Chapter 179 – The Druid of Yangchon Village (1)

<Jini: Hyun-ji, can I ask you something?>

Seo Hyun-ji, who was taking a short break after her run, received a text message.

<Seo Hyun-ji: What is it?>

<Jini: Yeah, well, my grandma keeps sending me these proof shots, and something seems a little weird.>

Proof shots?

Seo Hyun-ji tilted her head at the out-of-the-blue message.

What could possibly be weird about the proof shots her grandmother was sending?

<Jini: Beekeeping.jpg>

<Jini: It’s this one. I think this person looks a bit strange.>

Seo Hyun-ji blinked at the photo Jini had sent.

A stooped old grandmother was standing with a muscular bee, larger than herself.

No, that wasn’t just a bee; it looked exactly like the gangster bees she had seen before.

Honeybees were beneficial insects. But that large, thuggish honeybee was difficult to classify as beneficial.

The thought of a honeybee with a hairy chest brought on a wave of PTSD.

It was a memory she never wanted to relive.

<Seo Hyun-ji: Unni, that’s not a person…>

<Jini: Is this that Spider-Man thingy.jpg>

<Jini: Weird, right? Huh?>

<Seo Hyun-ji: It is weird. Very, very weird.>

What she saw in the picture wasn’t a spider-human, but a spider the size of a person.

Seo Hyun-ji laughed in disbelief.

‘It’s photoshopped.’

She scoffed.

Even back when they were in a group together, Jini used to pull mischievous pranks all the time.

<Jini: See, it’s weird, right? I’m a huge fan of the Spider-Man series and I’ve seen them all, but the Spider-Man suit isn’t that hairy.>

Of course it was hairy; it was a picture of a real spider.

Seo Hyun-ji was old enough now not to fall for these kinds of tricks anymore.

<Seo Hyun-ji: Your grandma looks very healthy 🙂 It’s nice to see~>

<Jini: Yeah, she’s super healthy. But she said she found a puppy on the mountain behind her house yesterday, and something’s a bit off ㅠㅠ>

<Jini: New family member, Baekgu.jpg>

“…”

Seo Hyun-ji was at a loss for words for a moment after seeing the next photo.

<Jini: Strange, right?>

It was beyond strange.

It would be more accurate to call it dangerous.

It was a picture of the stooped old grandmother shouting “House!” at a dog larger than herself.

The massive dog, with only its tail inside the doghouse, had three heads.

A Beagle, a Schnauzer, and a Cocker Spaniel.

It was the infamous hell-raiser dog she’d only heard stories about, Cerberus.

But Jini’s reaction was even more ridiculous.

<Jini: This isn’t Baekgu, it’s a black dog.>

<Seo Hyun-ji: Unni, that’s not the important part…>

<Jini: Should I stir-fry some mushrooms and send them to you?.jpg>

A photo showed colorful mushrooms with bright red patterns next to the grandmother.

The mushrooms seemed to be avid smokers.

She couldn’t tell if they were poisonous, but one thing was certain.

They looked dangerous.

<Jini: A bird I’ve never seen before.jpg>

It was no wonder she’d never seen it before.

It certainly wasn’t an animal that lived in the countryside.

A man-eating bird, resembling a dodo, was side-eyeing the grandmother as she took the proof shot.

Its beak was drenched in saliva.

<Seo Hyun-ji: Uh, Unni. First, where is this? Is your grandmother alive right now? I mean, when did you last hear from her?>

<Jini: She says she’s seeing a lot of new animals lately and keeps sending proof shots. Ah, another one just came in lol>

<Jini: The kids keep fighting.jpg>

The photo showed the Baekgu—no, the Cerberus—at her grandmother’s house brawling with a unicorn from the house next door.

<Seo Hyun-ji: Unni, where is this???>

It seemed something had happened in the countryside. But because they were elderly, they didn’t seem to recognize the changes.

No, even Jini, who was sending these pictures, didn’t seem to grasp the severity of the situation.

***

“Isn’t that Seo Hyun-ji from Four Girls?”

“Wow, it’s really Seo Hyun-ji.”

It had been a while since she had retired from the entertainment industry, but many people still recognized her.

Right now, Seo Hyun-ji was in the middle of the street.

She was carrying a large backpack, bigger than her own body.

“Hyun-jiiiiii~!”

Jini stopped her compact car and came running with her arms wide open.

Seo Hyun-ji was enveloped in a hug by the bubbly Jini, feeling as if she were being frisked.

“Is that a military backpack? Why are you carrying something like this? Don’t you Hunters have some kind of special storage bag?”

“Unni, just because I’m a Hunter doesn’t mean my inventory capacity is huge. Usually, without a porter-type trait, you only get one or two inventory slots.”

“Really? Well, put it in the trunk for now. It must be heavy!”

“By the way, Unni, when did you get your driver’s license?”

“Hmph, I got it right after our group disbanded. Figured I needed a way to make a living now that the girl group days were over.”

She said that, but Jini was thriving on variety shows.

“Isn’t it about time you started working again? Your last drama was a huge hit, you know.”

“For now, I just want to focus on my work as a Hunter.”

“Well, I guess it’s nice to have a hero who protects the Earth among us. Still, I worry about my baby getting hurt.”

Jini said, breaking into a wide, gummy smile.

“Shall we go now? The countryside is amazing. The air is so fresh.”

“Ah, wait a minute, Unni. There’s still one more person.”

“One more?”

Just as Jini was about to ask who it was, she felt a dark shadow fall over her.

*Clip-clop, clip-clop.*

A horse, entirely red, was striding gracefully down the bike path, its hooves echoing.

-You have arrived at your destination.

“Whoa, whoa.”

A man with a sturdy build dismounted from the horse’s saddle.

He was, in society—no, in the entire world—the hottest man alive.

“Huh? Huh-huh-huh!”

Jini pointed at Lee Hyunbin the Deliveryman, her reaction as ecstatic as a regular person seeing a celebrity.

“No way! No way! This is my first time seeing him in person! Hyun-ji, can I get his autograph?”

“No. It’ll go to his head.”

“Aww… I really want his autograph… Hello?”

Jini greeted Hyunbin with her usual friendliness.

“Hello.”

Hyunbin smiled gently as he dealt with Jini.

‘To think he can smile like that.’

The only smile Seo Hyun-ji remembered seeing on Hyunbin’s face was a wicked grin that stretched from ear to ear.

She had flinched more than a few times seeing it.

He smiled like that whenever he was tormenting and pushing others around.

At least, the hero’s smile she remembered from her childhood wasn’t like that.

Seo Hyun-ji shook her head, snapping out of her thoughts.

That wasn’t what was important right now.

‘But why did he suddenly show up on a horse?’

Seo Hyun-ji watched as the mysterious horse Hyunbin had ridden chewed on some hay and looked at her.

‘Where did he ditch his car to ride something like that?’

It defied all common sense.

“You must be so, so, so! busy! Thank you so much for helping us!”

“Not at all. We should all help each other out.”

Seeing him smile and pretend to be a good person gave Seo Hyun-ji goosebumps for some reason.

His usual behavior made this facade feel completely dissonant.

“Well, shall we go?”

“Ah, but you came on a horse.”

It seemed Jini had finally noticed the oddity as well.

Seo Hyun-ji waited for the answer to a question she was also curious about.

“I just got it, and it’s actually not bad. It takes me to the gym on its own after I wake up. The self-driving is amazing.”

“Wow, that puts Tesla to shame. It’s eco-friendly and looks so great.”

“…”

It seemed she was the only one who found the situation strange.

‘Not like this is the first time.’

Seo Hyun-ji decided to ignore Hyunbin’s eccentric behavior.

“It would be perfect if I could just do something about the muffler.”

“The tuning seems to be done really beautifully. Wow, we have such similar tastes.”

Seo Hyun-ji blinked, watching the two who had become fast friends.

Jini had always been exceptionally friendly, but she never thought she would hit it off with Hyunbin, whom she had just met, so well.

‘Huh.’

For some reason, she didn’t feel great about it.

It wasn’t jealousy, just that she didn’t like how they were talking to each other, leaving her out like a spare part.

So, she casually spoke to Hyunbin.

“The driver’s insurance must be pretty expensive.”

Hyunbin’s expression immediately soured.

“What are you talking about? Horses don’t have driver’s insurance.”

“Come on, Hyun-ji. There’s driver’s insurance, but not horse insurance.”

…She was right, but it was somehow infuriating.

“Ah, but are you going to ride the horse there?”

“No, I can just put it in my inventory.”

“Wow, that’s so cool. It must be so convenient!”

Jini clapped her hands and rejoiced like a child as she watched Hyunbin store the horse in his inventory.

Watching her, Seo Hyun-ji felt a strange churning in her stomach.

But she didn’t let it show.

She got into the back seat of the car, placed her backpack on her lap, and hugged it.

“Sit here in the passenger seat. When else would I get to ride with a hero like Hyunbin?”

“Oh, come on, a hero?”

“I’m a huge fan. I saw Hyun-ji’s vlog before, and you were so good at whipping her into shape. No, I mean, you were so strict and professional. The reaction to that was insane, you must not have known.”

Seo Hyun-ji looked at the two sitting in the driver and passenger seats and placed her backpack on the seat next to her.

It didn’t seem like anyone would be sitting next to her for a while.

Their destination was Yangchon Village.

It was quite a long drive.

The conversation between the two never stopped along the way.

Seo Hyun-ji looked at Hyunbin with narrowed eyes.

He didn’t spare her a single glance.

She looked at Jini.

Her driving was quite skilled, unlike the clumsy unni she knew.

“So, Oppa, what’s your ideal type?”

“…”

Seo Hyun-ji blinked.

At some point, Jini’s way of addressing Hyunbin had changed to “Oppa.”

“Around a 500 total for the big three?”

“What’s that? Height? Weight???”

Jini tilted her head, not understanding what Hyunbin meant.

Seo Hyun-ji felt a sense of despair, as if she had been corrupted for understanding his words.

‘That “Oppa” must have made his grin stretch from ear to ear.’

Seo Hyun-ji found herself pouting without realizing it.

*Rattle, rattle.*

The car, driving on an unpaved road, came to a stop. The entrance to a village, filled with a quaint, rustic scenery, came into view.

“Ugh.”

Seo Hyun-ji got out, carrying her backpack.

She hadn’t realized how uncomfortable an unpaved road could be.

The car had shaken so much that her bottom was sore.

“I’ll carry that for you.”

“Oh my, oh my. You don’t have to. Bin Oppa, your muscles are so rugged, but you’re so sweet. But shouldn’t you be helping Hyun-ji instead of me?”

“I am as sweet as sugar.”

‘What kind of poison sugar do they have where you’re from?’

“And Hyun-ji is fine. Among Hunters, there’s no man or woman.”

Seo Hyun-ji smiled faintly at Hyunbin’s words.

‘That muscle-head.’

He had been getting on her nerves for a while now, and a grudge was beginning to form in her heart.

Even if she was a Hunter, she was still a delicate woman. Of course, she was also a superhuman who could wipe out an entire armed company.

“Grandmaaaa~!”

Just then, Jini started waving at someone in the distance.

“Oh my, my baby’s here.”

A stooped old grandmother, who had been plowing a field with an ox, saw her granddaughter and came out from the field.

“Grandmaaaa!”

“My goodness, you must be busy. What brings you all the way out here, my baby?”

“I came because I missed you, Grandma. Hehe.”

Watching the two of them, a smile formed on Seo Hyun-ji’s lips.

She knew the story.

Jini had lost her parents as a child during the Gate incident, the Great Cataclysm.

At that time, South Korea was overflowing with orphans.

Shuffled between relatives’ houses, she had nowhere to go.

The one who took her in then was her maternal grandmother.

It was her grandmother who had raised her like a precious jewel, ensuring she wanted for nothing.

Seo Hyun-ji had known since long ago how special Jini’s relationship with her grandmother was.

Ever since their trainee days, Jini had always said she wanted to succeed for her grandmother’s sake.

Just then, something strange caught her eye.

The yellow ox and the black ox plowing the field with the grandmother were much larger than she expected.

‘Were they always that big?’

It was her first time in the countryside, so she thought it might be possible. But suddenly, the yellow and black oxen undid the ropes on their bodies and stood up.

“…?”

The two of them started smoking cigarettes.

“Minotaurs?”

No matter how she looked at it, something was wrong with this village.