Translator: Wan ED/PR: Personal Ghost
41. Outside the borders (7)
[Hong Gyubin] … Uisin-ah?
As if according to my predictions, Hong Gyubin was awake, the reply came straight away.
[Hong Gyubin] It wasn’t even an hour since my vacation started… ㅠㅠ;;;
It seemed like he realized that I contacted him for work.
But if it wasn’t even an hour since his vacation started, didn’t it mean that he kept working overtime and was only now leaving work?
‘He has yet to leave the country. That’s great.’
As the Newspaper Club’s schedule changed, if he left the country, it would be a bit complicated move.
Before I could even state my business, Hong Gyubin’s messages poured out.
[Hong Gyubin] Seeing how you contacted me at this hour, it doesn’t seem like an ordinary event. Nothing happened to teacher Jegal-nim, right?
[Hong Gyubin] Did something happen in the place you went to on the news-gathering trip?
[Hong Gyubin] Where are you now? If you moved according to the schedule plan, you should be on the way to the China Player Training Center. Should I contact the branch there? Teacher Jegal-nim is safe, right?
It seemed that he asked about Jegal Jaegeol twice, because news about him were that important.
I passed on to the worrying Hong Gyubin the key points about Hyeonmu handing us Mok Uram, and about wanting help with getting Mok Uram home.
[Hong Gyubin] Hyeonmu interfered into human affairs after such a long time, huh? And in addition to protecting, it was about an Eungwang School’s student?!
[Hong Gyubin] But why was Uisin’s classmate there? And didn’t you say that he didn’t attend school even once?
Hong Gyubin had doubts for a moment, but then he came to a conclusion and withdrew them based on what he knew.
[Hong Gyubin] Ah, Uisin is in class 0, right? Because this year Eungwang School’s class 0 is so docile, I didn’t register it.
I guess Eungwang School’s majesty spread even to the Player’s Association.
It couldn’t be helped, because not a long time ago, on the Teacher’s Day, the 2nd year class 0 achieved a great success in dominating an otherworld through the ‘Superpower Wave Link’.
After Hong Gyubin bought the ticket for the morning flight to Chengdu and confirmed the time so Hwang Jiho’s subordinate would pick him up.
“Hong Gyubin you say. Not a bad choice, eh?”
When I closed the device screen, Hwang Jiho abruptly spoke.
“Shove him around a lot. It’s the road that Hong Gyubin chose. If this is a task about the Player community, and in particular Eungwang School in which Jegal Jaegeol is, this punk will happily accept it.”
I had doubts if he was truly happy to accept them, but it didn’t seem like Hong Gyubin would refuse work about Eungwang School.
‘Hwang Jiho knows that Hong Gyubin is Jegal Jaegeol’s fanatic?’
Thinking about it, Hwang Jiho mentioned Hong Gyubin for a moment, saying they knew each other.
— Yeah. Hong Gyubin received a blessing of a very irritating Jin bastard, so I observed him a few times. The trigger for that punk to become a Player was interesting.
Hong Gyubin, who possessed foresight skill, received a blessing of the annoying Jin, the Seo tribe’s head[1] Cunning, and Hwang Jiho said that he was interested so he observed Hong Gyubin a few times.
It seemed that Hong Gyubin graduated from Eungwang School, so did he observe him since highschool days?
“Team leader Hong Gyubin-nim graduated from Eungwang School, right? I heard that He is teacher Jegal Jaegeol-nim’s student.”
“Hong Gyubin didn’t graduate from Eungwang School. He must have graduated from an ordinary highschool. Because until he graduated from highschool, he was hiding his superpowers.”
I thought that Hong Gyubin graduated from Eungwang School, but you’re saying that he was hiding his superpowers and came out from an ordinary highschool.
There were just one or two points that bothered me about Hwang Jiho’s words just now.
I started by asking about the thing I was bothered about.
“I know that teacher Jegal Jaegeol-nim kept working in Eungwang School.”
“That’s also correct. Jegal Jaegeol should be able to only work in Eungwang School.”
Hwang Jiho spoke enigmatically with shining eyes.
It seemed that he was testing if I could figure out it from here.
‘Hong Gyubin came out of the academic highschool, and Jegal Jaegeol only worked in the Player special highschool, Eungwang Highschool. And the age difference between the two isn’t big. I thought that by chance Jegal Jaegeol was teaching the 3rd year highschooler Hong Gyubin as first vice-homeroom teacher, from the moment he early graduated from the university. But it doesn’t seem so…’
My reasoning soon ended.
“When teacher Jegal Jaegeol-nim worked as a private academic instructor or private tutor, he was teaching team leader Hong Gyubin-nim, huh?”
“Correct. Jegal Jaegeol worked part-time as a 1 on 1 private tutor during his university days. You figured it out faster than I expected, eh?”
That is just because I also worked part-time as a private tutor during my university days.
I omitted those words and with Hwang Jiho’s words as a base, I spoke about my reasoning.
“Is the fact that teacher Jegal Jegeol can only work for Eungwang School related to team leader Hong Gyubin-nim?”
Hwang Jiho nodded his head once.
“The people, who experienced the Dark Age, were reluctant to let their clan’s precious sons become superpower users. The perception changed a lot now, but some people don’t change, right? Hong Gyubin’s house was like that. Jegal Jaegeol helped Hong Gyubin in achieving his dream of becoming a superpower user, but…. As the result of it, Jegal Jaegeol probably lost a lot of things.”
Long time before my Playable Character’s main episode[2] even started, and just around when he became adult, he was taking such risks for his student, huh?
“The process was a bit complicated, but… It would be distasteful to say everything with my own mouth, eh? You should ask Hong Gyubin or Jegal Jaegeol in person about the story afterward. But if you’re really curious, I can tell you.”
I ignored Hwang Jiho’s last words and asked:
“How do you know about that process?”
“I heard about the process in return for getting Jegal Jaegeol a job in Eungwang School. Because of criticism, there was some irritating human, but this one’s decision couldn’t be broken, right?”
You mean there was a story beyond that?
I guess there was something if even Hwang Jiho, who was neglectful, stepped out for a moment.
“With this matter, Hong Gyubin was given a special permission to always visit Eungwang School. Because as long as Jegal Jaegeol works in Eungwang School, that punk will never cause any harm to Hwang Myeong Foundation.”
Hwang Jiho added proudly that no matter what high-ranking Association’s employee it would be, it wouldn’t be easy for them to get a permission to always visit Eungwang School.
Since he told me about my Playable Character’s important background story, I moved while listening to whatever good things he said.
“There is still time to spare, so how about we wander around Hyeonmu’s night market?”
I accepted Hwang Jiho’s suggestion and before returning to the hotel, I strolled around the night market.
As it was difficult to reveal the origin of items bought here, the targets to give a gift to were limited, but to begin with, I decided to buy gifts for that limited few targets in this place.
At the end of my worries, I chose a lamp made from translucent paper, which if one poured a superpower wave into, it would shine with the color matching the Player’s unique superpower wave color.
Hwang Jiho looked at the paper lamp I selected, and his evaluation result wasn’t bad.
“It’s nice, eh?”
“Buy something else.”
“Hahaha! I won’t choose overlapping things.”
I decided to buy a lamp, but I was at a loss for a while.
I wanted to find a lamp, whose shape resembled Snare, but though there were many dog-shaped lamps, I couldn’t find a lamp which expressed our Snare’s cuteness and genius even partially.
I gave up and bought a simple shape, but Hwang Jiho was laughing all the while.
This one or Hwang Myeong-ho in his 60s had a vastly different impression, but it seemed that if he showed such an appearance, all class 0 children would recognize him.
‘No matter the age, he laughs exactly the same.’
While Hwang Jiho was laughing to his heart’s content, I was very seriously considering ‘how to kill Hwang Jiho’ in the meantime.
When we left Hyeonmu’s territory, left Mok Uram to Hwang Jiho’s subordinate, and returned to the hotel again.
“Jo Uisin, you won’t talk about that crow mask?”
Hwang Jiho, who stood at the balcony of my hotel room, asked.
I spoke as I didn’t exactly have thoughts of hiding it.
“I have business with Demons.”
From among the confirmed Demons, I was thinking of summoning the Crow Demon King, Sillentium of Silence and Bystanders.
Hwang Jiho looked at the crow mask in my hand as he spoke.
“The Ho tribe doesn’t have exchanges with Demons. But even if there were exchanges, those Demon bastards don’t form groups, so it would be meaningless.”
It seemed that Hwang Jiho wasn’t in the mood to deal with them, but it seemed that he had no thoughts of interrogating me any further.
“I’ll reveal through my power the identity of that unidentifiable power I felt during chess tournament and this time.”
Instead, he left a line that could be said by a villain in fiction, and disappeared outside the balcony.
***
Morning.
As the breakfast time grew closer, I entered the lounge, and saw an enormous hologram with ‘Newspaper Club’s victory’ written on it.
But something was strange.
‘It seems that the Newspaper Club won against the 2nd year class 0… but did they really win?’
The majority of victorious Newspaper Club’s members were scattered and sleeping around the lounge, and Jegal Jageol was wandering around covering them with blankets.
Opposite of that, the defeated 2nd year class 0 was circling around Jegal Jaegeol.
“Hello, what happened?”
After I spoke up, Geun Chansol and Wang Chansol replied triumphantly as if they were waiting.
“The Newspaper Club poured out their entire strength into the life and death battle against our 2nd year class 0 and fell asleep like a lie!”
I knew that the Newspaper Club members faced the 2nd year class 0’s game with seriousness and won, but I couldn’t understand why the hell class 0 senior bastards were so vigorous.
As if noticing my doubts, GeunChan&WangChan’s duo added:
“Because the Newspaper Club were so sold on the idea that they have to bring us down, they forgot about the essence of this trip!”
“Our goal was to have fun with teach Jegal Jaegeol-nim to the end of the world. Winning against Newspaper Club was a secondary issue, right?”
The detailed explanation continued after this.
It seemed that the 2nd year class 0 analyzed the Newspaper Club’s trip plan beforehand.
They, who knew beforehand about the game title that the Newspaper Club’s 2nd year seniors prepared for the war, made a plan.
Wearing headgear consumed more or less physical strength for the great game war, and the 2nd year class 0, who faced against Newspaper Club’s game fanatics, who already stayed one night up, focused on enduring and conserving their strength instead of aiming for victory.
The result of it was that even the Newspaper Club members who were only watching, like Mun Saeron, joined the board and a great free fight broke out.
The Newspaper Club won, but they were exhausted and fell asleep, while the 2nd year class 0 lost, but they were in good condition thanks to fighting well.
“Foolish victory, wise defeat. Ugly victory, beautiful defeat, that’s the point, right!”
“But it seems that Unknown Supernova and the 1st year class 0’s lunatic Hwang-ssi didn’t get swept into this. Well, you two handed us teach Jegal-nim’s 1st print magazine, so that’s fine.”
“During breakfast, teach Jegal-nim is ours! But because we lost the game, we will have to cover tomorrow’s hotel bill too.”
Leaving behind the Newspaper Club’s members, who won only pain, the 2nd year class 0 senior bastards spoke with power.
“Teach Jegal-nim! Let’s eat breakfast!”
“The Newspaper Club’s kids are sleeping so well, so we’re a bit sorry to wake them up.”
Dog-shit sorriness.
If we only looked at the ace of the Theater Club, Yeon Garam, she would really look like she was sorry, but knowing the before and after situation, the sorriness was ambiguous.
“Because we lost the game, we will bring a breakfast take-out. Because the restaurant here isn’t particularity good.”
“Ah, I don’t really know what the Newspaper Club’s kids like. Teach Jegal-nim, please choose with us!”
It seemed that they planned to go on morning shopping outside the hotel with Jegal Jaegeol.
In the end, the 2nd year class 0’s senior bastards with Jegal Jaegeol and me with Hwang Jiho finished the breakfast in the hotel, and we soon went out.
When we arrived in the hotel lobby at the first floor.
“Ack!”
“Clingy first disciple!”
“That’s terrible. How the hell did he get here?!”
Geun Chansol and Wang Chansol looked at Hong Gyubin sternly.
On the other hand, Hong Gyubin also had a disgusted look as he stood with someone at his side.
‘I saw that Person…’
Though we didn’t meet more than a few times, the person standing at Hong Gyubin’s side was an acquaintance from the beginning.
At that moment, I heard Hwang Jiho mumble with voice even more stern than GeunChan&WangChan duo’s.
“Cunning…”
*~*~*
[1] Seo tribe – ‘rat’ tribe.
[2] main episode — or main story? It’s a drama/movie term.
Translator’s note: Ahahaha… Hong Gyubin asking about that training center… heh.
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