Chapter 96 - You Said I Could Break It, Right? (3)

* * *

Ssssssh.

The woman felt a chill crawl across her skin. She could not hear a sound or sense the slightest presence.

The silence was so complete that her heart began pounding faster.

How had he approached without making a sound and taken her back so completely?

The woman’s expression stiffened rapidly. Seungyu, who had been watching her, slowly widened his smile.

He felt a chill too, but all he did was clench his fists and tremble. This was the person he served.

The realization filled him with exhilaration.

「This is what you wanted, right?」

「This is what you were running your mouth about, right?」

Hyeon-yul typed again, then slowly stepped out from behind her and held out the phone.

He met the woman’s frozen expression.

「Satisfied?」

“How did you...”

「Shh.」

「Trade secret.」

Hyeon-yul raised a finger to the mouth of the rabbit mask.

「Don’t pick another fight.」

「You’re making me want to kill you.」

After giving the warning, Hyeon-yul slowly walked back to the sofa.

If she ignored him again, killing her would be more than justified.

If her faction complained, he could simply show them the CCTV footage and point out that she had started it.

「Secure the CCTV footage, erase it, and bring me a copy.」

Hyeon-yul showed the message to Seungyu.

「You know what happens if someone makes another copy, right?」

“Of course. I’ll handle it immediately.”

Seungyu stepped outside for a moment.

「Sit.」

Hyeon-yul sat on the sofa and offered her a seat. The woman approached with all traces of amusement gone from her face.

「Yes, we’re collecting drugs.」

「You found the right place.」

He did not want a long conversation. He wanted to go home and knit, so he went straight to the point.

“What?”

The woman stared at him in surprise.

「They’re stacked in our warehouses.」

「Where did that information leak from, and how?」

「Tell me.」

The fact that her people had come here meant information had leaked. Hyeon-yul naturally assumed Seungyu already knew as much.

“What will you do if you find out?”

The woman narrowed her eyes and became visibly guarded.

Hyeon-yul took that guarded reaction as a good sign.

「I hate drugs. I’ll kill whoever leaked it.」

The woman’s expression changed. Surprise, perhaps, though there was something ambiguous about it.

“Are you serious? The Poison King wouldn’t have agreed to that.”

「I’m not the Poison King.」

「Do you want him back?」

“Even if you say you aren’t him, this faction itself still belonged to the Poison King. I don’t know how you got lucky enough to take it over...”

「Lucky?」

Hyeon-yul lowered the phone for a moment as though thinking.

“...What?”

The woman seemed unable to endure the silence now that her momentum had weakened.

Hyeon-yul let out a long breath.

「Then you should try getting lucky and taking this place yourself.」

He crooked a finger at her. It was an obvious provocation.

The woman pressed her lips into a tight line.

「When you heard the Poison King disappeared, why didn’t you come running like dogs to take everything?」

「Why didn’t you?」

「Does telling yourself it was luck make your self-esteem feel better?」

Hyeon-yul gave a short laugh at her attempt to dismiss him.

「You couldn’t do it.」

「You were terrified of the Poison King.」

「You couldn’t even deal with the idiots among this faction’s executives who fought over whether the Poison King’s seat belonged to them.」

「I only did what you couldn’t.」

Cowards talking big was ridiculous. The woman in front of him was no different from the rest.

Even after the Poison King disappeared, they had been too afraid to rush in. Now that Hyeon-yul had taken the organization, they found it irritating.

「Fine. I’m feeling generous.」

「You don’t know what the Poison King looks like, do you?」

“...What are you talking about?”

Hyeon-yul pulled up a photo on his phone and showed it to her.

「This is the Poison King.」

The woman leaned forward. Her face soon twisted in disgust.

The face in the photo was grotesque. To think something like that had existed beneath the mask made her feel as if she might vomit.

「Look carefully.」

「See the missing fingers?」

“They’re gone...”

「I cut them off.」

The woman fell silent and stared at Hyeon-yul.

The words “Are you joking?” hovered on her lips, but she could not force them out.

After all, the man in front of her really had taken over the Poison King’s faction.

‘What happened? Black Eagle captured the Poison King, but...’

Her eyes shook as a hypothesis formed.

‘Did this guy attack the Poison King before Black Eagle captured him? Is that why the Poison King went down so easily?’

Judging by the destroyed location visible behind the Poison King in the photo, the theory was hard to dismiss.

She had never really believed Black Eagle had defeated the Poison King by itself in the first place.

「I hate drugs.」

「Do you believe me now?」

Hyeon-yul kept holding the phone up until she answered.

He was getting annoyed that he had to spend his day off doing this at all.

More than anything, Hyeon-yul simply wanted to go home.

“Then why are you collecting drugs?”

The woman finally asked the question she had been holding back.

「Because I ordered them collected.」

“Why?”

「Because I’m going to deal with them myself.」

「If I leave them lying around, rats like you start causing trouble like today.」

「And that makes me want to kill them.」

“Then let me make one thing clear while we’re here.”

The woman pointed at herself before continuing her explanation.

“My younger sibling was taken as a test subject and died. Died because of those damned drugs.”

She forced down her rising voice, but the emotion still showed plainly.

The emotion on her face looked unmistakably like rage.

「And?」

“Forget whether other people point fingers and call us villains or whatever. Drugs need to disappear from this world. We’ll use any means necessary.”

「Why should I trust that?」

The woman thought briefly, then pulled out an external drive.

“These are factions we destroyed. Check it yourself.”

「I’ll contact you.」

「Give me your number.」

“Before that, why do you hate drugs?”

「Would you believe me if I said the same reason?」

“...Yes. I would.”

There was no hesitation in her gaze.

“If you actually get rid of the drugs, I’ll trust you more.”

「Tell me about a place that’s difficult for you to handle.」

Hyeon-yul had no intention of wasting such a good opportunity.

He needed information first. Dealing with her faction could come later.

「I’ll handle it.」

Hyeon-yul threw out the bait. He expected her to accept it.

The size of the organization that had once belonged to the Poison King was not a lie.

“There’s a company called Frunal that sells milk.”

Linda and Frunal. Both companies from the earlier information had now surfaced.

“The leader is heavyweight-class, but judging by the businesses they own and the way they operate, they’re mostly just big. Recent events made approaching them difficult.”

「Because of Black Eagle?」

“Yeah. Your people caused enough trouble that Black Eagle got sensitive too. It’s better to lie low for now.”

「You really think Black Eagle would arrest people trying to eliminate drugs?」

“Why don’t you just laugh at me instead?”

The woman sounded openly offended by Hyeon-yul’s response.

‘Why?’

Hyeon-yul did not understand the reaction.

Black Eagle wanted drugs eliminated too. If someone was doing that for them, wouldn’t Black Eagle welcome it?

“...The empire.”

The woman started to speak, then drew in a deep breath.

GRIND.

The sound of her teeth grinding made it clear she could not suppress the emotion rising inside her.

“I still believe the damned empire needs to be erased.”

「When you say it like that, it sounds as though the empire is the one making the drugs.」

“What if they are?”

「What evidence do you have?」

“...They should’ve stopped the test subjects. They should’ve stopped the drugs from circulating. Those bastards failed to do their job! That’s why they started grabbing everyone, whether they belonged to this side or not!”

「That’s a huge leap.」

Hyeon-yul saw no value in responding to an argument with no evidence or logic.

「If the empire could stop all of that, villains like us would already be gone.」

If the empire could not even erase villains, how was it supposed to stop test subjects and drugs completely?

More importantly, Hyeon-yul did not understand why she blamed the empire in the first place. Villains were the ones performing the experiments and manufacturing the drugs.

‘Ah...’

After thinking through it for a while, Hyeon-yul gave up.

‘This is just something a villain would say.’

My fault is your fault. Your fault is your fault. My own wrongdoing does not exist. That was the kind of logic Hyeon-yul had come to expect from villains.

If they possessed concepts like remorse and regret, it would be stranger for them to be here in the first place.

“What if the empire is deliberately leaving us alone?”

「Do you have evidence?」

“Not yet.”

「So you heard something?」

The woman smirked briefly at the phone. She clearly had no intention of explaining further.

“Trust isn’t exactly something that suits people like us, is it?”

「Of course not.」

「Our goals simply overlap.」

“If I learn something, I’ll tell you for now. The goal of erasing the empire will probably overlap too.”

「Fine by me.」

The woman stood after reading the message.

“Contact me. That’s all I came for.”

「Bring me something useful, and I’ll let your people destroy the drugs we’ve collected with your own hands.」

Hyeon-yul deliberately gave her an offer tempting enough to remember.

They had to destroy the drugs anyway. There was no harm in inspecting what they had accumulated first, then handing it over later.

“Not bad. You know how to negotiate.”

The woman smiled as if the negotiation had finally become interesting.

“What should I call you next time? Rabbit?”

「Call me whatever you want.」

「What about you?」

“Call me Yeon.”

Yeon smiled brightly after finally giving him a name.

“I’m leaving, Rabbit.”

「All right.」

「Take care.」

Hyeon-yul waved one hand as she walked away from the room.

After Yeon left, Seungyu came back inside.

“...What did you discuss?”

Seungyu approached Hyeon-yul and asked the question carefully.

「Investigate a company called Frunal.」

“Understood. I’ll begin immediately.”

「I can take the materials with me, right?」

Hyeon-yul genuinely wanted to go home now.

He had done enough. He had never planned to do this much in the first place.

He could feel himself steadily moving toward overwork.

“Of course. But are you already... leaving?”

「Why?」

「Is something wrong?」

“No. It’s nothing.”

Seungyu answered immediately, then hesitated before saying anything more.

「See you later.」

Hyeon-yul gave a short farewell before turning to leave.

Only then did Seungyu smile and bow his head.

“Have a safe trip. I’ll handle everything you ordered properly.”

Seungyu did not raise his head until Hyeon-yul left the room. He was smiling brightly.

* * *

Hyeon-yul raised his head. His gaze gradually darkened.

‘It’s my day off...’

The weather outside was especially pleasant that day as well.

Did he really need to do this?

Even after coming all the way here, he found himself hesitating.

The moment Hyeon-yul returned home, he had examined the files Yeon gave him.

There was no other way for him to obtain the drugs from the factions her people had already destroyed, so he had reviewed the information freely.

As he compared the records against drugs he already knew, one entry caught his attention.

It was information her people claimed to have obtained by digging through an experimental site.

Hyeon-yul’s eyes stopped immediately when he reached that passage.

Hyeon-yul wondered whether the experimental site might still exist.

Could it be the place where he himself had been kept?

That possibility had been enough to bring him back outside.

There was no choice but to check.

Hyeon-yul dragged his heavy legs along the forest path.

An experimental site could exist in a city or in the mountains. There was no easy way to predict it because the location depended entirely on the people building it.

That meant any discovered site had to be checked immediately.

Hyeon-yul raised his phone and checked the location once again.

‘This is definitely the right location.’

Nothing was visible. So far there were no scents other than animals either.

Hyeon-yul walked a little farther into the quiet forest.

Even with stones, roots, and small plants underfoot, his steps made no sound. It was as if he were not there at all.

Holding the phone, he circled the surrounding area several times before lowering his gaze.

The smell was different from the rest of the ground. Even the color of the soil looked subtly different.

‘...Ah. It’s underneath.’

The information Yeon had provided ranged from several years old to only a few weeks old.

Either way, enough time had passed that soil dug up and replaced here would naturally differ in color.

Something still felt slightly strange, but Hyeon-yul did not overthink it. He sank straight downward.

A hidden passage finally appeared beneath the forest floor.

He could have followed it, but he did not want to waste time. He continued descending.

The farther down he went, the more traces of the old battle appeared.

Broken debris and corpses filled the area, making every breath nauseating. Dust had accumulated everywhere as well, proving the facility had been abandoned.

Hyeon-yul continued downward until he reached the lowest level.

The rotten smell grew noticeably stronger on the lowest floor.

‘At least I found the right kind of place.’

Dark, dried blood covered the once-white facility. If experiments had been performed here, that amount of blood was only natural.

Everything had decayed together, making it impossible to tell which corpses had been test subjects. Hyeon-yul tilted his head as he looked around.

‘This isn’t the place where I was kept.’

Aside from being white, the structure was different.

Hyeon-yul had rarely been allowed to walk through his own experimental facility under his own power, but it had happened a few times.

How could he forget its layout?

He continued examining the area for anything Yeon’s people might have missed.

‘The computers are completely destroyed.’

Broken drug containers lay on the floor, their contents long since dried away.

Countless shattered syringes were scattered in every direction. There were also strange tools everywhere, enough that they could almost be called industrial equipment.

‘They cut off my fingers countless times with tools like those.’

It had been part of testing his healing ability. The fingers grew back every time, yet they repeated the experiment again and again.

Hyeon-yul looked around almost as if revisiting an old memory, then suddenly stopped.

Dust covered the floor, but there were areas where less dust had accumulated in the shapes of footprints.

The floor was white enough that most people might never notice. Hyeon-yul caught the slight difference immediately.

‘Why do the footprints go this way?’

Curious about the strange trail, Hyeon-yul followed the footprints.

They passed corpses, crossed ruined rooms, and ended in front of a wall.

After considering it briefly, Hyeon-yul extended a hand. His fingers sank through the wall.

Then he slowly walked forward through the solid-looking wall.

He did not know how long he had been moving when a new smell finally appeared.

‘...?’

It smelled more like recent construction than an abandoned facility.

Hyeon-yul accelerated. He slid forward until a half-finished white complex spread out before him.

‘Ha...’

The unfinished white complex looked extremely familiar to Hyeon-yul.

The facility had been painted white just like the previous one, but the structure and construction method were different.

If he had to compare it to something, it looked similar to the place they had discovered beneath the secret base not long ago.

‘...No way.’

Hyeon-yul heard several sets of footsteps approaching from nearby.

There were three people approaching through the unfinished facility.

‘They can’t be ordinary civilians.’

Hyeon-yul did not hesitate for even a single moment.

Appearing behind them, he pierced the throat of the man in the center.

“...K-kgh.”

Before the cry could spread, Hyeon-yul swung hard to the right.

One head fell, and two bodies collapsed.

Hyeon-yul immediately turned left and placed a blade against the final man’s throat.

Covered in the blood that had sprayed outward, Hyeon-yul looked like an evil spirit.

“Are you building this place so you can use Black Eagles as test subjects?”

He asked the man who appeared to be involved with the facility.

If the man did not know, Hyeon-yul could simply find a computer and search it himself.

He hoped the answer was no, but the atmosphere of this place felt exactly the same.

Building styles rarely overlapped this precisely by coincidence.

“...”

The man could not speak, but the nervous way he looked around already confirmed enough.

Hyeon-yul cut the final man’s throat without asking anything further.

The man clutched at the wound as blood leaked out, staggered, and collapsed.

Hyeon-yul watched until he died, then smiled.

‘Come to think of it, they said I could break this place, didn’t they?’

—What a shame. You came all this way for nothing. I wouldn’t even blink if you destroyed this place. I have plenty of money. I can build as many of these as I want.

The man who used a portal-like ability had definitely said that.

If this was the second site, then there had to be a third.

Judging by the construction progress, the sites had probably been built around the same time.

‘I wonder how much money they really have.’