* * *

SHHHH.

A chill ran over the woman. She had heard nothing, sensed no presence at all. The utter silence made her heart race.

How?

How had he approached without a sound and taken control of the space behind her?

Her expression rapidly stiffened.

Watching her, Seungyu's smile widened. He felt a chill too, but merely clenched his fists and trembled.

That was the person he served.

He felt elated.

「This is it, right?」

「This is what you were running your mouth for, right?」

Hyeonyul typed again, then slowly stepped out from behind her and held out his phone. He met her frozen expression.

「Satisfied?」

"How..."

「Shh.」

「Trade secret.」

Hyeonyul raised a finger to the mouth of his rabbit mask.

「Don't pick any more fights.」

「You're making me want to kill you.」

After that warning, Hyeonyul slowly walked back to the sofa. If she ignored it, he would have ample grounds to kill her. If her faction complained, all he had to do was show them the CCTV footage.

She was the one who had started it.

「Secure the CCTV footage, delete it from the system, and bring it here.」

Hyeonyul showed Seungyu his phone.

「You know what happens if you make a copy, right?」

"Of course. I'll take care of it immediately."

Seungyu stepped outside for a moment.

「Sit.」

Hyeonyul sat on the sofa and offered her a seat. She approached, every trace of amusement gone.

「Yes, we're collecting drugs.」

「You've come to the right place.」

He didn't want a long conversation. Wanting to hurry home and do some knitting, he got straight to the point.

"What?" she asked in surprise.

「They're neatly stacked in warehouses.」

「Where did that information leak from, and how?」

「Tell me.」

Their arrival meant information had leaked. He assumed Seungyu naturally knew that too.

"What will you do if you find out?"

She narrowed her eyes, beginning to grow wary. That was a good sign.

「I hate drugs, so I'll kill whoever it is when I catch them.」

Her expression changed. Was that surprise? There was something slightly ambiguous about it.

"Are you serious? The Poison King—that bastard wouldn't approve."

「I'm not the Poison King, though?」

「Sounds like you want him back?」

"You can say you're not, but this faction itself still belongs to the Poison King. I don't know how you got lucky enough to take it over..."

「Lucky?」

Hyeonyul put his phone down for a moment, making a show of thinking.

"... What?"

Perhaps her bravado had faltered; she couldn't endure the silence. Hyeonyul let out a long breath.

「Go on, get lucky and take this place over yourself.」

Hyeonyul crooked his fingers at her. It was an unmistakable provocation. Her lips pressed tightly together.

「Why didn't you come charging in like a dog when you heard the Poison King was gone?」

「Why didn't you?」

「Does comforting yourself like that boost your self-esteem?」

Hyeonyul laughed.

「You couldn't.」

「You were trembling in fear of the Poison King.」

「You couldn't even deal with the idiot executives here fighting over whose seat his throne was.」

「I merely did what you couldn't.」

The sight of cowards running their mouths was absurd. Not just the one before him—the others were all the same. Even with the Poison King gone, they had frightened themselves out of making a move. Now that he had taken over, it seemed they resented it.

「All right, I'm feeling generous.」

「You don't know what the Poison King's face looks like, do you?」

"... What are you talking about?"

In answer, Hyeonyul brought up something on his phone and showed her.

「This is the Poison King.」

She leaned forward. Then her face twisted.

It was hideous. To think that face had been beneath the mask. She felt as though she might vomit at any moment.

「Take a good look.」

「The fingers are missing, right?」

"They are..."

「I cut them off.」

"..."

She stared at Hyeonyul without a word. The question Are you joking? hovered on her lips, but she couldn't bring herself to say it. Hadn't the bastard in front of her actually taken control of the Poison King's faction?

'What happened? The Black Eagles captured the Poison King...?'

Her eyes wavered. A theory quietly occurred to her.

'Did... this bastard attack him before the Black Eagles caught him? Is that why they captured him so easily?'

Looking at the wrecked surroundings behind the Poison King in the photo, she could reach no other conclusion. No, she had never believed the Black Eagles had captured him in the first place.

「I hate drugs.」

「Do you believe me now?」

Hyeonyul held up his phone until she answered. He was starting to get irritated, wondering why he had to do this on his day off. He wanted to go home.

"Then why are you collecting drugs?" she asked.

「I told them to.」

"Why?"

「To dispose of them myself.」

「Leaving them lying around lets rats run wild, like today.」

「Makes me want to kill them.」

"First, let me make something clear while I'm here."

She pointed at herself.

"My younger sibling was dragged away to be a test subject and died. Those goddamn drugs killed them."

Forcing down her rising voice, she let her emotion show. It seemed to be anger.

「And?」

"Whether people point fingers at us and call us villains or whatever else, drugs need to disappear from this world. We'll use any means necessary."

「What reason do I have to believe you?」

She seemed to think for a moment after reading his message, then took out an external hard drive.

"These are the factions we've destroyed. Take a look."

「I'll be in touch.」

「Give me your contact information.」

"Before that, why do you hate drugs?"

「Would you believe me if I said it was for the same reason?」

"... That, I believe."

Her gaze was unwavering.

"I'll believe you more if you dispose of the drugs."

「Tell me somewhere you're having trouble dealing with.」

Hyeonyul didn't let this excellent opportunity slip away. He needed information. Dealing with them could come afterward.

「I'll handle it for you.」

He cast the bait. He expected her to agree anyway. The sheer size of the faction the Poison King had led spoke for itself.

"There's a company called Prunal that sells milk."

Linda and Prunal. The two companies he'd identified through that information had come up.

"Their leader's power really is on par with the big players, but looking at their premises and what they do, they're just big. Recent events have made it hard to approach them."

「Because of the Black Eagles?」

"Yes. With your people running wild, the Black Eagles have gotten touchy too. We need to lie low for now."

「Surely they wouldn't arrest you for trying to eliminate drugs?」

"Why don't you just laugh at us?"

She sounded offended.

'Why?'

Hyeonyul couldn't understand her reaction. The Black Eagles wanted to eliminate drugs too. Wouldn't they welcome someone offering to do it for them?

"... The Empire."

She started to speak, then drew a deep breath.

GRIND.

But apparently she couldn't contain her surging emotions; he distinctly heard her teeth grinding.

"I still believe that goddamn Empire needs to be wiped out."

「Putting it that way makes it sound like the Empire manufactures the drugs?」

"What if it does?"

「What's your evidence?」

"... They should have stopped people from being made into test subjects. They should have stopped the drugs from circulating. Those bastards didn't do their jobs! That's why people on our side and everyone else were dragged away indiscriminately!"

「That's quite a leap.」

Hyeonyul saw no value in responding to claims with neither evidence nor logic.

「If the Empire could stop that, we'd already be gone, wouldn't we?」

How could an Empire that couldn't even eradicate villains stop the creation of test subjects and drugs? He didn't understand why she was blaming the Empire in the first place. Villains were the ones conducting experiments and manufacturing drugs.

'Ah...'

Hyeonyul stopped picking it apart.

'It's just a villain talking.'

My fault is your fault. Your fault is your fault. Nothing is ever my fault.

What more could he expect? If they were capable of reflection and regret, their very presence here would be strange.

"What if the Empire is simply leaving us alone?"

「Do you have evidence?」

"Not yet."

「You've heard something, haven't you?」

Looking at the phone, she gave a brief smirk. She had no intention of telling him.

"Honestly, trust doesn't really suit people like us."

「Of course not.」

「Our goals merely overlap.」

"Our goal of wiping out the Empire probably overlaps too, so if I find anything out, I'll tell you for now."

「That would be nice.」

She read his message and stood.

"Contact me. That's all I came for."

「Give me something good, and I'll let you destroy the drugs we've collected with your own hands.」

Hyeonyul dangled something tempting. The drugs needed to be destroyed anyway. There would still be time to hand them over after checking everything they had collected so far.

"... You know how to negotiate, huh?"

The corners of her mouth rose.

"What should I call you next time we meet? Rabbit?"

「Whatever you like.」

「And you?」

"Call me Yeon."

Yeon smiled.

"I'm off, Rabbit."

「All right.」

「Goodbye.」

Hyeonyul waved.

After Yeon left, Seungyu entered.

"... What did you discuss?" he asked carefully, approaching Hyeonyul.

「Investigate a company called Prunal.」

"Understood. I'll get started immediately."

「I can take the documents, right?」

Now Hyeonyul truly wanted to go home. He had done enough. He hadn't planned to do this much in the first place. He could feel himself steadily heading toward overwork.

"Of course. But are you... leaving already?"

「Why?」

「Is something wrong?」

"No, nothing like that."

Seungyu broke off and hesitated.

「See you later.」

Hyeonyul said his farewell. Only then did Seungyu smile and bow his head.

"Have a safe trip. I'll make certain your instructions are carried out properly."

Seungyu didn't raise his head until Hyeonyul had left. He was beaming.

* * *

Hyeonyul lifted his head. His gaze was growing dull.

'It's my day off...'

The weather was nice too. Did he really have to do this? Even after coming all this way, he hesitated.

As soon as he'd gotten home, he'd examined the files the villain named Yeon had given him. Since there was no way to obtain the drugs they'd already disposed of, he'd looked through them without concern. While checking for overlap with drugs he knew, a passage had caught his eye.

It was information they claimed to have obtained by digging into an "experiment site."

His gaze had stopped there. Could it still exist? Could it be the experiment site where he'd been held?

That possibility had brought him back outside. What could he do but check?

Hyeonyul dragged his heavy legs along the forest path. Experiment sites could be in cities or in the mountains. Their locations depended on the whims of the bastards who built them, making them hard to pin down; whenever he found one, he had to check it immediately.

He raised his phone.

'This is the right location.'

He couldn't see anything. So far, there were no scents besides those of animals.

Hyeonyul walked a little farther. Despite the jutting stones, small plants, and other things underfoot, his footsteps made no sound. It was as quiet as if he weren't there.

Holding his phone, he circled the area until he lowered his gaze. The scent differed from the surroundings. The soil's color also seemed subtly different.

'... Ah, it's underneath here.'

The information Yeon had given him ranged from several years old to only a few weeks old. In any case, time had passed, so if they'd dug this place up, the soil's color was bound to differ.

Still, something felt a little off.

Without thinking deeply about it, Hyeonyul burrowed straight down. A passage appeared. He could follow it, but he didn't want to waste time. He kept descending.

The farther he descended, the more traces of the battle came into view. Broken debris and corpses filled the place, making every breath nauseating. The accumulated dust, too, testified to its abandonment.

Hyeonyul reached the lowest floor. The stench grew worse.

'I did find the right place.'

Darkened blood covered the stark-white space. Experiments would have been conducted here, so that much blood was only natural. Everyone had rotted alike, leaving no way to tell who had been a test subject, but Hyeonyul tilted his head this way and that.

'This isn't where I was.'

Apart from being pure white, its layout was different. Though it had hardly ever happened, he had walked around the experiment site on his own feet before. How could he forget that layout?

Hyeonyul peered around, checking whether they had missed anything.

'The computers... are completely destroyed.'

The contents of the shattered drug containers strewn across the floor had already dried up. Countless broken syringes lay everywhere. He could also see all manner of instruments that could practically have passed for workshop tools.

'They cut off my fingers with those countless times too.'

They'd done it to test his healing ability. His fingers reattached again and again, yet they checked countless times with every experiment.

Looking around as though lost in memories, Hyeonyul suddenly stopped. Amid the dust, he saw shapes with relatively less dust in the form of footprints. The white floor might have made them invisible, but he detected the subtle difference.

'Why do they lead this way?'

Puzzled, he followed the footprints. They passed corpses and wrecked rooms, then stopped before a wall.

After a moment's thought, Hyeonyul reached out. His hand seeped through the wall. He slowly walked onward.

How long had he walked? Just as he began to think there was nothing there, a new smell emerged.

'...?'

It was close to the smell of recent construction. His steps quickened. As he glided forward, a space with unfinished, pure-white interiors unfolded before him.

'Ha...'

It was exceedingly familiar to Hyeonyul. It was decorated in the same pure white, but its layout and style differed from the place he'd just seen. If anything, it resembled the place he'd recently discovered beneath the secret base.

'... Could it be?'

He heard approaching footsteps.

Three people.

'There's no way they're civilians.'

He didn't hesitate. Appearing behind them, he pierced the middle one's throat.

"... G-gah."

Before the cry could spread, Hyeonyul swung wide to the right. One head fell, and two bodies collapsed. He immediately turned left and held his blade at the remaining person's throat.

Spattered with blood, Hyeonyul looked like a demon.

"Is this place being built to use Black Eagles as test subjects?"

Hyeonyul asked the man, who appeared to be involved with the facility. If he didn't know, Hyeonyul could simply find a computer and search it. It would be a relief if he was wrong, but this place had the same atmosphere. Tastes in building design seldom coincided so neatly.

"..."

The man couldn't speak. But his manner, as if gauging Hyeonyul's reaction, confirmed it.

Hyeonyul slit his throat. Clutching his bleeding neck, the man staggered and fell. Hyeonyul smiled as he watched until the man died.

'Come to think of it, he said I could smash this place, didn't he?'

["Oh dear, you wasted your trip. I won't bat an eye if you destroy this place. I have plenty of money. I can build as many more of these as I want."]

The bastard who used a portal-like power had definitely said that. If this was the second site, it meant there was a third as well. Judging by the construction timeline, they seemed to be building the sites almost simultaneously.

'I wonder just how much money you have.'