As those questions deepened, autumn truly flew by in the blink of an eye.
Spring, summer, autumn, winter—those are just old sayings now.
How is it that autumn is so short? Before I knew it, the spirit of early winter had enveloped Korea.
It wasn’t freezing cold, but it was the kind of weather that required closing all the open windows and pulling out outerwear.
The cicadas that had been noisy before seem to have all died, leaving only tranquility outside the window.
The only sound was the wind occasionally rattling the window.
I could usually tell autumn was coming by the dragonflies seen outside the window, but this year it seemed like I hadn’t seen a single shadow of one.
It’s already winter, and it doesn’t seem right to say they haven’t appeared yet…
As I worried about the unseen autumn visitors, it was that promised even-numbered day in the afternoon.
During the time Siyeon should be at the academy, I was lying on the sofa without a care when Gomteng suddenly flew in from the deeper part of the room.
With such a leisurely afternoon, there was only one reason for him to crawl out of the room on his own.
“Did it come?”
“Yes.”
“Just a moment.”
When I mentioned the reason I guessed, Gomteng let out a short affirmative response.
With that brief request to wait, I sat up from the long sofa I had been lazily lying on and, without any sense of urgency, walked slowly toward the room.
Since the weather had gotten colder, I also pulled out long pants and long-sleeved clothes, not to mention the winter essential of thermal underwear… and a black pantyhose, just like that.
To be honest, I couldn’t say I felt comfortable about pantyhose; it felt way worse than a bra.
However, that discomfort vanished the moment I put it on, overwhelmed by the warmth exceeding that of thermal underwear.
The faint trace of my male pride faded in the face of practicality.
If I were a man, it wouldn’t be strange to hear, “You’ve finally gone crazy,” but with my current appearance, it was totally fine.
Just like putting on thermal underwear, I pulled the pantyhose up to my waist, sliding my feet in, and lifted it up like putting on pants.
The soft texture of the pantyhose clung smoothly to my thighs and calves, as if considering the user.
Under the black fiber, a hint of peach color peeked through, and I slipped on black track pants over it.
This was better than most thermal underwear.
Once I yielded to practicality, the first thought that came to mind was, “Why didn’t I wear this sooner?”
I had even bought four pairs of thermal underwear to wear underneath; what was I going to do about that?
With pantyhose and long-sleeved underwear, a complete set of long-sleeve track pants.
The preparation for going out, which now included a face mask that hardly had any meaning left, was complete.
Yet instead of heading straight to the entrance, I found myself aimlessly walking to the refrigerator.
With a rustling sound, Gomteng, who had been waiting near the entrance, peeked his head into the kitchen and asked,
“Aren’t you going out?”
‘I’m just bored…’
“You don’t even respond anymore?”
“Ah, just wait a moment… It’s only a few seconds.”
I snapped at Gomteng’s urging and reached into the refrigerator with the opposite arm from the one that was opening it, pulling out a hefty bag.
It was 500 grams of dried squid, yellowish-colored, which I had bought to mix with gochujang and syrup for side dishes.
Without closing the refrigerator door, I slightly tore open the squid bag and took out a handful.
After putting the dried squid bag back in its place and shutting the refrigerator with a thud, I stuffed the handful of dried squid into a small zip lock bag and crammed it into my pocket.
With my hands tucked into the pockets of my track jacket, I nodded my head to indicate the entrance and said,
“Let’s go.”
“Wow… that’s visually shocking.”
“What?”
As I was shoving my foot into the back of my loose sneakers, I heard Gomteng’s lament filled with disgust from the side.
“When I think of magical girls, I didn’t expect this kind of image at all…”
I turned to look at the flying Gomteng and tapped the front of my sneakers on the floor, asking him, while it seemed he mixed up something weird from somewhere again.
Well, to be honest, Gomteng wasn’t entirely off base.
Anyone hearing the term ‘magical girl’ for the first time wouldn’t envision those magical girls stepping out the front door with a curse-like expression every time a monster appeared, transforming while surveying the empty streets to go catch the monster.
“An intense battle against a formidable foe! Friendship! Teamwork! Isn’t that the typical hopeful development like in a superhero show?!”
It really seemed like Gomteng had seen some hopeful kids’ anime somewhere, as he delivered a passionate exclamation about the archetype of magical girl stories.
Given that he was standing as one of the biggest victims in the magical girl world, it was honestly amusing.
With a chuckle, I softly recounted what he had gone through so he could be self-aware.
“You already fell short by turning the monsters you caught into mascots.”
“Oh.”
Unfortunately, this was a world where the ‘Hell Joseon’ patch was fully completed.
It seemed Gomteng finally realized his position, as he muttered a short, bewildered response that contradicted what he had just said.
“Stop talking nonsense and come down; it’s too high to reach.”
I shoved him into the opposite side of the pocket holding the dried squid and stepped out the front door.
The elevator was coming down from the 13th floor.
Standing dumbly in front of the elevator, fiddling with my smartphone, I slipped my fingers into the slightly opened zip lock bag to grab a piece of dried squid to chew on.
Unlike the chewy squid legs that took a while to chew with sturdy teeth, the dried squid shredded smoothly and pleasantly sweetened within about five chews.
Chew, crunch.
Chew, crunch.
While my busy left hand went back and forth between my mouth and pocket, I quickly made my way toward an empty alley.
Yet, for some reason, it was hard to find any vacant alleyways.
People everywhere.
It wasn’t like I was searching for a transformation point, capturing moments like when a black box recorded, but rather, most folks were simply hunched over their phones, standing fixed in place.
With one hand holding my smartphone while scratching the back of my head with the other, I began to ponder if I needed to go to some secluded underground parking lot.
When suddenly…
“Did you catch something?”
“Yes?”
In the alley where people were milling about, a stranger approached me.
Did I catch something? What?
I tilted my head in confusion, and she glanced briefly at my smartphone screen before bowing her head and apologizing as if she had made a mistake.
“Oh, sorry… I thought you were playing a game.”
‘Game? What game?’
The awkwardly retreating woman fixated on her phone like the other individuals hanging around the street.
A game that required going outside just to bury one’s nose in the phone?
‘Oh, is that it?’
In that moment, I recalled the game that Siyeon had madly wanted to play all the way to Sokcho.
Was it Erthu Wok or something like that, the Earth running game? Now available nationwide?
After that realization flickered through my mind, I understood why there were so many people in these normally empty streets.
It was nice that the unemployed folks were coming out from their rooms, but…
‘Crap, where am I supposed to transform now?’
On the contrary, the thought that this was quite distressing filled my head.
Thanks to this unexpected trend, even alleys that used to be completely empty now had one or two people roaming around.
Ultimately, after wandering around the alleys, I found my way into a somewhat shabby-looking villa.
“Sun.”
After transforming in the place where windows were located between the staircases of the villa floors, I leaped out through the window.
Having delayed in finding a place to transform for quite a bit, Gomteng, who had quietly guided me outside, flew swiftly toward our destination.
However, it was an all too familiar path and destination heading toward the sky.
It turned out our destination was the rooftop of Saengwon Middle School.
It was the moment Seo Hyun’s wish of hoping that a monster wouldn’t appear at school manifested.
‘Well, this works.’
Though the monster was bound to show up somewhere, I felt annoyed at Seo Hyun now that her vague words had led to this outcome.
If it really did demolish the school like she wished, would they really consider a day off…?
That bad thought flickered in my mind, but if I did that, the internet judges would graciously add it to my achievements, so I decided against it.
It was quite late, and while I had donned a face mask for the first time in a while, I was just about ready for a quick glimpse of the monster’s face before calling it a day.
“Huh…!”
“…?”
After glancing at me, the monster was startled and vanished in an instant from the rooftop of the school.
Rather than using some sort of ability to hide, like in some game’s plots, the monster simply disappeared right before my eyes.
I had just arrived and was left only perplexed.
“What the…?”
As I let out a dazed moan, Gomteng, equally surprised, tilted his head nearby.
It felt like the phrase “You had your eyes open but got robbed” would click right here; nothing was left before my eyes.
Even if I claimed I had seen an illusion, the alarms had gone off properly…
“Are we now at a point where we kill monsters without even lifting a finger?”
“Stop talking nonsense; what on earth was that? I feel like I just got jumped.”
As I scratched the back of my head feeling uncomfortable about the monster that had just vanished before my eyes…
The monster, who had just disappeared before Sun’s eyes, found itself gripping a small device near the life center, experiencing the thrill of a tense moment back in the teleportation chamber.
The monster sighed in deep relief, having just come through a stifling situation.
“Wow, that was seriously terrifying…”
Clinging on as if it were a lifeline, it held one small device.
It was a reverse teleportation device typically used by high-ranking monsters.
By heavily restricting the distances, uses, and directions, it was something that could be produced in small quantities, and the monsters sent cheers and praises for it.
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