Chapter 337

He looked around the building once more. But no matter how many times he checked, the answer remained the same—this was clearly a public institution that took in children without parents.

"The name and location are different from the place the original owner of this body used to attend, though."

And yet, paradoxically, do you know what the Archmage thought the instant he laid eyes on such an altruistic institution?

"As expected, it'd be better to wipe out at least half the Earthlings."

A dangerous thought immediately took root in his mind.

Of course, in this age of monsters, many children lost their guardians to unfortunate accidents.

But even before the magical shockwave struck this planet, the reasons children ended up needing protection were already obvious enough.

Twenty percent due to abuse.

Twenty percent abandoned after being born out of wedlock.

Another twenty percent neglected amid divorce proceedings.

And several more percentage points from infant abandonment.

Nearly half the cases stemmed from sheer negligence or outright harm.

"Oh, my head hurts."

And even if those children did end up in a facility like this, could anyone really guarantee that their lives would be safe?

Of course not.

Luck still played a part.

If they were unlucky, they might end up trapped in some absurd facility where even meal subsidies were embezzled—too young to escape, with nowhere else to go.

So...

"Why are there so many mammal cubs in this tiny building?"

His expression barely changed, but for a brief moment, the blond man seriously considered docking points from this place simply because there were so many people inside.

But then—

"Hey, guys! Look over there. There's a super scary-looking man standing by the door."

"Where? Which door?"

"Move. I wanna see too."

"Whoa, seriously? His face is incredible."

"Who is that?"

Perhaps because he had been standing lost in thought right in front of the wide-open entrance, Kim Giryeo was quickly spotted by the residents.

"Noona, there's a thief outside!"

"A thief! He's trying to steal the new padded jacket I got!"

"Ugh, guys... I don't think you should throw words like that around so casually..."

And just as the trail of magical energy had suggested from the start—

there really was a certain B-rank Awakened in the playground.

"That person's not a thief..."

Soon, a woman with long black hair came to a stop.

Despite her neat and composed appearance, Seonwoo Yeon was carrying an armful of dirty, heavy construction materials.

The moment she recognized someone, her eyes widened like those of a startled rabbit.

***

Then came the explanation.

"Hunter Kim Giryeo."

Come to think of it, this place was no different from an elementary school or kindergarten—a place that ought to be strictly protected.

So why hadn't I realized sooner that lurking suspiciously around the entrance was a terrible idea?

"Hello, Seonwoo Yeon-ssi."

"Yes, hello. May I ask what brings you here all of a sudden?"

"I was just passing through the area and sensed a familiar magical presence."

"Was there really no other reason?"

"Yes."

"I had a feeling it'd be something like that. But if you do this to other people too, you're probably going to get into legal trouble sooner or later..."

A break room inside the building.

I sat there holding a paper cup of barley tea they'd given me, listening to something that was almost—but not quite—a scolding.

From Seonwoo Yeon's perspective, she'd simply been spending an ordinary weekend when an unexpected visitor suddenly appeared.

And to make matters worse, she was not the type who enjoyed having her carefully planned schedule disrupted.

"Wow... It really is an S-rank Hunter."

"Why did you come to our orphanage?"

Still, it was fortunate that everyone except her welcomed me warmly.

I glanced around and looked through the gap in the door.

"That was fast."

The moment our eyes met, the children scattered in embarrassment like startled wild animals.

Soon after, a quiet conversation began.

I was the first to break the silence.

"By the way, I don't know if I should be asking this, but I'm honestly curious why Seonwoo Yeon-ssi is here."

Slurp.

Seonwoo Yeon took a sip of her barley tea and answered with a single sentence.

"Because it's the weekend."

That alone was not much of an explanation.

"Weekend?"

When I merely blinked at her in silence, Seonwoo Yeon eventually elaborated.

"To put it simply... I'm like most office workers. Since today is my day off from Association work, I'm spending it on a hobby."

"Hobby?"

"Why are you asking again?"

"So your hobby is... visiting orphanages?"

"More precisely, volunteering."

Oh my.

"I originally helped organize bookshelves at the local cultural center every weekend. But the system changed this year, so I moved my volunteer work here instead."

So this was apparently something humans did for fun.

"Before I awakened, I also liked donating blood. But now, since even inserting a needle counts as a special case, I had to stop... which is a bit of a shame."

I listened quietly, then asked.

"Why?"

Why offer your labor for work that doesn't even pay?

The question came straight from my gut, and Seonwoo Yeon looked even more flustered.

"I, well... because I was bored, I guess..."

"What do you mean?"

But before long, she began defending herself in earnest.

"I know. Whenever I say this out loud, people either act like I'm strangely admirable for no reason, or they sneer and tell me I'm weird."

"Hmm."

"But honestly, this kind of hobby isn't anything special. I'm a government-registered Awakened, so my salary has always been comparable to that of an employee at a major corporation, even if it's a little lower than what guild Hunters make."

"Wow."

"Besides, I hardly ever need to enter high-difficulty gates for work. Most of the time, I'm just supporting real Hunters and making their jobs easier."

"So what's the point?"

"Even if I earned more money, there's nothing I particularly want to spend it on. I can choose safe work without much trouble—so why would I risk my life for equipment?"

"I..."

"I think most Awakened civil servants are like that. If money were their top priority, they probably wouldn't have entered this field in the first place."

I parted my lips slightly.

"So yes, my salary is more than enough. But if I stay home alone on my days off, it gets a little lonely... and somehow volunteering ended up becoming my hobby."

The way she explained it sounded perfectly reasonable.

But it was still something I could never imagine doing myself.

"What is she, some retired old lady enjoying her golden years?"

Could someone really become a volunteer simply because they were bored?

No one was grading her.

No one was watching.

And yet she quietly kept doing it anyway.

"Wow. You really are a good person."

I praised her with almost pure admiration.

But the instant those words left my mouth, Seonwoo Yeon's expression became ambiguous.

One corner of her lips rose slightly, then fell again.

To put it crudely, she looked as though she'd accidentally bitten into a bug.

"Thank you for the compliment. But as for what I think of myself... I'm not so sure. I don't think that's true at all."

How could someone who voluntarily did unpaid work for others not be a good person?

...Wait.

Was she interpreting the concept from the perspective of the Ministry of Employment and Labor or something?

"Don't be too surprised. To be honest, that's all it was."

"Yes?"

"Maybe other people feel differently, but at least for me, I never do this with some grand sense of duty."

"..."

"Helping people just makes me feel good. It sort of feels like this might help keep me out of hell, you know? Like I'm stacking up karma points in advance, just in case. And of course, it feels nice when people thank me..."

"..."

"It's just that what I want in return isn't money. That's all. I still expect something."

The moment I heard that, the first thing I did was acknowledge one point.

"There is no reincarnation system in this world like the one you're imagining."

It was meant as a friendly warning not to waste effort on something pointless.

But when Seonwoo Yeon answered, I was left speechless.

"I know."

Seonwoo Yeon.

From the very beginning, even her surname system had been different enough to cause me trouble.

Her education, the color of her hair, even her awakening level—

judged by the standards of an S-rank Hunter, everything about her should have been completely ordinary.

So why did this Earthling always manage to defy expectations?

"Something just occurred to me."

I voiced the thought that had suddenly come to mind.

"Seonwoo Yeon, since we're already talking about things like the afterlife, let me ask you something hypothetical. What do you think would happen if every selfish person disappeared from this world?"

The case I had in mind involved an extremely serious egoist.

In other words, I made sure to clarify that I was talking about people who had gone so far as to kill others.

But I truly hadn't expected this kind of answer.

"Then of course that would be good, but..."

"Oh."

"Even if they all disappeared right now, wouldn't more people like them appear again in the future? So would it really mean anything?"

Seonwoo Yeon continued in a light tone, as though casually discussing a movie we'd watched together.

"Even people who are good now can become bad later depending on their environment."

She probably had no idea what kind of fate hung on those few words.

And she likely never would, not even until the day she died.

"But there are examples of the opposite too, so now I'm reconsidering whether getting rid of every serious criminal would really solve anything..."

"Huh."

"I believe in original sin. I wasn't particularly fond of children to begin with, but did you happen to hear what the kids in the dormitory were saying about you earlier, Hunter?"

"Yes."

"Exactly. Kids these days can be really mischievous. Personally, that makes me a little uncomfortable. But if you look further ahead, I believe some of them will definitely grow up to become very kind people. At least, that's how I see it for now."

The woman, dressed casually today, said that and slowly began bringing the conversation to an end.

[North-South Barley Tea]

She gathered up the used tea bags to throw them away, then for some reason put the work gloves back on—the same ones she'd been wearing when I first saw her.

"Gloves?"

When I asked, Seonwoo Yeon answered lightly, as though it were nothing worth mentioning.

Apparently, part of the orphanage building had been badly damaged by monsters that escaped from a dungeon.

Because the facility's budget was too limited to hire a full team of workers, they had recruited Awakened volunteers instead—something normally permitted only in emergencies.

According to Seonwoo Yeon, she was basically here as a porter.

The gloves were simply to keep her hands from getting too dirty.

Well, considering she was a B-rank Hunter, she could probably handle most heavy lifting on her own.

After finishing her explanation, Seonwoo Yeon returned to work.

No matter how much she enjoyed volunteering, she seemed to be in a bit of a hurry.

She was probably hoping to get home before dinner.

"..."

Well then.

That Earthling had gone back to work, and there was nothing else for me to do here.

So I decided to return to my original plan and head back to the hospital.

But before that—

I should settle this first.

Swoosh.

I pulled the small spiral notebook from the right pocket of my pants.

Then I added one final sentence at the bottom of the page and brought the day's evaluation to an end.

***

*Earth has Seonwoo Yeon... +123

*[100] End with Achievement-

***

Anyway, on a planet where genes like hers clearly existed, what right did an Alphauri have to talk about "managing" anyone?

"Let's put this plan on hold indefinitely."

These people were a thousand—

no, ten thousand times better than some alien like me.

***

And just [N O V E L I G H T] like that, another day passed.

Sunday morning arrived, though it still didn't quite feel real that a few words from one person had made Homo sapiens slightly safer.

I returned to my hospital room, took a nap, and finished getting ready.

And by "getting ready," I meant something simple.

Packing my things for discharge.

I also had to confirm that there were no additional serious health problems.

At some point, a nurse came by and told me when I'd be allowed to leave.

But there was still some time before I had to vacate the room, so I decided to take care of one last matter in this spacious VIP suite before returning to the temporary studio apartment I'd secured for research.

The Earth-style "pruning" plan had gone up in smoke.

But everything else I'd decided on during that first day of hospitalization, up on the rooftop, was still proceeding as scheduled.

So first, according to the original objective, I needed to neatly wrap up the matter of the Fake Beasts.

Come to think of it, hadn't someone practically volunteered to become the perfect source of information?

"Besides, now that I remember, they told me to contact them first once I had fully recovered."

Using that masterpiece of mammalian invention known as a mobile phone, I called someone over.

And now, before that person had even properly begun speaking, they were sitting awkwardly alone on the three-seater sofa against the opposite wall.

I stared at the large mammal seated there in a rather particular posture.

Eventually, I couldn't hold back any longer and asked.

"You're indoors—what's with the sunglasses?"

According to the instincts embedded in my brain, there was something deeply wrong with the other person's outfit.

At my opening remark, Kang Changho adjusted the pitch-black accessory on his face and finally spoke his first words.