Chapter 297

Morning came.

The third day of the Tokyo Artifact Expo dawned without incident. There had been plenty of chaos along the way, but thanks to the unexpected efforts of a certain Awakened, the initial response had proven effective, and the highlight auction had proceeded without any problems.

And so, everyone was able to welcome the final day of the event in relative peace.

“There’s still plenty of time before my flight, but since I’ve already eaten... maybe I should start heading out.”

It would have been nice to watch the auction in person while I was here, but that was fine.

As you can see, the moment I saw the starting price, I gave up on bidding at almost the speed of light and instead spent my time thoroughly exploring the rest of the venue.

And now here I was, waiting to leave empty-handed.

‘Before I go, let’s stop by the ice cream shop one more time. They have a few flavors here that I can’t get in Korea.’

Originally, I had planned to flee the country the day before yesterday if I succeeded in stealing that particular piece of black fabric...

‘Hmm.’

But since that plan had already failed, was there really any reason to return home early?

If I had suddenly changed my ticket and fled the moment something happened, it would only have looked suspicious.

So, in order to avoid showing even the slightest hint of guilt or unusual behavior, I had deliberately forced myself to enjoy sightseeing all the way through the third day.

‘...Still, what’s with these people? They haven’t even taken a proper statement from me, and I was actually at the scene.’

Now that I thought about it, there was something mildly unsettling about the whole situation.

‘Is investigative procedure just different here because it’s a foreign country?’

No matter how cautious I remained, the other side never made a move.

And now that my departure was right around the corner, even my nerves had finally begun to settle.

Before long, I arrived in front of the ice cream shop inside the event hall.

Holding the cash I had borrowed from Seonwoo Yeon in one hand, I raised my phone and checked the screen.

‘Hmm.’

For now, I decided not to cancel the reservation emails—which were essentially polite ways of saying ‘please save me’—until I had safely returned to Korea.

‘Let’s see... Seonwoo Yeon’s number should be around here.’

I closed the mall app and switched to the call screen.

But at that exact moment, an incoming call appeared.

‘Ion?’

The number flashing across the screen belonged to the Japanese Hunter whose business card I had saved on the first day.

“Hmm? Hello?”

And what he said was...

“You’re lifting the restriction and suddenly want to meet at Building A?”

What was this about?

Had they somehow discovered what I had tried to pull on the first day and were now planning to publicly execute me?

For a moment, that absurd possibility crossed my mind.

But Ion’s explanation was nothing of the sort.

On the contrary, that grand engineer sounded genuinely intrigued and asked me to come over because there was something interesting he wanted to tell me.

So.

“Y-yes, understood. Then... I’ll see you at Building A in ten minutes.”

Besides, there were even Korean government officials on-site. Surely no one would dare try anything with them around.

Right?

After hesitating briefly, I decided to accept Ion’s request without resistance and headed toward the designated building.

Soon, inside the exhibition hall—

“Hmm?”

I found an S-rank Hunter waiting for me.

It was not the person I had expected to see.

Ion had been the one I spoke to on the phone, yet the person standing there was Montake.

What was more, the normally stern-looking man was suddenly wearing an enormous grin as he delivered his news.

“Hunter Kim Giryeo, the negotiations went well!”

It was confusing.

But at the same time, it was good news.

The negotiations had gone well.

“The [Fragments of Midnight] being exhibited here. After discussions with the Technology Bureau, we finally received permission to export it overseas!”

That was far better news than I had expected.

If I let my guard down here, it would be obvious just how delighted I was.

So I did my best to keep my facial muscles under control and casually changed the subject.

“By the way, where is Ion? I got the message from him.”

“Ah, you mean Yamasaka Ion. That ranker isn’t at the venue right now. Because of the incident in Building A, the police needed to confirm a few things with him, so he’s been held up there.”

“Hmm.”

“But that isn’t what matters right now. In any case, the negotiations concerning the [Fragments of Midnight] currently in Japan’s possession have definitely been concluded.”

The Japanese representative hunter continued explaining.

Throughout the event, Montake had persistently petitioned the country, which was the actual owner of the [Fragments of Midnight].

In response, the Japanese Magical Technology Agency made a proposal.

If the Imaltan Guild, as S-rankers, agreed to assist with national research projects, permission for the export would be granted.

The three highest-ranking hunters in Japan immediately accepted the condition.

Why?

Because, by coincidence, all three had been involved in the dragon raid in the past.

‘For a selfish intelligent being, he sure knows how to apologize properly.’

Well, I suppose it made sense for him to behave nicely after receiving a legendary item.

I lazily glanced toward his item box, then quickly composed my expression again.

“E-excuse me. But unfortunately...”

What came next was Ion’s rather hesitant attitude.

“There’s just one thing. An additional condition has been attached.”

“Hmm?”

“The government has stated that they cannot hand it over for free.”

From what I could gather from the explanation, the Japanese government had some essential research that required this Epic-grade artifact.

Even if they transferred [Fragments of Midnight] to me, they intended to purchase another used item of the same type from overseas.

The problem was that the resale price of this particular Epic item had skyrocketed in previous transactions.

“Acquiring another [Fragments of Midnight] would require an astronomical amount of money. Even if one appeared on the market, it would be difficult to convince politicians to allocate such a large budget. On top of that, competition with the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology has already been intense lately...”

That was a long explanation.

In short, what Montake meant was this.

“They were concerned that you might find the price outrageous, but according to the Technology Bureau, this is the minimum amount they need to receive in order to justify transferring the Epic-grade item to a Hunter like yourself.”

“You can tell me.”

“After negotiating the amount down again and again... the final proposed price is 10.2 billion yen.”

Coincidentally, when I converted that into Korean won, the result was an oddly familiar figure.

It was almost exactly the 100 billion won sitting in my bank account.

On the first day of the event, when I had offered somewhere around 20 to 30 billion won, they had not even bothered to entertain the idea.

‘So this was its actual price all along. Well, I suppose that makes sense. Unlike [Twin Guardian Angels], this item provides a completely unprecedented form of protection.’

That made a certain amount of sense.

I briefly took out my phone.

After calculating the exchange rate between Japanese yen and Korean won, I discovered that even after transferring 10.8 billion yen, including transaction taxes such as VAT, I would still have roughly 2 billion won left in my account.

A truly staggering amount.

Assuming international transfer fees on this planet weren’t absurdly high, it actually didn’t seem like a bad deal...

“I-I’m sorry. We truly didn’t intend for things to turn out this way, but somehow, that’s simply the price the government settled on.”

“That’s interesting.”

“The Technology Bureau told us that lowering it any further would be extremely difficult.”

Montake.

To put it somewhat rudely, the man was tall and thin as a toothpick, yet sweat was pouring down his face.

He kept glancing nervously in my direction, as if an F-rank with no magic power were somehow someone to be afraid of.

“Furthermore, the biggest problem is that our Imaltan Guild currently has no cash reserves. I know this sounds incredibly rude, but Hunter Kim Giryeo, the truth is that we’ve been preparing compensation—no, distribution funds—for the Kageshima incident that occurred earlier...”

“Yes.”

“We’ve genuinely exhausted every source of funding available to us, and the company is currently operating on debt. Therefore, realistically speaking, it would be difficult for the Imaltan Guild to pay the transfer fee demanded by the Technology Bureau on your behalf.”

But from my perspective, I was perfectly satisfied with the current offer.

In other words, weren’t they saying they would hand over that entire piece of black fabric as long as I paid the money?

‘Considering what that fabric can actually do, even a trillion won might be undervaluing it. Come to think of it, judging by the auction results, even something like [Traina] nearly reached the trillion-won mark.’

I made my decision immediately.

Fine.

I’ll buy the fabric.

When I gave them my answer without even taking a few seconds to think it over, Ion’s eyes widened in surprise.

But he immediately moved to proceed with the transaction.

“Aah, understood! In that case, I’ll contact the event manager immediately and have the barrier around the display case released.”

I had gotten everything I had come here for.

There was no point lingering any longer.

‘I’d already half given up on it... but I actually got it in the end.’

How exhilarating.

And just like that, I was able to return home with a sense of accomplishment, having fulfilled the original purpose of my trip to Tokyo.

If I had known I would have this much money left over, I might have splurged on the most expensive seat on the plane.

Well, I had been curious about the other class anyway.

Let’s just say I satisfied my curiosity.