"Ryu...are you also going?"
Kim Ryung smiled at Haeun without saying a word. Haeun's face immediately withered.
"I can go alone now. Thanks for the help."
Cheon Areum turned with a faint wave, not bothering to look back as he headed out of the office. He had no intention of interfering in those lovers' alone time.
Maybe I scared him a bit too much...
The guild master's office wasn't hard to locate, it was clearly marked on the elevator's information panel. The entire 10th floor was reserved solely for Yoon Seoyul. As the elevator doors slid open with a soft chime, Cheon Areum was met by a man dressed in a crisp black suit, his expression stern, standing silently as if he had been expecting him.
"This way please."
Cheon Areum silently followed the suited man, his footsteps light on the sleek floor. The man paused at a tall wooden door and knocked three times in sharp rhythm before pushing it open. They stepped inside together. The room was roughly the size of Cheon Areum's old bedroom—not bad. The lighting was dim, making it difficult to clearly distinguish anything inside.
"Master."
With a quiet click, the man lifted the window covers using a remote. Sunlight poured into the room, chasing away the gloom and casting sharp lines across the polished floor and minimalist furniture. On the three-seater couch, Yoon Seoyul winced at the sudden brightness. He raised a hand to shield his eyes, his fingers spread in irritation as if the light itself had personally offended him. His posture remained slouched, casual yet unmistakably exhausted, like someone who hadn't rested in days.
"Uh... I told you not to call me master."
Yoon Seoyul's voice was low and scratchy, laced with fatigue and mild annoyance. The man standing beside Cheon Areum gave no reaction, his expression unchanging as if the remark hadn't been directed at him.
"Cheon Areum is here as requested, master."
Only then did Yoon Seoyul shift, lifting his head with a slow, deliberate motion, his half-lidded eyes finally opening to acknowledge them. The man, having delivered the message, gave a curt nod and exited the room without another word, the heavy door clicking shut behind him.
"Take a seat, Cheon Areum."
Yoon Seoyul sat upright on the couch and rubbed his eyes with the back of his fingers, slow and tired.
"Did you not get any sleep last night?"
Cheon Areum walked over to the back of the three-seater couch, walking leisurely, gaze dropping to the man lounging beneath him. Yoon Seoyul had his head tilted against the backrest, eyes half-lidded and glazed with fatigue as he stared up at him. Faint dark circles had begun to settle beneath his eyes, the weariness etched into his features. Yet, even in this disheveled state, with his hair falling away from his face and his expression slack, he remained anomalously handsome. It was the kind of effortless charm only someone like the main character could possess—unfairly perfect even upside down.
"You also didn't sleep well last night."
"I couldn't because I was constantly waiting for my payment which never came."
Cheon Areum replied flatly as he sank into the other end of the couch. The table in front of the couch was cluttered with scattered documents, some stacked haphazardly while others lay face down.
"Kim Ryung didn't have your bank account information. If you want it in cash or sent to your bank account, you can ask my secretary—the one who led you here."
"I also have a request. You can keep the money if you want in exchange for it."
Yoon Seoyul's brows drew together in a frown as he looked at Cheon Areum. After what had happened the night before, the audacity to speak so casually, to even suggest a trade, was bold. But Cheon Areum remained composed, meeting his gaze evenly. Shameless or not, he had already decided—this was something that had to be done.
"Let me join your guild."
"..."
"No. If you have another request I can fulfill that one but not this."
Petty jerk.
"Why can't I join your guild? Because I'm an F-Class?"
"The reason we don't accept low class hunters is because as one of the top guilds we only receive high class gates. It is already dangerous for low classes to enter gates that are not on their level, but healers despite being rare are too defenseless."
What the hell...that actually makes a lot of sense...how am I supposed to convince him now? It's not like I can ask him to protect me by entering every single gate with me.
"Haa... forget it then. There's another thing I want to ask you."
Cheon Areum hadn't come with the mind of joining his guild anyway. The most pressing matter was that he didn't know where Rian was or how to get him.
"I have a younger brother who's way younger than me...."
How do I tell him this?
"What is it? Is he not well?"
"Um...I don't know. Our grandmother took him with her. I live alone with my brother—he doesn't like living with her but she still took him while I was not home yesterday. Can you track him down and give me his location?"
The only way to track him down would be to use tracking abilities outside the gate. Yoon Seoyul had tracked down multiple people in the book—that meant he had someone who could do that for him.
"Is that all?"
"Hm? Oh yeah."
Cheon Areum wasn't expecting him to agree without a hitch. Yoon Seoyul didn't question him about anything else. As the main character he sure was charitable.
"Did you hear that, Joon? Wake me up when Inho is back from the gate."
Yoon Seoyul spoke to thin air. Concerned, Cheon Areum asked seriously.
"Who are you talking to?"
"My secretary. He can hear everything."
Talk about creepy....
Cheon Areum's work was done here. He was considering taking the money from his secretary too when his wrist was caught and he was pulled down to sit back on the couch.
"What?"
Yoon Seoyul continued to stare at Cheon Areum, his gaze unreadable, before letting out a low breath and reclining back onto the couch.
"....????"
"Just stay here until Inho clears the gate."
"Why do I have to?"
"I can't sleep without the presence of another person."
"Then ask someone else. Why do I have to sit here and watch you sleep?"
Cheon Areum wriggled his hand from Yoon Seoyul's grip ready to leave.
"Everyone else is busy working. I can't just grab anyone from the street and tell him to sit there while I catch up on sleep, can I? There would be rumors everywhere of how the so-called S-Class Yoon Seoyul can't sleep."
Cheon Areum was about to say that he should call one of his family members if he is that afraid of such rumors from spreading but then he remembered. It was when Yoon Seoyul was in elementary school when an A-Class gate exploded in the neighborhood where he used to live with his family. It was an unexpected explosion—the awakeners inside the gate were instantly killed without a single remain of their bodies and everything within a 1000 meter radius was destroyed from the collision of the blowout.
All members of his family including him were home at that time. The only survivor out of all of them was Yoon Seoyul who was discovered covered in blood under the rubble days after the eruption. The only reason he was still able to survive was because he had awakened as an S-Class.
"How can you trust me to not spread such rumors?"
Cheon Areum muttered absentmindedly. Yoon Seoyul was already deep in slumber so no one answered him.