Chapter 65

The moment they arrived at the guild, Hae-gun led Eui-rim straight up to the fourth-floor conference room. Two familiar faces and two strangers were seated inside. Judging by the clutter of paper cups strewn across the table, they had been waiting for quite some time.

“Oh? You’re here sooner than expected.”

Ahn Moonhyuk was the first to notice them. Brightening with an enthusiastic wave, he hauled himself up from a chair that looked comically small beneath his massive frame.

“Take a seat. Heard you had a rough morning.”

“Ah, but I should probably greet everyone else first…”

“Take your time, take your time.” Moonhyuk waved the hesitation away before it could form into words. “Besides, Sejun over there stopped growing halfway, so he gets touchy whenever someone taller stays standing. You’re better off sitting down fast.”

“Moonhyuk-hyung, do you want to die?” Hwang Sejun snapped.

“What would you like to drink?” Moonhyuk pressed on, completely undeterred. “I grabbed a whole spread of pastries from the bakery nearby, too. Want me to bring some over?”

Regardless of the daggers Sejun glared at him, Moonhyuk kept chatting away. He had always been easygoing and brazen, but never quite to this extent; his bustling energy carried an unmistakable buzz of excitement.

“An iced Americano works, right?”

“Ah, yes. Thank you.”

Declining such hospitality would have felt rude, so Eui-rim offered his thanks, which only broadened Moonhyuk’s grin. He watched Moonhyuk slip out of the room before turning toward Hae-gun. With Moonhyuk gone, Hae-gun was the only one left who could smooth over the awkward silence.

Yet perhaps because this was the first time their eyes had met since the car conversation, Hae-gun merely offered a quiet, mischievous smirk. Guiding Eui-rim toward a seat by the window, he gestured for him to sit and tossed out an abrupt question instead of introductions.

“Where’s Chaeyoon?”

“On her way with the hunter suits. Chief Hong said she couldn’t make it today, so she went to pick them up in person.”

The speaker was a woman with hair cropped short above the nape of her neck, bronzed skin, and sharp monolids. An unfamiliar face among Cheongho’s public roster, she had to be the member known only by reputation—Hunter Na Yeojin.

“Chief Hong couldn’t make it? Why?” Hae-gun asked.

“Said a fire broke out at Forge Factory 3. It’s out now, but the barrier-generation machinery broke down, so she went to inspect the damage,” Na Yeojin replied.

The sudden news caught Eui-rim off guard.

Barrier equipment went down in a fire?

Barriers were the perimeter barricades erected around dungeons. As a rule, they had to be replaced every two months; letting that window lapse drastically increased the risk of a catastrophic breach.

“The perimeter around Abyssal Origin Cave is coming up on its cycle soon, too. I’m not sure if repairs will finish in time.”

Lee Seonha chimed in, her expression grim. Her features had been tightly set from the start; clearly, the factory fire was creating headaches on several fronts.

“Nothing to be done.” Hae-gun’s tone was practical and dry. “Depending on the situation, I’ll just have to lead next month’s sweep myself. Assign the first week to me.”

“You plan on going alone?”

Hae-gun considered Seonha’s question for a beat before shaking his head. “Not alone. With Eui-rim-ssi.”

“…With me?” Eui-rim asked.

“Yes. We agreed to build up your stamina and physical strength anyway. The Isolation Ward can’t be helped, but the area around Abyssal Origin Cave makes for decent training ground.”

Eui-rim could easily picture the expression behind that mask—one corner of his mouth hooked in an amused smirk. He didn’t need to pull the mask off to know it.

“Well, we can table that for later.”

The topic shifted in an instant. After quietly studying Eui-rim, Hae-gun turned his gaze toward the boy across the table.

What was his name again? Ahn Moonhyuk called him Sejun earlier… wait. Sejun?

“I didn’t give permission, so you shouldn’t be activating your skill, Sejun-ah.” Hae-gun spoke mildly—which made the warning all the more chilling.

“…”

“Drop the skill this instant.”

The sharp reprimand froze the air brittle as glass. Everyone held their breath as the room fell dead silent.

“Hwang Sejun. Listen to the Guild Master.”

Lee Seonha’s strict voice sliced through the razor-sharp tension, clearly intent on resolving the matter before the atmosphere soured further.

Eui-rim looked at the youthful face staring down at the floor and let out a quiet sigh. Only after connecting the name to the face did a forgotten memory resurface with vivid clarity.

Right. That’s him. Hwang Sejun. The mental-type hunter who exposed Moonseong Guild years ago and vanished without a trace.

Thanks to him, Moonseong Guild’s ugly underbelly had been dragged into the light, sending shockwaves through society. The downfall of Yuk Do-hwan’s mother from her position as Guild Master and the government’s emergency regulations on curse-casters had all stemmed from this lone hunter’s whistleblowing.

To think he had been sheltered by Cheongho Guild all along.

Rumors had claimed Hae-gun took him in after he fled Moonseong, but Eui-rim had never been able to confirm it. Setting aside the Cheongho theory, wild stories had run rampant—that Yuk Do-hwan had buried him alive, that he had fled overseas into exile, and everything in between. Among them, escaping abroad had seemed the most plausible. Yet contrary to all speculation, he was living safely right here.

Then in my previous life, was Cheongho Guild protecting Hwang Sejun as well?

If he was the sixth guild member whose identity had remained shrouded until the very end, it made total sense why Yuk Do-hwan never managed to track him down before the Shadow manifested. When hiding from Moonseong, no sanctuary was safer than Cheongho.

“…I’m sorry, Hunter.”

Glancing Eui-rim’s way, Hwang Sejun muttered a sullen apology. Watching him fidget with his fingertips, eyes darting restlessly, reminded Eui-rim of the late Eui-jun, stirring a quiet twinge of pity.

“Still, I haven’t properly used the skill yet, so couldn’t you let it slide just this once?”

“It’s fine. I don’t mind at all,” Eui-rim said, meaning it.

Truth be told, curiosity outweighed any offense. Eui-rim simply wondered what kind of skill the boy had tried to cast to draw sharp rebukes from both Hae-gun and Lee Seonha.

“Yeojin, you take it easy too.”

Lee Seonha’s scolding promptly pivoted to Na Yeojin, who had been quietly watching Hwang Sejun and Eui-rim. While grasping the full picture was difficult, Na Yeojin had evidently been caught attempting to trigger a skill of her own.

Then again, someone was bound to grow suspicious. Lee Seonha and Ahn Moonhyuk had simply accepted him with unusual nonchalance. If Eui-rim had been in their shoes, an unvetted supporter appearing out of nowhere would look suspect to him as well.

“My apologies, Hunter Kang.” Having no desire to sour the mood further, Na Yeojin offered an apology readily. Extending a hand with an awkward smile, she added, “I didn’t mean any harm. I just wanted to see what kind of person you were.”

“Yeojin has a replication ability among her skills.” The moment Eui-rim shook and released Na Yeojin’s hand, Hae-gun cut in. Ignoring her incredulous glare, he calmly continued, “She can copy a target’s appearance and a portion of their skills, making them her own. It’s a specialized transformation skill.”

“Wow. You’re just spilling my private info like that?” Yeojin protested.

“It’s your own fault for trying to cast a skill right in front of me without permission,” Hae-gun replied, unmoved.

“No, but seriously! Did I do that for fun?” she burst out. “Since neither the Guild Master nor the Vice Guild Master showed any interest in vetting him, Sejun and I had to step up, didn’t we?”

Even at her defensive plea, Hae-gun remained stone-faced. However much she emphasized acting for the guild’s benefit, irritation clearly won out over appreciation.

“Of course, I admit it was rude,” Na Yeojin quickly conceded, raising both hands in surrender. “Still, I couldn’t just ignore my doubts about Hunter Kang. Transitioning from a healer to a hunter was bizarre enough, but stepping forward out of nowhere offering to help clear the Tower smelled completely suspicious.”

“He even knew the passcode to Mount Gamak. No matter how much we think about it, it makes no sense…”

With Sejun chiming in, Hae-gun’s eyes narrowed further. Eui-rim held back a sigh as he glanced between a troubled Lee Seonha and the silent Guild Master.

Lee Seonha aside, why was Hae-gun so irritated? It wasn’t as if the two were wrong. Besides, hadn’t Hae-gun himself struck Eui-rim in the solar plexus out of wariness when they first met?

Granted, some semblance of mutual trust was established now, but only because Eui-rim had laid bare most of his hand. Setting aside the fragments and his regression, he had practically surrendered every scrap of information he possessed. Hae-gun had taken that into account and chosen to trust him.

“Yes. I believe it’s entirely natural for you to feel that way.”

Eui-rim spoke up calmly, drawing every pair of eyes in the room. Ignoring Hae-gun’s direct gaze, he looked straight at Hwang Sejun and Na Yeojin.