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Chapter 7
The next morning, I woke up early and headed to a nearby park before going to work.
I had searched the internet, but I couldn’t find a suitable material to attach the dying Neofinetia to. If that was the case, wouldn’t it be better to find one myself?
I was looking for a stone covered in a moderate amount of moss. Mounting a Neofinetia on a stone was much more difficult than using a moss support, and there was a greater chance that its roots wouldn’t settle properly. But this case was different. I was certain that mounting it on a stone was the right answer.
‘Since I’m here, maybe I should take some pictures too.’
I could make a photo book based on the lake park in my neighborhood. More importantly, perhaps because the results were so good, taking pictures had genuinely become my hobby lately. Even if I took a picture of a trash can in my neighborhood, it came out looking like a work of art. How could I not enjoy it?
Click!
I carefully searched the ground, and whenever I found something that looked like it would make a good picture, I took a photo with my phone. Grass and dirt, trees and stones. As I wandered around taking pictures, I eventually forgot all about looking for a stone for the Neofinetia and found myself taking pictures of the lake surface sparkling in the morning sunlight.
Click!
“Huh?”
“Hmm?”
At that moment, someone briefly entered the frame of my camera before disappearing.
A woman wearing black athletic pants and a windbreaker with the zipper open. Beneath the pink sports bra that covered most of her upper body, her clearly defined abs were visible. They looked incredibly beautiful.
“Uh… Oppa?”
But the part that surprised me wasn’t her body. It was her face.
Wearing a white baseball cap and her long, wavy hair tied into a ponytail, she had a very familiar face.
“Sena?”
She was Yoo Sena, my high school classmate Yoo Jia’s younger sister.
“Ah, hello.”
She bowed politely while pulling her jacket together and zipping it up.
“Did you come out to exercise?”
“Yes.”
She had always seemed quiet and calm, but seeing her dressed in workout clothes gave me a completely different impression.
Wasn’t I also a former judo athlete before I retired because of an injury? Her firmly toned abs were impressive, and even though her arms and legs were covered by her clothes, I could tell they were completely free of excess fat and packed with muscle.
“Oppa, did you come out to take pictures…?”
“Well, I’m doing that too.”
Taking pictures and looking for a stone.
“Do you jog like this every day?”
“Not every day… Only when I have a free period or afternoon classes.”
I had expected her to be the diligent type, unlike the mischievous Yoo Jia.
“Alone? What about your sister?”
“She’s sleeping.”
I let out a small laugh.
Just as I expected.
“If you’re not busy, should I take a picture of you?”
“Ah, is that okay…?”
Why wouldn’t it be?
The cost of 100 won was nothing, and if the subject was a pretty college student like Sena, I’d gladly pay it.
“I’ll take it with your phone.”
“Thank you.”
Since Sena already knew how good I was at photography, it made sense for her to thank me for taking it. If it had been someone else, she probably would have thought I was some kind of pervert.
“Come over here and stand. Turn your body slightly to the side, and tilt your head like this. Raise your chin a little and look over there…”
I was giving posing instructions to my high school classmate’s younger sister.
I found the perfect spot where the morning sunlight would make her beautiful features stand out even more.
“Um, could you lower the zipper a little?”
“What!?”
Maybe that was a somewhat reckless request.
But I had absolutely no ulterior motive. I simply wanted to take a picture in which she looked as beautiful as possible.
“…This much?”
Perhaps she understood what I meant. After hesitating for a moment, Sena lowered the zipper.
Her pink sports bra became visible again.
I said I had no ulterior motives, but could I really fool myself?
It was true that my eyes were drawn to her chest. There was quite a contrast between her innocent-looking face and her surprisingly full figure.
‘Get a grip, idiot.’
As I said, she was my high school classmate’s younger sister. Looking at her that way would be disrespectful to the subject.
Whoosh.
Just then, the wind blew at exactly the right moment.
Her neatly tied ponytail swayed gently, and I didn’t miss the timing.
Click!
“…”
As soon as the photo was taken, Sena zipped her jacket all the way up to her neck.
She had been running with it completely open before meeting me.
‘Well, there is a big difference when someone you know is around.’
“Um… Does it look good?”
She cautiously approached and asked.
I answered with admiration.
“It’s really pretty…”
“W-What!?”
Her eyes widened, and then her face turned red.
I showed her the picture on her phone and said again,
“Don’t you think you came out really pretty?”
“Wow…!”
Of course, she couldn’t help but be impressed too.
She was already beautiful, and the right lighting and angle, combined with the movement created by the wind, had turned the photo into a perfect piece of art.
“Thank you so much!”
“Ah~ That was rewarding.”
Sena blushed again when she saw me grinning.
Perhaps she was still embarrassed by the picture with her sports bra showing. My classmate’s younger sister bowed politely and then started running along the trail again.
“Ugh!”
I brought the stone I had picked up from the park into the bathroom.
I had practically dug it out of the ground. A moderate amount of moss covered the top, making it look suitable for mounting the Neofinetia.
Whooshhh.
I carefully washed the dirt off the bottom with the shower.
Once it was cleaned up, I planned to place it on a suitable stand and attach the Neofinetia to it.
♪♩♪♬
Just as I finished washing the dirt away, my phone, which I had left outside, rang.
I put in my earphones and turned the shower back on.
Whooshhh.
“Hello?”
“Hey, I heard you met my sister today?”
Ah, Yoo Jia.
Whooshhh.
“Yeah. She was jogging in the park.”
“You asked her to let you take a picture of her, didn’t you?!”
“Yeah.”
The way she put it sounded a little strange, but it was true.
Whooshhh.
“Who gave you permission to take a picture of someone else’s sister… Hey! What are you doing? It’s so freaking loud!”
“I’m taking a shower right now. I’ll call you back later.”
Was she an overprotective sister?
It was annoying, but I decided to call her again after I finished washing the stone.
I left the clean stone on the balcony so the water would dry, then called Yoo Jia on my way to work.
“Why? Did you call because I took a picture of your sister?”
“You’re not stalking Sena, are you?!”
“What stalking? I went out to look for something and happened to run into her.”
She was making me sound like a stalker.
“Hey, don’t try anything with my sister just because she’s nice. Just because Sena can’t bring herself to say something unpleasant to other people doesn’t mean you can hit on her whenever you want.”
“Why are you telling me that? I only took one picture of her!”
“No, no. A woman’s intuition is telling me very strongly. If you keep hitting on Sena, I’m not going to let it slide.”
Putting aside how unfair that was, if Sena and I ever wanted to see each other, that would be between the two of us.
Even if Yoo Jia was her sister, what right did she have to order me around?
“Okay. We really just happened to meet, so don’t misunderstand. I have to get to work, so I’ll hang up~”
But I couldn’t be bothered to argue, so I ended the call.
Sena was pretty.
But that didn’t mean I wanted to date my classmate’s younger sister.
In the first place, I had spent all my time focusing on sports, so I had never really thought about dating.
Sure, it would be nice. Dating a pretty younger college student like Sena would certainly be enjoyable.
‘But it sounds like a hassle.’
Especially with Yoo Jia involved. That made it even more troublesome.
As soon as I got home from work, I quickly attached the Neofinetia to the moss-covered stone.
I didn’t even have to think about how to do it. My hands moved on their own, and the Neofinetia’s roots were attached quite neatly.
Spritz.
I filled a spray bottle I had at home with water and sprayed an appropriate amount.
Winter was approaching, and the weather was becoming drier. Rather than putting it out on the balcony, I decided to keep it in my room, watch it carefully, and take care of it whenever necessary.
“Right, I need to send a picture.”
I had promised the owner of the Neofinetia that I would send a picture every day.
Even though there was no need to make such an effort, my professional-level photography skills came into play again. The seven pictures of the Neofinetia taken from various angles were so good that it almost felt wasteful to send them for free.
-I’m amazed! The pictures are incredible. I look forward to working with you from now on, sir!
The reply came less than four seconds after I sent the pictures.
He must have been anxiously waiting for them.
But now there was almost nothing left for me to do.
As long as I managed the humidity properly, it would settle in and adapt on its own. Once it could survive without my care, I could return it and receive the remaining 300,000 won.
“Wait a second…”
= = =
[Third Hobby: Gardening]
-Description: All plants you care for will remain in optimal condition, and you can accelerate their growth.
-Maximum number of plants that can be affected simultaneously: 2 pots
= = =
At present, I could take care of two potted plants at the same time.
And in reality, once a plant was properly set up, it only needed occasional care afterward.
Then wouldn’t it be better to take on another job?
If I took care of two pots at once, my income would double.
[Quest (Gardening): Take care of a plant owned by someone else.]
On top of that, I could complete the repeatable quest.
Increase the limit, then take care of several pots at the same time, increase my income, and repeat forever.
‘I’ve completed the perfect cycle of passive income..!’
When I went to work tomorrow, I should ask Ms. Cha if there was anyone else who wanted me to take care of their plants.
“Hmm…”
I could expand my gardening hobby that way, but what should I do about the other two?
To obtain a new hobby, I had to complete the newly unlocked coding and photography quests.
[Quest (Coding): Create a simple program, distribute it through donations, and earn more than 1 million won in revenue.]
I had been thinking about it whenever I had free time, but I didn’t have any particularly good ideas.
I didn’t even have a sense of how far coding could take me in the first place.
Right now, I had the skills, but I lacked any real depth in the field of coding itself, so I couldn’t create something truly original on my own.
‘I’ll put coding on hold for now.’
Photography was somewhat easier to figure out, but the problem was that the category was too broad.
Since everything I photographed came out well, it seemed like anything would work. Still, to make a photo book, I needed to choose a single theme.
‘The park is kind of boring.’
The photos looked great, but would anyone actually buy them?
No matter how impressive a photograph was, once it entered the world of the internet, there were countless pictures just as good.
I needed photographs attractive enough that people would actually pay for them.
Who would care if I said, ‘This is the lake park in my neighborhood’?
‘I need a really killer theme.’
I needed a subject that would make people think, just from hearing the title, I want to see this.
“Hmm…”
There was one idea that came to mind, but it wasn’t possible.
A photo book featuring Yoo Jia’s younger sister, Sena, whom I had photographed that morning.
‘Get a grip.’
No.
There was no way Sena would agree, and if Yoo Jia found out, she’d kill me.
However, the idea of using a model seemed good.
It would probably have more demand than ordinary landscape photography, and if I used a beautiful model comparable to Sena, it would attract much more attention.
“Let’s see… How much do models cost?”
The industry was surprisingly accessible.
When I searched social media, I found people who were willing to model for free as long as they could share the finished results.
But if I wanted to sell a photo book, I would need to own the rights to the photographs completely.
So using someone for free wouldn’t work.
There were quite a few non-professional models who charged between 50,000 and 100,000 won per hour.
“Wow, this person shows a lot of skin…”
As I kept scrolling down with the mouse wheel, I found all kinds of people.
Being pretty was practically a requirement, and although some pictures seemed to have been edited, most of them had excellent faces and figures.
Among them, people who did game or anime cosplay tended to have particularly revealing outfits.
I wasn’t specifically looking for that, but if I wanted to sell a photo book, wouldn’t this category be easier?
‘Should I send a DM?’
After thinking it over carefully, I sent a message to one model whose photos were relatively modest but who had uploaded a large number of pictures.
-Hello. May I ask how much you charge for modeling?
