Chapter 61 – Cleanse (2)

The group raising their voices and approaching Michael.

The people who had been between Michael’s table and the approaching group fled from their seats like lightning. It seemed this wasn’t their first or second time experiencing this.

The group surrounded the table where Sun-woo and Michael were sitting, and a middle-aged man emerged from the group and glared at Michael.

The middle-aged man had a scarred face and one arm cut off at the wrist, replaced with a prosthetic hand.

“I’ve been watching your actions all this time while continuously hearing the voices of the comrades who died. I hoped to see you show even a little remorse for what you did wrong, but you’ve just been talking excitedly and enjoying yourself here.”

The middle-aged man continued denouncing Michael in front of him. Looking at the situation, it seemed he was spouting off to justify his own actions.

According to his words, it appeared Michael and he had been in the same mercenary unit until recently.

A few months ago, while carrying out the same mission, Michael suddenly said it was dangerous, completely ruined the team atmosphere, and then disappeared.

After Michael disappeared, the team encountered a trap and was annihilated except for him, and he ended up losing one arm.

“I told you it was falling behind. Falling behind. The unit concluded the same thing.”

At Michael’s excuse, Sun-woo covered his face with his hands. There was no way it was falling behind.

“Falling behind? You, who moves through the jungle like your own home!”

There was no need to ask who was more credible between Michael making excuses like a joke and the opponent with a disabled body venting his resentment.

“You need to feel the pain of dying too!”

The man’s shouting eyes were filled with bloodshot.

Whether ghost voices were echoing in his head as he said, he couldn’t know, but at least proper sleep seemed impossible.

It appeared the opponent was suffering from serious war aftereffects or PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder).

At his outcry, the breathing of the people surrounding them began to grow rough. They seemed to be the man’s friends.

The man had apparently heard that Michael came to drink alone and gathered with his friends to take revenge.

But then, one person poured cold water on the tense atmosphere.

“It seems like the atmosphere is pretty rough, so I should leave first.”

Sun-woo quietly got up from his seat and said goodbye to Michael.

“What! You’re going to abandon me?”

Surprised Michael tried to grab Sun-woo’s arm, but there was no way Sun-woo would let himself be caught.

“This doesn’t seem like something I can take sides on.”

At Sun-woo’s words, Michael looked on the verge of tears, but Sun-woo really planned to leave him behind.

Even though he was alone, he wasn’t the type to get beaten up by this number of people, and even if he did get beaten up, it would be okay. He had done enough to deserve it.

Sun-woo rather felt like cheering for the other side.

Sun-woo tried to leave the table immediately, but the people surrounding them didn’t move aside.

“You also attend Cleanse where that guy goes, right? Do you know how long those guys have been going around causing trouble?”

The man blocking Sun-woo spoke while pointing at Sun-woo’s clothes. It seemed he was being misunderstood because of the clothes he received from the association.

“Right. How much trouble we all have because of those guys.”

“Do you know how hard it is for everyone because of those guys who act recklessly trusting their company?”

It appeared that unlike Sun-woo’s thinking, the other people didn’t come just for the man.

“Tsk, would they believe me if I said I’m wearing this but I’m a freelancer? Just how much trouble did they cause for everyone to be like this?”

Well, the summoned of this dimension. Especially American summoned were mostly mercenaries who just shot guns every day. There was no telling how much evil they had committed with a corporation close to being above the law behind their backs.

“Teach them both a lesson!”

In the end, Sun-woo failed to escape.

There were no other people visible in the bar anymore. The bartender who had given Michael the middle finger locked the bar door, turning the bar into a sealed room.

The group surrounding the two all took out clubs or sticks. They had apparently prepared as well.

And the next moment, people swung their clubs toward Michael and Sun-woo.

Bang!

But at that moment, an explosive sound echoed and the pub seemed to freeze in time.

The people swinging clubs all froze, and Michael whistled softly.

A person was embedded in a wall quite far from where they were gathered. The sight of someone half-buried in a wooden wall was very surreal.

“Oops. Reflexively, I just…”

And under the stopped club, Sun-woo was making a troubled expression while withdrawing his extended fist.

His body had reflexively reacted from all the fighting he’d done, and he ended up sending the attacking opponent flying.

“It would be nice if we could just end it roughly like this…”

Sun-woo opened his mouth while looking around at the terrified people, but rather his words became the trigger.

“Die!”

The terrified people began rushing in recklessly.

Sun-woo sighed and Michael excitedly swung his fists.

A little later, the pub became very quiet.

People sprawled everywhere, broken tables and chairs. And bar employees hiding in corners looking at Sun-woo with terror-stricken expressions.

And Michael with an excited expression and Sun-woo looking depressed were standing in the middle of the pub.

“We’ve destroyed everything. This feels completely like villain behavior.”

It was just simple self-defense, but the skill difference was too great, so it just felt like bullying weak opponents.

“It’s okay! The association compensates for most things. Moreover, since they attacked first this time, billing for treatment won’t be easy, right?”

“Good grief, on top of that an evil corporation too…”

Sun-woo’s sigh deepened even more.

Shortly after, the two left the bar, leaving behind the terrified employees.

“Is it okay to just leave like this?”

“I contacted the company. People will come soon.”

For Sun-woo who had been prepared to be harassed by police, he couldn’t help but feel lukewarm about Michael’s words.

And Sun-woo could feel the association’s frightening power once again.

Before leaving the pub, Sun-woo told the frightened employees.

“Don’t worry. Everyone just fainted, no one is seriously hurt.”

Since it was the words of someone who destroyed the entire pub and embedded people in walls, the employees had clearly absurd expressions even while terrified.

But after the two left the pub and some time passed, the collapsed people groaned and got up.

During the fight, Sun-woo had knocked out his opponents while trying his best not to hurt them.

“You didn’t use that pressure point thing and knocked them out the hard way? I was looking forward to seeing that.”

“I tried to make it look like a normal fight as much as possible. I couldn’t let a video or something get filmed by bad luck.”

“That seemed to go out the window with the first punch.”

The two who left the pub were walking slowly down the street while talking. Sun-woo was feeling bitter about the complicated looks from people looking at his clothes.

“It seems we’ve lost all the local goodwill.”

“Well, they were rough guys to begin with. But more than that, the mission danger level is too high. If everyone can’t release it like that, they won’t be able to endure.”

The face of Michael responding from beside him looked quite serious, unlike other times.

“Our missions were often dangerous too. But other summoned seem to be incomparably more dangerous than what we went through. There wasn’t a single person who hadn’t failed a mission, and countless people suffered damage close to total annihilation. Well, they say there were many teams that were completely annihilated…”

Michael was right. It was work where they were thrown into an unknown world without a plan and had to eliminate dangerous enemies. There was no way it wouldn’t be dangerous.

“Even when going on operations as mercenaries, we analyze the enemy position and plan operations as much as possible before deployment, but this is complete headbutting on bare ground. It’s hard for everyone to endure with a sound mind.”

But Michael grinned saying, “Well, I don’t care though.”

“Anyway, thanks to that, personnel consumption is too severe. There are quite a few bad rumors circulating too. I wonder how it’s even being maintained.”

Hearing Michael’s words, Sun-woo thought it was good he came to headquarters. It seemed the association wasn’t just problematic at the Korean branch but was fundamentally an unstable organization.

The next day, Sun-woo and Caroline boarded a plane back to Korea. Sun-woo felt sorry seeing Caroline returning to Korea right away, but Caroline didn’t seem to mind.

“America or Korea doesn’t make a difference to me anyway. My hometown isn’t this world.”

At Caroline’s calm words, Sun-woo had no choice but to agree.

***

Several days later,

Dimension Delta (Martial Arts World).

Southern boundary of the Taklamakan Desert in Xinjiang.

“A desert this time?”

Sun-woo clicked his tongue lowly in the middle of the desert where sand dust was flying. The terrain kept changing each time, and finally he had come to a desert.

Since the sun hadn’t risen yet, it wasn’t that hot, but it wasn’t time to be relieved.

The fortunate thing was that Sun-woo wasn’t summoned to the desert alone. Two summoned were there first.

One was a beautiful swordsman from Mount Hua and the other was a mystical-feeling holy maiden. They were Nan-seol and Yeon-hwa.

The two were standing a bit apart from each other, apparently waiting for other people to appear. Whether it was the somewhat introverted Nan-seol or the self-paced Yeon-hwa, it seemed neither found it easy to approach the other and become friendly.

In the midst of this, when Sun-woo appeared, both made glad expressions, but Sun-woo rather felt troubled.

Others might see it and envy him as having cake in both hands, but the Divine Cult’s holy maiden and Mount Hua’s disciple who hates the Divine Cult. For Sun-woo, he had no answer on how to handle this mission.

“I wonder if there’s any thought to this.”

Sun-woo complained to those above, and fortunately at that moment, another person was summoned.

“Rotten luck. A desert this time.”

The person who appeared was Hwangbo Ja-gyeom with a large build and a greatsword strapped on.

He was scratching his head with a troubled expression when he discovered the people who came first.

“Hey! It’s been a while, you two. You two have bad luck too. A desert mission. Seems like we’ll suffer a lot.”

Sun-woo and Nan-seol also greeted him, and Hwangbo Ja-gyeom introduced himself to the woman he was seeing for the first time.

“A summoned I’m seeing for the first time. I’m Hwangbo Ja-gyeom of the Hwangbo family.”

Perhaps swept up in Yeon-hwa’s atmosphere, Hwangbo Ja-gyeom’s greeting was quite polite, unlike him.

When he greeted, Nan-seol’s greeting immediately followed.

“I’m Nan-seol, third-generation disciple of Mount Hua Sect.”

“Ah, wait!”

Surprised by the sudden succession of greetings, Sun-woo stepped forward. He had to stop Yeon-hwa’s greeting.

But despite his restraint, Yeon-hwa’s mouth opened.

“Divine Cult’s holy maiden, Yeon-hwa.”

Only the sound of wind was heard over the desert, and

Shing!

Immediately Nan-seol’s sword was drawn.