CH 201

Brr! Bang!

From one side of the room, gunshots could be heard, but, of course, they weren’t real. Instead, in between the mechanical-sounding gunshots were familiar game taglines, such as, ‘Fire in the Hole!’

‘An FPS game?’

Since DIO’s proliferation worldwide, the gaming industry, or games that weren’t DIO, had considerably diminished.

Unsurprisingly, though, quite a few people felt burdened by fighting or conducting battles in virtual reality due to the immense difficulty. So, multiple other games still operated; however, it was still a weird sight to see someone playing a game other than DIO.

“Uhm, are you Byun Miri?”

When Dongsoo called out the name he had read earlier in the will, a sharp voice responded.

“It’s not Byun Miri; it’s Lea Schmidt! Moreover, I have nothing to say to you, so get out of here!”

“I can’t. You’re underage and need a guardian….”

Dongsoo spoke calmly, but Miri responded by shouting, “I said go away! You’re after money! I have no interest in that family’s property, so take everything and disappear! Oh, right, did you want this house, too? I’ll purchase it from you. The officially announced price is 1.1 billion won, but I’ll be considerate and give you 1.5 billion won. That works, right?”

This wasn’t the type of tone or wording a high school girl would typically use. Furthermore, as a teenager, she couldn’t possibly have that much money, Dongsoo thought, ‘Even if she did, that doesn’t change the fact that she’s still a minor.’

Click.

Hence, Dongsoo used the key enclosed in the will to open the door and enter Miri’s room.

“What the hell? Don’t come in!”

Miri shouted in an angered and aggressive tone, but Dongsoo didn’t mind as he looked around.

“This place is a mess.”

Miri’s room was a pigpen. There were instant cup noodle bowls discarded haphazardly throughout the area, clothes strewn across the floor, and rubbish littering every space in between. Yet, even within that chaotic area, the messiest thing was the girl in the middle of the room.

“This… is terrible.”

Miri’s hair was unkept, dragged on the ground, and covered in a film of grease as if she hadn’t washed it in a long time. Though it was hard to see the extent of her hygiene issues just by looking at her, Dongsoo could smell a terrible stench emanating from her body. She epitomized the classic case of a shut-in.

Bang.

Miri- no, Lea Schmidt flinched at the sight of Dongsoo promptly turning around and leaving the apartment. If Dongsoo tried arguing or attempted to drag her out, she was planning on beating him up, but he just walked away, which momentarily put Lea at a loss.

Though her front door was left unlocked, Lea felt no fear. She didn’t eat anything nutritious, which heavily contributed to her skinniness. However, despite her physique, she could easily fend off three to four adult men.

Lea didn’t possess overwhelming muscular strength, but she did have an inhumanly fast and accurate sense of perception and a battle instinct that allowed her to take advantage of everything around her. Just as Yongno could easily deal with strongmen who trained in all forms of martial arts, Lea, even at her young age, could handle most situations by herself as long as a gun wasn’t trained on her at point-blank range.

Click.

“W-what?”

Exactly thirty minutes later, Dongsoo returned. In his hands were a broom and rag, tens of garbage bags, and all sorts of cleaning supplies.

“It’ll get dusty in here, so I’m going to open the windows.”

“Eh? Huh?”

Regardless of Lea’s reaction, Dongsoo started cleaning.

Dongsoo opened all the windows and started tossing the small mountain of garbage into the bags he had brought. Much of the trash came from delivery food, such as paper bags and wrappers, to plastic bags and containers; Dongsoo collected all this trash and separated it into recyclables and general waste. The sheer volume of the garbage was immense. More than ten 50-liter bags had to be thrown away.

“Tsk. So much dust.”

“Hey. Wait. What are you doing?”

“If you’re not going to get up, at least roll to the side. You’re getting in my way.”

“What?”

Dongsoo overturned the house, starting with the living room. He got rid of all the garbage and put everything else where it belonged. After sweeping, he went over the entire apartment with a vacuum cleaner, which he found buried in the corner of the house. Then, Dongsoo wiped the floors with a mop and finished with a hand rag, which he had to wash eight times.

Whoosh!

He even cleaned the bathroom, which smelled god-awful. First, he threw hot water on every surface, wiped off the dirt and scum in the bathtub with a cleaning solution, and removed any mold by spraying bleach. With that done, he moved on to wipe the sink’s faucet with a hand rag and applied baking powder in the sink basin to remove the stains. Then, he placed toilet paper all around the toilet bowl and sprayed deodorant and cleaning solution on it, leaving it to sit and soak for about an hour.

“W-what’s up with you? Why are you so good at this? Are you some sort of professional cleaner?”

Lea muttered in bewilderment, but Dongsoo pretended not to hear. He cleaned with such fervor and concentration that his forehead started dripping with sweat.

“This is leftover Coke, right?”

“Uh, yeah. It came with the chicken I ordered….”

Glug, glug, glug!

“Eh? Hey… why are you emptying it down the toilet!”

“I’m using it to remove the last bit of stubborn toilet bowl stains.”

Soon, Dongsoo finally finished cleaning the bathroom and all the other rooms. The books previously strewn across the apartment were piled on bookshelves and organized by type, and any remaining books were put in boxes and placed in an unused room. Dongsoo also washed all the dirty dishes and cups scattered here and there and tidied up the kitchen.

The cleaning lasted two hours.

“Now, only the biggest problem remains.”

“What? There’s still something left to do?”

“You.”

Dongsoo dragged Lea and threw her into the bathtub. Lea was determined to retaliate if he attacked, but she couldn’t resist for some reason. She couldn’t muster up her strength after seeing Dongsoo’s eyes, which didn’t contain an iota of selfishness or greed.

“Put the clothes you were wearing into the washing machine. I’ll leave a new set of clothes near the door so you can put them on after you’re done showering. How can a young woman be so messy and unkept….”

“Kyak! Hey! Get out! Who asked you to do this?! What do you want?! Do you want this house? Are you cleaning because you plan to live here?”

Lea shrieked, but Dongsoo didn’t bat an eye. He had come across these sorts of [kids] countless times in the past.

“Whatever, I’m leaving for today. I’ll prepare a meal for you, so eat it after you get out of the bath. Put the dishes in the sink. I’ll take care of them tomorrow.”

“Hey! Just what are you planning-”

“Be careful. I can see your underwear through your clothes….”

“Kyak!”

After leaving her in the bathroom, Dongsoo went out and slammed the door behind him. Now alone, Lea stood motionless with a dumbfounded look plastered across her face.

“What… what’s up with that guy? No, wait, what did he do to the bathroom? Why is it shining?”

The bathtub squeaked whenever she touched it, and she was at a loss for words. She couldn’t believe this was the same space she had occupied just a few hours ago.

Lea took a warm shower, something she hadn’t done in a long time, before coming out of the bathroom. Dongsoo had already departed, but he left a bowl of steaming rice and some side dishes on the dining table.

Dongsoo didn’t know this, but it had been almost five years since Lea received such a meal.

“What’s up with that guy?”

Lea couldn’t understand what was happening.

And in that manner, a week passed.

“Hmm, good. She finally had the sense to put her finished dishes in the sink.”

“W-what are you talking about? I only put them there because I was walking by that area!”

“Thank you.”

“No, wait, what the hell….”

For a week, Dongsoo came to the house every day, providing three hot meals while he was there. Lea no longer had to rummage through a pile of clothes on the ground to find what to wear. Naturally, ever since Dongsoo started coming over, the apartment was clean and organized.

Lea used to yell at Dongsoo to get out, but she realized that she now eagerly awaited her mealtime. The house, which had been nothing more than a garbage dump, had become cozy and peaceful.

“Why do you have so few clothes… What kind of clothes do you like?”

“Military uniforms!”

“… I’ll try and find some military-looking clothes for you. Make sure to lock the front door,” Dongsoo said calmly before leaving the house. After a week, Lea felt it natural to have Dongsoo in the apartment, but he never slept at his adoptive parents’ house. He came and went as if he was working a nine-to-five job.

Click.

When the front door closed and Dongsoo’s presence faded, Lea hesitated, having been eating a dish of buttered corn with cheese that Dongsoo had prepared for her to snack on.

“Oh… oh, no. I was going to tell him not to come back… this is dangerous. This is a temptation, the devil’s temptation.”

Shivering, she took another bite of the buttered corn with cheese. As the warm cheese melted in her mouth, she felt her mind relaxing.

“Damn it. What the hell is up with that guy? Isn’t he the one who was brought in and then kicked out by the man and woman who used to own this house before they croaked? Is he trying to be friendly before taking his revenge?”

Like a beast, she could read another person’s psychological state just by smell and expression, so she knew what she stated wasn’t true, which only added to her confusion. Dongsoo’s kindness arose from a general sense of goodwill. He acted entirely selflessly.

“I have to make sure he doesn’t come back… if I beat him up, then he probably won’t come back….”

Yet, she couldn’t do that. Dongsoo left her alone to do whatever she wanted, but he cared for her needs perfectly. She had become totally used to life with Dongsoo; it was to the point that she worried about what she’d do if he really left her. Lea suffered from being unable to do what she desired because of the physical comforts she was enjoying.

Bang!

This novel is available on bit.ly/3iBfjkV.

An explosion erupted in the distance. The sound was all too familiar to Lea, but that was also why she felt so bewildered.

“… Shelling?”