Is It Strange For A Succubus To Be Wearing Clothes?

Chapter 60

—–CROW—– 

Dawn broke. Kim Jun-su, an ordinary man, began his day as usual.  The alarm clock roused him, but it felt as though a strange whisper from somewhere else had pulled him from sleep.  

He looked at himself in the mirror, a strange feeling washing over him, like his eyes weren’t looking back at him, but staring off at something else.  He quickly dismissed the feeling and headed to the bathroom.

He went to make toast for breakfast, dropping a slice.  As it landed on the floor, words flickered into existence within it.  

Korean, English, Latin, and unknown characters materialized in the air, then vanished.  Like a cryptic message encoded in the toast, the letters flashed before his eyes, but he simply picked up another slice, the incident already forgotten.

On his way to work, he found himself walking down an unfamiliar street, yet he believed it to be his usual route, without a shred of doubt.  

Faces, devoid of expression, flickered in and out of existence among the passersby.  Jun-su simply thought that people seemed unusually expressionless today.

Someone greeted him, their voice clearly distorted, yet he responded mechanically, oblivious to the unnatural sound.  He then noticed a thick fog surrounding him.

*‘I should be careful. Even in Seoul, monsters and strange creatures can lurk in the fog.’*  It was a dangerous world.

He arrived at his workplace and sat down at his computer.  The letters on the screen began to scramble, forming symbols that seemed to convey some meaning.  Unfazed, he unconsciously copied the symbols into his notebook.  When his colleagues asked what he was doing, he simply smiled and said, “Just taking notes.”

At lunchtime, he went to the cafeteria with his coworkers.  The food on his tray shifted and moved unnaturally, as if glitching.  But to him, it looked like a normal meal.  He laughed and joked with his colleagues, eating without hesitation.

“Look at him…”

“Call someone… now…!”

“Stay away from him.”  His colleagues stared, some frantically making calls on their phones or smartwatches, but he remained oblivious.

On his way home, he began to mutter to himself.  Nonsense words, yet they flowed with a rhythm and cadence, like an incantation.  His voice rose and fell, echoing in the twilight streets.

Just before falling asleep, an image flashed in his mind.  A complex geometric pattern, interwoven with strange phrases.  He forgot it instantly, but it was already etched deep within his subconscious.

And at 11:12 PM that night, a memetic contamination hazard warning was issued, centered around the Euljiro district of Seoul.

The [Witch Meme] had erupted in the heart of the city.

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***

Jae-hee’s unexpected nuclear option in Transvia had thrown the Korean government, which had mobilized an entire army corps, into disarray.  They hadn’t intended to annihilate the kingdom, only to conduct a show of force, leading to small-scale skirmishes and eventual colonization.

But Jae-hee had acted as a tactical nuke, wiping out the entire kingdom.  No survivors.  No way to locate the misillite deposits.  No maps.  What now?

Of course, they couldn’t blame Jae-hee.  Even small-scale conflicts could lead to Korean casualties.  And it had been discovered that the plunderer kingdom had been planning to use unstable Gates to raid Korea.  Without Jae-hee’s intervention, there would have been significant bloodshed.

Dan Ah-yeon, upon learning this, praised Jae-hee profusely.  “As expected of Jae-hee-nim!  You may seem impulsive, but you’re truly a just and kind person, preventing the loss of innocent lives!”

Jae-hee simply smirked at Dan Ah-yeon’s naive admiration.  But the results were good, so it didn’t matter.

Meanwhile, Citra sent her a message of gratitude.

—*Jae-hee-ssi, thank you. Thanks to you, we can claim a stake in the exploration.*

“Oh my, really?”  Oh, right.  She had originally planned to sell her share of the spoils to Citra.  She had completely forgotten about it, caught up in the moment.  But the outcome was beneficial for both of them, so it was all good.

—*Since you completely obliterated everything, they’re shifting focus to exploration and information gathering.  Fortunately, we’re ahead of the Korean government in that area.*

“You have a lot of other succubi working for you, I presume?”

—*Heehee, indeed.*  Of course.  Citra was the Succubus Queen.  Considering the massive red-light district in the Beetle Nest, she likely commanded a significant number of succubi.  Sending a group of them to charm the locals would be an effective way to locate the misillite mines and other resources.  With any luck, they could even charm a local leader and establish a colony.

—*From now on, we’ll have to expand our influence ourselves.*

“Need any help?”

—*I’m part of the underground, you know.  Accepting too much help would weaken my position.*  At the same time, a substantial sum was deposited into Jae-hee’s account.  Interesting.  She hadn’t even given Citra her account information.  *How many zeros are there?*  One, two, three… wow.  That was a lot.

—*Consider that a down payment.  I’ll send you more as our influence grows.*

“Heehee, I’m not complaining.  I didn’t expect such generosity.  I guess I’ll have to do you another favor sometime, Citra?”  She wasn’t greedy, and she had everything she needed, but more money was always welcome.  But this was… excessive.  What was she supposed to do with all this money?  She usually only spent money on small things, like takeout or convenience store snacks.

Wait.  *Money like water…?*

*Bathing in money… that would be beautiful, decadent!*  Oh, she had to try it!  Not with paper money, that was dirty.  With gold coins!  Bathing in clean, shimmering gold coins.  Visually stunning, devilishly beautiful!  A beautiful woman surrounded by gold, the very symbol of greed and desire, a classic image in both Eastern and Western cultures.  She had to capture it in a photograph, a painting!

“Heeheehee…”

—*Why are you laughing?*

“Just had a fun idea~”  Yes.  She would save up, buy gold coins, and bathe in them!

And so, Jae-hee’s little excursion, or perhaps picnic, to another dimension came to a pleasant end.  The area around Gaeseong would likely be busy for a while.  With the shift from invasion to exploration, the government would be issuing large-scale missions, and Hunters and underground factions would flock to the area, vying for their share of the spoils.  Another dimension, once cleared of danger, was a gold mine, a land of opportunity.  There were stories of C-rank Hunters stumbling upon a mine in another world and becoming billionaires.

Back home, Jae-hee was bored.  Her house, destroyed by Yoo-jin, had been repaired, and Dan Unnie was swamped with paperwork related to the Transvia Gate incident.  Apparently, it was because she had obliterated the kingdom.  *Heehee, as expected of me!*

With nothing to do, her Ego Violin materialized beside her with a *pop*.

—*Play me if you’re bored!*

—*Let’s go to the North Pole if you’re bored!*

“There are no penguins at the North Pole.”

—*N-no way…*

“There are polar bears, though.”

—*Then let’s exterminate the polar bears!*

—*Exterminate!  Exterminate!*

—*Exterminate!*

“Why are you so mean to the poor polar bears?”  Exterminating them for fun wouldn’t be so bad, though.  But playing… playing the violin…  She *had* played quite a bit in Transvia, but these restless spirits within her violin demanded more, every hour.

“Now that my house is fixed, should I grant the wishes of those who crave classical music?”

So, Jae-hee decided to do a surprise broadcast.  Right in the middle of the day, while those important people, the ones who craved her music the most, were hard at work.

***

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***

And so, the midday concert began.  Thanks to government funding, ostensibly for “Exploring Multi-Purpose Ability Applications of Specially Managed Returnees,” Jae-hee’s house was equipped with state-of-the-art broadcasting equipment, costing millions, the kind of technology most broadcasting stations could only dream of.  Incidentally, this equipment had been destroyed when Yoo-jin demolished her house, forcing Dan Ah-yeon to file for emergency funding.  While Hoyeon Guild had covered the repair costs, acquiring such specialized equipment took time, even with money.

—*What’s this?  What’s this?*

—*Here we go, here we go, here we go…*

—*This broadcast is so half-assed, what the fuck (censored message).*

“Hello, everyone~”  Jae-hee wasn’t interested in broadcasting.  Or the Hunter community.  But people were *very* interested in her appearance and the brief glimpses of her charm they had experienced.  During her first broadcast, she had slept for an hour, playing for only five minutes.  But that was enough to enthrall viewers who lacked resistance to her charm.  They had been obsessed with her ever since, unable to sleep, their minds filled with images of the veiled Jae-hee.  Unbeknownst to her, the community forums were filled with thousands of desperate pleas:  “Please broadcast again… please… please… please…”  Of course, in this day and age, such obsession wasn’t enough to warrant a memetic contamination warning.

“Heehee, did you miss me?”  This time, protective wards were in place.  With her veil on, the broadcast wouldn’t enthrall viewers through the screen.

—*OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG*

—*Beautifulbeautifulbeautifulbeautifulbeautifulbeautifulbeautiful*

—*Beautifulbeautifulbeautifulbeautifulbeautiful*

—*Where do you live?  Give me your number!*

—*Love at first sight, Unnie!  Unnie!  Unnie!*  Apparently, the previous enchantment hadn’t completely worn off.  The sheer volume of viewers and the level of excitement were insane, considering this was only her second broadcast.

Jae-hee couldn’t be bothered to explain everything.  *That’s Dan Unnie’s job.  Why should I have to explain?  It’s because I’m so beautiful!*

“I’m not much of a talker.”

—*NoonaNoonaNoonaNoona*

—*UnnieUnnieUnnieUnnie*

—*What are you doing?  What are you doing?*

—*Wow, beautiful.*

—*Wow, that voice…*

“So, let’s get straight to the point.”  Without a word, she summoned her violin.  The captivated viewers were already hanging on her every move.  With her violet eyes gleaming in the dim light, she held the violin, positioning herself in the center of the frame.  The camera, purchased with millions in taxpayer money, provided excellent image quality.  Her black hair swayed gently, her demonic wings fluttered, and she slowly raised her bow.

The air stilled, all other sounds fading, as if the world held its breath, waiting for her music.

What to play today?  Ah, yes.  *‘La Campanella’*.  While famous as a piano piece… no, the original was a violin concerto by Paganini.  Liszt had later arranged and performed it on the piano, making it even more challenging.  But today, she would play the piano version.  It was technically impossible to play the piano version on the violin.  The sheer number of notes required more than two hands.  But for Jae-hee and her Ego Violin, such limitations were meaningless.

*‘Melody, be torn asunder.’*  Under her touch, the violin seemed to come alive, imbued with a new vitality.  The fast, cheerful rhythm flowed through the strings, clear and sharp, the notes shimmering in the air.  Like a beam of light piercing the darkness, her melody resonated brilliantly.  Though only one violin played, it sounded like two, three, an entire orchestra.  Her fingerwork was superhuman, flawless, breathtaking.  Each stroke of the bow produced a high-pitched note, clear as a bell, echoing through the room.  The tempo increased, the melody building to a dramatic crescendo.  With seamless precision, she poured all her emotion and passion into the music.  Not a single note was out of place, each one perfectly executed.

*La Campanella*, meaning “little bell,” sounded less like bells and more like a death knell.

*‘Allegro – fast and furious.’*

As she played the final note, lowering her bow, the vibrant melody faded into silence, as if a spell had been broken.  The air returned to normal, the viewers feeling a tremor deep within their souls.

The enchantment was lifted.  The intoxicating spell that had clouded their minds, broken their hearts, was gone, replaced by reason.

—*Wow…*

—*Whoa…*

—*Insane…*

—*What was that…*

—*Clapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclapclap*

—*Where are the donations?*

—*Enable donations!*

—*Wow…*

—*I’ve never heard anything like that.*

—*Amazing…*

Jae-hee smiled faintly and waved.  *And now, the broadcast is over~*

—*?

—*?

—*??

—*What?*

—*Huh?*

—*I think the screen froze.  It went black.*

*Wait, what?*  *A single song and that’s it???*

—*No, one more!*

—*At least introduce yourself, damn it!*

—*Is it really over???*

—*What is this?*

—*No, you can’t just play one song and leave!!!*

The viewers erupted in protest, but Jae-hee was already closing the stream.  She chuckled, watching their frantic messages.

“True beauty is most appreciated when it’s not easily obtained~”

…

…

…

…

…

…

…

Want. To. Meet. Her.

I want to meet her.

I want to see her.

How?

I don’t know her.

I need a way.

A magic spell.

An incantation.

A ritual.

A curse.

To meet her.

To possess her.

I need it.

I need it.

I want to be a witch.

I will become a witch.

I am a witch.

We are witches.

We will become witches.

—–CROW—– 

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