I Just Want to Quit Everything
"What the hell are those bastards doing popping up here?"
While Han Su-Ho worked to dispel the magic interfering with their own, Jeong-Hoon sealed off the house with his vassals and scowled.
He had never imagined that The Organization might be connected to the incident that had erupted the moment he returned to Korea.
"It would seem this amendment is very much to their liking," said Jeong Si-Min in a soft but sharp voice, turning his body while still pointing a finger at the sky.
With an enemy of the family on the field, an SSS-class escort for Jeong-Hoon was non-negotiable. Chief Butler Joo was currently spearheading the group restructuring of their business interests. Elder Council President Fernandez was mobilizing every connection he had to dig into The Organization's true nature. That left Jeong Si-Min—relatively free as the overall head of trainee vassal education—to serve as Jeong-Hoon's escort.
"If they like the amendment that much, doesn't that mean The Organization is a corporation just like the family?"
"Ah… one could look at it that way. As expected of a Gaju with a warrior's gifts. Your insight is truly excellent."
"That was a compliment, but it somehow feels like it came with a performance review. Is that because of your job as Professor Jeong?"
Jeong Si-Min slowly nodded in acknowledgment, then lowered the finger he'd been pointing at the sky and aimed it at Jeong-Hoon instead.
"Oh—pardon me!"
"It's fine. I'm not going to scold you for pointing. Just say what you want to say."
Having pointed at Jeong-Hoon out of habit, Si-Min hurriedly whirled the finger around, spun his body in a circle, and pointed at the sky once more.
"A sharp observation—but is that really all there is to it? We don't know The Organization's exact scale, but we do know their agents are embedded everywhere."
"…Meaning The Organization already knows about the PS Association?"
Jeong Si-Min nodded at Jeong-Hoon's question, then deliberately held his silence. He intended to wait until Jeong-Hoon arrived at the answer himself.
"Right. There could easily be Organization people around the president."
But that raised a new question. Why would an organization hostile to the family go along with a plan led by the family's own Gaju? It felt off.
"Uh… Professor Jeong. Are you saying The Organization is trying to plant spies in the family through the PS Association?"
"Correct. And if this conjecture holds…"
"Then by creating the PS Association, we might catch not just their tails, but the body itself."
Jeong-Hoon wore a look of pure disbelief. The PS Association, something he had conceived on the spur of the moment at the time, was turning out to be far more important than he had ever expected.
"Gaju. The interference magic has been dispelled."
And right on cue, Su-Ho—who had been working tirelessly to break the spell—reported that the job was finally done.
Ko Yu-Yeon, who headed the family's legal team, had entered the National Assembly as Kim Dae-Yeong's legal advisor. With the congressman's family kidnapped, security was essential, so Yu-Yeon—who could plausibly serve as counsel—had taken the role of his escort.
In a world that changed in real time under the pressure of Awakened and monsters, no one found it strange that Ko Yu-Yeon had been brought in as a legal advisor.
"Attorney Ko Yu-Yeon. Any interest in a career change?"
"Pardon? What do you mean by that?"
"I'm asking whether you'd consider becoming my permanent legal advisor—not just a temporary one."
"I'm flattered by the praise. But I am our Chairman's man."
"I know. I only said it out of envy."
Captivated by Yu-Yeon's competence, Kim Dae-Yeong had spoken knowing full well it was impossible. He envied Jeong-Hoon for having a retainer like this.
Kim Dae-Yeong had spent long years as a politician, yet no one around him could match Ko Yu-Yeon—not even half of him. And Jeong-Hoon had several such talents at his side.
"If you ever do decide to switch jobs…"
"Lumen—more precisely, our Group—operates on a principle of lifetime employment."
Yu-Yeon deflected the suggestion with smooth finality and allowed himself a faint smile.
"Still—though it feels wrong to say this while receiving your help—Chairman Lee Jeong-Hoon is dangerous."
"Excuse me? Dangerous how? Where else will you find someone who works himself to the bone for the world the way our Chairman does?"
"Aren't Chairman Lee Jeong-Hoon's people currently embedded throughout the National Assembly?"
He was right. It wasn't just Ko Yu-Yeon serving as legal counsel—family vassals were stationed all over the Assembly. Just as they had kidnapped the family of Kim Dae-Yeong, the man most likely to oppose the amendment, there was no telling what threats might be leveled at other members of the Assembly. That was why the vassals had been deployed. And yet the only person inside the National Assembly who had noticed was Kim Dae-Yeong himself, who knew the full story.
To a politician who conducted his legislative work with genuine conviction, Jeong-Hoon's power felt more terrifying than the gang that had abducted his own family.
"You wouldn't claim that someone with power is fine simply because he happens to be righteous, would you? The problem is that a private individual holds that kind of power in the first place."
As an outstanding lawyer, Ko Yu-Yeon could hardly be unaware of the issue, so Kim Dae-Yeong laid his true feelings bare without restraint.
"So that's what you meant. But if the world weren't the way it is, our Chairman would never have needed to hold that power."
"I understand that. But I can't agree with it."
"I wasn't asking for your agreement. And the Chairman's support right now isn't being offered because he wants your agreement either."
Yu-Yeon let out a short laugh as he set the stage, then fixed the dazed Kim Dae-Yeong with a piercing stare.
"It's simply that you suffered because of something Chairman Lee Jeong-Hoon wanted to do. He's helping you out of a sense of obligation for that."
As if to say so you can relax, Yu-Yeon bowed his head. Kim Dae-Yeong exhaled a long sigh.
After hearing something like that, a tremor ran through his heart—the sense that he ought to set aside his political convictions at least once and vote for this amendment.
Inside a van parked near Congressman Kim Dae-Yeong's house, Jeong-Hoon had set up a command post and drummed his fingers on the armrest of his seat.
Once the magic was dispelled, the investigation proceeded without a hitch. Psychometry had identified three Organization operatives as the kidnappers. They had abducted Kim Dae-Yeong's family members one by one, loaded them into a vehicle parked nearby, and slipped away quietly.
"What about the CCTV?"
When Jeong Si-Min finished compiling and reporting the findings so far, Jeong-Hoon brought up the cameras. The magic had only interfered with their own spells—the CCTV footage would still be intact.
"Already under review. Within a few hours, we'll know exactly where they went."
In fact, the moment Baek Si-Hwan and Han Su-Ho began investigating the house—the moment the magic was being dispelled—the surrounding CCTV had already been under examination as well. Even without breaking the spell, they could have mapped the kidnappers' route given enough time. The real reason they had dispelled the magic was to study The Organization's methods—ways of advancing family magic along different lines.
"And the vehicle registration?"
"It came back as a ghost car. But we can still find out where they got it, so we'll have a trail to follow."
A ghost car making it hard to track—that line didn't work on the family. And for reasons still unknown, this was a rare, exposed tail of The Organization. They would hunt it down and stamp it out completely, no matter what.
"But why send an S-class into a kidnapping that was going to be this easy to detect? Could it be a purge?"
They had already speculated that The Organization also wanted the legal revisions for founding the PS Association—but even so, resorting to something as extreme as a kidnapping didn't make sense to Jeong-Hoon. He still couldn't understand why they would deploy an S-class capable of using magic.
"It might have been mindless. Or…"
"They're trying to draw our attention this way while they achieve some other objective?"
"Something along those lines is possible, yes. After all, these are people who accumulated power while staying under the family's radar."
Jumping to conclusions was unwise, but it was by far the clearest answer to the question, so Jeong-Hoon nodded.
"Gaju. Urgent report."
The car door suddenly opened and Han Su-Ho stuck his face in. Jeong-Hoon turned his head with a look that said, What now?
"What is it? Has another congressman's family been kidnapped?"
"…No. They've been released. Congressman Kim Dae-Yeong's family."
Seeing the troubled look on Han Su-Ho's face, Jeong-Hoon shook his head hard.
"I'm sorry—what? Why?"
"Whee—no idea. We tracked the ghost car through CCTV, and they were found unharmed at the final destination."
"And the perpetrators?"
"Already fled."
Jeong-Hoon's expression went blank with disbelief. They had gone so far as to use magic for the kidnapping—and then simply let everyone go, clean as that?
"Was it really just a ploy to divert our eyes?"
"Judging by the situation right now, wouldn't you say so?"
A sense that they were being pulled into one of The Organization's schemes settled over Jeong-Hoon, and his face darkened with unease. He needed to get back to Lumen and reorganize everything, and fast.
The leader of The Organization—who had ordered Kim Dae-Yeong's family released—hurled his phone across the room and collapsed onto the bed.
"Aaah, I just want to quit everything!"
Having gone to the trouble of ordering a kidnapping only to reverse himself and free them, the leader could not contain the irritation flooding through him.
He was the head of The Organization, but he lacked the kind of absolute organizational grip a family Gaju possessed. That was exactly why accidents like this kept happening. The New York incident itself had been caused by a squad leader who had taken the leader's plan and run off with his own interpretation of it.
"Seriously—why the hell would you use magic, you idiots? Did you just want to show off that you were S-class?"
The reason Kim Dae-Yeong's family had been released: because the operatives had used magic in the process of covering their tracks.
No one knew how much information about The Organization the New York squad had leaked before being wiped out. But one way or another, the family had realized The Organization existed. And in that situation, if they discovered magic that The Organization had developed independently…
"That's basically taking out a full-page ad saying, 'We did this!'"
They had planned to move as quietly as possible and accelerate the founding of the PS Association. The moment magic was used, though, the whole thing became a collision course with the family. They could have argued they were already committed and pushed through to the end—but then the family would have tracked them relentlessly. That would leave The Organization with only two options: all-out war with the family, or cutting off the tail.
And as the leader of The Organization, he could state flatly that they were not capable of a full-scale war with the family. In weight class, funding, combat strength—in every respect, The Organization was no match. They had more warm bodies, sure, but flaunting numbers in open war would only feed them to the family's overwhelming equipment.
So cut the tail?
Barely a month had passed since New York, where they had burned through thirty percent of The Organization's fighting strength—two SSS-class, three SS-class, two S-class, and two hundred A-class. Even if those people had done something monumentally stupid, he couldn't afford to throw away an S-class who could use magic just to sever a tail.
In the end, there was only one option.
Release Congressman Kim Dae-Yeong's family, disguise the whole affair as if some other purpose had been at work, and get the kidnapping team out of the country as fast as possible. That was the only way to escape the family's pursuit. Of course, precious assets—like the channels for obtaining ghost cars—would be burned by this. But compared to losing an S-class, the cost was far cheaper. Incomparably so.
"Well, this one was a mess—but we still achieved the objective, so whatever. Time to move on to the next stage."
With that, the leader of The Organization pushed himself up from the bed and changed his expression. The means available to The Organization were not limited to this.