Chapter 113
Chapter 113
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 113
Chapter Title: Why She Stayed
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Lee Yoo-hyun, who had been asked to perform maintenance on the Nina Pinta Simulator, visited the Association's First Headquarters for the first time in a long while.
It was currently mealtime.
After briefly meeting Seol Do-yoon in a nearby park, Lee Yoo-hyun scooped up a spoonful of packaged kimchi fried rice and spoke worriedly.
"By the way, that Min Ji-cheol secretary you said you swayed... he makes me a bit uneasy. How long do you think the Association Chairman will keep trusting him?"
Seol Do-yoon, who was eating a chicken breast salad and sandwich bought from a convenience store, thought for a moment before replying.
"He'll probably keep trusting him. To manipulate the suspicious Association Chairman with information, you had to sway someone he couldn't help but believe in. That's Min Ji-cheol, the secretary he's worked with for decades. They both know their interests are too intertwined for betrayal to be easy."
Hearing that she'd swayed the secretary who'd worked with the Chairman for decades made Lee Yoo-hyun suddenly curious about how Seol Do-yoon had pulled Min Ji-cheol into this.
It must have been incredibly difficult to shatter decades of built-up trust.
"How did you sway Min Ji-cheol, Do-yoon? Isn't he in a position where betraying the Chairman would be really hard?"
"I used that very point. Min Ji-cheol lives off the Chairman's trust, but he's a greedy man too, so he's secretly done a few things the Chairman would hate. Minor stuff that gets overlooked because it wasn't betrayal meant to bring him down."
Seol Do-yoon chewed and swallowed her chicken breast sandwich before continuing.
"What I targeted was exactly once. One light betrayal that could shatter the trust. I gathered traces of his minor deviations, used guilt to blackmail him, and said let's betray him just once."
What Seol Do-yoon had demanded.
The one wiretap request from that golf course meeting.
She'd made the weight of betrayal feel light by calling it just one phone call, then tempted him by promising to erase all records of his deviations if he complied just once.
"And by leaving a record of that one betrayal, I got a leash on Min Ji-cheol again."
But it was just a leash—she couldn't expect more than the wiretap from him.
Min Ji-cheol, whose interests were tied to Kim Woo-sung, couldn't fully betray the Chairman.
Kim Woo-sung's downfall would mean his own.
"Just because he sided with us once doesn't mean he's fully on our side."
"Ah. Even if he doesn't actively help, he won't tell Kim Woo-sung the Chairman about Inoah's existence. He wouldn't want to get caught for betraying him."
"Hmm..."
Seol Do-yoon suddenly fell silent, staring at the last piece of chicken breast on her fork.
"Probably. If the trust with Kim Woo-sung breaks, Min Ji-cheol becomes nothing."
Having finished her meal, Seol Do-yoon stood up.
Just then, several supervisors who had also finished eating passed by the walking path in a group, leading some A-Class Abyss kids.
"Do-yoon, is that chicken breast you're eating again?"
"Puhaha, if you want to bulk up, tell me! I'll teach you gym for free!"
"Ah, Hunter Lee Yoo-hyun! Hello!"
Spotting Lee Yoo-hyun and Seol Do-yoon, the supervisors greeted them energetically as they passed.
A-Class Abyss kids like Mun Se-rim and Yeo Woo-kyeong were eating snacks and ice cream bought by the supervisors.
"The supervisors seem a bit too friendly lately."
"The A-Class kids are growing into strong hunters, so they're terrified of retaliation."
"Ah..."
Lee Yoo-hyun frowned as she watched the supervisors playfully teasing the A-Class kids, who were chattering noisily.
"Seeing one reason why the A-Class kids want to stay in the Association makes me want to puke..."
After receiving approval, the Chairman suddenly faced complaints from various human rights groups, making it impossible to forcibly keep the underage Association-affiliated hunters (Abyss A-Class) around.
She'd thought the kids would bolt from the Association the moment the restrictions lifted, but they stayed firmly put.
Kids who were constantly worked to the bone.
They were called Association-raised hunters, but they just accepted their position as dogs or slaves of the Association.
'Anyway, staying here lets you definitely gain power. Lately, they treat us like future A-rank hunters, and it's great. Don't worry about it.'
She suddenly recalled what one A-Class Abyss kid had said.
That was how some kids ended up liking Kim Woo-sung and the supervisors, even after their lives had been ruined and they'd suffered so much.
Claiming they'd been given strength others didn't have.
"Haa... Once the supervisors, who were once objects of fear, approach kindly, they'll follow even more."
"Well, that's true, but not all A-Class Abyss kids are suffering from Stockholm syndrome. There are kids like Sae-byeok."
"Then should we first get the supervisors or the kids hostile to the Abyss Project out of the Association?"
At Lee Yoo-hyun's words, Seol Do-yoon's expression seemed to brighten subtly for a moment, then darken as she clicked her tongue.
"Even Sae-byeok and the kids around her won't leave the Association even if it kills them."
"Ah... Having finally caught a breath after escaping hell, they're scared of a new environment."
"Yeah. Better to accept small misfortunes than choose an unknown future. The Association was supposed to be better than the orphanage they came from in the first place."
"Are you okay, Do-yoon? You sound so detached, like it's someone else's business."
At Lee Yoo-hyun's question about whether she was okay, Seol Do-yoon smiled.
"Honestly? It doesn't really affect me. Before the Association got approval, even in that closed-off situation, I could have escaped, but I chose to stay."
...Ah.
Thinking about it, it was a bit strange.
With Do-yoon's current abilities, she seemed like she could sneak out and live well on her own.
"Were you staying because you were worried about the other kids?"
"No way. I wouldn't be fazed if the kids died. Don't think I'm weird. It's just that I don't feel much."
Lee Yoo-hyun looked at Seol Do-yoon for a moment, then averted her gaze so as not to make her uncomfortable.
"Got it, you're fine. Then why did you stay?"
"Just because the Association Chairman is so cringey and annoying that I want to kill him."
That half-baked arrogance where he thought he could do anything because he was 'Kim Woo-sung'—it was so grating and irritating.
Her limbs were already shriveling up.
It was humiliating that his childish behavior at his age could affect her directly or indirectly.
Suddenly, a memory surfaced.
That day, when security systems were downed to match the thunderstorm.
'Let's get out of here. We can go without getting caught today.'
"Ah, so that's why it was so hectic? You're preparing to run? Tsk, fine. Go well.'
'You're not going?'
'Nah, you go.'
Lee Sae-byeok, stubbornly staying at the Association to be experimented on.
'Why stay? I don't get it.'
'If we both disappear, the remaining kids will suffer double for our shares. Security will tighten too. Go alone. I'll say you died shitting and got buried on the back mountain.'
'Hmm... Alright. Thanks.'
And as she was leaving, she thought of Sae-byeok taking her share of beatings too.
Suddenly, she twisted her ankle and got caught by a supervisor.
She tried to escape a few more times, but strangely, that day the supervisors' instincts were especially sharp, making it hard.
She ended up getting thoroughly beaten repeatedly and dragged back to her original room.
So she looked for other ways, but suddenly it all felt too bothersome.
That's how things dragged on to this point.
Where did it go wrong? Why did the orphanage director sell us out in the first place?
With kids screaming like this inside the Association building, why does no one hear?
After tracking it down, she learned about the man named Kim Woo-sung.
When she found out the Abyss Project organizer was moving them by shoving money their way, Seol Do-yoon suddenly wondered about the motive behind that cruelty.
Then she overheard Kim Woo-sung on a call by chance.
'What, uh. Running various projects, having some fun with it. Annual sales hit 10 billion? Haha... You think that's all I'm worth? Why you gotta be like that? This is my second prime~'
....
'They all keel over at my word....'
'...You know who my backing is?'
....
What was she supposed to do?
Whether it was vicarious shame or whatever, she didn't want to hear more and ran.
To think all this was Kim Woo-sung's pathetic self-esteem-boosting project to overcome his lameness.
Making money with crude methods, commanding shallow people who risk their lives for cash.
Yet deluded into thinking he was smart and awesome.
Suddenly, running away felt more embarrassing than bothersome. It felt like she was more incompetent than that pathetic Kim Woo-sung.
"...So I stayed at the Association because I wanted to kill the Chairman."
Seol Do-yoon summarized for Lee Yoo-hyun why she'd come to loathe Kim Woo-sung.
It was good not to skimp on background explanations for Lee Yoo-hyun, who empathized well with others and moved systematically.
The proposal to first extract kids hostile to the Abyss Project might be impossible, but it appealed to her.
That's why she opened up to Lee Yoo-hyun, despite rarely sharing her past.
Lee Yoo-hyun, who had been listening intently while sighing, suddenly tilted her head.
"Wait a sec. You said you stayed voluntarily at first, but then said you couldn't escape because the supervisors' senses got sharp. Isn't that weird?"
"......?"
At Lee Yoo-hyun's question, Seol Do-yoon tilted her head and reviewed what she'd said earlier.
Thinking about it, yeah.
Seol Do-yoon, who had been blinking silently for a moment, soon smiled and replied.
"Looks like I unconsciously bluffed because I didn't want to admit my physical incompetence wasn't nimble enough. Early on, I definitely couldn't escape because I was powerless."
"...Is that so?"
"Yeah."
Lee Yoo-hyun narrowed her eyes and smiled.
"Or maybe..."
She suddenly wanted to tease Seol Do-yoon, but seeing how much she was denying it, she swallowed her words, thinking it best not to push.
"Haha, no. Anyway, if Sae-byeok and the other kids are scared to leave, the least damaging and most natural approach might be to overhaul this whole place into something pleasant."
At Lee Yoo-hyun's summary, Seol Do-yoon slightly frowned.
She'd just thought of the least damaging method, but hearing it from Lee Yoo-hyun's mouth sounded like some idealist's fancy, making her uncomfortable.
"You're going with building up forces to crush the Chairman, but couldn't we just expose his corruption, send him to prison, and be done?"
"There are lots of people who don't want Kim Woo-sung to fall. He's planted devices in every relationship. So those around him can't just watch him crumble."
That's why he'd made everyone necessary invest in the Abyss Project.
It was like saying even if he died, he wouldn't die alone.
Actually, the fastest and surest way was to kill the Chairman.
But that would unleash too many uncontrollable variables.
One of them: one of his stinky connections hijacking the system Kim Woo-sung built or burying all the Abyss evidence wholesale.
There were plenty of psychopaths around Kim Woo-sung who'd do that without hesitation.
Acting thoughtlessly could lead to secondary damages in many ways.
For now, creating organizations, solidifying systems, and gathering forces had succeeded to some extent.
Next was to tank Kim Woo-sung's value to rock bottom while making him dismantle his own devices.
To do that, she needed to naturally sever the surrounding interests that supported him.
* * *
Dun headed to the location Gesen had written down.
People were busily remodeling the building spotlessly there.
"Gaeddong, transparent mode."
[Transparent mode...]
From a blind spot, Dun activated invisibility and circled the villa where the black market would open, scouting.
'These shady types sure love secret villas.'
He'd heard the Abyss Project started in Kim Woo-sung's secret villa back in the early days.
With hands shoved in his pockets, Dun checked how the slaves would arrive at the black market.
Given Altoid's personality, he wouldn't just cart them in a carriage; probably using teleport magic circles...
"Gaeddong, can you sense magic circle presences or something?"
Dun, who had consumed the 'Mermel's Voice' item, whispered lowly to Gaeddong.
[......Can somewhat.]
"Really?"
<......>
Gaeddong suddenly went silent.
[Hiii....]
The Gaeddong enveloping Dun suddenly turned cold.
"Huh, why crying again."
[Gaeddong...... useless......]
Though Gaeddong's form wasn't visible, Dun could imagine bean paste face features with chicken-shit-like tears streaming down.
Dun bit his lip to barely hold back laughter.