Transferred to an SSS-rank Production Class

“Cat allergy?”

“Y-yes. Sniff, even from that distance, my nose was itching terribly.”

“Mr. Kim, you’re such a fool! Sarome isn’t a cat, it’s a tiger!”

I had wondered why someone who should have been interested in a tainted spiritual beast had remained still in Cheonsan. When I asked, thinking there might have been some ulterior motive, I received a completely unexpected answer.

“What would a bell without a nose know?”

“What? You insolent Mr. Kim!”

“Who started it first?”

In the brief moment I had looked away, an argument had broken out at the dining table.

It escalated to the point of finger-pointing, making my already throbbing hangover-induced headache even worse. Still, I couldn’t leave any food, so after cleaning my bowl, I held out my palm in front of Lee Kang-to’s face. Lee Kang-to, who had been lunging at me with veins popping in his neck, suddenly hesitated.

‘Oh, this works?’

I had tried imitating Han Cha-hyun, and it was more effective than I thought. Perhaps because of my stern expression, even the chattering goblin shut its mouth. Seizing the moment, I deliberately set down my spoon on the small table with a loud clang.

“H-Hunter Yun Gaho?”

“Seeing as you’re arguing, it seems you’ve finished eating. Let’s get up now.”

“Mr. Kim, are you angry at Sori?”

Pretending not to notice them furtively watching my mood, I left the room first. I could hear them whispering about how to appease my anger.

Swallowing a laugh, I spoke in a deliberately strict voice.

“Are you going to stay like that?”

“W-we were just about to get up!”

“I was going to say that! Sori, Sori will come too!”

The goblin and Lee Kang-to simultaneously came down from the wooden porch and followed behind me like ducklings. It couldn’t be more convenient to have these unpredictable two obediently following.

“Um, we’re going to that haunted house, right?”

“That’s the plan. However.”

“However?”

For the first time since leaving the tavern, I turned around. As usual, Lee Kang-to swallowed hard with a dumbfounded expression. I patted his shoulder, lifting the corners of my mouth.

“Hunter Lee Kang-to, you’re not going there.”

“Huh? Then where?”

“Please go to the marketplace.”

Lee Kang-to’s face turned pale. He immediately realized what I was about to ask him to do. With his eyebrows drooping downwards, Lee Kang-to clung to me, begging not to be left behind. In contrast, the goblin excitedly climbed up my body.

“Why? We’ve already found where the snail is!”

“What we’ve found is a haunted house, not a spiritual beast. Since we don’t know how things will turn out, we need to gather as much information as possible.”

“But still……”

‘Actually, it’s for a different reason.’

I couldn’t readily take Lee Kang-to to a place where the snail spiritual beast might be. What if the calm, hide-loving snail spiritual beast saw Lee Kang-to and fled in terror? It was better to separate him entirely to prevent any rash actions.

“But I, I want to see that spiritual beast thing too.”

To be honest, I wasn’t entirely comfortable leaving Lee Kang-to alone either. Even as I coaxed him, saying we’d meet up again at noon if he really insisted, worry gnawed at me.

‘I hope he doesn’t get into any strange trouble somewhere.’

◆◇◆◇◆

Although we had eaten an early breakfast intending to depart early, our conversation had dragged on, and quite some time had passed. Under the now bright sky, Lee Kang-to cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted.

“You must contact me if you meet the spiritual beast!”

He was so reluctant to let go until the very last moment that I felt utterly relieved when his figure became as small as a matchstick in the distance. His persistence was truly something else.

I sighed, looking at the reddish, bone-shaped marks left on my wrist. They were from Lee Kang-to clinging to me, saying he was sad to part. The goblin must have noticed too, as it jangled loudly and fumed.

“I don’t understand why he keeps that disgusting tail!”

“It’s just his preference, isn’t it?”

“Hmph, I can’t respect that kind of preference!”

Soothing the fuming goblin, I turned my steps eastward.

Before long, a cluster of abandoned houses with a gloomy atmosphere came into view. Except for the gentle babbling of a stream branching off from the Cheonhwa River, not a single sign of life could be sensed.

“Didn’t you say all the Mr. Kims fled to the west?”

“Yes, all the eastern neighborhoods are like this. Not just because of the yokai, but……”

‘If even the king ran away in fear, how bad must it be?’

I sighed, recalling the tavern hostess’s words. To think he’s in seclusion when he should be quelling the chaos. And yet, they say he still collects taxes without fail.

“They say the descendants of those who made a covenant with the Supreme God can’t even rise up.”

To hear people say they’re grateful just to be breathing. There couldn’t be a luckier fate than this. Perhaps because of the uniformly gloomy expressions of the NPCs I had seen, I felt hostility towards a king I had never even met.

‘Wait, who am I worrying about here?’

Ever since I started delving into hidden quests, I kept treating NPCs like real people and this place like a real world. Even as I told myself not to get too immersed, my heart softened. And this was when I had my own problems to worry about.

I shook my head vigorously to shake off the excessive emotions.

“She said it was a house with two large persimmon trees side by side, right?”

“Mr. Kim, Mr. Kim. But do you know what a persimmon tree looks like?”

“Yes, it has round leaves and deep green……”

As I was speaking, recalling the persimmon tree in my grandmother’s yard, I realized there was a big problem.

‘How do I find a persimmon tree in winter when there are no leaves or fruits?’

The goblin rolled around laughing at me as I closed my mouth in confusion. It seemed to find my predicament quite amusing. The clear laughter mixed with metallic sounds soon stopped.

“Oh my, what would Mr. Kim do without me?”

“Do you have a way?”

“Well, I do, but……”

The goblin, unusually, trailed off. Had it picked up Shinju’s speech habits already? The goblin, transformed into human form, mumbled in front of me before spitting out the rest.

“I’ll tell you if you grant my request.”

“A request?”

“Yeah. So… Mr. Kim, can’t you just call me by my name?”

And here I was wondering what kind of request it would be. It said it was envious of how I called Cha Tae-yang ‘our Tae-yang’. Since it wasn’t a difficult thing to do, I nodded, and the goblin’s eyes sparkled with anticipation.

“Will you help me, Sori?”

“Yeah! Sori will help!”

“Thank you.”

Sori expressed its joy by doing a somersault and pointed towards the small stream.

“Over there, that way! That spiritual beast, it seems to be quite a clumsy one for a snail. Its energy is overflowing, overflowing!”

“Are you saying it’s not usually like this?”

“Of course not. Most of them you can’t find even when they’re right under your nose.”

Sure enough, as Sori had said, before long we saw a house with thatched roof and two large trees inside its walls. This house, standing alone by the riverside, was quite different from the other houses in the neighborhood.

“……Isn’t that laundry?”

Clothes were hung on a clothesline fixed to the persimmon tree branches. They were hung so haphazardly that most had fallen to the ground.

But that wasn’t all. Dried persimmons hanging from the eaves, household items scattered all over the wooden floor for some reason, and shoes placed crookedly on the stepping stones. Even from a distance, it exuded a strong sense of being lived in.

‘Someone is definitely living here!’

What kind of person would live in a house said to be haunted? As I was marveling at the homeowner’s courage, Sori repeatedly patted my shoulder with its maple leaf-like hand.

“Fire, fire! Mr. Kim, there’s a fire!”

“Huh? Why suddenly……”

“Agh, you dense Mr. Kim! I won’t be responsible if it all burns down while you’re dawdling!”

Sori, wrinkling its nose, flew off towards the thatched house without me. As I blinked, watching its bean-sized figure recede, I belatedly came to my senses and ran after it.

“Sori, where are you?”

As I entered the house’s yard, I could faintly smell something burning.

Sori’s voice, shouting “Here!” as if it had heard me, came from somewhere. As I looked around, I found it hanging from the door, struggling.

“It’s here! Looks like a fire started in the kitchen.”

“I’ll do it. Please step back.”

“Okay!”

As I flung open the wooden door, an acrid smell hit me. The source of the smell was a pot over a blazing fire in the hearth. Something that had once been food had been left to overcook to the point of nearly becoming black charcoal.

And then.

“This person……”

A woman sat in front of the hearth, tightly gripping a soy sauce dish, lost in deep sleep. She was so graceful that even the soot on her cheeks made her look like an ink-wash painting.

“Hey, wake up already!”

Sori repeatedly pressed the woman’s cheeks, which had turned red from the heat. But true to someone who hadn’t woken up even in this state, she didn’t easily open her eyes. Quickly giving up on waking her, I picked up a water bucket from the floor.

“For now, putting out the fire is the priority, so I’ll go fetch some water.”

“Water? I want water too… Ugh, so dry.”

The woman, who hadn’t moved at all until now, started sleep-talking as soon as she heard the word ‘water’. Even as her lips moved, her eyes remained stubbornly closed.

‘She’s not pretending to sleep, is she?’

The suspicion that had crept up was quickly dispelled thanks to Sori.

“That’s what you get for being a snail in front of a fire!”

Sori, scolding as if exasperated, pulled on the woman’s long, chestnut-brown hair. Her head tilted limply in the direction it was pulled.

Wait a minute. So this person, no, this spiritual beast is the snail we’ve been looking for? It was so different from what I had imagined. Before I could even feel confused, the snail spiritual beast tugged at the hem of my clothes.

“Urgh, please, water, waaater……”

“We’re going to cook this snail at this rate! Mr. Kim, just pour a bucket of water over her head.”

“Ah, yes. I’ll be right back.”

Still, I had to put out the urgent fire first, so I extinguished the fire in the hearth with water I fetched from the stream in front of the house. I poured the remaining water into a gourd dipper and carefully dripped it over the snail’s face.

It was only when not just her face, but all the clothes she was wearing were soaked that the snail’s fingertips trembled slightly. Even before opening her eyes, she snatched the gourd dipper from my hand and brought it to her mouth. The way she gulped down the water desperately was quite pitiful to see.

Only after emptying the dipper, which was larger than her face, did her eyelids finally lift. Ignoring us who had helped her, she immediately stuck her head into the iron pot.

Soon, tears welled up in her eyes, which were like black pearls.

“Waaah- I’ve ruined it again.”