Chapter 114
Chapter 114
Miss Siri?
Because of his small frame, I thought he was a boy, but his appearance belonged to a young man. Perhaps he had undergone Cybernetics surgery, because the vertical line running across his face left a strong impression.
Still, he was someone I didn’t recognize.
“Who are you?”
“……Who? Ha, you’re asking who I am?”
As if he had heard something he never should have, a crescent smile spread across the young man’s lips.
Drawing a sly and vicious curve.
A face was a mirror reflecting one’s life, and it let me roughly infer how the young man had lived up until now.
As expected, unlike the friendly way he had approached me, the young man immediately started picking a fight.
“For fuck’s sake, you’ve got no basics. You don’t know me? Even after entering this line of work? Just because you’ve got a bit of skill, everyone looks like a pushover to you? Think you can do everything on your own?”
Words that were rude to the extreme.
When I narrowed my eyes, the young man exaggeratedly waved both arms around.
“Look at those eyes? Damn scary, real scary.”
It was then that Fernandez slammed down the vodka martini with a thunk.
“That’s enough, Johwang. I don’t recall giving you permission to cause trouble in my establishment. Or are you planning to keep going and break the unspoken rule?”
Though his warning tone was deliberately cold, the young man, Johwang, showed no sign of backing down as he continued.
“Well, well, if it isn’t Fernandez, the guy who wrapped up my junior so tightly he wouldn’t even let me see him.”
“He’s not your junior. And it’s not that I was trying to keep him hidden.”
“Whatever. I wasn’t trying to bully him either. I was just teaching him the manners a junior should naturally have toward his senior. Seriously, does it make sense to stand there with your head held high without even greeting your superior?”
At the unreasonable outburst, Fernandez stepped forward to defend me.
“Ga-on deserves to be treated that way.”
“Looks like you’ve completely fallen for him. Talent really is scary, huh?”
Hehehe.
Chuckling obnoxiously, Johwang lightly jabbed my side.
“I don’t know what Fernandez told you, but that guy isn’t a broker, he’s a volunteer worker. He only takes requests from people with tragic circumstances that don’t even make money.”
That much I already knew.
Altruism was practically the phrase that represented Fernandez himself.
Still, admitting it obediently would’ve been boring, wouldn’t it?
Especially in front of someone suddenly showing hostility.
“Or maybe your skills are only worth that much.”
“Wow, what a man. Yeah, you’re pissed because some random guy suddenly showed up and started talking shit, huh?”
After looking me up and down, Johwang clicked his tongue.
“I heard there was a promising rookie, so I came to check your face out, but you’re bland as hell. Your Slot looks mediocre, you’ve never had genetic modification, and your equipment is pathetic. Yeah, I guess I can give you about 30 points.”
Johwang rose from his seat and slowly turned around.
As though he wanted me to react.
But I remained completely indifferent.
Eventually, after Johwang left Columbus, Fernandez encouraged me.
“You endured that well. There’s nothing to gain from clashing with a guy like him.”
“When someone barks that much, it actually kills the mood instead. And it happened to be right when patrol drones were passing by.”
“Don’t tell me…….”
“Yeah, he provoked me on purpose. Like he was begging for me to take the bait. If I’d lost my temper and swung a fist, we’d have gone to the Public Enforcement Office together. No, considering how confidently he started it, maybe he’s got a Sheriff he knows there.”
But my self-restraint was far too deep to play along with him.
And—
“It’s obvious, isn’t it?”
His overbearing attitude from beginning to end and his vicious choice of words.
It was a form of breaking someone in.
You could also call it an initiation ritual or territorial hazing.
I couldn’t help but think, now of all times—
But the density of incidents I’d experienced since arriving on Mars had been so high that it was easy to forget only a little over a month had actually passed.
The timing for people to start feeling threatened by me was appropriate enough.
“He was probably stimulated after seeing your recent accomplishments. In this industry, every capable problem solver is a potential rival.”
Just as Fernandez said, things really had picked up after I accepted Baek Seol’s request.
Kenji and Baek Gi were exceptions since their matters couldn’t be made public, but even so, I was someone who had entered Hyphen Colony alongside Alonso and Gustak and returned alive.
That alone was proof of strength.
“More importantly, do you know him?”
“As you heard, his name is Johwang. He’s a problem solver known by the alias Destroying Demon. When he first entered the industry, I personally brokered jobs for him.”
“The fact that you said ‘when he first entered’ makes it sound like that’s no longer the case.”
“Correct. At some point, he started going astray, and eventually formed a crew with unsavory people.”
“And by unsavory people?”
“People who mainly work under contracts with parties that can’t be openly discussed. You could call them a sort of subcontracting company.”
“So basically underlings for criminal organizations?”
“Exactly. That’s why there’s nothing good about getting deeply involved with them. Those people are the kind of problem solvers who’ll do absolutely anything.”
“Problem solvers who’ll do absolutely anything, huh…….”
After draining his vodka martini to the last drop, Ga-on quietly stared down at the glass.
For some reason, he had a feeling they would meet again.
***
A flea market opened every weekend in District 31.
A meaningful day where households cleared out their belongings along with the dust piling up on them.
Even Ga-on, who lived in District 32, could never ignore such an event.
Belongings were things forgotten in memory.
And forgotten objects meant their value and origins were equally uncertain.
Perhaps because of that, countless antiques were being sold for dirt cheap even at this very moment.
The antique market was peak season with no off-season.
The one who found treasure first was the winner, and so Ga-on wandered around like a bee searching for honey.
This was a sacred ritual carried out every single Solweek.
And today, he even had an adorable companion with him.
“Oppa, there are cassette tapes over here! And they’re all medleys from the 2030s! And these are only 100,000 Pia?!”
As expected of Miss Retro.
Living up to that nickname, she was fully enjoying the scenery of the flea market.
Squealing while looking over the displays, genuinely throwing herself into bargaining negotiations.
The only shame was that, armed with sunglasses and a mask, her various expressions couldn’t be appreciated.
Still, considering the popularity she had only recently begun to gain, it was an unavoidable choice.
Come to think of it—
“Is it okay for a popular idol to be wandering around like this? What about your schedule? Didn’t you say you had a music show today?”
“Ah, that? The performance will be replaced with a prerecorded hologram. Apparently that’s how they do things these days. It’s not like every member of a group can match schedules all the time.”
Recording a live stage as a hologram only to broadcast it again as a hologram.
What kind of absurd creative economy was this?
Shaking his head at the technology modern society boasted about, Ga-on continued.
“You’ve been restraining your ability since then, right?”
“Yes, I’ve been careful.”
Then she mimed zipping her mouth shut.
Naturally, she also rubbed up against him, asking to be praised.
Good job, good job—
As Ga-on stroked Sakuya’s head, her latest updates poured out like a magic lamp being opened.
“To be honest, I don’t even have time for useless thoughts anymore. The moment I wake up, I have to go straight into schedules.”
Sakuya complained that she didn’t even sleep four hours a day.
Ga-on had also seen news about Mystic through various media outlets, so he knew just how fiercely she was throwing herself into her activities.
Not long ago, hadn’t they been invited to a festival hosted by the Board and performed the opening stage?
Though seeing her get excited over antiques made that hard to imagine.
After chatting for a while like that, Ga-on skillfully gathered antiques into his arms.
Mostly items related to the Olympics or the World Cup.
Since those festivals no longer existed in the 24th century, there were many people interested in them.
If he targeted the right buyers, he could easily earn several times his investment back.
Startled by the amount he was collecting, Sakuya asked,
“You’re not planning to decorate your house with all that, are you?”
“It’s for collecting purposes. Things like these double in value later on.”
He had even rented a storage warehouse already.
Having traveled the world and stashed treasures in every Dome, it was now time to plant seeds in the Colony as well.
Although Ga-on had immense love for items that continuously appreciated in value like this, he never purchased stocks.
No matter how thoroughly he erased traces, as long as records remained in the system, eventually someone would grab hold of the tail.
In the past, he had tried various ways to circumvent the issue through borrowed-name accounts, ghost companies, bearer bonds, or proxy representatives, but after realizing the candle was costing more than the cake, he cleanly gave up on all of it.
It was then that Sakuya brought over a round coin.
“Oppa, look at this. I got it for 500,000 Pia.”
“This is…….”
There was no way he wouldn’t recognize it.
After all, it was the last item he had sold before leaving Earth.
Yes, what Sakuya had brought was a commemorative coin distributed by Second.
A gift delivered by an alien civilization thousands of years more advanced than humanity.
It was also one of the primary materials used in Hexagondice.
But—
“It’s fake.”
“What?! This is fake? But it looks exactly like the images I searched online!”
This was an era overflowing with information.
Anyone could sit in one place and accumulate deep knowledge, but experience itself could never be replicated.
“The texture is different.”
Actually touching it was part of that.
When Ga-on spoke firmly, Sakuya’s gaze naturally turned toward the peddler who had sold the commemorative coin.
But nobody was there anymore.
Realizing she had been tricked, her shoulders drooped.
“Well, I guess there’s no way something like this would end up in a flea market.”
“They were selling something worth 5 million Pia for 500,000 Pia. You should’ve gotten suspicious from that point onward.”
“Hiiing.”
Once again, Sakuya was growing through firsthand experience of society’s cold realities.
Then suddenly, as though something had occurred to her, she clapped her hands.
“Come to think of it, if you can tell the difference, does that mean you’ve seen a commemorative coin before, Oppa?”
“Yeah.”
“Then have you seen Second too?”
“As if. Those guys just built an embassy and never come out.”
Of course, that was a lie.
When Second visited in 2158, Ga-on had also been there.
Even now, he still remembered the speech they gave back then.
The extraterrestrial lifeforms who came from beyond the cosmos, Second, had been friendly toward humanity.
So much so that it was difficult to understand why.
There had been no threatening declaration.
No lawless invasion.
They simply wished for one thing.
[We desire humanity’s ‘transformation’!]
—uttering words anyone would find ominous.
[We apologize. Once again, we desire humanity’s ‘prosperity’!]
It was only a difference of two syllables, and ones difficult to distinguish at that, so nobody pointed it out.
As expected, corrected reports soon appeared, claiming it had merely been poor word choice caused by translation issues with Housol.
Ga-on had believed that too.
But little by little, ever so slightly, the information—the truth—changed.
In the end, even the history of it having been a mistake disappeared entirely.
All that remained was Second’s congratulatory message wishing for humanity’s prosperity.
The original version could no longer be found anywhere.
A deliberate distortion of information.
But nobody noticed it.
Since no obvious consequences had appeared even after more than a hundred years, Ga-on had gradually forgotten about it too.
Still, whenever he occasionally remembered it, it felt like a fishbone lodged in his throat.
[We desire humanity’s ‘transformation’!]
What they had said back then.
Was it truly a mistake?
Or their true intention?
***
After finishing his date with Sakuya and returning to District 32, Ga-on had no choice but to stop in front of his house.
Today was the day Sera was supposed to make a business visit.
He had even received a message saying she would enter first and tidy things up, so the lights should have been on.
But the house remained completely dark.
Opening the front door and stepping inside, Ga-on felt his entire body tense at the strange presence.
The moment he sensed an icy chill lingering through the room—
Thud, roll roll.
Something the size of a soccer ball rolled over and stopped at his feet.
It was someone’s head.
“……Miss Siri?”
His throat tightened involuntarily.