OMH Chapter 70

70.

Because Cha Wooreen explicitly told me not to kill the monster, the baby monster was able to greet the morning.

Though I don’t know if it will be able to greet the next morning.

Now that the monster is born, it can’t be hidden anymore.

As soon as it was dawn, I took the monster to the Research Center.

Thankfully, it was the weekend, so I was free from other duties.

Cha Wooreen was also free, so she followed me, and Woojin followed because of Cha Wooreen.

Still, the important thing is returning the monster to the Research Center.

Maybe the Research Center employees, with their sideburns, would see the newborn sideburns and forgive Cha Wooreen.

With that hope, I opened the door to the Research Center.

“Oh? Gang Hana Esper! What brings you here? Did you suddenly develop a passion for commercializing our Mirnare?”

Not likely. But I held back what I wanted to say and took out the monster, which I had placed in Cha Wooreen’s kindergarten bag, and said only what was important.

“The kid I brought yesterday put a monster egg in her bag, and it hatched. So I’m returning it.”

“What? There was an egg in the breeding ground? Oh my, it’s been so long since I’ve seen a newborn Mirnare… So cute! The last one we hatched in the breeding ground was a month ago.”

As expected, the researchers here were irrational and, captivated by the newborn baby monster, overlooked Cha Wooreen’s mistake.

However, they also provided too much information that I didn’t want to know.

Like how these monsters are managed for breeding at the Research Center, so seeing one born naturally in the breeding ground was a first, or even useless information about how the newly born monster’s pigment had mutated.

But Cha Wooreen seemed to like these useless stories, and her eyes sparkled.

“Then, is our Bbibbi special and amazing?”

“Who’s Bbibbi?”

“The puppy I brought.”

When did she give such a cute name to the monster?

However, the researcher didn’t care whether Cha Wooreen called the monster a puppy or Bbibbi, only staring at the monster on my palm.

“Oh my goodness… How can it be so pretty? It’s admirable that it was born through natural reproduction, and unlike the golden-scaled Mirnare, its scales are silver. And its eyes are blue. We’ve observed brown, gold, and green eyes so far, but never blue.”

I felt burdened by the researcher getting more and more excited while looking at the monster.

Since the monster is on my palm, that person keeps getting closer to me. I think their breath is going to touch my fingers.

I grabbed the monster with my free hand to hand it over to the researcher completely.

No, I was about to grab it. If only that thing hadn’t bit me.

“Ouch, this thing is biting people now? Let go of my finger, you little rascal.”

“Oh? Mirnare’s… The color, the color changed! Oh my goodness!”

“Me too! Show me too!”

I got my finger bitten by the monster, but no one cared.

Instead, Cha Wooreen clung to my arm like a monkey, begging me to show her the monster.

“Really… What’s so different about this rude monster that everyone’s making such a fuss? Oh? It really changed?”

Because Cha Wooreen was clinging to me, the scales of the monster I saw again had turned yellow like the ones in the breeding ground.

It was definitely fascinating. Even its eyes turned brown. Although it’s still biting my finger.

“Hana-ssi… Is your finger okay?”

Only the angelic Woojin was worried about me.

“Of course, I’m okay~ Don’t worry, Woojin-ssi. It’ll fall off if I just shake my hand lightly.”

To reassure Woojin, I lightly shook the hand that the monster was biting.

The monster, with its insignificant body size, finally let go of my finger and rolled to the ground. I guess the monster’s strength was even more insignificant than I thought.

“No! Bbibbi!”

“Kyaaak! Our Mirnare!”

My ears were ringing from the screams of the two people around me.

Catching the monster before it hit the ground isn’t difficult.

I was about to reach out to catch the monster, but Cha Wooreen was in that direction.

I changed my method, held Cha Wooreen’s hand, and supported her so she could catch the monster herself.

Tap-

The monster landed lightly on Cha Wooreen’s palm.

-Bbeeee.

“Wow! I caught it! Did you see, Oppa? Bbibbi, are you okay?”

Cha Wooreen was so happy to have caught the monster that she stomped her feet and boasted to everyone with a flushed face.

If I hadn’t been holding Cha Wooreen’s hand, the monster would have fallen again.

“Everyone, look! Mirnare’s color changed again!”

The researcher, who was only interested in the monster, shouted for everyone to look at the monster.

Indeed, the color had changed as the researcher said.

The monster had returned to its original appearance, with white scales and blue eyes.

*

“Really? No joke?”

“Really? I can raise it, right?”

“That’s right. I’m Chae Sooji, the director of the Mirnare Research Center. It’s within the director’s authority. You can rest assured.”

‘No, I can only rest assured when what you say isn’t a lie.’

I couldn’t bring myself to say what I was thinking and just sighed deeply.

That Chae Sooji, whether she’s a director or whatever, is telling me to raise the monster in my room. What kind of nonsense is that?

To be exact, she said she wanted Cha Wooreen to raise the monster, but how can a seven-year-old raise it? Woojin and I will be taking care of everything.

Oblivious to my feelings, Cha Wooreen was busy experiencing feeding the monster with a baby bottle. For something so small, it ate so much, receiving one made for human babies.

“But that’s a reptile. Do reptiles drink milk?”

“Not exactly milk. It’s artificial meat ground up and mixed with water. With so many of them, it’s too hard to tear the meat and put it in each one’s mouth.”

“Then can I just feed it any kind of meat?”

“That’s right. It’s a monster, after all.”

Since it can’t be avoided anyway, it’s better to raise the monster properly. I braced myself and listened intently to Chae Sooji’s lecture on how to raise the monster. The stories that it wasn’t picky about food and knew how to use the toilet were impressive.

And according to Chae Sooji, since those guys actually have fangs, they have a tendency to bite.

But she added vague advice that Cha Wooreen is special, so it’ll be okay.

I looked at Cha Wooreen playing with the monster.

Certainly, the monster was particularly obedient to Cha Wooreen.

There were many situations where a child’s touch might feel uncomfortable to the monster, but the monster’s appearance of lying flat without even hissing was strange.

Especially, I really don’t understand the meaning of the changing colors.

As a result of experiments conducted by Chae Sooji, that monster changes into two colors.

The first color is white scales with blue eyes, like when it was born, and the second color is yellow scales with brown eyes, the same as other monsters.

And there were conditions for the color to change.

If I touch its head, it turns yellow, but if Woojin or Chae Sooji touch it, the color doesn’t change. Once it turns yellow, it stays yellow even if Woojin or Chae Sooji touch it.

But if it comes into contact with Cha Wooreen, it turns white again.

Even if Cha Wooreen doesn’t touch its head, the monster turns white again. Seeing that it turns white just by being near her without touching, Cha Wooreen seemed to be a more special existence to the monster than I was.

When it’s with Cha Wooreen, the color doesn’t change even if I touch its head.

I wish the Research Center would take the monster and study it intensively because of the meaningless scale dyeing, but unfortunately, the director’s thoughts were different from my wishes.

She wanted Cha Wooreen to always be with the monster.

“Isn’t it so romantic? A Mirnare born for humans has already found a special human and formed a bond… This is a sign that Mirnare will play a big role in the field in the future! So, what do you think about working with our Mirnare in the field, handsome next team leader?”

And she was even trying to entice Woojin to use the monster.

“If you’re going to do that, shouldn’t you prove what that monster can do first? Field work isn’t a joke.”

I stepped between them to protect Woojin and blocked Chae Sooji.

But Chae Sooji seemed to be a director-level figure, so she didn’t back down easily.

“Oh my? To prove it, we have to do experiments. No matter how great our Research Center’s facilities are, they’re not as vast as the outside field. Our Mirnare needs to spread its wings and fly in the sky. So, of course, we need to get cooperation first so we can experiment in the field. Don’t you think so, next team leader? Of course, we’ll send out Mirnare that have been fully trained. Fighting the monster’s power with the monster’s power. Isn’t it cool? It’ll definitely be helpful to the field Guide.”

Chae Sooji kept turning her eyes to Woojin and flirting with him, even though I was there.

I regretted being shorter than Woojin today. I needed to completely hide Woojin so Chae Sooji couldn’t see him.

There’s no choice. I changed my strategy.

“Then you can ask for cooperation from our team! The Great Monster Extermination Team! Where else can you deal with monsters more professionally than here? Why do you keep bothering Woojin!”

“Ah~ that team? It’s a bit too dangerous to send our Mirnare out for experiments there. What if our precious Mirnare gets hurt?”

“……”

I really never imagined this perspective. Is the monster that precious?

“And Gang Hana Esper isn’t even the team leader of that team. Does she even have the authority?”

“……”

This is a bit too much. I’m still the team’s ace.

“So, I want to hear our next team leader’s opinion? What do you think about working with our Mirnare?”

Chae Sooji gave me a lot of feelings of defeat and only clung to Woojin.

Is it okay to embarrass me like this because I’m not the team leader? I desperately wanted to have power today.