The Mud-Slinging Is a生物 Habit
"Block it, now!"
"Seal that hole over there!"
Japan's Self-Defense Forces had thrown a full cordon around the gate.
The grasslands of Hannibal, an A-rank gate — the very gate the Sword Demon had entered after butchering two players.
"What the hell is going on?"
"He got killed by the Sword Demon, didn't he?"
"I heard he even attacked the Association."
The citizens nearby murmured among themselves. Word had already spread far and wide that the Sword Demon had terrorized the Association and taken lives.
I have to turn public opinion around right here, right now!
Sweat beaded on the brow of the Japanese Association President. He had to rewrite the Sword Demon's image on the spot and pin every last crime on that Korean.
"Everyone — the articles circulating in the news are fabricated!"
The president stepped forward personally to steer the narrative. At his shout, heads turned.
"A vicious awakener from Korea threatened the Sword Demon and manipulated him into doing it!"
This might sour relations with Korea, but that could wait. Right now, none of it mattered.
As long as He exists, everything will work itself out!
Little by little, opinion began to shift at the president's words.
"So the bad guy isn't the Sword Demon, it's that Korean?"
"The Sword Demon would never do such a thing!"
"He's a hero of Japan!"
Human beings are creatures of bandwagoning. Even facts they'd recognize as lies if they stopped to think — the moment one person sets the mood, the crowd gets swept up in it.
You idiots!
Once a mood took hold, it was not easily reversed. And if he cemented this narrative and spread it across the world, he could bury his own sins and preserve the Sword Demon's image all at once.
"We will protect the Sword Demon, who punishes the wicked, and punish the nation of Korea that sent evil to our shores!"
"Yeah!"
"Yeah!"
The surrounding citizens roared along with the president's cry. The mood had flipped so easily because Association staff were planted among that very crowd.
Now, as long as the Sword Demon emerges—!
Everything would be perfect.
Then the gate shuddered.
It had been cleared from the inside.
Gulp.
President and public alike swallowed hard, tense with anticipation. They waited for the Sword Demon to step out.
But the gate closed without a single soul emerging.
"Wh-what is this!"
The president was flustered. If the gate had cleared, someone — whether those Koreans or the Sword Demon — should have come out.
But no one had.
N-no, my plan—!
There was no way to stage the scene now, no way to arrest the Koreans for show. Without a forced confession, this entire performance was worthless. All he'd managed was to wreck relations with Korea for nothing.
"What on earth is going on?"
"There's no Korean and no Sword Demon!"
"Was the Association President lying to us?"
In an instant, the mood reversed — a pivot so fast you'd never guess these were the same citizens who'd been nodding along with the president seconds before.
No! It can't be! This can't be happening!
The Japanese Association President screamed internally.
I knew this would happen.
I frowned as I emerged from the gate. Trusting my gut and using my stealth skill before stepping out had been exactly the right call.
They're scrambling like mad to pin the Sword Demon's sins on me.
If I admitted to any of it, the Japanese president's standing would rise and Korea would be put on the back foot.
How adorable of you.
I wanted to slit that president's throat on the spot, but I couldn't. If I showed myself now, everything would unfold exactly the way he wanted.
For now, I need to disappear.
I slowly drifted away from the spot where the gate had stood.
"Nothing beats home."
"Everyone feels that way after a rough trip abroad."
I nodded along at Dad's words. I was sitting on the living room sofa, munching on snacks.
I hadn't flown back into the country. The airports were sealed off by the Self-Defense Forces.
Did they really think that would keep me in?
I had Cheongun, and I had gates. A gate can be opened anywhere one has been opened before. So I'd opened an exit in my own room and made it home safe and sound.
"Today, Keita, the president of the Japanese Awakeners Association, stepped down in disgrace."
The TV was buzzing with talk of the Japanese Association President. When President Bang Hak-shik responded to the man's public blunder with a hardline stance, the truth finally came pouring out.
"Shouldn't have pushed his luck."
I clicked my tongue, watching the Japanese president flicker across the screen. His beard had grown out ragged, and his eyes were clouded as if he'd been drinking.
"Tsk, tsk."
"That's what happens when greed gets the better of you."
Dad clicked his tongue; Mom sounded positively vindicated.
But there was something weighing on me now.
What about North Korea?
I hadn't thought it through until now, but Envy was supposed to have been in North Korea all along. And a year from now, she was supposed to clash with the North Korean subjugation force.
Yet Envy hadn't been in North Korea — she'd been on the Korean mainland.
Which meant, as of now, North Korea was most likely free of the Demonic Cult's grip.
In other words, an untouched gold mine.
I need to move in and spread my influence — now.
Yes. I had to claim all those prize lands for myself. The problem was how to cross into North Korea.
Use my footwork? Stealth? None of it would work.
As long as that genius of detection is guarding the whole area.
So the next option was getting official permission from President Bang Hak-shik. That was the only remotely realistic route.
The issue is what pretext I use to ask….
While I was turning that over, my senses picked up demons. Quite a few of them, at that.
These bastards….
Barely home a day, and work was already calling. I pulled on a jacket and stepped outside, then shifted into my footwork.
Basic Footwork: Speed.
Moving on my footwork, I cut through the surrounding demons one by one — and when only the last one remained, I chose to take it alive rather than kill it.
"Gah!"
The demon glared up at me, face twisted like it had chewed dog mess. I drove my dagger into its shoulder without mercy.
Shunk.
"Aaargh!"
The demon shrieked as the blade punched through. Thankfully, it seemed to have no resistance to pain.
This makes it easy.
I pressed in around it with my mana — around the demon, at least.
"From now on, you answer every question I ask."
"I'll answer if you just—, GAAH!"
As a lesson in how to speak, I gave the dagger a slight twist. The demon thrashed in agony.
Torture wasn't my specialty, and I didn't enjoy it — but when necessary, I used it.
"I'll talk! I'll talk!"
"Will you, now?"
It broke to the pain far faster than I'd expected. That surprise aside, at least I didn't have to keep at it.
"Then which faction do you belong to?"
"L-Lust."
Figures. Envy's faction had been all but annihilated. There was no reason for this many demons to gather under one banner otherwise.
"Why did you come from Japan to Korea?"
"To abduct you."
"Abduct me?"
Ridiculous. But the demon wasn't lying. So it really had crossed into Korea to take me.
"Why abduct me?"
"Lust was enraged by the Sword Demon's death. She ordered you brought back — either to take the Sword Demon's place, or to become her own consort. She also promised a reward to whoever brings you in."
Long-winded, but the gist was this: Lust had chosen me as the Sword Demon's replacement, with a bounty on my head.
"What a crock of shit."
The situation was a genuine crock of shit. Living a normal life was impossible if I'd be catching gazes like this from here on out.
"Should I just go into a gate, then?"
That would be the cleanest solution. Even demons would have limits chasing me inside a gate.
"I've told you everything. Are you sparing me?"
"Huh? What gave you that idea?"
I said my piece and twisted the blade. And with that, the demon's head came off.
Thud.
"Hah…."
No demons lingering in the area anymore. But over time, more would come, and they'd only keep multiplying.
I'd better head somewhere with a gate.
Just as I was thinking that, my phone rang. I pulled it out and checked the message.
"Ha — could the timing be any better?"
The message on my screen came from the Geumgang Guild. More precisely, from the secretary. And its contents were exactly the support I needed right now.
— We would like to propose your joining the raid on the S-Rank Gate Battlefield of the Wastes.
The very gate I'd been longing for. And not one of those low-tier gates cleared in a day or two — a full-fledged S-Rank Gate.
"Ren."
"Yes."
Ren answered Lust's questions without ever lifting his head.
"Have I done something wrong?"
"No. It was simply a matter caused by your sibling's foolishness."
"Is that so?"
Ever since confirming Ken's death, Lust had been in a slump. Her target, Han Jin, had escaped — and Ken, a long game-piece she'd raised with considerable care, had died at his hands.
"But tell me… why did your brother defy my orders and go outside?"
"……"
Ren gave no answer.
The truth was, he knew the reason. His brother Ken had been consumed by obsession. Once fixated, he clung without limit or end. This time, the object of that fixation had been Lust herself.
Who could have imagined it would come to this?
Ren had never tried to stop Ken's fixation on Lust. He'd dismissed it as mere fanaticism and left it alone.
That had been his mistake.
I never dreamed his fixation on Her ran that deep.
Blindsided by an obsession beyond anything he'd imagined, Ren had been slow to respond — and his brother had paid with his life.
Ren's brow furrowed at the memory of that result.
"So? When will you bring me Han Jin?"
"Most of the faction's demons are currently being dispatched to Korea."
"That's not the kind of vague answer I asked for."
"My apologies."
To fill the void Ken had left, Lust had ordered Han Jin brought in. But this was the demon who had slain one of the Seven Great Demons. None of them dared move rashly.
"Next time we speak, I'd like to see results. If you can manage it."
"I will produce results as quickly as possible."
With that answer, Ren left the room.
To Ren, Ken had never been more than a being bound to him by the word "brother." The only thing that mattered to Ren was whether he could win Lust's recognition.
Han Jin….
Ren turned the name over in his mind and gazed at a photograph. The human who had monopolized Lust's attention.
Perhaps you'll be a little different?