The Villainous Director Is Raising a Child!

While I was still stunned into speechlessness by the first pinecone attack of my entire life, the girl kept hurling pinecones and shouting:

"Ever since you got here, my grandma has had no energy at all! All day long she just sighs and looks like she has too much on her mind! So hurry up and get out of our village! Get out!"

Thrown as I was by her ferocious energy, on another level I actually felt relieved.

So she does know I'm here. She was ignoring me so completely I'd assumed she couldn't care less.

"Sorry, but I can't just leave either. I've got business with your grandmother."

Even at my answer, Ari let out a "Hmph!" of a scoff and just kept throwing pinecones.

Tok, tak.

They didn't hurt, but it was a fairly pitiful assault.

Still...

She's doing this to protect her grandma.

Understanding what it took for a girl her size to throw pinecones at a grown man twice her height, I decided to just quietly stand there and take that admirable, fierce little tantrum.

That was when it happened.

Right as another pinecone came flying at my face —

Shk—!

A black shadow shot out from beneath Sihyeok's feet like a living snake and snatched the pinecone straight out of the air.

"Huk!"

At the impossible sight — the first she had ever seen in her life — Yeon Ari's eyes went round.

"What is that!"

It was a shadow.

Not the kind of shadow she knew, the kind that lay flat against the ground — this one writhed as if it were a living creature.

The owner of that shadow — Sihyeok — had, at some point, stepped in front of me.

"Don't hurt the Director."

Yeon Ari's gaze shifted from the cold look in Sihyeok's eyes down to his feet.

There, the black shadow that had just plucked the pinecone from the air was writhing like a live beast, growling as if it might spring out at any second.

It was a bizarre, terrifying kind of power she had never once seen in her whole life.

"Hnnk...!"

The bold ferocity from a moment before was gone without a trace.

Her face went white with terror of the strange sight in front of her.

"Waaah—!"

Unable to hold up against the frightening scene, she finally burst into tears and turned and pattered off toward home like a squirrel.

Aigoo.

I let out a small sigh.

Made her cry after all.

Something sat uneasy in me at having made a small child cry — a child who had only been trying to look out for her grandmother.

That was the exact moment.

"...Director."

Sihyeok tugged very carefully at the hem of my clothes.

When I looked down at him, the child's eyes were sparkling with expectation — Didn't I do well?

I hid the laugh threatening to burst out at how transparent his reaction was and dropped one big hand over his head.

"You did great protecting me. But don't use your power on ordinary people without abilities. It could turn into a headache later."

At my words, Sihyeok's head drooped.

"...But she was hurting the Director..."

I wanted, right then, to sweep the child into a tight hug for that dear little answer, but I forced myself not to.

Delinquents didn't do things like that.

Instead, I gave his small shoulder a couple of taps.

"Yeah. Thanks. For protecting me."

It moved me.

A child who had only ever hidden in his own shadow had worked up the courage to protect someone else.

That dazzling bit of growth alone was enough to fill my chest.

But at the same time, one corner of my mind was tangled.

Getting close to the granddaughter — that's out the window.

Quietly, in my head, the entry [Plan C: Befriend the granddaughter, open the teacher's heart] was silently deleted.

She's done with us now, probably...

But as if to make a mockery of my prediction, a strange sort of shadowing began.

Whenever I was working in the village head's tangerine grove, a small bobbed head would pop out between the leaves off in the distance and vanish again.

It was Ari.

Like a detective, the child would just watch — from a distance — me working in the field and Sihyeok, who never took his eyes off me from the shade.

After a few days of this so-called surveillance, I decided to speak to her first.

"Do you want to say some—"

But my words only backfired.

"...!"

Her face went red as a beet, and she wheeled around and bolted into the woods.

"...Well then..."

From the next day on, I decided to change my tactics.

Never speak to her first.

And sure enough, Ari, as if she'd gained confidence from it, only got bolder.

The distance that had started at a good hundred meters shrank to fifty a few days later. And a few days after that, to ten meters right in front of us.

Watching, the village elders smiled with satisfaction.

"Aigoo, our Ari's finally found a friend to play with."

Friend?

I looked at Yeon Ari, ten meters ahead, still staring at us hard enough to bore holes.

More like surveillance than a friend, if you ask me.

And then, finally, today.

Ari didn't just watch from far off any longer.

While I was working in the field, she marched straight up to Sihyeok, who was cooling off in the shade of a tree.

"Hey."

Ari looked down at the sitting Sihyeok and asked:

"You're an Awakened, aren't you? That shadow from before — that's your power, right?"

But Sihyeok, as if she weren't even there, just kept his eyes fixed only on me.

At Sihyeok's reaction, Yeon Ari pouted for a moment, but she didn't give up.

"How old are you? I'm eight. Do you go to school?"

"..."

"Why'd you come here? Did you come because of that mister?"

"..."

"Don't you have any friends? You must be bored, right? Want me to be your friend?"

At her words, I realized — this whole time — why Ari had been shadowing us.

She wanted a friend.

Well, of course — in this mountain village there wasn't a single other child her age.

A child that curious — how badly must she have wanted a friend.

But Sihyeok had no way of knowing what was in her heart.

The child, looking annoyed by Ari chattering next to him, got up and walked over to me.

"I'll help."

Copying me, he started pulling weeds with his small hands.

To me, it was as sweet a sight as I could ask for — but to Ari, being flat-out refused, it seemed to have been quite a blow.

Her face flushed bright red with a mix of frustration and embarrassment.

She glared at us for a long moment, then let out a "Hmph!" and just turned and ran off.

I watched her retreating back with a heavy heart, then turned to Sihyeok, glued to my side, and asked:

"Why won't you play with her?"

Sihyeok grumbled tersely:

"She threw pinecones. I don't want to play with someone who hurts the Director."

At the flat, uncompromising answer, I had nothing to say.

...Now what.

You couldn't force a child who didn't want to play to go play with someone.

Looking at the stubborn set of his little face, persuasion wasn't going to be easy either.

And so the next morning came.

As always, I was just heading out to help with work in the village head's tangerine grove — when I saw Ari, some distance off, running toward us cradling something precious in her arms.

"Hey!"

Then, with a wildly confident smile — nothing at all like yesterday's — she thrust the thing out with a "Ta-da!"

What came out of her arms was... a roast sweet potato, steam curling up off it.

"You've never had one of these before, have you?"

The village head, who was just coming out of the room, saw the scene and gave a warm chuckle.

"Aigoo, brought out the prized sweet potato, did you. Awful good, that, even eaten on its own."

At his praise, Ari's shoulders lifted with pride.

"Wanna eat this? My grandma roasted it — it's really good."

The warm, sweet, nutty smell tickled the tip of my nose.

But Sihyeok, after a single glance at that sweet potato, snapped his head away to the other side.

Not so much as a flicker of interest.

Then he tugged on my sleeve and murmured, quietly:

"Let's go."

A refusal that flat, that clean.

The proud smile on Ari's face froze right where it was.

Then that face went red — deep red — with humiliation and hurt.

"I-ick—!"

She stamped her feet and hurled the roast sweet potato in her hand to the ground.

Then she turned on her heel and ran off toward home.

Aigoo...

And the next day, and the day after that.

Ari didn't give up. She brought boiled corn, then a perfectly ripe peach, and even a piece of her grandmother's yakgwa — every "treasure" she could find — and held them out to Sihyeok.

But Sihyeok, as always, just turned his head away.

At his response, day by day, the shadow on Yeon Ari's face grew.

The bold spark from the start was gone — replaced by a sad face that looked like it might crumple into tears at any second.

Watching it started to hurt me too.

Because a child on the verge of tears was one of the things I absolutely could not just stand by and watch.

Looks like it's time for the grown-up to step in.

That night, once I'd made sure Sihyeok was asleep, I slipped out of the village head's house.

I stood beneath the wall of the blue-roofed house and called the girl's name in a very small voice.

"Ari. Yeon Ari."

A moment later, the window opened, and a small head popped out.

The instant Ari saw my face, her brow furrowed hard.

"Mister, why're you here?! You came to bother my grandma, didn't you!"

I shook my head and said, in the gentlest voice I could manage:

"No. I came to see you. Do you have a minute?"

If anything, my gentle voice seemed to make her more suspicious — she didn't drop her guard, only stared at me hard.

"Grandma told me not to follow strangers."

"I won't take you far. If you're worried, I'll say it right here."

Looking her right in the eye, I drew my secret weapon.

"Don't you want to be Sihyeok's friend? I'll tell you how."

At that one line, Yeon Ari's eyes wavered hard.

She looked torn between her grandmother's teachings and her desire to get close to Sihyeok.

"Then... just a really quick minute! One minute only!"

With that, she vanished back inside the window.

Soon — from inside the house — a bustle of sounds: thud! — ow! — tussle, tussle — and then the front door creaked open very, very quietly, and the child came flying out like a gust of wind.

"So what's the way? Honestly, I don't even want to look at you, but I came out just this once."

I laughed at the boldness of it and thanked her, then got straight to the point.

"You want to be friends with Sihyeok, right?"

At those words, the fierce look on her face wilted at once.

"...Yes. At my school, my friends — I'd just talk to them first and share something good to eat, and we'd get close right away. But he's really hard."

I laughed inwardly for a second at the adorable complaint.

Then I dropped down onto one knee to be at her eye level.

"Ari. That's not because Sihyeok doesn't like you."

"...?"

"If someone was hurting your grandma, what would you do?"

"Give them what for, obviously! Anybody who picks on my grandma, I'll teach them a lesson!"

She balled up her small fist.

I nodded.

"Right. And it's the same for Sihyeok."

"For Sihyeok too...?"

"Mm. Right now, I'm the only guardian Sihyeok has. So the Ari who threw pinecones at me — he thinks she's a bad person."

At that, Yeon Ari's face fell.

"Then what do I do? I've already become a bad person to him."

I looked at that little face and grinned.

"So — here's the thing... Ari. Lean in a bit, would you?"

At my words, Yeon Ari's eyes began to sparkle with curiosity.

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