Chapter 66. Trap
I tried to keep my composure.
I asked Bella, “I don’t understand.” With a faint smile at the corners of my mouth, I spoke as calmly as possible. “Your behavior is the textbook attitude of a woman who has feelings. Who buys beef for a man she doesn’t like?”
Bella stared at me blankly.
I blinked once.
I once read that if you hold eye contact for more than three seconds on a date, the other person feels burdened.
Right at the two-second mark, I averted my gaze from Bella’s eyes.
“To me, beef and tteokbokki are the same.” Bella’s tone was flat.
But I thought she was lying.
According to posts I’d read online, when a woman buys expensive food, that’s a definite sign of interest.
It wasn’t just one place—it was dozens of places.
Statistically, it had to be true.
“No, that’s logically contradictory,” I said.
“A price difference applies the same to both the rich and the poor. Having more money doesn’t make that difference stop being a difference!”
At my words, Bella furrowed her brows.
She looked angry and displeased.
But there was another emotion mixed into her expression—something I didn’t know.
Pity? Worry?
I couldn’t understand why Bella disliked me.
Was she the type who valued looks above all else when judging men?
Compared to Cheolmin hyung or the fifteen younger brothers, objectively, I might lack in looks.
I was even a bit behind the younger brother whose hair loss had progressed severely.
But unlike them, I wasn’t an artificial handsome man—I was a natural handsome man.
Did Bella really not know the difference?
Besides, I had a stable job, and a personality that wasn’t abrasive and got along well with people.
There was no reason for Bella to dislike me.
“So why, exactly, am I not to your liking?”
At my question, Bella’s face turned sour.
“I didn’t want to say this much, but with things like this, you have to express it clearly so there’s no misunderstanding later, so I’ll tell you. First, Kang Chan, you’re too stupid. My ideal type is a brainy sexy guy.”
This was a shock.
I had never been called stupid even once in my life.
“Stupid? I got 140 on an IQ test. If it’s just intelligence, I’m in the top tier!”
“Really? I thought you’d be under 100. That’s unexpected. Then you’re just a fool with a good brain, Kang Chan.”
“Can ‘a fool with a good brain’ even exist? That’s logically impossible!”
“Look at your face in a mirror. Your eyes are glaring at me, but your mouth is smiling. Kang Chan, something is seriously twisted in you. You’re different from normal people. And you’re endlessly selfish and calculating. I can’t stand men like that. I like people who are good and kind even if they’re a bit lacking and imperfect. If I had to say, someone like Chanhyeok.”
Bella’s words shattered something inside me.
All this time, I thought I’d successfully hidden my defects and blended into society, living excellently like a normal person.
But to have my secret exposed by a foreign woman who hadn’t even been here long and didn’t even speak Korean well.
And on top of that, being evaluated as worse than Chanhyeok hyung triggered an unpleasantness I couldn’t rationally understand.
“Oh. I didn’t want to hurt you! Sorry. But like I said earlier, you have to say these things at the start so it’s easier for both sides, so please understand!”
After saying that, Bella took the kid from Room 102 by the hand and walked on ahead.
I dropped the smile I always wore and stood blankly on the street, lost in thought.
I could feel her looking back at me.
Bella walked for a while, then lightly glanced back at Kang Chan, standing alone and blankly in place.
With a deeply twisted expression, he looked serious to anyone.
But Bella shrugged.
The pain Kang Chan would suffer tonight was only beginning.
Bella took out her phone, found Lauren’s number, and pressed call.
“Ms. Bella? What is it?”
Lauren asked in surprise at Bella’s call.
“You remember I said I’d help you once, right? Tonight, don’t take only Cheolmin—bring all the lackeys with you.”
Leaving those words, Bella hung up.
That repaid the debt she owed from before.
As soon as she returned to the motel, she watched the kid run straight for the computer in Room 103 for a moment, then went into her room and resumed the drama she had been watching before dinner.
At Bella’s sudden contact, Lauren’s thoughts became complicated.
Because she couldn’t understand how Bella—who just watched dramas in her motel room or slept—knew what Lauren was going to do tonight.
Inside the motel, for unknown reasons, even wiretapping equipment didn’t work, so if Bella wanted outside information, the only way was her phone.
The phone Bella used had already been hacked by the CIA.
But her phone had not rung even once since she entered the country.
The only record was a message received via foreign servers when a North Korean nuke was coming, but the contents were already deleted, and restoration was impossible.
That fact alone showed she wasn’t an ordinary person.
CIA leadership was currently assuming Bella, Kang Chan, and Chaerin were members of a secret organization, but Lauren, who saw them every day on-site, thought differently.
They weren’t some secret organization.
But her opinion as a field agent couldn’t beat the conclusion reached by the Director and other key figures.
After reporting Bella’s words to the analysis team, Lauren went into Cheolmin’s office.
Answers that didn’t come no matter how much you agonized over them would be handled by the analysts who used their brains in the office.
“Are you here?”
Cheolmin was checking his sword in preparation for the Blood Fiend hunt that would happen soon.
“I don’t have a good feeling today. Just in case, let’s prepare more personnel. On the U.S. Army side, I’m planning to mobilize triple the usual number of special troops.”
At Lauren’s words, Cheolmin nodded.
“Understood. I’ll ready all the younger brothers.”
Soon after, fifteen members who had previously received internal energy from Kang Chan gathered in Cheolmin’s office.
Wearing black suits, every one of them was a handsome man with taut skin and a pale, clean complexion.
Whenever Lauren saw them, she felt she could never get used to it.
The two with thinning hair had shaved it all off into bald heads, and they gave off a distinct, intense charm.
Lauren thought that if they weren’t in black suits but instead wore idol outfits and sang, becoming world stars would be a sure thing.
“Today we’re all running the operation together. Form teams of three and move organically with each other!”
Cheolmin felt reassured looking at his younger brothers.
There was nothing to fear anywhere.
From the tests, the Diamond Body Art the Master taught them truly boasted powerful defense that even blocked bullets.
And the Finger Flick Divine Power couldn’t pierce a steel plate, but it easily pierced wooden plywood. If the target were a human, it would have power no different from a gun.
Moreover, they had lived their whole lives rolling around in fights, so each of them had their own competence in fighting. With internal energy circulating through their whole bodies, giving them superhuman strength, there was nothing to fear even if they fought dozens of people—anyone at all.
Even if the opponent wasn’t human, but a monster.
“Oh, right! The thing you asked for before—we’ll set a time and do it within this week.”
Lauren once asked Cheolmin for cooperation because she wanted to test, in real combat, how far internal-energy combat power could go against U.S. Army enhanced-suit troops.
For Cheolmin, who was smashing the Blood Fiends currently throwing Korea into chaos using the intel Lauren provided, there was no reason to refuse.
“Yes! Thank you. Then shall we go?”
They split into vans and headed to today’s destination: a shoe factory in the Yangju area.
According to the intel, it was a factory where a monster had been sighted the day before.
The police responded, but found nothing special. However, U.S. military surveillance analysis through satellites clearly captured the figure of a Blood Fiend.
Even though night had fallen, downtown was full of energy, and traffic was jammed.
Korea was in the greatest boom since Dangun, and self-employed business owners who, just months ago, said they were all dying were now letting out joyful screams at the flood of customers.
Watching that scene, complicated thoughts came to Cheolmin.
He wondered what would happen if the people learned that monsters were growing their forces in the shadows behind that splendor.
In no time, the streets would lose their vitality and become like a ghost town.
More and more, it became hard to clearly judge what was right and wrong in everything in the world.
Before Cheolmin became strong like now and built a large force, it was easy to judge right and wrong. But the more he had, the more the world looked gray rather than black and white.
“There are about twenty factory workers inside.”
When they arrived at the destination, the U.S. commander said.
After leaving Seoul and driving along a quiet road, the shoe factory that suddenly appeared was large, and the inside lights were brightly on.
About a hundred U.S. soldiers who arrived in advance had surrounded the factory, and they had already gathered information through infrared night-vision scopes and X-ray surveillance equipment.
About eighty regular troops and twenty enhanced-suit soldiers.
With Cheolmin and the younger brothers reborn, even alone, they could easily handle three or four monsters.
They could probably handle even more than that.
And those U.S. suit troops riding those machines could also comfortably handle one or two by themselves.
No matter how sharp the monsters’ teeth and claws were, they couldn’t tear steel.
It was sufficient strength.
“The suit troops will enter first. Please enter depending on the situation.”
The U.S. commander was a major, and he showed Cheolmin respectful etiquette.
“Yes. We will surround the perimeter, and if variables occur, we will participate.”
The suit troops prepared portable railguns and X-ray optical targeting devices, and the infantry prepared confinement gear to suppress Blood Fiends once captured alive.
Lauren was also checking her pistol, but Cheolmin thought a situation where her weapon mattered wouldn’t come.
In movies, America breaks down doors with log-like equipment, but in reality, the suit troops just tore them open with raw strength and entered.
There was no knock or warning.
Watching that, Cheolmin thought that if, by some chance, the intel was wrong and innocent people were inside, how shocked and bewildered they would be.
But contrary to Cheolmin’s thought, the footage coming from the camera mounted on a suit trooper’s chest unfolded differently than expected.
About twenty Southeast Asian workers inside the factory put their hands on their heads and dropped to their knees when the U.S. soldiers entered. When monsters were ambushed like this, they usually bared teeth and claws and attacked, but these people were reacting completely differently.
“Are they ordinary people?”
When Cheolmin frowned, Lauren also watched the screen with a serious expression.
There was no way the intel was wrong, so it was strange.
“Tell them to be careful. There’s a high chance they’re acting like ordinary people without revealing their true form.”
Lauren radioed the operation commander.
“They are ordinary people. Our self-developed test kit showed a negative result.”
After drawing a bit of blood from one Southeast Asian worker and checking it with the test kit, the commander reported to Lauren. It was equipment created by experimenting on monsters captured in the U.S. mainland. Lauren thought it made no sense and tried to contact headquarters.
“It’s a trap! Tell everyone to get out.”
From behind Lauren, just as she was about to call HQ, Chaerin’s voice was heard.
When she turned, Chaerin had appeared before she knew it, standing there with a sword in one hand.
“Master!”
Cheolmin was startled by Chaerin’s sudden appearance.
Then a strange scene was captured on the screen.
One of the shoe-factory workers who had been clustered together with hands on their heads, kneeling, wobbled to their feet and walked toward the U.S. soldiers.
“Don’t move! We’ll fire!”
But the factory worker, with unfocused, cloudy eyes, ignored the warning and walked like a zombie, both hands held out in front of him.
Thoomp.
When the portable railgun fired at the approaching man, a huge hole opened in the man’s abdomen.
But as if he hadn’t taken any damage, the man came forward and hugged the suit trooper who had just fired the railgun. Then the man’s blood, pouring from the wound blown open by the railgun, began to bubble—and exploded like a bomb.