Retire 241
by Cristae241 Father and Daughter (3)
I hate the saying, “Like parent, like child.”
It’s a phrase that judges me solely by my parents, regardless of my own efforts. For the same reason, I dislike the saying, “Blood will tell.”
If I succeed, it’s thanks to my parents. If I fail, that too is naturally their fault. Sure, if I do something idiotic and can avoid taking the blame by putting someone else in front, there are times when that’s convenient.
But what truly infuriates me is when, no matter how hard I try, I can’t escape the phrase, “You were lucky to be born to good parents.”
No one can understand just how maddening that is unless they’ve experienced it themselves—especially if your biological parents are worse than dogs.
Of course, since everyone who needed to know already knew I was adopted, there weren’t many who said such things about my birth parents. Usually, it was my sister who said things like this:
“You really are the teacher’s child.”
To this day, I still don’t know if that was meant as an insult or a compliment.
Either way, it was something I didn’t like hearing. Knowing this, my sister would say it every time I did anything.
“How is it that you’re exactly like the teacher?”
Definitely an insult…
But sometimes, there are moments when I understand why people say such things. At drinking parties with friends, we’d laugh and say it was proof we were getting older.
I’d get annoyed even then…
Damn it. Maybe I’m just an irritable person by nature.
I frowned at this unexpected glimpse of truth, then forced myself to focus on the screen full of redacted text.
The Mont-Saint-Michel dungeon is a famous one. Maybe because of where it’s located, some civilians who know little about dungeons romanticize it as an impregnable fortress, spouting infuriating nonsense. How many hunters have died in that so-called romance over the decades?
Yet sometimes, people even wrap that up in tragic romanticism…
As soon as Hope mentioned Mont-Saint-Michel, of course I checked the information. But the report my father wrote after entering that dungeon was heavily censored at the request of the French government before it ever reached Korea.
Generally, dungeon information is made available to all hunters, but since some idiots rely solely on that and crawl into dungeons beyond their abilities, S-class and above dungeons require special clearance to view. For a dungeon like Mont-Saint-Michel, it’s not at all strange for it to be censored at the request of the host country.
“Is it always like this?”
“No way.”
But there are limits.
I pulled up the standard Mont-Saint-Michel file. Mont-Saint-Michel Dungeon. Also known as the Library. Date of appearance. Monsters encountered. Dungeon structure…
Of course, as befitted the dungeon with the longest record of failed raids, every description ended with the phrase, “Not confirmed.”
Hong Seok-young read the document with a careful eye. Honestly, it wasn’t much help. This level of information could be picked up on any unraided dungeon forum if you paid attention.
“If it were me, I’d have written a separate account of my own experience.”
“Yeah, well. You did.”
I shrugged.
“That’s probably the document we just saw.”
“You’ve never seen it either?”
“No.”
I returned to the problem document.
“You always told us, no matter what, never to enter Mont-Saint-Michel. You kept it well hidden. Anyway, how many Korean hunters are going to make it all the way to France? Only someone at the level of Director could get in.”
“Hmm…”
Hong Seok-young stroked his chin and fiddled with the mana watch. He’d only tried it a few times, but he seemed to have gotten the hang of the controls, rubbing his finger across the hologram window.
I watched to see what he was trying to do, and saw him pressing down on the censored lines.
“…What are you doing?”
“I wondered if there might be a note or annotation.”
“Even if there is, it’ll look just like that.”
“……”
Hong Seok-young nodded as he looked at the window that popped up.
[■■■■■ ■ ■■ ■■■ ■ ■■■■■]
“I see.”
But even that gesture turned out to have meaning.
[Edited by Yoo Jieun]
[June 2, 2041]
The time my sister tampered with the document appeared. After my father had written his final letter.
[21:19:43]
Judging by the time, it was before she met me. I remember the Bangi-dong dungeon broke out around then. Edited by Yoo Jieun? Wait.
I pushed aside Hong Seok-young’s hand and checked the hologram window. The edit… where was it made?
From the Agency’s computer? If so, the Agency’s IP would show up. If not—
[HTS-00001]
My father’s mana watch.
I tried desperately to recall if my sister had been wearing the watch.
But no matter how hard I tried, all I could remember were her eyes staring straight at me. Her bloodied lips and pale face. Her voice, low as if it might fade at any moment, yet firmer than anything else as she told me to take the sword and, above all, to survive.
Damn it. How was I supposed to notice what she was wearing on her wrist in that situation?
As I stared at the mana watch’s serial number, the window flickered and another popped up.
[Woo Heejae, you idiot. If you want to see this, get my permission first.]
“……”
Yeah.
What was it I’d been ranting about earlier?
That I hated the saying, “Like parent, like child”? That I hated being told I was lucky to have good parents? My family, except for my brother, doesn’t share a drop of blood, so I hate “blood will tell” for the same reason.
But.
But still.
As I’ve gotten older, there have been times I finally understood why people say such things.
Like right now.
[Woo Heejae, you idiot. If you want to see this, get my permission first.]
I blinked several times, thinking I might have read it wrong, but the message didn’t change.
Damn it.
She had to take after Hong Seok-young, of all people, and copy him in this.
Why? She must have gotten the mana watch from Father, and the very first thing she did was this?
Damn it, why would she do this and lock me out?
This… damn it. What am I supposed to do now? Fine, I get that my sister couldn’t have known she was going to die. I get it. But…
I can’t even curse the dead.
“……”
Hong Seok-young shook with silent laughter beside me.
“…Just go ahead and laugh.”
“No, how could I?”
“Why not? Weren’t you just laughing?”
“It’s just… seeing that Jieun hasn’t changed at all, even after all these years.”
“Some things never change.”
Even so, would the current Hong Seok-young even recognize my sister if he met the younger Yoo Jieun? I had trouble recognizing her myself.
“Well, anyway…”
I started the car again.
My father’s words. Yoo Jieun. Or Hong Jieun.
All of it piled up in my chest.
At the very least, I’d learned that my coming here wasn’t just a matter of random chance.
It was a chance my father and sister had created through great struggle.
I never intended to waste it, but now I had even more reason to prevent the end of the world.
I couldn’t let their deaths be meaningless.
“Heejae.”
“Yes.”
“Woo Heejae?”
“What?”
“Heejae.”
“Why do you keep calling me?”
“Woo Heejae.”
“Yes.”
“Hong Heejae?”
“……”
“Heejae.”
“Enough. Unless you want to get out and run the rest of the way.”
Hong Seok-young didn’t even blink at my words. Maybe if he’d at least pretended, I’d have felt less annoyed.
No, I’d still have been annoyed.
“Hong Heejae. It’s a good name.”
“Who’s arguing?”
“Hong Jieun… At this point, should I just adopt both Jieun and Hye-eun? I’m already looking after them, so nothing much would change.”
“Do as you like.”
“Hong Hye-eun and Hong Jieun… That would mean Irok would suddenly have two older sisters. He’ll be fine, right?”
“…Why are you bringing him up?”
“Suddenly, I have a whole brood of sons and daughters. A big family. I should get a bigger house, right? Maybe a house instead of an apartment?”
Hong Seok-young mumbled, not listening to a word I said.
Right, where did my sister learn to ignore people so thoroughly? She learned it from a father like this.
And yet, when it comes to truly important things, they never say a word. About the Bangi-dong dungeon, for example. If Father openly admitted he failed, maybe he knows even less about the Ark than I do now.
There’s no one left to ask, and no sister to tell me, so all I can do is guess.
“Oh, by the way, I’ve been thinking.”
That word—“thinking”—sent a chill down my spine. I made sure not to slam on the brakes.
Earlier, there hadn’t been any cars around, but now we were in the middle of the city. If I braked wrong here, it’d be a major accident. I might be a hunter and walk away from most crashes, but if civilians got hurt, that would be a problem… After all the trouble of safely opening the training school, I can’t ruin it with my own hands.
“Why are you so tense?”
“Go ahead.”
“No, I mean, with your mana watch, I… that is, my future self, was able to pull up documents, right?”
“Yes.”
Hong Seok-young tapped the watch’s screen. He was deliberately letting the mana pattern be read.
“So that means my future mana pattern is the same as mine now.”
“Mana patterns are like fingerprints. I’ve never heard of two people having the same pattern, or of someone’s pattern changing with age.”
“Right? Otherwise, we wouldn’t use mana patterns as passwords.”
I had no idea where he was going with this. Hong Seok-young stared into space, avoiding my eyes.
“So if I can use that watch, then this Jieun should be able to as well, right?”
“……”
Good thing I was prepared. I almost crashed.
“If we put the watch on Jieun, just for that document—”
“No.”
“But we need the information in there—”
“I know. But we can’t.”
“…But it’s really necessary.”
“How are you going to do it? As a present? It’s obviously a men’s watch. Are you just going to ask her to try it on? Or put it on her while she’s sleeping? No matter what you do, it’ll be suspicious.”
Hong Seok-young frowned at my words.
“Kids are more perceptive than you think. She’ll notice right away if something’s off.”
“……”
“And if she asks what it is, what are you going to say?”
“Then do we not need this? We’re the ones who could use any information we can get.”
Hong Seok-young didn’t get angry, just calmly asked me,
“Is there really no way?”
“……”
“Really none?”
I couldn’t bring myself to answer. If I tried hard enough, I could probably come up with something.
I knew it. I knew.
I knew I was just being stubborn, and that in the end I’d probably end up putting the watch on young Yoo Jieun’s wrist.
But.
But…
Right now, my sister is happily living with her older sister, knowing nothing.
This Yoo Jieun hasn’t lost her only sister, hasn’t become Hong Seok-young’s prized pupil, and isn’t his only daughter, either. …Well, the daughter part is debatable, but at least she can smile brightly, just as a girl her age should.
Even if it’s just putting a watch on her wrist, I don’t want to drag her into all this.
This time, I want to protect my sister—no matter what.