Chapter 6

Chapter 6

“A skill only I can use? Is it… really strong?”

When Go Gyeol finished explaining, Kang Hoon’s eyes, swollen from crying, sparkled with curiosity. The wary attitude he had shown until just moments ago was nowhere to be found.

Only now did he look his age.

“What is it, exactly? The skills I have right now are…….”

Kang Hoon was about to rattle off the list of skills he possessed, but Go Gyeol stopped him with a gesture.

“That skill probably isn’t open at your current Level.”

“What?”

Kang Hoon tilted his head.

He knew that new skills could appear when his Level rose, but no one knew in advance what kind of skill would appear. Yet this man spoke as though he already knew everything.

“Mister… do you know about my skills?”

“To some extent.”

Go Gyeol admitted it calmly. That answer stirred a new confusion in Kang Hoon, along with an intense interest he could not resist.

“Are you a Hunter too, Mister?”

At Kang Hoon’s question, Go Gyeol shook his head.

“No. I’m a civilian.”

Instead, he jerked his chin toward the water purifier. There stood Lee Seong-ha, who had begun making coffee the moment they entered the office while humming some bizarre song like, “If you mix hot chocolate and coffee mix~ it becomes mocha coffee~”

“He’s the Hunter.”

“No way! Wasn’t he a priest?”

“He quit.”

“Hey! Get it right! Did I quit because I wanted to?! Didn’t I quit because of you?!”

Lee Seong-ha shouted, cup in hand. But Go Gyeol merely shrugged.

“Same difference.”

“You crazy bastard… I should never have gone to XX Kindergarten….”

Lightly ignoring Lee Seong-ha as he muttered like he was screaming, Go Gyeol turned his gaze back to Kang Hoon.

“Your ability changes depending on how you use it. Just because it’s a Curse doesn’t mean it’s automatically bad.”

“But I turn into a little kid every time I use it. Do you know why this happens too?”

Hope colored Kang Hoon’s voice. It had been the greatest fear crushing him.

“That’s called Rebound. Before that, do you know why Rebound happens?”

Kang Hoon shook his head. His face flushed slightly with shame.

“I don’t know.”

Go Gyeol let out a deep sigh. This brat really did Awaken and learn nothing afterward.

“What about Hunter Administration basic training?”

“That… was available online.”

“And?”

“…I paid a friend 10,000 won to sit through it for me, so I’ve never listened to it even once.”

In that instant, exhaustion washed over Go Gyeol like a wave, and he pressed hard between his brows without realizing it.

Lee Seong-ha, who had been listening to the entire conversation from the side, approached while sipping the unidentified beverage he insisted was “mocha coffee.”

“Go Gyeol. Can you handle this kid?”

His tone was light, but his eyes were serious. Go Gyeol answered while still pressing between his brows.

“I don’t need to handle him.”

“Hm?”

“What? You said you’d make me a Hunter. Did you lie?”

At the nuance that he was suddenly being abandoned, Kang Hoon felt disappointed without realizing it and asked. Hadn’t Go Gyeol said only moments ago that Kang Hoon had a powerful skill only he could use, and that he would make him a Hunter?

“No. I’m not the one who’ll make you a Hunter.”

Go Gyeol grinned and firmly grabbed Lee Seong-ha’s shoulder.

“You are, so it doesn’t matter.”

Lee Seong-ha frowned slightly and poked his own chest with one finger.

“Me?”

“Yeah. You.”

Lee Seong-ha slowly tilted his head to the side. Then, all of a sudden, he burst into an exaggerated laugh like a broken machine.

“Hahahahaha!”

For some reason, at that bizarre laughter, Go Gyeol and Kang Hoon began laughing along as well.

For a moment, awkward but cheerful laughter filled the living room.

But that was as far as it went.

Lee Seong-ha’s laughter cut off as cleanly as if sliced by a knife. Every emotion vanished from his face, leaving only a cold, serious expression behind.

“I’m not doing it.”

Go Gyeol leisurely crossed his arms. What hung at the corner of his mouth was not so much a sneer as the cold mockery of someone who had seen through everything. The smile of a victor.

A sharp question dug into the crown of Lee Seong-ha’s head.

“Do you have a home?”

In that instant, Lee Seong-ha’s thoughts froze into blank white. The day he had left home on his own two feet, swearing that he would become a priest, flashed before his eyes. The past in which he had cut off his ties with his family himself.

He had not known back then. He had believed without a doubt that if he became a servant of the Lord, a place to stay and food to eat would naturally be provided.

But now that he had thrown off his priestly robes, he was nothing more than a penniless man who owned nothing.

From between his stiffened lips, only the sound of air leaking out barely escaped.

“Ah.”

Driven into a corner, Lee Seong-ha barely attempted a counterattack. His voice trembled pathetically.

“Y-your place.”

As if he had been waiting for those words, Go Gyeol curved his eyes beautifully.

“Do you want to sleep in my bed with me?”

At that, Lee Seong-ha’s brow twisted hideously.

A blatant disgust spread across his entire face, as if he had seen something rotten. Go Gyeol enjoyed that reaction and continued speaking. His voice was soft, but every word became a chain binding Lee Seong-ha.

“You can’t sleep on the floor. I don’t have any bedding to spread out for you. And on top of that, are you going to leave a wandering high schooler living alone—an accident waiting to happen who doesn’t even understand his own power—on his own? You, a former priest?”

Go Gyeol paused briefly, then delivered the finishing blow.

“Wasn’t it only a few years ago that you kept singing about wanting to devote yourself to youth welfare?”

“……!”

In the end, Lee Seong-ha clutched his head with both hands. He had no choice but to swallow the rebuttal rising to his throat. It was all true. The fact that he had nowhere to return to, the fact that he had once gone around talking about such ideals, and most of all… the fact that he now knew how dangerous a boy named Kang Hoon was.

A Curse Hunter.

There was no knowing what he might do if he swung that power around recklessly. On top of that, he already had a record.

Turning away and pretending not to know in this situation would be an act that denied all the years he had lived as a clergyman.

“Haa…….”

With a long sigh, Lee Seong-ha acknowledged his defeat and raised his head. His gaze turned to Kang Hoon, who had been standing there from beginning to end, crushed by the taut current between the two men and forgetting even how to breathe.

He cautiously raised his hand.

“Um… I do live alone. But I have rooms.”

“It’s probably just a studio anyway. I don’t share a bed with men.”

“No, it’s not small. It’s a 42-pyeong apartment. There are… four rooms.”

Kang Hoon watched his expression and added,

“If you help me become a Hunter, you don’t have to pay rent.”

“Fine.”

Lee Seong-ha’s low answer dropped heavily to the floor. It was the moment their strange cohabitation was decided.

As if Go Gyeol found this situation, in which everything was going exactly as he wished, deeply satisfying, he clapped brightly.

“See? I told you. Former priests are soft-hearted. They can’t ignore lost little lambs.”

“Shut up.”

Lee Seong-ha growled, but the threat, light as a feather, did no damage to Go Gyeol. He merely shrugged. It was the composure of someone who had arranged the board, moved the pieces, and completed the picture he wanted. On that board, only Kang Hoon, who had suddenly ended up giving away the largest piece called a “home,” kept rolling his eyes between the two men in the cold current passing back and forth.

“Now, shall we move? Allow me to escort you two in my car.”

---

Go Gyeol’s car glided down the road without a sound. Apart from the comfortable ride, the air inside the car was stretched taut as a blade.

Lee Seong-ha, sitting in the passenger seat, rested his chin on his hand and glared only at the scenery outside the window, his mouth clamped shut. His profile was like a solid stone statue.

Kang Hoon, sitting in the back seat, pressed himself tightly against the backrest and did not move at all, as though he had forgotten even how to breathe.

As always, the one who cut through that suffocating silence was Go Gyeol.

“Since you’ve stepped back into this world anyway, how about at least contacting your family?”

“…Stay out of it.”

“I heard your grandfather’s health isn’t what it used to be.”

At the words tossed out indifferently, Lee Seong-ha’s shoulders went stiff as stone. A fine crack appeared in the expression reflected in the window. But in the end, there was no answer.

Soon, the car entered the underground parking lot of a newly built apartment complex so dazzlingly luxurious that it hurt the eyes.

The entire time they rode the elevator up to a high floor, Lee Seong-ha’s expression soured.

Even though they were on the way to his own home, Kang Hoon restlessly watched Lee Seong-ha’s mood like a man being dragged to the execution ground.

“We’re here.”

When Kang Hoon carefully entered the password into the digital door lock, the heavy front door opened with a cheerful melody.

The view beyond the door was like a page from a magazine shoot. Past the spacious entryway, a living room decorated with luxurious finishing materials came into sight at once.

Minimalist interior design without a single unnecessary thing, and beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows, the city’s nightscape spread out into the distance.

Everything was perfect, but there was not the slightest sense of human warmth in that place.

Lee Seong-ha’s first question was directed not at the house, but at the owner of the house.

“How long has it been since you came home?”

At the sharp question, Kang Hoon flinched.

“Four months.”

Lee Seong-ha asked nothing more and crossed the living room toward the hallway.

Kang Hoon hurried after him. In the hallway, three identical doors stood side by side. Without hesitation, Lee Seong-ha grabbed the doorknob of the room at the very end and turned it.

Inside, only a bed frame and a desk, which seemed to have merely been assembled and left there, stood alone. It was a guest room that had never once held warmth.

“I’m using this room.”

It was a unilateral announcement.

“Now, then. Mission complete!”

Go Gyeol, who had been watching the situation, declared with satisfaction.

“I’ll be going now. Kang Hoon, that man is surprisingly kind, so try coaxing him well. Lee Seong-ha, don’t starve the kid. You should earn your meals.”

Leaving behind an infuriating smile, Go Gyeol disappeared out the front door.

BANG. The sound of the door closing echoed especially loudly through the empty house.

An awkward, heavy silence settled over the living room.

Now, only the two of them truly remained. A former priest and a current high school student Curse Hunter, who had been complete strangers. It was the beginning of a strange cohabitation.