As You Command!
"So. Everyone's here."
Phantom looked around the living room—the Dan family, the volcano goddess, the chairman of the Korea Hero Association, an immortal and a Heavenly Tiger, a Heavenly Criminal, a shrine-maiden maid, a Russian swordsman, a lizard paralyzed from head to toe, the king of the werewolves and Deulkkot, and Phantom himself.
Leave out the two Americans still sprawled in a hotel room, and everyone who could be gathered had been gathered. It was not so different from usual.
"Thank you all for sparing your precious time. I am Phantom, the phantom thief. At present I am Phantom Loach, so please address me as Phantom Loach."
He hung upside down from the ceiling and bounced at the waist with a ridiculous spring. The shameless display left Mi Soryeong's head ringing, and Alexei drew his killing intent back under control.
"Before we come to the matter at hand, you will notice a few new faces among us. Now, now—if we remain awkward with one another, it will throw off everything that follows. Shall we begin with introductions?"
An arrow flashed across Phantom's mask. It pointed at Na Wangrang and Deulkkot.
The two stood a little apart from the rest. Deulkkot watched Phantom with wary eyes and tucked Na Wangrang behind his back.
"Well met. I am Deulkkot, the Blue Wildflower of the Plain."
He stepped forward as if to gather every gaze on himself. The muscular chest he spread so proudly was impossible to miss.
"A distinguished guest has come among us. This gentleman is an elder of the werewolves, one of the few nonhuman races still left on this earth. Everyone, please welcome him with a round of applause."
No one applauded. Phantom supplied the clapping with his mouth.
"Clap, clap, clap. Yes. I trust that deep in your hearts you are all profoundly glad to see him. Moving on."
"Mask. Cut it out. What farce is this?"
Hong Yumin snapped her fingers. The talismans binding Phantom crumbled into dust. He stayed planted to the ceiling by both feet and did not fall. A vein stood out on Hong Yumin's brow.
"Phantom Loach is no more. From this moment, behold Phantom Bat—"
"Oh, for—"
Unable to watch another second, Pele launched a dropkick. Divine flame roared around the goddess's foot as it drove straight into his gut.
Phantom Roast was complete.
Pele dusted off her hands.
"What are you doing in front of people you've just met? Hurry up and start, idiot."
"B-but, Pele..."
Phantom poured out his grievance as he browned to a perfect crisp.
"It's been ages since I had a stage I could actually play! You can't expect me to just sit still! These days, am I even a phantom thief? I'm a fixer!"
"Then make your debut by cleaning out Korea's Blue House, or the White House. All you've done till now is sneak around, and you want to whine about being a phantom thief? Save the nonsense and get up."
"Khhhk! Someday... the phantom-thief boom will come..."
The roasted phantom thief turned back into Phantom. True to form, he had gone out of his way to do something that deserved a beating.
"Haha... He's a very strange man, but at heart he's good. I hope you'll bear with him."
Dan Miryu said it to Deulkkot with cold sweat trickling down his face.
"That is for me to judge."
Deulkkot's reply was frost itself.
"Haha..."
First impressions mattered when you met someone, and that man ruined his every single time. Who knew when he would grow up.
Come to think of it, has anyone among us ever had a good first meeting?
...No. I don't think so.
Dan Miryu attained a fresh enlightenment.
"Ahem. We had a brief and pleasant commotion. Has the tension eased? Good. We begin now."
Phantom beckoned Na Wangrang.
"Would you step over here a moment?"
"Yes? Yes."
Na Wangrang put a foot forward. Deulkkot moved to stop him, but Na Wangrang shook his head, and Deulkkot, drawn tight in every limb, let him go.
"Our Mr. Wolf King. Do you know anything of the present situation?"
"...I don't."
"Honest. That's quite all right. This is a gathering for coming to understand."
Phantom cleared his throat.
"You see this friend, yes? As you can tell, the retainers who serve him will be entering Korea before long. Ten days at the longest, four at the shortest. And why is their coming a problem? That is what I mean to explain."
He beckoned Deulkkot. Wearing a thoroughly displeased face, the elder strode over.
Phantom set a hand on his shoulder.
"Elder, might you explain the werewolves' circumstances to the people here? I believe we'll need the background first."
"...And why should I?"
Deulkkot slapped the hand away. Phantom reeled like a man just jilted.
"W-why would you do that, Mr. Deulkkot? That isn't what we agreed."
"I have never spoken with a man like you. We are meeting for the first time. What agreement could there have been?"
"Th-then! Are you saying the you who drank with me and swore to trust me was nothing but my imagination?!"
"Wouldn't it be? You revolting filth."
"Th-then—!"
Phantom was cast into despair.
The audience, who had seen it coming, sighed.
"Well, of course. How long have they known each other, that he'd just throw a meeting together? They don't know a thing about one another."
"Dump the mess first and clean it up after. Name one time he hasn't."
"And he starts off like this with the very people he needs to impress..."
"He means he'll handle the opening, and the rest is yours."
"If I die, kindly assume it was overwork."
Dan Miryu dry-washed his face.
"Hm. May I call you Elder Deulkkot?"
Hwang Seokgu rose, carefully.
As that ominous bulk drew near, Deulkkot growled.
"Come no closer. One step more, and I will strike you down."
"Understood. I'll stop here."
Hwang Seokgu halted on the line Deulkkot had drawn, thin as it was.
"I am Hwang Seokgu. May I say a few words for our side?"
Deulkkot knew the name. Chairman of this country's Hero Association.
His wariness eased, a little.
"Speak."
"My thanks."
Hwang Seokgu pointed at Phantom.
"We gathered because we listened to that man. He said it seemed we would have to brawl with werewolves here in Korea. Hearing that, I could not sit still—not as a man who takes the nation's pay. So I came."
Deulkkot nodded.
"I do not know how that filth learned of it. But your words are true. Even so, do not worry. This is our clan's affair, and I will see that this country takes no harm. Should harm occur regardless, I will bear all of it. If property is lost, I will answer with property. As for lives... there will be no loss of life. I will make it so."
"I would be glad of that. But we are tangled with your side too deeply to look the other way."
"Tangled by what?"
"...A personal matter."
Deulkkot's instinct smelled rage. A quiet flame crouched in the deep of the heart, forcing itself down while it waited for the hour to burn.
The potential of it was so vast that he could not help a chill, though he was not its target.
"...Is it revenge you're after?"
Instinct supplied the answer.
"...!"
Hwang Seokgu startled, just barely.
"...Yes. For the record, that friend bears a grudge as well."
Dan Miryu gave a bitter smile.
"...Hah."
Deulkkot was in a bind. If that was how it stood, both sides were left in an awkward place.
"Who did such a thing to you...? Are you telling me the wolves have fallen that far?"
"There seems to be a misunderstanding. The ones we hold a grudge against are not werewolves. They are human."
"And what is that supposed to mean?"
"Haa."
Hwang Seokgu prodded Phantom with his foot.
"This one says my enemy has joined hands with the elders on your side."
"Joined hands?"
Those corrupted ones had taken someone else's hand?
He hadn't known. It was the first he was hearing of it.
Instinct refused to call it a lie.
What had come from that man's mouth was the truth.
So they didn't draw their blades on a whim. They had something to lean on.
Once he thought of it that way, several things that had puzzled him fell into place. Elders gone long enough to miss council. Corrupted conduct laid bare with such nerve.
What if they had backing that did not care whether it was discovered?
"Rotten things. Every last one of them ought to be torn apart and killed."
Better if it had been nothing but a rebellion of old men mad for power. They dared drag outside kin into it?
Deulkkot's killing intent climbed without end.
"Elder?"
"Hup—!"
Na Wangrang caught his hand. Reason, a breath from being swallowed by instinct, came back.
"Are you all right?"
"...I have shown you a disgraceful sight."
Deulkkot dropped to his knees at once. Na Wangrang urged him to rise.
Only after he had been promised, in no uncertain terms, that he would be punished did Deulkkot stand.
"What will you do? Will you stand with us?"
Hwang Seokgu asked it lightly. Deulkkot took a step back.
"That is not mine to decide. It belongs to our king."
"Uh... me?"
Na Wangrang scratched his head.
"Your Majesty, will you work with them? I shall follow the king's command."
"Uh..."
Struck all at once with a choice, Na Wangrang could only stare. Inwardly he cursed Deulkkot.
This isn't even passing the buck.
He'd been stepping forward just fine on his own.
I heard all of it, so judging isn't the problem, but ugh. The pressure!
Yes or no, and the road split clean in two. Na Wangrang understood that he stood at a crossroads.
What do I do?
Joining them was, by any ordinary measure, the right answer. Causing trouble in someone else's country and then telling them not to interfere was absurd to begin with, and the chairman of the Hero Association had no real reason to yield. A hero's work was guarding the people, and the werewolves were potential threats. They could be seized and thrown in prison on the spot, and he would have nothing to say for himself even with ten mouths.
But I'm a king, aren't I? As a king, just because our enemies did the same, is it really right for us to do likewise?
Where was the dignity in that?
Then Na Wangrang's instinct howled.
A king's instinct.
Fate made him choose the proper royal path.
His mouth opened before he meant it to.
"I'll settle it."
"You mean the werewolves will handle it among themselves?"
Hwang Seokgu spoke with careful respect to Na Wangrang, who was so much younger. The young man had stepped forward as their representative. That had to be honored.
Na Wangrang shook his head.
"No. I'll end all of it by myself."
"...What?"
"Your Majesty?"
"Elder Deulkkot. Don't hide it. Tell them everything."
Na Wangrang's eyes flashed.
"That I am here. That the king is in Korea."
"And add this."
"Whoever defeats the king shall sit the throne as the new king."
"Elder or warrior. Even a babe in arms."
"It does not matter who."
At Na Wangrang's bombshell, the room went still.
"Well? Aren't you going to?"
His voice had barely settled when Deulkkot, trembling with rapture, cried out.