City of Witches

1.

1 pm.

The day of the war had finally begun.

Siwoo, who had been studying about service and manners without even resting, looked out of the window, suddenly finding that his heart was beating faster than usual.

“Takasho… What the hell is that…?”

“You tell me… What kind of life have you been living, dude…?”

Behind the curtain, they could see through the situation at the Malkuth Gallery’s alley; It was bustling with people.

To be more precise, it was bustling with witches.

Even for Takasho, who had undergone all kinds of hardship in Gehenna and Siwoo, who had been living as a slave together with him…

It was their first time seeing so many witches gathering in one place.

The club hadn’t even opened yet.

Which meant that Periwinkle had done a great job to spread the news about the club to the witches.

“Finally…a chance…to leave a deep impression on our future customers… Let’s do this…”

“We need to get ready soon.”

As he muttered those words, Takasho embraced Siwoo, who was standing next to him.

It was the sight that he had seen for the first time in his life; Customers lining up in front of his club like Vienna sausages.

While he didn’t know if he could handle all these witches or not, he felt that it was appropriate to say his thanks to Siwoo first and foremost.

“My friend… Thank you very much… I will use this opportunity that you’ve given me to its fullest!”

“Friends gotta help each other, don’t they? You’ve also helped me a lot in the past, no need to act like this, seriously.”

As for Siwoo, he already had guessed that things would turn out this way, but actually seeing his prediction come true evoked a different kind of feeling from within him.

Of course, he didn’t help Takasho out with the intention of selling his own body to those witches.

His role was merely as a ‘bait’.

He’d stay at his table, changing his customer every fifteen minutes or so.

Only witches who purchased the most expensive alcohol would be allowed to be served by him for an hour but even after that, they still wouldn’t be allowed to have a second round with him.

Their plan was to use him as bait to attract the witches for two weeks, so that the club would gain enough traction to stand by itself without the need of his presence.

“But, Takasho… Do you really think I can do this?”

Though, even when the plan was clear, Siwoo still wasn’t confident that he could do his job well.

The problem here was that the thing that he needed to do wasn’t only to talk with the customers, but to ‘serve’ them as well.

Moreover, among those witches outside, there bound to be at least a dozen of them who’d have a prickly personality…

“What are you talking about? You’ll be fine, don’t worry.”

Takasho sent him a weird look, as if he had just said something weird.

Where the hell did he get this much confidence from?

After that exchange, Siwoo looked at himself in the mirror to look at his current appearance.

Neatly swept back hair, uniform that hangs down loosely like a swallow’s tail.

Takasho offered him a monocle for him to wear, but he refused it.

He said that this was the kind of look that the witches would love to see, but Siwoo just couldn’t see it.

“Alright, it’s time to make history.”

“Sure, whatever you say.”

The two men, dressed up perfectly in their suits, walked toward the front door.

And so, that was the monumental scene of the opening of Gehenna’s first host club, the Rose Glass.

2.

“It’s our honor to serve you honorable witches in our establishment.

“Due to the large number of people visiting us compared to the size of our business, we’ll be issuing queue tickets so that we can provide you with our best service.

“If you may, please share your contact information for your crystal balls with us, as soon as your number in the queue comes up, we will immediately contact you.

“Of course, if you prefer to wait for your turn in our establishment instead, you may spend your time leisurely at the salon on the second and third floor.”

Just because a lot of people had come, it didn’t mean that they could take all of them in.

The host club could only accommodate a maximum number of thirty people at once.

Since they had advertised themselves as a high-end entertainment club, it would be disastrous if they were to let everyone in and turn the atmosphere similar to that of a traditional market.

And so, Takasho decided that they’d serve a maximum amount of 120 customers each day, divided that number into four waves and assigned queue tickets for them.

In addition, he provided the witches with free middle-grade high-quality alcohol as a sign of appreciation. With that, he could start the club’s opening without much issues.

“Table 12 has run out of snacks, bring out some more. The customer seems to like cheese, so bring out the Stilton Cheese.”

“Yes!”

“Table 2 ordered a wine, so bring out the decanter. Has the caviar arrived?”

“It has, earlier this morning.”

“Check its condition. If it’s good, bring it out.”

“Yes, understood.”

Takasho busily walked around the place, providing service and guidance to some of the customers, listening to their complaints, and checking up on the hosts to see whether they were doing their job well or not.

For today, he wasn’t there to serve the customers directly as a host, but to act as a field manager while acting as the middleman between the hosts and the kitchen staff.

The host club employed former hotel chefs and sommeliers, so the quality of their work in that regard was pretty much assured.

“Hello, Ms. Witch. It’s an honor to have you here. My name is Liam.”

“I am Paul.”

The hosts escorted the witches to their seats.

In each seat, there was a standing screen provided for the sake of the witches' privacy.

As per Periwinkle’s advice, they provided pre-chilled Dom Pérignon and high quality snacks for free.

It went without saying that they let the phonograph being played and kept the room’s lighting dim to create a nice atmosphere inside.

Takasho considered hiring a proper band, but that could wait until the business was more successful.

“I can’t keep depending on Siwoo, after all.”

Naturally, ‘host club’ was a foreign concept for the witches.

They were experiencing what the Koreans experienced when the first Malatang Restaurant came to Korea.

Basically what they were doing at the moment was introducing the concept of the host club to the witches, trying to make them addicted to the experience while using Siwoo as a bait so that they could take that first step to try.

To Takasho, the success or failure of this business would determine whether he’d get to keep his life or not.

But, even though he was in such a situation, his heart was filled with nothing but joy and excitement.

“Ahh… I feel truly alive…”

He could hear the sound of champagne bottles popping from all over the room.

The small giggle of unpredictable women whose attitude might turn 180 in a blink of an eye.

His mind traveled back to the past as he remembered his enemies back at Kabuki-cho. The memory made his heart boil.

Back then, back when he was a new host, living together with six other fresh bloods together in a single dorm room.

When he had to share a bathroom with thirty people and drank a bucket full of champagne just to get a single bottle of alcohol as a tip.

He wasted all his youth, beating all his competitors while climbing up the ranking as a host.

Eventually, his bicycle turned into a Porsche and his 12-pyeong room turned into a penthouse.

He grew from a host whose name was unknown to everyone to someone whose name reverberated through the night of Kabukicho.

In that battlefield, he tried to attain the dream that was now buried fifty feet under.

The dream to become the King of the Night of Kabukicho.

Unfortunately for him, before he could attain that dream, his life was cut short when a truck suddenly crashed into him.

But now…

He had a second chance to attain that dream.

The opportunity to run an extremely luxurious host club that was incomparable to any host clubs ever existed in the Modern World.

So, he had no intention to tolerate even the slightest mistake.

“I came here to meet with that male witch or whatever, yet I’m stuck with the likes of you? Seriously, you’ve been rambling nonsense for a while now. Do you really think your ramble could qualify as a good service for me? What arrogance.”

Takasho’s ears, which were keeping track of all the voices inside the room, picked up that series of complaints.

This much was something that he had expected.

Even though he had provided his employees with manuals and training to handle this kind of situation, sometimes it still wasn’t enough.

So, he decided to show his employees a live example of it.

He took a deep breath before passing through the blind, to the seat where he heard the complaint from.

In there, a Slavic witch with brown hair was sitting, there was a clear dissatisfaction in her face.

“Hello, Ms. Scylla Kristan. My name is Mimaya Takasho, the manager of this place.”

When the witch heard Takasho’s words, she opened her eyes wide.

“How…did you know my name?”

She hadn’t mentioned her name even once from the moment she sat there, so it was understandable for her to be surprised when someone who claimed to be the manager popped up and called out to her like that.

“Please forgive me, when you were visiting the Malkuth Gallery the other day, I overheard your name from one of your companions.”

Of course that was a lie.

Just for today’s occasion, Takasho had memorized the names and appearances of the famous witches in Gehenna and all the witches living in Lenomond Town.

Because he figured that they might become his regulars.

This was his idea of a true host. Someone who, not only never forget the names of the customers that visited the club, but also the customers that had not visited the club.

“I made sure to remember your name, since you’re such a pretty lady.”

Takasho dropped his polite speech and went for a friendlier speech as he got down to his knees to make eye contact with the witch in front of him.

However, that wasn’t enough to quell the witch’s grumpiness.

Scylla’s surprised look only persisted for a moment before it was replaced by displeasure once again.

“Tch, that’s enough. Do you think I’m such a lowly witch, someone with the leisure to wait around for a man in this kind of place?”

“Please, what can I do to earn your forgiveness?”

“My forgiveness? Hah, do you think you’re qualified to earn it?”

At a glance, it seemed like she was really out for blood, but Takasho could tell that she wasn’t as tough as she let on.

Which meant that his strategy worked quite well on her.

So, he looked straight into her eyes.

“I will do anything for you, as long as I can convey my sincerity properly to you.”

If the customer seemed to be offended, apologize.

But, never show them servility.

The witches might be overbearing and their authority was something that was hard to resist for common people.

But, they were still women.

They still needed to be treated with patience. Showing one’s irritation would only make the situation turn sour.

“Do you really mean what you said?”

Scylla twisted her lips upwards before she took off one of her shoes.

Then, she filled it with the Dom Pérignon.

She threw him a smirk, as if trying to tell him ‘There’s no way you’ll actually do this.’.

Funnily enough, this kind of thing was something that was surprisingly common to see in host clubs.

“Now, drink— Huh?”

Before Scylla could even finish speaking, Takasho already picked up her shoe and emptied the champagne inside.

When he was done, he turned his face towards her again, smiling brightly at her.

There wasn’t even a hint of unpleasantness in that smile.

Then again, chugging Dom Pérignon served with a woman’s heel was pretty much a reward if anything.

“Does this make you feel better?”

Of course, Scylla didn’t expect him to take up on her show of contempt without any hesitation like this.

As she was still in a daze like that, Takasho stood up and straightened his disheveled clothes.

“I am aware that this much isn’t enough to earn your forgiveness, but I hope that this could quell your dissatisfaction, even if it’s a little.”

When he turned around, as if declaring that he was done here, Scylla called him out in a hurry.

“W-Wait…!”

“Yes? Is something the matter?”

“You really drank that?! Have you no self-respect?!”

“As long as this could eases Ms. Scylla’s anger a little, I have no need for such a thing.”

It took less than a minute for embarrassment to replace the irritation on Scylla’s face.

When facing the customer’s anger, the best course of action was to let them vent their anger to their heart’s content.

Even if they were witches, at the end of the day, they were still flowers, blooming in this greenhouse called Gehenna.

In front of Takasho, a veteran who had dealt with all kinds of women, from career women to rich women back when he was still in Japan, the witch was only an inexperienced child.

Now that they got this far, all he needed to do was to throw in a Gehenna-like comment right here.

“Although it’s regrettable that we can’t satisfy you, Ms. Scylla, we’ll still do our best to put a smile on your beautiful face. I wish nothing but for you to have a little fun in our establishment.

“And I will also gift you better alcohol as an apology, so could you please wait for a moment? Of course, it’s free of charge.”

“...”

At this point, Scylla’s expression turned significantly softer; A little apologetic even.

Of course, his statement of gifting her a better alcohol was a thoroughly calculated one.

If there was one thing he knew about a woman was that they’d become extremely generous when they felt the guilt after lashing out in anger.

And, as he had expected, she refused his free service.

“No, I’ll pay for it. I was being unreasonable anyway, so at least I’ll pay for the alcohol that I’m going to drink myself.”

“But…”

“Give me more of it. Two bottles for me and this friend here.”

“Understood, I’ll bring them to you immediately.”

As Takasho turned around and walked away, Scylla turned her head away too, but she secretly sneaked a glance at his back.

Of course, Takasho could feel her gaze on his back.

Melting away the anger of a woman that had already erupted while getting the picky, fussy women to think to come back for more.

Such was the technique of an elite host.

Takasho consciously tried to control his facial expression.

After all, the manager couldn’t just walk around the club with a silly grin on his face over this little matter.

He then went around the place again to see how the other customers were doing.

“Is Siwoo doing well over there?”

From the way he handled Periwinkle and looking at how many witches he got to befriend based on the pictures on his phone, Takasho figured that he had nothing to worry about in that regard.

Still, that didn’t mean he shouldn’t check up on him, so he walked toward the center seat, the place where Siwoo was serving his customers.