He could handle his body easily enough.

'Because I have my memories from when I was Arjio.'

But the abandoned mansion was terribly old, and it looked as if it would collapse if he pressed down even a little.

If that was the case, he thought it would be better to go up in a way that put no burden on the mansion at all.

That was how Jio had reached the third floor through the portrait.

"..."

"..."

Sanarae, who had been staring intently at Jio, asked with his usual smiling face.

"A landscape painting?"

"Yes, it was here."

"It's a painting of a cabin."

"Isn't it nice to look at?"

"It is nice to look at."

"I see."

Giovanni, skilled in social graces, deftly managed his expression.

"I did not think you would come up this quickly."

"For someone who says that, you didn't look surprised."

"I sensed you coming up."

It was not a lie.

'Only because I sensed it as soon as I came out of the frame.'

Hunter Sanarae seemed to have a contrarian streak, so Jio had thought that if he left him alone, Sanarae might come up by himself.

But he had come up faster than expected, and Jio had missed the timing to get rid of the frame.

'I needed a little time to manage my expression.'

That was why Jio had not immediately turned to Sanarae and had kept his gaze on the portrait that had become a landscape painting.

At any rate, it was a relief that Sanarae did not seem to have realized that he was this portrait.

Though if he was found out, that would lead to something interesting in its own way...

"Would you like to look around the third floor together?"

"Mm, I was planning to."

"It would have been nice if you had come up with me from the start."

"You were so quiet, Hunter Seo Jio, I couldn't help but worry."

"I have a decent stealth skill."

"Everyone does seem to think that."

"Do you not think so, Hunter Sanarae?"

"No, I think so too."

Sanarae smiled his usual smile and pointed to the roughly three rooms on the third floor.

"You haven't looked around yet?"

"I only just came up to the third floor myself."

"Then we can go together. Wow, how reassuring."

Perhaps it was true that the mansion was so dusty his nose hurt, because Sanarae was fairly cooperative in searching the ruins, as if he wanted to get out quickly.

The third floor also mainly yielded gold and jewels.

Hunter Sanarae seemed a little disappointed.

"It would have been nice if there were items."

"Are you not satisfied with gold or jewels?"

"Equipment you can use anywhere is better than minerals that are only nice to look at, isn't it?"

"You are greedy."

"Rather than that, I'm a liar."

"Hm, Pinocchio?"

"I don't exactly like that nickname, but..."

CLACK.

The rusted metal jewelry box closed.

"It's only jewels here too."

"Do Hunters not like accessories like these?"

"Jewels that only look good on the outside, I mean."

"I don't think Hunters who would be happy with such ordinary earnings after coming all the way to an A-rank dungeon are that common...?"

"Why is that?"

"..."

Sanarae looked at Jio, then continued.

"They aren't worth that much."

"They might help ordinary citizens, but we are fairly high-rank Hunters."

"After coming all the way here, most would want to make a proper killing."

"I understand glass is quite expensive."

"That's because glass can be melted down and used to make equipment or items."

"It takes a lot of work to make, and it costs quite a bit to increase its transparency."

"That is why, among jewels, glass in particular is expensive."

"Do jewels like these not melt?"

The jewels I draw melt, though.

'Is that because they are paint?'

Jio continued.

"I know for certain that gold and silver melt."

"Is there something wrong with my common sense?"

"... Of course you can make equipment with gold and silver too, but the limit of what they can hold is far lower than glass."

"Their properties are too fixed, so you cannot make as wide a variety of equipment with them as flexibly as you can with glass."

"Thank you for the kind and detailed explanation."

"Especially because Hunters' income cannot be settled with something like mere jewels or gold ornaments."

"It costs an incredible amount of money to get equipment that will save your life."

"There are so many Hunters who sell the deeds to their land or houses to buy equipment."

"Oh dear."

Jio let out an exclamation and asked.

"Thank you for the detailed explanation."

"You are not getting annoyed because I am too much of a 'young master,' are you?"

"Hard to say."

"Are you really a 'young master'?"

"In a certain sense, you may have hit the mark, but I do not think I have ever been raised that delicately."

"I see."

"That's unexpected."

"Do you dislike me?"

Jio smiled.

"That is not it either, is it?"

"I know this is a strange thing to say, but..."

Sanarae spoke with an expressionless face that held no emotion, and in an ordinary tone.

"Hunter Seo Jio, you seem older than you look."

"How old do I appear to you?"

"The website says you're twenty-nine."

"Is that wrong?"

"It is correct."

"But you seem older than that."

"I did not think I would hear such heartbreaking words just because I cannot keep up with trends."

"... That could be it."

After combing through the abandoned mansion in order, they moved to the innermost room.

"This must have been the bedroom."

They saw the frame of a bed so ruined it was hard to recognize, and an enormous portrait of a woman.

That, too, was only barely recognizable as a woman, and it was rotted and decayed as splendidly as the abandoned mansion itself.

The haunted portrait felt a strange sense of kinship.

'Oh, a portrait.'

Hello, I am a portrait.

'... They say surprising things often happen in dungeons... but I have never seen a haunted portrait like me until now.'

'This portrait also looks like an ordinary old and broken portrait.'

'How pitiful.'

Jio, who liked drawing and was himself a painting, felt human sympathy.

'Poor thing.'

If he did it properly somehow, it seemed he might be able to restore it.

"..."

"Hunter Seo Jio?"

"Yes, please speak."

"Is there something in that portrait?"

"There is nothing."

"Then why do you keep looking only at it?"

"Am I not allowed to?"

"Look at me when we talk."

"Yes."

Only then did Jio turn his gaze to Sanarae.

"What is it?"

"..."

Sanarae only smiled steadily.

"..."

Around then, the sunset came barging in, and under the strange pressure and convincing atmosphere, Jio shrank back.

Facing a deranged thug who seemed as if he might be laughing and chatting normally one moment, then go on a shooting spree the next, fear came crashing over him.

As the sun set in an instant with perfect timing and the abandoned mansion grew dark, the fear doubled explosively.

'... What did I do wrong?'

Instinctively, he realized he had done something wrong.

When someone stared through a person like that, one possibility was an invitation to socialize, and the second was a signal flare for war.

Right now, no matter how one looked at it, it was the latter.

And Jio realized.

'Ah, this.'

It was the atmosphere from when Mr. Yu Seongun and Ju-hyeon scolded him.

"... Did I do something strange?"

"Hard to say?"

"Did I frighten you?"

"I'm not sure."

"I apologize for all of it."

Flustered, Jio asked.

"Would you like something sweet?"

"..."

"It seems you do not like sweets."

He had offered because he thought that if he gave Sanarae something sweet at this bizarre timing, then if nothing else, the absurdity might ease this strange atmosphere a little, but he did not get a very good reaction.

Jio comforted the sweet chocolate cookie he always kept tucked inside his clothes.

'You are a good cookie.'

It was only that it had met the wrong owner.

The fellow was a perfectly delicious cookie.

"..."

"..."

And then he began to feel a bit wronged.

"Do people not appreciate portraits?"

"No, they do."

"Then I do not understand why you are scolding me with your eyes."

"... Scolding, huh."

"You really do speak in a unique way."

"Is there something odd?"

"You use such ordinary words even in this kind of situation."

Sanarae curved his usual smile and said,

"It's scary."

"Is it scary?"

You are not teasing me again, are you?

"If so, please tell me the reason."

"Will you fix it, then?"

"So that I will not make the same mistake again."

"I don't feel like it."

"Hunter Seo Jio, I think you can stand to make a few more mistakes."

"I do not like this atmosphere."

"I want to become better."

"That is why I am saying I think you do not need to become better."

"I do not understand why you are saying that."

So what mistake did I make this time?

'Am I not even allowed to look at portraits?'

He felt so wronged that he wanted to draft a complaint letter stitch by stitch.

Why was it that whenever he did something everyone else did, people got scared and made a fuss?

"I believe you are teasing me."

"You are a cruel person."

"I know you are not saying that because you are angry."

Sanarae added,

"You just say it because you think that is the most appropriate thing to say, right?"

At those words, Jio thought.

'It is only polite for humans to run words through their brains once before speaking.'

But he knew Hunter Sanarae had not said that in that sense.

Jio realized what the problem with the current situation was.

It was an ancient problem that had followed him all his life.

"I know I have a frightening expression."

"I have often been misunderstood in ordinary times as well."

He had seen more than one or two people freak out as if they had seen a ghost over the smallest things.

"So I worked hard to smile as I went about."

"Did it not work well?"

"It probably works well on most people."

"Then what is Hunter Sanarae trying to say right now?"

"It feels like the more I know, the greater the fear becomes?"

Jio was dumbfounded.

"What do you know, Hunter Sanarae?"

What do you know about me?

'How long has it even been since you saw my face, and now you know so much?'

Even Yu Seongun, the first friend Jio had made after becoming a haunted portrait, had never said something like that.

One side did not welcome it, and the other was showing off an unintended and hollow intimacy, so Jio felt tremendously dumbfounded.

"I do not think we are that close..."

"Are those things only close people have the right to know?"

"Most relationships would work that way."

"Were you offended?"

"What are you afraid of?"

Sanarae was pretending otherwise, but right now, he was a little anxious.

Jio could not understand why the situation had turned out like this.

At this rate, he really had no choice but to overhaul his face or live in an iron mask.

'But people would probably be afraid of even that.'

It was truly a difficult era for a person with a frightening impression to live in.

"You must not treat a perfectly normal person like a ghost just because you are scared of him, Hunter Sanarae."

"Why were you looking at that portrait for so long just now?"

"I was looking at it because I felt sorry for it."

"..."

Sanarae, who had seemed about to say more, once again curved his eyes like crescent moons.

"What do you like, Hunter Seo Jio?"

It was a question with an extremely bizarre context, but Jio understood.

Madmen tended to have conversation topics that leaped wildly all over the place.

Giovanni, everyone's kind priest, respected human diversity.

"I like things that are delicious and filling."

"Are you a ghost who starved to death...?"

"I do not think I have ever been possessed by a ghost."

"Anything else besides that?"

"I like good people."

"Ah, this is a problem."

Jio's thought had been correct.

"I'm not suddenly going to get eaten, am I?"

"I will say it once again, but human flesh is likely not delicious."

"I'm telling you, that is not reassuring at all..."

Sanarae was afraid.

And had been for quite some time.

When the two came out of the mansion, the sun had risen again.

"You are out."

"Did you find anything in particular?"

"There were mainly accessories."

"I see there were no special functions."

"Understood."

Garasani, who had been waiting for Jio, continued.

"While you two were upstairs, a message came in."

"Did another team contact us?"

"Yes, they say they need a healer, so they would like us to gather if possible."

And this team had two healers, Jeong Youngwon and Seo Jio.

Garasani checked the detection equipment as he spoke.

"Fortunately, it is fairly close as well."

"Are they injured?"

"Or poisoned?"

"I heard they encountered a large number of monsters."

"Then it would be both."

Jio felt as if he knew what Garasani wanted to say, and he smiled.

Perhaps he had failed at making dried fruit for this very purpose.

"I think I can be of help."

Have you ever heard of blood dumplings shaped by three suns gathered together?