CH 340

Piik! Piiik!

Fox wept sadly with its claws stuck in my clothes. Fearing that the dangling Fox might get hurt, I spoke as if to soothe him, unable to move recklessly.

“I’ll be back soon.”

Piik! Piik!

Why was he like this today? Originally, wherever I went, he quietly waited for me. My heart weakened when I saw him whining with tears still hanging.

I can’t help it. I took Fox in my arms and sighed.

“You must never remove the invisibility outside. Understand?”

Piik!

Fox, who quickly hugged me, wiggled his tail.

Well, I had been so busy these past few days that I had often left Fox in my room. He must be very lonely by himself.

Today, Kim Woo-jin, Min Ah-rin, and Kwon Jeong-han were all absent. It was a rare day when the room was free because the call came from each team. That’s why Fox seemed to be begging to be taken away.

I left the room with the invisibility Fox on my shoulder. When I went out in front of the guild building, I immediately saw Ha Tae-heon’s car waiting for me.

“Hello, Ha Tae-heon-ssi.”

Ha Tae-heon gave me a short nod of his head as I climbed into the passenger seat and a paper bag was put on my laps.

“What is this?”

A savory smell crossed my tip of nose. When I opened the bag, there was freshly made hot toast. Come to think of it, it was lunchtime.

“Thank you. I can eat it alone?”

“I ate before leaving.”

I hadn’t eaten a single meal yet because Kim Woo-jin wasn’t there. As I happily picked a toast, Fox sitting on my shoulder released the invisibility.

Piik!

Fox, smelling the toast, stretched out his paws with his eyes shining brightly. You could see, he wanted the toast, so I passed one toast to him. There were three pieces of toast in the paper bag.

While sharing toast with Fox, the car quickly moved to the address where the people who illegally approached the gate lived.

It was difficult to go directly to the H37 Area gate, which was targeted, because it was near the East Sea, but it was worth going to because people who did illegal things like that lived outside of Seoul.

“They’re not the ones who were released to the press, right?”

“Yeah.”

Ordinary people might have done something illegal like this. Only those of us who deliberately searched for information knew this.

‘Well, the guild management headquarters knew about it but pretended not to know.’

Fox, having eaten his fill of toast, curled up and lay down on my laps with a satisfied expression. I also put away the toast bag and picked up the document instead.

The Cent Guild, which owned the H37 Area gate, hid the incident as soon as they noticed that there were people who had accessed the gate in an illegal way.

It was because they had been warned several times due to gate management problems and if they got caught again, they could completely lose the gate management ownership.

However, the H37 Area gate was poorly located and was a small gate with no particular advantage. There was no guild that offered to take charge of such a gate. Taking ownership from Cent would only complicate matters.

I wondered if it was appropriate for the guild management headquarters not dig deep into this case. This part was also written correctly in the document.

Even if there was a group of people who illegally accessed the gate, the management headquarters must have quietly covered it up since there was no accident to take issue with.

There was no one but us to solve the case. I caught the tail of the Praus Cult based on the information Alice gave me, so it would be nice if I could get solid evidence this time.

Entering an industrial complex on the outskirts of Seoul, Ha Tae-heon stopped his car in front of a grey container building. Perhaps because it was cloudy, the building and its surroundings were exceptionally dark.

“Is it here?”

“If there’s nothing wrong, I’ll go there.”

“How is it?”

“I can feel about five.”

At those words, I also focused and looked inside the building. The number of crew members listed in the document was five in total, one C-rank and four B-rank, respectively. Like Ha Tae-heon, I also felt the energy of the five people.

All five of them weren’t dangerous because they were of low rank, but if they were related to the Praus Cult, it was highly likely that they possessed a moving item. We couldn’t miss the clue we barely caught, so it was better to approach them carefully.

“Fox.”

Piik!

As I got out of the car, the transparent Fox cried loudly at my call.

“Could you check it out? Find out if they have the item.”

Hearing my request, Fox flew straight into the building.

Fox, which could penetrate walls through transparency and could fly, would easily check the situation inside the building. He was sensitive to energy, so he would notice the weak energy of the item.

I waited for Fox to return in the car with Ha Tae-heon. Dark clouds filled the sky as if it was going to rain any minute, adding to the gloomy atmosphere.

It was complicated in my head how to respond if they had a moving item. I thought about various ways to deal with it, but Ha Tae-heon took something out of the pocket of his suit jacket and held it out.

“Eat.”

“Pardon?”

I was wondering what it was and it was a lollipop. The peach shape drawn on the wrapping paper caught my eye.

Why was it peach flavoured candy? A nightmare-like memory from the Requiem representative office popped up.

‘No, wait a second… could this be it?’

Recalling Cheon Sa-yeon’s face kissing me and smiling, I felt something strange and opened my mouth.

“Ha Tae-heon-ssi.”

“Say it.”

“Perhaps… did you contact Cheon Sa-yeon separately?”

“I did.”

Ha Tae-heon tilted his head slightly and asked.

“I heard you like peach-flavoured candy. Is not it?”

“……”

Cheon Sa-yeon, this crazy guy…

My fists trembled as I remembered Cheon Sa-yeon’s image who had excitedly shouted to Ha Tae-heon that I liked peach-flavoured candy. After swallowing the swear words, I forced a smile and said.

“Sure, I like that peach-flavoured candy.”

Ha Tae-heon, who heard the answer, nodded his head with a proud expression.

“There’s one more, so tell me when you finish it.”

“Yeees…”

When I peeled off the wrapper with a light pink peach on it and put the candy in my mouth, a taste similar to the candy I ate at the representative office spread in my mouth. I’m going to have trauma with the peach flavour.

When I thought what I did with Cheon Sa-yeon while eating the candy Ha Tae-heon gave me… my conscience… hurt immensely. It was Cheon Sa-yeon who did something useless, but I couldn’t understand why my conscience had to hurt.

I chewed hard on the candy aggressively, with the mindset that I would rather eat it to get rid of it. When I chewed the hard candy as if it was natural, Ha Tae-heon took out a new candy from his arms as if he had been waiting for it.

‘Why do I keep getting something to eat?’

Did he come with a determination to feed me all the things he hadn’t fed me before meeting me today?

My conscience was already painful to refuse, so I should at least match Ha Tae-heon’s mood. That was when I reached out for a new piece of candy.

As soon as I grabbed the candy, a soft touch touched my cheek with a cup sound.

“……?”

When I was surprised by the sudden skinship and stiffened, Ha Tae-heon started kissing my face here and there while holding my hand holding the candy.

“No, what the, wait…!”

Having been showered with kisses with my hand held together with candy, I tried to turn my head to avoid it, but it didn’t mean much.

‘Was the candy a bait!’

I was so confused because I never imagined that Ha Tae-heon would seduce me like this.

The strange sound and touch in my ears gave me goosebumps. Kung, I couldn’t stand it and as I struggled, my knees bumped somewhere.

Ha Tae-heon, who had been kissing me regardless of the car’s rattling, bit my lower lip weakly for the last time. It was then that I shrank my shoulders at the sharp pain spreading from my lips.

Piiik! Piik!

Fox’s cry filled with annoyance rang out. Fox, who flew like an arrow, entered the car and rammed his head into Ha Tae-heon’s chest.

“Tsk…”

Ha Tae-heon, who saw Fox hanging with his teeth in his hand, clicked his tongue and straightened his upper body, which had been leaning toward me. Fox, who held his fur up and bit Ha Tae-heon’s hand as hard as he could, rushed into my arms.

Pick! Piiik! Piik!

Fox, who was hugging me and throwing a tantrum as he was at Ha Tae-heon, looked quite shock.

Come to think of it, I thought something similar happened before. It was with Cheon Sa-yeon back then.

“I didn’t expected to be disturbed like this.”

Ha Tae-heon, whose skinship was cut off due to Fox’s intrusion, looked genuinely disappointed.

“I’m glad it was interrupted… I was shocked and thought my heart was going to drop.”

“Isn’t it about time you got used to it? It’s not once or twice.”

“……”

There was nothing to be said for being so shameless.

Anyway, it didn’t matter now. I asked, petting the anger Fox with his fur standing up.

“Did you have a good look inside? There are five, right?”

Pik!

Even in the middle of being angry, Fox answered steadily.

“What about the item?”

Piik.

This time he shook his head.

He was saying there were all five people listed in the document, but there were no items? It was a very good situation for us.

“Since there are no items, I think we can go in without worry.”

“Let’s start right away.”

I got out of the car with Ha Tae-heon and stood in front of the building entrance. The iron door of the large container was surrounded by several layers of chains. Ha Tae-heon tore off the thick chain at once with his bare hands like tearing paper.

“I will assist.”

One C-rank and four B-rank were enough for Ha Tae-heon alone. Rather, if I did, it would only get in the way, so it was better to support with the wind from a proper distance.

Ha Tae-heon kicked the iron door with his foot with a grumpy expression.

Kwaang! With a roar that made the ground shake, the iron door that had been kicked by the foot collapsed and fell out.