chapter_0570

570 – I Sell Paintings

570 – I Sell Paintings

Beep—

Beeeep—

The copier made a small mechanical sound as it spat out a sheet of paper.

Watching the endlessly copied images, Gaeul pulled a candy from her pocket.

“Ju-in, I want this.”

“Hmm… but candy can’t be copied, what should we do?”

“Anya?”

“Yeah. The copier doesn’t copy objects; it’s a machine that draws the images exactly.”

“······!”

Gaeul’s ears perked up as she realized the true nature of the copier.

With wide eyes, she pressed her face against the scanner.

“Uh…”

Did she want to take a picture of her face because it was a photo?

I pressed the copy button on the copier, just like Yoo Sang-ah taught me.

Beep—

The copier began to print Gaeul’s face, squished with her cheeks and tongue pressed down.

I couldn’t help but laugh at Gaeul’s flattened face.

“Hee.”

She looked so cute that I couldn’t take my eyes off the paper.

As I continued to stare at the paper, new faces started to emerge from the copier.

Squished faces of Levinas, Bomi, and even Saebyeok and Haneul.

When the flattened faces of the children were printed, I burst into laughter.

Hehehe.

Saebyeok approached me as I laughed uncontrollably, clutching my stomach.

Unlike her squished face, Saebyeok wore a serious expression.

“Gyeoul, you have to do this too.”

“Okay. Got it.”

Even if it would be a funny face, I couldn’t be the only one left out in this situation.

After copying my own squished face, a complete set was made.

“This is really funny.”

I should cherish this.

I wanted to keep the paper from getting wrinkled, but was there anything I could use?

As I looked around, I spotted a laminator placed in one corner of the office.

“Sophia, can I use this laminator?”

“It might be hot and you could get hurt, so I’ll do it for you.”

“Wow, thank you.”

I handed the paper to Sophia for laminating.

Sophia shivered slightly as she looked at the picture with the children’s faces squished.

“What is this…?”

“I printed it out.”

“Hmm…”

As Sophia examined the paper with our flattened faces, she eventually let out a small laugh.

Did she like our squished faces?

Sophia began to flap the shark tail as she started laminating the paper.

Zing—

Gaeul stared intently at the now sturdy laminated paper.

Curious about the lamination, she pressed the corner of the laminated paper with her hand and her eyes widened.

“Ikgu-muyak?!”

Gaeul’s ears and tail perked up.

She seemed surprised that the paper had become sturdy.

“This machine makes the paper strong so it can be kept for a long time.”

“Wow…!”

Gaeul clapped her hands and looked back and forth between me and the laminator.

I could easily guess what Gaeul was thinking.

“Gaeul, only paper can be laminated.”

“Gu-ae?”

“Yeah. If you put a person in, it would be a big deal, right? They might come out squished.”

“Hek…?”

Gaeul’s eyes seemed to rise.

She looked like she was imagining a squished person.

“······!”

Gaeul burst into giggles and quickly wagged her tail.

In Gaeul’s world, a squished person was funny.

The innocence of children can sometimes be frightening.

“Gaeul, you must never squish a person like that, okay?”

“Neung. Aratto.”

The good thing was that Gaeul listened to me well.

She never asked why when I told her not to do something, so I felt reassured just by her response of not doing it.

“Okay, I’ve laminated everything.”

“Wow, thank you.”

I gathered the laminated paper and looked over at Levinas, who was diligently drawing in the office.

Levinas was drawing directly instead of using the copier.

“Levinas.”

“Yeah?”

“Are you not using the copier?”

“Yeah! Levinas is going to do it by hand!”

Did he have a sense of pride as an artist?

Levinas was only willing to sell the drawings he made himself.

I could understand both Levinas’s and Bomi’s approaches.

It was just a matter of promotional items versus an artist.

The problem was where and how to sell so many drawings.

“Hey, kids, where do you think we should sell these drawings?”

“Can’t we sell them at the convenience store like before?!”

“This time, there are too many drawings to sell at the convenience store, right?”

The convenience store didn’t have enough space to display all the drawings.

The kids seemed to realize this too, and they began to ponder while looking at the many drawings.

“Hmm…”

“Hek…”

We needed to sell the drawings to many people.

A place with a lot of foot traffic would be best.

So, would selling them at the park be the best option?

As I was deep in thought about a suitable place to sell, Momoa, who was working, glanced at us and said,

“If you’re going to sell drawings, how about checking out Comic Con? I heard it’s happening this time.”

We were intrigued but unfortunately didn’t know what Comic Con was.

“Momoa, what’s Comic Con?”

“It’s like a comic festival. Many people sell their own drawings or products.”

“Wow.”

I didn’t know such a festival existed.

It sounded like the perfect festival for us right now.

Could we just go and sell our drawings?

I decided to check out this Comic Con place with the kids.

**

A convention center where people used to gather for cosplay in the past.

They said a special event called Comic Con was being held there.

Since it was quite close, the kids and I ran to the place where Comic Con was taking place, carrying a mat.

“Hek.”

Comic Con was a much larger festival than I had expected.

There were so many people that I couldn’t see ahead.

“Wooah!”

“Wooah!”

The kids couldn’t hide their excitement in a world filled with comics.

While it would be nice to explore this place, I wanted to show the kids something even better.

“Hey, kids, how about we explore after we sell all the drawings?”

“Hek! Matta! We have to sell our drawings!”

“That’s right…!”

Even if there were fun and interesting things right in front of us, we had to achieve our goal first.

It was a simple lesson in life that I could teach the kids.

“But where should we sell the drawings?”

“Um…”

At Saebyeok’s question, we looked around.

There were definitely too many people, and it seemed there was no place to sell our items.

‘Somewhere with fewer people… that spot looks good.’

In a corner outside the building where Comic Con was being held.

I laid out the mat there.

‘I used to sell from a spot like this back in the day.’

The location wasn’t great, but the result was a huge success.

Thanks to that, I could choose a secluded spot without hesitation this time.

“Hey, kids, let’s sell a lot of drawings.”

“Yeah! Let’s sell them all!”

“I’ll bring in a lot of people!”

Bomi conjured Black Mana above her hand.

Kaboom—

The Black Mana that rose into the sky exploded lightly like fireworks.

Bomi’s attention-grabbing act was enough to draw the attention of people around us.

**

Ahn Jung-nam was a high-ranking administrator of Comic Con.

Having loved subculture since he was young, he hoped to work in a related field and eventually became the manager of this massive event.

“Hehehe.”

This event is going well too.

Ahn Jung-nam’s eyes caught sight of an unusually long line.

The line was so long that he had to turn his head more than 180 degrees to see both ends.

‘What is this?’

Ahn Jung-nam was a competent manager.

So he knew very well that no one had applied for a booth over there.

Could it be an illegal booth?

What kind of illegal booth has such a long line?

Ahn Jung-nam couldn’t help but feel flustered as he looked at the long line.

The long line was a source of pride for the booth participants.

Only those with high recognition or outstanding skills could create a long line.

To think that an illegal booth was creating a line that symbolized that pride.

It could provoke the resentment of the official participants.

Illegal booths are absolutely not allowed.

Ahn Jung-nam engraved his principle in his heart and moved along the long line.

And there, he discovered the children selling their own drawings.

“One drawing per person!”

“Ikgu Baekgeon!”

“Do you need this?”

Seeing the Beastmen children selling their own drawings, Ahn Jung-nam had no choice but to stop.

He thought they were shameless people breaking the rules, but they were just kids.

“Um…”

Ahn Jung-nam valued rules, but he knew that the rules of this world were more important than the rules of Comic Con.

Touching the innocent children growing up was not part of Ahn Jung-nam’s rules.

‘Are they following the example of adults selling drawings?’

Children selling their own drawings.

It felt wonderful to see the future stars of Comic Con.

Just as Ahn Jung-nam was slowly stepping back.

He noticed a subordinate rushing towards him.

“Hey…!”

Just as the subordinate shouted something, Ahn Jung-nam lightly pushed his shoulder.

It was a silent gesture telling him to just go back.

“Senior?”

“Jun-hak, there are things in this world that you must not touch.”

“Yes?”

The one called Jun-hak looked puzzled as he checked the illegal booth.

There were the children of Dawn selling their drawings.

“Hek.”

It’s the kids from Dawn.

I almost touched them and ruined my life.

Jun-hak let out a sigh of relief and gave a grateful look to his senior who had stopped him.

He almost shouted at the daughter of the building owner who allows Comic Con to be held every year.

A word from the author (Author’s note)

Thank you so much for reading today!

Thanks for the comments and recommendations too! They always give me strength!

An uncle who doesn’t touch the kids.

An uncle who doesn’t touch the kids from Dawn.

Just a word apart, but the feeling is different…!

───

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