While the Portrait Slept

Around the time Ji-oh, having successfully finished the jerky content, drifted off to sleep, the world outside the frame was still deep in the workday.

"So that's why you called me in."

"Come now, let's just talk a little. Why the scary face?"

"If you think I only handle the 'Portrait of Ji-oh,' you're laboring under a serious misunderstanding…"

"I'm offering incentives, aren't I?"

"Damn capitalist society."

Yu Seong-un had been summoned by the guild master.

"Didn't I already tell you I'd organize the report and submit it soon?"

"How am I supposed to wait until then?"

"Why can't you wait for this?"

"You know me."

"I really don't."

"A man needs to look someone in the face when he talks."

"That's an excessive insult to our highly advanced modern society."

"The world these days has no warmth. Our employees even less so."

"I have no idea what warmth you're hoping for from this wretched world, or why you're demanding it from me."

"Everyone's so cold."

"That's your own preference talking, so spare me the nonsense."

Bi Sa-beol beamed at the thoroughly exhausted Yu Seong-un and mixed him a glass of fruit preserve syrup.

"Drink up and take heart, shall we?"

"Is this poison?"

"Oh come now. A gift from our precious Portrait himself, and you call it poison?"

"I'd rather have the poison. So I can drink it and just lie down…"

No matter how gentle the 'Portrait of Ji-oh' might be, it was still a being of the Source—and, put simply, a monster. Dealing with a rare humanoid monster was already taxing enough, and that was far from the only duty resting on Yu Seong-un's shoulders.

"The sea's been restless lately, so I got called out again."

Yu Seong-un was also handling external commissions on the side.

"When I looked into it, the movements of the Children of the Source were strange. I'll submit a report on that part soon as well. Probably tomorrow or the day after…"

"You can report that later. It wasn't even my commission."

"Of course you would say that."

"Then would you tell me about Ji-oh now?"

"I knew it would come to this."

For the record, Bi Sa-beol still had not managed a single conversation with Ji-oh.

"It's because you act so burdensome that Ji-oh avoids talking to you."

"What exactly did I do?"

"Plenty of employees have seen the black cloak, yet the guild master himself has never once spoken with him. At this point it's dereliction of duty."

"I was trying to talk to him, you know."

"I meant you should change your approach."

It was a matter tied to Ji-oh's nature.

"Ji-oh doesn't like rude people, does he?"

"He doesn't hate them."

"That's true, but…"

There were two things the 'Portrait of Ji-oh' disliked.

Rudeness, or malice.

…But even if he shies away from rude people, he doesn't regard them as wholly negative.

Among people there were those who liked dogs and cats yet disliked reptiles, weren't there?

In roughly that same way, Ji-oh avoided the rude. He did not demean their existence itself, yet he took no pleasure in associating with them.

"That indifferent side of him is quite similar to a Child of the Source."

"It would be. Even if he insists he is human, not every part of him can be the same as a human's. He may simply be trying hard to ignore the fact that he isn't…"

In truth Ji-oh was not thinking anything of the sort, but never mind.

"Well, that indifference seems to vanish when it comes to criminals."

Toward the merely rude he thought, Well, people can be like that, yet when faced with malice Ji-oh displayed clear revulsion. He had never actually encountered a criminal, but his everyday words and actions already made the fact plain.

"Either way, caution is required. You should be careful too, Guild Master."

"I'll try to restrain myself."

"You'll just say that and do it again. Anyway, so…"

The reason Bi Sa-beol had called Yu Seong-un was obvious.

"You're curious about how Ji-oh looked while sightseeing in Seoul?"

"Of course I am. An entity of the Source whose true nature we don't even know went walking through the human world. And came back gently, without causing any major incidents?"

"That's right."

Of course, there was one unsettling detail.

"One priest of the Sun did go missing."

"Ah, that much is nothing. When I checked, his background didn't look especially clean either."

"Which is why they're keeping it quiet internally as well."

"There's an initiation ceremony coming up soon, so they certainly wouldn't want it publicized."

"…I believe Ji-oh had a hand in the disappearance."

A hunter of curator caliber needed far more than ordinary powers of observation and memory. Yu Seong-un still remembered the man in scholar's robes he had encountered at Gyeongbokgung, and the missing priest was that very person.

"That day Ji-oh shaped his hand into the form of a camera and looked at the man."

"A camera? Considering that Ji-oh is a portrait, wouldn't a frame be closer?"

"That could be. In any case, after their eyes met he suggested leaving Gyeongbokgung, and he didn't look particularly pleased."

"Perhaps he ran into a bad person who didn't suit his tastes and it soured his mood?"

"I think the probability is high."

"So Ji-oh appraises people that way. Good information to know."

Bi Sa-beol's own information network had already confirmed the priest was shady. Yu Seong-un trusted Bi Sa-beol, and neither of them entertained for a second the possibility that the priest Ji-oh had dealt with might not have been a villain.

"Still, the fact that he handled it quietly confirms how well Ji-oh understands human society. He must not have wanted a fuss."

No. It had simply been Honey acting alone while Ji-oh was sprawled out asleep. Honey, too, had not been trying to avoid a scene so much as sensing a threat to its father, dealing with it, and then returning as if nothing had happened.

But Ji-oh did not give the impression of someone that thoughtless. On the contrary, there were times he felt like a being who knew so much that he chose silence, and the two men continued their conversation under the assumption that Ji-oh knew all of this.

"In that case I do wonder what would happen if he ran into a criminal head-on."

"Why would you wonder about something like that even if you're curious? Don't develop weird curiosities."

"So cold."

"……"

Does he want to act like that at his age?

I must not grow old like that.

Yu Seong-un ignored Bi Sa-beol, who was pretending to look pitiful.

"The most astonishing point from this tour and observation was, after all, the fact that Ji-oh lowered his own rank to a human level."

"…Lowered his rank?"

Bi Sa-beol wore a rare look of surprise.

"Ji-oh? He voluntarily lowered his rank all the way to a human's?"

"Yes. Surprising, isn't it?"

"Before surprising…"

Bi Sa-beol chose his words carefully for a moment, then found the right one.

"It's grotesque."

As expected, Ji-oh was not human.

"To dig out his own flesh like that without batting an eye."

"I was shocked the first time I saw it too. If Ji-oh had been human, he never could have made that decision."

"And if it was only to avoid causing a commotion, that makes it even harder to empathize with."

Bi Sa-beol had never spoken with Ji-oh, yet he had 'seen' him many times. The rank of the Ji-oh that Bi Sa-beol knew was on a level incomparable to any mere human's.

"And yet he deliberately dragged himself down until he could be felt as human…"

It was no different from the torture of being carved up while still alive.

"Did he seem unwell at all?"

"Nothing I could detect, and his expression was the same blank one as always."

"I see."

To Ji-oh, who had originally been human, the sensation was nothing strange. But to everyone else it was an eccentricity worse than plucking out one's own eyes, severing one's limbs, and pulling out one's entrails.

"Any other peculiarities?"

"Uh…"

Yu Seong-un chose a lighter topic.

"He likes food."

"No wonder he keeps sending food gifts."

"He seemed interested in both eating and cooking."

That had been a source of worry as well.

"If he's not careful he could get taken for a sucker."

"Oh dear."

That was a problem.

"You said you already warned him about that part, didn't you?"

"Whether he understood is another matter."

"A Child of the Source who is actively well-disposed is actually far harder to handle."

If it had been an ordinary monster they could simply dispose of it, but because steady mutual exchange was required there was far more to watch out for. Protection was harder than attack, after all.

"Still, his willingness to cooperate looks strong, so that's a relief."

"He's a good kid at heart, so…"

Setting aside the uncanny nature of his rank, Ji-oh was clearly a good sort.

"It's just that his mere existence is a threat."

"And that part isn't something we can do anything about, is it?"

"I know that."

But regardless of Ji-oh's diligence, continuous vigilance still seemed necessary.

"…Ah."

"Is there something else?"

"It's about Ji-oh's personality."

"Personality? Already interesting."

"The Ji-oh who lowered his rank truly looked human."

This required a little explanation.

"To the point that he seemed like an entirely different being from the usual Ji-oh."

"If it's that extreme, it isn't simply a matter of high or low rank, is it?"

"We confirmed that it exerts a slight influence on his personality as well."

"A side effect of lowering his rank?"

"Wouldn't the probability be high? For us, of course, this version is more harmless and therefore preferable…"

The Ji-oh inside the painting—or the one who sometimes wandered the building at dawn—carried something eerie about him. He was like a reaper.

No, closer still to death itself, without will or emotion.

Wrapped in a pitch-black cloak, footsteps nearly silent, always walking with his hands clasped behind his back as neatly as any aristocrat, he looked upon the world with curious eyes. And yet that expressionless, gloomy face held a certain chill.

That low temperature did not mean Ji-oh's personality was cold and calculating. It simply felt as though the existence itself was incapable of holding warmth.

"The Ji-oh who has not lowered his rank is extremely courteous, composed, and heavy. Even people who never spoke with him and only saw the portrait often said things like, 'It looks exactly like someone painted a deathbed scene.'"

Ji-oh felt like a being that embodied a funeral.

And then there was that remoteness.

"You could never call him human."

"But is a change of personality really something that needs discussing?"

"We confirmed it does have an effect."

The Ji-oh who lowered his rank truly seemed like an ordinary person.

"A rather taciturn man who still observes proper manners."

But the usual Ji-oh was different.

"He's a bit more arrogant."

"Hmm?"

"No, 'arrogant' is a little off… how to put it…"

It was hard to express.

"…As if he were someone of high station…"

Ji-oh looked down upon humans.

The way someone with a hobby of keeping insects might look upon a diligent ant carrying a load—or simply find it adorable.

"In practice Ji-oh gave people gifts any number of times. There was an element of reward, of course, but it clearly took the form of a bestowal. Even while claiming to be an ordinary twenty-nine-year-old human, he evaluated and praised employees far older than I am."

At that Bi Sa-beol asked,

"But the Ji-oh who lowered his rank was different?"

"Yes. At those times he truly looked like an ordinary young man."

The 'Ji-oh' Yu Seong-un had confirmed was a well-mannered, quiet twenty-nine-year-old.

"There were still moments when he was a little… excessively curious, or tried to settle payment with gemstones…"

"He isn't a real human, so those quirks are inevitable. Even so, the fact that he still behaved enough like an ordinary young man is truly fascinating."

"He said he had taken separate measures himself, so that was probably the influence."

There was also a point of concern.

"Ordinarily his high rank makes you think there's nothing you can do about him, but when he looks like an ordinary twenty-nine-year-old youth I start worrying he might fall for some strange scam."

"…Is it that bad? He still has emotion skills and all…"

"When he transforms into a human, not only does his personality become much milder, but his abilities also seem restricted. Even that emotion skill could only be confirmed if he deliberately made a frame-shaped hand gesture."

And one more thing.

"The longer he stayed outside, the weaker he became."

It was merely that, after long absence from modern society, his energy had been thoroughly drained, yet for Yu Seong-un—who fretted over every detail of Ji-oh's condition—he could not help attaching more varied meanings to it.

"I'm worried other people might try to mess with him."

"That would certainly become a problem."

"Right?"

"It's not only Ji-oh. It's that…"

Bi Sa-beol stroked his chin.

"Lowering his rank doesn't mean the essence goes anywhere."

Suppose you took two large chunks of metal and compressed one of them until it became very small.

One would certainly look large and the other small, yet the weight would remain the same. In fact, because it had grown smaller it would become easier to wound a human with it.

A similar example would be a bomb. Even if you craft a bomb into a small, cute form, the moment you light the fuse it still explodes. Compressed, it might even detonate far more violently.

"Without precise analysis this is only conjecture, but… because Ji-oh thinks of himself as human, any thrust at that essence will produce a far greater backlash. There's no need to go around causing such a catastrophe."

"I think the same."

"Unless the entire nation has agreed to a joint suicide?"

Therefore the Ji-oh who became 'human' clearly needed solid protection.

"We'll have to issue him a hunter's license."

"That alone should cut down on a good deal of trouble."

In this world a hunter was a kind of power-holder and celebrity. Simply flashing a hunter's license resolved most conflicts, because the Association strictly prevented fights between hunters.

"And one more thing."

Yu Seong-un continued.

"This is also a personality-related issue."

"What further problem could there be?"

"When he is human, Ji-oh can be defined as the twenty-nine-year-old youth 'Seo Ji-oh.' Correct?"

But Yu Seong-un had clearly witnessed it.

"When Ji-oh dipped his feet into Cheonggyecheon…"

"……"

"And when he rode the water taxi."

A change had come over Ji-oh.

"He was looking at the water with the gaze of an entirely different person."

That gaze did not belong to the taciturn, quiet twenty-nine-year-old youth Ji-oh.

Rather, it held a sense of years lived; the emotions were clearer; there was still a definite distance, yet it was not cold—soft like that of a beloved model student. The faint smile that surfaced even carried something light and cheerful, like a cool sea breeze.

In many ways it was different from both the existing 'Seo Ji-oh' and the 'Portrait.'

"There was a change in form as well. His hair turned white and a watery light swirled in his pupils."

"Oh, that sounds rather similar to Curator Yu Seong-un."

"It was a little… different from mine. Same general family, yes, but…"

That color was far warmer.

Like summer sunlight, or the surface of the sea.

"……"

He could not be certain.

"I'll look into it further."

"Let's do that."

They still knew far too little about Ji-oh.

(To be continued)