A Potato on an Entirely Different Level

“Holy shit.”

Oh Hyeonseong’s eyes widened.

There was no meat, no rice, and no other ingredients.

He had only shoved a single lettuce leaf into his mouth.

Yet the taste of that one leaf was genuinely shocking.

“What is this?”

There was no bitterness whatsoever, and the texture was crisp and refreshing.

More than anything, the lettuce seemed to contain a vibrant vitality, as though it were painting color onto a dull, monochrome world.

I ate lettuce just last week, but this isn’t even comparable.

Factory-produced lettuce was notorious for being dry and having the texture of chewing paper.

The excessive bitterness was a given, and if you picked up a cheap batch, you could consider yourself lucky if it didn’t have a musty smell.

Even naturally grown lettuce wasn’t much different.

Once Earth’s environment had come under the influence of miasma, naturally grown crops had also been forced to sacrifice many things in order to survive while resisting the contamination.

But this lettuce from his own garden…

Before he could even think about its texture or smell, the word fresh seemed to be something he could literally taste.

Fresh, vibrant life exploded inside his mouth.

Just like vegetables had tasted before the Gate crisis.

This isn’t the time to be standing around.

Crash!

Oh Hyeonseong hurriedly rushed outside and began picking lettuce from the garden.

He didn’t even have the presence of mind to grab a basket. He simply gathered armfuls of lettuce in both hands and brought them back inside.

He shook the dirt off, rinsed the leaves with water, and returned to the dining table.

Chomp!

My God…

It’s delicious.

Something as simple as a leaf of lettuce could be this delicious.

He felt as though he could happily accept being told to live as a herbivore for the rest of his life if it meant he could eat nothing but lettuce until the day he died.

Even when everyone else complained… I used to eat whatever was put in front of me without much reaction… And now food has shocked me this much.

He greedily chewed through the lettuce.

Then he scooped up another spoonful of rice.

“Khk…”

Oh Hyeonseong quietly put down his spoon.

The rice was a different story.

Even the lettuce from his own garden couldn’t save this rice.

“Did you deliberately make it taste good?”

He asked the spirit of life that had been staring intently at him, but the little creature shook its head.

It hadn’t done it intentionally.

All the spirits had done was make the lettuce grow quickly and healthily.

The fact that it had become delicious was simply a side effect of the spirits’ influence.

What on earth did you guys do to it…

What exactly had happened overnight?

Oh Hyeonseong decided that he needed to watch what the spirits did in the vegetable garden.

But by the time he had finished eating all the lettuce he had brought inside—

Ding-dong!

“Hm?”

The doorbell rang outside.

Kwon Gyeongmin, who had spent most of the previous day showing him around, was probably spending time with his family now, and Hyeonseong hadn’t ordered any deliveries.

There was no one he could think of who would come to visit him.

Puzzled, he opened the front gate.

Standing on the other side were a young man and woman.

“Oh, it opened.”

“Wow, he’s really young! Hello!”

The two greeted him brightly, and Oh Hyeonseong asked somewhat awkwardly,

“Who are you?”

“We’re your neighbors.”

“Neighbors…? Oh!”

He belatedly nodded.

He remembered the house that appeared after going a little farther along the western road.

In a city, the physical distance would have been far too great to call it the house next door.

But they were indeed his closest neighbors.

Their house was also located quite far south of the village center.

Given the isolated location of Hyeonseong’s property, that was practically the only house that could be considered his neighbor.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Oh Hyeonseong. I moved here yesterday.”

“I’m Yoo Eunha. Hehe. Uncle Gyeongmin told us roughly what was going on.”

“I’m Yoo Seungsoo. We came from that house over there. Have you seen the wooden house?”

“Of course. I was actually planning to visit you this afternoon, but you weren’t home.”

“I had to go into the city, so I was on my way back at the time. When I got back, I got an earful from Uncle Gyeongmin, so we hurried over to introduce ourselves. Haha.”

Oh Hyeonseong shook Yoo Seungsoo’s energetic hand.

Come to think of it, Kwon Gyeongmin had apparently already become known to these two as “Uncle.”

He was only in his early thirties, yet they were calling him uncle.

Maybe it was because he had a family now.

Or perhaps because he looked a little older than his actual age.

Either way, it felt strange that Hyeonseong was now being lumped together with him and called an uncle by young people.

He had still been firmly in his twenties before spending five years hospitalized.

“Are you two siblings?”

“As expected, you figured it out immediately!”

Yoo Eunha raised her index finger triumphantly and nodded.

There were only two of them, but somehow, the previously quiet house suddenly felt much livelier.

It wasn’t an unpleasant kind of noisy, either.

“There’s no point standing out here. Why don’t you come inside?”

“Excuse us~”

The siblings entered and sat down on the wooden platform in the middle of the yard.

At the appearance of strangers, the spirits quickly scattered and hid.

They were surprisingly good at disappearing once they decided to hide.

Perhaps because the siblings were naturally sociable, the conversation continued without much awkwardness.

“So you already went around and introduced yourself to everyone today?”

“That’s right. Everyone was really kind.”

“We settled here two years ago. Since moving to the countryside was new to us, we were worried about being treated poorly by the locals, but that never happened. It’s a great village.”

“Let’s get along well, fellow city-born newcomers!”

At Yoo Eunha’s words, Oh Hyeonseong chuckled and nodded.

He was glad that his closest neighbors were these two.

Unlike the city, where you could simply put up a wall and live without interacting with anyone, having an unpleasant neighbor in the countryside could become exhausting in all sorts of ways.

Since they were also originally from the city, there would probably be fewer clashes over differences in values.

He had also gained people who could give him advice as fellow newcomers to rural life.

“But you’re really handsome. And you’re incredibly tall, too. Are you a Hunter, by any chance?”

“Ah… Not at all. I did work in that field, but I was an office worker who handled all the behind-the-scenes paperwork. I was just a government employee.”

Oh Hyeonseong shook his head.

Just as his longtime friend Kwon Gyeongmin believed, he introduced himself simply as a government employee and concealed his true identity.

Although he no longer needed to strictly uphold the secrecy oath now that his unit had been disbanded, there was no benefit to revealing that he was a Hunter when all he wanted was a quiet life in the countryside.

More importantly, despite having operated on the front lines, his name wasn’t known to the general public.

Back then, Hunters’ activities weren’t nearly as open as they were now, and Hyeonseong had belonged to a unit that was classified as a state secret.

As a result, unless they had served alongside him back then, even many of the Hunters active today knew very little about him.

“You’re really not an Awakened?”

“Hey, there’s no way a Hunter would come all the way out to some backwater village like this, not even a provincial city. Do you know how much Hunters are worth these days?”

Yoo Seungsoo scolded his younger sister.

Even so, she tilted her head and muttered,

“No… He really looks like a Hunter to me…”

In the past, when people thought of beauty, they usually thought of celebrities.

After all, celebrities were the quintessential professionals who made their living from their appearance.

But things were different now.

High-level Awakened were generally born with exceptional physical abilities.

Long, straight limbs and superior body proportions were common.

Their skin remained clear and flawless, to the point where it was difficult to imagine them suffering from blemishes.

Not every Awakened was like that, of course, but the proportion of handsome and beautiful people among Awakened was significantly higher than among ordinary people.

This tendency was particularly noticeable among higher-ranked Awakened.

The more naturally gifted a Hunter was, the more likely they were to possess exceptional looks as well.

There was little reason to pay attention to the countless Hunters whose appearances weren’t particularly different from ordinary people’s.

After all, the Hunters who appeared in the media were the elite few with exceptional abilities.

As a result, public perception of the Hunter profession had changed.

By now, Hunters had become figures even more prominent than celebrities had once been.

They saved people on the battlefield and defeated monsters.

As beings absolutely essential to maintaining society, they naturally received enormous attention from the media.

And on top of that, they possessed enviable looks and star appeal.

There was simply no way they wouldn’t be popular.

Unlike in the past, when Hunters had operated in the shadows, the industry had rapidly moved into the public eye over the past few years and grown into a massive business.

That was why dedicated Hunter management agencies had emerged.

“Still, you must have seen a lot of famous Hunters. I’m jealous. If you worked for the government, did you ever see Han Suyeon? It’s my dream to see Han Suyeon in person.”

“Ask something that actually makes sense. Do you think an ordinary employee could see Han Suyeon?”

“You could at least see her passing by, you idiot! Why do you always have to argue with me?”

The siblings began bickering among themselves.

Oh Hyeonseong quickly changed the subject.

“So how did you two end up coming here?”

“Well… We were getting worked to death at our company… Haha.”

Yoo Seungsoo gave an awkward laugh.

“Of course, we didn’t come here simply to run away. We came with ambition.”

“Ambition?”

For a moment, Hyeonseong wondered what kind of ambition there could be in a village like this after moving to the countryside.

Then Yoo Seungsoo suddenly held out the box he had brought with him.

“What is this?”

When Hyeonseong opened it, he found a large quantity of potatoes packed inside.

“These are fresh new potatoes. We prepared them for our new neighbor.”

“Oh, thank you. But isn’t it a little early to harvest potatoes?”

“Under normal circumstances, yes. But synthetic crops aren’t the only things that have benefited from advances in technology. Naturally grown varieties have also been developed extensively. Their limitations are obvious because resisting miasma consumes so many resources, but there’s been plenty of progress.”

“The older folks stick with the varieties they’ve always used, but we’re different. And once you have proper facilities, you can overcome even more of those limitations.”

The siblings began pouring out explanations as smoothly as water flowing from a tap.

What they had invested in was an advanced, next-generation smart farm.

It allowed them to grow new varieties that couldn’t be cultivated in ordinary fields.

They could plant crops regardless of the season, reduce damage from miasma to keep yields stable, and, above all, cultivate premium varieties with vastly improved flavor.

“All the crops we grow are supplied to Hangyeong Department Store. Thanks to that, we get paid much better prices.”

“Hm? Don’t department stores only handle premium synthetic crops?”

“They used to. But people’s perceptions have changed a lot over the past two or three years. A meaningful customer base among the upper classes has started seeking naturally grown food. The difference in taste used to be too great compared to premium synthetic crops, but after continuous improvements, we’ve managed to bring the flavor up to almost the same level.”

“And we’ve invested heavily in our facilities, so our quality is even better. That’s why we’ve managed to get our products into the food section of Hangyeong Department Store, which is famous for being extremely selective.”

“I see…”

So they really weren’t joking about having ambition.

At this level, they weren’t merely experienced newcomers to rural life.

They were practically first-class farmers.

“Then these potatoes…”

“Of course! They’re going to be incredible. They’ll make your eyes pop open.”

Yoo Eunha confidently declared.

The siblings continued explaining a few more things about their advanced facilities and the latest agricultural trends before telling him to make sure he tried the potatoes later.

Then they left.

Oh Hyeonseong exchanged contact information with them and handed over the gifts he had almost forgotten to give them.

“Interesting.”

Oh Hyeonseong looked down at the box full of potatoes.

If these were good enough to be supplied to the food section of Hangyeong Department Store, supposedly the best department store in the country, then they had to be among the finest naturally grown potatoes available.

Once the siblings disappeared, the spirits that had been hiding gradually emerged from their hiding places.

“Well then… Shall we run a little test?”

Which one would actually taste better?

Oh Hyeonseong picked up his phone and began searching for instructions on how to grow potatoes.