Daddy is too Strong-Chapter 60

A small red creature with two little horns protruding from its head and cute, tiny wings on its back—no matter how one looked at it, it wasn’t a typical pet.

“H-hello?” Caught off guard, Yoo-Rin smiled awkwardly.

Yong-Yong, who had been staring intently at her, widened his eyes as he realized that the school uniform this stranger was wearing was identical to the one Yoon-Hee wore every day.

“My name is Jung Yoo-Rin. Is Supervisor Lee Do-Jun home by any chance?”

“Master is currently in the shower.”

“O-oh, I see.” Yoo-Rin seemed flustered.

Based on how this creature referred to him as Master, she figured it must be Do-Jun’s pet and asked, “Is there anyone else at home?”

“Why are you at our door, human?” Yong-Yong glared at Yoo-Rin as he recalled something Do-Jun had mentioned before.

If a stranger came to the house, he was supposed to find out why they were there and chase them out if they weren’t welcomed guests.

“Yong-Yong, who are you talking to...?” Wearing an apron, Yoon-Hee gently walked to the doorway.

She noticed Yoo-Rin facing off with Yong-Yong and said with a hint of surprise, “Jung Yoo-Rin...?”

Yoo-Rin was quite famous at the academy—so much so that not knowing her would make others doubt if one were even a student there.

She was the daughter of the Chief of the Hunter’s Bureau and, in terms of skill, was just behind Eun-Joo, the number one student and the sister of the Sword Emperor.

Yoo-Rin lightly bowed to Yoon-Hee and looked her up and down.

So, this is the girl who’s supposedly his daughter, huh? Interesting.

Yoo-Rin couldn’t remember ever seeing Yoon-Hee as she generally wasn’t interested in anyone other than herself and perhaps Eun-Joo at school.

“Hello, I’m Jung Yoo-Rin.”

“W-what brings you here...?”

“Well, today, Mister... no, Supervisor Lee was a great help to me, so I came by to say thank you. I heard he’s in the shower... Could I perhaps meet him?”

Although Yoon-Hee was curious about what kind of help Do-Jun had given her, she couldn’t get herself to turn away someone who had come all the way to thank him.

But what’s with calling him Mister? She’s making him sound old. In what way is Father old?

She felt annoyed but decided to be as polite as possible since Yoo-Rin was a guest looking for Do-Jun. She led Yoo-Rin to the sofa, upon which Karsiel was curled up, asleep.

“There’s two of them...?” Yoo-Rin muttered.

Yong-Yong shut the door and hopped back onto the sofa next to Karsiel, resuming the reality show he’d been watching.

Yoo-Rin observed this with curiosity before turning her attention back to Yoon-Hee.

“I heard from Mister... no, Supervisor Lee, that you’re his daughter?”

There it is, that Mister thing again... Yoon-Hee furrowed her brows.

To make matters worse, the way Yoo-Rin called him Mister somehow made it sound like she was close to Do-Jun, which Yoon-Hee wasn’t too fond of.

Placing the teacup she had brought with a rather loud clatter, Yoon-Hee said, “And?”

“Sorry...?”

This 𝓬ontent is taken from fгeewebnovёl.co𝙢.

As Yoo-Rin was taken aback by Yoon-Hee’s cold tone, the bathroom door swung open. Do-Jun emerged amidst the steam, wearing a white short-sleeved shirt and shorts.

He saw Yoo-Rin sitting on the sofa, sighed, and, while drying his hair with a towel, walked to the water purifier to get a glass of water.

“W-what’s with that sigh!” Yoo-Rin asked, caught off-guard by Do-Jun’s attitude.

“I knew someone had come, but I didn’t expect it to be you.”

“That doesn’t mean you had to be so disappointed!”

“Seriously, who keeps giving out our address?” Do-Jun murmured as he placed the glass in the sink.

Do-Jun stared at Yong-Yong, who was giggling while watching TV on the sofa. Sensing imminent danger, Yong-Yong slowly turned his head toward his master to meet his gaze and then quickly darted toward him.

“I told you to chase away solicitors,” Do-Jun said.

“Forgive me, Master. I was deceived by the uniform.”

Hearing this, Yoo-Rin shouted, “W-who are you calling solicitor?!”

Do-Jun briefly covered his ears with both hands, taking a seat in the single chair next to the large sofa.

“So, why did you come here?” he asked.

“I wanted to thank you for earlier,” Yoo-Rin answered as Do-Jun studied her expression.

No one would have gone through the trouble of finding his home address and coming all the way here just to express gratitude. Besides, she had already thanked him enough that morning.

“And what about the real reason?”

Yoo-Rin swallowed nervously and said, “Please ta...”

“No.” Do-Jun shut her down.

“But I haven’t even finished my sentence yet!”

“You were going to ask me to take you on as a disciple, right? Sorry if I was wrong.” Do-Jun shrugged.

Yoo-Rin lowered her head. “Yeah...”

She had felt something stir inside her chest when Do-Jun slaughtered two S-rank monsters with overwhelming power.

It wasn’t love or infatuation but a primal desire to become stronger like him. If she could become Do-Jun’s student, her growth would be much faster than taking lessons at the academy. There was no doubt about it.

“May I ask why you won’t take me on as your student?”

“On the contrary, why should I take you on as my student?”

“A billion won.”

“Huh?”

“I’ll give you a billion won. Then you can move into a much nicer and bigger house instead of this cramped, shabby place.” Yoo-Rin said, wearing a confident expression.

Do-Jun was a low-level civil servant at Seoul City Hall. According to her research, his annual salary was not even 40 million won.

A billion won was an amount that a civil servant could never even dream of having.

“Do you know how much an S-rank mana stone costs?” Do-Jun asked her.

“Yes. About 800 milli... oh.”

That’s when it dawned on her. Do-Jun could make as much money as he wanted and move into a better house whenever he wanted.

“Yoon-Hee does all the cleaning in this house. If we moved to a bigger place, the amount of cleaning would be overwhelming. Besides, I like this house, so I have no intention of moving right now.”

“I-isn’t there anything else you’d like?”

“There is. I’d like you to leave as soon as possible because it’s time for us to have dinner.”

The blunt response made Yoo-Rin feel a lump in her throat. Had she ever been so thoroughly rejected before?

Do-Jun let out a sigh as he watched Yoo-Rin trembling with clenched lips. In truth, he wasn’t entirely comfortable with just sending her back like this.

After a brief moment of contemplation, he finally said, “If you graduate at the top of your class, I’ll consider it.”

At Do-Jun’s words, the despondent-looking Yoo-Rin lifted her head sharply with a drastically brightened expression.

“R-really?”

Do-Jun was slightly taken aback by her sudden change in demeanor and slightly regretted what he had just said, but he quickly nodded regardless.

She was still a freshman, having only recently entered the Academy. It would take about three years for her to graduate; by then, this matter might simply fade away.

“Wow! Thank you! I’ll graduate at the top of my class for sure.”

Yoo-Rin walked over and clasped her hands around Do-Jun’s. Watching this, Yoon-Hee flinched slightly and bit her lips.

Then, Yoo-Rin approached Yoon-Hee, grabbed her hand with a bright smile, and said, “Let’s be friends from now on.”

***

Young-Chul and Kang-Hyun walked down the long, dimly lit corridor of the Monster Analysis Lab located in the basement of the Hunter’s Bureau.

On both sides of the hallway were various capsules, each containing live, squirming monsters with staff hustling around, checking their status.

One purpose of the Monster Analysis Lab was to study the monsters’ characteristics and produce auxiliary artifacts, using the byproducts obtained from them to aid hunters in hunting them.

“Has Supervisor Lee said anything else since then?” Kang-Hyun asked.

After obtaining the entry token for the tutorial zone, Do-Jun took about ten of them, saying he would enter first, understand the ecosystem, and report back. However, it had been two weeks since he had communicated with the Hunter’s Bureau.

“He said he’d organize the information he gathered and pass it along, but it seems it’s not ready yet. The good news is that he’s still showing up to work in Seoul, which means he’s not trapped in the Core.”

At the end of the hallway was a massive iron door over fifty meters tall. Young-Chul paused in front of the entrance and placed his palm on the scanner.

[Confirmed.]

[Opening the door.]

Creak...

The iron door began to part like an automatic door.

A short walk down the revealed corridor brought them to a view of researchers conducting analysis through a transparent glass window.

“Are those the monsters that were all over the news?”

A strange-looking bird and another monster resembling an ogre were neatly sliced precisely in half.

When Young-Chul tapped on a data pad attached to the glass, a holographic screen displaying the original forms and the Fissure wave readings of the monsters appeared in midair.

“The readings were 7,500 and 8,200. We consider anything over a thousand an S-rank, but these have far surpassed that. They’re too massive to be placed in the same S-rank category,” Young-Chul muttered as he looked at the data.

Kang-Hyun nodded and replied, “SS-rank. Supervisor Lee defeated them with such ease. It’s truly impressive.”

“Well, yes. But that’s not what I wanted to talk about. Do you remember your first Dive?”

“Yes, it was about three years ago.”

Kang-Hyun and two others became the First Hunters when there wasn’t even a concept of S-rank. He had entered the Core three years ago after repeated preparation and selection. That Dive was when Behemoth encountered S-rank monsters for the first time at the entrance to the Core.

“That was the start, wasn’t it? The appearance of S-rank Great Fissures on Earth.”

“Yes, it was.”

“And if we consider that Supervisor Lee Do-Jun was the first to enter the Tutorial Zone and explore, and after that, SS-rank monsters started appearing on Earth, it all lines up, doesn’t it?”

“You are referring to the Encroachment you mentioned before?” Kang-Hyun asked Young-Chul.

Ten years ago, when Fissures started appearing, people were suddenly able to view their own Status Windows. Awakened individuals emerged, capable of using their abilities to subdue monsters.

At first, only the weak F-rank monsters—goblins—emerged, but as time went on, stronger monsters started showing up. But even then, they never went beyond A-rank.

Not until they initiated the Dives into the Core.

“Maybe I was right. Perhaps all of this stems from the Core itself,” Young-Chul said. “Yes, I am talking about the Encroachment. We might be getting devoured by the Core.”

He named this phenomenon Encroachment for a reason. The Core didn’t unleash powerful monsters right from the get-go. Instead, it gradually released stronger and stronger monsters, starting with the weakest ones, as if it were allowing humans to adapt.

Earth seemed to be gradually eroding.

“Once Supervisor Lee sends us the information regarding the Tutorial Zone, we’ll reconsider this matter. Who knows, I could still be wrong,” Young-Chul said as he deactivated the data pad.