Convenience Store Worker From Another World Chapter 130

Episode 130. Even Chihuahuas Can Roll (2)

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The Chihuahua must have been quite frustrated that I didn’t understand, so he gave me a supplementary explanation of what he was doing.

To paraphrase what I heard, he said he works for a company that handles public and corporate network security, and he is a security expert who mainly hacks into security and then explains the vulnerabilities.

In addition, he gave an explanation mixed with various technical terms for over ten minutes, and I listened as carefully as possible before giving my opinion.

“yes?”

“What the hell, man. This is called a mouse… .”

A Chihuahua picks up a wireless mouse and holds it out to me with bloodshot eyes.

If I say, “Who doesn’t know that?”, I think I’ll see the blood vessels in my eyes burst. But what can I do if I really don’t know?

All of that aside, the situation itself where technical terms like function vulnerabilities and injections that I had to study to understand were coming out of this Chihuahua’s mouth was ridiculous. There’s no way this is a characteristic of the Chihuahua Kobold race in this world…

“You see two buttons here. The one on the left is the left mouse button, and the one on the right is the right mouse button.”

“Do you use a mouse to code? In the movies, they just use the keyboard.”

“Where did this kid come from and what did he see to be talking like that?”

“no?”

“Of course it is a movie, but why do you keep asking when you can’t understand it even if I tell you?”

That sounds right, so I decided not to ask any more questions about it. Yeah, Chihuahuas are good at coding, and this guy was the only one who got kidnapped by a magic UFO and came back after being hit by a beam. What does that have to do with me? Just do your job well.

After a moment of silence, the Chihuahua took a look at the laptop screen and asked again.

“So, what hours are you open for business?”

“I told you earlier. We’re open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.”

“Are the business hours the same for other places too?”

It varies by store, and is largely divided into two types depending on how the contract with the franchise is made: 24/7, or 18-hour operation.

When you see a convenience store with its lights off at night, instead of thinking, “Huh? Why are the lights off at that convenience store?”, think of it as a place that has signed a contract to only operate for 18 hours.

Let me tell you this, the Chihuahua, who had been staring at my face for a moment, suddenly turned around and put his paw on the laptop.

“I’m going to work until morning, so you go do your job.”

I was about to ask why I asked about the business hours of other places, but I gave up.

I’m measuring this Chihuahua’s anger level in this way. The better he feels, the angrier he gets, and the worse he feels, the calmer he gets. It’s an inverse relationship.

If we were to guess by this measurement, it would be clear that this Chihuahua is on the verge of being angry, if not quite angry. Isn’t this the first time this guy has talked about himself so calmly and at such length?

I don’t know why, but I guess he gets annoyed at having to work alone while everyone else is resting because of the gate. He said, pointing outside the main gate.

“Then I’ll go do what I have to do and come back. I’ll go out for a bit.”

Normally, he would be worried about our store, saying, “Then who will look after the store, you idiot?” But he just types away on the keyboard without saying a word.

I went outside and called the vampire professor.

It was late in the night when I called, but he probably wouldn’t be sleeping anyway. He was a vampire. The phone rang twice and then hung up.

[ I don’t have time to talk. I’m busy now, so later – ]

“I will. What we talked about this morning.”

The professor stopped talking. After a moment, he said one word.

[ Please wait 3 minutes . ]

Then the call ended, and while I waited, I just stared blankly at the night sky.

There are a lot of dark clouds in the sky. It looks like it might rain soon.

The moonlight that had been bright all week had disappeared without a trace. The minute hand on my phone clock changed exactly three times when I got a phone call.

[ I’m busy, so I’ll keep it short. I’ve just finished registering, and from now on, you’re a person involved in this case. Within the area of responsibility, the police department, the Hunter’s Association, and the Magic Agency… ]

“Wait a minute. Where, where?”

[ … The National Police Agency, the Hunter Association, and the Magic Agency. They can call upon the necessary personnel through the three agencies, and they also have the authority to search or investigate the gate through other means, and directly destroy the gate in case of an emergency. ]

Even after hearing it, it still didn’t feel real. Are you saying that if I call the police, they’ll come and give me donuts, and if I complain to the Hunter’s Association or the Magical Agency, they’ll come find me and listen to all my complaints?

I imagined it, and it would be quite funny to see a pickpocket wearing a uniform and asking for this and that. The professor continued.

[ Also, your area of responsibility is a circular area with a radius of 1.5km centered around the convenience store where you work. If you have any objections, I will assign you a different area. ]

“None. Anything else?”

[ You can start here. Or, do you have any other questions? ]

There were a ton of them. What on earth is the Magic Agency’s phone number?

If I asked that question, I knew I would be asked if I was a North Korean agent. After thinking about it for a moment, I asked the most ambiguous part of what I had just heard.

“You said there was another way earlier, what was that?”

[This refers to all available means, provided that they do not violate the law.]

“So you need to know what it is to think about it—”

[ All available means . ]

The philistine, nitpicking gentleman keeps repeating the same thing. In a frustrated tone. From then on, he kept mumbling.

[ In the committee . ]

“yes.”

[ Considering the scale, frequency, and damage status of gates in the city center, it is estimated that up to 7 days remain until the core gates are naturally destroyed. ]

“At least.”

[ 2 days. ]

Even now, countless anti-magicians are said to be moving around with sweaty feet.

We need to clean up the civilian damage that has already occurred, deploy personnel including anti-magicians to the expected locations of the gate occurrences, and identify key locations of the gate occurrences and eliminate them before they disappear naturally.

[ This means that there is no time to give instructions on each and every method or means. Even in the case of the list of civilian casualties – ]

“I understand. Do you have any advice for newbies who have been in the game for 2 or 3 weeks? Maybe a quick tip?”

I thought that if I hung up the phone like that, I would just feel lost. The professor, who had been silent for a while, clicked his tongue and said this.

[ How did you take the national qualification exam? ]

“I took a test or something….”

[Do it the way that works best for you. I’ll send you the information you need as a pdf file in the middle of the night, so check it out as soon as it’s sent. I’ll hang up.]

After that, he really hung up the phone, and the call time was recorded as less than 3 minutes. As the saying goes, he must be really busy.

After putting the phone in my back pocket, I looked up at the night sky again and thought. I still felt lost, but I couldn’t take back what I had already said. If it was something I had done during the test…

I was the one who erased the magic, but I received a lot of help from others until that point. My older sister helped me choose the work and put in the effort, and the store manager personally chose the final work.

Right now, it’s important to go through the process. Even if you want to ask for help, your older sister or the store manager will be running around sweating and moving around, each doing their own thing… .

“… … .”

The feeling of emptiness is growing stronger. If I had known things would turn out like this, I would have looked into more anti-magic books.

– Bam.

While I was thinking, a drop of water fell on my wrist. I looked up reflexively and saw raindrops scattered in the air, reflecting the streetlights.

“What the hell is this rain, again.”

I think I should go in and think about it. As I entered the store, the Chihuahua turned its head toward me as if it had heard the front door bell ringing.

“Hey, you piece of shit!!”

“why.”

“Why the hell, if you leave a customer in the store and leave, what will happen to the store? What if some thief comes and steals the safe and runs off? You’re going to take responsibility?”

“Did you steal anything?”

“Am I a thief? Why do you steal things?”

It looks like he feels better because the blockage he was stuck in while coding has been cleared, as the taste disappeared in 5 minutes. I gave him a quick recommendation because I was feeling upset.

“Please go in slowly. They say there’s a gate open outside, so there’s no telling when things might get messy.”

“Will you do that for me?”

“I can’t do the work for you, but wouldn’t it be better to live at home than here? That’s why you pay rent.”

“You can’t work at home, you piece of shit. The bed is too comfortable.”

I understand this. Why, when I leave work on time and bring overtime work with me, thinking I’ll finish it at home and rest a bit tomorrow, when I actually get home, I just throw it all away and collapse.

“Then do whatever you want….”

“hey.”

“Why again?”

“Why did you go out?”

I went out to get some air, but I stopped myself from answering.

Even though this Chihuahua mixed all sorts of curses in it, he told me what he was doing, so I should give him back what I got. After thinking for a moment, he took out his license and answered.

“I work as a half-wizard on the side. I also do some government work on the side.”

“This kid was a dog of the country?”

“No, that’s not it. Since you asked first, please listen carefully. I asked what I could do about the gates that are opening here and there outside…”

The reason that gate was opened is because there is a key gate somewhere, and he asked me to look for it around here. He also told me to take care of any civilian casualties that occur along the way.

Honestly, I don’t know much about civilian casualties. I’m the one erasing the magic, and I can’t touch and fix things that were broken by magic. My phone does that for me…

“So I was thinking, I want to find that gate, but how do I find it? – Yes.”

After finishing my conversation and looking at the Chihuahua, I saw that the wrinkles above its eyes were like double eyelids. It asked me in a tone of disbelief.

“Why is Pyeondol doing something like that?”

That’s right. Why am I doing this?

I was thinking about this topic a little while back in the taxi. Why did my plan to just work part-time and get away get so messed up, and what exactly do I want to do in this world?

It was only when I got out of the taxi that I was able to come to a somewhat vague conclusion. It wasn’t a problem that I could think about for an hour or so and get an immediate answer to.

That means I’ve lived 29 years in another world. It’s not like I’ve lived an easy life where I can easily find an answer after thinking about it for an hour.

So I thought about it a little more simply. Instead of thinking about what I want to do in the future, I thought about why I want to do this right now. Why should I do it? The answer to this came easily.

“Because of this f*cking gate, no customers are coming. No customers.”

The company I was working for went out of business because of Corona, and I had to go through that experience again because of this damn gate. You say we didn’t even make 100,000 won in sales for two days?

If I were just a part-timer, I wouldn’t know, but I’ve signed a one-year contract and have the title of manager, even if it’s only nominal. So shouldn’t I try something? It’s something that’s directly related to the store’s sales.

“Even if we put aside whether we can do it or not, if we continue like this, the store will go out of business.”

After finishing speaking, while looking out the shop window, the Chihuahua suddenly blurted out.

“How do I find that damn gate?”

“I don’t know either. Well, they’re saying that they’re going to lump all the gates together and then open in the middle or something like that…”

“hey.”

“yes.”

As I answered and looked at the Chihuahua, I saw that he was in the process of turning back on his laptop that had just entered sleep mode.

“Just wait a minute, you piece of shit.”