Part-Time Job

“I’m sorry. My item is not something worth presenting at the conference.”

Ro-un’s judgment was quick.
The academy’s notorious reputation and an item guaranteed to be a huge hit.
If he compared the two, somehow it felt like the item side would be sliiightly pushed back.

‘No matter how I think about it, distributing it separately is better than going out with the academy’s backing. Let’s stick to the original plan.’

The answer was to cut it off quickly.
However, the tiger had no intention of letting prey that had walked in on its own just leave.

“Student Lee Ro-un. I’m sorry, but what can I do?”
“Pardon?”

What was this? Why was he saying he was sorry?
Ro-un raised his guard and glanced at the chairman’s office door.

“Unfortunately, I don’t think I can remove you from this conference just because you don’t want to go.”

Baek Ho-yeon’s face was full of laughter as he spoke as if regretful.
That tiger was definitely not sorry at all!
Baek Ho-yeon tapped one part of the invitation with his finger.
It was a simple motion, but with Baek Ho-yeon doing it, it looked as though he might pierce right through the paper at any moment.
That hand was a weapon. A weapon.

“Look at this.”

Ro-un looked at the place Baek Ho-yeon pointed to while raising his guard.
[The student council president must attend.]

“No, why is this mandatory?!”

He meant to only think it, but it slipped out of his mouth without him realizing.
And no wonder, because in the pre-regression timeline, the student council president had never been required to attend the summer conference!

‘What the hell happened? The conference has never once attached a condition saying the student council president must attend.’

Ro-un stared intently at the person he suspected was behind this trick.
Baek Ho-yeon placed his brightly smiling face over his clasped hands.

“When I sent word that I really wanted to attend this conference, they attached a condition. So I put up student Lee Ro-un. They said if it was student Lee Ro-un, they would accept any research result.”

So the cause was this tiger!
Ro-un looked down at Baek Ho-yeon and swallowed the words that were about to burst out.
Seeing Lee Ro-un’s eyes, which held a mix of betrayal, indignation, anger, and confusion, Baek Ho-yeon felt as good as if he were running through the mountains.
Contrary to that feeling, the voice that came out of him was lowered as if soaked in sorrow.

“Ahhh. If Lee Ro-un doesn’t go with me, rumors will spread that I’m a foolish tiger who recklessly jumped into a worthless academy. If that happens, I won’t have the face to look my kin in the eye, so perhaps I should hand over my position and ascend to the heavens.”

Was he saying that if Ro-un didn’t go with him, he would abandon both the academy and the Tiger Clan and ascend?
This tiger, who cherished his kin so terribly much?

“Our princess will be sad. She will suffer greatly because she has such a poor excuse for a father.”
“……”

The image of tiny In-woo, who only came up to his waist, tearing up as she missed the absence of her father flashed before his eyes.
That tiger was cowardly enough to take his own daughter hostage!
Ro-un trembled and clenched his fists tightly.

“For reference, I handled Lee Ro-un’s student council president resignation letter on my end, so you don’t need to worry about your status as president. Our princess will be happy. It will be her first outing outside the Korean Peninsula.”

The thorough tiger blocked every mouse hole Ro-un could escape through and drove him into a dead end.
In the end, there was only one answer Ro-un could give.

“…I’ll attend.”
“Hahahahahaha! How reassuring, to have an excellent student like Lee Ro-un helping me!”

He shouldn’t have come here after being lured by the consent form.

‘Wouldn’t becoming an adult and dropping out be faster than getting this tiger to give me the consent form?’

Ro-un seriously wondered which of the two would be faster.
There was about one and a half years until his nineteenth birthday.
He had a feeling that passing two birthdays would be faster than getting that tiger to give him the consent form in the meantime.

“…Then I will take my leave now to prepare the item to submit to the conference.”

Ro-un, now a defeated soldier, rose from his seat and headed for the door.
Just as he was about to turn the doorknob, he heard an “Ah” from the tiger behind him.
Feeling ominous, Ro-un quickly moved his feet, but the tiger was one step faster.

“Right. I almost forgot. Student Lee Ro-un. Do you have any thoughts of taking a part-time job?”

What was this now?
Ro-un paused and turned back.

“A part… time job?”
“Yes! Student Lee Ro-un. Don’t you need money?”

The tiger asked smoothly, like an uncle asking his nephew whether he needed some pocket money.
For Ro-un, who actually needed a lot of money, it was a tempting offer.
However, to simply follow that tiger’s intentions made the tiger’s inner motives look far too black.

“I’m sorry, but I’m a student. I think preparing for the conference alone will leave me pressed for time.”
“You don’t attend class anyway.”

The tiger hit him where it hurt.

“I’ve lost interest in academics lately.”
“Is it that student Lee Ro-un has no interest in academics, or is it that you have no interest because you already know all of it? Your grades during the midterms were the same, after all.”

What a sharp tiger.
Had telling him to maintain the same grades as his first year during the midterms possibly been to confirm this?
Ro-un looked at the tiger with suspicion and distrust MAX written all over his face.
Even when Ro-un openly showed that he suspected him, the tiger responded with a beaming smile as if it did no damage at all.

“I think I can give student Lee Ro-un what he wants. If I offer Lee Ro-un a part-time job, you can legally skip class and earn money too. Two birds with one stone. What does Lee Ro-un think?”

Baek Ho-yeon propped his elbows on the desk, rested his chin on the back of his clasped hands, and smiled brightly.
Baek Ho-yeon’s offer provided exactly what Lee Ro-un needed right now.
As for him not attending class, fine, but how did he know Ro-un needed money?
Ro-un looked at Baek Ho-yeon suspiciously, but he didn’t budge.

“How about it? Won’t you make a deal with me?”

Had this tiger regressed too?
Even as Ro-un suspected the tiger, he had no choice but to sigh and accept a question whose answer had already been decided.

‘I want you to fill the teachers’ vacancies for a while. Until my people obtain teaching certificates.’

Baek Ho-yeon seemed sincere about changing this academy.
The fact that he had fired all the corrupt faculty, and the fact that he intended to entrust those vacancies to the Tiger Clan, both said as much.

‘Is he really trying to run the academy sincerely? Why?’

Ro-un could tell that Baek Ho-yeon was sincerely trying to run the academy, but he did not reach the conclusion that the cause was himself.

“But. Why entrust substitute classes to me, of all people?”
[Woof!]
“You’re curious too, aren’t you, Hyung?”

Lick, lick.

Looking down at Hyung licking his hand, Ro-un pondered Baek Ho-yeon’s intentions.
What did he trust in him, when Ro-un was only an academy student, to leave classes to him?
When Ro-un wondered about that, the tiger, who no longer hid the fact that he could read Ro-un’s thoughts, had said this.

‘Because student Lee Ro-un seems to know a lot and have plenty of experience.’

Had that tiger really regressed with him?
When Ro-un suspected that, Baek Ho-yeon added one more thing.

‘From what I’ve observed, student Lee Ro-un is the only one in this academy who puts effort into the students’ education. If it’s you, student Lee Ro-un, wouldn’t you be able to lead the students onto the right path?’

Who knows. Could teaching fix someone who could not be fixed even by beating them?
Lee Ro-un had tried for several years, including before his regression, to reform the students, but until the regression, Ro-un had not led anyone onto the right path.
In any case, that was the whole conversation with Baek Ho-yeon.

“Well, whatever the chairman’s intentions are, I just need to get paid and do my job.”
[Woof!]

Thinking that, Ro-un prepared class materials.
Even if he prepared them like this, it didn’t seem like those guys would read them properly, but he couldn’t do a paid job carelessly.

“Just look at how much this part-time job pays.”

Baek Ho-yeon had offered Ro-un a massive part-time wage in exchange for teaching substitute classes.
For Ro-un, who urgently needed independence funds, it was a difficult amount to refuse.
Enough that it would feel wrong to pass it off as self-study.
The Tiger Clan, closed-off and without even interacting with others, had more money than expected.
Perhaps thinking Ro-un was suspicious about the source of the money, Baek Ho-yeon’s answer with a wistful face had been a spectacle.

‘Long ago, that place was all pear orchards.’

At the words of a Joseon-era, no, prehistoric tiger, Ro-un was dumbfounded.
In any case, having come to know yet another real estate tycoon, Ro-un silently prepared materials to fill the teachers’ vacancies, or rather, to cover their classes.

Bang!

[Yelp!]
“Lee Ro-un! I heard the chairman called you!”
“Are you all right, Lee Ro-un?”
“You guys… opened the door and came in on your own again?”

He should have gotten the spare key back.
Ro-un stroked his startled Hyung’s back, and glared at the two who had suddenly kicked the door open and come in.

“Lee Ro-un. Are you okay?”
“Why are you making such a fuss?”
“You were called by the chairman!”

How did they know that too?

“What would there be for me not to be okay about?”
“The chairman is going wild like a madman these days!”
“The chairman is only going wild at the corrupt faculty.”
“That’s how it’s been so far, but what if he snaps and harms you too?”
“Why would he?”

Ro-un was gradually getting annoyed.
He had no idea what strange thing this guy Joo Hee-jun had heard or where he had heard it from to come bother him like this.

“Please stop reading posts.”

His brain was pickled in delusions.
Ro-un worried about Joo Hee-jun’s decline in intelligence.

“But Lee Ro-un. What are you doing right now?”
“Can’t you tell by looking? I’m preparing the work the chairman entrusted to me.”
“The chairman entrusted work to you?!”
[Whine.]

Why was this guy yelling now?
Could he not see that Hyung was startled?
Did he not know that he should not make loud noises around children sensitive to sound?
Ro-un covered his Hyung’s ears and glared at Joo Hee-jun.

“You. If you have the energy to yell, go do your work.”
“Lee Ro-un! What kind of work did the chairman entrust to you!”
“What are you going to do if you know?”
“Well, because I’m wor, wor, wor, wor.”
“Wor what. If you have something you want to say, say it properly.”
“Hahahaha. Lee Ro-un. Bomb Freak is worried about you.”
“I’m not Bomb Freak…!”

Joo Hee-jun glared at Cheon Su-ho with a face that said he didn’t know whether Cheon Su-ho was defending him or teasing him.
He was definitely doing it knowingly.

“Oh! Lee Ro-un. Isn’t this the material that was recently published at the conference? Is this about the passage we went to together?”
“That’s right.”
“You were organizing all this by yourself?”

Before he knew it, Joo Hee-jun examined the materials Cheon Su-ho was looking at and stared at Ro-un with an appalled face.
Why was he making such a fuss over simply organizing materials?

“You organized every recent incident? Hiiik! How do you know what the raid party cleared and how they cleared it?”

Some of it had been officially announced, but he had added his own experience too.
He had experience clearing passages that were several times more difficult than now, apart from the incidents that would become Calamities in the future.
Organizing strategies for passages already cleared now or unknown passages was nothing.

‘Though I only included information acceptable to disclose. Even if I do this, there’s no way the precious kids at our academy will actually read it properly.’

Because of his personality that couldn’t do anything carelessly, he had ended up making the class materials as meticulously as possible, but there would be no one who properly appreciated it.

“As expected of Lee Ro-un! This seems more useful than the teachers’ classes!”
“It looks that way to me too. Lee Ro-un, you seem more like a teacher.”
“Do you think the teachers who were sued one after another by the chairman would have made proper class materials? If you do things the way those teachers taught, you might end up dying in the field.”
“What?! It’s that bad?!”
“Didn’t you have a rough idea too?”
“No, when there were parts a little different from what I knew, I just roughly let those parts pass.”
“You don’t look it, but I guess you did some preparation.”
“Th-that’s right!”

At the word preparation, Joo Hee-jun flinched.
Of course he had prepared.
He was the grandson of a chaebol family, after all.
If he had not been shoved here because of his trait, Joo Hee-jun would have gone to Bukhan Academy, where only children of prestigious families were said to go.

‘Since he received elite education from a chaebol family, he must have known very well how poor the classes here were.’

In a way, Joo Hee-jun shutting himself in the research room and doing only research might also have been because he knew the class contents were poor.
Ro-un observed Joo Hee-jun, finding it strange how he showed not a single sign of being a rich young master.
Joo Hee-jun avoided Ro-un’s gaze and hid behind Cheon Su-ho.

‘Ah, shit. Why is he doing that again? Did I do something wrong?’

The only student who could remain still under the student council president’s gaze was probably Cheon Su-ho.
Because this was Jiri Academy.
Ro-un looked at Joo Hee-jun with disdain and asked.

“How far did you get with your work?”
“Why? Are you going to nag me again? I’m working hard, you know?!”
“That’s not it. The chairman asked if we’d like to present the item we’re making at this summer’s conference. He said he would support us with research funds too.”
“Research funds?! We can get money for doing this? Until now, we’ve only used basic supplied materials, but now we can receive support for other things too?”
“It’s not just applying for school supplies. We can buy what we need too, since they’ll give us research funds. Why? Is there nothing you want to buy?”
“Nooooo?!”

Joo Hee-jun hurriedly jumped out from behind Cheon Su-ho and grabbed Ro-un.
At the words that he could buy what he wanted, a strange heat rose across Joo Hee-jun’s face.
Seeing it up close was disgusting.
Ro-un shook off the arm Joo Hee-jun had grabbed.

“Hahahaha! Both of you are working hard. But Lee Ro-un, won’t it be tight to prepare for the conference being held in summer?”
“That’s right. So Joo Hee-jun, hurry up and go work.”
“Okay!”
“And we’ll get a research room too.”
“Really?!”

The research Joo Hee-jun was doing was fairly good, but using a research room was a different matter.
At first, he seemed to have experimented in the shared research room for students, but because he had blown it up several times, he had been banned from entering it again.

“Hahaha! I’ll help too. For now, I’m also registered as a researcher. Ah, right! Eat while you work.”

Cheon Su-ho held out the snacks he had been carrying.
More than half of these were destined to enter Cheon Su-ho’s mouth.

‘Still, this guy buys things that suit our tastes fairly well too.’

Ro-un glanced at the snacks Cheon Su-ho had bought, then brought over a tray.

“Cheon Su-ho. Are you going to stay here?”
“Yup. I’m a researcher too, aren’t I?”
“You’re only listed in name.”
“I’ll help too, Lee Ro-un!”
“What? Do you know how delicate this work is? How long has it even been since you obtained mana, and you’re trying to get involved?”
“I watched plenty from the side all this time. I can do it!”
“Heh! If you’re that confident, try putting mana into the place I engraved here.”

It had to be completed by infusing Holy Power, though.

‘Fine. Joo Hee-jun can just engrave another circuit to replace it.’

Cheon Su-ho confidently accepted the plate.
As Cheon Su-ho infused mana into the engraved circuit, he opened his mouth as if he had remembered something.

“Right. My Awakener registration card came out.”
“Huh? Whoa! It came out already?”
“It came out faster than expected.”

Getting an Awakener registration card issued normally took more than a week.

“They said the process changed this time.”
“Oh yeah?”

What had gotten into the Association?
Proprietress Gu should still be in the middle of beating them up.
Ro-un recalled the news he had checked that morning and tilted his head.

“If it comes out this quickly, I think I’ll be able to receive my next registration card soon too!”

At Cheon Su-ho’s statement, both of their gazes landed on him.

Pung!

[Yelp!]
“Ah. It exploded.”
“I told you it wouldn’t work!”
“Ugh.”