Chapter 434 – Part 2 – Bug Cleanup

Murmur murmur-

Many people were gathered in the association’s backyard.

A total of 92 hunters from the association who had gathered following Choi Seong-min’s orders.

They had no doubts about why they had gathered here.

They couldn’t even recall who had ordered them to come here.

They were truly puppets without will or thought.

That’s what being under Mind Control meant.

‘They’ve all gathered.’

Choi Seong-min, who had been in the backyard beforehand using stealth, smiled wickedly.

All 92 criminal bugs had gathered.

‘There are 4 more besides these guys, but it’s not easy to lure them out.’

He wanted to summon Kyle’s group from Wings of Hope too, but it was impossible due to surveillance around them.

‘That doesn’t mean I can’t kill them though.’

He decided to first deal with the criminals here and looked around.

The Presence Detection trait he had used effectively in his previous life told him there were no other witnesses.

‘Good.’

As soon as he finished preparing, Choi Seong-min’s body spun.

Swoosh swoosh swoosh swoosh swoosh swoosh-!

Blade Scatter hit the hunters’ heads.

They split like watermelons and the corpses disappeared.

It was because of the Vitality Recovery trait that had been useful in his previous life.

[You have absorbed the target’s corpse.]

[You have absorbed the target’s corpse.]

[You have absorbed the target’s corpse.]

………..

[Health is recovering.]

[Health is recovering.]

[Health is recovering.]

Countless messages about absorbing corpses appeared.

[You have killed Hunter An Guk-gwang.]

[You have killed Hunter Ban Hee-seong.]

[You have killed Hunter Choi Jong-in.]

………..

Countless messages about killing hunters also appeared.

Swoosh swoosh swoosh swoosh swoosh swoosh-!

When the cooldown returned, he scattered daggers once more.

There was no time to look at the parade of messages.

Rustle- Rustle-

Instead of the sound of corpses falling, clothes and belongings fell like fallen leaves.

It didn’t take long to kill all 92 people.

‘It’s finished.’

The backyard that should have been a sea of blood was filled with various clothes and belongings.

Anyone who saw it would think they had stripped naked and held a nude party.

‘I should get rid of all traces for now.’

Choi Seong-min used Shadow Manipulation to gather the clothes and belongings in one place.

He had thought it could only be used on living beings, but it seemed to work on objects as long as they had shadows.

‘It’ll be a bit noisy, but should I use Mjolnir a bit?’

Two hammers appeared in Choi Seong-min’s hands.

Whoosh whoosh whoosh whoosh whoosh!

[Stack 100/100]

[Lightning Strike is ready.]

[Look at your desired target and recite the activation word.]

The stack of 100 filled instantly.

Choi Seong-min’s gaze turned to the gathered clothes.

‘Lightning Strike.’

Rumble-!

The evidence disappeared without a trace with one lightning strike.

‘It’ll draw some attention, but there’s no evidence anyway.’

Perhaps because there was no one resisting, he dealt with it relatively easily.

‘I still need to kill 4 more though.’

Choi Seong-min concealed himself with stealth again.

* * *

“Stupid bastards.”

Don Hall looked at Kyle’s group with contemptuous eyes.

“I picked you as support troops because you said you wanted to see Eastland, and you create this mess?”

“……”

“Disobeying orders and mercilessly beating up employees who were surrendering. What would have happened if Leader Ryu Jong-ik had suggested breaking the alliance? Huh? Do you have brains or not?”

Don Hall put his hand on his waist and got angry, but Kyle’s group remained unresponsive throughout.

“Why don’t you say something?”

“We’re sorry. We have nothing to say.”

“It’s useless to pretend to repent now. That won’t make the crimes you committed disappear.”

“……”

“Consider yourselves lucky. It’s only because we said we’d punish you ourselves, otherwise who knows what punishment the Revolution side would have given you. You might have been tortured as spies like Christopher. Wouldn’t it be better to rot in a sunless cell for life?”

“……”

Kyle’s group still showed no reaction.

“If I had known you were such thugs, I would have kicked you out long ago…”

Don Hall clicked his tongue and shook his head.

“As soon as you return to Westland, you’ll go to trial. And you’ll rot in solitary confinement for life. Try fixing that temper of yours there.”

Then Kyle, who hadn’t said anything, quietly spoke up.

“There would be time to go to the bathroom before that, right?”

“What? Bathroom? A bastard like you doesn’t deserve to go to the bathroom…”

Don Hall was about to scold him but stopped.

Thinking about it, it was too much to prevent him from even going to the bathroom.

He couldn’t tell them to do it here, could he?

“Go and come back. Tsk.”

“I’d like to go to the bathroom too.”

“Me too.”

When the rest raised their hands as a group, Don Hall’s expression soured.

“What are these guys trying to do? Having some meeting in the bathroom?”

Don Hall was annoyed but didn’t say not to go.

“Steve. Keep a proper watch on what those bastards are doing.”

“Understood.”

Steve, whose combat power was superior to Kyle’s group, followed them like a shadow.

But they didn’t know.

That Kyle was heading to the bathroom because he had received someone’s instructions.

Kyle’s group entering the bathroom looked at Steve.

“Are you going to follow us inside the bathroom?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Just go in and do your business quickly.”

The scolded Kyle entered the bathroom.

“I need to take a big one.”

“Me too…”

“Me too…”

Click- Click- Click- Click-

The four entered separate bathroom stalls and locked the doors.

Steve found their behavior strange.

‘What are they up to?’

Honestly, he thought the four would put their heads together to plan an escape.

Or urinate.

But they all said they needed to defecate and went into toilet stalls.

Separately at that.

Steve crossed his arms and waited at this puzzling behavior.

‘We confiscated their belongings so they can’t conspire… Could it not be a lie?’

Hearing the sound of pants being pulled down, maybe they really needed to go badly.

But that thought was brief.

‘When are these bastards coming out?’

After 10 minutes, then 20 minutes with no sign of coming out, Steve knocked on the toilet stalls.

Bang bang bang-

“Hey, come out quickly. How long are you going to shit? Huh?”

There was no answer.

“What are you doing? Not answering?”

Knocking on other stalls yielded the same result.

A deathly silence enveloped the bathroom.

Only then did Steve realize something was wrong.

Bang-!

The door broke with one kick.

“You bastards! Answer me… What?”

Bewilderment spread across Steve’s face.

There was no one in the bathroom stall.

Here, there, even after breaking down all the doors, the stalls Kyle’s group had entered contained only toilets.

‘H-how is this possible?’

They hadn’t used stealth.

There was no way Steve, whose combat power was twice as high, wouldn’t have detected it.

‘This is really a job for ghosts.’

He couldn’t understand what had happened, but he could tell one thing.

“Holy shit…”

The situation had gone to hell.

* * *

“Phew.”

Choi Seong-min, who had canceled stealth, turned his head.

In his line of sight was the bathroom Kyle’s group had entered.

‘Fortunately, I wasn’t caught.’

Just before, Choi Seong-min had whispered orders to the mind-controlled Kyle’s group.

“Tell the vice-leader you’re going to the bathroom, then enter toilet stalls and lock the doors.”

Since he was using stealth and spoke quietly, there was no chance of being discovered.

The guys who entered separate toilet stalls as instructed had been killed by Choi Seong-min just moments ago.

Killing Kyle’s group wasn’t difficult.

‘Just use Shadow Movement to enter the toilet stalls, cover their mouths, and break their necks.’

The sound of breaking bones could be hidden by flushing the toilet.

Since corpses disappeared, just collecting clothes left no traces.

That was why he could kill them without being caught despite having a watcher.

‘Well, he seems to have figured it out now.’

Of course, Kyle’s group being dead wouldn’t be known until next month.

Even now, they just think they disappeared.

Though they have no idea how they disappeared.

‘Anyway, there’s zero chance I’ll be suspected.’

Choi Seong-min leisurely checked his traits.

‘I killed 96 people.’

This increased his traits to 1,100.

‘No need to look at inventory. Same with what traits I got.’

There was only one thing Choi Seong-min needed to see now.

‘My information.’

Elsis’s golden information window was his biggest concern.

-Name: Choi Seong-min (Min Do-jun)

-Existence: Transcendent

-Permission Level: User

-Divine Force Held: 96

As soon as he saw the Divine Force, Choi Seong-min’s expression crumpled.

‘What? It only went up by 96? That’s it?’

It seemed to increase by 1 per hunter.

He couldn’t help but be disappointed.

‘Derkius probably gets more Divine Force than this, right?’

Originally, the amount obtainable through the Hunter Slayer trait was limited.

It was designed to only harvest small amounts to avoid detection by Derkius.

‘Derkius is probably sitting still and monopolizing Divine Force, right? By annihilating all the countless souls ascending to the underworld?’

He couldn’t gauge how much Divine Force Derkius was earning.

‘Can Dayna and I defeat him even if we join hands?’

Even Insight found that part difficult to judge, as his mind was hazy like filled with fog.

The only clear part was that things in this world needed to be corrected first.

‘It’s almost finished.’

The coup was successful and the bugs were gone.

‘All obstacles have been removed.’

Now all that remained was to clean up the mess he had caused.

“Leader!”

Then Choi Seong-min saw Gang Min-chan running frantically into his view.

“Captain Gang? You went to inspect facilities… Is something wrong?”

At Ryu Jong-ik’s question, Gang Min-chan spoke with an urgent expression.

“It’s… not there!”

“What? What’s not there…”

“Kwak Min-cheol is not there!”

The smile instantly disappeared from Ryu Jong-ik’s face.

“Don’t tell me you dangerously went to the association president’s office? Didn’t I say I would handle that myself?”

“No. That’s not it. While inspecting facilities, I looked at the entry records, and there’s no record of Kwak Min-cheol coming or going!”

“You mean he didn’t come to work today?”

“We’ll have to go to the association president’s office to be sure, but… that seems to be the case.”

Ryu Jong-ik made a troubled expression.

The reason they attacked the main building here first instead of the association president’s office was to take control of the system.

Using the main building’s system, they could lower shutters to seal off the building where the association president was.

‘But Kwak Min-cheol isn’t in the building?’

It was like blocking a tiger’s den to catch the tiger, only to find the tiger had gone hunting.

‘What now? Do we have no choice but to wait for him to come like this?’

Just as he was worried about where to find Kwak Min-cheol.

Ryu Jong-ik realized his worry was unfounded.

The Black Mask had a solution.

“I know where Kwak Min-cheol is.”

“What? Then that’s fortunate!”

Ryu Jong-ik was delighted.

The Black Mask’s superior information gathering was a fact he had known for some time.

There was no way someone who had found and killed all the Great Heroes wouldn’t have tracked Kwak Min-cheol’s location.

“Shall we go now?”

“Yes. Let’s go!”

“Um, Leader…”

When Gang Min-chan tried to speak, Ryu Jong-ik raised his hand to stop him.

“Captain Gang, don’t follow us. The Black Mask and I will go settle this and return.”

“But…”

“Didn’t you promise me? Please.”

Gang Min-chan couldn’t bring himself to stop Ryu Jong-ik.

“Understood…”

* * *

Ryu Jong-ik and the Black Mask got in a car and moved.

Kwak Min-cheol’s mansion was not far from the association.

“To think there was a mansion this close…”

“You probably didn’t know because it’s in a secluded place.”

The two who got out of the car entered the mansion.

Only quiet silence flowed inside.

‘What? It’s like an empty house?’

There was no sign of people, as if there were no servants in such a large house.

‘Does Kwak Min-cheol really live here?’

The door was open and there were suspicious points here and there.

What particularly caught Ryu Jong-ik’s attention was the basement.

“What kind of place is this?”

“Who knows.”

The Black Mask shook his head as if he didn’t know either.

Ryu Jong-ik swallowed once and said:

“Let’s go down.”

They couldn’t just pass by, so they went down to the basement.

A moment later.

“This is…”

Ryu Jong-ik was stunned seeing the basement.

There were numerous rooms like a prison.

“This is the room from the video.”

Ryu Jong-ik remembered.

That it was the same place where Kwak Min-cheol had massacred his subordinates.

“Did he imprison someone here and kill them?”

“……”

The Black Mask remained silent at Ryu Jong-ik’s question.

Ryu Jong-ik figured that was the case and took a step.

Most room doors were broken, but some weren’t.

‘There must be something in this room.’

He felt it intuitively.

It was the only room that wouldn’t open.

“Shall we try opening it?”

When the Black Mask nodded, Ryu Jong-ik grabbed the door.

Crack-!

When the S-rank hunter applied force, the alloy door fell off.

“Huh?”

Seeing the person trapped inside, Ryu Jong-ik unconsciously opened his mouth.

“Kw-Kwak Min-cheol…!”

Kwak Min-cheol, who had been sitting with vacant eyes, raised his head.

As soon as their eyes met, Ryu Jong-ik felt rage surging.

“Kwak Min-cheoooool!!!”

Ryu Jong-ik’s sword pointed toward Kwak Min-cheol.