I brought the hanged criminal’s severed hand into the workshop kitchen and placed it in an earthenware bowl.

Why the kitchen? Because making this thing was practically the same as cooking.

Well, actual cooking used ordinary ingredients, and if you screwed it up, it just tasted a little worse...

Anyway.

A versatile magical tool for thieves that, depending on how you used it, could freeze anyone who saw its candle flame, put people to sleep, or make its user invisible.

Step one in making a Hand of Glory:

First, drain the blood thoroughly from the severed hand.

I looked at the hand, blood slowly seeping from the cut end.

‘... Would paper towels work, like when you drain blood from meat?’

But it was fairly big, and it had bones inside. Maybe soaking it in sugar water first would be better than using paper towels.

As I considered how to drain the blood from the hand in the earthenware bowl...

"..."

I glanced to the side.

"Gyaaa~."

Grizzly was crouching beside me, sticking out its tongue and running it around its mouth, licking its lips.

‘... It looks like that cat I saw online, licking its lips at some chicken.’

I turned back to the severed hand.

It was expensive... but I had money. Should I just buy one for it as a snack?

"...!"

Then I abruptly came to my senses.

I slowly dragged a palm down my face at the thought that had just crossed my mind.

"... Hah."

Fuck... I’d been about to buy it a severed human hand as casually as buying a tube of cat treats... I’d really gone off the deep end.

It wasn’t as though I’d suddenly felt a pang of conscience out of nowhere.

I hadn’t killed the person. Why would I feel guilty about making a candle out of a piece of corpse that would rot if left alone?

I was just... startled? No, that wasn’t it either.

I wasn’t all that startled.

I poured sugar water into the earthenware bowl to draw the blood out of the severed hand.

I studied it submerged in the water.

Five fingers. Probably a man’s, judging by its size. There weren’t any wrinkles, so it probably hadn’t belonged to anyone particularly old.

Blood seeped into the water, spreading a pale red.

And naturally, since it was a severed hand, I did think it was gross to look at.

If I hadn’t needed it to make a magical tool, I wouldn’t even have touched it.

"..."

... That was about it. Nothing else came to mind.

Right. I understood now.

This wasn’t an extreme situation, like a haunted mansion, a cannibal magician’s basement, or a campground crawling with zombies.

I’d realized all over again that I’d become a person... a magician who could accept something like this without batting an eye in ordinary, everyday life.

"... Ha."

I gave a small laugh and put those pointless thoughts in order.

Everyone reflected on their profession from time to time, didn’t they? It was nothing special.

Besides, I had something more important to do.

I glanced at Grizzly again.

"Gyaa? Gya-gya!"

Yes. Training Grizzly.

I wanted to just buy it one... but I wasn’t sure it was right to give it a snack every time it wanted one...

After some thought, my eyes lit up.

All right, I’d decided. No snack!

I told Grizzly firmly,

"No! That’s not a snack!"

"Gya... ah!?"

‘Not... a snack?’ Grizzly’s mouth fell open in shock.

Seeing that, I wondered if I’d been too firm.

I didn’t want to be mean to it over food, after all.

Enough time had passed while I was thinking, so I poured the bloody liquid drained from the hand into Grizzly’s food bowl and added some meat.

"You can’t have that. I need it for magic. Eat this."

"Gyaaa~."

Grizzly gobbled it down with relish, and I returned my attention to making the magical tool.

I dried the hand with paper towels and pressed it to squeeze out the blood.

I dried the earthenware bowl too, since I still needed it.

Now for step two in making a Hand of Glory.

There hadn’t been much to do, but waiting for the blood to drain had taken a while.

For the next step, put generous amounts of salt, saltpeter, and pepper into an earthenware bowl made by a magician, then mix thoroughly with a pestle.

CLINK, CLINK.

Then add the drained hand and work the mixture thoroughly into it.

I kneaded and kneaded.

"..."

Somehow, massaging a severed hand like this made me feel like Yoshikage Kira.

Anyway, I’d coated it thoroughly. Next...

『Leave it to cure for about fifteen days in a place out of the sunlight.』

... My eyes narrowed as I checked the instructions in <Mysteries of the Worm> again.

‘Am I seriously cooking something here...?’

It was ridiculous, but I’d already known that part, so I closed <Mysteries of the Worm>.

THUMP.

I covered the earthenware bowl with plastic wrap and put it in the workshop refrigerator.

Given the process, that was all the magical crafting I could do today.

It said to wait. What else could I do? I’d have to wait.

‘... Fifteen days, though.’

Well, I could study some other magic. If any Ghostbuster jobs came in, I could do those.

I did have a hundred million won, but that was strictly emergency money. Having more wouldn’t hurt.

For now, Grizzly had finished its snack.

"Gyaaa~."

I should head home and have dinner too.

* * *

Most vampires probably felt the same way, but Ioannis, the blond Greek vampire, liked winter.

The sun set early and rose late.

It gave him more time to be active, to have fun outside.

... Beside him, Mia—a beautiful young vampire with black hair, delicate features, and a feminine air—grumbled as he attended to Ioannis.

"You came all the way to Korea yourself, Master. That Chairman Kim should be crawling on all fours to give you a tour of Seoul, not refusing your invitation to go out. How insolent."

"Haha~. I’ve seen him fleeing on all fours plenty of times already. I don’t need to see it again."

Ioannis laughed, brushing it off.

"Besides, he’s the head of a magician family now. He said they have a family activity coming up, so he must be busy."

"Ha! You mean that ridiculous dinner gathering, the ‘Table of the Great Ones’?"

Mia scowled and sneered scathingly.

"All they do is imitate ghouls. What’s so great about them...?"

"Hehe~. Blood or human flesh—it seems much the same to me."

"I-it feels different! ... And that dinner gathering is so vile. Watching it makes me sick."

Mia pouted as he spoke. Ioannis smiled gently and stroked his head.

"Mmm..."

It was adorable how, despite all his grumbling, Mia closed his eyes and quietly enjoyed being petted.

And Mia was right.

"It isn’t to my taste either."

The Table of the Great Ones.

On the surface, it was a dinner gathering hosted by Chairman Kim. Naturally, though, it was no ordinary dinner.

Using the power of the grimoire <Cultes des Goules>, he lured wealthy, influential people to his side with the promise of youth and vitality through cannibalism.

They behaved like ghouls, stuffing themselves with human corpses, yet dressed in fine clothes and jewels to play at being kings and nobles.

From the sidelines, it was quite an amusing farce.

Ioannis gave a small laugh.

Of course, it was probably also a means of expanding the family.

But to Ioannis, it was one of Chairman Kim’s hobbies as well.

His dim-witted pupil liked watching society’s wealthy and powerful tear disgustingly into corpses.

Just as he himself had torn into his younger sibling’s corpse in a back alley as a child.

CLATTER.

Just then, someone rushed past, perhaps to catch a bus that had just stopped.

Ioannis put an arm around Mia’s shoulders and stepped aside.

In doing so, he lightly brushed shoulders with a black-haired man with sharp eyes and a white trench coat, who was passing beside him in the opposite direction.

Ioannis immediately gave him a gentle smile and a slight nod.

"Oh, sorry."

"No, it’s all right."

The man in the white coat also nodded lightly and went on his way.

Mia grumbled as he watched the man leave.

"He bumps into you and walks off with a little nod? How insolent."

Mia had been born in an era without a rigid class system. Hearing him, Ioannis—who had lived through a time when such distinctions were firmly enforced—let out a quiet laugh.

He appreciated the concern, but it was funny.

"Hahaha..."

He opened his coat, embraced Mia from behind, and tucked him snugly inside.

"Then we’ll have to stay pressed together like this, so no one bumps into us."

"M-Master, p-people are watching."

Ioannis lowered his head, buried his lips in Mia’s lovely black hair, and breathed in its fragrance as he whispered,

"Shall we go somewhere with no people, then?"

Mia ducked his head, hiding inside Ioannis’s coat, and murmured quietly,

"Yees..."

Ioannis walked on with Mia in his arms.

Times changed, but some things stayed the same.

When you bumped shoulders with someone in the street, it was best to exchange a slight nod and go on your way.

And beautiful boys were lovely.

And...

The man in the white trench coat.

"..."

Yohan briefly thought about the blond foreign man he had just bumped into.

‘... His Korean sounds really natural.’

He’d only said a few words, but they had sounded incredibly natural.

Of course, it wasn’t a particularly important thought, so Yohan kept going.

The hem of his white coat swayed with his steps.

* * *

Yohan’s little studio apartment.

In the kitchen (right in front of the bed), I grilled the meat I’d bought on the way home.

SIZZLE.

Thinly sliced beef brisket. It was a fatty cut, and some people disliked the texture, but I liked its rich flavor and satisfying chew.

Putting care into cooking a delicious meal was nice, but simply grilling meat and dipping it in sesame oil and salt was good too.

In real-world time, it had happened yesterday.

Less than a day had passed, but I’d spent a week suffering inside a dating sim, and the ten-million-won fee the Special Response Section had promised me had come through.

So I’d decided to eat a little more lavishly than usual tonight.

As I grilled the meat beside it, I added a suitable amount of water to yesterday’s curry so I could eat it like soup.

BUBBLE, BUBBLE.

I hadn’t finished the Hand of Glory...

But tonight’s dinner—beef brisket with sesame-oil dipping sauce and curry—was ready.

I looked down at it, smiling with narrowed eyes.

‘Curry, with meat on the side...’

It was an excessive number of calories, but eating like this once in a while should be fine.

First, I dipped a piece of brisket in the oil sauce and ate it.

Sliced thin, it wasn’t all that tough, and that rich texture really was good.

Next came some rice, followed by a spoonful of curry.

"Hehe..."

The curry that would normally have been my main meal was now merely a side soup! ... How bourgeois!

Of course, I was joking.

Obviously, eating a little curry with beef didn’t make me rich.

But what did that matter? I was enjoying it.

My phone rang just as I finished that satisfying dinner.

... The caller was Namgung Sua.

Well, she called over pointless things from time to time, so it wasn’t unusual.

I answered, and a sweet but snappish voice immediately sounded from the phone.

"Hey, mister! You haven’t eaten yet, right?"

"I just ate. Why?"

"Oh! What the heck! Why did you go ahead and eat without me? Whatever! It’s cold, so just open the door!"

"... What?"

The moment I questioned that incomprehensible remark—

DING-DONG! DING-DONG, DING-DONG, DING-DONG, DING-DONG, DING-DONG!

The doorbell rang like crazy. When I opened the door, Namgung Sua stood there: long, straight black hair, sharp eyes, and a catlike face. A girl whose rudeness was quite at odds with her cute looks.

But she wasn’t wearing the school uniform I’d seen at the campground. She had on a stylish, expensive-looking short dress and a fluffy-looking white coat.

She was dressed like a young lady attending some bourgeois party.

"Wow~. Your place is tiny! But you keep it clean. How boring."

Sua carelessly kicked off her shoes in the entryway and barged in on stockinged feet.

She took off her coat, put it on the bed, and sat down on the bed herself.

"..."

Fine. I was the one who’d given her my address. ... Though I hadn’t expected her to turn up out of the blue like this.

Anyway, she wasn’t a complete stranger. I didn’t particularly mind her visiting.

For now, I spoke calmly to her.

"Don’t people usually sit on the floor?"

"Uh... the floor’s hard."

Sua looked at me as though I’d said something stupid.

Maybe it was because my recent visitor had been Sion.

The difference in their upbringing felt even more pronounced.

Honestly, Sua was so brazen that I was dumbfounded. For the moment, it didn’t even occur to me to kick her out.

‘Let’s just see how much more she’ll act up.’

That was what I found myself thinking.

And...

Feeling that she was somewhere safe, Sua took her phone out of her coat when it buzzed and checked it.

Of course, it wasn’t her father, Namgung Su.

... It was a text from someone associated with Chairman Kim.

[You are invited to a dinner gathering.]

Her mood soured again. Sua silenced her phone and set it in a corner of the bed.

Her father, Namgung Su, had refused, and now they were inviting her to some mysterious dinner gathering.

Her father’s acquaintances... Even calling them acquaintances was ridiculous.

Anyway, she recalled Chairman Kim, whom she’d seen at a party for people connected to her father’s business.

A bizarre old man. But it wasn’t simply his age that put her off.

... Something about him didn’t feel human. He made her uncomfortable.

She couldn’t understand how the others could laugh and chatter beside that old man, fawning over him.

"..."

Sua took out a small, plastic-wrapped piece of chocolate and popped it into her mouth.

Eating a piece of chocolate when she felt anxious.

It was a habit she’d developed after the campground incident—more precisely, after eating with Yohan at the hotel buffet.

As sweetness spread through her mouth...

Sua looked at Yohan and grumbled,

"You have a guest. Aren’t you even going to give me something to drink?"

And I immediately raised my hand and gave Sua a light smack on the head.

SMACK.

"Are you nuts?"

"Aaah!?"