SWNOVELXO Chapter 126. Schadenfreude (3)
I checked the writer’s ID again.
But no matter how many times I read it, the letters remained the same.
Gu Seo-hyeong.
The fact that the name of that enchanter was here meant one thing.
*
Bang, bang, bang.
A sound scattered across the cold marble table as something splattered.
It was the explosion sound that occurred when an enchanter infused magic power into equipment.
– “Hunter-nim, what brings you here…”
– “Is the permission…”
However, a moment later, the outside of the workshop suddenly became noisy.
So much so that the enchanting sounds were buried.
But the worker seemed to expect this, telling the guards around him.
“Is an S-Class Hunter here?”
“Excuse me?”
“If he’s here, please let him in. Oh, I’m sorry, could you all step aside for a moment?”
Soon enough, Gu Seo-hyeong was able to have a private meeting with the guest who visited the workshop.
With bright hair and single-fold eyelids.
The man who once introduced himself as an F-Class was standing right in front of him.
Kim Gi-ryeo had come to visit the enchanter’s workshop.
“Wow, you got here super fast. Were you in front of the association when you called earlier?”
The enchanter adjusted his glasses and bantered.
But the response that came back was somewhat stiff.
“Gu Seo-hyeong.”
Gi-ryeo immediately asked.
In a way, it wasn’t an exaggeration to say he came all this way to confirm this.
“We were classmates?”
“Yeah.”
“Then why didn’t you say anything until now?”
The brown-haired woman replied calmly.
“… You ignored me first, right?”
Is the sadness felt in this statement just a misjudgment of the alien?
The magician with the Earthling’s body was momentarily flustered by the opponent’s remark, and Seo-hyeong continued with a grumbling voice.
“Honestly, you’re still you. Did I become so pretty that you didn’t recognize me? Huh?”
“Ah.”
“If I had any injuries, I wouldn’t feel wronged. Honestly, I thought you completely forgot about me, so it was a bit awkward to show it. Got it?”
But there was no reply.
The blond S-Class Hunter merely stood there, staring at Seo-hyeong’s face.
‘Hmmm…’
Honestly, from this side, it was maddening.
I finally met someone who had a connection with the body owner. Who would’ve thought that even face-to-face, the memories wouldn’t come back?
‘Anyway, we’re definitely classmates, right? So that’s why this Earthling suddenly suggested for us to drop honorifics.’
After a brief moment of contemplation, the alien great mage finally spoke up.
“Seo-hyung.”
“What?”
“Can you explain to me how close we were in school?”
“What?”
“Sorry, but I forgot all that.”
Right now, filling the gaps in memory was the top priority.
So he tried to gather information about his own flesh, even if it meant borrowing someone else’s hand.
Gu Seo-hyeong willingly took up this classmate’s request.
“Did I eat crow meat or something?”
Anyway, he said it happily.
*
The story goes back to their 3rd year of middle school.
That moment when Gu Seo-hyeong was being threatened by delinquents and a male student helped her.
“Hey! What are you guys doing?”
First, let’s explain the background.
Gu Seo-hyeong and Kim Gi-ryeo were in the same class during the 3rd year of middle school.
However, until the end of the first semester, Seo-hyeong couldn’t remember the other’s name.
It was understandable because, before this incident, she had never had a conversation with her classmate, Kim Gi-ryeo.
“Are you okay?”
“….”
“Let’s stay away from them for now.”
The person with roll call number 1 was what they called a quiet student.
They didn’t cause trouble, nor were they remarkable in any way, just existing in the corner of the classroom.
A person who lived a rather uneventful school life.
“The police will be here soon.”
While hearing that voice trying to comfort her, Seo-hyeong read the name tag in front of her.
[Kim Gi-ryeo]
And so she thought to remember the name of the student who helped her and be grateful forever.
That was the first impression that lingered in Seo-hyeong’s mind.
But one day.
Seo-hyeong noticed that the student she remembered came to school looking different than usual.
The corners of band-aids were faintly visible over the school uniform.
If he had that many band-aids on his body, maybe he recently started some intense workout or something.
A few days later.
Seo-hyeong learned the truth about the band-aids and was thoroughly shocked.
In fact, Kim Gi-ryeo hadn’t been exercising; he had simply been targeted hard by school delinquents because of that day’s incident.
“What? This was all from him being beaten up?!”
Seo-hyeong had been misunderstanding the reason she was free from bullying all this time.
When she threatened to report them if they messed with her again, strangely enough, the bullies had stopped bothering her.
“These crazy people…”
However, the surrounding area quieted down; in reality, it was just that the target had changed invisibly.
The group that had bullied her had now turned their aggression towards Kim Gi-ryeo.
And it was even worse than before.
“I seriously can’t take it anymore! Whether it’s a Knight or whatever, I’ll blow up everything. Gi-ryeo, report them at once! And we need to hold a school violence committee!”
Seo-hyeong cried out, filled with sadness that her friend who helped her was also suffering.
Furthermore, she attempted to punish the bullies, even if it meant enduring the unwanted gaze of the public.
“Enough.”
However, only one student firmly stopped her.
“Just leave it.”
The Gi-ryeo from eight years ago said that.
You’re going through a rough time right now; if you stress over this, it might be too much for you.
Unless something was broken, honestly, there was no way the teachers would step in properly.
And to top it off, he expressed his reluctance to blow things out of proportion due to personal issues.
“Besides, you’ll be graduating soon anyway.”
The tone of the male student sounded as if he had seen through everything.
As if to say, like an S-Class Hunter eight years later.
“Still…”
Seo-hyeong tried to persuade him to report several more times after that, but he remained quite stubborn.
Even after a few days, he told her not to talk to him anymore.
He mentioned it was better to distance himself if a celebrity was close to someone so that his group wouldn’t spread weird rumors.
“You don’t have to pretend to know me anymore.”
At this point, their relationship had become much worse than before the incident.
‘Does he dislike me?’
Young Seo-hyeong momentarily had that question.
If that’s the case, then why did Gi-ryeo step up to help, wanting to be close to someone like a celebrity?
As everyone knows, school violence operates on the premise that there are many bystanders.
If you rashly help someone being bullied, you could become the next target—Kim Gi-ryeo ended up like that.
“Why did you step in?”
But Gi-ryeo simply addressed this question.
“Well, actually, I was bullied a bit in elementary school too.”
“Ah.”
“But seeing the whole school gathered on the playground during sports festivals in that state, I really felt this way.”
“What kind of feeling?”
“If only I had one ally among all those students, I wouldn’t wish for anything more.”
Just one person.
He continued the conversation in a perfectly normal manner.
“So I thought about it from then on. I shouldn’t ignore those who are having a hard time…”
Gi-ryeo explained that stepping in was purely for his own satisfaction and suggested that since he was satisfied with this outcome, she shouldn’t worry about it anymore.
With comments like this, his personality could be naturally inferred.
“I see.”
Kim Gi-ryeo was a good student.
Moreover, he was a precious connection that helped Seo-hyeong endure the hellish middle school years.
But the friend from those young days saved her again as an adult.
“I was really surprised when I adjusted my glasses and recognized your face.”
As Seo-hyeong finished reminiscing, she tied her messy hair back again.
“By the way, Gi-ryeo, you haven’t changed a bit! You’re still as stoic as ever~”
She began recalling memories in a bright tone, but somehow, as the stories flowed, her expression gradually darkened.
“Helping someone in need is the same.”
And the reason Seo-hyeong’s expression grew somber was.
“I still remember exactly what kind of person you were… but…”
Kim Gi-ryeo hadn’t recognized her at all upon their reunion.
Not the experiences they shared, nor her name, nor even her face.
Thinking that all this information didn’t particularly matter to that S-Class made her feel quite gloomy.
“Wait a minute.”
But just then.
The man sitting across from her looked at Seo-hyeong’s expression and spoke up.
“Gu Seo-hyeong. There’s something you need to know. This is a bit of a secret, but…”
“Yeah?”
“The reason I couldn’t remember you is a kind of pathological issue.”
He revealed the truth.
“I accidentally lost my memory.”
“What?”
“Because of a brain injury, my memories just scattered. For a moment, I even forgot my own name.”
The being wearing another’s skin said this to comfort Seo-hyeong.
“Anyway, that’s why I didn’t recognize you… If I had been in my right mind, I probably would have recognized you right away, so please don’t take it too hard.”
Upon hearing this, Seo-hyeong was shocked, her eyes nearly popping out.
Memory loss.
“Wait, memory loss?! Did that happen while you were working as a Hunter?”
The man in a suit slightly nodded at that question.
Strictly speaking, since this was after Kim Gi-ryeo registered as a Hunter when he was reborn, it wasn’t entirely incorrect, right?
“Oh my goodness! I heard this job is dangerous, but I didn’t expect you would go through something that big!”
Seo-hyeong muttered with a serious face, then the alien great mage smoothly changed the subject.
“Don’t worry. I’m much better now. As you can see, I’m living my daily life just fine.”
“R-right?”
“Anyway, since that’s the case, how about you tell me more about my past?”
“Ah.”
“I’m wondering if something might ring a bell when I hear you talk.”
But Seo-hyeong made a troubled expression.
“Sorry, but I only know up to the end of our 3rd year in middle school…”
After all, she didn’t know much about Kim Gi-ryeo’s past either.
“You distanced yourself first, plus there was that incident during our high school year.”
“Dungeon Shock?”
Seo-hyeong nodded as she recalled the past.
“Of course, after the shock event quieted down, I remembered the emails we exchanged with video files, so I tried reaching out separately… but you never replied.”
From this perspective, it seemed that Kim Gi-ryeo’s actions after entering high school were completely untraceable.
“So I thought you had died.”
Why hadn’t Gi-ryeo checked that email?
Seo-hyeong wanted to scold him for not replying if he was alive, but she eventually dropped it.
‘No, maybe there were circumstances. Gi-ryeo must be frustrated now since he doesn’t remember, so I shouldn’t put pressure on him.’
It’s okay.
By some twist of fate, she had finally reunited with this benefactor.
Gu Seo-hyeong looked at the blond Awakened in a suit and smiled modestly.
“Anyway, do you have any idea how shocked I’ve been lately? Wow, you were claiming to be an F-Class, and suddenly you pop up as an S-Class Hunter…”
Her long-time friend hadn’t changed much from the image in her memories.
With those fierce three-hundred eyes.
It couldn’t be said to be a good thing, but it was a memorable impression nonetheless.
Seo-hyeong looked intently at Gi-ryeo and said.
“I was really happy when I heard you became an S-Class.”
After that, glistening dew formed in her eyes as she smiled.
“I’ve always hoped people as kind as you would end up well in life.”
“…”
“But I never thought it would really come true.”
Yet, there was no response.
The blond man had been staring out the window in silence for a while.
“Wait, let me gather my thoughts! Could you wait here for a sec? Oh, I have an enchantment I need to finish this morning. I’ll be right back!”
While Gu Seo-hyeong went to work.
The man sitting in the corner seemed lost in thought.
Tap, tap.
He tapped his finger on the table, creating a regular noise.