.
Is it done? They don’t look much different...
That was what I thought, when...
It was when the streetlight fell on the dog-poop-looking pellets.
A glittering light flickered across the surface, sparkling in tiny points.
It was something I hadn’t seen before.
I knew instinctively.
That had to be the Elixir.
“W-Well, I’ll head inside...”
As Gyuseon hurried away carrying a huge armful of belongings, I retrieved the bacteria swarm from the processed pellets and ran after her.
“W-What is it?”
She stopped in surprise, and I placed the pellets on top of the armful of things she was holding.
With both hands occupied, she couldn’t do anything but stare at me, bewildered.
“Weren’t you... taking that as a souvenir?”
“I have one favor to ask. If you have time, could you analyze those pellets one more time?”
“What? What do you mean...”
“Please don’t ask questions—just do it once. Something will be different.”
“Ehh...”
“This is my business card. Actually, I’m leaving my company today, too. Just check the phone number.”
I placed my card on top as well, then ran back to the car before she could even answer.
This way, she’d be curious enough to contact me.
If she just ignored me...
I’d have to find someone else.
Still, I had a feeling she wouldn’t ignore what I’d told her.
And that feeling came true the very next morning.
**
When I got home, I slept like a baby.
The day before yesterday, I’d worked past midnight, then came home and went to the assessment center as soon as I woke up.
After I got back from the assessment center, I’d spent hours considering the companies that had contacted me, then went back to the Seonggwang lab for an overnight shift.
It had been a day packed to the brim, so of course I was exhausted.
My phone vibrating was what woke me.
“Mmm... Hello...”
─I-Is this Kim Segyun’s phone...?
“Yes... Who is this...? Oh, Ms. Im Gyuseon?”
─Yes! I-I’m the one! I sent you a message... but you didn’t see it...
What time was it?
Seven in the morning?
I’d collapsed as soon as I got home at two, so not even five hours had passed.
“Yes, what is it?”
─Um, yesterday... what happened to those pellets you gave me?
That was fast.
She’d already done it?
“You already analyzed them?”
─When I brought them home, Elixir had already crystallized on the surface. I was so surprised that I analyzed them right away, and... I-It really... the bonding chains had been broken!!
Oh, right, the sparkles on the outside.
“So that was crystallization.”
─Y-You knew about this, didn’t you? You knew and told me to analyze them, right? R-Really...
“How pure was it?”
─We were able to extract almost 99.9% of the residual Elixir inside! Nothing left behind! This is incredible!
“That’s a relief.”
─A relief? Th-This isn’t just a relief... It’s a revolution! Completely...!
“Ms. Gyuseon.”
─Yes?
“My head is ringing.”
My head was killing me first thing in the morning.
─I-I’m sorry...
“No, I mean, it’s morning, so please keep your voice down so you don’t wake the neighbors...”
─Okaaay...
“And I’d like you to keep this quiet for the time being.”
─Huh? Why? If people find out...
“Yes, the price of the pellets will go through the roof.”
─Oh...
“Let’s make money first.”
There was no way we could keep it secret forever anyway.
Elixir wasn’t going to fall from the sky, and if we suddenly started sourcing and selling it, people would look for an explanation.
If that happened, pellet prices would skyrocket.
Even so, since I was currently the only one who could extract Elixir from the pellets, the price wouldn’t rise too much. But we wouldn’t be able to get them for practically nothing like we could now.
We needed to secure a lot before that happened.
─Huh? We...?
“Yes. I’m thinking of going into business with you, Ms. Gyuseon. What do you think?”
Actually, extracting only the Elixir from pellets whose chain structures I’d broken probably wouldn’t be too difficult.
If that were all I had in mind, I wouldn’t need to work with Ms. Gyuseon.
The real reason I absolutely needed to start a business with her was something else.
“You’re an expert in bacteria and that sort of thing, aren’t you?”
─I did major in that field...
“Perfect.”
I’d already looked her up before passing out after I got home.
Before joining the Seonggwang Biotech lab, Im Gyuseon had double-majored in molecular biology and materials science and engineering at MIT, and specialized in materials research combined with molecular biology.
Strictly speaking, she was on an entirely different level from someone like me, with only a high school education.
Now that I’d crossed paths with someone like her, I wanted to work together.
It would also be a huge help with my own Awakening ability.
“I’ll make sure you can do all the research you want. I’m not lying like Seonggwang Biotech.”
Seonggwang Biotech had probably promised her she could do anything she wanted, too.
Of course, even a conglomerate’s patience hadn’t lasted five years.
By contrast...
Obviously, even if I became reasonably successful, I couldn’t compete with a major conglomerate financially, but I had an ability.
The power to control bacteria freely and overcome their weaknesses by turning them undead.
That ability would surely appeal to this research-obsessed science nerd.
As if to affirm my confidence, a voice came from the other end after a brief silence.
─They say... things like this should be discussed in person... B-But I’m interested! I’d be happy as long as I can do research...
“Great. Get some more sleep for now, and call me when you wake up. I’ll come by.”
Good, the research side was taken care of.
The rest was figuring out how to get more pellets...
If I asked only for Luminarion pellets, anyone would find it suspicious.
Should I go back to working for the company?
No, that wasn’t it...
“Wait a minute...”
I noticed the trash in the corner of my studio apartment had vanished without a trace.
It was the trash I’d eliminated with bacteria yesterday to test my ability.
If so...
“Could I process dungeon waste the same way...?”
My thoughts raced.
After thinking it over for a while, I picked up my phone and called someone.
─Hello?
“Hey, Mincheol hyung. Are you free to talk?”
It was Mincheol hyung, who’d worked with me yesterday.
─Yeah. Hey, you punk, I heard you’re quitting starting today?
“Yeah, that’s how it turned out.”
─You should’ve told me yesterday. I would’ve at least bought you a meal.
“I was too tired yesterday.”
─Right. Let’s meet sometime and grab a meal.
“Sure, hyung. Anyway, I have a proposal for you... You have all the contact info for our clients, right?”
─Clients? Well, yeah.
Though he occasionally filled in on collection jobs when things got busy, like yesterday, Mincheol hyung was basically in sales.
You might wonder why a salesperson did manual labor, but that was just how small businesses worked.
His regular job was going around pharmaceutical companies, research institutes, and the like to land waste-disposal contracts.
“Hyung, want to start a business with me?”
─What kind of ridiculous idea is that?
“I’ll pay you twice what you’re making now. No manual labor, either. You’ll only have to handle sales.”
─Are you... out of your mind?
Who would believe it if someone who’d been doing manual labor with you just yesterday said he was starting a business and would pay you twice your salary?
“Hyung, check what I sent you on KakaoTalk.”
It was the contract offering me an annual salary of 500 million won.
I’d covered up whatever needed covering and sent him only the amount.
─...Don’t tell me...? You Awakened?
“Yeah, that’s the contract they offered me. My salary is 500 million won after taxes, hyung.”
Of course, I wasn’t going to sign the 500-million-won contract...
Still, a 500-million-won annual salary was enough to make sure my employee wouldn’t have to worry about funding.
─No, why start a business when you could just be a Hunter?
“First tell me if you’re in or not. Hurry up. I’ve got a plan.”
─I can’t decide that right now...
“You’d be a managing director! Director Jang—are you really going to pass this up?”
─Damn it, let me think.
“The offer’s only good until tonight.”
─Fine. I’m hanging up.
I said tonight, but I had a feeling he’d reply within a few hours.
For some reason, my hunches had been right lately.
And the last call I made was to...
“Zephyros! Could I meet with you for a bit?”
Either way, I needed startup capital to get a business going, so I’d have to choose one of the companies in that pile of business cards.
And for some reason, I wanted to talk to Zephyros first.