Choi Hyena's childhood couldn't be described as happy, not even with a stretch.
Even though she was born as the eldest daughter of the Seongbuk Choi family, a prestigious family of magic users, she had to part with her mother at the tender age of two.
Choi Hyena's father, Choi Taehyun, repeatedly wailed and fainted before his wife's body.
Originally, Choi Hyena's mother, Choi Yeonju, had been sickly.
She was always plagued by minor ailments, and the hospital said she wouldn't live long.
Nevertheless, Choi Yeonju, with her heart set on bearing her beloved husband's child, defied everyone's opposition and became pregnant with Choi Hyena.
And ten months later, when she safely gave birth to Choi Hyena, both of them were as happy as if they had gained the whole world.
But perhaps the heavens did not allow them that happiness.
Immediately after childbirth, Choi Yeonju's condition worsened uncontrollably.
Even pouring money into buying elixirs and hiring skilled priests, her illness raced towards the worst, without end in sight.
Before long, Choi Taehyun had to lose his wife, and Choi Hyena had to lose her mother.
Choi Taehyun, who had to bury his wife in the cold earth, seemed to have given up everything as a parent from that day on, leaving the still-young Choi Hyena and wandering outside the house.
Choi Hyena had no way of knowing what he was doing outside.
Even on the rare days when he came home, he never once glanced at his daughter, Choi Hyena.
Choi Hyena, who was thirsty for parental love, couldn't help but be disheartened by the cold attitude of her only parent.
The small wound that formed then grew bigger day by day.
It was only natural that Choi Hyena, neglected by her parents, was raised by her grandparents and the family's servants.
Except for when she was very young, Choi Hyena never received affectionate words or touches from her parents, but she still loved her father.
Her grandparents told her that her father was doing that because he was hurting.
So, she firmly believed that if she waited patiently, someday her father, whose wounds had healed, would hug her warmly with a bright smile.
However, among the expressions of Choi Taehyun that remained in Choi Hyena's memory, there was no smiling face.
Of course, it might have been there when she was a baby, but now all that remained were tragic expressions of weeping, despairing, and raging.
As time passed with Choi Taehyun never returning, Choi Hyena turned eight.
And summer arrived.
That summer was especially hot and gloomy.
Because serious casualties occurred one after another, the news always delivered bleak news, and the streets were always enveloped in a gloomy atmosphere.
Only undertakers, with work pouring in, were the only ones who could smile on such a summer day.
That day, as if a hole had been torn in the sky, heavy monsoon rain poured down relentlessly even in the middle of the night.
Cicadas and crickets did not sing in the sound of rain. Or maybe they did, but they were drowned out by the rain.
Choi Hyena woke up in the late hours of the night, needing to relieve herself, and was walking down the empty hallway.
As she walked, drowsy with sleep, Choi Hyena frowned at a strange, unfamiliar stench.
And something wet touched her feet.
*Rumble-*
At that moment, a bolt of lightning fell from the sky, momentarily lighting up the dark hallway.
And Choi Hyena saw an unbelievable sight.
-Caw!!
The servants who she was usually friendly with were brutally murdered and lying in the hallway, and above those corpses was the figure of 'Father' looking down at her.
-Our Hyena…
As a face stained with blood and a hand dirtied with flesh that she didn't want to know who it belonged to reached out to her, Choi Hyena instinctively stepped back.
-D, don't come any closer!!
-My daughter, your dad has come to pick you up.
Choi Hyena trembled at his crazed gaze, not knowing what he was thinking or what emotions were mixed within him.
He was not the father she had been eagerly waiting for.
Naturally, it was impossible for the terrified and trembling young Choi Hyena to escape from Choi Taehyun.
In a desperate moment where Choi Hyena would be helplessly caught by his bizarre hands if he took even one more step.
-Hyena!
Choi Youngok, Choi Hyena's grandmother, appeared, wreathed in crimson flames.
-You! How dare you set your dirty feet here!
Choi Hyena was taken aback by the anger beyond Choi Youngok's distorted expression, which she had never seen before.
At the same time, she felt relieved.
As far as she knew, her grandmother was really strong.
-Tsk, an old fox interfering.
Choi Taehyun had no choice but to leave, hearing the sound of Choi Youngok, who was then a 5-circle mage, and people running from afar.
-Hyena, someday your father will come back for you.
With those words that would become a curse to Choi Hyena, Choi Taehyun disappeared.
The damage that day ended with the unfortunate deaths of two servants, but Choi Hyena could not forget the memory of that day.
The sight of the servants collapsed and covered in blood.
The figure of her father who killed them.
And the unknowable look in her father's eyes as he looked at her.
Even now, nearly 13 years later, she could not forget the memory of that day.
-…Dad.
The too-young Choi Hyena hugged the little teddy bear her mother had left her and shed tears.
Only a voice that would never reach echoed emptily.
"Sorry, but I'm not your dad."
"…Huh?"
Choi Hyena, who opened her eyes at a voice that should never have been heard, met Kang Hyunwoo's eyes at a distance that seemed like their lips would touch any moment.
And so, after three seconds of silence.
"Kyaaaaak!!!"
Inside the narrow tent, Choi Hyena's scream echoed.
***
Amidst the noisy sirens of police cars and the attention of the gathering crowd.
A man standing inside the police line threw the cigarette he was smoking on the ground.
"This is driving me crazy."
An isolated gate occurred around 7:49 PM. After reviewing the CCTV footage, two civilians were swallowed up.
No, they weren't ordinary civilians.
Both were registered mages in the Magic Tower, and one of them was even the precious Choi Hyena of the Seongbuk Choi family.
Because of that, the upper echelons of the police department were in chaos due to Choi Youngok, a 6-circle mage affiliated with the Magic Tower, who had appeared in the command room.
That's right. It was Choi Youngok, who was known as the crazy fire mage.
If her granddaughter didn't come out safely, no one could dare to predict what kind of mayhem she would cause.
Thanks to that, he, who had been assigned as the investigating officer, was caught in the crossfire of a whale fight, as the upper echelons were rushing him to resolve the situation.
If Choi Hyena didn't come out of the gate safely, he would be the first to lose his job.
Even though he had already smoked a whole pack, Inspector Go Minseok had to rack his brains.
"You've worked hard."
At that moment, a man who appeared to be affiliated with the World Hunter Association appeared on the scene, like a savior.
"Nice to meet you. I'm Yoo Seongbin, the team leader of Special Gate Team 1."
"Ah, you've arrived."
"Yes, the traffic was really bad."
Yoo Seongbin had to hold back a hollow laugh at Go Minseok's excessively humble attitude.
Well, it wasn't that he didn't understand.
It was obvious that he was the one who would be taking the fall for this incident.
"Um… but Team Leader Yoo Seongbin?"
"Yes? What's wrong?"
"What are you planning to do now?"
Inspector Go Minseok was desperate.
He had three children to support, and his wife would cook three packs of instant noodles at once.
If he lost his job at a time like this, the future of his family would be bleak.
"Well… we have to wait."
"…Yes?"
"There's no other way. We have to wait a week before we can go in and rescue them. Until then, doing this is the best we can do."
If the problem could be solved just because one team had arrived, an isolated gate wouldn't be called a special gate in the first place.
Now it was time to pray.
He could only pray that the two mages inside would survive for a week.
"Team Leader, the test results are out."
"Really? What does it say?"
The expression on the face of the staff member who had been tasked with investigating the gate's rating wasn't good.
"…It's B-class."
***
Silence fell between Kang Hyunwoo and Choi Hyena inside the narrow cave.
"…This is unfair."
Kang Hyunwoo, sitting in front of the campfire with slightly reddened cheeks, and Choi Hyena, glancing around uneasily as if she was uncomfortable.
"W, well, who told you to be naked and… hugging me…"
Choi Hyena had no choice but to cut her words short.
No matter how ashamed she was, her conscience still had some sharp edges, so she couldn't keep complaining about an action that was meant to save her life.
Besides, after Kang Hyunwoo's back came to mind as he struggled to carry her through the snowy field, even the guilt she felt about the slap she had landed as soon as she woke up soared endlessly like a winged stock.
"Haa… I saved her life, and then I'm suddenly treated like a sex offender and even slapped…"
"…"
"Well, what can I expect from a commoner? I should be grateful if I don't get hit a few more times for being a beggar."
His tone was infuriating, but everything he said was true, so she couldn't argue.
Although the process was lewd and shameful, she had to admit that her attitude towards the benefactor who had saved her life was not right.
Apologizing here was the right thing to do a hundred times over.
"I, I'm…!!"
But Choi Hyena had never apologized to anyone before.
Who would dare demand an apology from the only heir of the prestigious Seongbuk Choi family?
As a result, that simple word wouldn't come out as if it was stuck in her throat.
But as a member of the Seongbuk Choi family, she had been taught that it was a natural duty as a human to repay the kindness she received, so she steeled herself again and resolved to apologize politely.
No, she only resolved to do so.
"I, I'm… you crazy pervert!! Still, how could you take off a woman's clothes and hug her?!"
"Oh, your boobs were amazing."
"Kyaaaaah!!!"
Choi Hyena rushed at Kang Hyunwoo, screaming shrilly, but there was no way she could beat Kang Hyunwoo in a physical fight.
Rather, Choi Hyena was captured and trapped in Kang Hyunwoo's arms.
"L, let go of me…! You crazy pervert!! Won't you let go of me?!"
Kang Hyunwoo wasn't one to forgive such trivial resistance.
Kang Hyunwoo, who suppressed her resistance by hugging Choi Hyena, wore a nonchalant expression.
"Don't act up for no reason, or you'll collapse again. I'll just leave you outside next time."
"…L, let me go."
"Why, are you afraid I'll touch your boobs again?"
"…Again?"
At that moment, Kang Hyunwoo felt like he had messed up.
"You… how many times did you… while I was sleeping…!!"
Kang Hyunwoo quietly avoided her gaze and released Choi Hyena from his arms.
At that sight, Choi Hyena only wanted to rip out all the hair of that damn pervert, but she exercised superhuman patience and endured.
It was the last respect for the benefactor who saved her life.
"…By the way, where did this tent and blanket come from?"
"Secret."
He had no intention of telling Choi Hyena, who wasn't even his match, about the app.
Choi Hyena didn't seem to want to ask deeply and turned her head away.
It was unexpected.
Since mages were all crazy about curiosity, he thought that Choi Hyena's personality would lead her to persistently dig until the end.
It was surprising that she was showing the minimum level of etiquette at a time like this. It didn't seem like they were in a position to stand on ceremony anymore.
'By the way, she was mumbling strangely earlier.'
It was shocking to see Choi Hyena shedding tears while repeatedly calling for her dad.
He thought she was as strong-willed as Cheon Yeohwa.
But he could understand.
He even felt a strange sense of kinship with Choi Hyena, whose face was covered in cold sweat as if she was suffering from a terrible nightmare, not just a simple dream.
When I was young, I used to wake up screaming from dreams where my parents appeared and yelled at me.
Every time that happened, the nun would comfort me and reassure me all night, so I could fall asleep comfortably.
I realized how grateful I was for that at the time.
Come to think of it, I thought I would visit the nun once I returned to Earth, but I had forgotten about it without realizing it.
I resolved to visit her without fail once I escaped from here.
'Shall we eat something soon?'
He didn't know exactly, but he roughly felt like it was morning outside.
While he was holding Choi Hyena, he had also dozed off for a while, and he had been running like crazy in the snow yesterday, so he was quite hungry.
He calculated how many days he could last with the food left in his inventory.
Well, even if five more people were added here, he could easily last a week.
"Are you going to eat?"
"No!"
What a temper.
Is she acting like that because I said I touched her boobs earlier?
Well, I can't force someone to eat if they don't want to, so I decided to prepare only what I was going to eat for now.
Today's breakfast was seafood ramen.
I put a small crab that was being sold at a discount at the mart into boiling water along with the ramen seasoning and noodles.
Even though the lid was closed, the smell of ramen that stimulated the appetite quickly filled the cave.
Regardless of that, I had a lot of concerns about the future.
'…First of all, I need to know what kind of monsters are inhabiting the gate.'
I wanted to stay in the cave for a week and then escape, but the situation was unlikely to go so easily.
Even if the gate boss didn't move because it was protecting the core, if a mid-boss level monster appeared, this place was just a small prison with nowhere to retreat.
It was right to scout the surroundings at least.
If I only knew the gate's rating, I wouldn't have to worry this much.
*Grumble-*
"Hmm?"
Just as my head was filled with complex thoughts, my gaze turned to Choi Hyena, who was sitting with her back turned, at the familiar sound that came from somewhere.
Although I couldn't see her face, her earlobes, which were as red as her hair, seemed to be showing her expression instead.
"Are you hungry?"
"…Whatever."
"Don't be stubborn and come and eat."
If she gets hungry and collapses later, I'll have to carry her again.
Then I really feel like abandoning her.
"So come and eat."
"…"
Choi Hyena's face, which sat in front of the pot as if she was crawling, was as red as if it would burst any moment.
"…But where are the chopsticks?"
"Before that, I think we need to sort out our titles."
"What…?"
Looking at Choi Hyena, I suddenly remembered what happened at the blind date.
How dare you ruin my precious first experience?
"Call me 'Honey'."