Chapter 207 – Next Target
Before calling Christine, Ryu Min called Jeffrey first.
“Yeah? You’re coming?”
Apparently, Christine was already on her way to Korea.
“Why?”
- I think she wants to hear your next Round prophecy, Prophet-nim.
‘She could’ve requested it over the phone, but she’s coming in person.’
Well, when someone gives you prophecies that become blood and flesh every time, it would be rude to say “just tell me over the phone.”
“Jeffrey. Tail Christine. When the time comes, I’ll contact you. Lure her to the location I want.”
- I will follow your command.
‘Originally I was going to call her using the excuse of the next Round prophecy, but…’
If Christine was coming on her own, there was no need to talk on the phone.
‘It’s better that she doesn’t realize I’m involved as much as possible.’
If word reached Ma Kyung-rok that Ryu Min had summoned Christine—
A stray arrow might end up pointing at him.
And then the target might naturally become his younger brother, Ryu Won.
‘That’s why I’m not pulling out my stock recklessly either. I need to play the victim too.’
It didn’t make sense for a Prophet to go broke trading stocks, but if he said he couldn’t see the future, that was that.
‘When the time comes, I’ll call Seo Arin too. Of course, from Black Scythe’s phone number, not mine.’
He planned to lure the two of them to one place and make them see Ma Kyung-rok’s true face.
Assuming, of course, that Ma Kyung-rok actually committed a crime.
‘First, I should have Joo Seong-tak tail Ma Kyung-rok. I have other errands.’
Ryu Min didn’t have time to tail Ma Kyung-rok himself.
He needed to grasp the Messiah’s movements first.
‘And I need to meet John Delgado too.’
If he met John, there was something he wanted to test.
Whether he could make use of Sariel, the one turned into a summon.
‘They’ll gather at that cabin again this time too, without fail.’
He could vividly imagine what conversations the Messiah would exchange inside.
‘They’ll probably talk about this and that while referring to me as Swingman.’
In that case, he couldn’t go in Swingman’s appearance.
He needed to listen to what they were saying, so he planned to monitor them using Invisibility.
“Hyung, where are you going again?”
“Yeah. I’m going abroad for a bit.”
“Don’t tell me you’re going to meet that Japanese girlfriend?”
‘Japanese girlfriend?’
He’d gone to Japan for a hot-spring trip, and it seemed that misunderstanding stuck.
“Uh… yeah, something like that.”
“Haha, then I approve. Have a good trip, Hyung!”
“Yeah. I’ll be back.”
Without meaning to, he’d gained a girlfriend, but Ryu Min thought it wasn’t a bad excuse.
Booom—!
With a single punch, the table in the cabin split with a loud craack.
“Does this make any sense? Our members got taken out!”
The one raging with a face turned bright red was none other than Yang Qiwen.
He had confirmed the failure of the Black Scythe assassination operation through the Round 12 results window.
Because the name Black Scythe was sitting blatantly in first place.
But he wasn’t disappointed that the operation failed.
The other apostles here were the same.
Because there was still the alternate plan Swingman had proposed.
And yet…
“Fck—what kind of fcking bastard did this to my people…!”
When they returned to reality, something shocking had happened.
All 28 members of the Heuk Society who moved directly under Yang Qiwen had been killed.
Yang Qiwen, a Player, had been inside a heavily secured bunker-style house, so he could avoid disaster, but…
Booom—!
“Damn it! F*ck!”
Now he had no direct civilian subordinates left.
If he had anyone, it was only Jang So-wi—his right-hand man and a Player.
“Calm down. At this rate, you’ll break the table.”
When the Messiah founder, Spaniard, tried to stop him, Yang Qiwen glared with eyes like axes.
“Is this table the problem right now? All my direct people are dead!”
“Members can be gathered again, can’t they? There should be countless punks who’d love to come under China’s Rank 1, Yang Qiwen-nim.”
“F*ck—do you think I’m some bloodless, tearless psychopath? My family died! My men—my subordinates I ate from the same pot with, overcame hardships with!”
“……”
With Yang Qiwen shouting like that, Spaniard didn’t open his mouth again.
It seemed the organization had been a pretty important part of Yang Qiwen’s life.
For a while, only ragged breathing and furious screams filled the cabin.
“I’ll kill them. I don’t care who it is—I’ll split their belly, yank out their guts, and strangle them to death with it.”
Then, unable to just watch, DarkSoul spoke.
“Hasn’t the culprit already shown themselves?”
“The culprit’s shown themselves? What the hell are you talking about?”
“Think about it. At the time of the crime, all of us were in the Otherworld. So the culprit must be a civilian. And the only people who knew the operation were the Heuk Society members, right? Then the answer is obvious. It was an inside job.”
“So f*ck—are you saying one of my people betrayed me? Right now?”
“That’s the only possibility. Or are you saying someone in our Messiah betrayed us? One of your members must’ve lost their mind and betrayed you.”
“Are you done talking?”
Yang Qiwen glared with a murderous look, but DarkSoul stayed calm.
“Then let’s ask just one thing. Before you attacked Black Scythe, you said you found corpses in front of the villa, right? Was there any member missing among them?”
“……There was one. A guy named Zhang Chen.”
“Ahh. Then that bastard is the culprit. Right before the job, he stabbed his comrades to death, went back to China, and cleanly took out the rest of your members.”
“But Zhang Chen was found dead too, with the other members.”
“Then someone silenced him, or he killed himself after finishing the job.”
“……F*ck, it’s not something you can say that easily. Zhang Chen isn’t the kind of guy who’d betray…”
“Do traitors walk around with ‘traitor’ written on their face? Or do they drop hints in advance that they’re going to betray you?”
“……”
“The better someone is at killing people, the better they are at acting. They wear a mask in daily life, then reveal their true colors when the time comes.”
Bang—!
“What does some Jap bastard know to run his mouth!”
Yang Qiwen denied it, but DarkSoul looked around at the others as if to say he was obviously right.
“In your eyes, is my reasoning wrong?”
No one answered DarkSoul’s question.
Silence was an unspoken yes.
DarkSoul grinned.
“In my opinion, that guy Zhang Chen was a traitor planted by a rival organization. He waited for the right opportunity, and when the time came, he started moving.”
“No… thinking about it, I don’t think a rival organization is involved. It might be related to Black Scythe…”
“Black Scythe?”
Yang Qiwen, having calmed down a bit, spoke in a composed tone.
“After seeing my people get hit, I went to Korea to confirm something. I even went into Black Scythe’s villa, but no one was there.”
“Well, maybe he just went out—”
“There was nothing that could be called a trace of a person. It was completely empty, like someone who knew this was going to happen and left the house vacant.”
“What? Then are you saying Black Scythe figured out our operation in advance?”
“That must be it. Before we executed the operation, I was clearly told he was inside that villa.”
At that moment, DarkSoul snapped his fingers.
“Ah, now I get it! Black Scythe figured out our operation beforehand, bought off that member Zhang Chen, and then hired another killer—after it was over, he silenced him.”
It was a plausible assumption, but one problem remained.
“The question is how he noticed our operation…”
“Could there be a traitor among us?”
“Among us…?”
At that one line from Yang Qiwen, the mood changed instantly.
Everyone began watching each other with sharpened eyes.
But John Delgado shook his head as if saying there was no need to suspect each other.
“I agree there’s a traitor. And I think I know who it is.”
“Who?”
“Isn’t it obviously the person not here?”
At that, everyone thought of one person.
The only apostle not attending the cabin meeting was Swingman.
“Why is Swingman the traitor, John Delgado-nim?”
Spaniard asked in a calm tone, but inside he was boiling.
After all, these were members he had recruited personally.
If one of them betrayed them, it wouldn’t be unrelated to his responsibility.
“I’m not certain. I’m just saying there’s a high possibility.”
“Then what’s the reason?”
“In Round 12, I partied with Black Scythe.”
“Of course. If the operation failed, the alternative was to approach Black Scythe.”
“At that time, there was a Player named Jepi beside Black Scythe.”
“Wait—Jepi, isn’t that the assassin who provided Black Scythe with a hideout?”
“Yes. When I first saw the nickname, I was startled too, but the face was different from reality, so I wondered if it was another person. He didn’t seem to recognize me either. I just assumed the assassin we hired had lied and called out a false nickname. But then.”
John Delgado’s eyes flashed.
“If that Jepi really was the Jepi we met, and was in league with Black Scythe? Then everything is explained. He spread false information beforehand to deceive us and helped Black Scythe.”
“But we only asked him to tail, we didn’t tell him the detailed plan.”
“That’s why there’s a traitor inside. Who called that informant Jepi? It was Swingman. The reason Black Scythe could stop it beforehand would be because of Swingman’s help.”
Swingman, Jepi, Black Scythe, Zhang Chen.
If those four were in cahoots, every piece of the puzzle fit.
“F*ck! I knew it. That curry-man bastard! I didn’t like him from the moment I first saw him!”
Only Yang Qiwen burst out in rage, but the others didn’t feel much different.
They were all grinding their teeth with betrayal.
“Where is Swingman? Why didn’t he come?”
“We lost contact. Even searching with Tracking doesn’t show him.”
“Tracking doesn’t work?”
“It says he’s a person who doesn’t exist.”
“Ah.”
What that meant was simple.
“He must be dead. In Round 12.”
“Hah, that idiot bastard. Dying in Round 12.”
“Then we can’t even get revenge?”
They wanted to punish the traitor, but if he was dead, there was nothing to be done.
“Zhang Chen is dead, and if Black Scythe is hard to take revenge on, then only one person remains.”
“Jepi. We need to track that guy.”
“But how do we track him when we don’t even know his real name?”
“In reality, we can’t. If we’re going to do it, we do it in the Otherworld. I know his face and nickname, so I can find him.”
When John Delgado said it confidently, Spaniard concluded.
“Then in Round 13, we’ll track that guy Jepi together with John Delgado-nim. If we torture him, we can find out the truth. And we can learn information about Black Scythe as well.”
“F*cking assassin bastard. I’ll avenge my men.”
“I don’t care what mission Round 13 is—that bastard’s a dead man. He shouldn’t have touched us without knowing his place.”
With the four apostles grinding their teeth like that, the meeting ended.
Their new target was Jepi, presumed to be Black Scythe’s companion.
“Whew.”
John Delgado returned home after the meeting.
He’d managed to survive this Round too by partying with Black Scythe, but—
‘Can I survive the next one too?’
As the Rounds continued, his fear grew.
It wasn’t just about revenge against Black Scythe.
‘It’s okay. I have an angel.’
In Round 12, he had turned the angel he fought against into a spirit undead summon.
He’d been found out, but for some reason Black Scythe let him go.
With a warning not to climb any higher.
‘Right. In a situation like this, what revenge? Surviving comes first.’
Just in case, John Delgado checked his status window.
But just like a brand, the message was written there again.
[Penalty is being applied.]
[Permanently, all stats decrease by 50%.]
[Permanently, summon stats decrease by 50%.]
“Shit the f*ck!”
Just looking at the stats cut in half made anger boil up.
Why did he have to get paired with Black Scythe and end up like this?
Curses came out on their own, but there was at least one fortunate point.
‘I have an angel summon.’
It was an unnamed angel, but it clearly looked incredibly strong.
Even if it was a mouse before a cat in front of Black Scythe—so what?
‘It’s a summon that can’t even be compared to ordinary Players or monsters. I can say with certainty: it’s the strongest summon I’ve ever obtained.’
If you make a dead target your summon, you can command it at 50% of its living stats.
Because of the penalty it would be halved again, but even taking that into account, it was sure to be strong.
‘From now on, the only thing I can trust is this unnamed angel summon.’
He had to get stronger.
Putting revenge against Black Scythe aside, he had to survive until Round 20 first.
‘And then I’ll say it as my wish. To kill Black Scythe.’
Of course, it was nothing but a fantasy.
Wouldn’t it be better to wish to become 1,000 times stronger than Black Scythe, rather than that kind of wish?
“Then I can rule the world, and do everything I want. Heh-heh-heh.”
Laughter burst out.
Alone in his house, he cackled like a junkie.
Still, it didn’t matter.
“No one’s watching anyway, right? Hee-hee-hee.”
“I am.”
At the third-party voice, John Delgado flinched in shock.
When he looked over with a hardened face, there stood a stranger wearing a mask.
‘A white mask?’
For a split second, the video he’d taken of the villa entrance flashed through his mind.
The man called Black Scythe there had worn the exact same mask.
“Y-you… don’t tell me…”
“Yeah. The person you’re thinking of.”
With those words, a large scythe appeared in the intruder’s hand.
A scythe with a familiar shape—one that had severed his limbs.