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Chapter 16
The Healer Who Gives Without Holding Back
A crisis had arrived where flies might start buzzing around my future potion shop.
[Well, there’s no problem with it, so why worry?]
‘Are you sure? You’re certain it’s safe to drink?’
Just then, Lee Haesol asked,
“Is it okay to drink this?”
Erich answered calmly.
[If anything, it’s good. There’s nothing bad about it.]
‘Th-then that’s fine.’
“Yeah, you can drink it. It just sparkles a bit. The effect is the same.”
“I see.”
He must have come to ask because it was different from other lowest-grade potions, and that made him uneasy.
His expression was calm, and I didn’t sense any bad feelings toward me.
I liked that straightforwardness.
Lee Haesol had a strong presence in class, having even been the grade representative, but compared to that attention, he himself was a very quiet person.
‘It can’t be helped, given his situation.’
He was cursed.
Strictly speaking, it was a curse he put on himself. In exchange for producing A-rank performance with B-rank mana, he accepted a penalty. I think it was something his family, desperate for an S-rank, had recommended.
Even so, considering that curse, it was important that he trusted my potion.
‘Maybe I don’t need to worry.’
I’d noticed earlier that he was the one who told the others about my potion’s effects before I handed them out.
I smiled gently and said,
“You don’t need to worry about side effects. I’m not sure how strong the effect will be, though.”
The more I talked myself down, the stranger it was—everyone else went quiet.
Even now, Lee Haesol’s expression twisted very slightly at my words.
As if he’d heard something upsetting.
Anyway.
I kept confirming, like this, that Hunter Academy students were generally kind-hearted.
Of course, I knew those reactions came because I kept emphasizing that I knew my place.
“Do you want me to give you more, if you need it?”
I asked first.
He thought for a moment, then said quietly,
“No.”
And he tucked the potion into his clothes.
Thinking the conversation was over, I tried to close the box, but Lee Haesol stepped closer.
As he approached, a cold, silvery mana seemed to draw near with him.
The chill unique to ice-type mana.
It was flowing out from Lee Haesol.
“But.”
His voice dropped lower.
“Were you in the workshop until late yesterday?”
I paused.
How did he know? It wasn’t Yoo Hanseong.
We weren’t close enough for that.
“How do you know I stayed late yesterday?”
“……I saw you, by chance. And after that, I saw you often.”
“Late at night?”
“Yeah. I come out to practice pretty often too.”
“At the old school building?”
“I was just passing by there. I practice in this building.”
“Ah!”
I remembered.
Lee Haesol was a practice addict.
Before becoming S-rank, he trained desperately every day out of his own sense of responsibility.
He even did physical training diligently.
It seemed I’d caught the eye of another practice addict.
“If Hanseong had seen you, he’d probably have thought it was interesting. Another person like me.”
When I muttered with a smile, Lee Haesol tilted his head.
“Hanseong?”
“Yeah. He asked why I practiced so hard.”
“What did you say?”
We started walking together as we talked.
I felt the gazes in the hallway slowly disperse.
“I said that since I’m F-rank, I need to work harder.”
Lee Haesol fell silent for a moment and lowered his eyes slightly.
Then he said,
“Isn’t it more normal to practice healing than manufacturing?”
[That’s what I was wondering too.]
Ignoring Erich’s comment, I answered,
“I’m not good at healing.”
Thinking of the unnecessary extra word attached to my heal skill.
“You’re… not good at healing?”
Lee Haesol asked, looking genuinely confused.
For an F-rank, you could only use it three times, but normally the issue was the number of uses, not activating it.
“It’s also just my preference.”
[You’ve got no intention of answering properly, huh. Tsk.]
I let Erich’s grumbling go in one ear and out the other.
But my heal wasn’t just a heal—it was called “Reverse Heal.” I’d never even seen it in the original story. The description was vague, and the rank was low too.
“So I’m trying to at least get manufacturing right.”
Lee Haesol lightly bit his lip.
“I see.”
After a brief silence, he spoke again.
“But still, staying out too late…”
He trailed off and lowered his gaze.
His expression softened in an odd way.
That look felt… ambiguous.
‘Aren’t we not that close?’
Why did it look like the concern of a worried friend?
‘Ugh, maybe he’s just worrying regardless of closeness.’
I swallowed a sigh and smiled quietly.
“It’s fine! No one goes there anyway. You know the old building has unstable mana.”
I carefully folded the box and tucked it under my arm.
“And if someone did come there, it’d probably only be to suggest a party. But as you know, there’s no way anyone would want to put me in a party.”
As I said that, a small breath of relief mixed into my chest.
Yeah. No one should need me.
That’s the safest way.
Then Lee Haesol suddenly said,
“……I wonder.”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
My voice dropped without me realizing it.
Lee Haesol stared at my face for a while, then turned his head away.
He silently tightened his grip on the potion.
Silvery mana flickered with his movement. Why had he been leaking mana this whole time?
I was curious, but as an F-rank who wouldn’t normally sense mana this sharply without Erich, I didn’t ask.
Unnecessary interest wasn’t welcome.
“……No. You’ll find out soon enough.”
He muttered briefly and stepped back.
“You said you were going down, right? Go on ahead.”
I nodded.
“Mm.”
And slowly walked down the hallway.
The feeling of his presence fading backward lingered strangely.
…What was that?
Erich laughed low.
[What do you think? He’s saying that after seeing your potion’s effect.]
I waved it off in my mind.
‘No. Not yet.’
[Not yet? Even if they don’t say it, plenty of people are already shocked by your potion’s effect.]
‘Isn’t that an exaggeration?’
I’d used it myself and given it out.
The sparkle was unexpected, but the effect itself was exactly what I’d expected.
But Erich seemed to think differently.
“What is it?”
When I asked out loud in frustration, Erich replied slyly,
[Looks like that person will tell you.]
‘That person?’
“Um.”
In front of an empty classroom.
The person everyone in Class 8 would unanimously vote as the most angelic-looking was standing there.
I looked at her in confusion.
Yoo Hee.
We’d at least exchanged greetings before.
Still, a lot of people were talking to me today.
Even if it was because of the potion, wasn’t this too much?
“Uh, hi. What’s up?”
Her gaze briefly flicked to the box in my hands.
Catching that, I barely managed to stop my mouth from falling open.
Was it really because of the potion?
“Hari, um…”
Hee smiled slightly.
“Could you walk with me for a bit?”
This kind of flow wasn’t good.
Yoo Hee was dangerous.
She was an assassin—my second-favorite character I only wanted to watch from afar.
But running away would be strange too.
“Oh, why?”
“I have something to say, just the two of us. Is that okay?”
She lightly tugged at my arm.
Her fingertips were warmer than I expected.
‘These hands belong to the record holder for the most kills in her family?’
Yoo Hee being from an assassin family was revealed midway through the original story.
Before that, she was described as angelic but suspicious.
So I couldn’t act like I knew, but her touch was so gentle that it was hard to hide my awkwardness.
So, for now—
“Then… um, have you eaten lunch?”
She tilted her head slightly without blinking, then smiled like an angel.
“Not yet.”
“Then let’s go together. We can talk while eating, right?”
“Let’s eat and talk. If you’re okay with it, I’ll buy coffee.”
The school café even had private spaces.
Watching Yoo Hee twist her hair slowly around her fingers while gazing at me, I swallowed.
Then I nodded.
“Alright. Then let’s just get a brunch menu and eat there.”
“Thanks. That’s a good idea.”
After throwing the box into the classroom trash can, Hee immediately came back to my side.
‘Erich.’
[What.]
‘Is the reason she’s acting this friendly really my sparkling potion?’
[If you won’t believe it, why ask?]
‘I need to believe it to believe it. It was definitely just a potion.’
[You lack common knowledge from only practicing short-term attributes. That “sparkle” you’re talking about is a trait recorded in books. There are precedents.]
‘What?’
[Don’t you know? Potions that came out of dungeons.]
Potions that came out of dungeons…
There was no way that meant nothing.
