S-Class Hunter Heals with Monsters - Chapter 169



Only Noblemtl

Episode 169: The Day I Released Dry Roots into the Mountain

It’s a little cold.

Nam Ki-seok thought, sniffling from the cold.

It’s lonely to sit alone on a dark mountain.

It’s not like everyone really forgot about me and went back. Just when he was thinking that, a gate opened in front of him.

“older brother!”

Nam Ki-seok smiled brightly at the person coming out of the gate.

He went to Cheon Do-woon, who had packed the doppel and put it in his pocket.

“Huh? Kim Na-ri is here too?”

“I came too!”

Kim Na-ri raised her hand and shouted.

“Brother Sparrow and Sister are here too.”

“Yeah. I came.”

“Oh, even the death penalty!”

“Why am I your executioner… Hmm? You look cold. Put this on.”

Seok Woo-hyuk took off the padding he was wearing.

He was a doppelganger chimera and didn’t catch cold.

In comparison, Nam Ki-seok, who had been waiting alone in the winter mountains for hours, had a red nose and ears.

Nam Ki-seok was moved when he took off his padding at the sight of her pitiful appearance.

“Thank you. I am so blessed to have been sentenced to death!”

“So why should I execute you… oh, that’s okay.”

Seok Woo-hyuk chuckled.

It seems that he wants to take Cheon Do-un as his teacher, so if you look at it that way, the death penalty call isn’t entirely wrong.

“I can’t see Brother Number 49?”

“I’m here.”

Number 49 was sitting on the floor, flapping his tail.

He crossed the gate dragging his tail.

It looked like a scene from a horror movie, with him crawling on the floor with his hands on the ground.

“Sorry, I’m sorry. I couldn’t see you because you were down there.”

Nam Ki-seok nodded.

In the meantime, chimeras from the family continued to come over one after another.

The gate closed only after the power was restored.

At that, Nam Ki-seok’s face turned into a look of surprise.

“What’s going on with you all? Why are you carrying so much luggage? Do you have any other business in Gold City?”

Nam Ki-seok asked, looking at the boxes they were holding.

“There’s nothing to do. We came here to eat together.”

“Rice?”

“Yes. These boxes are the groceries you brought. Since you are a top chef, you are here. We should come over to the chef’s side.”

Nam Ki-seok’s eyes widened at Cheon Do-un’s words. A smile slowly appeared on his face.

The feeling of loneliness disappeared like melting snow.

There are so many people who need you.

“Oh, I see. Now that we’re all here… how about having a barbecue today?”

“Barbecue?”

“Yes. We light a big fire like a campfire and sit around it outside and eat together.”

This is his own villa garden. All the barbecue equipment was in the storage room.

Nam Ki-seok quickly ran to the warehouse and brought out various things.

“I’ll set it up right away!”

The table was set up in no time.

Chairs were also placed one by one for the group to sit around.

Next to it, a large pile of firewood was piled up and lit.

“Hurry up!”

He activated his pyrotechnic powers by shouting the words he had learned from his siblings.

A fire bigger than a person suddenly burst into flames.

Nam Ki-seok smiled as the garden brightened.

‘I should have done this a long time ago.’

As the great flame rose, it was no longer cold.

‘No, isn’t it because of the fire that it’s not cold?’

If I were alone, it probably wouldn’t be as warm as it is now.

Nam Ki-seok thought so. Growing up as an only child, he liked this bustling atmosphere.

Now that the preparations are done, it’s time to get into the hands of the chef.

Nam Ki-seok tied up his curly blond hair.

The pure white apron was worn with a professional touch.

He set up a brazier in front of the table, put in charcoal, and lit it with his ignition power.

“Ooh! This is barbecue…!”

Even though she hadn’t baked anything yet, Nari’s eyes sparkled.

“Barbecue. Let’s see how it differs from the clams we make.”

The siblings looked at Nam Ki-seok with eyes filled with pride.

“Barbecue? I’ve only heard of it. Can I try it now?”

Number 49, who has lived his entire life at sea, has a face full of anticipation.

As their expectations were focused on him, Nam Ki-seok became nervous.

My shoulders were heavy with the expectations of my family. But that didn’t mean I could avoid it.

‘I am… the number one chef of the Coconut Family!’

Giving himself a hint, he opened the preservation box his companions had brought.

“Brother Cheon Do-woon! Please cut the ingredients here into skewer-sized pieces!”

“I?”

“Yes! My brother is more precise and faster than me. Since there are many people, we will go fast and fast. We will focus on speed!”

After washing his hands, Nam Ki-seok took the paprika out of the preservation box.

The ingredients were already washed and placed in a container, so they could be used right away.

“Let’s go, brother!”

Nam Ki-seok threw ten yellow peppers.

Cheon Do-woon, who saw that, pulled out the thread and swung his arm.

Whirlwind, wirlwind. As the thread swept through the air, the paprika was cut into evenly sized pieces.

“It’s coming, it’s coming…! I’ll catch it!”

Kim Na-ri brought a large plate and walked around underneath it.

Kim Na-ri, who had received all the paprika, wiped the sweat from her forehead.

“Our breathing is in sync. Is that good?”

Yoo Beom clapped his hands and laughed.

“Everything is good. It’s a shame that the cheering sound is gone.”

Yujiah said something regrettable. Nam Ki-seok made a face of regret at that.

“Okay, here comes the pork! Ugh!”

Nam Ki-seok threw the pork.

“Pork, pork.”

Cheon Do-un’s indifferent voice continued.

“Woooooooo!”

Kim Na-ri shouted as she caught the flying pork at high speed.

“That, that’s barbecue…!”

Number 49: My heart was warmed by the sight of barbecue I had never seen before.

The barbecue I had only heard about sounded like a circus scene from a magazine I had once seen.

“Oh, I didn’t know. This is what barbecue was like.”

Number 49 said.

‘no.’

Seok Woo-hyuk denied it in his mind.

That’s not barbecue. I don’t know any barbecue like that.

Having lived in human society for a long time, he opened his mouth and his eyes shook.

“Eurachacha! Thirty sausages! Here we go!”

Nam Ki-seok threw the sausage into the air.

The sausages scattered in all directions were cut into regular intervals as Cheon Do-woon snapped his fingers.

“Ah. I forgot my cool. Cut it, sausage, sausage.”

Yoo-beom burst into laughter at the dull voice that sounded like someone reading a book.

Kim Na-ri’s eyes widened at the sight of sausages pouring down from the sky.

“Oh, the sausages are pouring out…! I have to get them!”

Kim Na-ri’s eyes glowed red.

“Booster ON!”

Kim Na-ri disappeared, leaving behind only an afterimage. The machine’s high-speed movement was used to receive food ingredients.

When Kim Na-ri appeared, the bowl in her arms was filled with sausages.

“Hey, is barbecue something you can’t do without moving that fast?”

Number 49 opened his mouth and shouted.

‘no.’

Seok Woo-hyuk denied it in his mind.

He had never seen barbecue like this in his life.

After that, all kinds of materials flew into the sky. Each material was piled up in the bowl.

“Leave the skewering to us. We have decades of experience skewering grilled clams.”

Yoo Beom flew up carrying the ingredients piled in the bowl.

“Eugene. Are you ready?”

“Come anytime!”

Yoo Beom threw the ingredients in the bowl into the sky.

Yujia put a skewer on each finger and jumped while shouting.

“Hurry hurry hurry!”

The strange voice of the usually reserved Yujia. Just that alone made the group hold their stomachs and laugh.

Yoo Beom flew. The cooking ingredients flew. Yoo Ji Ah flew too.

Every time the two of them combined, the ingredients were skewered one by one.

“Well, to have a barbecue, you have to fly…!”

It’s a very difficult dish. The 49 exclamations continued.

‘No, that’s not it.’

Seok Woo-hyuk’s denials continued.

This is more of a circus than a barbecue. Seok Woo-hyuk, who has a serious personality, couldn’t keep up with the atmosphere and his mouth fell open.

‘Well, still… everyone looks happy.’

How long has it been since I last laughed like this? Seok Woo-hyuk looked around at the group.

‘I think it’s the first time I’ve seen the teacher laugh like that.’

In the old days, there was little to laugh about.

Even taking that into account, Cheon Do-woon’s expression looked incomparably brighter than it did then.

‘Maybe he was like that originally.’

In the past, I didn’t laugh because there was nothing to laugh about.

Maybe he was originally a person who smiled a lot like that.

No matter how the process went, the barbecue tasted great.

The combination of meat and vegetables with a savory taste melted in my mouth.

Seok Woo-hyuk smiled as he looked at the well-cooked barbecue skewers.

‘It’s not bad to live like this.’

A blazing bonfire.

The sound of meat cooking.

The neon sign of Gold City seen from below the mountain.

It was a peace I hadn’t felt since I became a doppelganger chimera.

Seok Woo-hyuk has lived his life hearing that he is not fun because he has a very serious personality.

A smile soon appeared on Seok Woo-hyuk’s lips.

* * *

“I can’t eat any more. I’m full now…!”

Kim Na-ri slumped down on the chair. Kim Na-ri patted her plump belly and shouted, “Give up!”

“Don’t sleep here. Go inside. I’ll make you a blanket. You guys should go inside too. It’s late at night, so go to sleep.”

Nam Ki-seok said as he opened the villa door.

The group entered the villa with full faces.

The chimeras also followed along.

“Isn’t your brother coming?”

Nam Ki-seok asked Cheon Do-woon, who was sitting at the table.

“You go first. I’ll go and look at Joseph’s notes.”

“All right.”

Maybe you just want to concentrate alone in a quiet place.

Nam Ki-seok nodded and then consciously left the place.

Cheon Do-woon, a man alone in the garden, took out Joseph’s notebook.

Now that we’ve had our fill of barbecue, it’s time to learn about Dodak’s physical changes.

He unfolded his notebook.

What I’m trying to find out is the relationship between the World Tree and the Mandragora leaves.

As he was turning the pages, he stopped at one point.

There was a single line written there in Joseph’s bad handwriting.

“My little mandragora. Where have you gone?”

It’s a phrase that anyone who sees it would think is poetic.

But the moment Cheon Do-woon saw it, he laughed. He realized when this was happening.

[Number 17, you! You took my roots!]

Joseph’s cries, which I had heard as a child, lingered in my ears.

Cheon Do-woon recalled the day he stole Joseph’s mandragora.

He is 19 years old.

Cheon Do-woon was given the task of entering the gate for the first time in a long while.

He infiltrated Joseph’s lab on the day he received the mission.

On Joseph’s desk was a tank filled with dirt.

As Cheon Do-un approached, the roots of grass buried in the ground began to show their faces.

-Phew… .

A feeble and listless cry. The thing in the tank was none other than a cultivated mandragora.

As Cheon Do-un put his hand into the tank, Mandragora climbed on top of him.

It was an action taken to recognize Cheon Do-un as a fellow tribesman.

[You know what? You look like the root I met when I was little.]

Cheon Do-un said. The grass roots that bore fruit in the crevice cave flashed through his mind.

[They don’t look alike, but when I look at them, I strangely think of their roots.]

The roots that lived in the crevice cave were really plump.

By comparison, this root was only about the thickness of a finger.

[Even though they don’t look alike at all, I strangely think of that guy. Is it because their cries are similar?]

It was natural that both of them would give off a similar vibe.

However, at that time, Cheon Do-un did not know that the root he had encountered as a child was a mandragora.

It was because I had never seen a wild mandragora before.

[If you continue like this, you will die of malnutrition.]

Cheon Do-un spoke to the dry root.

The one remaining leaf on the root was floating yellow.

[It seems like Joseph is trying various tricks to save her. It’ll probably be difficult.]

If this is really Mandragora, the only way to save it is to send it back to its hometown.

Cheon Do-woon looked at the roots and put them in his pocket.

I left the lab just like that.

Why am I helping this root? Cheon Do-woon asked himself. No answer came.

Either because it resembled the roots he had seen as a child, or because they simply caught his eye, or because they were meant to tease Joseph.

If you ask me for a reason, I can give you anything.

But none of them felt like there was a clear reason.

‘The habitat of Mandragora is mountainous. Can we release them into the mountains?’

Cheon Do-un explored the tallest mountain nearby.

The gaze stopped at a dormant volcano in the distance.

The volcano, which had long since ceased activity, was covered in grass and trees, giving it a green color.

[That would be nice. It looks the tallest around here.]

If there’s a place like that, there must be a mandragora habitat.

Cheon Do-un ran towards the mountain.

How high did I climb? As I neared the top, the density of magic changed.

The dry root’s eyes widened at the feeling of home he felt for the first time.

-Phew, phew… .

The root knew what this feeling was. It was something it had never felt before, but it knew instinctively.

-Whew, Whew… .

Where I should have grown up. Where my people are.

I should have grown up eating this kind of energy.

The leaves of the dry root trembled. Juice welled up in the eyes.

The root closed its eyes and began to absorb mana.

They continued climbing like that for quite some time, and at some point, Cheon Do-woon’s steps stopped.

His gaze was fixed on the rock in front.

[Found it.]

The corners of Cheon Do-woon’s mouth quietly rose.

[Do you feel it? Your people are behind that rock.]

Behind a large rock, a single green leaf was sprouting out.

It moved. It even poked its head out as if to check Cheon Do-un’s movements.

When its eyes met Cheon Do-un’s, it flinched and hid behind a rock.

[You’re so scared. You still seem like a young child. Judging by your size, you’re probably about the same age as me.]

Cheon Do-un put down his roots in the ground.

[Go and see.]

-Phew, phew… .

The dry root looked at the rock with trembling eyes. The root also felt that there were kin beyond the rock.

The root took a step. He took another step. As he walked, he looked back at Cheon Do-woon.

-Huh…?

[Okay, go.]

The root walked back towards the rock. After walking about three steps, it looked back at Cheon Do-un.

-Whew, Whew… ?

[I told you to go. You can go.]

The dry root hesitated and then straightened up.

Although he was staggering due to malnutrition, he stood tall and looked up at Cheon Do-un.

-Whew…!

I’m going.

-Whew, Whew…!

Go join a new group.

The root reported to Cheon Do-woon. A little bit of juice rose to the corner of his eyes, but he quickly wiped it away.

A strong root does not cry.

The dry root turned around. This time, without looking at Cheon Do-un, he walked straight towards the rock.

The small roots disappeared behind the rock.

This completes the merge. Cheon Do-woon turned around after seeing that.

‘I saved you this time.’

I couldn’t save you before, but I saved you this time. Cheon Do-woon smiled.

‘I saved you this time.’

It was a smile that seemed somehow bitter.

-Whew!

Cheon Do-woon turned around at the sound he heard behind him.

A dry root was coming out from behind a rock and looking at the sky.

-Whew, Whew…!

[Yeah, you too, take care.]

Cheon Do-woon waved his hand and then turned around.

The dry roots did not take their eyes off the sight.

I will never forget that adult mandragora. That’s what I swore.

He engraved the image of the large mandragora that had saved him in his eyes.

The mandragora that Joseph had raised was returned to its own kind.

“I wonder if that guy is doing well.”

Cheon Do-woon, recalling the incident at that time, took out a dodak from his fanny pack.