Surrender
"You're properly insane. You think you'll get away with pulling this kind of stunt inside the Shelter?"
"Yeah. I think I will."
"The Administrators won't just sit back and watch."
"Seems like they're sitting back just fine to me."
At that, Ganjeol let out a dry chuckle and rose to his feet.
"Before the Administrators come to execute me, I suppose I'll discipline you myself. Gong Won-goo. You've gotten far too cocky."
Begonia moved faster than Ganjeol could extend his hand.
He burst outside in an instant and charged straight at the man without hesitation.
There was nothing special about it. He was simply running.
But threatened by the sudden approach, sparks crackled to life at Ganjeol's fingertips.
Zzzt-crack!
A powerful electric current.
Won-goo, who had looked ready to lunge in himself, hurriedly ducked down beside the Trailer instead.
It was a swift judgment call — the best he could make without knowing exactly what Ganjeol's ability entailed.
Among elemental magic, lightning and fire were feared above all others for their capacity for mass slaughter.
So there was no choice but to proceed carefully. If the electricity Ganjeol wielded had a tendency to spread at his will, nothing could be more dangerous.
And since Ganjeol's power wasn't magic-born like Number Four's, extra caution was warranted. Its potency wouldn't simply be cut in half just because the number of targets increased.
If your resistance lost the contest, you'd be knocked unconscious on the spot — or dead.
Won-goo had no intention of gambling his own life and the lives of his crew on that kind of coin flip.
Not that he hadn't considered it, of course.
Back when no counter-strategy against Ganjeol seemed to present itself, he'd even toyed with the idea of using Lee Hyun-seong.
The power of 'Huang Zhiheng's Chinese Cleaver' that Hyun-seong carried was resurrection.
He'd imagined a plan that used that resurrection to draw aggro and strike Ganjeol down — but it cost far too much.
Hyun-seong's mental resistance stat was already abnormally high as it was.
If he poured even more investment into mental resistance now, their entire growth plan could come unraveled.
And then the card called Begonia had landed in his lap. There was no reason not to play it.
Thud!
Struck squarely by Ganjeol's electricity, Begonia pitched forward and collapsed.
He fell limp and lifeless, almost absurdly so.
"Coming all this way just to skulk around like a rat?"
The crew had already dismounted from the Trailer and taken cover at the rear, ready to handle the Ganjeol Point forces flooding in.
Bang!
Jeon Hye-ji fired. She slipped out from behind the Trailer, took a snap shot, and ducked back into cover.
Even without properly aiming, the bullet streaked toward Ganjeol's head.
Zap!
But the bullet froze in midair and dropped to the ground.
"You've underestimated me far too much. This much is nothing but—"
Ganjeol's words cut off mid-sentence.
He stared at Begonia with a stunned expression.
Begonia was pushing himself back up.
Smoke rising from his body.
And there was one more difference.
Begonia's body had grown larger than before.
It was unmistakable. Same appearance, but bigger.
"So this was the card you'd prepared."
"Tell me everything you know about the Number Society, Ganjeol. How did you make contact with Number Four?"
Ganjeol's face twisted.
"Damn it. You were one of Cheon's men all along! Director Tak! Tak!"
The flustered Ganjeol called for his right hand, Tak — but no answer came.
"Oh, he was the Director, was he? That bastard's right over there."
Won-goo pointed at the front of the Trailer.
He meant that the man had been run over during the first collision.
"……"
Zzzt!
The moment Won-goo showed a sliver of himself, Ganjeol released a bolt of electricity.
And Begonia charged.
He dove headlong with that massive frame in a flying tackle, but Ganjeol hopped backward with nimble footwork to evade, then tried to scatter electricity in all directions and flee.
Thwip!
Just then, one of Jeon Hye-ji's harpoons lanced toward Ganjeol's flank.
Ganjeol batted the harpoon away with his electricity.
But at nearly the same moment, a second attack went for his ankle.
A rope made from a Tail Dog's tail.
Won-goo, wearing insulated gloves, snared the airborne Ganjeol's ankle with it.
"Trying to run off without taking responsibility, you little shit? You made this mess, so you clean it up. Did you really think we wouldn't anticipate you bolting?"
Zzzt-crack!
Instead of an answer, electricity came crawling up the Tail Dog's tail toward him.
Won-goo let go immediately.
The current slithered up the tail like something alive, lunging for Won-goo's hand — but he yanked it back fast enough that it never touched him.
And he confirmed something important.
Won-goo had deliberately wrapped the gripping section of the Tail Dog tail-rope in layers of electrical tape.
Because he'd wanted to know exactly how Ganjeol's electricity behaved.
By common sense, electricity shouldn't be able to exert force through an insulator — but common sense didn't apply in this world anymore.
He absolutely had to verify whether the lightning Ganjeol wielded operated within the bounds of normal physics.
And that verification paid off handsomely.
Ganjeol's electricity was climbing right over the electrical tape, coming for Won-goo himself.
Which meant one of two things: either Ganjeol's lightning could pass through insulators, or it carried some ability that allowed it to leap over them entirely.
Crash!
Because Won-goo had ripped the rope away with a hard yank, the mid-jump Ganjeol went crashing to the ground.
Begonia didn't miss the opening.
He was on Ganjeol instantly, wrapping him in a bear hug.
A surge of powerful electricity immediately came leaking out of Ganjeol's body.
Begonia ignored it completely and squeezed down even harder.
Crunch!
All he'd done was cinch a clinch tight, and the sound of bones grinding came through.
At the same time came the hiss of flesh searing under the electric current, the smell of it, and then smoke rising into the air.
Even so, Begonia did not release his grip.
He simply sagged, still locked around Ganjeol in that crushing embrace.
Grimacing, Ganjeol tried to tear him off.
Just then, a blinding light suddenly flooded Ganjeol's vision.
Mu Beob-sa's magic.
And behind it came the mage himself, charging forward behind a shield wrapped in coil after coil of electrical tape.
The moment Mu Beob-sa closed to a certain distance, he simply let the shield go.
"You gutter rats——"
Blinded by the light, Ganjeol vented his fury in a massive discharge, and it slammed into Mu Beob-sa's shield.
But by then, Mu Beob-sa had already let go of it.
The pot-lid shield crashed into Ganjeol's skull with a resounding clang.
CLANG!
It was, incredibly, a Fisher-exclusive shield. He'd merely bashed the man's head with it, but there was no way the impact could be trivial.
Ganjeol's forehead split open, and blood began to spray.
"Your blood pressure's high. Drain off about ten liters and it'll drop right down."
"Gong Won-goo… you son of a bitch!"
"Save the introductions. If you've got no more cards to play, then GG, you bastard. You're finished."
"What the f—"
It was Jeon Hye-ji who cut off the words of Ganjeol, who had only just shaken Begonia loose.
She'd fired again the moment his gaze drifted elsewhere.
The round slammed into Ganjeol's head. This time the shock was worse than the pot lid.
He'd taken an actual bullet to the skull.
Ganjeol had strong Coin enhancement behind him, but he wasn't a Reinforcement type, so the impact was unavoidable.
His head snapped violently back and he was slammed into the wall.
"One look at you and I can tell. You're the type who got by on his ability alone and never learned anything else. How the hell do you fight this badly with a Gift like that?"
Ganjeol writhed on the ground in agony.
What hurt more than the pain was that the words coming out of Gong Won-goo's mouth kept grinding against his nerves.
On top of that, Won-goo had at some point donned A-One's Tinted Glasses as well.
"Shut your mouth!"
This time Ganjeol unleashed an even more powerful discharge.
Three thick branching bolts of lightning came crackling down on Won-goo as he advanced without pause.
But Won-goo positioned himself precisely between the three bolts and slipped through them with practiced ease.
"Hey. Your pattern's exactly the same every time. That's the classic mistake kids with power and no experience make. No contingency plan. You thought being here meant you could do whatever the hell you wanted, didn't you?"
Ganjeol rolled backward into a backflip and put distance between them.
Bits of stone and shattered debris clung to his body, but he paid them no mind.
In the meantime, Begonia was rising to his feet again.
And even more startling than that —
At some point, Won-goo's crew had sealed off every escape route Ganjeol could have taken.
While Won-goo bought time, they had looped around behind him.
"Kgh! Ghhk!"
Some of them had even climbed up onto the building's upper floors.
Suwon, specifically.
Suwon too stood there in insulated gloves, holding a Tail Dog's tail.
He'd fashioned it into a lasso and waited above for Ganjeol to step into it.
The moment Ganjeol entered range, Suwon didn't hesitate — he dropped the loop around his neck.
Then he swiftly tied the rope to a hook he'd set into the wall beforehand.
Just as expected, electricity came crawling up the Tail Dog's tail.
But Suwon had already dropped away and vanished.
"DULLAAAAAAH!"
The Dullahan came roaring in at full charge.
With his neck snared and his feet dangling in the air, Ganjeol felt pure, icy terror as the armored figure closed in.
I die like this? Me? This pointlessly?
It was a pathetic response for a man of his reputation.
But part of that was the sheer thoroughness of Won-goo's crew's preparation.
And the one who deserved the most credit was none other than Lee Hyun-seong.
Hyun-seong was single-handedly carving through the charging Royal Guard.
Since the guard packed with Reinforcement types threw their lives away without a second thought, they still couldn't break through him easily.
Meanwhile, Won-goo's crew subdued Ganjeol completely.
It had been a near-perfect operation.
Ganjeol, resisting until the last with his legs kicking upward, unleashed one final spray of electricity in all directions before going limp.
And with that, he lost consciousness.
Pacific pounced as if he'd been waiting for exactly that moment, seizing Ganjeol by the legs.
Then Geum Chul-soo pulled a coffin out of the large Trailer.
Killing Ganjeol had been the goal — but they'd brought it along in case a chance arose to take him alive.
A coffin built specifically to restrain him. Since there was no telling how well it would actually work, Won-goo's crew had prepared plenty of contingencies beyond it.
In that short span, Pacific was already driving shot after shot into Ganjeol's leg.
"Isn't that too much? You sure that's safe?"
Won-goo asked after the fifth injection.
"What, you want me to look after his health too?"
"True. Wasn't exactly giving it to him for longevity, was it?"
"Our Director Gong likes things done properly. That's why I'm being generous. He won't even know he slept for about three days."
"Okay."
In the meantime, Begonia rose with his newly enlarged frame.
And he stared straight at Won-goo.
"A staring contest? If you've got something to say, say it."
"I didn't need you after all."
"No. I needed you."
"……"
"I mean it. Without you, I'd have planned this differently."
"……"
"Isn't that how this whole world works? One move decides life or death. You tanked Ganjeol's attacks twice — which means you bought us exactly that many openings."
"Unexpected."
"I settle accounts with Gong completely. No games. Our deal ends here. You're free to go."
Begonia gave a small nod and walked away.
Won-goo grabbed the unconscious Ganjeol by the hair and sprinted outside.
There was Lee Hyun-seong, still trading blows with the Royal Guard.
He was already wounded in multiple places, the worst being his right thigh, which had been run through by a blade.
"Hyun-seong."
"Yes, Hyeong-nim! Your little brother has followed orders faithfully!"
"Good. You've done more than enough. You can rest now."
"Yes, Hyeong-nim."
Jo Mu-sa rushed over at once. Meanwhile, Won-goo hoisted the limp Ganjeol up and thrust him forward as a shield.
"We've got Ganjeol! If any of you bastards want to live, surrender! You sons of bitches!"