196 – Who Is the Enemy – 3

At this point, to the outside world, the Lumen party was known to be missing.

If so, how did one of the Seven Sages—specifically Yul-yeong, who had met Gi-jun once before—find out he was in Uralta and contact him? It was because of the recent rampage of spatial authority that had occurred in Uralta.

“Since your news cut off after the first rampage, and now, nearly two months later, a similar phenomenon has occurred again. Anyone with a brain would have no choice but to know you were related to it.”

Thinking there was no need to pretend ignorance in front of one of the Seven Sages, he had asked Unika to connect him with her, but he was already beginning to regret it.

Despite having tried to launch a surprise attack multiple times, failed, got scared, and run away, she could still maintain such a haughty attitude.

Gi-jun replied, fed up with the young woman’s boastful voice coming from beyond the communication device Unika had handed him.

“How do you know what happened in Uralta in the first place?”

“We are the ones who manage the teleport gates across the entire continent. But strangely, whenever a teleport gate malfunctions, an inaccessible coordinate is detected. Then, wouldn’t we naturally keep an eye on that coordinate?”

“You found the coordinates, but you couldn’t access them?”

“Yeeees, that was the very annoying part. Entry was blocked by an absurd barrier! So we were just keeping an eye on it…”

In the first place, Gi-jun could not properly understand what keeping an eye on coordinates meant.

Was it correct to understand it as… detecting the generation of a teleport gate connecting to a specific destination?

“Exactly. After all, since you are someone who even became a Hero of Gratia, you must have that level of understanding.”

“Are you being sarcastic?”

“Of course not. Even if triggering the Grand Quest was luck, completing it beyond perfection was an undeniable skill. I see you in a new light. To be honest, when I saw you back then, it didn’t look like you had that much potential.”

He wanted to sarcastically ask if she was indirectly saying her own eyes were terrible, but he held back.

The words of Yul-yeong, one of the Seven Sages, continued from there.

“To think that coordinate—the coordinate of death from which no one who was dragged away has ever returned—would be detected in Uralta, which doesn’t even have a teleport gate? Right after that, I was terrified to hear the news that the Lumen party had disappeared, but fortunately, my disciple was alive and well in Cor, so I was relieved.”

“Disciple?”

“I mean Ji-hye.”

“Since when was Ji-hye your disciple?”

“She is going to become my disciple soon, so it’s the same thing. Within the great flow of magic, that much is just a minor error, an error.”

Gi-jun thought once again that he really disliked this woman.

“Anyway, after that, the rampage happened in the same place again… I can guess what happened, but let me ask first. How did it go?”

Gi-jun snorted and decided to give her the answer she wanted.

“You won’t be detecting that coordinate in the future.”

“Perfect! As expected of the Hero, I believed in you!”

“By any chance, have you ever been hit with a shield? If you haven’t, I can let you experience it.”

“Sorry, it was just an attempt to ease the tension. You are too scary…”

Hearing Gi-jun’s menacing voice, Yul-yeong apologized in a serious tone for a moment.

Considering she was making such a fuss, had she perhaps been nervous all this time?

If so, the dignity of one of the Seven Sages was in tatters.

When Gi-jun snorted without making any other reply, she continued in a somewhat subdued voice.

“So… by any chance, can you tell me what was inside there?”

“Do you think I’d tell you?”

“Tch, anyway, it’s about time you came to Hyeon. Bring Ji-hye along, too.”

He thought she was only talking about the rampage of spatial authority, but the main point had finally come out.

However… Gi-jun did not answer her right away but frowned, lost in thought.

Since she contacted him at a time when he was already worrying about where to go after leaving Uralta, it felt extremely coincidental.

In the past, she had promised Gi-jun that she would compensate him for her rudeness.

Especially now, when the party’s reputation had risen and annoying pests were gathering around, it would not be a bad idea to go collect it while also showing off their connection to one of the Seven Sages…

“Why now? Did something happen by any chance?”

“Ah—yeah, I suppose I looked too anxious after all.”

Perhaps because she had once tried to scam him and suffered dearly for it, Yul-yeong admitted it immediately.

“You know that ‘deviation’ from before.”

Deviation.

Was she by any chance talking about the Frankenstein Junior incident that had occurred at the Animo branch of the Magic Tower?

That was precisely the reason Yul-yeong could not act tough against Gi-jun right now.

He replied in an exasperated voice.

“You mean that deviation where you guys denied any involvement, claiming the Magic Kingdom had nothing to do with it.”

“We really had nothing to do with it!”

Of course, Gi-jun did not truly suspect it either by this point.

Frankly speaking, if the Magic Kingdom had seriously sided with the Dark Faction, the entire continent would have already been swept into a great war.

“We had… nothing to do with it.”

“What did you just say, punk?”

“Wait, you.”

As Gi-jun, whose mind had gone blank for a moment, let out a dumbfounded voice, Yul-yeong replied in a tearful voice.

“I didn’t know either! I really didn’t know!”

“Are you calling that an excuse right now?”

Gi-jun wanted to lose his mind and just take it easy, but it was not the time for that yet.

If the Magic Kingdom had truly been encroached upon by the Dark Faction, there was no way a figure of the Seven Sages’ caliber would meekly confess the situation to Gi-jun.

“I’m a newcomer among the Seven Sages. Even for the incident at the Animo branch, I only moved immediately after being told that the Animo Magic Tower was about to collapse and that I should go clean it up in the name of the Seven Sages.”

At the time, Frankenstein Junior had appeared to swallow the Magic Tower by his own power alone.

However, the possibility that someone else had been connected behind him.

Or the possibility that after taking over the Magic Tower, he had connected with someone in the Magic Kingdom.

Or otherwise, the possibility that black magic was spreading through the Magic Kingdom via a path different from Frankenstein Junior.

All of these were entirely possible.

“I didn’t pay any attention to it after that, but from a while ago, I started to feel gazes that seemed to be monitoring me… Perhaps they are trying to recruit me, or perhaps they are trying to kill me…”

Perhaps even Yul-yeong coming to Animo had been someone’s scheme.

The ‘test’ on her had started from that very point.

No matter how many groups were secretly active within the Magic Kingdom, rather than killing her, a member of the Seven Sages, out of the blue, they would want to draw her in as an ally.

Feeling his headache worsening, Gi-jun asked a question.

“If the Magic Kingdom… falls to the Dark Faction, what happens?”

“First of all… first of all, the teleport gates across the entire continent would be cut off. In the worst-case scenario, they could all run rampant at once, causing casualties ranging from tens of millions to a hundred million.”

So just by simply turning to the Dark Faction, that would happen.

If things went wrong, it might develop into an incident larger in scale than the Grand Quest that had occurred in the Gratia Kingdom.

Gi-jun even felt a sense of gloom, wondering why he was receiving this kind of consultation.

“If it’s such a serious matter, why are you contacting me? There must be plenty of other people you can trust.”

“I don’t know who to trust. At least among my acquaintances in the Magic Kingdom…”

“Then what about outside the kingdom?”

“…”

“Do you happen to have no friends?”

Gi-jun ended up discarding his concept of a solemn Flame Human hero, but Yul-yeong, on the other side of the communication device, was so severely damaged by his words that she had no time to question his concept.

“I-I’ve barely ever gone outside the Magic Kingdom, so how could I make friends outside! Still, there was someone I could trust quite a bit, but he was disqualified…”

Disqualified, rather than dead.

He felt like he knew who she was talking about, but since he did not want to get wrapped up in more trouble, he decided not to press the matter.

“So the only one I can trust right now is you. At least you personally smashed that monster called Frankenstein or whatever.”

“Right, speaking of which, if something like this happens, shouldn’t you contact the Empire first? The Hero is in the Empire, after all. The Hero.”

“Fatum is currently missing.”

After delivering the not-so-good news in a chilly voice, she added in a lowered voice.

“And I can’t trust the Empire either. Of course, they would move if I actively contacted them, but there’s a high chance the information would leak to the enemy. Then, they would immediately come for my neck instead of this suffocating standoff.”

“So that’s why it’s me.”

“Be glad. It means you possess enough power and honor to be chosen as the trump card by one of the Seven Sages.”

“I will go.”

“…Really?”

At Gi-jun’s immediate response, Yul-yeong replied in a dumbfounded voice.

“I didn’t think you’d come.”

“If you thought that, why did you contact me?”

“Well, I was just struggling out of desperation… and also to talk about the coordinate of death.”

“How foolish. I will be there within fifteen days, so hold out until then. And hand over the fee for the teleport gate, too.”

“No, wait. You’re really coming?”

“Why are you making me repeat myself? Do you really want to get hit with a shield?”

At Gi-jun’s words, she hesitated before answering.

“I was just surprised that you’re coming without any fear when it’s an urgent situation where even I, one of the Seven Sages, feel the danger of death. Besides, our first meeting wasn’t all that great… Ah.”

For a moment, she let out an exclamation of realization.

“By any chance, did you fall for me?”

“I’m not going. If you go to the underworld and meet Persephone, make sure to tell her you died while spouting nonsense.”

“Wait a minute! I’m sorry, it was a joke!”

Since he was able to hear polite language from one of the Seven Sages, he decided to let it slide just this once.

“It wouldn’t end with you dying alone. If many people could be in danger, it is only natural to move to prevent it.”

“Well, if you solve it, it will be treated as a quest and you can receive a reward, but…”

“We are clearly speaking the same language, yet the meaning isn’t getting through.”

“If you are truly moving out of pure goodwill, that’s really creepy. At least, even if someone like that fell for me, I wouldn’t be happy at all.”

“Are you talking nonsense because you really don’t want me to go by any chance?”

“This is what we call ‘Memorized Humor’ in the Magic Kingdom. By remembering a joke that worked once and repeating it, you reduce the waste of time spent trying to think of new humor.”

“I’m sorry, but it wasn’t very funny from the start.”

Gi-jun let out an empty sigh and declared briefly but firmly.

“Anyway, I will go as soon as I am ready, so wait for me.”

“Ye-Yes.”

Finally, the communication was cut off.

Gi-jun stared at the unresponsive communication device for a moment with an expression as if he wanted to smash it, then finally relaxed his shoulders.

“I really dislike this woman.”

“It seems she likes Jun quite a bit, though.”

Gi-jun was startled by Tilla’s words, but Unika, the very person who had prepared the communication device, also replied to Tilla’s words with a highly displeased expression.

“Could it be that the one who fell in love at first sight is actually the member of the Seven Sages? Just looking at how she suddenly contacted you like this in a crisis situation is suspicious.”

“No, not everyone in the world views me as favorably as you guys do.”

“There’s no way. There is no woman in the world who wouldn’t fall for Jun.”

Gi-jun pinched the cheek of Tilla, who declared this with a bright smile, but seeing her look pleased even by that, he decided to give up on everything.

“Ah—sorry, everyone.”

He realized belatedly that he had ended up answering that he would go to the Magic Kingdom without properly consulting the party members.

And that to a place facing an ongoing crisis.

“I should have heard your opinions too… I was in too much of a hurry.”

Feeling that he was still far from being a proper party leader, Gi-jun apologized in a dejected voice.

“There is no need to consult us, Jun. Your will is my will.”

Tilla replied with a gentle smile, but it was completely ruined by the overlapping image of her smiling foolishly while having her cheek pinched just a moment ago.

Still, fortunately, the rest of the party members also seemed to share Tilla’s opinion.

“Where we go is for you to decide, Hyung.”

“If Shin-kun goes, I will go with him wherever it is.”

“To tell you the truth, I now have the conviction that no matter where we go, as long as I am by Jun-nim’s side, I won’t die.”

“Ugh, I want to go too, but…”

Pretending not to notice Unika, who was caught in conflict until the very end, he picked up the Letaphone.

Since she told him to bring Ji-hye, he was planning to contact Ye-min first, but…

* * *

[Me: I’ll go, Oppa.]

[Master Devotee(Leta): No, ask Ji-hye first, and if she says she’ll come, you only need to send her.]

[Me: We’ll all go, Oppa.]

[Master Devotee(Leta): No, I mean… yeah.]

[Me: You said it was Uralta, right? We’ll go there for now, okay?]

[Master Devotee(Leta): Wait, we’ll go to Cor when the time comes.]

[Me: Hot spring…]

[Master Devotee(Leta): …Alright, I’ll come pick you up.]

[Me: I love you, Oppa!]

“You say you love him so easily through text, so why can’t you say it to his face?”

“Hye… Ji-hye, shut up.”

“You were trying to call me Hye-ji again just now, weren’t you!”