No matter if the neighborhood is turned upside down by the sound of monster attacks, I calmly entered the house after finishing what I needed to do and entering the front door password.
It seems the art academy tends to keep people for quite a while.
Even as I checked the CCTV, called the police, and squabbled with the package thief lady, it was almost 7 PM and Shiyeon still hadn’t returned.
If it were a typical academy, she wouldn’t be back until around 9 PM, so maybe this is to be expected?
The Gomtaengi, which had crawled out of my pocket, seemed equally shocked by the package thief’s actions, murmuring a few words as we walked outside.
“No… How can there be a lady like that?”
“The world is wide and there are many crazy people out there.”
I opened the small cardboard package I had brought back, tightly hugging it, to check its contents.
Inside the box was bubble wrap like a matryoshka, and inside that was another box.
I tore off the packing tape and opened the tablet PC box, which was covered in thin plastic wrap, proving it to be an unopened brand new item.
I decided to leave the emotional unpacking for Shiyeon.
With a pop, I grabbed the remaining bubble wrap and burst it one by one with my fingertips as I entered the room.
After lying on the bed, I kept popping the bubbles as I rolled sideways.
Once I started, the strange addiction led to an endless series of pops.
When I had popped about half of them, I got tired of it and twisted the unpopped sections like wringing a cloth.
With a dull sound of crumpling, the bubbles were flattened.
Ah, this isn’t the time for this.
Getting up from the bed where I had been lying blankly, I gathered up the laundry that had been drying on the rack and began to sort them neatly.
After putting each piece in its respective closet, I headed to the kitchen.
“What should I make for dinner tonight—”
Muttering to myself, I opened the refrigerator and freezer once, rustling around as I searched.
Inside the refrigerator, along with eggs, there were some sesame leaf soy sauce, squid sauce, and lonely jars of red pepper paste and soybean paste.
Though there were various frozen foods in the freezer, nothing really struck me as appealing.
My hands drifted around aimlessly inside the fridge.
At that moment, the Gomtaengi suggested.
“There’s a bag of sliced pork belly in the freezer; how about we fry it and put it on rice?”
How does it know more about the refrigerator’s contents than I, the landlord?
I tilted my head in surprise, but it wasn’t a bad suggestion, so I took it out from the front of the freezer.
It’s not a dish that splatters oil all over like frying….
Thinking there’s no need to go all out, I just draped an apron over my underwear and took out a wok resembling what one might find in a Chinese restaurant, setting it on the induction stove.
Food tastes best when it’s warm.
I grabbed my smartphone to time Shiyeon’s return and sent her a message.
[When will you be back?]
Still showing an ongoing 1 indicator, is she still in class or something?
With no choice, I decided to wait a moment without turning any buttons on the induction stove.
“Mary, but….”
“What?”
“A monster has appeared.”
“Ugh, how annoying….”
It hasn’t been long since I took my clothes off.
Hearing the Gomtaengi’s words, I hung the apron I was wearing on a kitchen chair, went into the room with a grimace on my face, and put on some training clothes.
The monsters seem to be able to recognize me now, but just in case, I stuffed the mask into my training top and headed outside.
The elevator was coming down from almost the top floor.
Instead of waiting for it, I’d rather just walk down.
As I walked down to the first floor, the elevator arrived at the same time I reached it.
“Oh? Where are you going?”
At that moment, Shiyeon appeared from the shared entrance into the apartment.
Had she come home without looking at her smartphone, she had a bewildered expression.
“Ah… I’ll cook dinner after I’m back, so wait at home.”
At that moment, the elevator doors opened with a clank.
“Oh? Mary, hi Shiyeon.”
“Hello.”
It was Taehyun, a neighbor from the same apartment, appearing from inside the elevator.
Things are getting complicated.
Shiyeon entered the elevator while Taehyun matched his pace with mine, who was just coming out.
No, please just pass by.
“Where are you going?”
“Exercising, and you?”
I answered that I was exercising, implying I was defeating monsters, while subtly asking about his plans.
Please don’t overlap.
Actually… even if they do overlap, can’t I just avoid it?
By mentioning exercise, it’s a confirmed fact that I’m heading to the nearby park, so please just say you’re going to the mart over there.
Don’t lie about being a diligent human going to exercise at 7 PM when there’s little time to play as a middle school student.
“I’m going to the mart over there.”
“Oh, okay, good luck.”
Fortunately, our paths didn’t overlap.
Pretending to be indifferent, I acted as if I was starting my exercise from right in front of the house.
I swiftly escaped the apartment complex with proper running form.
As soon as I stepped out, my smartphone buzzed with a disaster alert.
Hastily, I headed toward the illegal parking zone full of vehicles, away from CCTV and patrols.
“Sun.”
I whispered the incantation as I looked for a cozy transformation point.
With a gentle bounce, the breath I had been drawing sharply went down.
‘This part is amazing.’
No matter how I think about it, this transformation is practically an invincible cheat code in reality.
Unlike my original body, I don’t get tired; I don’t get burned, I can fly, and my strength is beyond mere humans.
As I admired my temporarily shrunken body, the Gomtaengi urgently urged me on, pulling out the mask from my pocket.
“What are you doing? Let’s go!”
“Yeah, I’m going… you’re not letting me think about anything else.”
“That’s something to do after we defeat it!”
“Ugh… you’re right for some reason.”
Swiftly flying into an apartment complex in Bupyeong.
It resembled something like a bipedal lizard man, with only one eye, akin to those found in games or fantasy comics.
I quickly descended, reducing speed to gracefully land directly in front of the monster without causing the ground to crumble beneath me, and took out my cane heading straight towards the unobstructed sky.
“Oh?”
“Thanks for coming, have a nice trip.”
As the monster failed to comprehend the situation and stood there flustered, a thick red beam shot out from my cane.
In less than 10 seconds since I arrived on the scene, while observing the lower half of its body starting to scatter like powder, separate from its vanished upper half, I lightly leapt and flew upwards, escaping the scene.
Tonight’s dinner would be sliced pork belly over rice.
On my way back home, I deactivated my transformation at a few points I remembered.
As I undid the transformation, the sensations I had lost returned.
“Ah, I’m out of breath.”
Entering the house while taking off my sneakers.
Thinking that there would only be me entering, Shiyeon walked out barefoot from the room where the light was spilling.
“Mary, great job—”
“Uh, phew… how was the art academy?”
Exhaling a breath that had risen to my chest, I asked Shiyeon about the art academy she visited for the first time today.
Having never been to an academy since elementary school, she seemed to take the bright demeanor with her excitement about it although it’s not a study academy.
“It was fun!”
“Good to hear… I’ll fry the meat, so just wait a moment.”
As the heat trapped inside me escaped, I felt refreshed the moment I took off my training clothes.
With the training outfit soaked in darker colors, I tossed it into the laundry basket like a basketball.
Even though it’s still a cool early spring, my clothes soaked with sweat after merely running a bit.
After quickly wiping my hands and arms with only the sink’s water, I chopped an onion on the cutting board, slicing it thin but not too thick.
Next, I opened the freezer to take out the bag of sliced pork belly I had set aside earlier.
Setting the induction to the maximum heat, I emptied out the entire bag of meat.
Meanwhile, I took out some white rice I had neatly stacked in the fridge and put it in the microwave, setting it for 2 minutes and 30 seconds, just right for eating.
While it spun, I gathered various seasonings nearby.
Whether it was beef rib seasoning or pork rib seasoning, I prepared a jar of rib marinade sauce and some pepper.
I cooked the sliced pork belly, and when I could tell some oil was surfacing, I added the sliced onion directly into the pan.
I sprinkled some pepper lightly, whenever.
Then, amidst the growing sizzling sounds of the meat, I heard the microwave beep—indicating the rice was heated through.
With the meat sizzling more intensely, Shiyeon peeked her head out.
To her, I commanded briefly, as if to say it was time to get ready to eat.
“Grab the chopsticks and spoon—”
“Okay!”
Then, I scooped out a serving of rice into a wide bowl where we could mix it well.
Just as the water from the onions began to simmer down while cooking the meat, I gently poured in a ladle full of rib marinade to prevent it from completely evaporating and burning.
As the sizzling sound of the oil mingled with the boiling of the marinade, the delicious aroma of rib seasoning filled the house, even with the vent running.
Dividing it appropriately between the large pan and the bowl above, I was done.
“Let’s have dinner!”
Sliced pork belly stir-fried with rib marinade and onions over white rice.
There’s no way it could taste bad, and we enjoyed our pleasant dinner.
