Babel
"Shit. Dog-bastard—what the hell is this? Fuck!"
Choi Taemin froze in place and glared sharply at the man spitting curses.
The first thing Taemin had done as time slowed was use the talisman his brother-in-law had given him. He hadn't believed the claim that it would render his opponent immobile, but frankly, less of what his brother-in-law had shown him so far was believable.
And once again, a miracle was unfolding before his eyes.
"What kind of trick is this?! Undo it. Now!"
A powerhouse even Choi Taemin would have struggled to handle stood rooted to the spot, unable to budge an inch, all mouth and no movement.
Thud. Thud.
Taemin walked slowly toward the man, and when he finally stood before him, he pressed the tip of his sword against the man's throat. The icy chill bleeding off the blade wiped the playfulness from the man's face, freezing it solid.
"What? You gonna kill me?"
Could I actually kill him?
Taemin swallowed dryly as he looked the man dead in the eyes. The problem was the warning his brother-in-law, Lee Jaeseong, had given him.
'Brother-in-law. After you throw it and they're bound, just run. One hit breaks the talisman's effect. Better to run than to half-ass it.'
Strictly speaking, the odds were better than ninety percent. No matter how mysterious a powerhouse his opponent might be, Choi Taemin was no pushover himself. In fact, with the man frozen in place like a statue, Taemin was confident he could take his head in a single stroke.
But the tip of his sword drifted slowly downward.
Alone, he might have pressed the attack—but his daughter stood behind him. And recalling the ability the man had displayed moments ago, there was no guarantee he didn't possess a survival skill that nullified fatal wounds or reduced damage. What if that single strike failed to sever his throat? The talisman's effect would shatter the instant he landed the blow, and a cornered beast might unleash something close to a self-destructive barrage.
Taemin's gaze found his daughter Seo Yeon behind him, watching him with worry written across her face. In a situation where he had to protect her, even a single one percent of uncertainty meant the other ninety-nine percent could be safely ignored.
"Haah. Regrettably, that's it for today."
With a short sigh, Taemin slid the sword back into its sheath. At that unexpected turn, the man's face began to twist grotesquely.
"Seo Yeon, let's go home."
"Huh? Wh-what about that guy? We're just leaving him?"
"I don't know how long that thing your uncle gave me lasts, but poking at it carelessly would just be a hassle."
Taemin turned away without sparing the man so much as a glance. Treated like discarded trash—no, treated worse than that—the man's mouth erupted in a scream.
"Hey! You shits are ignoring me right now? Huh? You think I'm gonna let this slide? If you don't kill me today, I'll make you regret it for the rest of your lives!"
The man roared until the veins stood out on his neck. And it was at that exact moment that Taemin, who had been leaving without a shred of regret, stopped in his tracks.
"Don't get the wrong idea. I'm not leaving loose ends behind because I want to. If we meet again, I will settle today's debt."
Taemin wrapped an arm around Seo Yeon's shoulders and walked toward the gate's exit. Bound by the Binding Talisman, unable to move so much as a finger, the man could do nothing but watch the backs of the father and daughter as they walked away.
"You fucking bastard! At least untie this before you go!"
Naturally, there wasn't the slightest reason for Choi Taemin to oblige.
"KYAAAHH! Sir! Help meee!"
Stepping through the front door, I couldn't help but let out an awkward laugh at the scene spread across the middle of the living room. Yoon Jiseok, with his broad shoulders and fearsome face, was rolling back and forth on the floor, while Jang Yeongsu lay already collapsed, wearing a sullen expression. Only little Seojun, gleeful beyond measure, ran around cackling with a toy sword in hand.
"...What are you two doing?"
"Ah, well. Haha. We were playing with him, and, uh... got a little too into it."
Yoon Jiseok said this with an embarrassed face the moment he noticed I'd come in.
"How... did it come to this."
Jang Yeongsu was simply muttering to himself, an existential crisis written all over his face.
Truthfully, the reason Jang Yeongsu and Yoon Jiseok were at our house was simple: no one else came to mind who could watch Seojun. Honestly, I had my doubts about handing my nephew over to a pair of grizzled middle-aged men, but...
'Turns out they're surprisingly good with kids?'
Judging by Seojun's expression, it hadn't been a bad choice.
Beep beep beep—click.
It was at that moment the door lock chimed and the front door swung open. And right behind it, I saw my brother-in-law and Seo Yeon stepping inside.
"...Did something happen?"
I asked my brother-in-law that. No—to be precise, I had to ask it. Seo Yeon looked relatively unscathed, but strange marks were visible all over Taemin's body. His clothes were lightly scorched here and there as if singed by fire, and Seo Yeon's face carried a sullen look that didn't quite fit her.
"Jaeseong. We need to talk."
My brother-in-law said this to me, then glanced at Jang Yeongsu and Yoon Jiseok behind me—a silent question of whether it was fine to speak in front of them. I gave him a small nod.
"Has Seo Yeon ever caught a mutant before?"
I nodded at his question. It was true that I'd deliberately arranged for Seo Yeon to take down the Golden Goblin. And what my brother-in-law said next was something I had never imagined. Someone, coveting the title effect Seo Yeon had gained, had tried to take her life.
A memory of my master surfaced unbidden.
'One last question. Do you truly intend to become my disciple?'
'Yes.'
'Becoming my disciple means becoming the Young Cult Master of the Blood Cult. The moment you ascend to that seat, countless people may come for your head—whether you wish it or not. That is the nature of positions. That is the nature of debts and grudges.'
Back then, my master had deliberately worn a stern face, yet to the very end he had left me a way out.
'If you find that blood-soaked seat distasteful, you may refuse. We don't need to be master and disciple—there are many bonds we could forge instead. The age gap is a bit wide, but we could be close friends. Or perhaps simply acquaintances who meet now and then for a quiet chat.'
But despite his persuasion, I had chosen in the end to become the Blood Cult's Young Cult Master—my master's disciple. At the time, it had seemed like the best path.
The problem was that I had failed to consider that the 'title' I'd handed my niece could likewise become grounds for making her a target.
'I was complacent.'
A simple desire to hand her something good had, in the end, made an enemy of unknown identity for my eighteen-year-old niece.
But the self-reproach didn't last long. If the cause lay with me, then the solution was mine to carry out as well. If flies swarmed because of a title, then it was enough to clear them away so thoroughly that those fly bastards wouldn't even dare think of approaching. That was precisely why Salmak no longer existed in Murim.
"Who was it?"
I asked my brother-in-law, my eyes sinking cold. He said he'd been lucky enough to escape thanks to the Binding Talisman I'd given him, but that didn't erase the fact that Seo Yeon had been attacked.
"I don't know. He seemed Japanese... He used some kind of explosive mana orb, and, ah—other than the fact that he sounded like he was speaking Japanese but I heard it as Korean..."
It was just as I was growing frustrated with my brother-in-law's vague description that Seo Yeon dropped something unexpected.
"Uncle. I got a photo of him."
"What? When?"
"Back when Dad had his sword at the guy's throat. To show you."
I let out a small laugh watching her answer her own father like that. My niece, it seemed, was more on the ball than my brother-in-law.
One odd thing, though—Seo Yeon's expression was a shade darker than usual.
And then, that moment.
"Uh, that looks like Kuroda Sho?"
An unexpected voice came from behind me.
"Goddammit!"
Inside a run-down factory on the outskirts of Tokyo, Japan, Kuroda Sho was fuming as he returned to his hideout.
"Fuck! Me! Kuroda! Beaten down by some nobody!"
Kuroda Sho trembled all over at the memory of the humiliation from earlier. After that strange talisman had stuck to him, he'd been unable to move for a while—it was only several minutes after the two of them had left the gate that his body had come free again. And even then, it had only happened because an orc warrior that appeared out of nowhere swung an axe at him, breaking the binding. He'd butchered every orc warrior in the vicinity on his way back, but Kuroda Sho's mood refused to improve.
The back of that man, who had looked at him like garbage and walked away without even a parting glance. To Kuroda, it was a humiliation worse than death.
"A gear-carried lucky bastard dares to look down on me?"
Still seething, gasping for breath, Kuroda flung himself irritably onto the sofa. Then he jammed a special headset, shaped like a VR device, roughly onto his head where it sat on the coffee table.
Verifying biometric information...
Welcome to Babel, Rascal 1.
Those guide messages floated across his vision, and moments later a virtual space spread out before him, dominated by an enormous round table. It was a place where only the worst criminal hunters—wanted by every nation across the globe—were permitted entry.
The moment Kuroda connected, an avatar in clown makeup seated across the round table cackled and spoke up.
"Oh, kiddo. So you went all the way across the sea to Korea and got royally fleeced, huh?"
At the mocking voice, Kuroda's brow twitched. The man behind the clown avatar was Jack, the notorious murderer out of Texas, USA. Naturally, Jack was speaking flawless American English, but to Kuroda's ears it sounded like perfectly natural Japanese. And to Jack, in turn, Kuroda's words would sound like English.
A miracle that tore down the barrier of language. The reason it was possible lay in the title possessed by Babel's leader: the Tongue of Baektak. Thanks to that perfect language patch, madmen from every corner of the world could band together regardless of nationality and run this vast criminal syndicate.
"Shut up if you don't want to die, Jack. I didn't get fleeced—I got hit by some bullshit bug item."
"Ahaha. Kiddo. You of all people know gear counts as skill, don't you? Still, what a shame. That Golden Goblin title looked pretty sweet."
"Ha. I haven't given up yet. And keep pissing me off, and I might just take your title next."
"Oh? Feel free to try, if you're so confident."
Kuroda glared at the clown through gritted teeth. Ever since he'd caught the Kamikakushi, the yokai of the gaps, he'd gained the ability to create sliding doors that let him travel anywhere he desired. But the weakness of that power was that he had to be able to picture his destination's exact image. He knew Jack operated somewhere near Texas, but without knowing his precise location, Kuroda couldn't hunt him down no matter how badly he wanted to.
"Could you say that to my face?"
"Anytime. Hell, I could even send you a photo of where I'm standing right now."
Their juvenile bickering came to an abrupt halt at that moment. At some point—no one could say when—a figure wearing the head of a black sheep had taken a seat at the round table.