116 – HGL 116

J.

Jung-bin gripped his phone tighter and looked around. None of the team members were looking his way yet, but they would notice immediately if he acted strangely. He had to be as natural as possible.

“…Is that so. Please wait a moment.”

Jung-bin ran a hand over his face. Then, he stood up and grabbed the suit jacket he had draped over his chair. The rustling of the jacket sounded loud.

“……”

Several team members turned to look at him, their faces questioning. Instead of answering with words, Jung-bin raised his index finger and pointed to the ceiling. A look of exhaustion appeared on the team members’ faces. Someone even seemed to sigh.

Jung-bin wedged the phone between his shoulder and ear, wrote a sentence on a piece of scrap paper with a pen, and held up the paper.

‘I’ll be out for a while. Take a break.’

The team members who checked the message nodded. His regular pace quickened as soon as he left the office and opened the door to the emergency stairs. Tap, tap, tap, his shoes hit the stairs quickly.

A place without CCTV and where no one could overhear his call. Jung-bin stopped on the stairs leading to the basement and took a moment to catch his breath.

Normally, he would have ignored it. He would have thought it was another impersonation. But….

‘J is back.’

Did that person know the weight of those words?

Jung-bin rubbed the back of his phone with his thumb, took a breath, and opened his mouth.

“Sorry for the delay. Please speak.”

“Sounds like you were with other people. Still haven’t left work?”

“……”

“It’s almost midnight.”

Every time he heard the distorted voice, he felt a throbbing in his chest. A sensation that was hard to tell whether it was tension or anticipation. No, could he even call this anticipation? This feeling was closer to anxiety.

Whether the other person knew his feelings or not, they were rattling on.

“Phone calls are a bit unreliable, aren’t they? I want to talk in person. Are you free now?”

J, the person they had tried to find by forming a tracking team but failed. The fact that he contacted them first and asked to meet was an unforeseen situation.

‘Besides….’

What Hong Ye-seong had said came to mind.

“J said that the Dungeon Restructuring seemed to have happened because of him, but he doesn’t know the reason yet. Until he finds out the reason, he’ll only appear when absolutely necessary without any external activities. Like this Dungeon.”

When absolutely necessary. It was a vague statement. He quickly reviewed the recent events. Was there a problem as urgent as the S+ Grade Dungeon? Prometheus had infiltrated the Awakened Management Bureau, but it wasn’t a problem that J would intervene in. Then why? Jung-bin couldn’t answer easily.

“……”

“Are you very busy? If so, it can’t be helped.”

There was a hint of disappointment in the distorted voice. Jung-bin quickly replied.

“No, I’m available. Where should I go?”

“Ah. I’ll give you the address. But come alone. And don’t tell the Director.”

As if waiting for it, the voice began to recite a street address. Jung-bin mechanically wrote down the address while racking his brain.

The Prometheus’ Dummy had dug into the heart of the Awakened Management Bureau. The possibility that this call was a trap couldn’t be completely ruled out. It had been eight years since J disappeared into the Rift, and there had been countless people impersonating him. Most of them were trash that wasn’t worth responding to, and they disappeared before he even had to deal with them….

‘But still….’

He had to go, even if it was a very small possibility. That was the duty of the survivor.

The address the other person gave him was a playground. As he headed there, Jung-bin tried calling the number back. No one answered. Just in case, he searched the number and found that it was a public phone.

“……”

Jung-bin parked his car in a nearby alley and slowly walked. It was a quiet night where even the crickets weren’t chirping. His lips kept drying out. Finally, the playground came into view.

A young man wearing a cap and a plain black mask was sitting on the exit of the red slide. He had a nonchalant posture with his arms resting on his knees.

A thick jacket zipped up to his neck, black training pants, and slightly exposed ankles and flip-flops caught his eye. If it weren’t for the mask, he would have been mistaken for an ordinary person.

Moths were busily moving under the flickering streetlights. It felt like the air around him was heavy. As if sensing Jung-bin’s presence, he raised his head.

“Ah.”

A distorted voice, a short exclamation. He nodded slightly as if to greet him.

“It’s been a while. I wonder how you’ve been.”

Jung-bin didn’t answer. The tone was familiar, but he couldn’t easily believe it.

Was it really him? How did he know his number and contact him? If it was him, why did he suddenly show up? Wasn’t he in hiding? Why hadn’t he contacted him? Countless questions arose, but all of them were unanswered.

Fortunately, Jung-bin was good at hiding his expressions and even better at extracting information.

He smiled with his hands behind his back.

“Yes. It’s been a while.”

“……”

This time, the young man didn’t answer. Jung-bin rummaged through his vague memories. What was J’s build like? He was a bit smaller, but the build itself should be similar. It was hard to tell since he was sitting on the plastic slide. The young man rested his chin on his hand and muttered.

“Is your body doing okay?”

“Excuse me?”

“You hurt your right arm back then. Protecting the kids from the Golem.”

“……”

Jung-bin’s eyes widened. But he soon hid his expression. The fact that he had injured his arm had spread to Channel 1 and other places. But such detailed inside information was only known to those who were there…. No, he couldn’t be sure with just this. There was also the possibility that he had heard Hong Ye-seong’s account….

Then the young man sighed deeply.

“Ugh, how can he twist and turn his words like that… I can’t stand it.”

The young man stretched and stood up. He put his hands in his pockets and stood crookedly. Black eyes scanned Jung-bin from head to toe, even the scars on his arm exposed under the rolled-up sleeves. The young man shrugged.

“You’ve become much more suspicious.”

“I apologize. The situation is what it is.”

Jung-bin bowed lightly. The young man, who had been pacing in front of the slide as if contemplating for a long time, crossed his arms.

“Shall we talk about the time we hung out on the outdoor stairs of the headquarters?”

Outdoor stairs. Jung-bin, hearing the familiar place, let out the breath he had been holding. Haa, the tension in his shoulders eased. Jung-bin rubbed his face with both hands and muttered.

“Ah…. So you’re really the real deal.”

“Would I be fake?”

“……”

Jung-bin, who had been rubbing his face and gathering his emotions for a while, suddenly raised his head.

J, who said he would only appear when absolutely necessary. J, who had suddenly contacted him. Had something big happened? He wouldn’t have contacted him just to say hello.

Jung-bin asked urgently.

“Has something big happened?”

“Ah… well, it’s not a big deal.”

The young man rubbed the back of his neck.

The boy who was thought to be dead was alive and well. Like a miracle.

Even Cha Eui-jae, who didn’t believe in miracles, believed in miracles the moment he held Lee Sa-young in his arms. A dark space filled with the stench of blood. Only the two of them were breathing. He liked the warmth he felt when Lee Sa-young, unlike his usual self, rubbed his head against him. He could have held him all day if he had his way.

He was the only proof that Cha Eui-jae’s life hadn’t failed, and he was so precious that even the best words in the world weren’t enough….

However.

“I’m tired.”

“Okay.”

Precious was precious, and all.

“Sorry, I have a Guild meeting. Let’s talk later.”

“Okaaaay.”

Not being able to communicate was a separate issue!

They met after eight years. Even if friends or family met after eight years, they would have a lot to say, so how much more would Cha Eui-jae and Lee Sa-young have to say?

Eui-jae had a duty to hear everything about what had happened to Lee Sa-young over the past eight years, why Lee Sa-young was dragged to Prometheus, and what kind of experiments he had undergone. Because he was his guardian!

But Lee Sa-young was attending the Hanover Soup Restaurant every day, and when he tried to talk to him, he avoided him like an eel. The reasons were various. Guild meetings, Dungeon, Rift, cleaning up after Guild members, Bureau of Rift Management attendance, and so on.

One day, when he tried to stop him from leaving, he even pretended to be tired and clung to him. Eui-jae suspected that this guy had been caught by Jung-bin’s leash again, but he accepted it for now.

But there was a limit to that.

On the day that Lee Sa-young had been avoiding him with all sorts of excuses for a week, Eui-jae squatted in front of the recycling bin, peeling the plastic off a soda bottle, and thought.

Seeing how it had been like this for a week, there was a high possibility that Lee Sa-young would never open his mouth. He was terribly sensitive and stubborn, just like someone he knew.

The only card that Cha Eui-jae could use right now was Very Small Miracle Mingi Seo. However, if he asked Min-gi Seo for information about Prometheus, there was a high possibility that it would be cut off at Lee Sa-young’s level.

He was confident that he had more experience receiving only limited information while working as J than anyone else. Of course, he knew how to deal with it. Was he going to have to live like this, only receiving limited information? No.

‘I need to find other information providers.’

Eui-jae threw the recycling bag away and returned to the store, opening the 『Hunter Basic Guide for New Hunters』, which he had only opened three or four times since he received it as a gift. And he opened a page. What was stuck in it like a bookmark was,

Awakened Management Bureau Field Response Team 1

Team Leader Jung-bin

It was Jung-bin’s business card.

The streetlight flickered precariously. Late at night, two young men who didn’t fit in at all with the playground were facing each other in tension.

Looking at Jung-bin’s face, which was full of embarrassment and tension, Cha Eui-jae….

“Give me all the information about Prometheus and Lee Sa-young.”

He suddenly demanded classified information.