Translator: HunterW
Editor: RED
Oh Taeshik, the guild master of the Hitman Guild, the only crime guild in Seoul, was panicking.
-How is he this powerful?-
What he saw happen outside of his office was the most shocking thing in his entire lifetime. The tank Specialist with the Earth Armor skill wasn’t an Unrivaled deva, but he still had the highest DEF in the entire guild. Yet he was killed with a single attack.
-Shit! I was careless. I knew that he was powerful, and yet I still ordered them to attack. I sent them to their deaths! I’m such an idiot!-
Lee Jiwon had been a constant source of worry for Oh Taeshik. That worry grew the more Lee Jiwon became famous, but Oh Taeshik thought that he would be safe as long as Lee Jiwon didn’t know that the Hitman Guild was behind the kidnapping attempt. He even had his underlings keep their mouths shut so that they would never run into Lee Jiwon ever again.
That order to kill Lee Jiwon earlier was more out of shock than anything. There was no way he could beg for forgiveness, even if he bowed in prostration.
Oh Taeshik just could not think of how Lee Jiwon knew where to come knocking. Did someone in his guild leak that information, or did Song Haechang screw up and leak it himself?
-Whatever the case, I need to survive this first.-
It wouldn’t be a problem if Lee Jiwon killed Oh Taeshik here and Oh Taeshik just took on a death penalty. The real problem here was if Lee Jiwon made the entire Hitman Guild his target and subsequently destroyed it, or decided to take over instead. If either of those were the case, Oh Taeshik stood to lose everything.
-I can’t lose it; not my guild!-
Oh Taeshik made his decision. He would hand over to Lee Jiwon all of the information he had on Song Haechang. That man has been too quiet these days. Oh Taeshik was afraid of the Sunbin Guild, yes, but right now, he was more afraid of this monster in front of him.
—
“Is your name Oh Taeshik?” I asked when I saw the expensive name plate on his desk.
“Yes sir! My name is Oh Taeshik. I’m currently the guild master of the Hitman Guild.”
“Then do you know why I’m here?”
“I do.”
I nodded in satisfaction at Oh Taeshik’s quick and straightforward answers. “Good. Tell me what you know.”
“Yes, sir. So, the reason why the Hitman Guild wanted to bring you here was…”
“Hold up. I know that you guys wanted to kidnap me, so don’t sugarcoat the details. Tell me straight up.”
Oh Taeshik’s forehead was dripping with cold sweat. He cleared his throat before continuing. “Yes, sir, my apologies. The reason we wanted to kidnap you was that the Sunbin Guild…”
“The Sunbin Guild?”
“Yes, sir. Song Haechang of the Sunbin Guild gave us the order to kidnap you after giving us all of the intel he had on you. Of course, that intel was complete garbage. He also wanted us to force a Respawn Point on you, and imprison you after we killed you.”
From what I could tell, Oh Taeshik wasn’t lying, but nothing he said made any sense. “Song Haechang, huh…?”
“Yes sir. Song Haechang was the first member of the Sunbin Guild to learn the Unrivaled skill and was heavily supported by the guild, but all of his efforts ended in complete failure.”
“Hmm.” I hadn’t realized it then, but I knew who that was now. Song Haechang was the first person I encountered after waking up after four years.
The reason I didn’t recognize him then was because he was so different from the Song Haechang I had heard about in the past. In my past life, Song Haechang wasn’t as famous as his younger sister, Haein, but he had never let down his title of the Crown Prince of South Korea once. Whenever the Yung Gong Guild would mess with Seoul and the Sunbin Guild, he would always call for action and paid them back in full. His good lucks, charismatic leadership, and skills as a deva commanded respect from those around him. There was not a single man out there who wasn’t envious of Song Haechang’s life.
-That Song Haechang has it out for me?-
To be honest, I was suspicious that it was him. It was almost as if he was waiting for me when I woke up, and only someone who knew I that I had just woken up could give the order to kidnap me. In other words, the culprit was the person who kicked me out as soon as I had woken up, calling me trash and a loser all the way to the door. It had to be Song Haechang.
-But why? What reason would he have to do that?-
I had no connection with the man. I had never even met him before.
“I…I have proof.” Oh Taeshik spoke up, noticing my confused expression.
“What, really? Bring it here.”
“Yes, sir!”
He quickly took a painting off the wall and revealed a hidden safe. He opened it and took out a folder after digging through a pile of documents. “Here it is. I also have a recording of when Song Haechang called to give us the order. Should I put it on?”
“Yeah, go ahead,” I told him as I flipped through the report.
The report had quite the amount of information about me. The biggest piece of evidence that the order came from within the Sunbin Guild was my level. Only they knew what my level was when I showed Song Daechul and the others my level 32 Stats Menu. After that, I had fallen asleep!
The video showed Song Haechang’s call to Oh Taeshik and how Song Haechang gave the intel to the eagle.
“Hmm.”
“He may be the black sheep of the family now, but he is of the Sunbin Guild. We had no choice but to carry out his order.”
I didn’t pay attention to Oh Taeshik’s excuses. All I could think about was if all of the Sunbin Guild knew about this.
-If it’s to this extent, there’s no way they don’t know about this.-
They had to know if Song Haechang was behind this and yet, they let it be. They even let the Hitman Guild exist. They had to know that I would eventually find the Hitman Guild myself. I put the report and the USB in my inventory for now.
“Okay. I’ll figure out what to do with this later. Now we have to take care of this thing between us.”
“Huh?” Oh Taeshik didn’t seem to understand what I was saying.
“What? You thought this was it? I took on quite a few injuries then, and I’m still traumatized about that incident. You’ve got to properly compensate me for that, don’t you?”
“That’s…right. Of course I have to,” Oh Taeshik replied. He was dumbfounded, but I ignored him.
I did come here to get my revenge, but it wasn’t my only goal here. It wasn’t like I actually got hurt enough to exact my revenge or anything. I just wanted to extort them as much as possible. They weren’t good people, and they crossed the wrong person.
Soon, Oh Taeshik opened his inventory and took out 47,000,000 golden rings. “This includes all of the Hitman Guild’s current profits. It’s I have.” It was definitely a lot, but I had more than a billion.
“You don’t have a Rank 8 item on you, do you?”
“A Rank 8? We can’t afford such a thing…”
I guess that was too much to ask from a smaller guild.
“Okay. This is good for now.”
“For now?”
“I’m just saying. Don’t mind it too much.” I was starting to act like a loan shark or something.
——
I left the dejected Oh Taeshik in his office and left the Luna Hotel. My original objective was the entire Hitman Guild for trying to kidnap me, and even threaten Kim Jihan to act as my double agent, but now I knew Song Haechang was behind it all. I also wanted to know why Song Daechul had left the Hitman Guild in his backyard all this time.
My next destination was the 97-story Sunbin Guild building. I headed there without using Blink, in case things went south.
—
Song Daechul, Song Myungsoo, and a few others were holding a meeting in the Sunbin Guild’s headquarters.
“Guild master, we had plenty of chances to deal with the Hitman Guild; why have we let them exist all this time?”
“He’s right, father. This might come back to bite us, sooner or later.”
“That’s enough. There’s no point if we can’t get rid of them completely.”
“…” Song Myungsoo fell silent at his father’s answer. He knew what he meant. He might act confident and prideful on the outside, he was actually sick with worry on the inside. It was because of his only son, Song Haechang.
Unable to deal with his younger sister’s overwhelming success and the pressure from his grandfather, Song Haechang now had a serious inferiority complex. He was also unable to forgive himself for his actions, thanks to his pride, and became even more crooked. It was enough to attempt to kidnap Lee Jiwon, the man his grandfather and his younger sister cared so much about. After the attempt failed, rumors and tales about Lee Jiwon only grew, causing Song Haechang to fall in a spiral of madness.
‘How did that piece of trash become so strong?’
‘He’s so strong after sleeping for four years straight…what does that make me?! Me! Me!!!’
‘Gahahaha. I know he’ll come to kill me soon. He’ll come to have his revenge and I’ll be begging at his toes to spare me. Gahahaha!’
‘Fuck them all. Fuck them all to Hell!’
No one could try to comfort and ease him anymore. He was already way off the deep end now. His inferiority complex only grew worse the more famous Lee Jiwon became. Song Haechang would constantly compare himself with Lee Jiwon.
Even if Song Daechul could deal with the Hitman Guild completely, he couldn’t help Song Haechang. That was why he left the guild alone.
At that moment, a secretary entered the conference room.
“Guild master, Lee Jiwon had just left the Hitman Guild and is quickly making his way here.”
“I understand.” The secretary left, leaving the room in complete silence.
After a few minutes, Song Haein spoke up. “What do you plan to do now, grandfather?”
“We’ll just have to deal with it as is,” Song Daechul said, as he sat back on the sofa. “By the way, how are things with the Cheng Long Guild?”
“Wai Chung is quite furious still, but it doesn’t seem like there will be much of an issue. He knows that neither of us have anything to gain,” Park Manho replied.
“Keep an eye on them. He won’t cool off any time soon.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did you prepare what I asked?” Song Daechul asked Song Haein.
“I did, grandfather. I have the Rank 8 item we found in the King-Emperor’s Tomb.”
“Good. That’s for Jiwon.”
All of the board members had reviewed the King-Emperor’s raid many times. Once again, they saw Lee Jiwon’s unbelievable power. They had also reviewed the last part of the video many times as well; if Lee Jiwon was really waving his hand as an indication to choose the fifth chest.
To Song Daechul’s eye, however, it was obvious. Lee Jiwon was telling Song Haein to choose the fifth chest, and that was why he had prepared the Rank 8 item. Handing over the Rank 9 item was impossible, but he still wanted to thank Lee Jiwon. A few were against it initially, but quickly gave in when they realized that Lee Jiwon’s abilities and power were real. It would be better to keep him as an ally than as an enemy!
—
I soon arrived at the front of the Sunbin Guild’s building. “Let’s finish this.” I wanted to find out where we stood once and for all. Were we enemies, or were we allies? Or were we now just complete strangers? I slowly but confidently walked to the front entrance.
