# 71
***
“Cha Ki-young.”
After reaching the first floor and making a call, Cha Ki-young’s excited voice rang in his ears along with loud music.
“Jin-ha! When did you arrive?”
“Come pick me up.”
“Huh? Why does your voice sound like that? Where are you now?”
“I’m at Cheong. I’ll wait for you on the first floor….”
“Oh my. Okay, wait just a moment. I’ll fly over!”
“Don’t bother, just drive safely.”
“I’ll fly over while driving safely, don’t worry. Seok-ho!”
The call ended with that shrill call. Jin-ha was starting to feel feverish and increasingly dazed.
No matter how he thought about it, it was strange. He never had gate sickness before, and he’d never heard of fever being a symptom of gate sickness. There must be some other problem.
Jin-ha made his way to the bathroom, trying not to stagger. He needed a mirror.
Placing both hands on the sink and leaning against it, he took slow, deep breaths. When he opened his Information Eye, countless rays of light were branching out from his body. It was in this state even though he had organized it not long ago.
Unconsciously, Jin-ha first checked his connection point with Riyekan.
[Lee Jin-ha]
Riyekan’s lost soul fragment (25/34)
The soul was finding its way back to its owner faster than expected.
Jin-ha squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them and began erasing unnecessary information. Fell in love with Legas’s bean dish, Nam Hyun-seok is suspicious, I hope Riyekan is eating well, key holder, must safely conquer the dungeon…. Among those bits of trivial information, Jin-ha finally found the branch he was looking for.
[Lee Jin-ha]
Abnormal Status: O%?g? � 이 i�&
But could he really say he found it? Jin-ha stared intently at the broken text, trying to interpret it, but the characters didn’t budge. Instead, additional information branched out.
[Lee Jin-ha]
Abnormal Status: O%?g? � 이 i�& (14 days)
Fever(B), Mana Depletion(C), Nausea(A), Sexual Urge(B), Tachycardia(C)
After confirming the text on the small branch, Jin-ha couldn’t believe his eyes. Everything else made sense, but what the hell was “Sexual Urge” doing there?
His head throbbed with a headache that wasn’t even listed among the abnormal statuses. He’d never seen anything like this before. Both the broken text and this abnormal status type had clearly never appeared on Earth before. And it was definitely a high-grade type.
It seemed he’d contracted it in that other world, but he had no idea how. If he had to guess when it could have happened, it would have been when he was exploring the dungeon with Riyekan, but that was at least a week ago, and it was strange for symptoms to appear only now.
Above all, if something had happened to him there, there was no way the great mage Riyekan wouldn’t have noticed.
“Hnngh…”
Jin-ha inhaled sharply and gritted his teeth. Something inside his abdomen seemed to poke him, followed by a pain like someone was squeezing his internal organs.
Until the wave of pain gradually subsided, Jin-ha closed his eyes tightly and endured. When the pain finally diminished to a tolerable level, Jin-ha took out his phone with trembling hands. Just as he was about to make a call, it vibrated. Reflexively sliding the screen to answer, Cha Ki-young shouted:
“Lee Jin-ha, where are you! You said you’d wait on the first floor!”
“Bathroom.”
“I’ll be right there!”
Cha Ki-young really arrived immediately. Jin-ha, who had been leaning against the sink with his eyes closed due to the dizziness that had worsened while his Information Eye was open, frowned at the sight of Cha Ki-young rushing in.
“Jin-ha!”
“My head hurts, so please be quiet.”
“Oh, sorry! But what’s hurting?”
“I don’t know…. Just take me home….”
“Okay, let’s go to the hospital.”
“No, home….”
As Cha Ki-young supported Jin-ha, who was dripping with cold sweat, and led him out of the bathroom, the employee Seok-ho, who had been waiting outside, approached in surprise.
“Are you okay?”
“Seok-ho, contact the hospital.”
“Yes, boss.”
Jin-ha waved his hand to stop Seok-ho before he could pick up the phone.
“Jin-ha, you don’t look like someone who can insist on not going to the hospital! This looks much more serious than when you collapsed last time!”
“It won’t help to go to the hospital….”
“…Then?”
“Please contact Dr. Jo Sung-hyun. Tell him I need a potion to remove an abnormal status….”
“You’re like this because you’re under an abnormal status?”
Cha Ki-young’s face contorted with worry.
“What the hell happened to you over there…! No, rest first. Seok-ho, call the store and check what grades of abnormal status removal potions we have.”
Abnormal status removal potions are legally sold only in Hunter-exclusive shops, so why would they have them at their store?
Jin-ha wanted to press him on this point, but his mouth wouldn’t move. His consciousness was gradually sinking. His body went limp, and he felt as if he were being immersed in something hot.
“No high-grade ones? What kind of inventory management is this? Quickly send someone to the market. Right now!”
***
When he opened his eyes, his physical condition had noticeably improved. He still felt nauseated and dizzy, but it was nothing compared to before he collapsed. Jin-ha was blankly staring at the sunlight streaming through the window when a sudden thought made him bolt upright to look for his phone.
“…Thank goodness.”
He had worried that he might have been unconscious for days, but fortunately, only one day had passed. He had promised to return within three days, so he could stay on Earth until today. But considering Riyekan’s personality, he should probably return very early tomorrow. Otherwise, Riyekan would surely find something to nitpick about.
Jin-ha was rubbing his forehead with a cold hand when he got out of bed. After putting on slippers and stepping outside the room, he heard clattering sounds from downstairs. Peering over, he saw Cha Ki-young sitting at the coffee table doing something.
Seeing that carefree back view made Jin-ha suddenly angry. He quietly went down the stairs and kicked Cha Ki-young’s leg hard.
“Aaack!”
“Don’t pretend it hurts.”
Cha Ki-young bent over, rubbing his shin, and complained.
“It really hurts! Why are you kicking people?”
“How did that happen? Why does your store have abnormal status removal potions?”
“…Well…”
Cha Ki-young closed his mouth and rolled his eyes. The previous talk about running some kind of detective agency disguised as a bar was surely all lies.
“What exactly are you doing?”
“…Weeeell…”
At that moment, a large man wearing an ill-fitting floral apron walked awkwardly from the kitchen.
“Um, please have your meal first.”
“Mr. Kim Seok-ho, why are you preparing meals here? Does Cha Ki-young make his employees do this too?”
“No, just me. He pays me well, so it’s fine.”
His bright, innocent eyes, unsuited to his large build, sparkled like a cow’s. Well, if he was paid well and satisfied with the arrangement, that was better at least.
Jin-ha looked back and forth between the two surprisingly compatible people and sighed, moving toward the kitchen. He didn’t forget to beckon Cha Ki-young to follow.
From the conversation during the meal, Jin-ha learned that the bar Cha Ki-young insisted was an errand center or detective agency was actually a company with about 50 employees. They had a few Hunters, and in rural areas, they tracked and caught monsters that escaped from overflowing gates, or harvested herbs that had mutated due to dungeon influence and sold them.
“What errand center? You’re just an unregistered illegal guild….”
“Not an errand center, a detective agency! And we don’t conquer gates or dungeons. So we’re not a guild, I tell you. Right, Seok-ho?”
Seok-ho nodded vigorously.
“That’s right. We just catch monsters that guilds haven’t found yet.”
“And sell them on the black market, you say.”
At the sharp remark, Seok-ho mumbled. He seemed to have a lot to say but was holding back. When Jin-ha looked at him to encourage him to speak, Seok-ho lowered his gaze timidly but still said what he wanted to say.
“In rural areas, the Anomaly Management Agency moves slowly. Gates overflow more frequently than in the metropolitan area, but since there are fewer guilds stationed in rural areas, Hunter dispatches are delayed too. We only go to such places.”
“……”
Jin-ha had to keep quiet. There was nothing wrong with what Seok-ho said. Sensing this concession, Cha Ki-young added:
“And selling on the black market is just to earn points, you know?”
“What points.”
“You know, Seok-ho just went to America to track down his father’s past. Do you know how hard it is to get a U.S. visa these days? But if you contribute to the market and accumulate points, you can spend the points instead of money to handle such things. We bought the high-grade abnormal status removal potion with points too.”
“I didn’t ask you to….”
“Hey, why are you saying such hurtful things? We worked so hard. Right, Seok-ho?”
Ignoring Cha Ki-young who was huffing while seeking agreement from Seok-ho, Jin-ha rubbed his throbbing forehead. He had thought Cha Ki-young was living diligently and felt relieved, but this was the kind of diligence he meant.
Then again, it had been strange from the start that Cha Ki-young could run a bar normally enough to expand and relocate.
Author: Hyacinthus B
Hyacinthus
