DM Chapter 3

The single blue bill tossed to her like a favor by the Esper would buy her a week’s worth of meals at the ration center. Of course, she’d have to discreetly exchange it for coins first.

Lost in thought, she hadn’t noticed the man leaving until he brushed past her.

Watching his figure disappear at the end of the alley, Yoon Min reached down and petted Dung-gae’s head. Though fully grown, Dung-gae was still so small that he barely reached her knees. He wagged his tail furiously, like a little helicopter, clearly delighted by her touch.

“He must really like you.”

Dung-gae was proving to be quite useful indeed. Yoon Min praised the dog’s value, giving him a pat on the back, thinking how he earned his keep better than some people.

The next day, Yoon Min got moving early. She put on her cleanest clothes and carefully brushed Dung-gae’s fur.

Given the man’s curiosity about the dog’s name, it seemed he had a genuine interest in Dung-gae.

“Of course, I’m not giving you away to anyone. But it makes you feel good to earn your keep, right? You need to look clean and cute,” she told Dung-gae.

Although he couldn’t possibly understand, the dog pranced around Yoon Min excitedly.

Her plan worked, more or less. After a few hours of begging in the alley, the man appeared at his usual time and paused in front of her. It was a distinct change from the past week, where he’d simply tossed her coins and moved on. Yoon Min looked up at him, her eyes gleaming. He wore a different outfit from yesterday—a long coat, a navy sweater that rose to his neck, and gleaming black shoes beneath his tailored pants.

His warm, gentle expression softened his neat features, making her drop her guard a little.

“Are you starving this dog?”

The man asked, looking down at Dung-gae, who had already begun licking his shoes again.

‘He really does have an interest in Dung-gae,’ Yoon Min thought, congratulating herself for brushing the dog’s fur that morning.

“No, I feed him every day.”

Yoon Min found this man intriguing.

Soldiers or mercenaries never spoke to her. To them, she was barely a person—just part of the scenery, a lifeless stone on the roadside that they needn’t bother with.

But this Esper had spoken to her twice.

“You’re not an Esper, are you?”

One of his eyebrows lifted at her blunt statement.

“You thought I was an Esper?”

“Anyone dressed like you is an Esper.”

The man chuckled, as though amused by her answer.

“Is that so? I suppose I didn’t disguise myself well enough.”

“Disguised yourself?”

“In a way.”

“Why?”

“No need to advertise that I’m an Esper.”

Yoon Min made a puzzled face. Espers were typically proud to be Espers. They were overflowing with arrogance and confidence, often brash and confrontational. Of course, this perspective was largely instilled by her aunt.

“Then why do you think I’m not an Esper?”

The man seemed genuinely interested in continuing the conversation with her.

“Because an Esper would never speak to me.”

“They could, you know.”

Yoon Min was quickly growing bored with this exchange. It felt like a pointless conversation. He could simply drop a coin and be on his way. Or, even better, give her a bill like yesterday.

Perhaps her thoughts showed on her face, as the man smiled and took out his wallet. Yoon Min’s eyes lit up.

He pulled out another bill and held it out to her.

She quickly scanned the area, then snatched it and tucked it away in her coat. The man laughed softly, clearly amused by her swift actions. As the money settled safely in her pocket, she couldn’t shake the feeling of just how strange today—and yesterday—had been.

“Life must be pretty boring for you.”

As Yoon Min studied the man, she murmured to herself.

“Seems that way,” he readily agreed.

“So why are you hanging around here? Is a Gate opening? Or was a virus found?”

Though she thought it unlikely, given that he wasn’t in combat gear, Yoon Min tilted her head in curiosity as she asked.

“Came out for some fresh air.”

Yoon Min’s expression grew even more puzzled. To put it kindly, Sector 37’s shantytown was no place to go for fresh air. It would’ve made more sense for him to wander toward Sectors 40 or 41—or even Sector 50 if he were an Esper.

The man’s face betrayed no awareness of the contradiction in his words. Or maybe he was simply shamelessly ignoring it.

She eventually lost interest in the man, turning her thoughts to the crisp bill she held. As her aunt used to say, Espers were indeed baffling creatures.

An Esper of any rank above F wouldn’t be aimlessly hanging around here. That much was certain, so it seemed this man giving her money was indeed F-grade, and perhaps a bit unstable. Poor thing.

While Yoon Min was pondering over her theories, the man, who had been looking down at Dung-gae, finally began walking toward the end of the alley, disappearing from sight.

The pleasant, lingering scent he left behind seemed to tickle her heart.

For the next week, the man returned to Sector 37 daily and consistently stopped to chat with Yoon Min.

Remembering her aunt’s warning that “No Esper is fully sane,” Yoon Min maintained a bit of caution mingled with a sense of mystery when dealing with him.

After all, he could suddenly turn on her, tearing her apart. Not that her wariness would change anything.

If an Esper decided to kill her, there wasn’t much she could do to stop it.

“Even an F-grade Esper is quite strong, right?”

“…I’m not so sure about that.”

“Isn’t it just because you’re used to being around people much stronger than you?”

“Maybe.”

He tilted his head, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. Perhaps it was her imagination, but Yoon Min felt that over these few days, she and the man had grown somewhat close, sharing bits of idle conversation.

“So, where do you work?”

Generally, F-grades were stationed between Sectors 10 and 13, where they worked alongside soldiers to fend off monsters crossing the boundaries or supervised porters.

She asked, partly to confirm what she already knew.

“I work wherever there’s a Gate to be opened.”

It seemed that even between Sectors 10 and 13, Gates were now opening with some frequency.

“Must be tough.”

She recalled once seeing an F-grade Esper overseeing porters who carried corpses. Since their telekinesis was relatively weak, their main tasks involved binding piles of corpses into walls or digging deep pits in the hardened earth.

The man stifled a smile at her oddly old-fashioned expression of sympathy.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“Yoon Min. Not just ‘Min’—it’s ‘Min-i.’”

Yoon Min liked her name. Her aunt had given it to her, saying it represented “the honorable principles a person should uphold.” Although she hadn’t exactly lived up to that noble meaning, it was a name she cherished.

“Do you have parents?” he asked.

“Never had any.”

“…It’s amazing you survived.”

“There was an old woman who took care of me.”

“And where is she now?”

“Dead.”

Yoon Min’s brief response didn’t seem to phase the man. He merely nodded, accepting it without any sign of sadness.

“Did you cut your hair yourself?”

“Yeah. Why? Does it look weird?”

“It’s not exactly neat.”

“Don’t care.”

“When did you hurt your leg?”

“Why are you so curious about everything?”

The injured leg and hunched posture were part of an act to make herself look smaller and more vulnerable, but there was no need to reveal all these details to him.

Yoon Min would drop her guard around him, only to suddenly become wary, like a caterpillar bracing against cold rain. Yet the man never seemed bothered by her erratic behavior, and each time her wariness faded, she found herself starting conversations with him.

Most of their exchanges were like this—simple, idle chatter.

Dung-gae adored the man with almost obsessive enthusiasm. The moment the man’s footsteps sounded in the distance, Dung-gae would perk up, wagging her short tail furiously. As soon as he came into view, she would dart toward him, circling around him and licking his black shoes as if crazed.

“No, she doesn’t have any virus,” Yoon Min would assure him each time.

Though she couldn’t be sure if Dung-gae was male or female, the way she acted made Yoon Min certain it was the latter. Dung-gae seemed to love the man’s clean, nicely scented presence, likely from his frequent showers and fresh clothes.

And still, he never pushed Dung-gae away.

“What’s your name?” she eventually asked.

“Lee Hyun.”

A name that suited him well, Yoon Min thought.

As she and Lee Hyun grew closer, the bills started piling up—one, two, eventually eight in total. This amount of money made her nervous. She’d never held so much in her life.

To someone from the Center or living under its protection in Sector 50, such an amount would likely be trivial, but for Yoon Min, scraping by in the shantytown of Sector 37, even a single coin was something she’d fight for, risking life and limb. Holding eight bills was enough to make her hands tremble.

She’d hidden them under the mattress where her aunt had once kept a map. She wasn’t foolish enough to take one straight to the ration station without exchanging it first.

After Lee Hyun left, she abandoned begging for a while and loitered near the exchange.

Two burly mercenaries eyed her indifferently, while other men, likely porters, came and went from the place.