Chapter 11

With no intention of resisting, Pado was tossed backward and plunged into the lake beneath the waterfall. Sinking beneath the surface before rising back up, he lay flat on his back and drifted lazily atop the lake.

“What was that all about?”

“A peck.”

“Do I look like an easy target to you?”

“No.”

Lying flat with the water’s surface as his bed, Pado gazed up at the sky.

“You’re a pain in the ass.”

The only daughter born between the current commander of the West Sea Legion and its sole S-rank Hunter.

Black-market royalty raised among outlaws since birth.

A peer who scouted him, rescued him, brought him to the floating city White City, and showed him a new world—his benefactor… No matter what words you used to describe her, she was a complicated piece of work.

Among the heavyweights of the floating city, there were many who disliked having Pado anywhere near Morae.

Perhaps because Eun Morae had shown a direct interest in him, the higher-ups had regarded Pado with suspicion from the very day he arrived in the floating city. Adults who claimed they had dotingly raised Morae since childhood seized upon any flimsy excuse to pick a fight with Pado.

One day they’d summon him to throw down, and the next they’d play a petty trick on him.
Pado was the one playing the subordinate, so what on earth was there to be dissatisfied about? Perhaps because he was one of the few guys his age around, they were ruthless to him. They acted as if they’d bury him six feet under the moment a single tear slipped from Morae’s eyes.

The mother who had raised her with doting affection had fled a research facility twentyish years ago and was a Hunter boasting an impregnable fortress. Inside the West Sea Legion, which was her turf, no one dared treat Eun Morae lightly. There was no way she could ever be considered an easy target.

Leaving all that backing aside, Eun Morae herself was a riddle wrapped in an enigma.
Half a year had passed since he took Morae’s hand and entered the legion. Morae was always difficult.

Just when she seemed to be extending a friendly hand, she’d coldly brush him off, and just when she seemed to hover around his side, she’d grumble and drift away. One moment she’d smile as if she’d grant him anything and heap him with expensive gifts, while the next she’d covet even the trivial possessions Pado held dear.

Eun Morae was the kind of woman who would gift someone tea that other men drooped over while coveting Pado’s worthless stone ring.

With her so utterly unpredictable yet fiercely proud, they inevitably clashed at every turn.

“I can’t figure you out.”

Why on earth had she slept with him?

Was she genuinely mortified at the thought of losing to the women at the Downtown Workshop? Or had she wanted to keep Pado tied down even if it meant offering up her own body?

If so, was she actually interested in him, or would she do that with anyone as long as they were strong?

Why had she stayed with him all through the night, keeping pace with the endless sex?

Two days had passed since he tried to hold her close again around dawn only to get kicked away.

Though she had spent the interim dodging him without a word, the moment they were forced into a face-to-face situation, she acted completely nonchalant.

And yet, the only words she’d managed to squeeze out were demands not to go anywhere else. She didn’t drop a single common phrase about that day being a mistake or suggesting they forget it and go back to normal. She only tossed out casual remarks, dodging the topic as if starting a conversation would just be a hassle.

Riding a wave of momentum, they had gone all out, but now that it was over, it felt hollow.
It felt like tasting a grand course meal he’d had his eye on until his stomach was ready to burst, only to realize after eating every last bite that the food had been poisoned.

If he hadn’t known, he could have at least enjoyed it in his dreams. The price of a single bite was poison spreading through his body.

Morae had seemed to enjoy it plenty that day, too, but now that it was over, things had turned out like this. At this rate, it felt like he was the only one who had exposed a weakness, or to put it more crudely, like he’d been used as a dildo and tossed aside.

Because the seal had been peeled back, his body heat had spiked to the limit with nowhere to vent. He couldn’t keep running into Eun Morae’s face feeling like this.
Pado jerked upright from the water’s surface and sat cross-legged on the lake. Water gathered thickly beneath his body, supporting him firmly.

Being out on the lake was nice. Morae, who couldn’t manipulate water, couldn’t reach him out here, making it easy to keep his distance.

“Sorry for shoving my lips in your face. Well, I suppose you can fuck someone and still hate kissing them.”

“It’s not like—”

It would have been great if she’d continued with “It’s not like that,” but silence followed. Pado shrugged and lightened the mood.

“I figured I’d knock out my first kiss as a bonus, but it’s not that easy.”

“You haven’t had your first kiss even at your age? What were you doing while everyone else was dating?”

“Why are you picking a fight again when you’re not even going to grant it? Forget it. My lower half already lost its seal, so I’ll at least save the upper half.”

Morae wore an expression that suggested she had a mouthful to say, but ultimately kept her trap shut. He figured she might have wanted to pick another fight, but reined it in after realizing she needed to keep him on a leash.

Even if that wasn’t it, there was no helping it. Pado didn’t know mind-reading, and Morae wasn’t going to tell him.

Without probing any further into Morae’s state of mind, he moved on to the main topic.

Dealing with Eun Morae felt like his sanity was being steadily worn away piece by piece.

“You say I have no reason to leave, but the truth is, I have no reason to stay either.”

He was born and raised on the outside. Fleeing the government and coming to the floating city was half a year ago.

No friends, no family, and even after half a year, the closest person to him was still just Morae.

He didn’t share her dreams, nor did he harbor any grand ambitions. He was too young to love a life rooted in the dirt, and too grown up to appeal solely to mere sentiment.

While there was no pressing reason to walk out on the West Sea Legion, there was no real reason to stick around, either. At most, he just had a debt to pay back.

“I still have a conscience, you know. I’m not going to come back and pick a fight with the legion just because I’m leaving, so stop worrying.”

Morae wanted to possess Pado. She viewed Pado—someone capable of gracing and protecting her home—like a precious gemstone, refusing to hand him over to others.
There was no falsehood in that desire, but Morae already had a hundred gemstones in her hands.

As long as she kept playing the princess with all her heart right here, the number of gemstones in Morae’s hands would only continue to grow.

Staying behind as just one of those was a hard pass.

And to name one more reason.

The look in Morae’s eyes as she glared at him like she wanted to murder him was thrilling.

“You…”

The fact that Morae was throwing a tantrum at the news of his departure poured sweet rain upon his heart. Her inner thoughts, which had always been so hard to read, were glaringly obvious now. An overflowing, resentful desire not to lose Pado was spilling out.
Even so, he was glad to know he wasn’t completely useless in Eun Morae’s eyes. Not that it was enough to make him decide to stay in the legion, though.

“And I don’t really mesh well with crowds.”

The West Sea Legion was an organization large enough to dominate the archipelago. All its large and small affiliated groups totaled over 15,000 people, and around a thousand people passed through the central administration every day.

Pado, who had been brought in by Eun Morae and was expected to stick by her side, quickly became a notable figure forced to cross paths with hundreds of people.

He had been enduring it so far, but it was far more burdensome than he’d expected.
Things had been quiet since coming here, but Pado was simply not cut out for communal living.

Just how much trouble had he caused over that very issue in the past? The immediate catalyst for his brief stint crossing over to the West Sea Legion was his utter ineptitude at group living.

Pado was painfully aware that he didn’t fit into any collective. Naturally, since he hated rules and loathed taking orders, how could it be any different? Even now, being forced to obey Morae’s commands because of his debt was grating on his nerves and making him restless.

“…”

Morae shot him a gaze so intense it felt like it could melt Pado away.

She stayed silent. While she threw full-blown tantrums in front of adults, she rarely made a fuss in front of Pado. She knew well enough that Pado wouldn’t indulge her whining.
Morae also knew that if Pado stubbornly dug his heels in, she had no means to stop him. When that happened, all she could do was glare at him filled with frustration.

“You’re such an idiot.”

Morae raised her tightly clenched fist and struck the air.

“Such an idiot…!”

This time, the tip of her foot kicked at the lake. The water’s surface rippled with a splashing sound.

“Utterly brainless. Why walk a path like that when a good one is right there?”

“Right. There’s no fool quite like him.”

“Indeed. He’s got plenty of strength, but he’s still got a long way to go.”

A discordant voice cut in right after Morae’s words.

While the ones interrupting the conversation were just the voices of a somewhat middle-aged man and a young woman, their actual presence was triple that number.

A stream of water swiftly whisked Morae away and hid her behind Pado’s back. Instead of panicking, Morae skillfully concealed herself behind him, keeping her eyes locked on Pado’s blind spots.

“Long time no see, Pado.”

Six people surrounded the waterfall in a wide circle. Among them, a middle-aged man who looked the oldest waved at Pado. A stylishly dressed young woman beside the man also waved brightly in greeting.

“Well, look at you all crawling out in a neat little line.”

Stuck on the lake, right behind Pado’s back, Morae sneered.

Aside from a single young woman around Pado’s age, most of the visible six were up in years. They were people who had to be at least fifteen years older than Pado. Pado recognized them at a single glance.

“Things were strangely quiet, so I thought you lot had given up, but you came in a whole pack.”

“Tsk, watch your mouth. What kind of attitude is that calling your elders ‘a pack’?”

“Who in their right mind acts docile toward people who came to arrest me?”

Two of the six were strangers, but four were familiar faces. With two of them, he had looked at their tiresome mugs far too many times.

Wearing large badges on their chests, they were the Justice Enforcement Division. Affiliated with the Hunter Association, they were criminal investigators targeting Hunters tasked with monitoring, supervising, and apprehending them for misconduct and atrocities.

Just how many times had he owed his life to them before coming to the floating city?

Since he had braced himself for this from the moment he left the city half a year ago, it wasn’t a shock. If anything, the only surprising part was that it had taken them this long to track him down.

The lake began to bubble fiercely, and several large pillars of water surged up behind his back. While environments filled with water gave Pado the advantage, there was a high probability they had brought along a Hunter with a bad elemental matchup.
“Is that the West Sea Legion princess in the back? So she’s Eun Morae.”

“Who’s that?”

The stylishly dressed young woman chimed into the conversation. Hearing her bright, familiar tone, Morae poked her head out over Pado’s shoulder to interrogate her identity. Pado replied with a slight frown.

“A school friend.”

“It’s Lee Yeonhee. A rookie in the Justice Enforcement Division and second-generation of the Blue Star Guild Guild.”

“Ah—I remember now. Those good-for-nothing losers who acted all high and mighty only to get crushed by my mom and tuck their tails and run. So you’re that family’s kid.”

Starting right out of the gate, Morae provoked the enemy in a heavily disadvantaged 6-to-2 situation. Expecting nothing less from Morae, Pado shrugged his shoulders unconcernedly.

Conversely, having her parents insulted right to her face, Yeonhee’s complexion worsened visibly. Clenching her teeth tight, she shot right back at Morae’s words.

“Just like the rumors, you’ve got a real princess attitude. Snappy and completely devoid of manners. Don’t you even understand the situation you’re in?”

“Oh, the situation crystalizes just fine. You lot are terrified of Pado, so you dragged a whole ten-man squad out from somewhere as grand as the Justice Enforcement Division just to pick a fight. Guess Pado’s a bigger big shot than I thought.”

“There’s eight of us.”

A middle-aged man with a chubby build casually tossed out the correction.

“That’s factoring in the manpower needed to deal with Eun Morae of the West Sea Legion as well.”

In short, this was no coincidence; it meant they had approached with the explicit intent of targeting both Pado and Morae.