"You're not supposed to use skills on people."
Smack. Without even waiting for me to finish, Kim A-rin had already activated her skill, so I slapped her on the back.
Lightning was already crackling around Kim A-rin's body, but my invincibility skill was active at the same time, so.
[ No Attacks During Dialogue. ]
Smacking Kim A-rin on the back while she was menacingly threatening Park Se-rin didn't even tingle, let alone electrocute me.
Park Se-rin had already been scared out of her wits before any of that and was bawling her eyes out, but…
Anyway, after explaining that the whole thing was a misunderstanding, I made Kim A-rin bow her head.
You can't make someone cry and then not apologize.
"That's not how I raised you! Hmph!"
"……You should've just said it was chocolate from the start."
"Shh. Apologize first."
Not listening to me before losing her head and flying into a rage.
Mistaking Park Se-rin for a would-be child murderer.
Threatening Park Se-rin with the overwhelming power of an S-rank Hunter.
I made her apologize properly for all of it.
Technically I had my share of fault in this too, but calming Park Se-rin down came first.
"Um, I didn't do anything too terrible, did I?"
"…No, you didn't…."
"That's a relief, then."
I stood beside Park Se-rin, gently soothing her with soft pats.
Along with a brief rundown about how Kim A-rin had always had a bit of a short fuse since she was little.
"I thought she'd turned over a new leaf after becoming a Hunter, but — honestly. Still not fully human yet. Please understand, okay? I'll apologize on her behalf."
"Um, Ji-woo… do you and Hunter Kim A-rin know each other……?"
"Well, more or less raised her on my back, you could say."
"……Who raised who?"
"I raised Kim A-rin."
"??"
It's true, though. She doesn't believe me.
I really did carry Kim A-rin around on my back when she was little.
If you dig through the website of the orphanage I grew up in, there are probably photos from back then.
I remember people who came to volunteer at the orphanage took pictures of me and Kim A-rin together.
Oh, but I wonder if those photos got swapped out to show girl Ji-woo too? I haven't checked, so I have no idea.
"Anyway, you're here to give me money, right?"
"Well, um…. I did come to see you, that much is true…."
"Then let's go! Chop chop!"
I grabbed Park Se-rin by the wrist, then gestured at Kim A-rin to lead the way already.
Either way, the most important thing right now was my cut of the Dungeon clear reward.
Apparently all the Hunters I'd met yesterday, Park Se-rin included, had already arrived, so I was the only one left.
"Which floor?"
"35th."
"Oh……"
—Stretch, stretch.
—Stretch, stretch.
"…Stop staring and press it for me."
Only then did Kim A-rin press the button for the 35th floor, which was at a height I couldn't reach no matter how far I stretched my arm.
Up until that point, Park Se-rin had been standing quietly behind me too.
Why were two people taller than me just watching?
—Clunk.
"…!"
The elevator finally lurched into motion once the button was pressed.
The only problem was that it moved so fast it was a little terrifying.
It blew past the 10th floor in an instant, then the 20th, then the 30th, and arrived at the 35th before I knew it.
I thought they were launching a rocket.
I wasn't ready to go to Mars yet.
"We're here."
"I-is it over?"
I finally let go of the elevator handrail and escaped through the open doors.
What greeted me was a floor-to-ceiling glass wall, a long corridor stretching alongside it, and meeting rooms spaced out between them.
So somewhere among all those meeting rooms was my Dungeon clear reward.
Well — the Hunters I'd met yesterday, I mean.
"Let me run down the hall──!"
—Grab.
"No running in the hallway."
"O-okay…."
And so I walked down the corridor alongside Kim A-rin.
I made a point of ignoring the view beyond the glass wall, which was dizzying just to glance at.
…Who builds a building this tall.
—Creak…….
"Oh."
"Ji-woo!"
Following Kim A-rin, I finally stepped into one of the meeting rooms, and familiar faces came into view.
The bearded Hunter who'd been the raid leader, and another Hunter I'd exchanged names with, Lee Yu-ju.
Plus various other Hunters whose faces I recognized but whose names I didn't know.
They'd all been waiting for me to arrive.
"All familiar faces…. …Actually, scratch that."
It wasn't just the Hunters from yesterday — a few Haetae Guild executives were seated there too.
And among them, the woman the news had been going on about as the Haetae Guild's guildmaster.
Come to think of it, she was an S-rank Hunter too, wasn't she.
"Are you… the one called Lee Ji-woo?"
"That's me."
"Kim A-rin. Is this really her?"
The Haetae Guild's guildmaster looked back and forth between me and Kim A-rin with a baffled expression.
But I'd expected this.
To everyone else, I'm just a little girl.
But my true identity is a terrifying S-rank Hunter who makes even fellow Hunters tremble in fear.
I was already looking forward to seeing what expression the guildmaster would make when she found out who I really was.
"Give me my money. Gimme the money."
"……The shamelessness is definitely a family trait."
The guildmaster, expression complicated, told me to take a seat for now.
Apparently what mattered more than money right now was figuring out what had actually happened at the Gangseo-gu Gate.
Completely opposite values from mine.
Probably going to be hard to get close to her.
"Then let's begin."
"Yes, of course."
At the guildmaster's word, the raid leader Hunter answered respectfully and rose from his seat.
He looked older than her, but I guess rank really is everything for Hunters.
It seemed like Hunters always spoke formally to anyone ranked higher than themselves.
That was news to me.
"Good day. I am Jang Baek-cheol, a B-rank Hunter affiliated with the Rudders Guild. On approximately the 13th, myself and the other Rudders Guild Hunters were——"
The rest of it was a bit dry and long-winded, so I filtered it out as usual.
The initial assessed rank of the Gangseo-gu Gate had been C.
The Rudders Guild, being the nearest, had assembled a raid party with appropriate forces and moved to clear the Dungeon.
But once inside, it was packed with monsters that looked closer to A-rank, not C-rank at all.
They fought as best they could but were gradually pushed into a corner, and then at some point everyone suddenly lost consciousness.
When they came to, the monsters were gone and there was a random little girl standing there.
That was the gist of it.
And yet he talked for ages. I nearly fell asleep in the middle from sheer boredom.
—Murmur, murmur.
—Tap, tap.
"Hey, hey."
"Huh?"
Kim A-rin's nudge snapped me back to attention, and I found every pair of eyes in the room now fixed on me.
I quietly asked Kim A-rin why everyone was staring, and she told me it was my turn.
Oh, right.
"Right. I am Kira."
"…Ji-woo."
"Okay, that was a joke. I'm, um…. Just a part-timer who happened to be passing through."
With everyone staring at me, I was oddly nervous and the words weren't coming out right.
But there was no need to be that tense.
I'd end up being the strongest one here eventually anyway.
Why would I be intimidated in front of future small-fry?
"So, according to Kim A-rin, you took down everything including the boss monster. And retrieved the Dungeon Stone."
"Correct. You've got it exactly right."
"But how am I supposed to believe that?"
Midway through my explanation, the guildmaster cut in and demanded proof.
Proof that my claim — that I'd done everything from start to finish alone two days ago — was true.
"…Assimilation!"
【Rank: F → S (Currently Assimilating: Fenrion — 23%)】
【Currently Assimilating: Fenrion (23%)】
Seeing is believing.
Rather than explaining at length, I simply showed them what I'd looked like two days ago.
An exclamation point appeared above the guildmaster's eyes.
Ears and a tail had suddenly sprouted from me, and she looked quite startled by it.
"That bearded guy over there wanted to wait for Gate Shock to pass, so I ended up stepping in and took care of all the monsters like this and like that. Found the Dungeon Stone too."
Catching the guildmaster slightly off guard, I didn't waste the opening and explained how I'd found the Dungeon Stone.
There were Hunters in this room who had personally witnessed me retrieving the Dungeon Stone, after all.
When their testimonies confirming my account followed one after another, the guildmaster fell into quiet contemplation.
"…Lee Ji-woo."
"Give me my money."
"No, right, the money I can give you, but…."
The guildmaster, face complicated, spoke.
Did I know what rank of Dungeon I had cleared two days ago?
Of course I did, so I nodded.
S-rank, obviously.
Which meant the Dungeon clear reward would be just as substantial.
Who do you think you're calling an idiot. Just hand over the Dungeon clear reward. Or else you die.
"From what I hear, you want to join our guild. With an attitude like this, I'm not sure……"
"Ah."
I was an idiot.
When I thought about it, every single person sitting in front of me right now was a future superior of mine.
The moment that realization hit me, I immediately did a complete 180 and promised.
Whatever they asked, I'd answer anything.
"Then let me ask first. What type was the boss monster?"
"Um……. Some kind of golem, I think. I pulverized it into dust."
"What about the other monsters. Anything you remember?"
"Hmm…. Wolves and orcs? I beat them all down too."
After my brief testimony, the guildmaster called someone over and quietly asked them something.
But I was currently in the middle of Assimilation with Fenrion.
No matter how quietly they whispered among themselves, I could hear every word.
I had two extra ears right now, after all.
"Boss monster, was it the golem type?"
"Yes, that's correct. And it being reduced to dust… that's correct too."
"What about the orc-type and wolf-type monsters. Were there signs of them being struck?"
"That's… also correct."
The guildmaster's eyes widened slightly again as my words were confirmed true once more.
It was a satisfying sight to behold.
She had a prim look about her but surprisingly good reactions.
Maybe we could actually get along?
"Any more questions?"
"……For now, please step outside. We need to talk among ourselves for a bit."
It seemed the appearance of a new S-rank Hunter (in the making) had rattled her quite a bit.
She had me and the Rudders Guild Hunters leave the meeting room, then held a discussion with just the Haetae Guild members inside.
I tried listening in just in case, but I couldn't make out what they were saying in there.
Had they put up some kind of soundproofing spell?
—Flinch.
"…Oh."
While waiting for the Haetae Guild's meeting to wrap up, an all-too-familiar signal arrived.
I looked around for a bathroom, and thankfully spotted a restroom sign just down the way.
Unlike boys, girls had a hard time holding this signal in, so I had to get there as fast as possible.
[ ♀️ Women's Restroom ]
"………Ugh."
Where I needed to go was the women's restroom, but I still walked toward it feeling vaguely awkward about it.
Either way, I was an 11-year-old girl right now.
There was nothing to be embarrassed about, so why was I like this.
"Good job handling that on your own…. …Haah."
After somehow getting through it, I went to unlock the stall door to leave.
Well — tried to.
—Click.
"Honestly, what on earth is going on……."
From a stall a little ways away from mine.
The guildmaster's voice drifted out from inside.
With two extra ears right now, even quiet mutterings like that came through crystal clear.
It would have been polite to leave without eavesdropping on someone's private thoughts, but for some reason my curiosity got the better of me.
I just wanted to know what the guildmaster was saying to herself.
"……I want to touch those ears, but will she get mad? No, maybe if I offer her pocket money she'd let me."
"…?"
"Ji-woo, Ji-woo…. Ha, even her name is cute. No wonder Kim A-rin is so protective of her. So unfair, honestly."
"…?……??"
"I really want to pinch those cheeks. Is there any way, seriously……? I hope I didn't make a bad impression. You idiot, fix your tone. Talking all stiff to a little kid. So proud of yourself just because you're a guildmaster, aren't you……!"
I bolted after hearing that much.
I picked the wrong guild to join.
