CHAPTER 255: HIGH-CLASS GUIDES (1)

"GEON-AH, what are you thinking?" Semi asked quietly. "You suddenly fell silent."

After Chang-ho and all the Civilians working in the mansion were safely evacuated in the basement built for emergencies like that, Semi went back to the main mansion with Geon.

Well, they didn’t get inside.

They just stood in the garden.

Semi put a barrier around the main mansion so the other buildings would not get affected by the explosion that Hwang Yejun warned them about.

[I hope my barrier is strong enough to withstand it.]

"Noona, how old is Seon Eunseok again?"

"He just turned eighteen this year."

"Is that his international age?"

"No, that’s his Korean age," Semi said, knitting her eyebrows. "Why are you asking about my son’s age, Geon-ah?"

"Noona, there wasn’t a single teenager who awakened as a Guide before."

"Huh?"

"The youngest Guides to awaken were all twenty-year olds by the time of their awakening," Geon explained calmly. "We— the Guides from the Center— believe that the System only awakens people in their twenties as a Guide because of the nature of our job. Guides have to have physical and intimate relationships with their Hunters, after all. That’s the reason we believe the System only chooses adults to become Guides."

"I understand what you’re saying, Geon-ah. But my son was forced to take drugs to awaken— the System didn’t choose him to be a Guide."

"That’s the thing, Noona— the Forced Awakening Drugs that we inspected before didn’t work on minors."

"You conducted a test on minors?"

"No, we didn’t," Geon said while shaking his head. "But, during the time people taking the Forced Awakening drugs was at an all-time high, APA put the Center in charge of the victims’ rehabilitation. According to our studies, only people aged twenty and above were affected by the drugs. People nineteen and below weren’t affected at all."

Oh, god.

"That means whoever made the Forced Awakening drugs have succeeded in making the new drugs more effective," Semi said, rubbing her arms when she felt goosebumps all over her body. "Are they targeting children now?"

"I don’t know, Noona, but..."

Geon’s words were swallowed by the loud explosion that made the ground shake pretty hard.

The earthquake lasted only for a few seconds.

But the explosion blew up a huge part of the mansion.

Fortunately, the barrier protected Semi and Geon from the flying debris.

[Hwang Yejun, please keep my son safe.]

***

"W-WHAT did you do...?!"

Yejun raised an eyebrow at Seon Eunseok who spoke informally to him. "Huh?"

"Sir," Seon Eunseok added immediately, obviously intimidated by Yejun’s simple ’huh?’ "W-What are you doing in my room, sir? And why did you destroy it?"

Right.

The roof collapsed, all the glasses there broke, and there were long cracks all over the walls and the floor.

[At least the entire mansion didn’t blow up.]

And Seon Eunseok remained safe because of the barrier that Yejun put around the kid.

[Gotta protect Wonhee’s nephew.]

"Sir?"

"It can’t be helped since I ripped apart an L-Grade contract," Yejun said while cracking his knuckles. "Don’t worry— I got your mother’s permission."

"..."

Hmm?

[The kid is suddenly pale.]

"Why do you look like you want to faint?" Yejun asked. "Did you do anything that will get you in trouble?"

Seon Eunseok shook his head. "I can’t talk about it!"

"Because your parents will explode once you speak about it, huh?"

The kid’s eyes almost popped out of their sockets.

Bingo.

"You crazy kid," Yejun said while clicking his tongue. "I already destroyed the contract, so nothing’s gonna happen even if you start talking about it."

"R-Really?"

"I destroyed it, okay?"

"How can I trust you?"

"Don’t trust me— trust the love I have for your aunt. I will never do anything that will hurt the people that Wonhee cherishes. That includes you, punk."

Only then did the kid look relieved.

"I promise I didn’t sign any sketchy contract! I’m not involved with Awakened People outside my family," Seon Eunseok insisted. "I was surprised when Ahyeon Hyung said that the candy I’m regularly eating is poisonous. After that, a Status Window just popped up!"

"Oh, I see. So, what did the Status Window say?"

"It says my parents will blow up if I talk about the candy!"

Right.

That was the content that Yejun read in the contract.

[Now I’ve confirmed that the kid isn’t lying.]

"Did you sign any kind of contract with the person who gave you the candy?"

Seon Eunseok flinched.

[Bingo.]

"I invested in my friend’s candy business," Seon Eunseok said in a small voice while avoiding Yejun’s (judging) eyes. "It was a huge amount of money, so they insisted that we make a contract."

"If it was a huge amount of money, why didn’t you inform your parents? Or at least whoever it is that manages your finances."

Seon Eunseok gulped hard. "M-My financial advisor knows, and he was the one who advised me not to tell my parents until I get back the money I invested in my friend’s candy business."

Ah, caught the bastard.

Well, one of the bastards, to be precise.

Yejun immediately called Semi using his Status Window. "Noona, I need you to grab your son’s financial advisor and bring him here."

***

"DO VILLAINS only attack during the night?"

Ah.

Park Ruda rolled his eyes when the lecture started.

As if the abandoned church wasn’t creepy enough, everyone around him was wearing black and gold robes.

[This is why they call us a cult...]

"We don’t need to hide in the darkness— we’re not in the wrong."

Even the ’pastor’ giving the lecture wore a robe that hid their face.

"So, we’ll attack in broad daylight," the ’pastor’ announced passionately. "We will claim the power that those shameless high-class Guides don’t deserve!"

And everyone cheered.

Except for Ruda.

[I’m also a high-class Guide, am I not?]

***

Hi! I posted the story about the world with Towers and without Guides that N, the World Ranker, mentioned to the Big 4 before.

It’s called Time-limited F-Class Wife, and here’s the teaser:

"CONGRATS, Miss Baek— you’re pregnant with South Korea’s #1 Hunter’s baby!"

Baek Gyubin, the leader of a flopped Kpop girl group, is beyond shocked after hearing that she’s carrying Hunter Han Wooju’s baby.

And to be informed that she’s pregnant as a twenty-five-year-old virgin?

That’s crazy!

It’s even crazier that her ’baby daddy’ is the Guildmaster of Blue Dragon— the strongest guild at the moment.

Plus, Hunter Han Wooju is the CEO of a luxury shopping mall and a known member of Korea’s W1 Trillion Club.

In short, Hunter Han Wooju is way out of Gyubin’s league!

"How did I get pregnant with your baby, Hunter Han Wooju?" Gyubin asked awkwardly. And then she remembered THAT incident, causing her to gasp out loud. "Is it because I ate your dragon ball?!"

Wooju let out a long sigh. "Miss Baek, it was an egg and not a ’dragon ball.’"

***

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