I like diterranean food.
I do have a bit of an old-school palate that hunts down Korean food no matter what country I’m in, but diterranean cuisine is special to .
Just picture it.
High-quality fish pulled from warm, blue coasts; sumr vegetables in every shade of green, yellow, and purple; and olives, olives, olives!
diterranean food has a vibe all its own. Instead of being drowned in heavy, overpowering sauces, it brings out the natural character of the ingredients and keeps the flavors simple. People who can’t appreciate that charm... I can only feel sorry for them.
Right now, there’s a perfectly grilled fish on the plate in front of . Beneath the golden-brown skin, the pure white flesh looks so plump it might burst out at any mont. I pick up a piece with my chopsticks and pop it into my mouth.
’Hmm, is this a salmoriglio sauce?’
The bright, popping scent of lemon and the sharp bite of oregano blend together on my tongue. It’s excellent.
Next up is the vongole spaghetti. Between the generous pile of clams, the pasta strands glisten a golden color, coated with Parsan cheese, arugula, and olives.
I twirl up a forkful right away...
’Mmm, this is good. Very good.’ True to diterranean style, the clam broth gives it a clean, light flavor. It’s on a completely different level from the flavor you get from cheap clam noodle soup at buffets in Korea.
Next, I have gambas loaded with shrimp and so fried chickpea hummus left. Which one should I start with...
“Boss! This is no ti to be spacing out over food! Here we gooo!”
At Cha Doyeon’s shout, I snapped back to reality.
“Yusin’s faaaavorite—random—ga!”
’Oh, for crying out loud.’
I hurriedly flailed my arms and joined in on the intro, then shouted “Image ga!” and held up all five fingers.
“Fold if you’re under 5th Circle!”
“Wah! Boss, that’s cheap!”
“Fold if you’re wearing glasses!”
“Jo Yonghee! No taking your glasses off now!”
Wild laughter erupted from all around.
“Fold if you’ve never dated! Hey, Boss, why aren’t you folding?”
“Wow, that’s so serious disrespect right there!”
“Fold if you have over ten billion won in assets!”
“Fold if you’re wearing an Adidas shirt!”
“Fold if you’re the Tower Master!”
’Wow, unbelievable.’
In an instant, all five of my fingers were down.
“Drink! Drink! Drink! Drink!”
“Down it, down it, down it, down it, down it!”
I grabbed the nearest bottle of cola and chugged it in one go. Cola dribbled down my neck, but with everyone cheering on, I ended up draining the whole thing. Then, after slamming the empty bottle down, I covered my face with one hand and raised the other arm.
“All right, next ga is... Oh my, Boss. What is it?”
“Did it go down the wrong pipe?”
Everyone’s eyes were on . Face flushed, I answered, “Ah. I just... had a sudden reality check. Give a second...!”
“Kya-ha-ha-ha-ha!”
That snapped out of it. A drinking ga without alcohol... Everyone else was completely swept up in the mood, but there was no way I could handle this sober.
“Master! At parties like this, the guy who loses his mind the most is the one having the most fun!” Na Daeyong, down to nothing but his boxers, declared. The problem was that the man had completely lost his mind.
“I’m going to head up now.”
“Hey, that’s la!”
“Boo—!”
The 4th Floor team booed . Their energy level was so high I just couldn’t keep up.
“Sorry. You guys shouldn’t stay up too late either. Turn in at a reasonable hour.”
“Yes, sir!”
Quite a bit of ti had passed since we arrived in the Republic of Malta.
And the reason we were doing all this?
We were just too bored.
We had finished everything. There was nothing left that could threaten the Seed of Sealing, and most of the monsters were being taken care of by Eunsol’s golems and turrets. Were we really supposed to sit around doing nothing for sixty-six days? We were so bored that we had resorted to playing alcohol-free drinking gas in the Magic Tower.
“Ugh, I’m tired.”
The 4th Floor team kept the gas going. I grabbed a piece of focaccia topped with cheese from the spread of diterranean dishes on the table and stepped into the magic-circle elevator.
Second Floor, Grand Library.
No matter how many tis I ca here, I couldn’t get used to it. It was a literal forest of books. Whether I looked at the walls or the ceiling, everything was packed with shelves.
I wandered around looking for Jeong Seojin. Not seeing him nearby, I took the stairs up to a higher level. The higher I climbed, the older the books beca. So were yellowed with age, others had covers so burnt and tattered they were barely holding together. Thanks to the preservation magic cast on each shelf, they were being kept in the best condition possible.
’That aside, how far in did he go?’
Following the stairs deeper and deeper into the library, I finally reached the “Sealed Stacks,” the section with the highest security level. It was from a book here, titled 『The Record of Calamity』, that I had learned about the Rank 11 Nesis.
Jeong Seojin was there, sitting with his back against a pillar, books spread out in front of him as he read.
Feeling a sudden urge to ss with him, I crept up quietly and said, “Seojin’s faaaavorite—random—ga!”
“...”
Jeong Seojin turned to look at with an expression of utter disgust.
“I always prided myself on having no prejudices about new forms of culture, but that ga is where I draw the line.”
“Pffft—ha ha ha ha!”
I set the container of nicely toasted focaccia down in front of him.
“Eat so of this while you work. You skipped dinner.”
“Ah, thank you.”
Without taking his eyes off the book, Jeong Seojin picked up a piece of focaccia and took a bite. His eyes imdiately went wide.
“This place makes excellent focaccia.”
“Right? The food around here is solid no matter where you go.”
“I’ll co down for a al once the random ga is over.”
“The 4th Floor kids look ready to spend the whole day playing in the lobby.”
With a groan, Jeong Seojin leaned the back of his head against the pillar. The sight was so funny I couldn’t help but snicker out loud.
“Ungh.”
I plopped down next to him and stared straight ahead.
“You’ve already opened three of them.”
The locks on the Sealed Stacks were structured as cipher puzzles that couldn’t be opened without specific knowledge. Jeong Seojin had solved three of them almost entirely on his own.
“I wonder how Armin Walter is doing.”
“He is no longer the Armin Walter we knew, that much is certain.”
On that thought, I stepped into the first of the sealed rooms. Despite its size, this large chamber held only six books. They were dangerous or ancient volus, stored on top of sealing magic circles. Among them, there was one item that wasn’t a book at all: a single stone.
The serial killer who had secretly slipped into Korea, “Armin Walter.” He was also the reason Han Yoonjeong had beco a Pharaoh. He had been a player with a Unique Ability to transfer his soul. After losing to in a direct confrontation, he had secretly transferred his soul into a nearby stone, presumably to fake his death. Of course, I caught him imdiately and confiscated it. Now it was being stored here in the Grand Library.
“According to Erendel’s 『Soul Studies』, a disembodied soul left unattended for a long ti eventually returns to its natural state,” Jeong Seojin spoke up. “At this point, we should consider the existence known as Armin Walter effectively erased. What’s inside this stone is almost a lump of pure soul. In Erendel, they call this a soulstone.”
“Hmmm.”
I stared at the stone in silence.
“Actually, I was thinking of using this to recreate a dark magic spell.”
“Excuse ?”
Jeong Seojin’s expression hardened at once.
“Do you an the spell that would turn that man into a Titan...?”
“No, no, nothing that dangerous!”
I drew a sharp X in the air with my arms. Jeong Seojin pushed his glasses up.
“Then what kind of magic is it?”
“Hmm, how should I put this...”
After thinking it over for a mont, I answered, “Let’s call it... resurrection magic.”
Jeong Seojin just stared at , completely dumbfounded.
* * *
After hanging out with Jeong Seojin for a while, I went back up to the 9th Floor.
My desk was a ss of demon-related docunts. I sat down, downed the vitamin drink Ea had left there in one shot, and went back to my investigation.
Right now, I was digging into the pasts of the demons who had attacked the Magic Tower. Their day jobs ranged from office workers to students, actors, and soldiers. They had all laundered their identities so thoroughly that unless they transford into monsters first, it was nearly impossible to pick them out. On the surface, there were no obvious commonalities, so I was trying to find even the thinnest thread connecting them.
Chewing on my pen, I marked up the list.
“The ones that stand out are the demons who worked at the sa company.”
The demons had known each other for a long ti. It wasn’t strange that so of them worked at the sa place. However—
“Tower Master, I have results.”
With a bright shimr of light, Ea appeared, perched on the edge of my desk. She had also been digging into the demons’ past activities.
“How did it go?”
“I found records of six demons who worked for a company called GreenCare.”
“...Oh? Now that’s suspicious.”
A company tied to six different demons was not sothing I could just ignore.
“What kind of company is it?”
“A German pharmaceutical firm. It ranks in the global top fifty and is second among German pharmaceutical companies, a very solid corporation.”
Germany was a powerhouse in pharmaceuticals. Being second there was no joke.
“Definitely worth investigating.”
Ea nodded in agreent.
“How long would it take you to hack GreenCare?”
“It will take so ti, but I’ll try.”
“Please do. I’ll head to Germany right away.”
Ea tilted her head.
“Going to Germany is fine, but what exactly do you plan to do there?”
“...Honestly, I was just going to wing it. Is that too reckless?”
Once we beca a World Guild, we would be able to exercise investigative authority anywhere in the world, but for now, I was only a candidate and didn’t have that kind of power. Even as an officially recognized Rank 2 hunter, I couldn’t exercise investigative authority in another country outside of a battlefield.
Furthermore, a pharmaceutical company’s research facility would have insane security. Infiltration would be next to impossible.
’There has to be a better way in...’
I opened my smartphone and searched for a company called GreenCare. Many of the famous products I used in my daily life—disinfectants, bandages, pain relief patches—turned out to be from this very company.
“Tower Master. Ah—open up.”
While I was digging for information, Ea pressed a liquid pouch to my lips. I drank it without looking up.
’What is this bitter symphony of... seaweed?’
“Marsh snail extract today, I see.”
“Yes, Tower Master.”
“What about the arrowroot extract we bought last ti?”
“You already drank it all, Tower Master.”
Damn it.
“Guess I’ll have to make a trip to Seoul.”
“I recomnd you just buy an extractor.”
“No way. Bora would kill .”
As I bantered with Ea and scrolled through the search results, an interesting post caught my eye.
“Actually, there’s no need for to go in as a hunter.”
She looked at in confusion.
“Looks like they recently held an investnt conference for a new drug. Have Seojin contact GreenCare. Tell them Alchemia is interested in investing in their new drug developnt.”
Ea’s eyes lit up.
“As expected of you, Tower Master! I will contact them imdiately.”
“Good. And give Samia a heads-up, too. We’re leaving early tomorrow morning.”
“Understood.”
I stretched my arms high above my head, intending to squeeze every last drop of benefit out of my certified Rank 2 status, which allowed to travel anywhere in the world.
The line was cast. Now to see what would bite.
“Tower Master, please don’t forget to bring back so German sausages.”
“We’re not going sightseeing!”
* * *
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