“Look at this! His front paws are so squishy! Oh my god, his little toe beans are pink!”
Jeong Iseul had been squealing non-stop while carrying Alt the entire way, and she finally went ahead and blew a raspberry right into his soft, round white belly. Startled, Alt’s eyes flew wide open as he flailed his chubby little front paws.
Those tiny paws slashing desperately through the air were doing their best to look threatening, but since the one on the receiving end looked far too happy about it, the whole thing came across less as an attack and more like an adorable little performance.
“Kyao!”
“How is being slapped in the face this brave and cute at the same time?!”
“Gyaoo! Gyagya—!”
“You’re pretty good at bonking too! You’ve got the makings of a general, you!”
Jeong Iseul’s giddy voice bounced and echoed through the ruins of the alleyway. The surroundings alone were the kind of street where it wouldn’t be strange for a monster to leap out at any moment — yet somehow, just that little corner of it felt oddly like a pet café.
<Alt Lv.1>
Maybe because he was only level 1, but despite being a dragon in name, his punches were utterly ineffective. Then again, that was just as much proof of how high Jeong Iseul’s base stats were.
“N-noona! He’s eating my head!”
“Ahaha, let him! Kids are supposed to be fed until they’re full, you know!”
“Why do you only get self-sacrificing at times like this?!”
I let out a small sigh as I watched Alt chomp down repeatedly on Jeong Iseul’s head with his mouth wide open. Even while attacking her, Alt kept glancing over at me.
More precisely — even as he was punishing Jeong Iseul, it seemed like he was checking to make sure I was watching properly. His eyes sparkled like a puppy desperate to be praised.
Alt really did seem to consider me, an NPC, as his owner. While he made no effort to hide his hostility toward Jeong Iseul and the other members, he was perfectly content to flash his most adorable puppy-dog eyes at me.
As someone who had never intended to take Alt on as a pet, this was awkward in more ways than one.
It wasn’t that I disliked Alt.
Honestly, he was cute.
Entirely white, round all over, pointlessly full of himself, and acting as if he had no idea just how small he was.
The problem was that being cute and being manageable were two entirely different things.
Seo Wonil, who had been guarding the rear and keeping watch, came up beside me. He’d been on high alert, keeping an eye on the monsters standing at a distance and watching us — just in case any of them suddenly decided to charge. Kim Seokju, walking at the very front, was doing the same.
Seo Wonil stopped beside me and glanced over.
“Why do you look like that?”
I looked up at him, then let out another sigh.
“I suppose I’m just a little caught off guard by this unexpected extra mouth to feed.”
“Unexpected? You paid Coins for it yourself — what are you talking about?”
I couldn’t tell Seo Wonil everything that was on my mind as he looked at me in puzzlement.
I never planned on making it my pet.
I had been fully intending to find a suitable Player to adopt Alt — so having him suddenly hatch like this left my head spinning.
Because the thing was…
The main diet of a pet is the ‘mana’ that Players possess. And I, as an NPC, have no mana.
He could apparently eat regular human food just fine, but that was nothing more than a snack.
The primary meal was mana — supplied by the owner, the Player.
How was I, someone who had no mana stat whatsoever, supposed to feed Alt?
This wasn’t simply a matter of feeding costs being expensive, or childcare being a hassle. The real question was whether I, at a fundamental system level, was even capable of properly fulfilling the role of Alt’s owner.
A Player could just channel mana into him, but I was an NPC.
My status window didn’t have a mana stat to begin with, and there was no way to force out a number that didn’t exist.
But handing him off to someone else to feed didn’t seem likely to work either — Alt would probably only follow me — and it wasn’t even clear whether a non-owner Player was allowed to feed him at all.
What if he dies within a few days because of this?
Since I’d never heard of a pet choosing an NPC as its owner, I had no idea where to even begin.
Seo Wonil seemed to have slightly misread the worry on my face.
“You’re going to have to stick close to us.”
“Hm?”
When I looked up at him, pulling myself out of my thoughts, he nodded in Alt’s direction — Alt, who was still patting Jeong Iseul on the head with the bottom of his paw.
“I figured it out back when you casually raided the ingredients and made kimchi jjigae, but seeing you buy a pet that size without a second thought really drives it home. You’re loaded with Coins.”
It seemed like he thought I’d bought a pet on a whim just because I had Coins to spare.
Seo Wonil’s gaze shifted to the monsters watching us from a distance. The monsters that made eye contact with him bared their teeth and radiated killing intent — but perhaps because I was nearby, none of them dared approach. Did those monsters think I was being held hostage by Seo Wonil?
“Monsters keep their distance on their own, sure — but Players are different. Once people find out you’ve got a lot of Coins but a low level, you’ll have people trying to shake you down one way or another.”
He wasn’t wrong.
In a world where your level determined your standing, the lower-leveled you were, the more you had to watch out for — not just monsters, but people too.
“That’s exactly why I decided to join your team.”
I glanced toward Kim Seokju at the front and smiled faintly.
“It’s mutually convenient, isn’t it? We use each other.”
I had taken stock of Kim Seokju’s character the moment I laid eyes on him.
A gentle leader.
Someone with great capacity for others — the type to embrace even useless members as family, and who, when the situation demanded it, was willing to make sacrifices himself.
A person like that wouldn’t be able to easily turn away from someone once he’d let them into his circle.
Even if that someone was nothing more than bait to get Eclipse.
I would use Kim Seokju and his group as a shield against other Players, and they would use me as the key to joining Eclipse.
That’s what you’d call a fair exchange.
Whether or not he’d read my thoughts, Seo Wonil narrowed his brows and said seriously:
“It’s true we agreed to team up because of your skill — but even if the Eclipse merger falls through, we have no intention of going our separate ways. We’ll still consider you a member and stay by your side.”
“Because of my skill?”
“Nothing to do with the skill. Once someone’s in, we never turn our back on them. …Though it seems like it wasn’t the same for the ones who left before.”
There was a bitter edge to that last part.
Having watched firsthand what words were exchanged and how the former members had walked out of the hideout — he had every reason to feel conflicted.
Starting with Seo Wonil, then Woo Jaekyung and Jeong Iseul, and beyond them, Kim Seokju.
I took a quiet moment to look at each of them in turn.
“Now I get why you guys let those people walk all over you.”
All four of them sharing that kind of mindset — that’s probably why they kept getting used and then abandoned.
Still, I like it.
At least these people didn’t seem like the type to betray anyone.
I gave Seo Wonil a slightly exaggerated shrug.
“Don’t worry. I have no intention of flashing my Coins around in front of other Players.”
“That thing alone is already flashing them.”
“That was… beyond my control.”
What was I supposed to do — he’d already hatched.
Just looking at Alt was enough to make me sigh, but oblivious to how I felt, he was already flying toward me with full enthusiasm. An all-white dragon roughly the size of a medium dog, flapping his palm-sized wings and barreling toward me in a full Superman pose — honestly, even I had to admit he was pretty cute.
“Gyaoo— Gyagyak!”
Alt came fluttering over and landed right on top of my head.
…Or rather, it was more like he’d clasped his front paws together, pressed his face against my head, and was dangling there. That sent all the weight tilting backward, nearly snapping my neck clean off.
“Gyahuhuh, Gyarreung!”
Alt rubbed his face all over the top of my head with reckless abandon. My head swayed limply back and forth with every motion.
I gave up and pulled a Lightweight Potion out of my Subspace bag, then splashed it over Alt’s head. Since Lightweight Potion evaporates on contact, it didn’t drip down onto me.
“Pureung! Pukya!”
Hit by the Lightweight Potion, Alt shuddered all over — and his weight instantly dropped to almost nothing. About as heavy as a military helmet now, which was manageable enough.
Seo Wonil, who had been watching, made a faintly complicated expression.
“…Normally, that’s what people call flashing.”
“Better than snapping my neck.”
Lightweight Potions weren’t cheap, but protecting my neck was worth it.
“It doesn’t matter anymore anyway. I think we’re here.”
Kim Seokju turned back toward us and pointed at something. Where his gaze landed stood a fairly clean-looking villa — the kind that clearly housed a lot of people.
Eclipse’s hideout.
