Chapter 49

Chapter 49

“Pfft, pfft, pfft-hah, cough, ha, haha… I’ve heard that conservative people tend to have more imagination, but… Pfft, pfft-ha.”

“Would you please stop laughing, Mr. Jeong Seojin? How dare you laugh so carelessly in front of the Master…”

“The problem isn’t that it’s in front of you, it’s that I’m laughing in this situation. Ah, Mr. Jeong Seojin. Seriously, stop laughing. You’re the only one enjoying this situation right now, aren’t you?!”

And in the midst of all that, Jeong Seojin, who kept on laughing, was punished thirty minutes later when I kicked him in the shin.

Of course, let’s just gloss over the fact that it hurt me, the one who actually did the hitting, more than it hurt him, and that he just looked at me with a completely unbothered face and asked, “Boss, is your foot okay?” Ugh.

* * *

Fortunately, after hearing the full explanation of how our relationship had formed, Guild Master Kang Mujin finally dropped that strange misunderstanding of his.

Not only that, but he suddenly let out a deep sigh while looking at Jeong Seojin, then apologized to me for getting me caught up in Jeong Seojin’s reckless behavior.

“No, why are you apologizing for something that’s my business?”

“Because you’re a hunter in my guild. Ha… Seojin. No matter how much you wanted to get stronger, how could you intimidate a C-Rank hunter who looks like she’d blow away with a gust of wind?”

“I never intimidated her.”

“Excuse me, it’s true that I’m just a C-Rank hunter, but I have a hard time accepting that description of looking like I’d blow away with a gust of wind.”

Who are you calling such an absurdly frail weakling?

Sure, I might be a C-Rank hunter, the lowest in the industry, practically civilian-grade, but I was still an Awakened who had undergone Awakening.

Of course, to inhuman S-Rank hunters like Jeong Seojin or Mr. Yoon Juyeong, a C-Rank like me probably looked less than an ant, but from a normal perspective, I was a perfectly healthy and sturdy person.

“Seojin, think about your impression and image. Every single word you say can easily be perceived as a threat or intimidation to lower-rank hunters.”

“No, that side and I agreed to this, you know? Of course, not canceling the master-servant relationship is entirely my will.”

“Since you’re admitting it, any chance you’d consider canceling it now?”

“If you’re not sincere about your relationship with the Master, how about canceling it while you have the chance, Mr. Jeong Seojin.”

—Master, why don’t you just use the skill again and subjugate that whole bastard instead? Arrogant wretches like him must be made to kneel and be humiliated!

The fact that Mr. Yoon Juyeong and Avan’s desires were so blatantly obvious in the middle of all this was ridiculous.

Mr. Yoon Juyeong seemed to hate all the other s…laves except himself, and Avan just seemed to want to make Jeong Seojin, who’d looked annoying from the start, kneel and humiliate him.

‘If someone like Avan had this skill instead of someone like me, wouldn’t the stress be a lot less?’

Of course, in that case, the problem would be that the skill might get overused everywhere.

…It couldn’t be that the reason the ‘Ruler’s Garden’ skill appeared for someone like me was for that kind of reason, could it?

“Mr. Yoon Juyeong, and Avan, please calm down. Mr. Jeong Seojin, if you could seriously consider deactivating the skill…”

“If you promise to reapply the skill to me, I could consider a temporary cancellation.”

“Seojin. Don’t tell me being dominated by a fragile person who looks like she’d collapse from a light tap is your taste?”

“What the hell are you thinking? This is why I say the more conservative a person is, the more twisted their imagination gets.”

“Otherwise, there’s no way you’d be so comfortable calling a woman your age ‘Master,’ Seojin.”

“It’s ‘Boss,’ not ‘Master.’ And you heard the whole story, so what’s with the nonsense? Isn’t calling someone ‘Boss’ a fair price for getting a plus one on my rank?”

“It’s not nearly fair enough, which is why I’m asking you to deactivate the skill. And I’m older than Mr. Jeong Seojin, Guild Master.”

“Then a taste for being dominated by an older woman—”

“Ah, I said no!”

At this point, I didn’t know about anything else, but I knew one thing for sure. That Jeong Seojin, who usually seemed detached or indifferent about everything, was completely helpless in front of Guild Master Kang Mujin.

I watched with keen interest as the Guild Master rambled all sorts of nonsense with a serious face, and Jeong Seojin got helplessly swept up in it.

‘How should I put this? The Guild Master’s nonsense involving me isn’t exactly welcome… but aside from that, seeing Jeong Seojin get swept up like this is kind of…’

I don’t know if I can put it this way, but it felt like watching a close pair of brothers, or maybe a father and son. Well, to be honest, since I grew up as an orphan without parents, I’ve never actually seen a real father-son relationship.

—Hmph, I never liked the way he usually acts… but seeing him get pushed around by an elder is quite a sight.

“Just asking, but Avan, have you ever studied Confucianism?”

—Huh? By Confucianism, do you mean… the philosophy founded by Confucius of China? Hmm, I know what it is, but I’ve never actually studied it or paid any particular attention to that field…

“No, it’s just that the way you act is exactly like a Confucianist…”

He looks like an elf straight out of a fantasy novel, yet he acts like a Confucianist running around preaching about men and women not sitting together after age seven… It really creates a cognitive dissonance between his appearance and his actual substance.

I gave the lump of light floating around on my shoulder a subtle look, then turned my gaze to Mr. Yoon Juyeong, who was standing a step away as if he had nothing to do with the situation that was the cause of all this.

‘I should make it clear to Mr. Yoon Juyeong too.’

It was something I had repeated to him countless times, but at the same time, it was a statement that had never been conveyed in a definite form, left vague and floating in the air.

I gently tugged at the hem of Mr. Yoon Juyeong’s clothes as he watched the conversation between Jeong Seojin and Guild Master Kang Mujin. He reacted immediately to my small movement and turned his gaze toward me.

“Mr. Yoon Juyeong.”

“Yes, Master.”

“I think you might have misunderstood what I said, so let me tell you again. I am not your master.”

“How can you say—”

“Just hear me out first, Mr. Yoon Juyeong.”

I firmly cut off the words that were about to come out of his mouth again.

Normally, I would have refrained from the rude act of interrupting someone no matter the situation, but right now, I thought it was more important to convey what was on my mind to Mr. Yoon Juyeong.

“I know that right now, because of the skill’s influence, you think of me as your master. And I also know that’s why you haven’t deactivated the skill.”

“……”

“But even so, I’m going to keep saying it. I am not your master, and I can’t be one for you.”

Mr. Yoon Juyeong kept silent as if answering my request, but that didn’t mean he agreed with my words.

In fact, even at this very moment, he was facing me with an awkward smile, as if he simply couldn’t accept it.

So I spoke even more firmly.

“I don’t consider emotions and relationships manipulated by a skill to be ‘real’ relationships. And of course, even if our relationship were ‘real,’ I’m the kind of person who believes one human being shouldn’t own another.”

“Master…”

“I don’t know exactly how my skill has affected you, or how much it’s… dominating you because of it. But I’ll keep telling you until this skill is deactivated. I am not your master, and you are not someone owned by me. And our relationship is an illusion created by the skill.”

It’s not that I dislike Mr. Yoon Juyeong. And the relationship I have with him now… I don’t exactly like it, but I don’t outright hate it either.

Besides, even if it was artificially created by a skill, our relationship probably isn’t completely meaningless from start to finish.

At the very least, I learned that Mr. Yoon Juyeong is a good cook, and I also found out that, for some reason, he doesn’t contact his family.

And I learned that he doesn’t welcome relationships with others as much as I thought.

‘I didn’t know at first, but at this point, I can’t not know even if I tried.’

Nearly a month has passed since we were first tied together in a “ruler” and “slave” relationship. But not once have I ever seen Mr. Yoon Juyeong contact anyone else privately.

Yeah, so… it’s really, unbearably heavy for me, but if I had to admit the truth, that was it.

At least at this point, I was the only valuable relationship Mr. Yoon Juyeong had.

It meant that this abnormal relationship—master and slave, forcibly bound by a skill—was his only channel for communicating with others.

‘So.’

So that’s why I couldn’t accept this relationship even more.

The fact that a person’s only relationship for communicating with someone else was forcibly created by a skill.

And on top of that, this relationship—born from an illusion and built on a lie—dares to claim “absoluteness” under the overwhelming influence of a skill.

“So, Mr. Yoon Juyeong, I don’t know when it’ll be… but someday, if you ever want to end this illusory relationship, even just a little, or… if you ever feel like you want to form a real, genuine relationship with me, then please, by all means, release the skill.”

“…….”

“Of course, that’s a long way off for now.”

It’s not like I want our relationship to change right this instant. There’s no way something like this gets resolved in one go.

This is just my guess, but it looked like the problem between me and Mr. Yoon Juyeong was likely going to be a long-term battle. At least until I properly understood my own skill, and Mr. Yoon Juyeong himself could face his own issues, even just a little.

If that happened, then someday.

‘The day I get to greet the real Mr. Yoon Juyeong will come too.’