92. Our Big Bro Went To America (1)

While Yujin and Shin Junseok wrestled over how to divide up the equipment and personnel Daehan Pharmaceutical had supplied, Jeong Sunim, for her part, was out pounding the pavement to promote the Saint’s series.

Daehan Pharmaceutical’s Bacchus was a fatigue-recovery tonic with a fair bit of worldwide name recognition. It wasn’t as famous as Austria’s Blue Bull or America’s Monster Power, but its outstanding efficacy sold it by word of mouth even across the Americas.

“Did the gift arrive safely?”

Jeong Sunim broached the subject gently to the figure on the other side of the video call. The woman there had short black hair that just brushed the nape of her neck, blue eyes, and a striking scar running across her forehead. Alice Kim, vice-guildmaster of the California-based guild [Little Angels], set the pill, flown over by express delivery, on her palm.

“Chairman Jeong. Got the item you sent express, no problem.”
“I’m glad.”
“What kind of medicine is it that you sent it over in such a hurry?”
“You’ll understand once you take it.”

Jeong Sunim wore a faint smile. The woman facing her across the screen tilted her head, looking puzzled, then tossed the pill into her mouth.

“Wow.”

Alice Kim was also the entrepreneur who had spearheaded Bacchus’s distribution in the States, which was exactly why her pill had been the first shipped out during the VIP-focused Saint’s Tears promotion.

‘Just taking it drops your magic-casting time by 20%, plus a Moving Cast on top?’

She wanted it.

America was the most advanced nation in the world for Hunter-support pharmaceuticals, and even there, no medicine with effects this groundbreaking had been developed.

“So, what do you think?”
“Chairman Jeong. Have you thought about breaking into the American market? I’ll set you up.”
“I’ll just take the thought.”
“With the skill to develop a support drug performing at this level, you’d be a hit in the States, I’m telling you.”
“With the Saint’s Blessing, I’m only handling distribution. It isn’t something we made, you see.”

Alice Kim’s eyes went wide.

“Who made a medicine like this?”
“Oh, come now. This is the part I’m not supposed to say.”

Chairman Jeong Sunim, reflected across the screen, looked troubled, and yet the corner of her lips twitched.

“An alchemist and a Saint. The two of them made it jointly, I heard.”
“…A Saint?”
“Oh my. Pardon me. Please pretend you didn’t just hear that.”

So that was why they had slapped a name as grandiose as Saint’s Blessing on the pill. The corners of Alice’s eyes curved into a smile.

“Chairman Jeong. What you just said. Could I hear it in more detail?”

“…And that’s how I came to introduce you to Representative Cheon.”

Having listened to Jeong Sunim’s account, Yujin fiddled with his chin. Alice Kim, was it.

‘No. Nothing at all.’

‘Regressing doesn’t mean I know everything, I keep telling you.’
Alice Kim, or the Little Angels? Sorry, but I’m meeting both for the very first time. This isn’t even Korea — how would I know the name of some guild, or its people, playing alley-boss (?) on the far side of the Pacific?

After chiding Kronos, he turned his focus back to the call.

“And how’s the drug working out?”
“They marveled that it was superb. If only the production volume could keep up, I’d have secured a sales channel on the American side too—it’s a real shame.”
“Well, that’s a relief.”
“Oh, right. Alice Kim said she’d like to invite the Saint over.”

Well now, that’s worked out nicely. The ink isn’t even dry on my visa, and already I’ve got a use for it again.

“Daehan Pharmaceutical will cover the expenses, so you needn’t worry.”
“I’ve got four more in my party—is that all right?”
“That much is no trouble.”
“Let me know once the detailed schedule’s set.”
“Yes. It won’t take long.”

The moment Yujin ended the call, Kronos voiced his curiosity.

‘She said a Saint, didn’t she. If she wanted to talk about the medicine, she’d have called for the alchemist.’

Chairman Jeong Sunim had surely let slip Yujin’s Stellar Rank on the sly, too. She must have sent the invitation because a gate within her jurisdiction needed a powerful ‘Priest.’

‘There’s something I need to get my hands on in America.’

The fortuitous encounter he was after was not one he could land on his own. He had been meaning to swing by one of two countries anyway, America or South Africa, so the timing worked out well. And if the invitation came from a guild with a fair bit of pull in California, he could get a hand drawing up his future schedule besides.

Yujin summoned the Scraps team, who were out hunting in the borderlands.

“Any interest in an overseas trip?”
“Boss. Even when you bring up a trip out of nowhere, all I hear is ‘let’s go capture a gate.’”

This brat. Sharp.

Concealing part of the truth, Yujin gathered his words.

“I’ve been invited by an American guild called the Little Angels this time.”
“Bro. The Little Angels—that’s them! Them!”
“Saying it like that, how am I supposed to know.”
“That celebrity who was famous as both an actress and a singer. The place where Amanda is the guildmaster!”
“…?”

Um, excuse me. And who’s that.

When five question marks floated up over Yujin’s head, Kang Minyeong cried out, frustrated.

“You really don’t know? The lead in the musical film You’re So Pitiful!”
“Is that for real, Senior?!”
“Ah. So it is.”

The Scraps team exchanged glances and let out a cheer. Yujin, the only one who couldn’t catch the mood, sat there blinking on his own.

“…Is that the important part.”
“Of course it is. Bro. My goodness, I am absolutely going!”
“The one who got invited by the Little Angels is just me, though.”
“You just said let’s go on an overseas trip!”
“‘You said,’ is casual talk.”
“You said—sir.”
“You lot are tagging along. Enjoy some sightseeing while I handle the guild’s commission.”

At Yujin’s groundbreaking declaration, the Scraps members flinched in shock, then their faces bloomed into smiles.

“What’s with the vacation?”
“Looks like Boss does look out for us after all.”
“Leave the California eats to me, sir.”

A warm, convivial mood wrapped around the group.

‘What. Giving them time off is the truth, isn’t it.’

Good little Yujin doesn’t know anything about lying.

The reason the Little Angels wanted a ‘3rd-Rank’ ‘Saint’ was obvious.

A gate capture.

Whether it would wrap up in short order or drag on for the long haul, there was no telling. For however long it took, though, he meant to give the party some time to rest.

‘I’ve got to give them a vacation, at least, or I’ll be cursed out.’

‘I don’t know either.’

Yujin grinned.

It’s true. The fortuitous encounter hidden away in some gate or other in America — I’ve only heard rumors of it. Beyond its being monstrously difficult and the reward, I don’t really know much.

Yujin had to face it firsthand to know.

Kronos quietly pitied the Scraps team.

Los Angeles. The largest city in the western United States, home to the densest concentration of Asian immigrants in the country, and the seat of Hollywood, the heart of world cinema and a hub of popular culture.

“Whoa. To think I’d live to take an overseas trip!”
“I’ll remember this day my whole life, sir!”

Kang Minyeong and Lee Seongmin carried on in a fluster.

The cost of overseas travel had ballooned astronomically since the Great Cataclysm. With erosion zones gnawing away at every region of the globe, flight and sailing routes had grown far more tangled than before. Back when he’d gone to the island of Crete to make Kronos his Constellation, the airfare alone had run close to ten million won; a single trip abroad swallowed an enormous sum.

‘All the travel expenses are covered by Daehan Pharmaceutical, so no wonder they’re excited.’
Laugh all you can. The day you’ll long for this moment is sure to come. Kuhuhu.

Clamping down on the laughter leaking out of his mouth, Yujin shot a sidelong glance at the Scraps.

“Mister Cheon?”

A woman wrapped in a powerful surge of mana, her hair in a bob, came toward him in a straight line. She had yellow skin, black hair, and blue eyes, and even without trading names, it was plain who she was.

“Thank you for the invitation. Vice-Guildmaster Kim.”
“Don’t mention it. I got a fine medicine as a gift, and I wanted to see a promising Saint for myself.”

The two of them chatted away naturally in English. Kang Minyeong looked back and forth between Yujin and Alice Kim with a blank expression.

“Bro. What’s with the English, sir?”
“In this international age, English is the basics.”
“Wow. I feel betrayed.”

For someone on his second go at life, English was a piece of cake.

“Call me Alice. Going by surnames is too stiff.”
“I won’t refuse.”
“And your party?”
“They’re here to tour LA. They’re traveling on their own, so just point them to where they’ll be staying.”

When Alice Kim crooked a finger, the secretary waiting behind her handed the party their hotel keys.

“Wh-whoa! This is a five-star hotel?!!!”
“Boss. This is far too generous a treatment, I think.”
“It’s only natural for my party.”
“Boss…!”

The two giddy ones I can let slide, but — Kang Minho. Why are you making that face too.

“Director Im. I’ll leave looking after the kids to you.”
“I’ll keep them in line.”

I didn’t call you over to play nanny to the Scraps brats, though. That’s just how it turned out. Sorry, but bear with the hassle while I go take care of business.

After confirming the party had cleared out of the airport in high spirits, the business talk got underway in earnest.

“You said you were a Saint, correct?”
“Yes. Though I can’t tell you which Constellation I serve.”
“The Saint’s Blessing. Just looking at that pill’s efficacy, Mister Cheon’s skill is as good as proven.”

I didn’t exactly mix any of my own holy power into the pill, you know.

Yujin didn’t bother to correct the misunderstanding.

“You’re aware my Stellar Rank is 3rd, yes?”
“Of course. A 3rd-Rank Priest is precisely what our guild’s been hunting around for.”
“Then, as I suspected…”
“Just as you’ve guessed, it’s a gate-capture commission.”

“Surely the Little Angels have talent of your own?”
“That’s true. Starting with the guildmaster herself, who’s a powerful Priest in the running as a Saintess candidate.”
“Then why hire me rather than someone from your guild.”
“Because capturing this gate calls for stronger Priest firepower.”

The Death Cry of the Wraith. The name alone sounded like it would be teeming with undead and wraith-type monsters. The Little Angels had thrown their rookie Hunters at the gate that had formed within their jurisdiction, only to be routed by the ceaseless tide of undead pouring out of it.

“So you need the power of a Saint like me?”
“Mister Cheon. You’re already a celebrity back in Korea.”

Alice smiled softly.

The double-gate capture. The mysterious yet tremendously effective holy spells. He was not even a Paladin, that pure Priest job, and still his martial might gave no ground to the Martial line of his own Stellar Rank. Finding a 3rd-Rank Priest as exceptional as Yujin would be hard even by combing all of America. That, in the end, was the judgment Alice Kim had reached.

“From what I hear, the Constellation you serve even granted you a powerful summon.”

Fafnir, you mean.

Regrettably, Fafnir had been left behind as chief overseer of the Necropolis defenses, which were in the midst of expanding their sphere.

A chicken instead of a pheasant, as they say. I brought one promising dual-sword wielder along instead.

“You’ve done quite a bit of digging.”
“Chairman Jeong asked me to keep it secret. Please pretend you didn’t hear that.”

Just as Jeong Sunim had slyly let information slip, Alice Kim too sidestepped the question with a light touch. Guessing as much, Yujin didn’t press her any further either.

“I’d like to hear the terms.”
“One of the unique-grade artifacts our guild has in storage. Whichever you wish, I’ll give you.”
“Generous terms.”
“The Little Angels’ prestige is on the line.”

If a gate broke, humanity’s territory shrank. And since no method had yet been developed for extracting a gate core fused with the earth, it was only natural to react sensitively to the mana density climbing by the day.

“Then I have one condition.”
“Let’s hear it.”
“In the course of the gate capture, I’d like to be delegated command authority.”
“I’m not sure those friends of mine will accept that.”
“I’ll handle convincing them.”

Alice Kim’s eyes filled with puzzlement.

“All right. If that’s the condition.”

Her deliberation did not last long. Alice Kim extended her right hand without hesitation.

A clean deal is always welcome.

Yujin clasped her hand in return.