Chapter 217
Chapter 217
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 217
Chapter Title: The Apostle's Chivalrous Challenge
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While smoothly pushing up the front lines and mopping up the Scavengers and the Under City, Yoo Seongwon soon heard the news that a Scavenger had arrived bearing a letter from Yi Moksa.
“What? Yi Moksa?”
“Yes. And she surrendered herself, saying to restrain her however we want. What should we do?”
“Hmm… Bring her in here.”
“Got it!”
With any other Scavenger, he might’ve suspected some trick, but Yi Moksa was someone he couldn’t just ignore. Yoo Seongwon immediately summoned her for a meeting.
Surrounded by three knights, including Gaulf, and bound in adamantium chains, she approached in a grotesque state—half her body transformed from human into demonic flesh. Her identity was obvious at a glance.
“Park Sookja, the former ruler of Pyongyang Under City? Nearly apostle-level… Who’d have thought she’d personally handle delivery duty.”
“That alone proves it’s authentic, right? Here—the letter for you, Sir Yoo Seongwon.”
“Hmm… It’s not tampered with or anything weird, is it?”
“You think the knights around would’ve let her get this far if it was suspicious?”
Yoo Seongwon nodded at Park Sookja’s cheeky response and accepted the box she respectfully offered.
He then carefully opened it and pulled out the letter inside to read.
Bracing himself for whatever scheme Yi Moksa might be plotting, the contents soon appeared.
[I, Apostle Yi Moksa of the Constellation ‘Slaughter King,’ hereby challenge Star Guardian Yoo Seongwon to a righteous and fair duel grounded in chivalry. One week from now, at noon. At the entrance to the ‘Core Dungeon’ in ‘Pyongyang Under City,’ let us fight without shame to the gods and stars we serve.]
“…Oh? Clever move.”
Yoo Seongwon frowned, praising Yi Moksa’s deviously brilliant wisdom once again.
She’d noticed he was bound by his passive skill, the Path of the Great Knight, and formally proposed a duel.
The slyest part was the location. By specifying the Core Dungeon entrance, she ensured the dungeon itself had to remain intact for the duel to proceed.
“And she set the deadline to a realistic week… No excuses to ignore or refuse. Tch! If she’d picked something vague like a month or half a year, I’d have dismissed it as a transparent ploy and ignored it…”
Yoo Seongwon clicked his tongue regretfully at the letter she’d brought.
In the midst of war, anything unrealistic would’ve been brushed off as a wicked ruse and torn up on the spot.
“Impressive work. Dealing with smart opponents is always a hassle. Sigh… But I can’t refuse.”
“Oh… As expected?”
“Tell her I accept. We’ll meet at the Core Dungeon entrance in a week. But relay that the war continues everywhere except Pyongyang. As long as it doesn’t interfere with the duel, right?”
Yoo Seongwon had no intention of letting her buy time without consequence.
As long as the Core Dungeon entrance in Pyongyang Under City stayed safe, the rest was fair game—he planned to keep the pressure on elsewhere to prevent any other moves.
“That’s all the business. Escort her out properly.”
“Oh, and one personal matter…”
“Personal?”
“Yes. It’s just nice to meet someone from the same facility.”
“…Ah… That facility?”
That facility—the orphanage substitute where Yoo Seongwon had grown up. It had devolved into chaos amid corrupt officials’ greed, the Constellations’ era, and the grandmaster’s defection abroad, piling disaster on disaster.
Hopeless patients and children were nominally registered then discarded or sold off. The kids received minimal education before forced into grueling labor within. It was a hellhole that profoundly shaped Yoo Seongwon’s personality.
“Hmm… But how do I know you really came from there? If you’re trying some half-baked scheme… I could end you right here. Plus, you’re from North Korea, aren’t you?”
“I lived in North Korea until Scavengers sold me into the facility, then a few years later, they sold me back out to Scavengers. Even for Scavengers, you think they’d peddle something like that?”
Park Sookja stated the horrific truth with casual innocence, but Yoo Seongwon gazed at her impassively and nodded.
Scavengers had existed in North Korea even before the Constellations’ era, so it wasn’t implausible for her to have been captured young, sold to the facility, then resold northwards.
“Why it happened? Blame the director’s twisted hobbies. Anyway~ To confirm we’re both facility brats, ask away. We can share what only we’d know.”
“That hellhole had its own little society among us kids. And in that society… there was something that stood in for real money. Know what it was?”
“Candy and snacks. Hard candies were the most valuable; peanut caramels the least. Oh, red ginseng candies fluctuated wildly because a specific group leader loved them.”
“…Correct.”
This was insider knowledge unknown to outsiders—details from the kids’ micro-society in a facility driven by adults’ greed, neglect, and brutal exploitation for profit.
Even amid abuse and backbreaking labor, the kids had formed a society. In tasteless meals and sewer-like conditions, gustatory pleasure was their sole solace.
Thus, candies and snacks became currency—used for favors or trades.
“But you could’ve heard it from someone outside?”
“Who’d tell? Almost no one got out… Heh heh heh.”
“True. You worked corpse disposal, so you’d know best.”
“Eek… That nightmare department? Explains why I never saw your face. I knew pretty much every boy in the facility.”
Memories so vile they tormented even the listeners.
Too squalid for casual chat, the tale turned faces pale and knights scowled. Yet the protagonists—Yoo Seongwon and Park Sookja—smiled.
It had been a sewer-like hell, but it was undeniably their ‘past.’ Meeting someone who shared it was joyful in itself. Surviving and growing from that inferno was a miracle.
“Anyway, you check out as a guest. Release her restraints. If she wanted a fight, she’d have started one already.”
“But…”
“With you all here, what’s the problem? And if she tries anything stupid, I’ll handle her mercilessly. No worries.”
Pleased to reunite with a fellow sewer survivor after so long, Yoo Seongwon freed Park Sookja and set up for a proper reminisce.
War meant no alcohol—just drinks and snacks as they continued their talk.
“Oh, corpse disposal bunked with the doctors. No wonder you were elusive. I was on the third-floor laundry crew. You know—the decent-looking ones got assigned there on purpose.”
“Ah~ (?) So they could handle clothes or underwear right away?”
“Ding ding ding! It doubled as a brothel. Remember that classroom next to the laundry? Officially there, but sealed off for no reason. Black curtains inside, and they did it all there.”
“…Yeah, I remember. Went up once to fetch a doctor. Heard faint (?) noises, but a staffer was guarding, so no peeking inside.”
As they chatted, their words flowed freely.
From the same sewer, they marveled at each other’s twisted fates.
One an S-rank hunter-tier Scavenger, the other conqueror of Asia’s three nations. An absurd future.
“So how’d you escape? I got sold to Scavengers and hunters, eventually breaking free…”
“Got kicked out. Couldn’t do anything right. Plus, over a decade in corpse disposal and cleaning… Made me like a symbol of death.”
“Ah… Right, right. Treated like the grim reaper or undertaker inside. Laughable once outside~”
Two survivors from a brutal sewer bloomed their story flowers, time flying.
Fortunately, they’d delegated combat reports and deployments to other knights, leaving ample chat time. Soon, topics shifted from past to present.
“So that’s how you became a Scavenger.”
“Yeah. Sacrificed half my body for this form and took over Pyongyang. All ruined because of someone~ How’d a facility kid turn out so upright?”
“Not long for me either. Was ordinary before… Anyway? What now? Using our shared origins to tug heartstrings?”
“Nah, come on. If we’d leaned on each other inside, maybe. But different departments—no meetings. Just same roots. Wanted to talk. Confirm that shithole was real, y’know?”
“…I see.”
“Whoever dies or lives, they become the strong’s fodder anyway, right? Can’t deny that.”
Yoo Seongwon offered only a faint smile at Park Sookja’s words.
Undeniable truth. What others learned grinding society, they’d grasped in that hellhole before emerging.
One lucked into a decent job for self-sufficiency; the other plunged deeper into the abyss, leading here.
“Bad luck, and I’d be a Scavenger—or dead long ago.”
“Yeah, yeah. Lucky you. Anyway, time to go.”
“Already?”
“Just came to talk… You really thought I’d pull something?”
Yoo Seongwon nodded without a shred of doubt.
“Yeah. Obviously. Especially a facility survivor and Slaughter King’s minion still kicking—prime suspect.”
It could’ve offended, but Park Sookja smiled.
Utterly reasonable. Survivors of that hell, under Slaughter King? Suspicion was the norm.
Even lost in nostalgia, Yoo Seongwon never forgot—proof he was tough as nails.
“Anyway, leaving… But~ one easy personal favor.”
“What?”
“No matter how this plays out, if I lose, kill me yourself. If I’m fodder, I’d rather be yours.”
“Typical Slaughter King apostle talk…”
“No, unrelated to Lord Slaughter King. World’s always this cruel—worse, even. At least you end life before eating… Way more humane than straw-sucking torture while alive. Bye~”
With that, Park Sookja exited the transport and vanished into the distance.
Knights and hunters asked, ‘Should we grab her?’ Yoo Seongwon just shook his head, watching her go.
In tangled emotions, he gazed at the ongoing battlefield, pulled a liquor bottle from his inventory, uncapped it, and downed it straight.
He couldn’t shake the churning filth in his chest without getting drunk.