Solo Swordmaster - Chapter 84

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

Chapter 84: Yoo Nakyeong Saw It

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[Hmm...]

In Rimon’s room at the Leviathan Hotel, a baby bird still covered in down was busily bobbing its head atop the desk.

Tap, tap-tap, tap-tap-tap.

Like an artisan carving a Buddhist statue, it painstakingly used its beak to shape a piece of snack into a pretty flower.

After finally completing a misshapen flower with four petals, Yoo Na-gyeong gulped down the piece of snack she had been pecking at.

Then she muttered.

[The Team Leader sure is busy.]

After the disaster at Black Dragon Construction caused by unidentified killers, the Black Dragon Clan had been moving frantically.

Whether to avenge a cousin or to restore their honor, Wang Gi-neung had mobilized the Shanghai Wang Family’s full strength to find the killers. Most of the other Black Dragon Clan members were helping with the investigation, at least indirectly.

They still had their normal work as companies to handle as well, so everyone had no choice but to stay busy.

Rimon was no exception.

After stopping the killers’ second attack, he had been running around nonstop, predicting their targets and preparing for further attacks.

And as his predictions kept proving correct, more subsidiaries had quietly joined Guardian, leaving Rimon even busier.

[Tch, he could’ve taken me along too.]

Thanks to that, Yoo Na-gyeong was bored.

Rimon had left her behind, so she had spent several days cooped up in the room, doing nothing but staring at her smartphone.

Maybe a room-bound recluse would not mind.

But for someone who liked noise and excitement, who would make up things to do just so she could go out, there could be no greater torment.

[...

Should I go check on the kids again?]

That was why Yoo Na-gyeong quietly left the room.

If she stayed shut inside any longer, she would suffocate. She might even start growing mold.

Of course, Rimon’s door was firmly closed, but that was no obstacle to her.

[Hup!]

Pop!

The Yoo Na-gyeong who had been on the desk suddenly appeared outside the door.

Having grown a little, her spatial teleportation ability had improved tremendously since the first time she escaped from the zoo enclosure.

[Still, it’s strange.]

Yoo Na-gyeong tilted her head.

[The Team Leader said he’d already trashed the Serpent That Joins the Ends. So why can I still use spatial teleportation?]

Yoo Na-gyeong had once been a high-level Player capable of spatial teleportation, but that was in her previous life.

She had died and reincarnated. The Constellation she had contracted with was gone as well. Normally, she should no longer have been able to use Skills.

Skills came from Constellations, after all.

Yet she could still use spatial teleportation.

Honestly, it was strange.

[Well, as long as I can use it, that’s good enough.]

But she only dwelled on it for a moment.

Perhaps because she was naturally optimistic.

Or perhaps because she just had a simple brain.

Either way, Yoo Na-gyeong quickly let the matter go. She scurried along, teleporting again and again as she headed for the childcare facility inside Leviathan.

[Hmm, the kids are doing well.]

Yoo Na-gyeong peeked out from beyond a window.

Seeing the children reading books or running around and playing, she smiled fondly.

[It does feel a little emptier... but kids still need to go to school. Yeah.]

Only the youngest children remained.

Thinking of Seong Sia and the other children who would be at school by now, Yoo Na-gyeong looked disappointed.

Her range had increased from before, but it was still only ten meters at most.

Even getting around Leviathan was difficult with her little scurrying steps. Checking on the children at school was impossible.

[If I could fly, I could get around by myself... When am I ever going to grow up?]

Wanting to grow up quickly was supposed to be the privilege of little children. Why did she have to worry about such things?

Yoo Na-gyeong let out a deep sigh, then continued watching the children with affectionate eyes.

That was when she met one child’s wide-eyed gaze.

“Huh? A bird!”

[Ah!]

Had she been too absorbed in watching?

Despite having been a PAB agent in her previous life, Yoo Na-gyeong had been caught while lying in wait. She quickly pulled back her neck.

Hoping the child would decide they had seen wrong and let it go.

“Birdie, play with me!”

But Yoo Na-gyeong’s wish was futile. Like a runaway train, the child came pitter-patter-pattering straight toward her.

[Emergency escape!]

Pop!

“Huh? Birdie? Where did it go?”

Yoo Na-gyeong fled in the end.

If it had been a complete stranger, that would have been one thing. But if she got involved with the orphanage children she had often met in her past life, they might discover her identity.

[Whew, that was close. I almost died.]

...

Of course, she had also felt a more immediate threat to her safety.

Yoo Na-gyeong loved all her younger siblings from the orphanage. But she was not so doting that she expected toddlers who had just learned to walk to control their strength.

She knew all too well how wildly children handled toys.

[Did I panic too much? I didn’t need to come all the way to the practice room.]

Yoo Na-gyeong scratched the feathers on her head.

Trying to flee somewhere safe, she had unconsciously come to the practice room she often visited with Rimon.

Then as now, “the safest place” had always been practically synonymous with “where Rimon is” to her.

The irony was that Yoo Na-gyeong had died by Rimon’s sword in her previous life.

[Hmm, I don’t really want to go back to see the kids just yet.]

She only thought for a moment before turning her head.

Seeing the case that held the Pitch-Black Violin in the back of the practice room, she looked regretful.

[If the Team Leader were here, I’d pester him to play something.]

After Rimon acquired the Pitch-Black Violin, Yoo Na-gyeong had heard him play it more than anyone.

Still, she always wished he would play the Pitch-Black Violin more often.

Rimon’s skill had improved by leaps and bounds, but his performances with the Pitch-Black Violin were on an entirely different level.

[He said he’d stop practicing so obsessively. Does that mean I’ll have even fewer chances to hear it from now on?]

Yoo Na-gyeong crossed her wings like arms.

She stared at the case for a while before opening her beak without realizing it.

[...

What a waste.]

She did not really believe Rimon’s ambition to produce performances as good as the Pitch-Black Violin through skill alone, an ambition so grand it might as well have shipped out on a deep-sea trawler.

But she had heard Rimon play more than anyone.

And she knew his insane talent.

So Yoo Na-gyeong found herself wondering.

The possibility was small, but if Rimon truly attained the level of skill he wanted, what sort of sound would the Pitch-Black Violin make?

[The Team Leader is immortal, so maybe someday he’ll really be able to play what he wants... But will it happen before I die again?]

How long did birds live, anyway?

Yoo Na-gyeong thought about it for a while, then let out a small laugh.

She had not even lived out her natural lifespan as a human, yet here she was, reborn as a bird and calculating her lifespan. It suddenly seemed absurd.

[Well, what does it matter? This life is a bonus anyway.]

Giggling, she turned around.

There was nothing more to see. She was thinking it was about time to return to her room.

[Huh?]

Yoo Na-gyeong’s eyes widened.

The moment she turned around, their eyes met.

A strangely familiar girl was standing right behind her, staring at her blankly.

[Huh?]

Startled that she had not noticed the girl until she had come right up behind her, Yoo Na-gyeong took a step back and blinked.

There was something strange about the girl.

Her feet floated in midair.

Her body was transparent enough to see through.

And her eyes looked oddly empty.

[Huhhh?]

As Yoo Na-gyeong tilted her head at the girl’s strangely unreal appearance, the girl’s form slowly vanished.

As if she had never existed in the first place.

Or as if she were a being without a body.

And the moment Yoo Na-gyeong finally remembered what such beings were usually called.

[Aaaaaah! A, a ghost!?]

The thunderous telepathic wave that burst from the telepathy item shook the entire practice room.

* * *

“So.”

His headache had already faded, but Rimon rubbed his temples for a moment.

Then he continued, staring coolly at the still-downy bluebird.

“You sent your already busy team leader a remote telepathic message strong enough to rattle my brain out of nowhere, and that’s all you have to say?”

[What do you mean, that’s all? I said a ghost appeared, a ghost!]

Yoo Na-gyeong cried out indignantly.

But Rimon’s reaction was lukewarm.

“So what am I supposed to do about it?”

[Ah, damn it! Believe me! I saw it clearly with my own two eyes!]

“I never said I didn’t believe you.”

[What?]

“I believe a ghost appeared. I just don’t see why it’s surprising.”

[...

Team Leader, a ghost appeared and you’re not surprised?]

Looking at Yoo Na-gyeong’s incredulous expression, Rimon looked even more incredulous as he asked back.

“Na-gyeong, do you know what you call someone who died, then comes back to appear in front of people and talk?”

[That’s a ghost, isn’t it?]

“Then can a ghost see another ghost or not?”

[Of course it can.]

“Exactly. So why should I be surprised by something so obvious?”

[...???]

Yoo Na-gyeong blinked several times, wondering what he meant.

Only a beat later did she grasp the meaning behind Rimon’s words. She hopped up and down, crying out sharply.

[I’m not a ghost, I’m a reincarnator!]

“Either way, you died and came back. Same thing.”

[What kind of nonsense is that!?]

“That’s how the truths of life always sound.”

At that shameless answer, Yoo Na-gyeong began stamping her feet. Rimon paid her no mind.

Having dealt with everything from zombies to demons whenever he purged black mages, one ghost sighting was nothing new to him.

Still, that did not mean he dismissed Yoo Na-gyeong’s account entirely.

‘Hmm, the Leviathan Hotel is not somewhere an ordinary wandering ghost could enter.’

Modern buildings constructed through Players’ Construction Skills might be different.

But the Leviathan Hotel had been built in the traditional manner. Those traditions included the Seven Dragons Society’s formation arrays and the temple’s barriers.

Without such measures, Leviathan was exactly the sort of place that would become a ghost den crawling with vengeful spirits.

‘Even so, if a ghost appeared... it is one of two things. Either what Na-gyeong saw was not a ghost, or it hitched a ride on something.’

Still, an old hand was an old hand.

Rimon immediately identified how a ghost could have appeared even within Leviathan.

And he also knew what powerful magical tool could have served as the medium that carried a ghost past the barriers and into Leviathan.

“A cursed instrument and a ghost. That’s a damn fitting combination.”

Rimon frowned at the case holding the Pitch-Black Violin.

Hearing that, Yoo Na-gyeong was alarmed.

[What? Wait! Are you saying that ghost is attached to your violin!?]

“It is not certain. It is only one possibility. But...”

[But what!?]

“I told you I sensed a strange presence whenever I played that violin. If that was the ghost’s presence, it would make sense.”