Dismantling the 28th Guild
They say the dead have no voice.
Those who have left this world can no longer speak their minds, nor can they resist whatever is done to them.
And it was precisely that fact that Lee Sena chose to exploit. In that moment, she decided to use her dead friend's corpse as her own shield.
I'm sorry, Seo Jiyun… but what else am I supposed to do? The dead are dead. The living have to keep living, don't they?
Even with her father as a powerful backer, if things continued like this, Lee Sena faced more than just the end of her career as a hunter—she could end up in prison. She stood at a crossroads where her entire life could be finished. And if that happened, the damage would not stop with her. It would also shrink the standing of her father, the Vice Minister who held real power at the National Defense Ministry—her only remaining hope.
As a daughter, she could not become a burden to her parents when she already failed to be of any help. Her father's power was directly tied to her own survival.
So Lee Sena judged that feigning incompetence and slipping free of the situation was by far the better option. Without a shred of hesitation, she put that judgment into action—killing a second time the friend who had already thrown away her life for her, all so that she herself could live.
And watching her do it, her longtime friend—the one person who had still held a last scrap of sympathy for her—felt a thick, crushing betrayal take root in her heart.
Lee Sena… you… how… how could you do something like this…
It was true that Sena had committed a grave wrong. Her disastrous judgment had gotten countless people killed, among them Choi Yujin's own comrades and friends. And yet, as a friend and a fellow hunter, Choi Yujin had still hoped Sena would not be punished too harshly.
But in this moment, every human feeling she had ever held for Lee Sena was shattering to pieces. Personal pity. Trust as a comrade. Friendship itself. All of it broke under the spectacle of a woman so deranged that she would discard the friend who had died for her, just to save her own skin.
Choi Yujin began to tremble with a betrayal she had never once felt in her life.
I still believed in you… I did… so how could you… use Jiyun like this…
Betrayal born from shattered trust cut all the deeper. Beside her, Na Jiseon was radiating a killing intent so raw it looked as if she might throw off the hunters pinning her down at any second and take Sena's head clean off. But the fury Choi Yujin felt in that moment ran deeper and far more terrifying still. It was not a flash of impulse. It was a resolve—a goal—to drag the creature standing in front of her straight down into hell.
The friend she had wanted to protect only minutes earlier was now branded as the enemy of a lifetime. In a low voice, Choi Yujin spoke to Na Jiseon beside her.
"…Jiseon. We're leaving."
"What? …But we can't just sit here and watch this disgusting farce—"
"They're all in on it. The hunters blocking us right now, and that major general nodding along to every scrap of that garbage—all of them. I'm sure of it…"
"Kh…"
Na Jiseon's face twisted under the weight of her rage at Choi Yujin's words. Looking at her, Choi Yujin spoke with iron finality.
"You get it, right? There's nothing we can do in a fixed show like this. The ending's already been decided—a slap on the wrist. So let's get out of here before we have to watch any more of this filth."
"Damn it…"
And so the two of them walked out, chewing on disappointment, fury, and betrayal.
Off to one side of the hearing chamber, someone had been watching them carefully. That person slowly began to nod.
The hearing ended exactly as expected—in absolute garbage.
Lee Sena was stripped of her position as Guild Master for failing to lead her guild, and permanently barred from ever holding the office again. But that was inevitable anyway, given that the 28th Hunter Guild was already on the path to dissolution. Beyond that, her punishment amounted to little more than community service, a period of house arrest, and a stint of hospital treatment after she was found to be of diminished mental capacity.
And given that S-class hunters were legally barred from discharge, it was only a matter of time before she would be working as a hunter again—Guild Master or not. In practical terms, the verdict went past leniency and landed squarely on a full pardon.
Of course it did. The whole proceeding had been under the influence of her father, Vice Minister Lee Jaemin, a power broker in the military. The outcome had been written from the start.
So Choi Yujin and Na Jiseon sat in the now-empty main building of the 28th Hunter Guild, watching that unconscionable farce of a conclusion with their own eyes, and poured themselves drinks.
"Damn it! …I was such an idiot… I should've just left that trash Sena behind back there…"
"No… no… this is all my fault… Even if I wasn't feeling well, I should've gone with you… If I had… if I had, at least Jiyun wouldn't have died just so things could end like this…"
If more of the 28th Guild's hunters—people who knew the internal truth—had survived, they might at least have been able to raise an official protest. But with the guild already dissolving and fewer than ten members left, even that was impossible. On top of everything, the hush-money candy Lee Sena had handed out had convinced every other remaining hunter to look the other way. There was nothing left the two of them could do on their own.
They wanted to curse the others for it—wanted it badly—but they also understood. Seo Jiyun had been their close friend, but she had never exactly been kind to the A-, B-, and C-class hunters under her. Sharp-minded, yes, but with a temper so vicious people called her a lunatic. From a subordinate's point of view, she had been a thoroughly unpleasant superior. The present situation was clearly wrong, but almost no one was going to risk their own interests and safety for a superior like that.
And so Seo Jiyun, abandoned by her remaining comrades, was thoroughly cast as the sole culprit of the entire affair. The two of them felt their insides burn as they drank and kept lamenting.
"What do we do now… The media's already spreading the story that Jiyun was the mastermind behind all of this… You go online and it's nothing but people cursing her out…"
"What is this… How did… how did everything end up like this… Hic… uh-hic… Jiyun… I'm sorry… I'm so, so sorry…"
They wept apologies toward a friend they would never see again. Hatred for Lee Sena burned white-hot in both their hearts, but there was still nothing they could do. The person at the center of it all, Seo Jiyun, could neither protest nor reveal the truth. The military, for its part, seemed determined to drive the narrative this way, fabricating Seo Jiyun's record wholesale and pouring condemnation down on her head.
And the shield named Seo Jiyun, thrown up to cover Lee Sena's crimes, was being endlessly dragged through the mud online—vilified as a national traitor who had sacrificed countless soldiers and then fled into the next world.
In a climate like that, no amount of truth-telling from the two of them would be accepted. They would only be attacked for covering for her because they had been her friends.
So they sat there, drinking through their rage at a fabricated reality and their own powerlessness, killing time with tears—
when a sudden knock sounded at the door.
Knock, knock.
Despite how much they had already drunk, their minds were still painfully clear, and that clarity only made them more irritable as they slowly approached the door. Lee Sena had effectively cut all ties with the place after the hearing, and the surviving guild members had packed up and left long ago. Wondering who could possibly be visiting when there was no one left who should come, the two of them carefully opened the door.
And standing there was—
"!… Y-you…"
"You're… from back then…"
"…It's been a while. Choi Han."
The adjutant who had once handed the 28th Guild a spectacular middle finger and walked out. At his unexpected appearance, both S-class hunters immediately bristled with wariness.
"What business do you have here?"
"Come to laugh at us? Yeah, that tracks. You suffered plenty in this place, and you even stabbed us in the back on the way out. This must be pure satisfaction for you, right?"
Their voices mixed self-mockery with raw anger. Choi Han looked at them and slowly shook his head.
"…That's not why I'm here. I came solely to carry out official business."
"Official business?"
"Yes. To proceed with the dissolution of the 28th Guild."
"You… you bastard—"
"Jiseon. We already knew this was coming. There's no point getting worked up about it now."
"…Kh…"
At Yujin's words, Na Jiseon forced down the surge of emotion with visible effort. Yujin took hold of her and drew her a step back.
"Come in. If it's something that has to be done anyway, I'd appreciate it if you finished it quickly."
"Thank you. Then…"
With that, Choi Han carefully stepped into the officers' office.