At night after training ended, I started the Weltschmerz meeting. Actually, it wasn't much of a meeting. It started as soon as we finished eating in the kitchen and walked about ten steps to sit in the living room.
"Where's Edward?"
"He's reading a book. After we taught him Korean, he's been reading children's books diligently these days."
"Somehow it feels like he'll learn Korean much faster than we learn English."
Cha Song-jin shrugged, nodding towards Kim Jae-ho and Han Seo-hyeon. He looked like he couldn't handle those two troublemakers. I could understand Kim Jae-ho who barely speaks Korean, but Han Seo-hyeon?
"What can I do when my brain freezes up just looking at English? I just wish everyone in the world would learn Korean."
Han Seo-hyeon's face was full of ambition as he dreamed an impossible dream.
It's like I could hear his inner voice saying, 'I must become the world's number one! I'll become number one and make Korean the world's common language!'
"I found studying English fun though."
Boos immediately poured out at Cha Song-jin's words.
"Boo, that's just you, hyung."
"But doesn't Edward teach pretty well?"
Even Han Seo-hyeon couldn't deny that. Edward's lessons were certainly good.
This was unexpected too. Edward was surprisingly good at handling people. He gave just the right level of education. He enticed Kim Jae-ho, who likes cute things, with cute characters, and approached Han Seo-hyeon by translating various international news.
He focused on conversation-based lessons with Cha Song-jin, who secretly likes to chat.
For me, it was a life-or-death one-on-one tutoring, so I don't really remember how I learned, making it hard to compare with John's lessons, but Edward's lessons were certainly quite good.
"Come to think of it, what is Jae-ho teaching?"
While everyone else was teaching something, it seemed like I told Kim Jae-ho to learn something too so he wouldn't feel left out.
Han Seo-hyeon answered my question, not Kim Jae-ho.
"These days he's teaching Cha Song-jin hyung various self-defense techniques. Though he's not digesting it at all."
At Han Seo-hyeon's words, Cha Song-jin's face turned red.
"Well, that's because Jae-ho moves in impossible ways!"
"Hyung's movements were pretty impossible too."
Remembering Cha Song-jin's body fluttering in the air like a flag in the wind, I nodded heavily. I patted Cha Song-jin's shoulder and said:
"Let's exercise hard from now on."
"Ugh."
Cha Song-jin lowered his head with a red face. The past few days of training must have engraved in his bones that his physical strength was lacking.
"By the way, what's the reason for calling this meeting today?"
"It seems like we haven't heard Song-jin hyung officially say he'll join our Weltschmerz."
"Ah, is that so?"
Cha Song-jin said with blushing cheeks:
"I already said I want to join your team. That I understand all your goals."
"Even knowing what kind of things we might do in the future."
"Yeah."
"Then now hyung is, um, officially a member of our Weltschmerz, uh..."
I cleared my throat, and Han Seo-hyeon frowned and said:
"Is this the best you can do?"
"H-how else should I say it better?"
"Welcome to our Weltschmerz! It should be at least that much."
"Woooo!"
Kim Jae-ho clapped loudly from behind. Right, maybe I should have prepared a proper initiation ceremony. I scratched the back of my head.
—You've attended plenty of ceremonies, is this really the best you can do?
'I absolutely hate imitating those ceremonies. Our Weltschmerz initiation ceremony can't be the same as those events where they put a fancy cake in the middle, spout nonsense, and clap hands.'
Maybe I should have followed the Peach Garden Oath instead. Though a peach tree might be too much, there are plenty of trees in the mountains...
No, even so, 'Though born on different days, we'll die on the same day!' is too barbaric.
—Whatever it is, it seems like it would have been better than this.
'Yes.'
I was too unprepared. Next time I should at least make a banner.
"Now let's decide hyung's nickname first."
"...N-nickname?"
"Yeah, you can't go around with the name Cha Song-jin when we're active. We need to make a name for you to use outside just in case."
"Can't I just be a member of Weltschmerz? I've never seen news articles mentioning specific members of Weltschmerz."
Ugh, speaking the truth! Well, the nicknames we decided were barely revealed to the public. But still.
"We might get involved with other villain organizations in the future. Having that kind of identity is important."
I said to Cha Song-jin, who still looked puzzled:
"Besides, we can't openly call you Song-jin hyung when we go out. What if someone recognizes you right away and puts out a wanted notice?"
I know this is quite an embarrassing thing to do. But what can we do! Anonymity is the most important thing for us.
"You only need to be embarrassed once at the beginning."
Han Seo-hyeon said that while patting Cha Song-jin's shoulder. No, you don't seem to have been embarrassed even once from the beginning until now...
—With that terrifying word 'death' no less.
'That's right.'
But I should keep quiet here, or I might face retribution from Han Seo-hyeon if I point that out. Cha Song-jin rolled his eyes and asked us:
"What are all your nicknames?"
"I'm Shen."
"Shen? Isn't that too American?"
"To be precise, it's the Chinese reading of the 'sin' at the end of my name."
"Why China of all places?"
"Well, that's a long story... To cut it short, the person I wanted to tell my name to was Chinese."
"Oh, who's that?"
Cha Song-jin said with sparkling eyes.
"There's no love story like you're expecting. I told her my name so she'd come seek revenge on me."
"Huh?"
"It's Xie Haozhu."
"That girl who said her father was murdered?"
I quickly changed the subject at Cha Song-jin's horrified look.
"And this one is Tod."
"It means death in German. I heard our organization name came from German too, so I just went with that."
"That's too authentic for 'just'... Then what about Jae-ho?"
"Jae-ho is..."
I swallowed hard at Cha Song-jin's words and said:
"Jae-ho."
"Huh? Didn't you just say we can't use our real names?"
"He says we can't call him anything different. What can we do when he insists his name must be Kim Jae-ho?"
"Jae-ho is Jae-ho."
We threw up our hands at Kim Jae-ho's stubbornness.
"But hyung is someone we can reason with, right?"
Cha Song-jin nodded at my desperate look and said:
"Even so, um, I can't think of a proper name right away."
"Anything is fine."
"Hmm."
After agonizing for a long time, Cha Song-jin finally opened his mouth.
"So I'm a teleporter, right? So maybe Porter for short?"
"Oh, using the nickname Porter while having teleportation ability..."
What's this inexplicable chill? Why do I feel like we absolutely must not use this name?
"T-this won't do."
"You're Shen!"
"Porter is not allowed, not Porter!"
Han Seo-hyeon sighed watching us start a childish fight.
"Really. Making such a fuss over something you can just name casually. Right, Jae-ho hyung?"
"You're too complicated too. Just be Seo-hyeon."
"...That won't work, hyung."
"Why?"
"...Never mind, hyung. Let's just watch."
* * *
On the day we finally decided Cha Song-jin's nickname after much trouble, I headed to Professor Geum. Professor Geum, who greeted me with quite dissatisfied eyes, soon brightened his eyes at the new information I delivered.
"So you're saying Weltschmerz has one more member?"
"Yes, and we also have one temporary guest. You don't need to worry about the guest, but well. Anyway, we need a lot more items now."
"Where do you keep picking up people like that?"
Professor Geum looked at me as if I was strange. I didn't plan this either, but what can I do when new people keep appearing wherever I go?
"Well, three was too few for a proper hero team anyway."
"What? What are you saying..."
"It's nothing!"
He seemed to have said something. Before I could ask what he said, Professor Geum quickly changed the subject.
"So what's the new one like?"
I briefly explained Cha Song-jin's ability. And the new nickname.
"It's X. It comes from 'escape'."
That was the nickname Cha Song-jin came up with after agonizing for a long time. Han Seo-hyeon said it was 'sycophancy' or whatever, but when asked if he didn't also choose a foreign language for his nickname, he shut his mouth.
He originally wanted to use 'destination'. But because shortening the first two letters becomes 'des', our team's death-obsessed Han Seo-hyeon got angry saying it overlapped with his concept.
It was no use saying it wasn't that 'death'.
In that sense, X. Actually, Cha Song-jin's face was full of fatigue as he uttered that word. He looked like he wanted to decide on any nickname and rest. So I just nodded instead of saying anything.
"Oho."
"He said he'd like an 'X' on the mask."
Of course, I was planning to entrust Cha Song-jin's share of items to Professor Geum too. Professor Geum's eyes sparkled.
"By the way, a non-combatant, huh. This is the first member like this. We'll need some more unique items."
"...What are you planning to do?"
"No, it's nothing. Just a good idea came to mind."
Well, he says this, so it shouldn't be harmful to me. And I had something else to ask Professor Geum.
"Can you get an artifact that can block mental abilities?"
"Hmm, I could probably find one if I look, but. Something like that would be incredibly expensive though?"
I poured out the dollars I had received from Han Seo-hyeon in advance.
"Is this enough?"
"Where did you get this money, no, don't tell me."
Professor Geum raised his hand theatrically and said:
"I'm not confident in keeping secrets."
"The pose is cool but the words are not at all."
"I'm just telling the truth. Haha, I'd spill everything if someone just mentioned the 'T' in torture. So don't tell me too deep secrets."
"That's really reassuring."
I'm newly relieved to know that one of my few collaborators has such a loose tongue that would blow away in the wind.
"Ah, and one more thing."
"More? You're trying to suck me dry when you've come after so long. Well, go ahead and say it."
"We need more phones. And I have something I want to ask about the phones..."
I cleared my throat and said while looking at Professor Geum:
"Have you been paying all the phone bills?"
"Yeah, ah. I guess so? I just set up automatic transfers from a borrowed-name account so I didn't know. Why?"
"Is it okay to make in-app purchases for mobile games on that phone..."
Damn, my face is turning all red trying to say it out loud. I turned my gaze away and continued:
"T-the pity is 80 pulls or something. No, well, if the money going out that way is too much, I can pay for it. So is it okay to make in-app purchases for games, or not?"
Professor Geum went quiet at my question. Right, it's a bit much after all. It's one thing to help a villain organization from behind, but to ask if it's okay to make in-app purchases for games in the meantime. It's a bit unseemly, isn't it?
"I guess it's a bit..."
"What game are you playing? What is it! Encore◆Boys? Baseball Stars?"
"What?"
"If not those, then is it that? Pocket Girls? No, 80 pulls to pity? Then there's only that game, Mighty Girls?"
"Ah."
I barely managed to escape that dungeon-like house, avoiding Professor Geum who said he was a comrade and could understand any preference as I couldn't easily say the game name.
"Ugh..."
This is the worst. I gritted my teeth remembering Nam Ju-hyeon's face.