The Lorenzio Palace was a sprawling, architectural nightmare of gray stone, Victorian steam-pipes, and Gothic arches that seemed designed specifically to trap as much dust as possible in its various crevices.
For the past three days, Yoo Joonghyuk had not been a king, a regressor, or a transcendent. He had been the "Janitor from Hell," an F-rank existence that the palace's permanent staff had begun to whisper about in hushed, terrified tones.[1]
In Joonghyuk's mind, those three days were literal nightmare for his dignity.
Day one had been the War of the Royal Kitchens.
He had spent fourteen hours scouring copper pots with such focused killing intent that the head chef had actually fainted, convinced that the way Joonghyuk gripped the scouring pad was a prelude to an assassination.
By the time he was done, the pots didn't just shine; they reflected the "Stories" of the food once cooked in them.
[System: Your 'Janitor' Acting Rate has reached 5%.]
[Attribute unlocked: 'Grease-Bane' – You deal 200% more damage to organic stains.][2]
[There is a possibility of a new Giant Story!]
Day two was the Subjugation of the Knights' Training Hall.
Joonghyuk had been ordered to wax the floors while the D-rank trainees practiced.
He had applied the wax using the footwork of the Splitting the Sky style.
The result was a floor so frictionless and perfectly leveled that three knights had suffered concussions within minutes of entering.
When the Knight Captain Draven had come to scream at him, Joonghyuk had simply pointed at a single, microscopic speck of dirt on the Captain's boot and stared him into a state of paralyzed silence.
Day three was the Purger of the Royal Latrines.
Joonghyuk refused to think about day three.
He simply promised himself that when he finally caught Baal, he would describe the sensory experience of an Arunheim latrine in such excruciating detail that the Devil would never want to eat again.
Now, on the fourth day, Yoo Joonghyuk stood before a pair of polished mahogany doors.
A gold-plated sign hung there: [Lotus Flower Merchant Group – Palace Liaison Office].
He was holding [The Janitor's Sturdy Polearm]—his evolved mop that now pulsed with a faint, rhythmic heartbeat.
His bucket, still rusted but now reinforced with "Mana-Resistant Sludge," sat at his feet.
His burlap tunic was stained with the sweat of three days of "Trash-Tier" labor, and a streak of soot ran across his sharp jawline. Even so, he stood with a posture that made the burlap look like royal silk.
"Clean the inner sanctum," the guard had told him. "And don't look the Merchant Queen in the eye. She owns half the palace's debt, and she'll have your head if you leave a streak on the glass."
Joonghyuk kicked the door open.
He didn't knock.
Janitors didn't need to knock for the dust, and he treated the inhabitants of the room as nothing more than particularly noisy particles.
The office was a jarring oasis of efficiency in the middle of the decaying palace.
Ledgers—thousands of them—were stacked in pillars that reached the ceiling, creating a literal throne of paper and ink.
Steam-powered calculators hissed in the corner, and the air smelled of high-grade Earl Grey tea and expensive ink.
Sitting atop the throne of ledgers was a woman.
She was dressed in a sleek, charcoal-gray suit that blended modern Seoul corporate fashion with the lace and frills of the Northern Superstate. She held a porcelain cup in one hand and a fountain pen in the other, her eyes darting across a document with the speed of a high-frequency algorithm.
Yoo Yeonha.
The "Shadow Financier of Arunheim."
The woman who had managed to turn a dimensional collapse into a hostile takeover of the local economy.
She didn't look up.
She simply flicked a finger toward the far corner of the room.
"The windowpanes are showing a 0.2% decrease in light permeability due to soot accumulation," she said, her voice cold and professional. "Start there. Use the vinegar solution, not the lye. And if you drip water on the ledgers of the Eastern Province, I will ensure you won't be able to get a decent job. Ever again."
Joonghyuk didn't move.
He leaned his mop against a stack of "Unpaid Taxes" and looked at Yeonha.
His [Sage's Eye] analyzed her current state.
She was vibrating with a high-sequence "Intelligence" gift, her brain processing the economic variables of this new world behind the Demon Realm Gate. And she was particulary in a state of [Everlasting Annoyance].
"You're wasting magic power on that pen," Joonghyuk said, his voice a low, gravelly rumble that resonated through the room like a funeral bell. "And your posture is inefficient for counting gold. You're leaning 3.4 degrees to the left to compensate for the weight of your ego. It's slowing your circulation."
Yoo Yeonha froze.
The porcelain cup stopped halfway to her lips. In the world of Arunheim, servants didn't speak unless spoken to. And they certainly didn't critique the "Merchant Queen's" ergonomic efficiency.
She slowly turned her head, her sharp eyes narrowing behind her designer spectacles. She saw a dirty man in a burlap sack. A janitor who looked like he had been living in a stable. But then, she looked at his face.
Even covered in soot and palace grime, that face was... problematic. It was a face that could cause a diplomatic incident. It was a face she had seen many times, usually while it was covered in the blood of constellations and djinns.
"You..." Yeonha whispered.
She took a sip of her tea, her brain trying to reconcile the "Supreme King" with a "Mop Handler."
The logic failed.
Her "Intelligence" skill sputtered.
SPLUTTER!
Yeonha spat her tea across the "Western Province" ledgers.
She coughed violently, her face turning a bright shade of red that matched her silk tie.
"Yoo Joonghyuk?!" she shrieked, slamming the cup down so hard it cracked. "What in the name of the Star Stream are you wearing?!"
Joonghyuk picked up his mop and began to aggressively scrub a spot on the floor where a drop of her tea had landed.
"The Gate assigned me a role," he said, his tone flat and dead.
Yeonha scrambled down from her throne of ledgers, nearly tripping over a stack of "Future Futures Contracts."
She stood in front of him, looking up at the tall janitor.
She looked at the burlap.
She looked at the rusted bucket.
"A janitor," she breathed, her shock transitioning into a terrifying, predatory amusement. "The Supreme King is a janitor. Oh, I wish I had brought a smartphone from Seoul. This footage would be worth more than the entire Arunheim treasury."
"Try it," Joonghyuk growled, his killing aura flickering. "And I will mop your brains into the sewer."
Yeonha quickly regained her composure.
She was, after all, a businesswoman.
Shock was a momentary weakness; profit was eternal.
She adjusted her glasses and smoothed her suit.
"Fine, fine," she said, her eyes glinting. "You're an F-rank Custodian. You have access to every room in this palace because people treat servants like furniture. By the way, I need... a 'cleansing' service. There are three rival merchant heads from the Theosophy Order who are trying to audit my palace permits."
Joonghyuk stopped scrubbing and looked at her. "You want me to kill them."
"I want you to clean them out," Yeonha corrected with a sharp smile. "And in exchange, I can provide you with 'supplies.' You can't use a sword here yet, but I have access to the royal armory's raw materials."
She walked to a hidden safe and pulled out a heavy, shimmering ingot of [Mythic-grade Star-Silver] and a vial of [Concentrated Dragon's Blood Bleach].
"These are weapon materials," Joonghyuk noted, his eyes narrowing.
"In the ledger, they'll be recorded as 'Premium Abrasive' and 'Heavy-Duty Disinfectant,'" Yeonha replied. "I'll even throw in a [Heavenly Bristle Brush] made from the spine of a Calamity-rank beast. You use these to 'upgrade' your equipment. You get your stats back; I get my rivals removed. Deal?"
Joonghyuk looked at the Star-Silver.
He could turn his mop into a spear that could pierce the soul of a devil.
"Deal," Joonghyuk said.
"The deal is already being recorded by the heavens," a new voice entered the room.
The air in the office suddenly grew heavy, laden with the weight of "The Law."
A woman with short, sharp hair and an iron-gray uniform stepped in. She carried a heavy mace at her side and wore an armband with the insignia of the High Auditor.
Xio Derecha.
She looked at Yeonha, then her gaze drifted to the tall, soot-covered janitor.
She didn't spit her tea because she wasn't drinking any, but the corner of her mouth twitched in a way that suggested a monumental internal struggle against laughter.
"Yoo Joonghyuk," Xio said, her voice echoing with the authority of a Sequence 4 Beyonder. "I am here to investigate the Lotus Flower Group for tax evasion and the use of 'unregistered divine laborers'."
Joonghyuk didn't stop cleaning. He moved his mop in a circle around Xio's boots, effectively "claiming" the space around her.
"I am a janitor," Joonghyuk said, his voice echoing her authority with his own suppressed "Status." "Step aside or be swept."
Xio Derecha took a deep breath, her shoulders shaking.
"I've seen you face the Outer God. I've seen you survive the 'Great War of Constellations and Demons'. But I never imagined I'd see you in a burlap tunic, threatening me with a bucket of soapy water."
She reached into her pocket as if looking for something.
"I truly wish the 'Star Stream' allowed for cameras in this zone. A picture of the Supreme King as an F-rank Custodian... the Tarot Club would pay a sequence-ascending fortune for it. Mr. Fool would probably have it framed in the Sefirah Castle."
She sighed: 'If 'He' was around... What if Mr. Fool will never come back?'
Joonghyuk's grip on the mop handle tightened until the wood groaned.
The [Torch That Swallowed the Myth] flickered in his eyes, a tiny, burning ember of the Supreme King's true power.
"If you laugh," Joonghyuk whispered, the killing intent in the room becoming so dense that Yeonha's tea actually began to freeze, "I will kill you. I don't care about the 'Law' or your 'Sequence'. I will mop this entire office with your remains."
Xio Derecha raised her hands in a mocking gesture of surrender, though the grin on her face was unmistakable. "Understood, O Supreme Janitor. I shall keep your secret... for a price."
She looked at Yeonha. "The Auditor's report will say the taxes are in order, provided the Janitor 'cleans' a certain high-security wing of the library for me tonight. There is a record I need to see."
Yeonha looked at Joonghyuk. Joonghyuk looked at the Star-Silver on the desk.
"Fine," Joonghyuk said, slamming his bucket down. "But someone needs to bring me a new tunic. This burlap is causing a 'Rejective Force' on my skin that is more annoying than Baal."
Yeonha smirked, picking up her pen. "I'll have Jang Hayoung fetch you some high-thread-count cleaning rags. Welcome to the team, Joonghyuk. Now, get to work. You missed a spot near the Auditor's left heel."
Joonghyuk looked at the spot.
Then he looked at Xio Derecha.
He mopped her boot.
Aggressively.
[System: Acting Rate as 'Janitor' has reached 10%!]
[Strength +1]
[Sarcasm Resistance +50%]
Joonghyuk ignored the messages.
He had a world to clean, and he was going to start with the people laughing at him.
[1] lol, i've been laughing so hard imagining him actually moppin' the floor XD
[2] LMAO, I'M SUCH A PIECE OF TRASH FOR WRITING THIS AHAHAAHAH