Chapter 132:
Chapter 132:
Chapter 132
Yu-hyun quickly rented a room.
Kwon Jia, who had been desperately holding on until then, rushed into the bathroom as soon as she entered the room.
Blech!
Yu-hyun, who was sitting on the bed, tried to ignore the sound coming from the bathroom that was only connected by a translucent glass.
He didn’t want to hear her vomiting like that, no matter what. Kwon Jia would feel embarrassed too.
“Seriously, I told you to drink moderately.”
Hiccup.
The only thing that came back to his nagging was a rough breath.
Kwon Jia came out of the bathroom with the sound of flushing the toilet.
She looked pale, as if she still had some alcohol in her system.
She staggered towards Yu-hyun with unfocused eyes.
“What is it?”
“…”
“Miss Jia?”
“…”
Kwon Jia didn’t answer.
Yu-hyun quickly moved his body to the side.
Kwon Jia collapsed on the bed where Yu-hyun had been sitting.
She buried her head deep into the bed and stretched out.
She spat out a hoarse voice.
“I’m, I’m sorry…”
“You’re really something else.”
He said that, but Yu-hyun took out a bottle of water from the mini fridge and handed it to her.
“Here, drink this.”
“I’m… out of… strength…”
“Ah, seriously.”
Yu-hyun handed a water bottle to Kwon Jia, but her hand kept dropping the bottle lifelessly.
He couldn’t just leave her like this, so he flipped her body so that her face was toward the ceiling.
She was so light that he flipped her easily like a piece of paper.
She had her eyes closed. She wasn’t asleep, but she still hadn’t regained consciousness.
“Seriously, what kind of collector gets drunk? People passing by would laugh at you.”
She drank a lot, but she was a collector, right?
How weak was the alcohol that she got this drunk even as a collector?
He couldn’t figure it out.
He had heard that there were some normal people who got drunk just by smelling alcohol, but still.
‘Hmm. If I let her drink like this, she’ll spill it all.’
Yu-hyun searched for a straw, hoping there was one.
Luckily, there was a straw next to the water bottle.
He opened the bottle cap and emptied half of it, then inserted the straw and put it in Kwon Jia’s mouth.
“Drink up.”
“Ugh.”
“Here, use the straw.”
Slurp. Slurp.
As soon as the straw touched her mouth, Kwon Jia started to suck the water like a baby drinking milk.
Yu-hyun felt a strange feeling as he watched her.
Kwon Jia was a beauty, and seeing her drunk and sucking the water from the straw he gave her made him feel something indescribable.
Slurp. Slurp.
“…Are you done?”
“Uh-huh. Cough! Cough cough!”
Maybe it was because she answered while drinking, but she suddenly choked on the water and spat it out.
Yu-hyun sighed and took back the straw, then quickly grabbed a towel and wiped her face.
“Seriously, why are you acting like this?”
“Ugh.”
“Just stay still for a bit.”
Kwon Jia seemed to be throwing a tantrum, but she didn’t resist Yu-hyun’s touch.
He wiped her face and then fixed her posture so that she wouldn’t choke again.
Sigh. Sigh.
Maybe it was because she was comfortable now, but Kwon Jia fell asleep with even breaths.
Yu-hyun was speechless.
First she was drunk, now she was asleep.
She was getting worse by the minute.
‘Well, at least she’s not causing trouble.’
But then again, this was trouble enough, wasn’t it?
Yu-hyun wondered how he ended up in this situation.
He cursed himself for suggesting to drink with her.
“How can you be so pretty?”
This wasn’t an empty compliment, but the truth.
Kwon Jia was a beauty who could attract anyone’s attention.
Her sleeping face was like that of a princess in a forest.
Come to think of it, Kang Hyerim and Baek Seoryeon were also beauties.
Yu-hyun couldn’t understand how he got to work with these beauties.
He just picked one person after another that he knew, and this was the result.
He didn’t choose them for their looks, but for their skills.
He wondered if the third collector would end up like this too.
“This is crazy.”
Yu-hyun shook his head.
He had to figure out what to do with the current situation first.
A man and a woman were lying on a bed in a motel room, just the two of them.
And one of them was so drunk that she couldn’t even greet him.
“…”
Yu-hyun silently looked at Kwon Jia for a moment.
‘Finally, some quiet time.’
He smiled wickedly.
Swoosh.
Yu-hyun reached out his hand to Kwon Jia.
For a moment, it seemed like her body flinched, but he dismissed it as his imagination.
His hand passed over her body and grabbed the edge of the blanket, pulling it over her.
“That’s it.”
Yu-hyun nodded in satisfaction after covering Kwon Jia with the blanket.
‘Hmm. Perfect.’
Yu-hyun looked at the book above Kwon Jia’s head, which he had just unlocked.
She was asleep and no one was disturbing him in this quiet space.
This was the best time to read.
***
The next morning.
Kwon Jia raised her upper body from the bed, holding her aching head.
“Ugh. My head…”
Her head hurt like it was about to explode. She couldn’t remember much from last night.
She remembered drinking and having some conversation with Yu-hyun.
And then, as she was about to say something, the film cut off there.
After that, all she could recall were fragments of broken memories.
She couldn’t tell if they were dreams she had while drunk, or things that actually happened.
“Hmm?”
Kwon Jia belatedly realized that she was in a strange place.
The interior design and the bed were nothing like what she knew.
“…!”
Kwon Jia hastily lifted the blanket and checked her body.
She acted reflexively, wondering if something had happened to her.
‘Nothing’s wrong…?’
Her clothes were exactly the same as yesterday.
There was no sign of anyone touching her.
Kwon Jia looked around in confusion.
“Are you awake?”
The voice came from a small wooden chair next to the bed.
Yu-hyun was sitting there with his legs crossed, looking at Kwon Jia.
His posture looked like he had been reading a book until a moment ago.
“What… happened last night?”
Kwon Jia asked nervously.
Yu-hyun recalled last night and then looked away with a distant expression.
His eyes were blank.
“…A lot of things happened.”
“…Are you serious?”
Kwon Jia asked with a rare panic, and Yu-hyun changed his expression and chuckled.
“No. I’m kidding.”
“…You.”
“Nothing much happened, really. Just that you almost threw up on me, or that you begged me for water because you were thirsty, or that you choked on it while drinking. You know, stuff like that.”
“…!”
Kwon Jia remembered some of last night’s events, albeit vaguely.
Could it be that those weren’t dreams?
Kwon Jia wanted to kick the blanket away with her foot, but she suppressed the urge.
She clenched her teeth and glared at Yu-hyun with a hint of shame.
“And… then…?”
It was as if she was implying that if he said anything more, she would strangle him.
Yu-hyun answered casually.
“Nothing. You slept peacefully.”
“…You didn’t do anything, did you?”
“Me? Why would I?”
“…”
Judging by his attitude, it seemed like Yu-hyun didn’t touch Kwon Jia at all.
That was indeed the case. Kwon Jia felt relieved by his answer, but also strangely dissatisfied.
What, so he really didn’t touch her?
“If you’re feeling better, get up.”
“Yeah. Ugh!”
Kwon Jia got up from the bed and frowned at the intense pain that ran through her skull from her forehead.
She had drunk too much last night, and now she had a bad hangover.
It wasn’t much compared to the pain she had endured before, but it still bothered her.
“It’s a hangover. I knew it. Here, drink this. It’s a hangover cure.”
Yu-hyun handed a bottle containing a potion to Kwon Jia.
It was not something that ordinary people could get in the market, but a special medicine that contained a [story] that could instantly get rid of a hangover.
It was Olympus-made medicine, so it was very effective for a hangover.
By the way, the price at the dimensional store was 100TP.
“How do you feel?”
“The medicine is good. My headache is gone. Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it. Well, if you’re ready, let’s go.”
“Huh?”
“‘Huh?’ What do you mean? It’s morning now.”
Yu-hyun’s expression was much brighter than usual as he said that.
“It’s time to go to work.”
His rest project that lasted for three days ended today.
***
‘What a weird guy.’
Kwon Jia looked at Yu-hyun’s back as he walked ahead of her and evaluated him like that.
‘Coward. Wimp. Impotent.’
Her emotions were so turbulent that she couldn’t suppress them.
It was partly directed at herself for making a fool of herself last night, but also at Yu-hyun’s behavior of taking her to a motel and not touching her at all.
Surely, Yu-hyun didn’t touch her because he wasn’t swayed by his desire.
But Kwon Jia could see herself feeling dissatisfied with Yu-hyun’s attitude somewhere.
He really didn’t touch me at all?
‘More than that, he definitely said it yesterday, right?’
-You’re really pretty.
As she recalled last night, a memory came along with it.
She thought it was a dream, and she remembered shivering when she heard that.
No way, that was real.
She still felt her heart beat a little faster when she thought of Yu-hyun muttering that.
‘Pretty…’
She had never been aware of her appearance in her life.
There were many people who admired her appearance in her distant past life, which she barely remembered now, but Kwon Jia didn’t take it seriously.
As if it was natural, she fought against the fantasy creatures with the awe of the people on her back.
But why? Yu-hyun’s one word came to her more strongly than the praises of many people.
‘Get a grip.’
Kwon Jia shook her head.
Pretty or not, that didn’t suit her very well.
What’s the point of dating?
What she needed now was to protect this earth from the end, and to find the purpose that she had forgotten.
Only those two things mattered to her.
She had rested enough and played enough.
Now she had to work harder than ever.
That’s what Kwon Jia vowed to herself, but her eyes couldn’t get away from Yu-hyun’s back ahead of her.
***
Yu-hyun chewed on his regret as he read Kwon Jia’s new book last night.
‘I thought there would be some different information in the new book, but it was still a bust.’
Of course, compared to what he had read before, there were some more details about the worldview added. But what Yu-hyun wanted was something much more important, information about the origin of Kwon Jia’s ability.
What kind of regression is it?
What is the source of that regression?
Where did she get that power from?
Yu-hyun sensed a similar smell from Kwon Jia’s infinite regression power to his own.
‘I’ll find out someday.’
Yu-hyun didn’t rush.
He decided to think that he might find out someday.
“Good morning everyone! Let’s start our enjoyable work today!”
Yu-hyun opened the door of the office.
His voice was noticeably more upbeat than usual, and Baek Seoryeon would have pointed it out if it were normal. But today she didn’t say anything.
There was another guest there.
The person who recognized Yu-hyun flushed.
“Are you Kang Yu-hyun teller?”
“You had a guest.”
The man who got up from his seat and greeted him lightly was a middle-aged man with a warm impression.
Next to him was another man who looked like an aide.
He smiled kindly and offered Yu-hyun a handshake.
At first glance, one might think he was an ordinary guest, but Yu-hyun knew he was not an ordinary person by the fact that Baek Seoryeon couldn’t say anything and that he came into the office without permission.
As expected, the guest who came was quite a big shot.
“Hehehe. It’s nice to meet you. I’m Kwon Dongjin, a member of parliament.”