The Tone-Deaf Healer Kills with a Song - Chapter 107

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Tone-Deaf Healer Kills with Song – Episode 107
“This really is quite high!”
“Yes, it is.”
“Is it safe to jump down?”
“Of course it is.”
The people around us didn’t even glance over when we suddenly jumped from a height of four stories.
So this is the world where handlers and hunters coexist?
“I could have jumped down alone, right?”
“Probably so.”
“Then why….”
You might think this is a strange conversation, but I was genuinely serious about it.
My guess was that Jung Hwan-jae had grown so accustomed to protecting me that while his mind understood there was no need to go this far, his body simply wouldn’t cooperate.
I understand the feeling. Even I still find myself reaching out to him for his hand or asking for help whenever we go anywhere.
Sung Ji-wook shouted “Here I go!” and leaped down lightly. Despite being no lighter than us, he reached our side in an instant.
“From here on, you can just walk on mana.”
“Walk on mana, you say.”
“Yeah, aerial walking.”
Sung Ji-wook gestured downward. The scattered paths certainly looked like we could walk across them the way one might tread upon the Milky Way.
It was clearly a safe path, so I was hoping Jung Hwan-jae would put me down now, but he showed no sign of doing so.
He continued walking solemnly without any change in expression, and I found myself growing flustered despite myself.
Since he wanted to carry me this far, I thought it wouldn’t be so bad to just go along with it, even if I should probably be more considerate.
“See that at the end over there?”
Sung Ji-wook, who had been watching us with an expression that said “this is quite the situation,” shook his head once and gestured toward something.
My gaze naturally turned in that direction. The mana Sung Ji-wook had extended stopped abruptly in mid-air.
“Since this is a Subspace Arena that humans have decorated with skills, there are these pitch-black empty spaces scattered throughout.”
“Can’t they be removed?”
“Of course they can be, but some researchers say they concentrate better with them there, and others say if we took those away too, they’d have nowhere to go and scream when they don’t feel like working….”
The more I listened, the more I began to wonder if Harp really did get lost and end up in the Subspace Arena, or if the missing person report was actually accurate.
Combining the people’s reactions with the explanation he was giving, it seemed more plausible that Harp simply didn’t want to work and went in there.
“…Is it really okay to suddenly drag someone out who doesn’t want to work?”
“Apparently, he has a habit of hiding in the Subspace Arena whenever he doesn’t feel like working, even normally.”
“Ah.”
Everyone here already knew about it.
I had thought Harp was the type to act with strict adherence to principles and rules, but it seemed he was more of a lazy, carefree sort who avoided work.
All sorts of images flashed through my mind. Jung Hwan-jae stopped right before the point where the mana disappeared.
“How do we open the door?”
“You just go in.”
Sung Ji-wook demonstratively stretched out his hand and pushed it through the gap. Though it was clearly empty space, I could see his hand disappear into something.
I nearly let out a shocked scream at the sight, but I managed to restrain myself with composure.
[Liri: The Subspace Arena here is incomparably vast compared to what the Center actually operates. We probably won’t even use a tenth of it.]
[Liri: If Ye-ah suddenly falls into the Subspace Arena and gets lost, stay calm and use the ring. Hunter Jung Hwan-jae will come to rescue you.]
If you get lost, don’t move and stay put so your guardian can come retrieve you. It’s oddly familiar advice, but I’m not sure it’s meant for me.
I’m twenty-four years old….
“Ye-ah, please go in first. Ji-wook has already entered.”
“Ah, yes.”
I tore my gaze from the message window Liri had sent and squeezed my eyes shut before stretching my foot across the gap.
The trace of mana vanished beneath my feet. The terror that I might plummet downward without warning was mercifully brief.
No fear, no wind—nothing touched me. A familiar hand wrapped around my shoulders.
“Nothing happened, so it’s safe to open your eyes. You’ve arrived safely.”
“Ah….”
Only then did I open my eyes, which had been squeezed shut against the fear.
I’d expected the darkness zone to be pitch-black, but it wasn’t.
A night sky stretched across all directions, and beneath my feet felt soft as walking atop blackout curtains. Rather than darkness, it might be better described as a space where the time of day is night.
As I looked around, Sung Ji-wook, who had been waiting ahead, called out to us.
“Hm?”
“There—Harp.”
Sung Ji-wook gestured forward with his chin, his demeanor suggesting he found it uncomfortable to approach.
I stepped beside him and craned my neck slightly to see who was there. A man sat on stairs made of darkness, his head clenched in his hands.
His honey-colored hair was disheveled—clearly he’d been tearing at it. What could he possibly be worrying about to look so tormented?
I was about to tiptoe away when Jung Hwan-jae gripped my shoulder.
“If we touch him right now, it might have adverse effects. Let’s observe and figure out why his mood has deteriorated so much.”
“Will we be able to tell just by watching….”
I know he’s muttering to himself. But he’s only saying “just a little longer”—I can’t discern exactly what’s troubling him.
Harp clenched his head once more, then pulled something from his pocket. A smartphone.
[Liri: WiFi works perfectly fine even inside the Subspace Arena! This is a service exclusively provided in Korea.]
[Liri: After the mega-Gate, people worked really hard to restore things like the internet post-awakening, so data from that sector has been exceptionally open. Other countries don’t stand a chance.]
“….”
I truly felt the reality of living in an internet superpower.
Harp quietly turned on his phone and began doing something with fierce intensity. The atmosphere around him was utterly impenetrable.
Was someone not answering his calls? Had he failed to convey some crucial information?
Perhaps he was suffering in silence over a lack of research progress.
Without realizing it, I’d adopted a worried expression about his lack of achievement when Sung Ji-wook suddenly sighed and began striding forward with purpose.
“Ji-wook.”
“Sung Ji-wook…!”
He completely ignored our panicked attempts to reach out and stop him.
Something clearly struck a nerve with him. If he’d noticed something, he should share it with us before going off like that—what were we supposed to do?
Flustered, I hurried after him, but Sung Ji-wook’s pace quickened. He stood before Harp and snatched the phone from his grasp.
“Didn’t you say you were going to conduct brilliant research?”
“You are… Hunter Joke?”
“Yet here you are, addicted to games and skipping work hours.”
A game?
“A game…?”
Jung Hwan-jae echoed my thoughts with a vacant tone. So he’d gone missing while playing games, and people were scrambling to find him? This was dereliction of duty on an unprecedented scale.
I’d never seen negligence like this before.
Though I’d acted on my own initiative, I wished I could gather up all the worry I’d poured into him and take it back.
What is this?
As we closed the distance with purposeful strides and moved to encircle him, Harp regarded us with evident bewilderment.
One eye was blue, the other gold.
I understood why he was called Harp just from looking at him. Among hunters, there were those whose appearance underwent such striking chromatic transformations after awakening.
The sacred aura dwelling in those eyes alone revealed how formidable a hunter he once was. Though he certainly didn’t appear that way now.
“Researcher Harp.”
“You all are… Ah, you’re that healer who appeared in the ranking tournament recently. Did people send you to find me?”
Harp clicked his tongue dismissively and rose to his feet. He snatched the phone from Sung Ji-wook’s hand and gave us a cursory once-over.
“But the lineup is quite impressive for just coming to apprehend me. What’s your business with a half-breed?”
“Half-breed?”
I found myself parroting his words without thinking. It was an unfamiliar term to hear in a place like this.
He laughed and tapped the side of his gold eye.
“The Staff Members implanted this eye, but since it’s gone now, I’m a half-breed.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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