Triggering the Trap Card (2)
I had no intention of ending this cleanly.
A mere broken arm or dislocated shoulder wouldn’t have been bad, exactly, but the gift I’d prepared for the bastard was a little heavier than that.
The moment I let a trace of my own mana seep into the mana Cha Heera had planted in advance, the result began to exceed even my expectations.
I’d been warned it would hurt, but this was far worse than I’d imagined.
“Aaaaaaagh!!”
In an instant, a fountain of blood burst from my right arm.
I saw Cha Heera’s face go taut with urgency as she severed the arm.
Of course, she wasn’t attacking me.
Cutting off my arm was closer to emergency first aid than anything else.
The mana she had secretly embedded in my body before we entered this place had just surged up through me like a runaway tide, so her reaction made perfect sense.
If she hadn’t severed the arm right then, her mana would have drilled straight into my brain in the blink of an eye.
The agony was overwhelming, but when I saw Ito Souta’s face twist in dumbfounded disbelief, it almost felt as if the pain itself had vanished.
Oh, that’s a real painkiller if I’ve ever seen one.
“You little bastard!”
Nice acting.
Cha Heera’s expression of genuine panic added just the right amount of life to this sudden disaster.
After all, she’d been the one who objected first, warning that this might be dangerous, so looking frantic was only natural.
Hahahahahaha.
I wanted to laugh out loud.
Instead, what came from my mouth was a scream of pain.
“Aaaagh!”
My arm came off in an instant.
It was only natural that it hurt. No, the more accurate way to put it was that every scream I’d been swallowing until now burst out all at once.
I’d been biting down on the pain ever since she escorted me here, so there was no way I could keep holding it back.
In fact, now that I no longer had to endure it, I almost screamed even louder.
I felt like a newborn baby all over again.
The cluster of noblewomen who’d been splattered with blood by sheer bad luck shrieked as one and scrambled away from me.
I caught sight of Jung Hayan, startled, rushing toward me in a panic.
Priests’ voices rang out, shouting for help, and Cha Heera, her fist clenched tight, began to swing at Souta.
Even the shockwave alone sent everything nearby flying in all directions.
“Aaahhh!”
“Eek!”
“Damn it!!”
If you wanted to look like the real victim, the most effective thing was to move your own body yourself.
It hurt a little, sure, but this was the rational choice.
Even as Cha Heera’s fist shot forward, I could see Ito Souta’s face contort while he stared straight at me.
For a brief moment, I also rolled on the floor and pulled my mouth into the widest grin I could manage.
You idiot.
KRRAK!
With a deafening crash, Cha Heera’s fist buried itself in his face, and his body spun several times through the air before slamming into the wall.
BOOOOM!
“You filthy bastard….”
“Cough….”
When the dust settled, what was left in view was Ito Souta, pinned against the wall and spitting blood, and Cha Heera walking toward him.
I expected it had to hurt beyond imagination.
His durability wasn’t all that high.
The whole thing had happened so fast that most people looked stunned, but once again, everyone’s attention started snapping back toward me.
Of course they’d focus on me; I’d been screaming and causing a scene in the middle of the party.
Almost immediately, priests crowded around and people started rushing over to check my condition.
“O-oh, Oppa, are you all right? Oppa… huuuuhhh… Oppa….”
“Ughhh….”
“Oppa….”
“Aaaagh!”
Jung Hayan, who had no idea what was going on, was sobbing her heart out while clutching my severed arm.
Even I had to admit the picture was pretty good. Lee Jihye had arrived at some point, too, and was tearing a strip from her dress to stop the bleeding from my arm.
What a scene. Damn… this is really something.
It was the kind of moment you’d expect in a war movie.
“What exactly happened here?”
Lee Jihye threw the obvious question at the priest.
She probably knew better than anyone else what had happened. Her ability to play furious was outstanding.
“No, first treat him. We need to reattach the arm. What are you all standing around for? Is this the time to dawdle? Call a priest, now!”
“Quickly, a priest… a priest!”
“If we’d been even a little later, this wouldn’t have ended with just one arm coming off.”
“Please describe the symptoms.”
“S-someone deliberately pumped mana in from the outside and caused it to go berserk. Fortunately, Lady Cha Heera cut off the arm in time, so it didn’t spread to the rest of his body, but he must be in terrible pain. F-first, we should suture the arm back on. Before it’s too late, we need to purge the residual mana from the severed arm. S-someone….”
“I-I’ll do it. I will.”
“Please, Hayan.”
Fortunately, the priest who’d rushed over was already leaning in a direction favorable to us.
I did think it would’ve been even better if they’d shouted it loud enough for everyone in the room to hear, but by now, everyone who needed to hear it had probably already heard.
The sudden mana surge that started with my right arm was the cause of all this.
Who had deliberately poured mana into me and caused this pain? Well, the culprit was as obvious as could be.
The very name everyone was thinking of.
Our idol.
Ito Souta.
This bastard was the culprit. No matter how you sliced it, this bastard was absolutely the culprit.
Those classified as strong usually possessed some kind of class effect related to advanced mana control.
Only someone who’d learned that kind of knowledge could deliberately inject mana into my arm and make it explode.
At most, there were five people in this room who could do that. The ones who came to mind immediately were Cha Heera, Victor Hart, and Ito Souta.
Victor Hart hadn’t had the spare mana to pour into me in the first place, so that left two suspects—and there was no way my beloved Heera noona would ever do something like this to me, so the culprit was practically decided already.
I figured the bastard himself must have realized he’d fallen into a trap by now.
When I lifted my head slightly, I saw Jung Hayan desperately pressing the severed arm back in place and forcing out the lingering mana, and beyond her I could make out the bastard, still vomiting blood.
“Cough… uweegh….”
It had been a surprise attack, but if it were him, he should have been able to evade it easily.
That was a little disappointing.
Seeing him cough up blood did feel good, but the most beautiful version of this story would’ve been if he’d retaliated against Cha Heera.
Even so, it was still satisfying.
The Yamato Guild members around him seemed to be trying to keep Cha Heera in check somehow, but it was hopeless. If it were up to me, I’d have loved to land the finishing blow right here and now, but…
Given the situation, that’s probably not happening.
Seeing Victor Hart blocking Cha Heera’s path and the guards who had rushed in, it looked like this was where it ended.
The old man’s face, fixed on Cha Heera, was all twisted up.
“Enough. I will not permit any further violence.”
“Move aside, old man. My business isn’t with you—it’s with the bastard behind you.”
“This is not an arena, Heera.”
“And you know damn well who started this little stunt first, don’t you? Yet it looks like you’re blocking me instead of that son of a bitch… and the guards are doing the same. Do none of you still know the difference between victim and aggressor? Do you need more proof? That bastard is caught red-handed. He tried to kill our Jagi in front of my eyes. He’s scum who deserves to die.”
Beautiful.
It was pure force.
Everything about it was force. In truth, it was complete nonsense.
No matter how insane Ito Souta was, he wouldn’t have lost his mind so completely as to pump mana into me and blow my head apart in front of all the high-ranking people gathered here.
If you thought about it calmly, it would be easy enough to realize he wasn’t the culprit.
But the same was true in my case.
Obviously, I wasn’t the kind of man who’d lose his mind enough to slaughter his guild members inside the royal castle of the Holy Empire, either.
I don’t exactly have the balls for that, either….
It was, at worst, just a return blow for the absurd ambush I’d suffered. With evidence in hand, reasons could be manufactured easily enough.
Truth was made here, just as that idiot had made it before me.
“You know something is strange. No matter how much he may have threatened Lee Kiyoung, he’s not stupid enough to start something like this in a place like this. Something must have gone… wrong. We should hear the facts properly and follow procedure first.”
“Well. That depends on how you look at it. There’s some pretty high-level information in our Jagi’s head.”
“…….”
“I can’t say it for sure because there’s no hard evidence, but this is serious enough that I can understand perfectly why Ito Souta would make such a reckless move. He probably wanted to shut our Jagi up by doing this. He knew that if our Jagi opened his mouth, he wouldn’t walk away unscathed.”
That’s the line.
Cha Heera was putting her whole soul into the performance.
I’d been worried it might come off awkward, but maybe because she was too worked up, she was nailing it.
Well done, Cha Heera!
“What….”
“He wanted to silence him enough to pull something like this in a place like this. There’s definitely motive. I guarantee it.”
Of course, it’s a lie.
“And the reason he targeted our Jagi and tried to frame him as a criminal by using Yuliena is the same….”
That’s a lie too.
“If we say the Lindel terror incident is connected as well, doesn’t that explain it?”
And this one is obviously a lie too.
“Even if that were true, you know and remember that punishing the guilty shouldn’t be your role, don’t you? I understand that you’re enraged because the one you love was hurt, but please think about what kind of place this is. If not… I won’t have any choice but to draw my sword, either.”
Victor Hart looked rather tense.
He was clearly entertaining the possibility that Cha Heera’s words might be true, swayed by her astonishing performance.
But the conversation we’d had before coming here would have denied that possibility already.
A daughter-like girl.
From his words, it seemed he held Cha Heera in tremendous trust, but there’s a reason people say there’s no point raising sons and daughters of your own.
Victor Hart slowly raised his sword, his face still hard, and I couldn’t help but speak up.
There was no reason to keep stalling any longer, and nothing more to gain from the standoff.
“Heera noona, I… I’m okay….”
“Jagi.”
The moment Cha Heera jolted and rushed toward me, looking as beautiful as ever, my heart started pounding like mad.
In this instant, Cha Heera felt more precious than Kim Hyunsung.
For some reason, I felt a little guilty toward our regressor, but that was how it was.
“Are you okay? Jagi? Your arm?”
“I’m fine… don’t make a scene. Noona….”
“Yeah… got it.”
She seemed to be calming down, trying to slide back into her cheap-theater tone once the panic had passed.
Watching the guards and Victor Hart surround Ito Souta in an instant put me in a very good mood.
“We’ll detain him first. We need to know why he did something like this in a place like this.”
“I did not attack Lee Kiyoung.”
“You’ll be investigated according to procedure, first.”
Good word, that. Procedure….
“Yes. I’ll submit to an investigation for now, but I did not attack Lee Kiyoung. I’d also like to make it clear to everyone here that I did not approach him with any intent to kill him, nor did I ever threaten him.”
“You’ll have a chance to make your statement later, separately. For now, come with us.”
“Yes.”
The bastard glanced at me briefly. It was only for an instant, but his face was twisted so badly it looked almost insane, which meant he must’ve been furious beyond words.
People like that—people who normally have everything and lack nothing—tend to see it as a humiliation when they’re taken down by something squirming like a grub.
He was probably already feeling like his insides had been turned over.
Even I had been so angry after getting stabbed in the back by him that I couldn’t sleep properly for days.
I didn’t know exactly what he was feeling, but there was no doubt he wanted to tear me apart right this second.
If he could have, I would already be reduced to pieces, my corpse impossible to find.
It didn’t take much thought to imagine how bitter it must feel to know he couldn’t do that.
If he wanted to kill me, he picked the wrong place.
He never should have dragged this into a political battle in the first place.
This isn’t over yet, poor fool. It’s just getting started, so go ahead and look forward to it.
I wanted to send some kind of message to the bastard still glaring at me.
Slowly, I lifted my middle finger, and a delicious thrill ran down my spine. A quiet smile tugged at my lips.
Fuck you.
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