Chapter 55
Chapter 55
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 55
Chapter Title: What on Earth Is His Identity!
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“The Smiling Man has carried out another terrorist attack!”
“Great!”
The Union Korea Branch was in a festive mood when the news first broke.
And why not? Lately, the Smiling Man had been getting way too much attention.
Being a villain, it went without saying that none of it was positive.
But it wasn't all outright negative either.
When it came to villains, there should only be curses, rage, and hatred.
Yet recently, all sorts of other opinions had started cropping up.
This couldn't go on. Villains were evil that had to be eradicated without mercy.
Heroes were the good guys, and the Union was the organization upholding that good.
No cracks could be allowed in that concept, definition, or perception.
That was why they welcomed this latest terrorist attack by the Smiling Man.
Some were even hoping for a high body count.
“B-breaking news! The Smiling Man is dead!”
The Smiling Man was dead? Hmm. Good news... but also not good news.
They could proclaim to the world once more that heroes had saved the day.
But it was a shame to lose a villain who instilled such long-lasting fear and anxiety...
“Ah! Correction! It's not the Smiling Man! One of the villains arbitrarily used the Smiling Man's name for this act!”
“What?”
Wait. Hold on. Hold on! This wasn't good.
The perpetrator of this attack wasn't the Smiling Man?
“The Sword Saint stepped in personally. He took him down with a single strike, and confirmation shows it wasn't the Smiling Man!”
“D-double-check it! It has to be the Smiling Man! He just pulled off a terrorist attack not long ago! If he's using Mana Threads, it's definitely the Smiling Man!”
“The villain experts have already verified it. He did use Mana Threads, but it wasn't the Smiling Man. The one who died is even registered in the villain database under a different name.”
Damn it! The Union Korea Branch's upper echelons cursed inwardly.
It had to be the Smiling Man. The culprit absolutely had to be him.
Only then could they bury the hopes of heroes prancing around claiming they'd saved him.
That kind of talk was just a fluke. See? He's back to terrorism already.
How could they hold out hope for a monster responsible for countless civilian deaths?
It was an insult to the heroes who died first and the victims who perished!
‘That's why we've been deliberately delaying S-Rank support whenever the Smiling Man shows up. But...’
But now, this would cast doubt on the previous attacks too.
Some experts had claimed they weren't the Smiling Man's doing, but they'd been ignored.
Under the Union's invisible pressure, he'd essentially become the prime suspect.
After that, rage and hatred toward villains had blazed hotter than ever—a perfect outcome.
They'd seized the moment to flood the airwaves with hero footage and related ads.
It had even painted the Union as the world's sole guardian of peace.
Now, people would start saying those earlier attacks weren't his either!
“Why the hell did the Sword Saint step in personally?!”
“W-well, didn't we ask the Jin Family directly for help?”
“We did! But that was just supposed to be for perimeter control! It's been years since that old man last took the front lines!”
As the Union upper echelons vented their frustration, one possibility dawned on them.
‘Could it be? Did the Sword Saint, that crazy old coot, figure out our plans and step in to sabotage us on purpose?’
Keep highlighting villain atrocities to bolster hero and Union authority.
Then wield public opinion surpassing national governments' support.
The emergency decree they were toying with was part of that groundwork.
Not everyone welcomed the Union's rapid rise.
Politicians from various countries. Established power players.
They were wary of the Union encroaching on their influence.
‘The Jin Family is no different. Korea's greatest swordsman of the previous generation. He's spent decades training disciples worldwide on the strength of that name.’
Most heroes who wielded swords were his disciples.
And they were subtly influenced by his words, knowingly or not.
That was the Jin Family's power—and the Union wanted to seize it.
They wanted total control over every hero.
“What do we do? If the Sword Saint is really trying to interfere...”
“When the hell is that crazy old man going to die?! If he kicks the bucket, the Jin Family's influence drops by more than half! Damn it!”
Suddenly, the Union brought up one possibility.
“Hold on. Think about it—if the Sword Saint dies, the Jin Family's influence vanishes practically overnight. His disciples, held together by his charisma, will scatter. And we at the Union could absorb them all!”
“Ha! As if we know when that old man will die! He's not even seventy yet, and physically he's way younger!”
“If he won't go naturally, we use other methods.”
Other methods besides natural causes? Did they mean...?
“Right now, our biggest headaches are two: the Smiling Man and the Sword Saint. The key point is one is a villain, the other a hero!”
“No way. You're suggesting we pit them against each other head-on?”
“No matter who wins, neither comes out unscathed. If the Sword Saint dies, the Jin Family wobbles—great for us. If the Smiling Man dies, we lose a villain stirring up weird nonsense—also great.”
The more they thought about it, the better it sounded. There was no superior path.
The optics weren't bad either. Hero versus villain. Plenty of reason to fight.
But even this brilliant plan had one flaw.
“We can't make the Sword Saint move. Or the Smiling Man. How do we handle that?”
The Sword Saint was a hero, but he didn't take orders from the Union.
And even if he did, it would raise flags. “Go kill the Smiling Man” out of the blue?
Anyone would get suspicious and start digging for reasons.
Making the Smiling Man move was even more impossible.
How do you get a villain to target the Jin Family?
He'd killed the S-Rank Hero Holy Knight, sure—but that was a sneak attack.
The Jin Family, by contrast, was a fortress that thoroughly isolated enemies.
Plenty of villains wanted to kill retired heroes for fame.
But even those lunatics never dared touch the Jin Family.
“We make them move.”
“Who, exactly?!”
“We'll make the Smiling Man move.”
“How?!”
“We lure him.”
Fortunately, they had one card to play.
A deep, longstanding line into the villain network.
“You're thinking of using ‘Purple’?”
“We lure him through them. Tell him the Jin Family head is bragging about killing a villain—and that even at his level, the Smiling Man got his name stolen.”
“Will he bite? The Smiling Man's no ordinary psycho.”
“That's exactly why his pride will be sky-high.”
No matter how weird a villain he was for saving heroes.
No one could stomach hearing that from a hero.
Especially since the Sword Saint was seen as a has-been these days.
His S-Rank status was ancient history; now he was barely hanging on.
Would the Smiling Man really hold back from such provocation?
“Purple alone has limits, of course. So we'll use every media outlet to make him snap.”
“Media, huh.”
“A villain killed in one hit by a geezer hero? Hammer that point, keep dragging the Smiling Man's name through the mud for getting stolen by that guy. Then run special broadcasts insisting Holy Knight died to a cowardly villain ambush.”
The reason the Highest Danger Class Smiling Man had dropped to Catastrophe Class.
The reason he'd skyrocketed to Seven Evils-level notoriety overnight.
It was because he'd killed an S-Rank. Ruin that, and it was done.
A Smiling Man wounded in pride from all sides would surely move.
Villains couldn't tolerate being called weak.
“Sounds good. But there's still a problem. What if there's no clear winner?”
“That's what we want most. Mutual destruction. Best-case for us.”
“You don't say.”
Smiling Man storms the Jin Family, fights the Sword Saint, and dies.
Or the Jin Family gets massacred defending against the Smiling Man's invasion, Sword Saint included.
For either ending, they could play their hidden card.
“It'll be a chance to deploy the assets we've been raising.”
No pressure to save people like heroes.
No lack of control like villains.
Secret forces raised solely for the Union.
“You. Ever thought about learning the sword?”
After another secret spar away from the family today.
The Sword Saint tossed out the question casually while downing cold water.
“Taking villain disciples now?”
“What's wrong with that?”
“I'll pass. Swords and I don't get along.”
“Don't say that. Just think it over.”
“Jeez. I said no, Elder.”
As he rejected the Sword Saint's offer, his phone suddenly rang.
Uncharacteristically polite for a villain, he excused himself and checked the message—
[Come right away. That's what she said to write.]
“Oh.”
The boss. The Black Woman was summoning him.