03. Guild Fair (5)

Suhyuk Cha.

The first tower attacker of mankind.

Owner of the first Masterpiece.

The strongest hunter on earth.

Fantastic adjectives attached to his name countless times.

And the person who inspired my dream of making a masterpiece 10 years ago.

I thought we would meet someday, but never thought we would meet in this way in a place like this.

“You… Where did you get this from?”

Cha Soo-hyeok looked at the red thread hanging from the hilt of the three-person sword with a puzzled expression on his face.

“This, obviously….”

Cha Soo-hyeok seems to be checking something by directly touching the red thread. I was offended by the sight.

It is a memento of his father, passed down to me by his grandfather. No matter how much he admired him, he was not something that could be touched carelessly.

“Give it back!”

I reached out my arm and grabbed the three-person sword in Cha Soo-hyeok’s hand.

Cha Soo-hyeok tried to make a reflexive move to avoid it, but when he checked my face, he froze.

“… You were a student?”

I didn’t move thinking it would work. Could it be that mankind’s strongest hunter couldn’t avoid even one of my arms?

But the three-man sword was caught so easily and slipped out of his hand.

‘What?’

What is it? Why is it so easy?

I returned the three-person sword to my waist while hiding my embarrassment.

I held the hilt in my hand, but I no longer felt the presence of a demon worshiper.

Since I was already chasing at a close distance, I eventually went out of range in that moment.

Damn it, I missed it too. He let out a deep sigh in despair.

Until then, Cha Soo-hyeok was looking at me with a confused expression.

Why did Cha Soo-hyeok recognize his father’s things? I stayed alert.

Because I couldn’t guess what kind of relationship he had with his father and his grandfather.

As if he had read my alertness, Soo-hyeok Cha raised both hands.

“I don’t mean to hurt you. I just want to make sure the owner of the thing is someone I know.”

“… These are my father’s.”

At those words, Cha Soo-hyeok hardened his expression and bit his mouth tightly.

It looked like the expression when half-expected things turned out to be true.

“Then you must be Kim Yi-jin.”

You know my name? I was even more surprised this time.

He was silent for a moment, then hesitatingly opened his mouth.

“… How is the old Kim Il-woong?”

Kim Il-woong. That was my grandfather’s name.

“Yes. Grandpa… Goodbye.”

“As expected….”

I needed an explanation to understand what the heck this was all about.

As if it was the same for Cha Soo-hyeok, he let out a long breath with confused eyes.

I never thought I would see with my own two eyes that mankind’s strongest hunter couldn’t keep his composure. Even in this situation, it felt very strange.

“I think we need some time to talk.”

“Wait a minute.”

It’s good to talk, but not here.

Auction time is running out. I couldn’t stay in a place like this to know how the plan of 10,000 was going.

“Not here. Please go up to the second floor.”

–

We moved to the cafeteria on the second floor.

From here, you can overlook the exhibition hall and the place where the auction is held.

Curiously, Cha Soo-hyuk didn’t reveal his identity at all, even though he was revealing his bare face.

Even when he entered the cafe, he handed over his card and left the order to me, and no one noticed that Cha Soo-hyeok was standing next to him in the crowd.

A camouflage skill or an item? He seemed to be the type to keep his abilities as long as he didn’t speak to them.

“Uh, the order….”

I ordered two drinks while fumbling through unfamiliar menu items. If I hadn’t been to the cafe with Yoon Seo-hee, I would have been in big trouble.

The drink was two iced americanos. Even if I ordered this because I’m not good at sweets, I wonder if Cha Soo-hyeok will drink well.

Honestly, I can’t imagine Cha Soo-hyeok eating a sweet frappuccino sprinkled with chocolate chips with a straw like Yoon Seo-hee, after he said it with his own mouth.

I brought the menu and sat down where Cha Soo-hyeok was waiting.

He didn’t even look at the drink he had brought and opened his mouth right away.

“Time flies so fast. How can that little boy be this big already?”

“Yes? When have you seen me?”

“I didn’t see it myself. But I’ve seen it a lot in pictures.”

You said that? That’s really something… It was such a strange feeling.

To think that the owner of Excalibur, one of the strongest hunters in the world, had known me since childhood.

“What is your relationship with my father?”

“Old man… Didn’t your grandfather explain it to you?”

“No. Not at all.”

I only know that my parents were hunters and lost their lives while climbing the tower, but I haven’t heard anything else about it.

I was curious. But my grandfather didn’t want to tell me such a story, and whenever he did, he showed a very distressed expression.

I just didn’t want to hear it, making my only blood relative, my grandfather, sad.

Still, if there was an opportunity to listen, I wanted to take this opportunity. What kind of people were our parents?

And what kind of hunter he was.

“I was a member of the same clan as your father.”

“A clan?”

“Yes. Did you really not know?”

Cha Soo-hyeok lowered his gaze and shook his head softly.

It was an expression full of bitterness, as if recalling the long past.

“I guess the old man still hasn’t forgiven me for not explaining anything to his grandson.”

“… ….”

My parents died while climbing the tower.

And a grandfather who hates hunters climbing towers.

Cha Soo-hyeok says he was once a member of the same clan as his parents.

I felt like I had a vague idea of what had happened, but I wanted to hear it directly from his mouth.

“Can you elaborate? About my parents.”

“Mmm.”

At my words, Cha Soo-hyeok closed his mouth for a moment and was lost in thought.

It was like searching for an old memory to know where to start.

“I have to talk about this first. The Mercury Guild was once the Mercury Clan.”

I know that.

The early days of Outbreak. The first generation Awakeners climbed the tower to prevent the gate from opening, or for their own reasons.

However, the tower is not an easy place for an awakened person without any information to do anything about it.

That’s why the Awakeners, who would later be called Hunters, gathered people and climbed the tower together as they lacked strength.

The early guilds that are now called guilds all started as clans decades ago.

“Your father made Mercury. When I joined Mercury as a Clan member, he was the Clan Leader.”

Uh.

What?

My head frowns at those words that don’t feel realistic at all.

I can’t guess what kind of expression I’m making right now.

My father made Mercury?

“It’s a little-known fact. But I never hid it.”

The ice of the untouched Americano placed in front of him melted with a rattling sound.

I needed something to cool my head off, so I sipped my portion of Americano.

Whether I said it or not, Cha Soo-hyeok continued to talk with a serious face.

“Everybody only wants to know the glory of Mercury, and they don’t really care how many people died before they achieved that achievement.”

His eyes went down for a moment, perhaps recalling a bad memory.

After a while, he raised his head again and looked straight at me.

“But it was your father who made Mercury today. It saved countless lives, including mine.”

“Uh….”

That’s too….

It was too much of a story to be taken all of a sudden.

I never thought of my father being such a great hunter.

When my grandfather gave me a thread with tremendous magical power, saying it was his father’s keepsake, I was curious about my father’s identity for a while, but this was a story beyond my imagination.

At that time, Cha Soo-hyeok was alone and the light on the device came on and the alarm flickered.

“There is a phone call. Wait a minute.”

He alone tapped the device with his finger. Then, as if the phone was connected, a young woman’s voice was heard over the speaker.

[Soo Hyuk! Where are you now?]

“What happened?”

[Criminals with an S-rank risk at Shinseoul Station… Information has come in that Rachel and Kung Thao have been sighted. The exhibition hall is bait! I’m on my way to the station right now, so Soo-hyeok is right… !]

Cha Soo-hyeok stares at my face for a while while answering the phone.

Then, as if he had finished his thoughts, he continued talking to the other person.

“I will join you later.”

[Yes!? What does that mean?!?]

“You alone should be enough for two S-rank criminals. Go first.”

[Ah, sir… Soohyuk, are you crazy? Are you kidding me Anyway, look at those two-]

Beep. Cha Soo-hyeok hung up the phone without listening to any more behind the scenes.

He connected the phone through the speaker as if he wanted me to listen, so I didn’t hide my puzzled expression.

“… Can I?”

“It doesn’t matter. Because I don’t think this is bait.”

Cha Soo-hyuk pointed at the three-man sword hanging from my waist with his chin.

“That sword. He had the power of an exorcist.”

“Oh, yes.”

“Who were you chasing earlier?”

You noticed. Well, there’s no way you wouldn’t know with Cha Soo-hyeok’s skills.

“At first I thought it was your group. But I know not now.”

“Yes. He was a devil worshiper.”

“… Also, was it?”

Cha Soo-hyeok looked at me with a more serious expression than ever before.

“I heard information that this venue has everything. If you know anything, tell me.”

“… ….”

It must be difficult to hide it here.

But before that. The time was slowly approaching.

I needed to make sure that the work entrusted to Baek Ji-soo went well.

“Wait a minute.”

“Hmm?”

I turned on my smartphone and checked my watch. The time had just passed 2 o’clock.

The exhibition hall under the cafeteria is bustling.

It deserves it. It’s time for the auction to open, but so far there has been no announcement.

At that moment, the speakers throughout the exhibition hall turned on and the voice of guidance rang out urgently.

[Ah. Ah… Guidance will be given. The auction scheduled for 2:00 PM is temporarily delayed due to internal circumstances.]

The hunters gathered at the venue raise their voices as if asking what this is all about.

“What? What does that mean! Auction delay!”

“You’re not going to stop, are you?”

[Once again, we will inform you. The auction scheduled for 2:00 PM is temporarily delayed due to internal circumstances. We will inform you again when the schedule is normalized-]

Whether the hunters were talking or not, the announcement unilaterally ended with what I had to say.

Crowds move in confusion at the unexpected news that the auction has been delayed.

Yes.

Baek Ji-soo did a good job.

I smiled in repentance.