I Was Kidnapped By The Strongest Guild

The next morning.

I was explaining to the divine beasts about the upcoming broadcast.

The sound of children giggling could be heard from near the tent.

"Huh?"

What were they doing that was making them laugh so happily?

Curious, I headed to the tent where the children were.

"Kids?"

Levinas was sticking her upper body out of a paper box made of taped-together sheets, while the other children circled around her, giggling.

"What are you doing?"

"Levinas jumping?"

What could that be?

Was it some game Levinas had created?

As I approached the children, I noticed holes pierced all over the box.

"Gyeoul, try poking the holes with this."

Bom handed me a sword made from reed stalks while giggling.

The long, spear-like reed sword and the round holes in the box.

I suddenly realized what game the children were playing.

'The Goblin's Revenge!'

Were they playing a real-life version of yesterday's goblin-stabbing game?

Intrigued, I took the reed sword and approached Levinas.

"Here?"

Poke-

I pushed the reed sword into an appropriate hole.

However, Levinas showed no reaction.

"Gyeoul, you need to stick in more."

"Okay."

Poke- Poke-

Just as I inserted a couple more reed swords at Bom's suggestion:

"Kyaa!"

Levinas jumped high into the air with a strange scream.

The powerful leg strength unique to horned rabbit beast-kin sent her quite high.

"Wow."

"Bunnyyy!"

Finding Levinas's leap amusing, Gaeul clapped her hands while giggling.

I had to admit, it was a fun prank.

"I'm falling!"

Levinas, who had jumped high up, landed in Saebyeok's arms.

Being naturally strong, Saebyeok caught Levinas effortlessly.

"Gauri too."

Gaeul pointed at the now-empty box.

It seemed she wanted to play the goblin game too.

"Sure. Want to give it a try, Gaeul?"

"Nyeam."

Gaeul lifted the bottom of the paper box slightly and crawled inside.

After a brief wait, Gaeul popped her face out through one of the holes at the top of the box.

"Peekaboo!"

Gaeul was delighted just sticking her face out of the hole.

Together, we all poked at Gaeul with our reed swords.

Poke- Poke-

After all of us had used all our reed swords, Gaeul began to tremble.

"Keukudak..."

Gaeul closed her eyes with a small death cry.

She was playing dead, going limp inside the box.

"Eh?"

So she was playing dead instead of jumping.

The unexpected turn created a moment of silence.

"Yah!"

Gaeul suddenly let out a battle cry and jumped up.

Though she didn't jump as high as Levinas, she still reached a considerable height.

"King! Gaeul doggy jumped high too!"

"Yes. Gaeul has good jumping ability."

Tap-

Gaeul landed lightly and began hopping around the box.

It was wonderful to see her enjoying the game so purely.

"Next..."

I was about to suggest that Bom or Saebyeok take a turn, but seeing Kwon Arin approaching, I had to stop.

"Kids, shall we get started now?"

"Yes."

We had agreed to do the broadcast in the morning.

We decided to put playtime on hold.

**

When we turned on the broadcast, the viewer count increased at an astonishing rate.

There were more viewers than Kwon Arin's average, likely due to the title of the broadcast.

[Beast-kin Divine Beasts]

Beast-kin and the never-before-seen divine beasts.

This combination was enough to attract people's interest.

I took the smartphone Kwon Arin handed me and decided to introduce the divine beasts myself.

"Hello. I'm Han Gyeoul."

[Oh, it's Gyeoul!]

[Gyeoul! Gyeoul! Gyeoul! Gyeoul!]

[What are divine beasts?]

I checked all the rapidly scrolling chat messages.

The camera was only showing the lush grass on the park ground.

This was intentional, to reveal each divine beast one by one.

"Divine beasts are like guardian spirits for beast-kin. They've recently come to live in the park with us, and I turned on this broadcast to let you know they're not dangerous."

From the smallest to the largest divine beast.

I planned to show them one by one.

I moved the camera to capture the turtle divine beast, the smallest one.

"This is the turtle divine beast. Its shell is incredibly hard."

[Oh.]

[It definitely doesn't look like an ordinary turtle.]

[It has a mysterious feeling.]

[But what's the turtle divine beast's name?]

"Um... its name is..."

Come to think of it, it didn't have a name.

It was called the Guardian, but that felt more like a title than a name.

What would be a good name?

Just as I was thinking, Gaeul, with her tongue slightly out, pointed at the turtle divine beast and said:

"Gubuki."

"She says Gubuki."

[Gubuki lol]

[It kind of suits it lol]

Maybe because it was a cute name?

The viewers seemed comfortable with it.

Since our goal was to make people not fear the divine beasts, I decided to give them cute names.

'I should leave the naming to Gaeul.'

Of course, if the divine beasts disliked the cute names, we'd stop, but the turtle divine beast Gubuki didn't seem to mind at all.

"Next is the mouse divine beast. It has incredible speed."

I moved the smartphone to capture the mouse divine beast.

However, the mouse divine beast was moving so fast that it was difficult to capture on screen.

Perhaps because I mentioned its incredible speed, it was showing off.

[What is it?]

[I can only see afterimages.]

"C-could you stop for a moment...?"

As soon as I asked, the mouse divine beast froze in place.

The chat began to move quickly as the mouse divine beast's appearance was revealed.

[Isn't this a hamster?]

[It's a hamster.]

[It's a hamster.]

[What's the hamster divine beast's name?]

"Um... its name is..."

"Chikchi!"

"She says Chikchi."

And so we introduced each divine beast to people one by one.

Gaeul named them on the spot.

The cute baby pig divine beast was named Kkulkku.

The monkey divine beast was Kiki.

The bird divine beast was Jjakjjak.

'...I should write these down.'

There were too many divine beasts to remember all the names at once.

As I was writing down each name Gaeul gave in my notebook:

"..."

Gaeul, who had been enthusiastically naming the divine beasts, suddenly had a blank expression.

Her finger was pointing at the giant butterfly divine beast sitting in a tree.

"Gaeul?"

Gaeul stood frozen in place, only her eyebrows twitching here and there.

I could roughly understand why Gaeul was reacting this way.

'She doesn't know the butterfly's cry.'

Gaeul had been naming the divine beasts after their cries.

Or she would cutely transform the names, like with Gubuki.

But butterflies were tricky.

We had never heard their cry, and transforming it into "Nubi" or "Nobi" sounded strange.

"Nabnab... napbibat-bang..."

Gaeul's tongue was twisting like someone experiencing an error.

I was wondering if I should name the butterfly divine beast instead.

"Since the butterfly divine beast is like a jewel, why don't you name it after that?"

At Saebyeok's suggestion, Gaeul's ears perked up.

She seemed to have decided on a name, pointing at the butterfly divine beast and shouting:

"Byong! Bingbyong!"

"Empty bottle...?"

Empty bottles were pretty like jewels.

Made of glass, they sparkled in the sunlight.

To Gaeul, an empty bottle might as well be a jewel.

But naming it "Empty Bottle" would create problems.

We wouldn't be able to distinguish it from actual empty bottles.

"Hmm... since bottles are made of glass, how about Yuri (Glass)?"

"Heuk...!"

Gaeul's tail wagged gently, suggesting she liked the name Yuri.

That's how we were able to name all the divine beasts.

"Are there any divine beasts who don't like their names? I gave you all pretty cute names."

I asked again in case some suddenly disliked their names, but none of the divine beasts showed any dissatisfaction.

Rather, they expressed joy by wagging their tails or hopping around.

I could quickly understand why the divine beasts liked these names based on their cries.

The names were derived from their own sounds.

When calling a divine beast, we had to make their sound.

From the divine beasts' perspective, it must have been pleasing to hear us attempting to make their sounds, however clumsily.

"The divine beasts will usually stay in their small form. But originally, they're this big."

I showed Jjakjjak, the bird divine beast with an enormous body.

Levinas was standing next to Jjakjjak for comparison, and even measuring to the tip of Levinas's ears, she was less than half of Jjakjjak's height.

[Seeing it like this, it's really huge]

[It could probably snatch up an adult man;;]

"Don't worry too much. They're wearing safety collars."

I explained to the viewers everything from how the divine beasts could understand human speech to how they would never attack first.

"I'm going to end the broadcast now."

[Nooooo!]

[Show more divine beasts! No, show all of them!]

[I want to see more of Gyeoul... ㅜㅜ]

"I'm sorry. I'll turn on another broadcast later."

[Bye bye]

[See you later ㅠ.ㅜ...]

After ending the broadcast with a slight delay, I looked around at the divine beasts.

I had one last thing I wanted to say to them.

"I'm looking forward to our time together."

It was a welcome greeting to our new family members.