Chapter 81 - How About This?

"So you just came back?"

"Yeah."

"I can picture the look on the Wang family head's face."

Limon gave Li Qingyu a flat look as she smiled wryly.

"Why? Is it that strange that I gave him a few pointers and left?"

"Yes."

"... I got the same impression from that Wang bastard. What the hell do you people think of me that you find it so surprising?"

"If I had to put it into words, a good-for-nothing son-in-law who does next to no work and only causes trouble?"

"You're one to talk."

Limon was dumbfounded. She was the one who had proposed to him in the first place—and created Guardian for him, an organization expressly meant to raise hell.

Li Qingyu answered calmly. "I'm only telling you what our clan generally thinks."

"My reputation's that bad?"

"Yes. And leaving the entire investigation into the attack to the Wang family head has disappointed them even more."

After all, Guardian was now the firm exclusively responsible for the Black Dragon Clan's security, and Limon was its head. Rather than personally leading the investigation, he had stepped back and relinquished responsibility. It was exactly the sort of thing people would criticize.

"But it's nothing you need to worry about. Your reputation was already so poor, Sword Lord, that it hardly makes a difference if it falls any further."

Was that supposed to be comforting, or was she teasing him? He couldn't tell from her placid face, and gave her an uneasy look.

"For all that, you don't look too worried. I thought the worse my reputation got, the more people would blame you for proposing to me."

"You've taken so much abuse on my behalf, Sword Lord, that I'm actually gaining sympathy."

"... Well, I guess playing chief eunuch of the Eastern Depot when I never asked for the job has paid off."

Limon swallowed a sigh.

'Why does everything keep going wrong?'

When he had first agreed to marry into the Black Dragon Clan, he'd had a firm plan: take control of the clan as quickly as possible, win its support, and use that as a foothold to gain control of the other clans in the Seven Dragons Society.

But he'd put the plan off to focus on training, and his reputation had kept falling until it was beyond repair.

'I don't necessarily need a good reputation, but at this rate I'll end up worse than a chief eunuch. I'll be one of the Ten Attendants.'

As Limon lamented how things had gone awry, Li Qingyu suddenly asked, "But Sword Lord, did you really have to turn down the Wang family head's offer? The support of the Wang family of Shanghai would have helped you a great deal right now."

"Helped me? It would've looked good on paper, that's all."

"Are you saying the Wang family head didn't sincerely intend to support you?"

"I'm saying it wouldn't have done me any real good even if he had."

Seeing her surprise, Limon explained matter-of-factly.

"I can't say I bear no responsibility for what happened. I'm the reason he was away, after all."

Wang Gi-neung might have looked every inch a treacherous courtier, but he was still the head of the Wang family of Shanghai. Had he not been away recuperating, the employees of Black Dragon Construction might have escaped being slaughtered.

"They're furious enough that this happened while he was gone. Imagine if I took a promise of support as the price for staying out of it. What would the Wang family think of me?"

"Hmm... A robber or corrupt official who injures someone, then charges them for the medicine?"

"Exactly. And you think they'd sincerely want to support me after that?"

The sister-in-law who tried to stop the beating was often resented more than the mother-in-law who delivered it. If he inserted himself into an affair involving a kinsman's death and profited from it, that alone could earn him resentment he didn't deserve.

"So rather than drag a horse that isn't thirsty to water and force it to drink, you'd let it roam free."

"At least it won't kick me."

Li Qingyu gave him an odd look as he shrugged. "That hits a little close to home."

"How so?"

"I've done my share of things that could get me kicked by a horse."

Limon chuckled at her embarrassment over how she'd protected world peace, brought about his downfall, and ultimately secured their marriage.

"That's different. The horse went to the water on its own."

"Did it?"

"You can't compare dragging a bridled horse somewhere against its will to climbing onto a bucking wild one."

"That cuts deep."

Li Qingyu smiled. She understood what he was trying to tell her, in his roundabout way: if he'd had even the slightest doubt about his own feelings, he would never have accepted her proposal at all.

"It's still a shame. Even if we'd only secured the Wang family of Shanghai's support in name, there are so many ways we could have used it."

"You'd certainly have found a way to make use of it."

Limon readily agreed. A woman capable of maneuvering even the elders would have plenty of ways to exploit the smallest pretext.

"Even so, it was better not to accept."

"Why is that?"

"If I'd taken the deal now, it'd be hard to step in later if things changed."

Li Qingyu gave him an odd look. She knew what he meant by things changing.

"... You don't think the Wang family head will catch the killers?"

"Under normal circumstances, he could. You're the Seven Dragons Society, after all."

Whether as an organization with a long history or as one of the world's leading conglomerates, the Seven Dragons Society wielded influence that ordinary police forces couldn't begin to match. That influence was why, despite a massacre on that scale, the police hadn't intervened and it hadn't appeared on a single broadcast. If the Society put its mind to it, it could quickly track down most criminals.

"But I have a feeling these ones aren't ordinary."

"A Sword Master's intuition?"

"More like a former PAB agent's intuition."

Limon frowned and continued. "There are plenty of players who aren't right in the head, but people this methodical about their madness rarely get caught without a fight."

"Can someone be methodically mad?"

"Your Seven Dragons Society is a prime example."

"I see. Put that way, it makes perfect sense."

Li Qingyu readily agreed. If faith could be called a form of madness, then the Seven Dragons Society was indeed a more organized band of lunatics than even a priesthood. Considering what the Society had done in the past, the massacre at Black Dragon Construction was mild by comparison.

"Then, contrary to what the Tracers say, perhaps this wasn't an indiscriminate attack. Perhaps they had a more specific objective."

"Or maybe they were bored, happened to spot Black Dragon Construction as they passed by, and decided to slaughter everyone."

"So it's only a possibility."

"There's no telling what's going on in lunatics' heads."

That was why Limon had told Wang Gi-neung only what he could establish with reasonable confidence from the traces at the scene. Jumping to conclusions about the culprits and confusing the investigation would have been worse than saying nothing.

'Though the Tracers seem certain it was an indiscriminate attack.'

『Criminal Psychology Insight』.

『Master Detective's Deduction』.

『Answers from the Stars』.

Tracers specializing in investigation and pursuit had used those skills and others to arrive at the same conclusion: the culprit was a psychopathic indiscriminate killer, and the slaughter at Black Dragon Construction had undoubtedly been an impulsive crime, not a planned one. Limon gave a dry chuckle as he recalled their testimony.

'Do they even realize there's nothing less reliable than calling something indiscriminate?'

As both a PAB agent and a Sword Master, Limon had faced countless criminals and villains. He knew that even crimes that looked indiscriminate followed some logic in the criminal's mind. Sometimes that logic made sense; sometimes it didn't.

And judging by a scene where the killers had been thorough enough to leave no evidence yet used murder methods steeped in madness, these culprits were a peculiar mixture of both. Hence his description of them as "methodical lunatics."

'If that Wang bastard isn't an idiot, the clues I gave him will have narrowed the suspects down already.'

Criminals connected to the military. Lunatics who enjoyed killing. High-level players on top of that.

Limon clicked his tongue at the suspect those conditions naturally brought to mind. It was still only a guess, but if he was right, there was little chance their atrocities would end here.

'I don't know what they're after, but if the Black Dragon Clan is their target...'

Deep in thought, Limon suddenly turned to Li Qingyu. "Princess, what's your security alert level now?"

"I've put everyone on Level Two alert for the time being."

"Level Two..."

He recalled the site of the carnage he'd inspected himself, especially the signs of Wang Gi-seong's resistance. After turning something over in his head, he frowned.

"Can't you raise it to the highest alert level?"

"Where?"

"Everywhere."

"... You mean every subsidiary in the country?"

"Yep."

The request came out of nowhere. Li Qingyu's eyes widened, then her expression turned grave.

"You think the killers will keep targeting our subsidiaries?"

"I know it sounds like an old man's needless worry. But what's happened once can happen twice."

Had she belonged to another clan, she might have dismissed it as the needless worry of a senile old man. Black Dragon Construction had been caught defenseless; attacking another Black Dragon Clan subsidiary now that they were prepared would be insane, even for a Monarch.

"That... would be a problem."

But Li Qingyu did not underestimate the experience of a seasoned veteran or a Sword Master's instincts. That was why the prospect troubled her.

"Too difficult?"

"The highest alert level requires mobilizing our combat units. We could protect two or three sites, but we don't have nearly enough people to guard every subsidiary."

The Black Dragon Clan might have fallen on hard times, but it was still part of the Seven Dragon Group. It had countless subsidiaries, and posting a combat unit at each of them was impossible in practice. Even with all the Seven Dragons Society's warriors, there were only so many masters. Spreading the units thin would only make them easy to defeat one by one.

"Hmm. So we need more hands."

Limon stroked his chin, pondering how they might protect every subsidiary from the killers. A moment later, his eyes lit up.

"Then how about this?"