Chapter 89 - I Know You

* * *

“Why do we need to escort them? The White Sparrows have been operating independently this whole time.”

Hadn’t that been what they always did? Hyeon-yul wondered whether they had been captured.

“The managers who infiltrate places to gather information aren’t limited to operations like that cult mission we handled before.”

Hyeon-yul asked back, “They aren’t?”

“Broadly speaking, there are managers who cooperate with the police to gather information, managers who infiltrate suspicious locations, managers who patrol questionable areas on a regular basis, and managers who are deployed before and after missions. Their roles vary.”

After giving a brief explanation, Haeryeon continued.

“We received word from the managers embedded in a villain company that they can no longer escape on their own. That’s why they need an escort.”

“Then why do you lump all of them together under the name White Sparrow?”

If the work was divided that specifically, Hyeon-yul thought each role should have its own designation. The current system felt considerably inefficient.

“They’re organized into teams just like us, Team 1, Team 2, and so on. They just aren’t referred to as fixed departments. The teams rotate through those duties.”

“Like Black Eagle?”

That was how things worked here as well. Jihwan had mentioned that Team 3 tended to handle somewhat more dangerous assignments, but it was not a team with one exclusive function. It was only a matter of doing a little more of certain work.

Haeryeon smiled lightly and said, “It feels strange to divide the White Sparrows like Black Eagles, doesn’t it?”

“Is there a reason?”

“Back when Black Eagle had only recently been founded, there was a time when a particular department gained too much power.”

Hyeon-yul blinked in surprise and asked, “Power?”

“They say things were extremely specialized back then. Instead of Team 1 and Team 2, there were divisions with names like infiltration unit, covert-entry unit, chemical-attack response unit, things like that.”

Nayun picked up the explanation from Haeryeon.

Hyeon-yul understood immediately. Every organization had departments that were considered especially important. Apparently some of those people had gotten full of themselves and started throwing their weight around.

“Black Eagle and White Sparrow were both organized that way, just like Nayun explained. One department once caused an uproar by declaring a strike and pointing to its workload as justification. Unfortunately, an emergency mission happened right then, and a lot of people died. After that day, the empire recognized the flaws in the system and changed things to the current rotation model, where everyone takes turns.”

“I’m saying this so no one misunderstands. Not everyone in that department supported the strike. Some refused to participate and still deployed on the emergency mission. They couldn’t prevent the disaster because there weren’t enough people, but ordinary civilians had no way to know that. A lot of people blamed them... a lot.”

Shinwoo quietly added that detail. Haeryeon looked at him for a moment, her gaze deepening before she nodded.

“That’s right. The Black Eagles who were expelled back then are believed to be the same former Black Eagles we identified through the information we obtained recently.”

Shinwoo reacted far more strongly than expected.

“...Is that really true?”

He sounded as though he could not believe it.

“It came up in the meeting. I’ll tell you once it’s more certain. We have the old roster, so we should be able to confirm it faster than you might expect.”

“Please do. You have to tell me. Please.”

When Shinwoo insisted again, Haeryeon gave him a reassuring smile.

“Don’t worry, Shinwoo. I’ll definitely tell you.”

Hyeon-yul looked from Shinwoo and Haeryeon to Nayun and Jihwan. Something about their expressions seemed dark.

“Continuing from before, what we need to do is bring back the White Sparrows currently embedded with those villain factions. If the groups are about to be dismantled anyway, there’s no reason to leave them there.”

“So this is a rescue operation?”

Hyeon-yul asked with a sense of unfamiliarity. He had never done a rescue mission before.

“It looks difficult, but it isn’t.”

Haeryeon immediately noticed the unfamiliarity in his expression.

“You just need to bring the targets back alive. Ideally, without injuries.”

“As long as they aren’t injured?”

Hyeon-yul’s gaze dropped slightly. Haeryeon immediately understood what he was implying.

“No. Their minds need to remain intact too.”

A crease formed near Hyeon-yul’s eyes. Jihwan glanced at him, then raised a hand.

“Team Leader, are the four of us going?”

“That’s right. This may or may not be the faction’s true base, but judging by the scale, it’s fairly large.”

“Then don’t worry. I’ll make sure we can bring them back safely.”

Jihwan smiled, and Hyeon-yul nodded. He was a mage, so Hyeon-yul assumed he could manage almost anything.

“There’s one more thing you need to know before you go.”

“Team Leader, that’s starting to scare me. I don’t like it when information keeps coming out like this.”

Nayun fidgeted with the desk. Unless it was an emergency, hearing one new piece of information after another from Haeryeon was rarely a good sign. It meant events they knew nothing about were moving quickly behind the scenes.

“You remember I told you there’s still a faction moving around even after the Poison King was captured?”

Haeryeon was no longer smiling, and Hyeon-yul stared at her.

‘But I told them not to touch Black Eagle.’

The Poison King’s organization was large enough that Hyeon-yul had never expected it to slip past Black Eagle’s notice. What had happened now?

“We still don’t know who the leader is, so for now we’ve decided to call them the ‘New Faction.’ Keep that in mind. That’s all.”

The moment Haeryeon finished, Shinwoo raised his hand. Haeryeon looked at him.

“If they absorbed enough of the Poison King’s faction to take it over, then I think they should be treated as the highest-priority threat.”

“I agree. The strange thing is that they refuse to create any point of contact with us. You’d think an organization that large would inevitably run into Black Eagle, but apparently they flee the moment they see us.”

“They run...? Villains see Black Eagles and run away?”

Nayun openly showed her disbelief. Wasn’t Black Eagle the thing villains hated most? There was even a saying that villains avoided wearing black clothes because they hated the association so much.

“What’s even stranger is that there are no reported civilian victims.”

“...What?”

Shinwoo’s eyebrows rose sharply at the unexpected explanation.

“I know it sounds absurd. That’s why we’re watching them. They run when they see Black Eagle and they don’t touch ordinary civilians. That gives us almost no justification to move against them. At that point they become ordinary criminals, but it makes no sense for the Poison King’s old faction to suddenly turn into ordinary criminals. That’s why we’re calling them the New Faction.”

“But they still attack other villains.”

At Jihwan’s puzzled remark, Haeryeon looked uncomfortable.

“That’s the problem. They’ve already taken down a heavyweight like the Red Witch. Growing even larger from here could happen in an instant. They’re already big, and the idea of them getting even bigger is about as bad as it gets.”

‘Does it look like I’m trying to expand the organization?’

Hyeon-yul thought about Haeryeon’s words. All he had been doing was making villains easier for Black Eagle to find.

“Whether they plan to ignore us only until they become large enough, or whether they genuinely have no interest in us, we don’t know. Either way, thanks to the New Faction, two villain groups have exposed themselves.”

“There’s a saying that the enemy of my enemy is my friend, but it doesn’t fit this situation at all.”

Nayun ran a hand across the desk and narrowed her eyes. A villain group as an ally? That was the first absurd thought that came to mind.

“For now, we’ll keep watching the situation. If anything new comes in, I’ll tell you immediately.”

As soon as Haeryeon finished, she pointed toward the door. Hyeon-yul stood first.

“Hyeon-yul is first again today.”

“That’s not why. What kind of organizations are the two factions?”

He wanted to know at least what sort of groups they were supposed to deal with.

“Neither one is a heavyweight. Think of them as groups desperately trying to become heavyweights.”

Haeryeon kept the explanation simple. That made sense. What they sold or what business they appeared to focus on was not especially important. The faction’s real company might sell something completely different. Everything else could simply exist as a decoy to hide the core operation.

“So they aren’t exactly small-time groups either.”

“If the two merged, they’d be large enough to qualify as a heavyweight. That’s why we need to eliminate both quickly.”

“Understood.”

Hyeon-yul bowed politely before heading straight outside.

“Hyeon-yul really was first, wasn’t he?”

Haeryeon looked at the rest of the team, none of whom had moved at all.

* * *

「*Case Start

- Two villain factions have become increasingly visible due to the recent conflicts among villain organizations.

*Case Progress

- White Sparrows deployed to suspected villain companies A and B, temporary designations, were ordered to withdraw so the true bases of the two factions could be identified.

- Both exposed factions are currently fighting other villain groups over territory.

- Security inside Villain Company A, temporary designation, has intensified, making voluntary withdrawal impossible.

*Points of Caution

- The safety of the White Sparrows is the highest priority.

- Avoid attracting the villains’ attention whenever possible.」

Hyeon-yul steadied his churning stomach while reading the summarized case report, then checked the faces of the White Sparrows they needed to rescue.

There were four people in total.

‘Do all four of us really need to deploy just to rescue four people?’

Hyeon-yul wondered whether Haeryeon had sent too many people. Finding someone’s location was not especially difficult when he thought about it.

There was only one problem. People went insane at different speeds when he placed them inside the darkness. They recovered with time, but that did not fit the requirements of this mission.

Hyeon-yul did not want to put people in there unless necessary. It felt like throwing filth into his own body.

He looked at the other team members.

“What should I do?”

If he were allowed to act independently, he would simply move on his own. For now, however, asking first was the proper thing to do.

“Hyeon-yul, I’ll explain the method we’ve been using.”

Nayun described the approach the team had already developed together. It made sense.

“First, Jihwan casts spatial magic over the building itself. You can think of the whole area as Jihwan’s domain.”

“To be precise, I can only affect the space itself. People are separate from that.”

Jihwan immediately filled in the important limitation himself.

“Jihwan connects that space to me. I’m not sure what the best way to describe it is, but through his magic, I can adjust the transparency of the building itself. In simple terms, it gives me X-ray vision. Understand?”

“Yes. I understand.”

Hyeon-yul nodded. If Jihwan could control the space itself, then something like that seemed perfectly plausible.

“My bullets can’t jump across space and bury themselves directly in someone’s head. That’s why we need Baek Shinwoo’s power.”

“My swords can ignore the space itself.”

Shinwoo summoned a sword and waved it in his hand.

“Once Shinwoo’s power restrains the villains, Jihwan opens a door. Then you go in, grab the White Sparrows, and bring them out. That’s how we’ve always done it.”

Only after hearing Nayun’s explanation did Hyeon-yul understand why Haeryeon had sent all four of them. These three had already built their teamwork around that method, and now that he had joined, they intended to work him into the same rhythm.

Even so, Hyeon-yul did not see any role that truly required him. If anything, he might disrupt a system that already worked.

“If it were up to you, Hyeon-yul, how would you solve this mission?”

When Nayun asked, everyone’s eyes turned toward him. They looked as though they would accept almost any answer, but Hyeon-yul did not interpret the attention that way.

Hyeon-yul asked back, “Are you really asking me for a solution?”

“That’s right. We need to coordinate.”

“Then you don’t need to ask.”

Hyeon-yul’s ambiguous answer left everyone silent.

“I can do anything.”

He could see like Nayun, attack like Shinwoo, and move through space like Jihwan. He could do all of it.

“Put me wherever you’re lacking.”

He could work anywhere. He could be used for anything. That adaptability itself was his ability.

“That’s good.”

Shinwoo spoke up. Someone who could fill any role and do almost anything meant they could finally operate at full speed.

“That means we can secure the targets faster, right?”

“That’s right. We can increase the pace.”

Jihwan nodded at Shinwoo’s observation. Normally Shinwoo handled the insertion side. With Hyeon-yul joining them, it was as if they had gained a blade that could move freely anywhere they needed.

“Hyeon-yul, for now, work with me on extracting the targets. We can adjust everything else as needed. Can you do that?”

Hyeon-yul answered Shinwoo’s question without the slightest hesitation.

“Yes. I can.”

There was nothing he could not do, and he could do even more than that. Before the mission began, Hyeon-yul took out a syringe and his medicine.

* * *

Their target was a ten-story building, unexpectedly large for what could be considered a mid-sized company.

Nayun moved to a location with a clear view of the building. Even from there, it was distant enough that the entire structure could be covered by the palm of her hand.

Her black uniform fluttered in the wind. Inside the building, now rendered increasingly transparent, countless people moved around as though walking through empty air.

Their faces were all different, but from this distance they blurred together until one person looked much like another. The only reliable way to identify the White Sparrows was by their faces.

The crowded interior resembled a swarm of ants, but Nayun remained steady. She had already seen scenes like this countless times.

‘This is awful.’

Still, there was one detail she could not simply ignore. The lights were on despite the hour before dawn. Everyone was still working.

They were not even being allowed to leave on time. How was this any different from the places Hyeon-yul had worked in the past?

<Jihwan, is the connection stable?>

<Yes. It’s connected.>

After receiving Jihwan’s confirmation, Nayun moved her eyes.

<First, I’ll mark the CCTV locations.>

Whenever her gaze paused, Jihwan’s magic automatically marked the spot. Starting from the tenth floor and moving down to the first, Nayun’s eyes swept through the building without hesitation.

No matter how well a camera was hidden, it was difficult to conceal the characteristic red light completely.

<Next, this is the security control room.>

Nayun shifted her gaze. Rather than destroying cameras one by one, it would be faster to restrain the employee controlling the system.

<And now, our targets.>

Nayun located one White Sparrow seated at a desk and working, another cleaning the building, and another eating something in the break room.

When she found the fourth, she froze.

<...They caught one.>

Messages immediately began pouring in after Nayun’s report.

<What do you mean?>

<What? They caught them?>

<Wait, were they exposed?>

<What condition are they in? Are they okay?>

Shinwoo and Jihwan fired questions one after another.

<They’re injured, but it doesn’t look critical. I think they came under suspicion.>

<...This is bad.>

The next message to appear came from Shinwoo.

<We should rescue that one last.>

Hyeon-yul’s message followed, and Nayun agreed immediately.

<That’s right. We can’t endanger the other three just to save one first.>

Nayun lowered her gaze while continuing to report.

<There are villains posted near the entrance.>

At a glance they looked like ordinary guards or people wandering around the building, but Nayun could see the difference.

<And they aren’t merely stationed there. Whenever someone leaves, at least two villains accompany them.>

She had just witnessed it. Two men who had been walking ahead suddenly turned around and hurried after someone exiting the building.

<Now I understand why they need extraction.>

The next message to appear came from Hyeon-yul.

<There are also four people on the roof.>

Nayun informed them of another detail.

<They’re holding something dangerous, so we’ll need to deal with them.>

Each of the four was carrying a gun. They looked like sniper rifles.

This organization was currently at war with another faction. What explanation could there be except that the rooftop shooters were stationed there for that conflict?

Shinwoo sent another message to the rest of the team.

<No one’s coming up, right?>

<No. Don’t worry and deal with them. I’d shoot them myself, but the sound might carry.>

Hyeon-yul sent his response without any hesitation.

<I’ll go.>

<Understood. I’m opening the way.>

Jihwan replied, and the rooftop door in Nayun’s view opened. Hyeon-yul walked out quietly.

<I’ll handle them.>

Even through text, Hyeon-yul’s calmness was unmistakable.