The Perfect Cover-Up
Gang Taebeom, the Deputy Minister of National Defense, held one of the top ten most powerful positions in the entire ministry.
He had even been a three-star general before that, so his personal abilities must have been outstanding as well.
At least, that was what Lim Dojun had thought.
“Gaaah! Stop… I’ll tell you everything! What do you want to knowwww!”
Yet the face of that distant superior Lim Dojun remembered from his captain days turned out to be far less impressive than expected.
A few stabs from the sword were all it took for the man to spill every secret he knew, tears and snot streaming down his face.
“Crystal Dragon summoning? That was the Chinese bastards’ idea! I didn’t plan it!”
“Then why get involved?”
“Th-that’s…”
“A bribe. You sold out for money.”
“……”
Watching Gang Taebeom avert his eyes, unable to answer, Lim Dojun pieced together the full story.
The plan to summon otherworldly monsters had been proposed by China’s Wang Chen. After accepting a bribe, Gang Taebeom provided the location, and the Ghost Temple took on the actual work.
It seemed the Ghost Temple had been strong-armed into the subcontract, but Gang Taebeom had jumped in purely out of greed.
‘Because of scum like this, my team was wiped out and I lived in constant agony…’
There had been a time when he possessed a soldier’s sense of duty, a willingness to lay down his life for the nation.
Of course he had been full of plans to retire once he saved enough money, but without that sense of mission the position would have been unbearable.
His subordinates had felt the same. Bastards like Yeo Juhwan and Gang Taebeom had insulted them all with nothing but greed and a few careless words.
“Aaaaaargh! S-stop… I already told you everything!”
“Anyone else in the government connected to this?”
“N-no one… If there were, I’d have to share the money, so I handled it all myself…!”
Lim Dojun nodded.
‘That’s fortunate.’
That explained why they had moved only the Special Counter-Abnormal Team 2—his direct subordinates—without any military support back then.
Awakened underlings who could be used and discarded made the cover-up easy.
With Yeo Juhwan taking the blame for the accident and leaving the service, everything would have been neatly buried.
If only Lim Dojun had not succeeded in his rehabilitation and shown himself again.
‘In the end, I’ll have to go to China to hear the whole truth.’
The mastermind behind the experiment was there.
Lim Dojun raised his sword to finish his revenge.
“Brother!”
At that exact moment, as if by coincidence, Go Wonjin appeared.
Seeing him, Lim Dojun inwardly cursed.
‘This is troublesome…’
He wasn’t wearing his mask, and of all people it had to be Go Wonjin who caught him trying to kill a high-ranking government official.
As a member of the Returnee Union, Go Wonjin would obviously try to stop him…
“Doing some good work, I see?”
“……Pardon?”
“Truth is, I was planning to secretly stab the bastard myself if the chance came up. As expected of my sworn brother!”
“……”
Go Wonjin’s bright smile as he approached showed no trace of falsehood.
“But can I take one stab too? I’ve been wanting to stick a blade in this fucker for a long time.”
“……”
While Lim Dojun remained speechless, Gang Taebeom broke first, tears pouring as he screamed.
“S-save me! Please save me! This man is a murderer! Police… the military… anyone, just call someone, please!”
“Ah. Shut up. This guy only runs his mouth when it benefits him.”
Go Wonjin frowned and covered his ears.
“Aaaaaaaaagh!”
“Yeah. Just scream like that.”
“……”
Go Wonjin really did stab the man once.
In the end, Deputy Minister Gang Taebeom couldn’t hold on long before his head drooped.
The final blow that decorated his death came from Lim Dojun’s sword.
“…Brother.”
Lim Dojun gazed at Go Wonjin with complicated eyes.
What was he even supposed to say?
From Go Wonjin’s perspective, Lim Dojun must look like someone hiding immense power.
On top of that, he had just witnessed him assassinating a high-ranking government official…
“Brother. I understand everything you’re worrying about.”
Go Wonjin patted Lim Dojun’s shoulder as if he knew it all.
“…You do?”
“Of course. Want me to guess? You’re wondering how to dispose of this bastard’s corpse naturally, right?”
“……”
“Hehe. Listen. I thought of something on my way here. The only traces on him are stab wounds, yeah? So we just toss him among blade-wielding monsters!”
It was a plan riddled with holes.
Yet Go Wonjin lifted Gang Taebeom’s corpse with eyes full of confidence.
“Uahaha! Right. Let’s go. I’ll show you what a perfect crime really looks like!”
Many of the monsters that had burst out during the gate rampage were undead, and a large number of them wielded cold weapons.
However, most had been frozen solid by Lim Dojun’s magic and were now immobile.
Go Wonjin actually looked even happier when he saw them.
—This makes it even more natural! Since brother stabbed them with an ice sword, the wounds are slightly different from normal stab marks. Placing him among these frozen undead will look way more believable!
They moved a short distance from the chaotic battlefield where soldiers, awakeners, and returnees were fighting and casually tossed Gang Taebeom’s body among the frozen undead.
A short while later, the two of them easily finished off a skeleton mage that had been crippled by Lim Dojun’s spell and could barely move, thereby bringing the gate rampage incident to a close.
With both the boss monster and its minions annihilated, the gate naturally collapsed and vanished.
Once the scene was wrapped up, the news broke not long after.
The comment section was filled with nothing but praise.
It made sense. A single mistake could have wiped out an entire city and caused damage to neighboring cities as well.
Since they had perfectly prevented that disaster, it was a job well done. Both the Returnee Union and the Awakener Association seized the moment to aggressively polish their public image.
However, unlike the regular news, a slightly different topic was trending in the returnee community.
At that same moment, several people were sitting in what looked like a conference room, watching the news and community reactions.
Lim Dojun, Go Wonjin, and a woman sitting across from them with slightly drooping eyes and a gentle impression.
Go Wonjin burst out laughing as he read the news comments.
“Krrrr! Did you see this? Everyone’s saying we did great. They even called us the best marriage material. Hehe. Should I reveal my name while we’re at it?”
“Mr. Go Wonjin. This is not the time to feel proud!”
The woman across from them was Kim Ha-young, one of the core executives of the Returnee Union.
In truth, even the Union’s leadership didn’t hold particularly strong authority.
The Returnee Union was a horizontal organization that only gave respect according to individual strength. The executives were closer to volunteers who handled the annoying tasks for the Union’s sake.
“You killed Deputy Minister Gang Taebeom!”
Kim Ha-young spoke as if she were at her wit’s end.
Although an embargo had kept it from the public, the death of a deputy minister was no small matter.
Still, because there had been almost no other casualties, the government had deliberately concealed the fact.
His death did carry some uncomfortable details, after all.
“There were signs that Deputy Minister Gang Taebeom had ordered a desperate last stand while secretly trying to escape by himself, so the government decided to look the other way. That’s why we’re extremely lucky. Otherwise they would have demanded to know why he was killed and held us responsible!”
At those words, Go Wonjin dug at his ear with his pinky finger.
“Deputy Minister Gang Taebeom? Hmm… who was that again?”
“Stop playing dumb! You were the one whining about not wanting to go to Cheongna because of that guy!”
“Ahhh… I remember now. I tend to forget dead bastards and annoying bastards. Since that guy was both annoying and dead, I guess I forgot him even faster. But the cause of death was an undead stabbing him, right?”
“You seem to know the cause of death very well. Almost as if you were right next to him.”
“The Pope of the other world sent down a divine revelation. Want to join the Extreme Martial God Sect too?”
“Ugh…!”
At Go Wonjin’s shameless reply, Kim Ha-young clenched her fists tightly.
“His corpse was covered in sword wounds and you’re still going to insist it wasn’t you?”
“I keep telling you it was the undead, not me?”
However, there was no clear evidence.
Even if there had been, it would have been difficult to press someone like Go Wonjin.
With his outstanding martial prowess and his background as a high-ranking member of the Extreme Martial God Sect, he was a dangerous individual who could easily become a cruel mass murderer if things went wrong.
He needed to be gently coaxed and handled carefully, yet every time he caused an incident like this the Union leadership suffered migraines.
“…Please. Mr. Go Wonjin. This time things worked out and the government didn’t make an issue of it, but please be more careful next time. Okay? At this rate we might really end up clashing with the government head-on.”
“Yeah, yeah. Next time I’ll plan it perfectly. I’ll even manufacture evidence. That should be fine, right?”
“That’s not what I mean!”
Kim Ha-young shouted in frustration.
After sighing deeply several times, she finally turned her gaze sideways.
Lim Dojun had been quietly listening the entire time.
—Stay quiet, brother. I’ll handle it.
Go Wonjin had promised in advance to cover for him.
Lim Dojun didn’t know why he was doing so, but it was fortunate for him.
If the Union had tried to hold him responsible, it would have become extremely annoying.
“Hello.”
Kim Ha-young swallowed nervously as she looked at Lim Dojun.
He was wearing his robe hood pulled low and a mask covering his face.
The returnee who had suddenly appeared during the Cheongna gate incident was a very burdensome figure for the Union as well.
‘They said he used incredible magic and swept the entire battlefield…’
An exceptionally skilled mage.
Just how powerful he was, her own high-ranking spirit had been chattering non-stop through telepathy since earlier.
The high-ranking wind spirit in the form of a small girl was flying frantically around Kim Ha-young’s head.
If not for the restriction that it could not stray far from its contractor, it would have fled the room long ago.
Kim Ha-young knew exactly how strong her high-ranking spirit was despite its cute appearance; that was precisely why she was horrified that Lim Dojun’s mere presence was enough to terrify it.
And then.
“……”
Lim Dojun’s gaze shifted toward the wind spirit.
Kim Ha-young was startled.
‘Did he… just see my spirit?’
Normally only the contractor could see it, yet Lim Dojun’s eyes were clearly fixed in that direction.
The high-ranking wind spirit that met his gaze began trembling violently before it finally couldn’t endure any longer and fainted with a small plop.