Chapter 56
Chapter 56
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 56
Chapter Title: Shadow
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Wang-sik wasn't used to fighting assassins.
*Incredible.*
It was his honest assessment.
His image of an assassin was someone who always hid in the shadows, launching surprise attacks. That was all Wang-sik had thought they were.
But he was wrong.
The assassin before him was engaging in a direct confrontation, and he was anything but weak.
*Screech!*
His claw scraped against the armor. When Wang-sik tried to grab the claw, it slipped away like a phantom, circling around to his side.
It was moving to a place his hands couldn't reach.
Assassins like this used their opponent's body structure to quickly seize an advantageous position.
In the moment he turned, no less than three attacks came in: one for his neck, one for his heart, and the last, completely unexpected, for his ankle.
*Clang!*
Of course, all that came from Wang-sik’s body was the sound of scraping metal. At that, his opponent ceased the attack and swiftly retreated.
Facing him again, the opponent was of a similar height to Wang-sik, with a slender build.
Though slim, he was 180 centimeters tall, making him rather large for an assassin.
Nevertheless, once the fight began, he was difficult to follow with the naked eye.
It wasn't just his speed; his movements followed unconventional paths, adding to the confusion.
*Tsk!*
The man scraped his own forearm with his claw.
As blood touched it, the claw began to radiate a red light, and a murderous aura, different from before, emanated from him.
"So you're getting serious now."
The man didn't speak. He must have been surprised by his target's skill, yet there was no change in his eyes.
A veteran assassin.
*Fwoosh!*
This time, Wang-sik attacked first.
The fight was long.
*A little more.*
Wang-sik had a way to subdue him instantly, but he held back.
*I need to learn this now.*
He let his opponent use every method at his disposal.
As time passed, he began to see the movements that had been imperceptible before.
How to move out of his line of sight.
How to twist a natural body movement at the last second to deceive him about the direction of an attack.
How to seize the blind spots of an opponent’s body.
How to attack two places at once, too fast for the eyes to follow.
How to strike vital points with precision.
The assassin's fighting style was effective and systematic. And from beginning to end, his focus never wavered.
*He just had the bad luck of facing me.*
After about ten minutes, Wang-sik caught the claw as it came for his eyes.
Only then did he see the beads of sweat on the assassin's face.
"Now, shall we hear your voice?"
*Crack!*
Wang-sik's fist shattered Miesse's elbow. Yet even in the moment his arm was dislocated, Miesse bent down, trying to strike the top of Wang-sik's foot.
*Clang!*
The attack was perfect, but it couldn't pierce Wang-sik's defense.
"Too bad for you."
*Thud!*
Wang-sik struck the back of Miesse's head.
Even a superb assassin couldn't help but lose consciousness from that single blow.
A man visited the Holland branch of the Dark Moon.
He was an old man in his late sixties, with a frail appearance and liver spots beginning to form on his face.
Indeed, as he entered the branch office, which was disguised as a small tavern, his steps faltered as if he might collapse at any moment.
But the branch manager, who had sent the customers away and was waiting anxiously, immediately dropped to his knees and bowed his head upon seeing the old man.
As the branch manager prostrated himself completely, the old man's voice, raspy as if mixed with iron filings, fell upon him.
"You've failed four times?"
"I apologize."
"Tsk, tsk. The other guilds will be delighted if they find out. Shouldn't we be doing good things for our own guild?"
It was a time of fierce competition.
If word got out that they had failed to eliminate a single target four times, the Dark Moon's prestige would surely fall.
"Headquarters will handle it, so be advised."
"What? No, sir. If you would just give me one more chance..."
"Are you disobeying an order?"
The old man's voice turned icy. The branch manager forgot he even had to answer, swallowing hard against the fear seeping into his body.
"I will manage this place until the next branch manager arrives. You would do well to gain more experience in the general manager position."
With a single sentence, he was demoted from branch manager to general manager.
This was the way of the Dark Moon.
"Th-thank you."
He had to answer this way. At least he had saved his own life.
"But if Miesse was taken down, this target must be no pushover."
Miesse was skilled enough to be considered mid-tier even at headquarters. Not only had he failed, but the target, Relic, was seen walking around perfectly fine the next morning.
"There will be no failure."
"Who on earth are you sending...?"
"He's someone who will certainly restore our pride. This matter needs to be finished quickly and buried."
At those words, a name came to mind.
"Shadow..."
"Do not speak his name so carelessly."
"I apologize."
The branch manager did not open his mouth again.
It was an exceptionally dark night.
Wang-sik, living as Relic, lay in bed and closed his eyes.
*Will I be able to get some sleep tonight?*
It had been nearly a month since he started living as Relic.
The number of times Wang-sik had slept peacefully during that period could be counted on one hand. Even with confidence in his defense, he had to remain vigilant in a situation where an assassin was sure to come.
As nearly a month passed, drowsiness seemed to dominate his body the moment he lay in bed.
*Something's strange.*
Even as he fought off sleep, Wang-sik had a strange feeling. But it was just a feeling.
Even when he closed his eyes and focused, nothing seemed out of the ordinary.
One hour.
Two hours.
As time went on, his body strangely began to tense up.
*Something is here.*
But again, it was just a thought.
It had already been five hours since he lay down in bed.
It was still the dead of night. And for a moment, Wang-sik couldn't overcome the wave of drowsiness.
The moment he realized he had dozed off, he felt a sharp, chilling presence.
"Huh?"
His surroundings were silent.
He had clearly felt a chill, but there was no sign of its source.
*This is torture.*
He couldn't sleep peacefully. Having not slept properly for a month, Wang-sik was reaching his limit.
*I just have to endure until morning.*
Wang-sik gave up on sleep and waited for dawn.
*Zzzzzz!*
Wang-sik was fast asleep, his body sprawled out.
He slept soundly, lulled by the floor that swayed like a waterbed.
"Well, I'll be. I've never seen someone sleep so comfortably on a boat."
Wang-sik, who had rented a fishing boat in the early morning, had asked the captain to keep the boat moving until evening.
"Just go out as far as you can and then come back. But please take a different route on the way back."
Less than ten minutes after the boat departed, Wang-sik had stretched out on the deck and fallen asleep.
"If any boat, even a small one, approaches, please wake me. Otherwise, don't disturb me until I wake up on my own."
Since he had been promised a large sum of money, the captain had no reason to refuse.
"Yawn."
Wang-sik, waking from a long sleep, stretched and stood up just as the sun was setting.
"Now that I've slept well, shall we have a proper fight?"
Wang-sik gave the captain the promised gold coin and returned home.
*They must know by now that this torture is useless.*
After getting a full night's sleep on the boat, his condition had improved. At this rate, he would have no trouble staying alert for several days.
"I think it's about time you came out."
He tried to provoke his foe, but there was no response.
Time passed, and as dawn approached, Wang-sik, who was lying in bed, opened his eyes.
*Screech!*
The sound came from behind him. But this noise was different from usual.
A blade shot up through the bed, shattering his shield and lightly piercing his skin.
*Thump!*
Wang-sik slammed his fist on the bed as he shot up.
"So you were there?"
He hadn't thought to look under the bed.
*At this distance, I couldn't even hear him breathe?*
The realization that an assassin had been right beneath him as he lay there sent a shiver down his spine.
*The one they sent this time is the real deal.*
Wang-sik didn't let his guard down and activated his armor. A golden suit of armor materialized around his body, but the ruined bed remained silent.
*He's definitely there.*
If it had been some kind of device, it wouldn't have been able to break Wang-sik's Holy Shield.
Certain of this, Wang-sik extended his chains.
As the chains lifted the bed, a black shadow seemed to scatter in a zigzag pattern before lunging toward Wang-sik.
*Clang!*
A dagger grazed his neck.
Fortunately, his activated helmet blocked it. But then, his opponent vanished again.
His pattern was completely different from Miesse's.
He appeared like a ghost and then erased even the slightest trace of his presence.
The attack had been fierce; the edge of the helmet that had protected his neck was cleanly cut.
It was a tense situation.
And yet, Wang-sik smiled.
"I finally found you."
Korean words came from his mouth. Still, his opponent didn't react.
*I definitely saw him.*
Wang-sik had seen the face of the man who tried to cut his throat.
"Sa Seon-gi. It's me, Bae Wang-sik."
When he called the name, he felt a faint presence from the ceiling.
Looking up, he saw a man clinging to the ceiling like an ornament.
"Bae Wang-sik?"
The man dropped down from the ceiling.
Drail, from the Dark Moon headquarters, was looking down at Wang-sik's house from the roof of a warehouse.
*This is taking a while. For Shadow to be taking this long... the target must be no ordinary man.*
Drail, a freckle-faced man in his late twenties, was leisurely taking out a piece of rye bread when he suddenly moved.
*It's started.*
He had heard a sound.
His role was to monitor the assassin, Shadow.
Shadow had a different story from most assassins.
He pressed himself against the wall, watching the inside, when a sudden roar erupted and two men burst outside.
The target and Shadow.
They exchanged fierce blows, but wounds began to accumulate on the target's body.
*As expected of Shadow. The opponent seems pretty tough, though.*
As the large target continued to take damage, he let out a roar and launched a counterattack.
It was an attack that seemed to say, "Let's die together."
*Shadow isn't the type to fall for that.*
Just as Drail predicted, Shadow swiftly dodged the attack, spun around, and sliced off the target's head.
*Thud.*
The head fell, and from the body that remained standing for a moment, blood gushed like a fountain.
An undeniable death.
Drail emerged from his hiding spot.
"Good work, Shadow."
Shadow left the scene without a word.
Drail gave one last look at the decapitated target before following after Shadow.
A moment later.
The brutally killed body of Wang-sik dissipated into gray ash.
Guardian Illusion.
The one who had been decapitated was a fake he had created.
*This should do it, right?*
Having faked the target's elimination, Wang-sik remained motionless in the living room.
After an hour, a man in black clothes appeared before him with the sound of a faint breeze.
"Bae Wang-sik..."
"You've been through a lot. Let's go back now."
Wang-sik smiled and held out his hand.
By participating in the act he had prepared, Sa Seon-gi had confirmed his intentions.
But Sa Seon-gi couldn't take Wang-sik's hand.
"I can't go. I came to tell you that."
"Why not?"
"They have Seon-yeong."
The Dark Moon didn't trust Sa Seon-gi, an outsider. That was why they assigned a monitor to him and were holding his sister hostage.
"That's a relief."
"A relief?"
At Wang-sik's words, Sa Seon-gi's eyes sharpened. Wang-sik replied as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"It means she's still alive. That's a huge relief. Most of our friends are dead."
"You've met some of the others?"
"I'm still looking. Now that I've found you and Seon-yeong, there are only 89 left to find."
Sa Seon-gi didn't suspect Bae Wang-sik of lying. Their conversation was in Korean, and there was no reason for Wang-sik to orchestrate something like this with ulterior motives.
"We can go back. To the place where we were born."
"Like I said, Seon-yeong is..."
"What's there to worry about?"
Wang-sik took a step forward and placed a hand on Sa Seon-gi's shoulder.
"We'll just have to rescue her. And then we can all go back together."
He said it so naturally that it made it sound like an easy task.