The God of Controls' One-Coin Clear: Bounty (4)
Two figures glided across the city skyline.
Not in a straight vertical plunge, but in a gentle, bird-like arc.
It was all thanks to Ran’s wind arts.
“Wow! This is no joke!”
Taeyang shouted, clearly thrilled.
The air currents whipping between the buildings slammed into his body with real force.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Gunshots rang out from the opposite side.
They were meaningless.
Ran’s wind arts were incredibly versatile.
They were especially outstanding at blocking long-range projectiles.
Ran shouted, “We’re dropping soon!”
“What? I can’t hear you!”
“We’re dropping, I said!”
The wind was too fierce for her words to carry, but Taeyang managed to infer the meaning.
The wind mana surrounding him was unraveling thread by thread.
Taeyang quickly scanned their surroundings.
They were currently at the height of a fifteen-story building.
The building he had started on was forty stories tall, so they had come down halfway, yet it was still plenty high.
Falling from here with no preparation would mean instant death on impact.
“That way!”
Taeyang pointed at a nearby building.
He intended to crash straight through the middle of it.
Whoosh!
When Ran swung her fan, the wind hurled Taeyang’s body toward the building.
Taeyang checked the glass window and thrust both feet forward.
Crash!
“What the—what is that?!”
“Crazy! Is it a pigeon?”
“A person! It’s a person!”
“Does that even make sense? This is the fifteenth floor!”
“How did he get in here? Did I take drugs or something?”
It was an ordinary company office.
Taeyang declared boldly, “Haha. Sorry about that! Keep up the good work!”
He glanced behind him. Ran was nowhere to be seen.
Of course.
She was exceptionally good at flying on her own, even if carrying his body was another matter.
It was far more efficient for her to wait leisurely on the first floor than to follow him inside the building.
Taeyang headed for the stairs instead of the elevator.
Thud.
A steel passage lit only by cold, grayish-white fluorescent lights with no sunlight to speak of.
Flap flap flap flap.
Hearing the sound of small mammalian wings, Taeyang smiled faintly.
“Fast.”
“You rat bastard. Did you think I wouldn’t find you if you hid?”
Click.
Schweitzer Angel.
He appeared and leveled his hand cannon at Taeyang.
“Wow. You sure you can fire that indoors?”
Taeyang answered casually.
In Amerigo, a vampire’s mobility was beyond common sense.
He had expected to run into the man eventually even if not here.
Kwaaaaaaaaang!
Taeyang twisted at the waist, dodging the cannon shot.
At the same time he stepped forward.
Crunch.
The fragile concrete floor shattered under Transcendental Jin-gak.
A precise footwork technique that shatters the ground and launches a spinning fist strike.
Bang!
Flap!
At the moment of impact Schweitzer Angel transformed into bats.
Taeyang thrust out his fist and ripped one of the fleeing bats apart.
Kieeeeeeek!
Angel had already manifested behind Taeyang and aimed the hand cannon once more.
“You don’t even need to reload that thing?”
Angel pulled the trigger without answering.
Kwaaaaaaaaang!
This time Taeyang rolled forward.
The asbestos wall of the stairwell shattered, revealing the ugly steel framework beneath.
Thud.
Angel stomped.
“Your movements are quick.”
“Thanks for the compli—”
Thump.
An ominous flow of mana.
Taeyang threw himself aside mid-sentence.
Absolute Shadow.
Angel’s shadow lunged at Taeyang’s own shadow.
“Damn.”
A technique that was physically difficult to avoid.
Taeyang’s body froze for a split second.
“It’s over, thief.”
Click.
“Haha. Friend? Let’s talk for a sec—”
Kwaaaaaaaaang!
“I said talk, damn it!”
Taeyang thrust his fist forward.
Explosive crimson energy that smashes through incoming attacks and temporarily dulls pain.
The bright red fist shattered the hand cannon’s projectile head-on.
Kwaaaaaaaaang!
His fist went numb.
Without the pain-suppressing effect of Blood Qi Surge, it would have been excruciating.
Taeyang circulated mana through his entire body to shake off the restraint and charged at Angel.
Flap flap flap!
Angel transformed into bats once again.
Staring at the dozen or so bats, Taeyang gritted his teeth.
He had expected it, yet a regretful mutter still slipped out.
“Isn’t there another way to deal with this?”
Aside from their behavioral restrictions under sunlight, vampires seemed like an invincible species.
In fact, the ranker Jesus who had reached the forty-eighth floor had deliberately let a vampire bite him during the bounty stage of that run and changed his own race.
Taeyang briefly touched the Light Saber strapped to his back before letting it go.
It was tricky, but the opponent wasn’t able to catch him either.
There was no need to push himself unnecessarily.
Kwaaang!
“Too obvious. Way too obvious.”
The moment Taeyang dodged the bombardment again, Angel reflexively transformed into bats.
Taeyang immediately leaped downward.
“This is getting dirty—let’s settle it next time!”
Flap flap flap flap!
The swarm of bats chased after him in a hurry.
Taeyang grinned.
“…is what I wanted you to think.”
His hand had already slipped into his pocket.
Fast Forward – Accelerates the body. (Cooldown: 12 hours)
The Greatest Machinery’s mainspring winds rapidly.
(Cooldown: 12 hours)
Triples physical speed for 1 minute.
Duration: 1 minute
Tick. Tick. Tick.
Taeyang kicked off the stair railing and shot upward.
Thump.
His right hand shot out.
Crunch.
One bat.
At the same time his left hand snatched a passing bat and hurled it into the one beside it.
The bats lost their shape under his monstrous strength and burst into red pulp.
Flap. Slam.
Three bats.
Taeyang’s hands accelerated until they left afterimages.
Kieeeeeeeeeeeek!
Taeyang shook the blood off his hands.
The thick droplets of bat blood splattered onto the floor.
“Too bad.”
In the end, he had missed one.
Hyeonhye’s voice crackled with frustration.
“Nice going. I keep telling you to be careful because you only have one life…”
Schweitzer Angel’s face was filled with shock.
It must have been dizzying—almost ending in an instant like that.
Taeyang looked at him and grinned.
“I’ll let you off this once.”
He had never planned to kill the man anyway.
It would be easier if the guy gathered the other bounty targets for him.
Besides, this opponent was nearly impossible to catch with ordinary methods.
The only reason he had confronted the vampire was to gauge the level of the city’s power holders.
Thud.
He had already reached the first floor.
Taeyang looked up and muttered leisurely, “See you next time, friend.”
I’ll be collecting the bounty then, so keep that neck nice and clean.
Taeyang stepped outside with a refreshed expression.
Level assessment complete.
Evaluation… yeah. Just about right for running wild.
Creak.
When he came out of the building, Ran was waiting with a bored look.
“Why did you take so long?”
“Ah, sorry. I was checking things out.”
Bang.
The door closed, and Angel muttered with a hardened face.
“This won’t be easy.”
* * *
Messiah’s companions were murmuring among themselves.
“How did this happen?”
“Does this mean all our groundwork is wasted?”
“Even our connections with Chongchong and the others?”
“Those remain. Most of them do. They’re useful no matter what. Information especially. However… the situation has become a bit unfortunate. That can’t be denied.”
“Too bad.”
It was natural to feel regret when things didn’t go as planned, but the disappointment they felt this time was especially sharp.
Under Messiah’s strict direction, they had completed the groundwork at a literally record-breaking pace.
Starting with absolutely nothing, it had taken them only six hours to reach the highest echelons of the city’s power structure.
Moreover, the vampire supplier who produced V-Heroin was one of the most secretive figures in the entire city.
Celtavigo muttered, “It really is a shame. We were in a position to seize the whole board of this stage and shake it.”
Messiah encouraged the dejected users.
“Actually, this is better.”
“Is there another method?”
“No. We proceed as planned. Nothing changes.”
“Nothing changes?”
Celtavigo asked back.
Messiah nodded.
The first thing he had done after realizing the situation had gone awry was to check—through Chongchong and the rest of their network—how much information had leaked.
“The rumor that Angel’s building was robbed has already spread. There’s talk that something important was stolen as well.”
“Then the fact that it was V-Heroin also…”
“Shh!”
Messiah lowered his voice.
“Keep it down. This isn’t something good for others to overhear.”
“Ah.”
“The rumor that the thing Taeyang stole was ‘that’ isn’t spreading.”
“What? How is that possible?”
“Because Angel’s side isn’t reacting on the surface.”
Celtavigo realized a beat late.
“Just one thief. If the thing Yoon Taeyang stole really was ‘that,’ they should have overreacted even more, right?”
“Logically, yes.”
One of the users asked, “Does that even make sense? How many people live in this city? How many eyes were focused on that explosion?”
Messiah snapped his fingers.
“That’s exactly the point.”
It was an astonishing level of information control.
“It looks like the city’s power holders all moved together to keep the flies from swarming the shit.”
And they had done so without even exchanging opinions.
“They blocked the information in perfect sync without any prior agreement? All of them?”
“It’s not their first rodeo. Like you said, how many eyes are watching the city right now?”
“It’s all accumulated filth. Or can you explain the current situation any other way?”
Since players who had entered the city were causing disturbances everywhere and drawing attention, it wasn’t entirely impossible.
Another user asked, “Then will the auction still proceed as scheduled?”
Messiah nodded.
“What matters to us isn’t ‘that item’ anyway. It was the people who would gather for the auction.”
“True. Looking at it that way, nothing really changes.”
“Will Angel’s side still open the auction even if they can’t recover the ‘item’?”
“They will.”
The auction was scheduled to take place at Club Pantheon.
Although the highlight was supposed to be V-Heroin, plenty of other valuable items would be on offer.
“For now we stick to the plan. Let’s focus on gathering cash. The items that will appear there are quite valuable—good enough to be useful even on the higher floors.”
* * *
Auction day. Club Pantheon.
Messiah, dressed in a sharp suit, gave final instructions to his companions outside the club.
“Check the signals regularly. I’ll keep sending updates even if nothing changes.”
“Understood.”
After a quick fist bump with his companions, Messiah stepped into the club.
A large guard stopped him.
“Your name?”
“Messiah.”
“Confirmed.”
The guard, who seemed to have memorized every invited guest’s name, opened the door immediately.
Once inside, Messiah scanned the room and clenched his fist.
It wasn’t wrong!
Antigone Plot with a six-million-point bounty, Bimal Straight with three-and-a-half million, Rebecca Handrake with four-point-eight million.
The faces he had memorized from photographs the night before were sitting casually at the surrounding tables.
Messiah quickly calculated the achievements he could earn.
Meeting the nobles of the night—the first encounter will definitely be mine. If I can snag two or three of them within five minutes, it’ll be a massive windfall…
Soon the club lights went out.
And the auction host, Schweitzer Angel, appeared.
A pale-skinned gothic man stepped onto the stage with impeccable elegance.
“There are many busy people here. We’ll greet each other separately, so I won’t waste time with formalities.”
He smiled faintly and began conducting the auction in a relaxed tone.
Flash.
The lights focused on the stage at the front of the club.
“Main event, the auction. Let’s begin right away. First item.”
It was then.
“You may enter…”
Kwaaaaaaaaang!
“Aigoo. If your boss sees this he’ll flip his eyes and start serving me, you know? Wanna bet?”
A bold, slightly cocky male voice.
The tables erupted into commotion.
“Even Angel is finished.”
“Seriously. It wasn’t like this back in the day.”
“Well. Even if they’re vampires, it seems only their bodies don’t age.”
“They said ‘that’ item won’t even be appearing in this auction, right?”
“It was stolen by a duo of thieves not long ago.”
“Really? He’s fallen that far? That Angel?”
“Shh. Don’t push him too hard. Whether you like it or not, the only supplier of ‘that item’ is right here.”
Schweitzer Angel’s face twisted.
Yoon Taeyang strolled in with a completely casual expression.
He pulled a white pouch of reddish powder from his pocket and shook it.
“Heard the restaurant was missing its main dish, so I came to help. Anyone got a problem with that?”
Messiah whipped his head around.
He came here?
Why?
What is he thinking?
Dozens of thoughts flashed through Messiah’s mind in an instant.
And soon those dozens of thoughts condensed into a single sentence.
Messiah let out a long sigh and muttered, “Why the hell are you here?”