Chapter 275

You’re naive.

That one sentence I’d heard the day before wouldn’t leave my mind.

I sat in the caregiver’s chair beside the bed, staring blankly at the humidifier spraying mist. Then a thought suddenly occurred to me, and I said it aloud.

“No. It wasn’t naivety.”

Murim was a world that lived up to the phrase a mountain of blades and a forest of swords.

Bloodshed was commonplace, and death was part of daily life. Might made right, and the survivors were the winners.

Whenever I witnessed the cruel side of Murim, I thought of the modern world.

An organized welfare system and laws. People’s sense of ethics. A civilization incomparably more advanced than Murim.

But I had been wrong.

“It wasn’t that I was naive. I was just stupid.”

Murim people wore swords at their waists, but modern people hid daggers up their sleeves.

Monsters weren’t confined to Gates. They existed outside them, too.

People who wrapped themselves in expensive clothes and wholesome images before ruling over the concrete jungle. The moment those bastards began drawing the daggers hidden in their sleeves, they became the monsters outside the Gates.

Like Won Myunghoon.

I had been thinking too softly about things. Even though I knew the world was unfair and fucked-up, I hadn’t been able to let go of my complacency.

This is the modern world. A democratic society in the twenty-first century.

There might be a vicious struggle to prove one’s abilities, but I had believed something like today’s incident couldn’t happen.

And this is what that got me.

I stared at Im Kkeokjeong sleeping on the bed. Both arms, severed below the elbows, had been treated with recovery magic from a high-ranking healer and advanced potions.

He probably wouldn’t have much trouble with daily life, but I couldn’t guarantee his return as a Hunter. Potions weren’t a cure-all.

Which bastard was behind this?

Various thoughts swam through my cold mind.

Who had sent the Black Hunters, and why? What was their purpose?

Cutting off Im Kkeokjeong’s arms could have been a warning to stop here. Or it could have been the signal announcing the beginning.

I’ll find out what they meant soon enough.

Until then, I had no intention of sitting around and waiting.

Neither did Team Leader Choi.

“Get some rest, Uncle.”

I had just pulled the disordered blanket over Im Kkeokjeong when—

Bzzzz.

Along with the vibration, a smartphone lit up the darkness.

It was a short text message from Team Leader Choi.

Team Leader Choi: To the Guild House.

I left the hospital as soon as I read the message. It was deep into the night, and two people were waiting for me at the Guild House, where everyone else had already gone home.

“Ah, Mr. Jin Taekyung.”

“Welcome.”

Team Leader Choi and Song Song.

Butler Kim, whom I had naturally expected to be there, was nowhere to be seen.

Team Leader Choi noticed my gaze and spoke first.

“He’s stepped away for a moment.”

“Really?”

It was unusual to see Butler Kim absent from Team Leader Choi’s side, where he had always stood like a shadow. But that wasn’t important right now.

I skipped straight to the point.

“What happened?”

“I should offer you a cup of coffee before I explain, but… Take a look at this first.”

Instead of a coffee cup, Team Leader Choi held out his smartphone. The screen displayed the country’s largest online portal.

His long finger tapped an internet article, and a stream of articles divided into different categories appeared.

Among them, I skimmed the article at the very top.

[The Judiciary Bows Before the Fame the Public Has Created. Where Is the Fairness?]

[United Party Supreme Council Member Assemblywoman Yoon Seoyoon: “A Death Brought About by One Individual’s Rash Actions. Won Myunghoon Should Have Faced the Judgment of the Law.” Strong Condemnation…]

[Self-Defense or Murder?]

Articles filling the politics and society sections. They didn’t include my name, but it was obvious who they were talking about.

“When was this posted?”

“An hour ago. And it already has over a hundred thousand views and more than five thousand comments.”

“An hour ago? That would’ve been around four in the morning.”

“Apparently, netizens are more diligent than we thought. Or should I say the paid commenters?”

“Interesting.”

Team Leader Choi took a sip of coffee that had gone as cold as the smile on my lips.

“There’s an even more interesting article.”

“More interesting than this?”

“Scroll down a little. It’ll be more than you expected, Taekyung.”

He was right. My finger stopped moving before I realized it.

I stared silently at the headline in bold.

[Exclusive Interview with Former Colleague K to Be Released Early: “Famous Hunter J Is an Ugly Human Being.”]

When I tapped the article, a preview video of an interview lasting just over three minutes appeared. After a fifteen-second advertisement for a luxury cosmetics brand, the screen filled with the image of a potbellied man in a carefully tailored suit.

There was a small amount of mosaic blurring over his face, but I recognized him at a glance.

“Ha.”

When I realized the identity of the middle-aged man—or rather, “former colleague K”—a hollow laugh escaped me.

It was an all-too-familiar face. Someone I had thought I would never see again was right there on the screen.

“I didn’t expect to see him again like this.”

Song Song, who had been looking at the phone over my shoulder, asked,

“You really know him?”

“Of course. How could I not?”

“If things were bad enough for him to give this shitty interview, you obviously didn’t get along.”

“No.”

“Then were you close?”

“It’s not that…”

What word could describe the relationship between that man and me? I thought about it carefully before opening my mouth.

“It was fucking awful.”

“Oh.”

No matter how I thought about it, those words fit perfectly.

Our relationship had been that terrible. Considering everything we had been through together, it was almost strange that we had never crossed blades.

I stared at the face that had somehow grown even fatter since the last time I’d seen him.

Mr. Common Sense. Long time no see.

Kim Sangshik, Team Leader of the Sopung Guild.

When I had been an F-rank Hunter, he had been the one who goaded the Guild Master into firing me.

The last time I’d seen him was when I ran into him at the Association while going through a Grade reassessment. And now, I was seeing him again like this.

I heard he was fired from the Guild afterward.

Kim Sangshik was a man with no ability and endless greed. Despite his name, he lacked common sense, too, and had been fired after committing every kind of idiotic blunder imaginable.

He was practically the very definition of a petty little man, so it was obvious that he had been grinding his teeth at me ever since.

That was probably why he had even filmed an interview like this.

Let’s hear what kind of bullshit he’s spouting.

As it happened, the reporter’s questions began playing on the video.

“‘I hear you have something to say about the recently famous Hunter J. First of all, is it true that you were his former colleague?’”

Kim Sangshik nodded with an unusually serious expression.

“‘That is absolutely true. I was Jin Tae… No, J’s immediate supervisor.’”

“‘More precisely?’”

“‘He was a member of my team. I became team leader after the Gate accident two years ago. I was also the one who notified J of his dismissal this summer.’”

“‘Oh dear. Was there a reason?’”

“‘There wasn’t just one reason.’”

After that, Kim Sangshik launched into an indignant tirade about why he had fired me.

Every single excuse was a gem of bullshit, but his final exchange with the reporter was the crowning touch.

“‘I was falsely accused of employment corruption and driven out of the Guild where I had worked for more than twenty years. But I did not fire J for any personal gain.’”

“‘Are you saying there was another reason?’”

“‘Yes.’”

There had been a reason they had released only a three-minute preview. Kim Sangshik ended it with the solemn expression of a martyr for the nation.

“‘During the mutated Gate accident two years ago, J threw his teammates to the monsters as prey and fled. He is the kind of man who won’t hesitate to do any ugly and dirty thing to survive…’”

I couldn’t properly hear what came after that.

Even after the video ended with a caption promising that the full interview would be released soon, I continued staring at the screen in silence.

As if Kim Sangshik might leap out of it if I kept watching long enough.

Team Leader Choi broke the heavy silence.

“How did you find it?”

Ah, how did I find it?

Well. The back of my head felt numb, and part of me wanted to laugh. At the same time, my lower stomach was boiling.

“It’s very interesting. Just like you said, Team Leader.”

“I laughed when I first saw it, too. I know roughly what kind of person the K in the interview is—or rather, the man named Kim Sangshik. The problem is…”

“The public won’t find it very funny.”

“Exactly.”

The comments section was already on the verge of exploding.

There were more than ten thousand comments now, and I didn’t need to read them all. One of the most upvoted comments caught my eye.

(Best comment) I knew this was coming. I heard it across the bridge¹ and thought, No way, but I had a feeling it would blow up someday.

What bridge? And what the hell is supposed to blow up?

I didn’t know what kind of asshole had written it, but it was a relief he wasn’t standing in front of me.

If he had been, I would have made sure that at the very least, he heard the next rumor from the overpass to the Yellow Springs.

“Well, I don’t think there’s any need to read more.”

I closed the comments with a hollow laugh.

Team Leader Choi took back his smartphone, folded his arms loosely, and spoke.

“This is organized. It’s clear now that sending the Black Hunters was part of the plan from the beginning.”

“And they’re the ones creating the hostile public opinion, too.”

“That’s how people are. Once someone really starts muddying the waters, it’s hard for people to keep their bearings.”

“And I doubt there will be even a single line in the news about Uncle Kkeokjeong being attacked in the middle of all this.”

“You understand the situation well.”

“If I didn’t, I’d be a fucking idiot. Did the investigation team handling the case say anything?”

Team Leader Choi slowly shook his head.

“Don’t tell me they’re in on it, too.”

“There seems to be outside pressure. The CCTV footage is in the other side’s hands, too.”

“Didn’t you say there were witnesses?”

“We’ve lost contact with all three.”

“That’s just fantastic.”

A sound like bones shifting out of place came from my clenched fist, which had tightened without me realizing it.

“They’re really coming at us with a plan.”

“They seem intent on isolating you completely. The interview with Mr. Kim Sangshik is part of that.”

We weren’t dealing with some Third Rate media company that sold gossip.

This was one of the country’s ten largest major media outlets.

They would wrap even the most ludicrous bullshit in attractive packaging and broadcast it convincingly. Along the way, they would use money and power to bolster its credibility.

For example… testimony from people who knew me well.

“We’ll get to see the faces of my old coworkers again. Though I guess it’ll be hard to recognize them if they’re shown with their faces mosaicked.”

I asked Team Leader Choi, who was looking at me with an unreadable expression,

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

“As I recall, Jin Taekyung had a good reputation within the Sopung Guild.”

“I got along with everyone. It was such a dinky little Guild.”

“Then why did you think that?”

“Because there’s one thing that works on everyone. This. And this.”

I brought my thumb and index finger together and wiggled them.

In the end, it came down to money. Money was everything.

For Hunters who were willing to risk their lives to make money, the temptation would be even stronger.

“Maybe it’s because I’ve been blindsided so many times in a row, but… These were people I’d spent seven years laughing and joking around with. And I still can’t trust them.”

If this had happened a few days ago, I might have naively believed in my old coworkers.

But not now. The world where dreams, friendship, and common sense meant anything had already vanished from my mind.

“Looking at how the article made it into the politics and society section, it seems like they greased some lawmaker’s palm, too. You think they couldn’t buy off a few low-rank Hunters who are struggling to make ends meet?”

“…”

“It’s obvious. I’ll become the worst bastard alive, get carved up all over the internet, and be torn apart. The image I’ve built up until now will come crashing down, and our Guild will come crashing down with it.”

Team Leader Choi, who had been wearing a strange expression the entire time, let out a quiet laugh.

“You’ve improved a little. You can think like a jaded adult now.”

“Are you taking back what you said yesterday about me being naive?”

“I’ll decide after I see what you do from this point on.”

“What?”

“We can’t just stand there and let them do this to us.”

As he spoke, his finger pressed the screen of his smartphone. A ringing tone sounded, and someone answered.

“I found it. The tail.”

Butler Kim’s low, smooth voice flowed through the speaker.