Chapter 79
Chapter 79
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 79
Chapter Title: A Quick Visit (2)
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Vroooom.
As they left the city limits, the taxi bounced up and down on the rougher road.
Inside, Kanghyeok stared out the window, his lips pressed into a firm line.
“You ain't got no luggage, so I gotta ask, you a tourist? The view's not bad, eh?”
The taxi driver occasionally spoke to him with a thick Italian accent.
Kanghyeok didn't respond, continuing to gaze out the window.
Not that he was captivated by the passing Italian scenery.
*What's going to happen?*
This was his first time meeting the Errant Priests.
Something he had never experienced in his past life.
No one at the company had ever done it, so there were no records.
He hadn't entertained the naive thought that Gabriel and Amos would welcome him with open arms.
The Errant Priests were fundamentally hostile to the company.
Approaching them was perhaps akin to charging into enemy territory unarmed.
*Still, I have to go.*
The organization that had destroyed the world.
Because the only people who could track them were the Errant Priests.
It had only been a week. Only.
Only a week had passed since he'd sunk their cruise ship and thwarted their plan.
“A quiet one, aren't you.”
The taxi driver grumbled and turned onto a side road.
For the first time, Kanghyeok looked at the driver, who just shrugged and kept driving.
“Don't try anything funny.”
Thump!
As Kanghyeok spoke in a fluent Italian accent, the taxi driver's hands flinched on the steering wheel.
It seemed the driver had assumed Kanghyeok was a clueless tourist who knew nothing about Italy.
“Hey, you speak Italian?”
“Very well. I've been here many times for work.”
“A-ahem.”
“Get back on the main road. Don't even think about taking some pathetic detour.”
The sharp tone and intense gaze with which Kanghyeok spoke were not those of an ordinary man.
The taxi driver swallowed dryly and returned to the main road at the next fork.
“Phew!”
This was why you always had to be careful taking taxis in a foreign country.
Kanghyeok pushed a breath through his teeth and pulled out a cigarette.
Click, fwoosh!
Kanghyeok took a few bills from his wallet and tossed them into the cup holder between the driver and passenger seats.
The driver looked like he wanted to say it was a non-smoking car.
But given what he'd just tried to pull, he carefully took the money, not wanting to get on Kanghyeok's bad side.
Whirrr.
Instead, he opened the rear window to let the smoke out.
“Hooo!”
The driver, clearly startled, jumped again as Kanghyeok exhaled the smoke like a sigh.
*Damn bastard. Why'd he have to pull a stunt like that?*
“Tsk!”
Kanghyeok narrowed his eyes, looked out the window, and brought the cigarette to his lips.
Sizzle.
The tip of the cigarette burned fiercely, shortening it. Kanghyeok blew the smoke out the window, picturing the faces of Gabriel and Amos.
*Are they the only ones I can rely on right now?*
A week had passed, so there was a high probability they'd found something.
Anything, no matter how trivial.
He needed it.
To stop those bastards from destroying humanity again.
*If this goes well, I might gain something else, too.*
Who would benefit most from getting involved with the Errant Priests?
Certainly not the company.
Nor the organization he was chasing.
It was none other than Kanghyeok.
A powerful armed group that could become his strength.
If he could confirm their true nature and build even a small connection, this visit would be a tremendous success.
Having finished his cigarette, Kanghyeok leaned his head back fully against the headrest.
A long time passed like that.
They entered a lush, green country village, and the taxi driver slowed down, rubbing his stiff neck.
“This is Brennero.”
“To the nearby church. It should also be an orphanage.”
“A church? I've never heard of a church around here.”
“Then find out.”
The driver silently did as Kanghyeok said.
He drove to the edge of the village, rolled down his window, and spoke to a middle-aged woman who looked like a local.
“Signora! Can I ask for directions? Is there a church around here?”
“Why are you going there?”
At her overtly wary response, the driver jerked a thumb toward Kanghyeok in the passenger seat.
The woman, perhaps thinking Kanghyeok was a tourist, told him the location of the church.
“You can just go straight that way, but... are you a tourist?”
“I'm here on business.”
The middle-aged woman frowned.
“If you're thinking about something like adoption, you'd better give up. They never let anyone adopt the children. They don't get along with the townspeople, you see.”
The driver glanced at Kanghyeok, asking what he wanted to do. When Kanghyeok told him to go, he thanked the woman and headed toward the church.
Clunk, clunk!
“Damn, what kind of road is this?”
The driver was flustered by the bumpy surface typical of a country road, and then dumbfounded when the road simply ended.
“Well, this is...”
Kanghyeok got out of the taxi.
The car couldn't go any further, but it was a path a person could walk, so the taxi was no longer needed.
“Will you be quick? I can wait if...”
Kanghyeok answered by shaking his head.
The driver sucked in his lips, turned the wheel, and drove back the way he came.
Chirp, chirp, chirp.
Walking down the narrow path, filled with the loud chirping of insects, Kanghyeok felt like he was entering an unfamiliar world.
He walked for about twenty minutes.
In the distance, he saw a humble church.
*Is that really the headquarters of the Errant Priests?*
There was no way to know.
It was an unknown place no one had ever visited.
On the surface, it looked incredibly peaceful, a place far removed from combat or firearms.
The lush trees, the clean church, and the children playing with a ball in the distance, looking so innocent, only reinforced that impression.
Rustle.
Kanghyeok, who had been about to take out a cigarette, stopped his hand.
The children playing with the ball had spotted him and immediately stopped, their eyes fixed on him. That, and he had detected a familiar scent hanging faintly in the air.
The smell of heated lead.
The acrid smell of gunpowder.
Kanghyeok met the children's gazes before walking toward the church.
A nun blocked his path.
“How can I help you?”
An ordinary nun?
No, a retired soldier in a nun's habit.
Her posture and the small scars and burns peeking out from under her sleeves gave her away.
At least, to Kanghyeok.
“I'm here to see the Father.”
“What is it regarding?”
“There is something I need to discuss.”
A calm smile spread across the nun's lips, but it didn't reach her eyes.
“He is in the confessional. I'll show you the way.”
Kanghyeok followed the nun into the church, toward the confessional.
*It's well-kept inside.*
The scent of old wood and brick.
And mixed with it, the smell of incense.
If he hadn't known the Errant Priests were here, he would have thought it was just an ordinary church.
“This way.”
Click.
As Kanghyeok entered the confessional, the nun closed the door behind him. He sat on the chair placed before a thin partition.
The thin wooden partition was a lattice screen, so he could faintly see inside.
*Is that the Father?*
A man with a large build, whose silhouette was barely visible.
No, was it even a man?
He couldn't even be sure of the gender.
Facing the leader of the Errant Priests for the first time, an atmosphere settled in that made it difficult for even Kanghyeok to speak rashly.
“I don't believe we've met.”
“There is someone I wish to meet.”
“This is a confessional. If you have sins, speak of them first.”
Kanghyeok looked at the Father through the screen.
He couldn't even tell what posture the Father was in.
Still, he could clearly perceive the atmosphere and emotions in the air.
*Hostility, tension. But no fear.*
This Father seemed to have already figured out who Kanghyeok was.
He must have heard from Gabriel or Amos, so his identity was one thing.
But from when?
From the moment he walked toward the village or the church?
Kanghyeok ran his tongue over his teeth and spoke.
“I've killed people.”
“Murder is a great sin.”
“I know.”
“For personal vengeance? Or at the behest of another?”
“Out of necessity.”
“The worst form of all. How can a mere human judge such a necessity?”
Perhaps it was the power of the space, but it truly felt like a confession.
Thus, Kanghyeok spoke with unconscious force.
“But I couldn't just let them be.”
“And why is that?”
“I know what those bastards will do.”
The image was still vivid in his mind.
The burning bus.
The melting people.
Just recalling that day brought back the stench from his memory, sharp and real at the tip of his nose.
“This is my business, and I don't expect anyone's understanding. But I need someone to help me. Someone to hunt them down with me.”
It was then.
Kanghyeok fixed his gaze on the screen.
Something familiar was pressed so tightly against the screen that its shape was visible.
*A gun barrel.*
Right behind the screen, it was aimed precisely at Kanghyeok's head.
Click.
The sound of the safety being released was followed by the sound of the gun being cocked.
“I understand your intent, but there is one thing I must confirm. Are you affiliated with the company?”
Kanghyeok remained silent, meeting the gaze of the gun barrel.
Looking at the round muzzle felt like staring into the crazed eyes of a killer.
Especially a loaded one.
Yet, he felt no killing intent from the Father holding the gun.
“If I say yes, will you pull the trigger?”
“I do not know.”
“I think I do. I am with the company. As a subcontractor, though.”
“I have not heard of your company having such a thing.”
He knew the company well.
This man, the Father.
Kanghyeok narrowed his eyes and replied.
“I'm the first.”
“You would not be lying.”
“I'm not the kind of man to lie in a confessional.”
“...”
“I know why you pulled out the pistol. It's because you hate the company. But I also know why you haven't pulled the trigger yet.”
He already knew what the Errant Priests desperately needed.
Kanghyeok remembered the Errant Priests of the future, not the present.
“I know what you want from me. It is difficult right now. But if the opportunity arises, I will guide you.”
“You know what I want...”
“Clothing and weapons to protect the children.”
In the future, the Errant Priests wore vestments and habits made of bulletproof material.
Their armaments were also far superior to what Gabriel and Amos had.
The Errant Priests must have been searching for this for a very long time.
*But they must not have been able to make contact with anyone who deals in such things.*
That must be why the Errant Priests' full-scale activities were delayed until much later than the present.
“A proposal as sweet as Satan's. But I am not so foolish as to accept an offer made without reason.”
Click.
That was the sound of an index finger moving to the trigger.
“I'm not offering it for nothing.”
“Then?”
“I want you to become my strength.”
“Why is that?”
“Because we are looking at the same thing.”
The bastards Kanghyeok was chasing moved as a group.
As an individual, he was bound to hit a limit someday.
*I can't just rely on the company. I need other people.*
Even now, he didn't understand.
How the company had fallen to them so easily, so futilely.
That was why Kanghyeok needed another power to help him, and he hoped it would be the Errant Priests.
A suffocatingly long time passed.
“I want to speak with Gabriel and Amos.”
Just as the sound of the nun pacing anxiously outside the confessional could be heard, the Father spoke.
“Follow me. Gabriel is waiting.”