chapter_0645

645 – Museum

645 – Museum

Gaeul’s magic show continued without a break.

The next trick was a high-difficulty escape act.

“Ikgu Ggaemmuya Ggaemmu.”

Gaeul held up Seol, who was dressed as a monster, for everyone to see.

It wasn’t an incredibly scary costume; she was just wearing a white cloth with holes for her eyes.

“Is Seol playing the monster?”

“Yep. And it’s scary.”

Gaeul, sitting in a chair, handed us a rope.

It meant to tie her up tightly.

“Can I tie her legs too?!”

“Ugh…!”

“Let’s tie her arms behind her back.”

The kids tied Gaeul’s body and the chair with the rope.

They bound her so tightly that she could never escape.

“Gaeul, can you escape even though you’re tied up like this?!”

“No way!”

Gaeul’s eyebrows shot up fiercely.

At the same time, the grand music that had stopped began to play again.

It was the music announcing the start of the show.

“Meow! Meow!”

Seol crawled slowly toward Gaeul, making a different sound than usual.

Gaeul acted scared as she watched Seol.

“Ggaemmu! Ggaemmu!”

Woah.

Gaeul shook her bound body back and forth.

We couldn’t help but focus on this quite thrilling situation.

“Meow!”

“Beep beep beep!”

As the monster Seol got closer, Gaeul finally sounded the emergency siren.

Just when we thought she had failed the escape magic, Haneul brought a blanket and covered Gaeul’s body.

“Yap…!”

A few seconds later, when Haneul removed the blanket, something amazing happened.

Gaeul had vanished in an instant.

“Whoa!”

Even though we knew she had used a portal to disappear, the performance was so good that it was quite entertaining.

The kids widened their eyes and looked around to find Gaeul.

“Gaeul has disappeared!”

“Gaeul, where did you go?!”

“Peek-a-boo!”

Gaeul’s voice echoed from inside the Ggaemmi Guild container.

Did she move there through the portal?

As we waited quietly for Gaeul to return, she didn’t come out through the door for a long time.

“Huh?”

Curious, I opened the door to the Ggaemmi Guild.

There, I found Gaeul tightly bound to a chair behind the door.

“Let me go.”

“Oh, okay.”

It wasn’t a magic trick to untie her; it was a trick where she vanished with the chair.

Seeing Gaeul waiting with her bright eyes for someone to untie her made me smile without realizing it.

“Is there no magic to untie ropes yet?”

“Nope.”

“I see.”

I untied Gaeul’s arms and legs.

Then Gaeul burst out laughing and ran outside the guild building.

“Wow!”

“That’s amazing!”

“It was so much fun.”

As the kids applauded, Gaeul bowed deeply.

It was the moment when Gaeul’s hard-prepared magic show was about to end.

“Gaeul, what’s up? Why are you so good at magic shows?”

“You pulled off a difficult trick so easily.”

In response to the kids’ questions, Gaeul took a small jewel out of her pocket.

It was Gaeul’s special item that activated her brain.

“Ah.”

So she used an item.

No wonder she was speaking so well.

I patted Gaeul’s head, happy for her successful magic show.

Thanks to that, we could enjoy the day.

**

The next day.

I was wandering around the neighborhood with the kids.

While taking a different route than usual, we discovered a strangely shaped building.

“The World Currency Museum?”

Could we see various currencies from around the world?

The admission fee of three thousand won was practically nothing if the kids could learn something.

“Hey, do you guys want to go into the museum?”

“Sure.”

Saebyeok seemed to have a similar thought as she nudged the kids forward.

As we entered the small museum, it truly felt like a world of money.

“Hey, look at this. This is money that was used a hundred years ago.”

“A hundred years? Is that coin older than a shark?!”

“Uh… um…”

I wondered if Sophia might be a bit older.

It was a serious moment of contemplation.

Bomi pointed to another rusty coin in the display case.

“This one is two thousand years old!”

“That one is definitely older than Sophia.”

“Whoa!”

Just the fact that it was old was enough to pique the kids’ interest.

For our kids, who were around ten years old, two thousand years was an enormous amount of time.

“Wanga! Wanga!”

“Huh?”

“Does that mean I can live for two thousand years with Levinas?! Is that a promise?!”

“Yeah. Let’s do that.”

If only we could live that long.

I chuckled to myself at that thought.

Gaeul started to stomp on the marble floor of the museum.

The sound was a bit loud, but fortunately, there was no one in the museum.

“Gaeul, should we be quiet in the museum?”

Gaeul nodded at my reminder and began to stomp on the floor with much softer steps.

Then she pointed to the display case next to her.

“One hundred…!”

“One hundred won?”

In the display case Gaeul pointed to, there were a lot of one hundred won coins.

I wondered why there were so many one hundred won coins, but surprisingly, each one was rare and valuable.

“Wow, Gaeul, this one is worth four hundred thousand won.”

“Huh?”

“This one… whoa, it’s worth seven million won?”

Gaeul tilted her head in confusion.

It was a one hundred won coin, but its value was not one hundred won, which was strange.

“There are special one hundred won coins.”

“Special?”

“Yeah. This is a precious one hundred won coin, and you need to bring a thousand of them to buy it.”

“……!”

To buy one coin, you need a thousand of them.

Gaeul’s ears perked up in surprise, and she took out a coin pouch from her pocket.

“Chwing…! Gaeul too…!”

“You have a precious one hundred won coin too?”

“Ugh…!”

What Gaeul pulled out was an ordinary one hundred won coin.

It wasn’t rare, nor was it treated with a matte finish; it was just a regular one hundred won coin.

Yet for some reason, Gaeul treated it like a precious one hundred won coin.

“What kind of one hundred won coin is that?”

“It’s the one you gave me…!”

“Ah.”

So it was the one I gave her.

It made sense that Gaeul would cherish it.

I also valued the things my family gave me.

“Ikgu, can I not trade it for a cloud?”

“A cloud? You wouldn’t trade it for a coin even if I gave you a cloud?”

“Nope!”

She wouldn’t trade it even for a cloud.

I was so happy that Gaeul valued the coin I gave her so much.

“Then how about a rainbow?”

“I wouldn’t trade it for a rainbow either.”

“You wouldn’t trade it for a rainbow? Then… how about an ant?”

“I wouldn’t trade it for Ggaemmi.”

Goodness.

She wouldn’t trade it even for a rainbow or an ant.

I felt inexplicably good and stretched my arms wide.

“Then how about a giant ant the size of a mountain? It’s the biggest ant in the world!”

Gaeul flinched at my question.

However, her agitation didn’t last long.

“I wouldn’t trade it for a mountain Ggaemmi.”

“Wow.”

Does the one hundred won coin I gave her rival a mountain-sized ant?

It was a day that made me feel a bit proud.

**

After finishing our museum visit, we returned to the park.

While I briefly went home, something amazing was happening in front of the Ggaemmi Guild.

“Let’s put this here.”

“The anchovies go in the front.”

Saebyeok and Haneul set up a table near the campfire.

Bomi brought out chairs from the guild, and Levinas had taped two paper boxes together to make a table.

“Huh?”

What on earth were the kids doing?

As I stood there watching, Levinas placed my arrow on the paper box table.

“What are you doing, Levinas?”

“I’m making a museum!”

“A museum?”

“Yeah! Wanga Museum!”

My museum, huh.

Looking around, I noticed the kids were placing items on the tables and chairs they had brought out.

Dried anchovies, slingshots, and more.

All items related to me.

“Oh…”

Feeling a bit flustered, I stood there for a while just watching the kids.

Then, surprisingly, a rather large museum began to take shape.

‘Goodness.’

The kids were quite serious about making my museum.

I didn’t mind them going this far.

“Hey, kids, it’s a museum, but there are no explanations?”

“Explanations are given verbally!”

“Ah.”

A museum where the kids explain things themselves.

That had its own merit.

Just then, I thought to myself that I could charge a pretty high admission fee.

Ensia approached us, looking around.

“What is all this… is this Winter’s stuff?”

Ensia seemed to realize quickly that it was my stuff.

I was surprised she could recognize all of it.

My tail perked up in excitement.

“You recognize it’s my stuff?”

“Yes. I can’t not know. By the way, why is Winter’s stuff out?”

“It’s the Wanga Museum!”

Levinas answered Ensia’s question.

Upon hearing that it was my museum, Ensia began to show curiosity.

As she wagged her tail and tried to enter the museum, Levinas stopped her.

“You have to pay an admission fee to enter the museum!”

“How much is it?”

“Um… one hundred… one million won!”

Goodness.

The admission fee for the museum is one million won.

I thought it was so expensive that no one would come, but Ensia pulled out her wallet with a serious expression.

“That’s a bargain.”

“Yeah! If Wanga Museum is this price, it’s cheap!”

“That’s right.”

No way.

I thought they were just joking, but I was taken aback when I saw Ensia casually opening her wallet.

Was Ensia really going to pay one million won?

Just as I widened my eyes in surprise, Ensia put her wallet back in her pocket.

“I’m sorry. I’ll go to the bank for a bit.”

“Eh, Ensia?!”

I grabbed Ensia as she turned to leave.

I was just astonished that Ensia was actually considering paying one million won.

Author’s Note (Author’s Afterword)

Thank you so much for reading today!

Thank you for the comments and recommendations! They always give me strength!

In Winter’s museum, there are anchovies… slingshots… and even a dented pot…!

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Thank you for the 10 coin donation, Lee Seung-eon!