After Waking, the VIP Room Was Waiting
When he opened his eyes, it was to an unfamiliar ceiling. Slowly pushing himself upright and turning his head, he took in the room around him. The space and facilities were beyond those of a private room, and everything about it suggested a VIP hospital suite. On the sofa beside him, So-jin sat neatly with her eyes closed, dozing.
Even though she was older than he was, the sight of her was oddly cute, and a smile spread across Hyun-jun’s lips.
“Cute.”
The thought slipped out before he could stop it. He winced, but fortunately So-jin seemed to have gone beyond simple drowsiness and into the kind of sleep that left her utterly relaxed, so she hadn’t heard him at all.
“May I come in?”
A sharp voice came with the sound of someone at the door. It was Hae Jong-seo, the head of intelligence. Hyun-jun gathered the brief stir of feeling that had risen in him and answered.
“Come in.”
“Excuse me.”
The door opened slowly, and Jong-seo stepped inside. Seeing So-jin asleep on the sofa, he softened his footsteps. As expected of someone from the Executive Division who had learned assassination techniques, he was adept at erasing his presence.
“Are you all right?”
At Jong-seo’s question, Hyun-jun drew up his mana and checked his condition. Since all his injuries had been healed when Durendal descended, he still had no external wounds. His mana circuit was a little tangled, though; that was a problem he could settle within a day.
“Han So-jin came every day and stayed by your side.”
Just as Jong-seo said, So-jin had been visiting the room every day, waiting for Hyun-jun to wake. Perhaps because her feelings had reached him, Hyun-jun felt a twinge in a corner of his heart and nodded.
“How many days has it been?”
“A week.”
“What happened to the Executive Chief?”
The last thing he had seen of Tae-min was his body collapsing in a bloodied heap, and the memory still sat uneasily with him.
“Fortunately, he survived. But his injuries are severe, so he’s still being treated. He’s regained consciousness, but not enough to return to work yet, so I and Team Leader Lee Gyu-hwan have been handling the Executive Division’s duties.”
“Is Lee Gyu-hwan handling anything important?”
They had leverage over him through his younger sister and the other Executive Division hunters, but it was too early to trust him completely.
“I’ve been handling all the important matters personally.”
It was a satisfying answer. Hyun-jun nodded and asked,
“Where is the Executive Chief now?”
“He’s resting in the room right next door. We secured the adjoining room for better protection efficiency.”
“Then I’ll go hear what happened over the past week in the Executive Chief’s room.”
So-jin was asleep here. He didn’t want to wake her unnecessarily, with that exhaustion still melting across her face. Jong-seo understood what Hyun-jun meant and moved ahead first. The two of them quietly left the room and closed the door.
“This way.”
Jong-seo began leading him. Tae-min was hospitalized in the room right next door, and three Executive Division hunters in suits were guarding the corridor.
They opened the door and went inside. Smaller than Hyun-jun’s room, but still luxurious, the private room’s interior came into view at a glance. A few more steps brought Tae-min’s figure into sight, lying on the hospital bed.
“Ah... Guild Leader.”
“No need to get up. Lie back down before I get angry.”
Hyun-jun stopped Tae-min from struggling up. The fact that he was wrapped in bandages like a mummy, the sort you’d be lucky to see in Egypt these days, was enough to show how serious his injuries were. The hospital had taken good care of him, apparently, because the bandages were neat and clean.
In a way, seeing Tae-min like that was moving. Hyun-jun had ordered him to protect So-jin, but he hadn’t expected him to carry out the command with his life on the line until he ended up in such a wreck.
“S-sorry, Guild Leader.”
“If you understand, focus on recovering. I’d like the Executive Chief back at work as soon as possible.”
At Hyun-jun’s words, Tae-min thought of the murderous pile of work that had lately exploded because of the guild’s expansion and trembled.
“His recovery is progressing well. He’ll probably make a full recovery within a few days.”
Jong-seo, who had been listening quietly, delivered the finishing blow with care. Tae-min shot him a faint, resentful glance, then looked away. Never had he hated hunters’ exceptional regenerative abilities more than he did today.
“That’s a relief.”
For hunters above B-Class, so long as the wound wasn’t fatal enough to threaten their life, most of them could receive help from a recovery-type hunter and shake off their injuries within a week. Tae-min, however, had suffered wounds severe enough to threaten his life, which was why he had not fully recovered even while Hyun-jun was unconscious.
“But the hospital facilities are quite good. Where are we?”
“Jaeil Hospital.”
At Hyun-jun’s question, Jong-seo, standing nearby, answered. Unlike his usual calm voice, the name “Jaeil Hospital” made Hyun-jun pause in slight surprise.
“Then the place I was just in was the VIP room of Jaeil Hospital?”
“That’s correct, Guild Leader.”
Tae-min nodded. Hyun-jun spoke again.
“The Jaeil Hospital I know?”
“Yes. If you mean the largest hunter hospital in Asia, then yes.”
No wonder it had been much wider and more luxurious than an ordinary VIP room, but he hadn’t expected it to be that Jaeil Hospital. If Jong-seo’s words were true, then Hyun-jun wanted to know how he had been admitted here. A VIP room at Jaeil Hospital was not the sort of place you could get into simply because you had money.
“Who arranged it?”
Someone had intervened.
“Lee Jin-a.”
At Tae-min’s answer, Hyun-jun furrowed his brow and sorted through his thoughts. He had only just regained consciousness, so his mind was still tangled, but the memory of someone named Lee Jin-a surfaced quickly enough.
“You mean the S-Class mage, Lee Jin-a?”
And the second daughter of the Jaeil Group. If she had stepped in, there was nothing strange about his waking up in a VIP room at Jaeil Hospital.
“Yes. Lee Jin-a helped us a lot this time.”
“Give me a detailed report. What happened during the week I was unconscious?”
Hyun-jun asked the question from Tae-min’s answer. He figured he needed at least a verbal report right away.
“May I explain?”
Jong-seo, who had been listening quietly, stepped forward carefully and asked. Hyun-jun nodded. He seemed more likely to know the situation in detail than Tae-min, who had also lost consciousness.
“Right after you lost consciousness, Guild Leader, the Great Demon Guild members arrived at the scene. Fortunately, Joo Hye-ri had already been taken away by my men, but we hadn’t managed to secure the other bodies, and the Great Demon Guild members found them, which led to a standoff almost immediately.”
It must have been a tense situation.
“There was one A-Class hunter and seven B-Class hunters. On our side, all we had were the four B-Class hunters from the Executive Division who had arrived first under your orders, Guild Leader.”
Jong-seo continued in a trembling voice. Just speaking of it seemed to bring the tension of that moment back to him. Four B-Class hunters were a force that one A-Class hunter could handle alone. Jong-seo had gambled his life to protect Hyun-jun, Tae-min, and the others lying there.
“Did you send out a rescue request before you died...?”
Hyun-jun muttered to himself with a frown. He thought he had sorted out the situation quickly, but because he hadn’t killed Hye-ri, it was also possible that, just before she could be taken alive, she had sent a distress signal.
“Lee Jin-a helped?”
“Yes. Because she vouched for us, the Great Demon Guild backed off for the time being, but the Special Police Bureau says it will conduct an official investigation into Joo Hye-ri’s disappearance. Once they learn that you’ve regained consciousness, the bureau’s investigators will probably visit within three days.”
“That’s troublesome.”
He hadn’t expected things to become this tangled.
“I’m sorry. We should have disposed of the bodies faster...”
“Because I lost consciousness...”
“No. It’s not the intelligence chief’s fault, or the Executive Chief’s.”
Hyun-jun’s gaze drifted to the window. The sky was dark, and below, countless lights shimmered. He didn’t say anything else, but Tae-min and Jong-seo could easily guess what he was thinking.
“We’ll talk later. Someone’s coming.”
He sensed a presence. At Hyun-jun’s warning, Tae-min and Jong-seo nodded without a word. Soon the presence drew closer, stopping in front of the door.
Lee Jin-a?
Wraith’s Executive Division hunters were controlling the corridor, so to have reached the door without issue narrowed the candidates to those with reason to come here recently. It wasn’t hard to guess. Before there was even a knock, the door swung open, and a sharp-faced man in a black suit stepped in first. Hyun-jun searched his memory.
Was his name Park Seok-hyun?
An upper A-Class hunter. He was the attendant who had stood by Jin-a’s side when Hyun-jun first met her. Then Jin-a herself walked in behind him, dressed in a light one-piece dress.
Her long, wavy hair fell all the way to her waist, giving her a composed impression, while her face had the sharp look of a cat. If she ever chose to act cute, she’d probably be very pretty, but how many men in the world could make a woman like that want to do something cute? Hyun-jun shook his head.
“It’s been a while, Kang Hyun-jun. But why are you suddenly shaking your head?”
“I was just clearing away a delusion.”
Jin-a still wore a face that said she didn’t understand, but he didn’t bother explaining further.
“Should we move somewhere else? I have something to say...”
As she trailed off, Jin-a shifted her gaze toward Tae-min and Jong-seo. At that, Hyun-jun answered with an even expression.
“Those two are my closest people.”
He didn’t explain it at length, but the meaning was clear enough: they were people he could trust. Jong-seo’s expression barely changed, but Tae-min looked genuinely moved.
“First of all... thank you for taking care of me.”
“It wasn’t difficult.”
Given the influence of the Jaeil Group, it was obvious her words weren’t empty boasting.
“You probably want something, so I’d appreciate it if you told me.”
“It was just goodwill. Of course, after this incident, I did calculate the possibility of you coming over to our side at the Jaeil Group.”
The conversation didn’t go any further. It really did seem to have been simple goodwill.
In the end, am I the one who has to make the move?
Hyun-jun shook his head and stepped toward Jin-a.
“Then, as a chance taken from this meeting, I have a proposal I’d like to make. Would you hear me out?”
“I’ll hear you out first.”
Jin-a’s eyes sparkled with curiosity. She wanted to know what proposal the man in front of her was about to make to the second daughter of the Jaeil Group.
“I have a lot of enemies.”
“I know. You’ve been stabbing at people all over the place.”
“And I’ll have even more enemies in the future.”
“So you don’t intend to sit quietly.”
“I’d like the Jaeil Group to become a shield for me and for Wraith Guild.”
It was too suspicious, too perfect in timing, to say that the Great Demon Guild had nothing to do with the one “behind the scenes.” Not knowing how large that hidden power really was, fighting alone would be foolish. At the very least, he thought it best to establish one ally he could trust. And in the current situation, the Jaeil Group was the most viable option.
“You know what that means, right?”
“Yes. I do.”
At Jin-a’s question, Hyun-jun nodded.
“Then you must know how much risk that carries. Do you have the value and the reason to make me accept that risk? What does the Jaeil Group gain from this alliance?”
He had been waiting for that question. Hyun-jun answered with a calm face.
“An absolute working relationship with a future SSS-Class hunter.”