Chapter 84
Fear—something he had never seen in him before—filled Chang-kyung’s eyes as he gripped Hyuk-min by the throat.
“Just what the hell are you!”
It wasn’t the casual Chang-kyung from his past life, nor the sage-like Chang-kyung of the present.
It was the raw, primal voice of a human being drowned in terror.
“Gak! Gack, gack!”
He felt the hand on his throat tighten.
But despite the firm grip, Hyuk-min’s boosted Stats made it feel like little more than slight pressure on his windpipe—something he could easily endure.
“Get… a hold of yourself.”
Hyuk-min’s sincere words sent a small tremor through Chang-kyung’s shaken mind.
As the fear ebbed and Chang-kyung’s pupils constricted, Hyuk-min asked,
“What… did you see?”
“Haaa….”
As if his senses were returning, a deep breath escaped Chang-kyung.
The grip loosened, and the hand slowly slid away from Hyuk-min’s neck.
“My apologies. My apologies.”
Only then did Chang-kyung look around.
Everyone’s eyes were wide, their faces utterly dumbfounded.
They looked like people who had just witnessed something shocking from someone they never believed capable of it.
“Hoo…”
That seemed to fully snap Chang-kyung back, and he staggered, his body swaying.
Hyuk-min stepped in and supported him.
“Are you all right?”
“I think… I need a little rest.”
“Venerable Master!”
Mantae, finally coming to his senses, rushed over.
He tried to take Chang-kyung from Hyuk-min.
“Before that.”
Hyuk-min pushed Mantae’s shoulder as he came running, out of breath.
Thump!
Mantae reflexively caught Hyuk-min’s wrist and glared at him with a murderous look unlike anything he had shown before.
“Let go. If you don’t want to die.”
“Just a moment.”
“Do you think I’ll forgive you for what you’ve done to the Venerable Master!”
Just as Mantae was about to wrench himself free, Chang-kyung weakly raised a hand and waved him off.
Then he leaned in and whispered into Hyuk-min’s ear.
“I saw a darkness deeper than the Abyss. The darkness I saw with my own eyes was hell itself.”
Hyuk-min’s brows twitched.
A darkness deeper than the Abyss.
He wasn’t certain, but it had to be the dark mental world he had been in.
A quiet, empty world of nothingness.
But to hear it described as hell… he couldn’t understand it at all.
“The pitch-black things that fell like a veil all carried a negative power. As if they meant to negate everything.”
The LIMITLESS System…?
“It was the first time I’d ever seen such a thing. I felt all the sorrow and rage in the world, and beyond that, a killing intent that sought to destroy. Something I’d never seen—not even from the Heavenly Star of Massacre, said to be born to Kill God, nor from the most wicked of men who’d committed every kind of murder.”
Mantae stepped in and naturally took Hyuk-min’s place, supporting Chang-kyung.
“But how can you… be perfectly fine while harboring something like that?”
“That’s—”
“I’ll ask just one thing.”
Chang-kyung raised a hand, cutting him off.
“Is what you seek to obtain through the Great Buddha Temple that pitch-black thing called LIMITLESS?”
“It is not.”
“Good… then that’s all that matters.”
Only then did Chang-kyung nod, visibly relieved.
Seeming to have recovered considerably, he moved away from Mantae’s support and stood firmly on his own two feet.
Clasping his hands behind his back, he headed toward his quarters and spoke loudly enough for everyone to hear.
“I’ll see you all again in thirty minutes. I apologize for my disgraceful behavior. I’ll see you then.”
Chang-kyung and Mantae walked away.
In Hyuk-min’s vision, along with them, was the System window with its black background and red border.
‘I’m the one who’s curious. LIMITLESS—no, Sealed Rebellion… just what the hell are you?’
He bit his lip, silently staring at the opaque LIMITLESS System window.
= = =
Inside Black Label’s headquarters.
Hwang Ji-young, having finished her arrangements, pressed a button on her intercom.
As if on cue, a woman who looked like an informant entered and stood before her.
“You called for me?”
“Is Nansan—no, Wi Gwakdu’s location still Leshan?”
“Yes. He hasn’t moved an inch from his lodging near the Great Buddha Temple.”
At that, Hwang Ji-young let out a snort.
“So that’s how it is.”
From the shadows of her office, Left Wing emerged.
“Is it really all right to hand Bang Hyuk-min over like this?”
The shadow—far too small for a large man past middle age and nearing his elder years to come from—added a smile to Hwang Ji-young’s snort.
“He’s quite a remarkable fellow, isn’t he?”
“This is Nansan we’re talking about, not just anyone. No matter how outstanding Bang Hyuk-min is, Nansan is a different story.”
“Can’t you tell just by looking? Right Wing probably already knows.”
As soon as she said it, Right Wing walked in through the same door the informant had used.
The informant carefully stepped back at the sight of Right Wing entering with her usual elegant, composed demeanor.
Unlike Left Wing, Right Wing directly managed an assassination company, and her presence alone was enough to make the informant tense.
Right Wing briefly looked the informant up and down, then answered Hwang Ji-young.
“The news I’m hearing is so astonishing, I can hardly believe it.”
At that, Left Wing tilted his head.
“Why is that? The fact that Wi Gwakdu hasn’t returned yet means his business with Bang Hyuk-min isn’t over, doesn’t it?”
“I don’t know what that business is. But the fact that the hot-tempered Wi Gwakdu is still in Leshan makes one thing certain, doesn’t it?”
This was no longer a conversation for an informant to hear.
Right Wing nodded toward the door, and the informant, as if waiting for the signal, hurried out.
“Either Bang Hyuk-min defeated Nansan, or at the very least, they fought to a draw.”
“Bang Hyuk-min? Defeated Nansan?”
Left Wing’s expression turned to disbelief.
He tilted his head again.
Bang Hyuk-min’s actions so far had certainly been exceptional.
But defeating Nansan was on a completely different level.
“That can’t be. It’s unofficial and purely my opinion, but Wi Gwakdu’s combat power ranks within the top ten in all of South Korea. You’re telling me Nansan, a man like that, lost to a greenhorn who’s only just starting to make a name for himself—even if he is a Legendary Title Holder?”
Right Wing shrugged once.
“I wasn’t there, so I wouldn’t know. But Wi Gwakdu’s current location speaks for itself, doesn’t it? This is an order from the Minister of National Defense, to whom Wi Gwakdu—of all people—is completely loyal. Do you really think that reckless guy, who charges into any situation, wouldn’t have even tried to capture Bang Hyuk-min after arriving in Leshan? Especially after this much time has passed since he got there?”
Only after hearing the detailed explanation did Left Wing nod.
“I suppose that’s true….”
“What are your thoughts, Guild Master?”
Hwang Ji-young, who had been listening, nodded.
“My thoughts align almost perfectly with Right Wing’s. Bang Hyuk-min and Wi Gwakdu fought, and Bang Hyuk-min won. During that, they struck some kind of deal, and Wi Gwakdu—satisfied with the terms—is now waiting in Leshan for something.”
“Brilliant.”
“That’s a possibility.”
Left Wing nodded along, as if he finally understood, thanks to Hwang Ji-young’s step-by-step interpretation.
Then, as if something suddenly occurred to him, he picked up a file and placed it in front of her.
“Ah! My apologies. This information just arrived, but I’m only delivering it now.”
“Didn’t we already process today’s intel?”
“We did. This isn’t information someone tried to buy, so it doesn’t require separate payment, but the person who delivered it insisted it was urgent and that I show it to you immediately, Guild Master.”
“Urgent? Where did it come from?”
“It came from Busan.”
At the word “urgent,” Hwang Ji-young’s brows twitched.
She took the file and quickly began reading.
Right Wing lightly tapped Left Wing’s shoulder and scolded him.
“Why are you only giving her the urgent report now! Are you still confused about prioritizing your work?”
“Urgh…”
“You’re an executive of the Information Guild, and you still don’t realize that time is life when it comes to information?”
“I heard something so important, I momentarily forgot. My apologies.”
A long silence stretched as Hwang Ji-young read.
Both the scolding Right Wing and the scolded Left Wing turned to watch her.
With each passing moment, Hwang Ji-young’s expression grew more serious.
Something was wrong.
“Who sent this?”
“Ah! It’s a compilation of reports from three different places.”
“I’m asking who.”
“The White Mountain Guild, the Haeundae Guild, and Leshan.”
Right Wing’s eyes widened.
That combination of sources was deeply unsettling.
“Guild Master! What is it?”
Thump.
Hwang Ji-young closed the file and spoke gravely.
“Send a text to Bang Hyuk-min right now. Tell him a smuggling ship carrying men sent by an alliance of the White Mountain and Haeundae Guilds has departed… for his location. It’s a speedboat, so tell him it’ll arrive sooner than expected. Send it now.”
“….?!”
Startled, Right Wing hurriedly pulled out her phone.
Then Hwang Ji-young added the crucial detail.
“The combination is unsettling. It looks like they’re targeting Wi Gwakdu as well. Among the elite teams of ten, two particularly dangerous individuals are on board.”
“Who… are they?”
“The Haeundae Guild’s Yaksha and the White Mountain Guild’s Knife Rain.”
An alliance between two massive guilds.
And the ten-man elite teams were monsters—each considered the best of the best in their respective guilds.
Ten from the Haeundae Guild’s special strike team built for the guild leader, and ten from the White Mountain Guild’s unknown shadow unit.
On top of that, the guilds’ gatekeepers—Yaksha and Knife Rain, who rarely moved—were also in motion.
This was no trivial force.
In the end, Hwang Ji-young also took out her phone.
She immediately called Hyuk-min, anxiously biting her nails.
“Please, just pick up….”
Her insides burned at the thought of a force capable of crushing two or three small-to-medium guilds in Seoul in a single day now on the move.
= = =
Swoosh~ Swoosh~
Off the coast of Shanghai, China, where the waves crashed, people began to emerge from the water onto land, one by one.
Chinese public security officers, as if they had been waiting, started counting the heads as they came ashore.
“One, two, three…”
Not one or two, but twenty-three in total.
“Twenty-three confirmed.”
Despite their apparent illegal entry, the moment the count ended, the officers gestured toward someone in the distance.
A man who had been quietly facing the sea breeze walked over, and the officers parted to either side.
He stood before the twenty-three people, who had tossed their wetsuits to the ground.
“Are you ready?”
At the unfamiliar Chinese man’s question, the two men at the very front looked at each other and nodded.
Then an unusual amount of Mana began to pour from the Chinese man’s body, seeping into a pattern on the ground that had been inscribed at some unknown time.
Smirk.
The corners of the clearly extraordinary Chinese man’s mouth curled upward.
The pattern, saturated with Mana, began to glow with a blinding blue light, making a strange noise as if it were about to explode.
Zzzzzzzzzing.
Just before the Mana-soaked pattern could detonate, a few familiar words flowed from the Chinese man’s mouth.
“The White Mountain Guild and the Haeundae Guild. Was that it? Anyway, I’m sending you to Leshan as you wished, so good luck.”
Zzzzzzzzzzzing! KABOOM!!!
The pattern finally erupted with a deafening roar and a brilliant flash of light.
The ground where the pattern had been cracked and caved in, the tremor strong enough to shake the entire area.
When the cloud of dust cleared, only empty space remained.
He smiled brightly at the spot where the twenty-three people had vanished without a trace.
“Ah, that was tiring. I heard a Legendary Title Holder appeared. Is a war finally breaking out in Korea, too?”
As if it were nothing, the Chinese man shrugged at the public security officers.
“Well, it’s none of my business.”
“You’ve worked hard, Master Kyung-gwang.”
“Yep~ You guys work hard, too~”
In the unfamiliar land of China, not South Korea…
Twenty-three Koreans had arrived, leaving behind no documents or evidence.
With only two names in mind.
Wi Gwakdu and Bang Hyuk-min, and in full Armament.
On an otherwise peaceful, ordinary night.
Beneath the star-embroidered, tranquil sky of Leshan, many stars stitched in blood were about to fall.