The fact that a cat could talk wasn't very important to me.
Ah, right, there were talking cats in the world too. That level of impression.
The problem was the sentence that cat had spat out.
The boss.
Why was he angry? In our organization, standing by until given an order was standard. And yet just because I'd been holed up in my room for a few days….
"Both me and the boss are very angry, meow. You didn't respond, meow. I cried and cried until my throat went hoarse, meow!"
Ah.
I remembered the cat that had been wailing horribly outside my house these past few days. It had even been scratching the walls and raising hell, so I'd assumed it was mating season.
I'd forgotten the existence of the talking cat. Well, I hadn't seen it for the past several years….
"Is the boss very angry?"
"You're in big trouble, meow. He's summoned you to the hideout, meow!"
"What?"
Being called all the way to the hideout was something that hardly ever happened. The boss was a man of obsessive cleanliness.
Wasn't he the type to relay orders to organization members through this cat, for fear of information leaking?
For someone like that to have lost contact with me for several days—it was possible I'd drawn his suspicion.
…….
Surely he hadn't summoned me intending to kill me?
"Guess I have to go."
"Hurry up and go, meow."
Whoosh.
The cat turned its body around.
"Wait."
"Mrrow?"
I still had important business left.
"Where's the hideout located right now?"
"…Meow seriously."
The cat shook its head. Even though it was an animal's face, somehow I could sense an air of exasperation.
I wiped off the blood and changed into a suit. Once I'd finished getting ready to leave, I picked up the cat. The moment my hand touched it, the cat threw a fit.
"I don't want to die, meow! I hate getting electrocuted, meow!"
Ignoring it, I put it into a paper box. It was a box I'd picked up from a garbage dump.
"Mrrak!"
"We're taking a taxi, so stay still."
I felt fierce kicking from inside the box, as if to ask why it had to come along.
It couldn't be helped. At the moment, I was in a position that needed help in many ways. And for the role of helper, this talking cat was perfect.
I hailed a taxi on a nearby road. After giving an address near the hideout, I turned my eyes to the window.
Even then, the pounding from the box didn't stop. Maybe because of that, I felt the taxi driver's gaze.
I told you to stay still….
The closer we got to the center, the more tall buildings there were. But here and there, unnatural gaps stood out between the buildings. They were probably spots where gates had occurred.
The scenery six years later wasn't all that different. Even by then, the technology to build structures in midair hadn't been developed.
Whether there were people or buildings there, gates opened without discrimination. There were heaps of people here who'd had their lives stolen that way….
That was when a certain face flashed by in the swiftly moving scenery outside the window.
The car stopped briefly at a red light. Perhaps noticing my reaction, a puzzled voice came from inside the box.
"Mrow?"
It was a small sound, but in the quiet taxi it rang out fairly loud.
"Sir. That thing in the box, don't tell me it's a cat?"
"…No."
"No my foot. It is. You're not going to abandon the animal, are you?"
I leaned toward the window and looked at the opposite sidewalk. Because of the distance, I could only see the back of a head. A man with long hair tied up high was walking among the people.
It was a face I couldn't forget no matter how I tried. The atmosphere differed from my memory, but it was definitely Choi Haegang. He was playfully joking around with someone wearing the same combat uniform.
Who's the other one?
Compared to Choi Haegang, the person was short, so I could only see red hair. I was guessing at the identity when Choi Haegang suddenly turned around.
"!"
Startled, I jerked away from the window. My eyes met the taxi driver's in the rearview mirror, where he'd been observing me.
"Seemed like such a decent-looking fellow, and I was wondering why you'd go to a place like that…. Look, a person shouldn't do that. What did the cat ever do wrong?"
Before I could even explain, the light changed. Clicking his tongue, the taxi driver started the car.
To be precise, he tried to start the car.
The car only made a loud engine noise and wouldn't move forward.
"Huh? Why's it doing this?"
The taxi driver, fiddling with the gear lever, spotted something and screamed.
"Aaaaagh! A-a gate! It's a gate!"
A gate?
Hold on. Here, of all places?
I hurriedly tore my eyes from the window.
The car was sinking fast, as if being swallowed into a swamp. Already more than half of it had vanished beyond the gate.
When I checked outside the window again, a black hole had already spread out all around us.
…I'm fcked.*
This isn't of my own will, boss.
My head went numb and I squeezed my eyes shut.
My body pitched forward. I grabbed the front seat with one hand to keep from falling.
Crash!
A collision sound rang out, and the instant I opened my eyes again, I was in a completely different world.
Sunlight streamed in through a window with no glass.
Glancing around roughly, I saw all sorts of cooking implements hanging from a stone wall. Knives and bowls of various shapes, a pot suspended over a hearth.
It was an old kitchen, the kind you'd only see in a fairy tale.
Except everything was abnormally enormous.
As if I'd walked into a giant's house.
A sound of admiration escaped me.
Ahh… a place of memories….
This was where I'd first met Choi Haegang before regression. Probably the dungeon where I'd killed off every last survivor….
Including Choi Haegang's friend.
Was today that day? I should've held out a bit and refused to come. Damn it, I never wanted to run into Choi Haegang again….
The nightmarish face I'd seen through the taxi window earlier surfaced in my mind.
It felt like a headache coming on, and as I grabbed my head, an irritating sound came from the front seat.
"Ugh, kgh…."
It was the taxi driver. He was groaning, clutching his thigh. Looking now, his shin was bent backward.
It seemed the front of the car had taken the impact while falling from the gate.
"Oh dear…. Are you all right?"
"Ugh, aaagh…."
No proper answer came back.
Looking around, the situation of the other people caught in the gate didn't seem much different from the taxi driver's. Though since it was a gate that opened at dawn, there weren't many people.
Given the nature of gates—where you get swallowed from the feet first and plummet diagonally through the air—it was easy to injure your lower body in the process of entering.
Cases of getting hurt by objects sucked in alongside you, like trees and paving blocks, were frequent too. It tended to get more serious when there were a lot of people, but at a glance this dungeon was on the lighter side for casualties.
"Mrr—ow."
The cat in the box, of course, was perfectly fine.
When I released the force holding it down so it couldn't get out, someone knocked on the window.
Knock knock knock.
A pretty-faced man and I met eyes across the taxi window. The other mouthed something. Probably telling me to open up.
I want to ignore him.
Red hair, combat uniform…. That was definitely the man who'd been beside Choi Haegang earlier. I was curious about his identity, but that didn't mean I wanted to see him this close up.
Ugh….
But I'd already met his eyes. The best move now was to behave inoffensively so I wouldn't become a target of that man's vigilance.
The instant I opened the car door, the man, suddenly close, asked with a worried face.
"Are you all right? Are you hurt anywhere?"
"I'm fine. But the driver…."
When I pointed at the front seat, he cast his gaze that way and his eyes went wide. He flung open the driver's door and began first aid, and his hand movements were no ordinary thing.
I observed the man carefully.
What was his name again.
His manner was excessively calm. On top of that, the reddish tint in his eyes and hair. That was the trait of a flame-type Awakened.
Now that I thought about it, it seemed some flame-type Awakened had cleared this dungeon. I didn't remember the face well, though.
Was that this person?
Having finished the first aid, the man scooped up the taxi driver and got out of the car. He told me to follow, then moved at a quick pace. He seemed to be heading for a corner spot hidden by a shelf.
When I rose from my seat, the cat—which had slipped out of the box at some point—came trotting after me.
I asked the back of the man's head.
"What's your name?"
"What?"
…Was the timing awkward? I smiled naturally and offered an excuse.
"From your clothes, you seem to be a Hunter."
"Ah…."
"I thought you might be someone famous. You handled the treatment without hesitation."
The man, who'd been breathing roughly as though the taxi driver was heavy, answered after a moment.
"It's Hajae. Yeom Hajae."
He went on to reveal that he belonged to a guild called "Atlas," then said this.
"Don't worry. He lost consciousness, but I gave proper first aid."
"Atlas…."
Looking now, several people were stepping forward to move the injured behind the shelf, out of sight. Choi Haegang was among them.
So the guild I half-destroyed was called Atlas.
Yeom Hajae spoke to me even while exhaling laboriously.
"You, um…."
"Kim Cheolsu."
"…Right. Kim Cheolsu, you're…."
"I'm a civilian."
He nodded.
"Where were you headed?"
"I was on my way to an animal hospital."
I lifted the cat that had been walking beside me, holding it up for him to see.
"Mya—ow."
"Aww, cute. Aren't you, kitty."
"Hsss."
"Oh-oh. Lay your fur down."
The cat bared its claws.
"Keep that up and you'll get a shock from the static, ouch."
"Mrk…."
It went quiet. To stage a harmonious scene, I rubbed the cat's belly rub-rub. In truth, since I didn't know where I was supposed to pet, it was closer to randomly mauling it.
"…."
Yeom Hajae glanced at me, then hurried his steps without a word.
"Haegang-ah!"
"Hyung."
When we arrived behind the giant shelf, Choi Haegang took the taxi driver from him. After laying the driver down properly, Choi Haegang said he'd go help others and left right away.
Keeping my eyes fixed on his retreating figure, I leaned against the wall, and Yeom Hajae and the cat sat down beside me.
Is it okay for him to be the only guild member resting?
Just as I was thinking that, Yeom Hajae broke the silence.
"We'll be able to get out soon."
"I see…."
"…."
The conversation petered out limply. I was busy observing Choi Haegang.
"Are you all right?"
"…."
I had no intention of carrying on a long conversation with this Hunter. I didn't want to get tangled up with him, so I wanted him to disappear quickly. When I didn't answer, he turned his head and looked at me.
"Cheolsu?"
"Yes. Of course I'm all right. Cheolsu is just fine."
I rolled my eyes to meet Yeom Hajae's and smiled.
"You're the one I should be asking, Hunter. You looked pretty worn out."
"Ah, yes. It's embarrassing to admit, but for a Hunter I've got weak physical strength."
He certainly looked it. Thin limbs, skin like flour. I'd killed him easily before regression too, so no wonder I didn't remember him well.
I was sizing up his attack power with a quick glance when he clenched his fist tight.
"But my ability is good, so please trust me. I'll definitely protect you, Cheolsu."
"Haha. Reassuring…."
The reject who got one-shot by my ability sure talks a big game. Hiding that inner thought, I spoke gently.
"Thanks for worrying about me. Like I said, I'm not hurt anywhere."
But an unexpected reaction came back. After I finished speaking, Yeom Hajae, who'd somehow gone quiet, suddenly rose to his feet.
While saying something strange.
"…Sir. You don't have to push yourself."
He faced me and hesitated, as if there was something he wanted to say. I got an uneasy feeling.
"You've been… trembling badly this whole time."
