Chapter 23: Protecting Earth, Even as a Carless Kim

I got up from my sickbed exactly after two days.

The recovery clock vanished, my stamina returned to normal, and I regained my condition.

The recovery clock was tedious to wait for, but knowing when I’d heal wasn’t bad.

I wasn’t completely incapacitated, and after defeating the ghoul necromancer, I felt a bit better.

But my stamina wasn’t great for activity, so I kept lying down.

As I stood up, RiceCookerMan, who’d been guarding the place and distributing cold rice from the fridge, greeted me.

“Ugh, my arm hurts.”

[Why does your arm hurt!?]

“Huh?”

My Super Regeneration hit LV8.

Regeneration reached LV50.

Just from grinding.

So, I ground like crazy to raise my skill levels.

Regeneration skills mean I could lose a hand and be fine.

Why not stack them up?

The problem is, I ground so much my arm’s pretty sore.

It hurts…

“Hey, your power was on. Don’t you know what I was doing?”

[I see!]

This guy’s suspicious.

The Fairy’s Flower Bud outside the window shakes its leaves.

I haven’t been nurturing it much lately.

“Ahem, I love you. Grow well.”

<Affectionate words of encouragement +100>

“+100?”

Oddly, it’s way more points than the description suggests.

[It must’ve been starving for love!]

“So, saying ‘I love you’ sparingly works better than spamming it.”

[Its leaves are drooping again!]

“No, no, I love you.”

<Even so, loving words +100>

“…What?”

I thought the Fairy’s Flower Bud racked up points because it hadn’t heard ‘I love you’ in a while.

Some people never tire of hearing it, while others think it makes you look shallow if you overuse it.

It’s like how praise from someone who rarely compliments, like a gruff “Hmm, good job,” hits harder than flattery from a smooth talker.

But that wasn’t it.

At this rate, it’ll bloom in a few days.

“So pretty.”

<Sounds like a daily quota, but still feels good +100>

It’s nice that it’s rising, but why are the messages like this?

“No way it’s the bud itself talking through the status window, right?”

From my perspective, either someone’s filtering these status messages, or they’re showing up as I want them to.

With the humid weather, the house smelled gloomy, so I tried to ventilate.

When working, I want to go home and lie down, but when lying down, I want to get up.

“Ugh, it’s hot.”

Cleaning’s needed too.

Even after beating the necromancer while sick, I only half-assed it with the cordless vacuum and mopped the floor.

The corpse explosion attack came as gas, so it probably dissipated into the air.

But it’s that season where opening the door feels like a loss thanks to the air conditioner.

In a studio with only one window, I had to open the hallway door to ventilate.

As I started cleaning, I spotted something weird near the wallpaper.

My high intelligence lets me read info, but it’s so small I need to zoom in with my smartphone.

<green mushroom>

A mushroom that grows by absorbing nutrients and moisture from bodily fluids. Effects cannot be guaranteed if consumed. Only identify and consume with higher intelligence or appraisal skills.

“What’s this now?”

With the humid weather and exploding corpses, mushrooms started sprouting indoors.

This is driving me nuts.

I’ve heard of mushrooms growing from corpses.

I collected them for now.

Mushrooms can make you grow, serve as crafting materials, or have medicinal uses, probably.

<green mushroom x3>

<red mushroom x1>

<yellow mushroom x1>

Five mushrooms total.

“They’re pretty colors… but they’re probably not from this world.”

I know colorful mushrooms are often poisonous.

They look like traffic lights.

I looked up poisonous mushrooms on a well-known wiki: the yellow one resembles the yellow-lamp mushroom, the red one the stinkhorn.

Even plain-looking ones can be toxic.

“Hmm.”

I’m deep in thought.

I need a lab rat.

If these mushrooms are helpful, I might let them grow naturally, but if not, I’ll clean them out.

“Let’s clean them anyway.”

It’s a human home—letting fungi multiply is like declaring you’ve given up on health.

After being this sick, I can’t let that happen.

Next, I swept up and separated the gold coins sucked into the vacuum.

Separating the coins wasn’t hard.

The gold, dropped as items, was just collected, and the floor’s dust and debris were washed away with water.

It would’ve been creepy if there were a lot of corpse remains.

“They’re dropping a lot…”

Zombies with more flesh were the wealthy elite of that tiny-world, surviving longer.

Surviving longer meant they acquired more assets from other dead, carrying more gold.

So, they drop more.

I heard there’s a formula like that.

“Hmm.”

Just in case, I ground the necromancer’s ashen corpse even more.

After grinding, I sprinkled red antiseptic to disinfect pathogens and mixed it.

Why go this far?

I’m still pissed off.

Why do I have to clean?

If those trash bags hadn’t exploded, it wouldn’t be this mess.

Ring, ring.

“Who’s this?”

A friend I hadn’t heard from in a month called.

We’re barely in touch, but dodging the call felt like it could kill me.

“Why, Mom?”

[You’re on break, right?]

Break, probably.

I was counting down to the break per the academic calendar.

“Yeah, it’s break.”

[Why’s your voice like that?]

“Just woke up.”

My throat’s hoarse from coughing up blood a few times.

I slept a ton too.

[Go to bed earlier and wake up earlier. Aren’t you coming home?]

“Not going.”

[Why?]

“Got fired.”

[What?]

It’s not something to hide.

“I told you. My subject’s teacher took a year’s leave until winter break, returned in July, and there’s no spot for me.”

[What kind of teacher does that?]

Can you not get mad, Mom?

Still, my mom gets pissed off at things that screw me over.

Except for my sibling.

[Then stop paying rent and come here. Help with the farm too.]

“I’m busy with another job here.”

[Really? You got hired again that fast? What’s the job? Part-time?]

“Opened a private deboning shop.”

[Deboning? What’s that?]

“Parent deboning, you know. Send me some money, Mom.”

Click.

This lady—her kid can ask for allowance, can’t he?

She called first and then gets upset.

Why enforce a no-feeding-the-idiot rule?

It rings again.

She hung up by mistake.

She’s still bad with smartphones.

“Why’d you hang up? I can ask for allowance.”

Click.

“…”

She hung up and called again.

Should I lie that hanging up racks up the phone bill?

[So, you eating well? Not just living off delivery since you’re not earning?]

“I’m eating like crazy. Send me rice.”

[You told me not to send rice before.]

“Rice is medicine, Mom.”

[That’s right!]

I almost shushed RiceCookerMan, but its voice is just thoughts.

[You were whining about needing protein.]

“That’s what you said.”

You watched Secrets of Life and Death and told me to eat protein, cut back on bad carbs.

Why’s the nagger acting like this?

[Shut up. It’s summer, so kimchi’s tricky, but I’ll make side dishes. Come get them.]

“I’m not going. I got a job.”

[Deboning parents, huh?]

“Your spine’s already been deboned by Jiyu. Where’s the work?”

[Shut up.]

No reason I can’t go when I’m leaving rice to RiceCookerMan and sleeping.

I was practically knocked out for two days, and it was fine.

[Stop lying. It’s obvious you’re lounging at home right now.]

“…It’s remote work.”

[Then why’re you whining for allowance?]

Her voice rises at “allowance”—she’s pissed.

But she reads the situation from my lines, so my mom’s a genius when it comes to her son.

[It’s obvious you’re slacking. Come down. Your dad’s insisting on a sleep endoscopy, making a fuss. I don’t want to deal with it, so you go as his guardian.]

They’re still fighting over sleep vs. non-sleep endoscopy?

Sleep endoscopy needs a guardian and isn’t covered by insurance, so Mom suggested non-sleep since it’s quick.

But Dad said he can’t handle it and wants sleep, claiming she’s dismissing him, and they’re still at it.

Isn’t it time for a colonoscopy too?

“So, you’re saying I should be his endoscopy guardian? Your busy son? Why not call your daughter?”

[What’s keeping you busy? You’re not at school, obviously lounging at home.]

“It’s remote work. I might even be holding the fate of the world.”

If I don’t stop these otherworld beings in my room, the world could end.

If the leveling system spreads to humanity, who knows what side effects it’d have?

Even if there are none, the corpse poison from that world could spark a second pandemic.

[Come and help put up boar-proof fencing on the farm.]

“Stop farming. That land’s raising boars, not crops. What if your son gets gored?”

[…I’ll send 1 million won.]

“Yes, Mom. I’ll make time to come down soon.”

Did her stocks go up?

Guess I gotta go.

And I need a job.

So they stop calling me. Otherwise, I’ll end up fighting a boar…

“…Hmm.”

It’s entirely possible.

There’s no place to test my strength in this world, but a beast with combat power like a boar might work.

***

Another trash bag burst.

A hole ripped open, and something with just an arm crawled out and fell to the floor.

“What a hellish world. What are those monochrome valleys?”

The first thing it saw was the uniformly white or black cars in the nearby parking lot.

The arm decided to crawl away from the trash pile it was trapped in.

“Ugh, it’s so hot. Corpses wouldn’t survive this.”

Crawling on asphalt heated by the summer sun, the shoulder, neck, and head that had burned away started regenerating.

Sunlight weakens regeneration, but long-term regeneration via Super Regeneration made it possible.

“If only I had legs. That damn bastard. I’ll chew his flesh and make him a skeleton soldier—huh?”

The cruel giant ground the lower half of its body and flushed it down a white puddle.

That part couldn’t regenerate.

Whoosh.

As the necromancer crawled on the asphalt, its vision darkened, and something crushed it, flattening its newly regenerated head, shoulder, and neck beyond recognition.

Thus, it died again.

<Limit break available. Proceed?>

The car crushed it, but since it wasn’t trap hunting, it didn’t count toward levels.

But the enhancement points accumulated in the car.

“What’s this?”

Carless Kim, unknowingly, pressed the “Yes” button on the navigation.

<the equipment glows brightly and disappears.>

His M/B-marked car vanished like a dream.

Thankfully, the car seat, properly optioned, remained, protecting his backside.

Thus began Carless Kim’s desperate legal battle with a foreign car giant.

***

[Gold Purchase]

[Cash Same Day]

“Hmm.”

Mom really sent 1 million won.

The sender’s name was <thisismysontoo>, but it’s for labor costs to help with boar-proof fencing and extermination.

Thinking of withdrawing some cash, I visited a bank branch near the terminal market.

On my way out, I saw a sticker on the glass door of an old gold shop filled with clocks.

“If I sent it, maybe the family would find harmony.”

I’ve got some gold.

If I sent 1 million won home,

Mom might roll up her sleeves to put up boar fencing, or say to Dad, who’s in a cold war, “Help with the fencing,” ending the cold war and opening détente.

Then I wouldn’t have to go home, could keep guarding the gate, and contribute to peace.

“Let’s check the price.”

I stopped a pandemic single-handedly; I deserve a reward.