56. Company

Shin Junseok clutched the Paracelsus’s Magic Cylinder, rubbing his cheek all over its round surface.

“Bro. Is that thing all right?”
“There’s a lot of eccentrics among geniuses.”
“Ah. So that’s why you, too—”
“What was that you said?”
“Talking to myself. Pay it no mind, Bro.”

Kang Minyeong abruptly whistled a tune. What a goof.

‘Stop using such grandiose words. It makes you look weak.’

‘If you stop to assign meaning to every little thing, you’ll never get anything done.’

At his core, Shin Junseok was a man obsessed with alchemy. Yujin’s words or the moment might sway him, but his fundamental nature would never change.

‘I have to look at the core.’

After rubbing his cheek against the cylinder for a good long while, Shin Junseok belatedly came back to himself.

“Where did you get this?”
“Found it on the way over.”
“Don’t joke around.”
“I got it clearing a gate with a fellow named Song Myeongseok.”

Nodding along at the familiar name, Shin Junseok let out an admiring “Ah—.”

“That’s Arahan’s Supernova!”
“Didn’t I tell you? The Arahan Guild proposed a joint clear to these kids.”
“For the country’s number-one guild to actually give up the spoils…”
“Give them up, nothing. We won them by contribution.”

Shin Junseok’s eyes went back and forth between the cylinder and Yujin.

“Shit!!!!”
“Why are you cursing right to a man’s face.”
“It’s Arahan’s Supernova! There’s a way to say things calmly, you know.”
“This coming from the guy who’s got a whole crowd showing up with bundles of money.”
“That and this are the same thing?”
“You kicked aside the thirty billion Arahan offered.”

Listening to the two of them bicker, the Scraps let out a strangled “Hwuh—!”

“Th-thirty billion, you said!?”
“B-Big Bro. No. I’ll call you Big Bro—er, Oppa!”
“Even just security work’s fine. Use me too, please.”

Look at the adoration practically dripping from their eyes.

“He turned it down, so what’re you clinging on for.”
“Ah. Is that so.”
“You could’ve said so sooner, sir. Forget I said anything.”

Their stance flipped fast as light itself.

At the word “sir” in particular, Shin Junseok’s throat bobbed as if something had welled up. He wore a ridiculous expression, unable to cry or laugh.

“Study that tool long enough and you’ll come to understand the secret arts of alchemy from another world, too.”
“There’s never been a thing my partner said that was wrong, so I believe you.”

‘Of course. It’ll never be wrong, so don’t worry — in the original history, the one who uncovered the secret hidden in this cylinder was you.’

“Have you eaten?”
“I’ll eat a little later. The factory’s automatic mixing machine is acting up.”
“And then you’ll go and starve again.”
“‘Again,’ you say? Have you ever seen me skip a meal?”

‘Yeah. Before the regression, I saw it sickeningly often.’

Old memories surfacing, Yujin pressed Shin Junseok harder.

“Then did you eat dinner yesterday?”
“Ah, that’s—”
“You didn’t eat three days ago either.”
“Have you got CCTV rigged up in my workshop or something?”

‘I don’t need to rig anything up to see it plain as day. His living patterns run on a loop whether I’m watching or not — I just said the first thing that came to mind.’

“It’s a dinner party. I’ve got things to discuss, too.”
“A meal is nothing but a tiresome act of recharging the body with energy…”

— Smack!

Yujin’s smack sent him reeling, and Shin Junseok glared back with both eyes.

“Cut the nonsense and go fetch some chairs.”
“Understood.”

Displeasure still riding his face, Shin Junseok stalked into the workshop, and Yujin clicked his tongue at his retreating back. Tsk, tsk.

The group gathered in the yard in front of the workshop, a patch no one ever tended, overrun with nameless weeds.

— It really is too much. Does the owner not maintain his home?

“Ge-gel, ge-ge-ge-gel.”

Jo Seungcheol burned the grass away with fire magic, and Fafnir swept the rising sparks, smoke, and ash aside with his Dark Fighting-Aura.

“Seongmin. Take backpack number five out of the Bag of Infinity.”
“Ain’t that the one we use in the borderlands?”
“I bought it for dinner parties.”
“Got it!”

He set the chilled beef on the table and rolled up his sleeves.

— You’re not grilling it right away?

“It’s been a while, so I ought to show off a bit of skill.”

He laid the chuck flap on the cutting board and sliced it into bite-sized pieces, then set them on a pan over the flames of a makeshift hearth rigged from an oil drum, stirring a few times until the meat cooked evenly through.

Cube steak needed a sauce. He had a special one, oyster sauce and minced garlic and the like reduced down into red wine. The heat surging off the oil drum was tremendous, but Yujin brought both sauce and meat to their finest without a single misstep, the kind of skill no one could imitate from a recipe alone.

“You wouldn’t happen to have majored in cooking, would you?”
“Majored, nothing. I’m a high-school grad.”
“The folks in my camping club can’t even do it like this!”

Lee Seongmin burst out, all worked up.

The heart of cooking is fire control. A fire lit in an oil drum can’t be dialed up and down like a gas range or an induction stove; the only things to trust are instinct and timing. From all their camping, the group could tell Yujin’s skill was out of the ordinary.

“Surprised at just this? I haven’t even properly started yet.”

Heh heh heh. Yujin smiled, brimming with confidence.

‘Who’d have thought the day would come when I’d share my one and only hobby.’

‘A hero can’t live on an empty stomach either, you know.’

Before the regression, he’d had little in the way of fellowship. A Necromancer by nature, he usually went into gates alone, and even after he founded the Necropolis in Kaesong, he saw the dead often enough but few of the living ever stayed for long.

‘There were a few who came seeking instruction, but it wasn’t a place to stay long.’

He would either buy food off the black market passing through the Kaesong region, or trek all the way to Ground Zero for a meal, which was a real pain.

‘At first it was just to fill my belly, but the longer I kept at it, the more fun it turned out to be.’

‘And a backwater goblin has a knack for spouting nonsense.’

— Sizzle, sizzle.

Next came flank steak, and all sorts of other meat dishes besides, which he laid before the group one after another.

“It’s delicious!”
“Bro. I think I’m gonna fall for you.”
“…Energy resupply isn’t half bad, maybe.”
“If you get the chance, teach me some cooking.”

Praise poured in, and the corners of Yujin’s mouth twitched faintly.

“Fafnir. You want some too, don’t you?”

— If your aim is to mock the dead, then you’ve succeeded.

Fafnir whipped his head away. He was an undead crafted to draw out a Draconian’s full stature and nature, but taste was the one thing that couldn’t be brought back. Still, there was a way around even that.

“Minyeong. Cast Sync on Fafnir.”
“Yes, sir.”

Sync was a unique trait that linked one being’s senses to another’s, usable on the inanimate or the living alike; Kang Minyeong, the user, could share as much or as little of the senses as she needed. Back when they cleared the Iron Tomb, they’d borrowed Fafnir’s “eyes.”

— Doing that won’t… ah!?

“Whoa. So it really works.”

— Munch, munch.

Juices burst in little pops, and as the rich aroma of meat swirled through his mouth, the blue flames blazed fiercer still.

— A taste I’d long since forgotten.

“I can’t let you chew it yourself, so make do with vicarious satisfaction.”

— Truly an undeserved reward, Master.

“Don’t thank me. Tell Kang Minyeong.”

Fafnir stepped before Kang Minyeong and bowed at the waist, a full ninety degrees.

— I will never forget this kindness.

“I just did what Bro told me to. It’s nothing, don’t worry about it.”

In his past life, Fafnir had been an enemy he’d fought to the death; the one who took the Mirror Hunters’ lives had been Yujin’s own champion. The regression had overturned the relationship completely. And yet.

‘It’s not so bad, is it.’

Remembering the days before the regression, Yujin smiled softly.

By the time the meal wound down, the sun had crossed over to the west.

“Boss. But why didn’t you cook back in the borderlands?”
“Monsters don’t wait around for you to finish cooking, do they.”
“True enough, the borderlands are dangerous.”

The borderlands were a space half-turned into another world, gate and reality jumbled together. Monsters spawned there from time to time, and mutations beyond their rank cropped up often enough. His own senses had dulled from crossing the line of death so many times, but to the average Hunter it was a no-go zone they’d never set foot in.

“But isn’t the interior of the Necropolis domain relatively safe?”
“Ah. That’s just too much of a hassle.”

Kang Minho put on a dumbstruck expression.

‘Just think about it. Do a hobby too much and it turns into work.’

“That was a fine meal, partner.”
“Satisfied?”
“It was better than the Daeseong Group cafeteria.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

By that verdict, his cooking had bested the cafeteria of the country’s largest corporation, and Yujin grinned from ear to ear.

“Bro. That breezy mood doesn’t suit you.”

Kang Minyeong recoiled, but did Yujin care? Ahem. He cleared his throat and looked around at the group seated at the table.

“Now that we’ve filled our bellies in good spirits, let’s move on to the main subject.”

The others fixed on his words. They hadn’t known him long, but this was the first time he’d set a mood like this.

‘What on earth is he going to say?’

‘Mm. The steak was good.’

‘Has my partner secured a new alchemy idea?’

‘Ugh. Once he’s done talking, I’ve gotta restock the goods.’

Just as each of their thoughts was wandering off in its own direction, Yujin’s voice dropped low and wove all four minds into one.

“I’m going to build a Company.”
“You mean a firm?”
“Translated literally, it’d come out that way. What I have in mind is a slightly broader framework.”

Company. The trend had started over in the American Hunter industry: inside the bounds of a single Company, every Hunter-related business was gathered under one roof. In this country’s terms, it was much like grouping a corporation’s affiliates, or its subsidiaries.

“Does my workshop come under you, partner?”
“Strictly speaking, yes, but I’ll hang a respectable title on the founding members of the Company.”
“Heh, heheh. This is enormously amusing.”

Shin Junseok clutched his belly and laughed, a hissing sound leaking out of him.

‘He’s actually intrigued.’

‘How would a backwater goblin know a man’s heart.’

He’d said it before: geniuses are each missing a screw somewhere. This was a man who’d walked out of a leading conglomerate and gone into debt on a private workshop just to bury himself in research.

‘He’s pleased because he thinks getting in deeper with me means getting more alchemy knowledge out of me.’

‘He’s run the numbers in his head, too, no doubt.’

A Hunter who’d decisively beaten Arahan’s Supernova, Song Myeongseok: the potential for growth was overflowing. By now he’d have finished calculating that becoming family under one roof called the Company could only work in his favor, one way or another. This was a man who’d risen to senior researcher at Daeseong, after all.

“For the record, I’m going to found a House grounded in necromancy.”

There was the Necropolis he’d founded in the borderlands, and now, on top of it, the slice of the Red Spider’s operations he’d just taken over.

“So you planned it this way from the start, Boss.”
“The Red Spider is an underworld organization. It was dangerous work.”
“Next time, at least ask our intentions, please.”

Well now. From the red creeping up Kang Minho’s neck, he was clearly pretty angry. Yujin had pulled the Scraps back out of consideration for them, but apparently that hadn’t sat well.

‘I figured that hero nonsense of his was about due.’

‘We’re in the middle of an important talk here. Quit popping up and scattering my thoughts.’

“I’d be the alchemy workshop, then.”
“You, partner, just keep doing what you’ve been doing.”
“But are you including those kids in the Company too?”

When Yujin nodded, Shin Junseok’s eyes changed, taking on the same edge he’d worn the day Yujin first walked into the workshop. With those sunken eyes he coolly weighed the Scraps’ worth.

“I understand your meaning, partner, but I’d ask you to keep business and sentiment separate.”

He’d concluded that they didn’t suit the Company Yujin meant to build.

The remark scraped at their pride, but instead of bristling, the Scraps fell silent.

‘I’m grateful you’re giving us a chance, but it’s beyond us.’

‘Sticking close to Bro’s side — isn’t that our best bet?’

‘We can’t let our ambitions run too big.’

Having just heard that Shin Junseok had kicked aside a thirty-billion investment, they couldn’t bring themselves to jump at the Company now that it was on the table. One slip and they’d only end up dragging Yujin down.

“Don’t worry. I vouch for these kids.”
“You mean to say they can fulfill their roles as members of the Company?”
“They’re talents every bit as remarkable as you, so don’t worry.”

It was the truth. The twin siblings would one day become the “Mirror Hunters,” 8th-Rank Hunters so rare that only a handful existed even decades on. And Lee Seongmin’s ability? Used properly, its applications were inexhaustible.

“B-Boss!”
“I swear my loyalty to you from here on out!”
“I-I’ll call you Oppa. Bro!”

‘Don’t get moved by such trivial things. Please.’

When the Scraps gazed at Yujin with sparkling eyes, Shin Junseok let out a short sigh of his own.

“If you’ve judged it so, partner, there must be a reason for it.”
“Anyway, even if it’s a Company, it’s not as though I mean to do something with it right this moment.”

Raising the Company with Shin Junseok and the Scraps was a move for the future. A grand picture sat in Yujin’s head, and the Company was where it all started.

“Still, it ought to have a name, no?”
“I’ve already thought of one.”
“Oh. That’s our Bro for you. Hurry, tell us.”

Eyes bright with anticipation poured over him, and Yujin recited the name he’d settled on in advance.

“Black Company.”

— Whooosh.

A cold wind swept past¹ between them.