Chapter 54

It felt like watching an old TV.

Scenes and voices stuttered across a faded screen, cutting in and out. Even so, the heat of the battlefield came through vividly.

“Kill!”

“Destroy the Jin Family of Taiyuan!”

The people packed into the narrow gorge charged forward with a roar. Behind them, a flag marked Mount Heng whipped in the air.

At the tips of those steel-blue weapons was another flag.

Jin (振).

And hundreds of martial artists sealing off the gorge.

“They’re bastards with neither martial honor nor chivalry. The Mount Heng Sword Sect disappears today!”

“Attack!”

Static crackled.

The view zoomed in through the noise, locking onto two people who stood out beneath the flag of the Jin Family of Taiyuan.

An old man with a long white beard spoke.

“This is going to be a long fight.”

A massive man answered.

“And the last one.”

The old man smiled wide.

“It will be. Without fail.”

And then.

People crashed into people, swords into spears. Countless martial artists collided, and a thick blood-mist settled over the gorge.

Somewhere, a drumbeat announcing the start of battle rolled out.

Boom. Boom. Boom.

“Hah.”

I sat up, soaked in sweat. Another Murim dream.

Unlike at first, I could remember it clearly even after waking.

The battle has begun.

Even after I came back to reality, time kept moving in Murim.

The scenes I had seen might be happening there right now. A great battle with the fate of two massive forces on the line.

No. There’s one more.

A third force led by the Head Elder.

Once the fighting hit its climax and both sides had taken heavy losses, that was when they would finally move.

What about Hyuk Mujin? What happened to the reconnaissance squad?

If they arrived in time and exposed the betrayal, the worst could still be avoided. Or the opposite had already happened, and everything was already over.

The Head Elder….

An old man who had given me the creeps from the first impression. Who would have thought that so-called elder of the Jin Family of Taiyuan would be plotting something like this?

If the Head Elder became the final victor, it would all be over.

The end of a rebellion always brought a bloody purge.

Jin Wikyung, Wipeng, Hyuk Mujin, and the reconnaissance squad.

Plus Han Yeop, too badly injured in his fight with Jopil to march out, and Gong Yacheong and the siblings Socheon and Soyul, still recovering.

Familiar faces appeared and vanished in my mind again and again.

What were they to me?

One month in Murim.

To them, I had been a Benefactor, a trusted superior, and a comrade they could turn their backs to. And to someone…

“I’m proud of you.”

“Are you hurt anywhere?”

“Survive, youngest.”

I had been a blood brother, too.

But what had they been to me? NPCs loaded with advanced AI? Or people?

What were they?

Another dimension only I could come and go from, and the people left behind there. What was I supposed to do about that?

My eyes drifted to the capsule on their own.

If I went back….

The thought startled me. I was out of my mind.

Go back and do what? It was a great battle with some two thousand martial artists mixed together. Among them were monsters as strong as Jopil, One Question, One Kill—or even stronger.

And I was thinking of going back there?

“You lunatic. You crazy bastard. You’ve completely lost it.”

I was muttering it like a sigh when my phone rang.

Bzzz.

Luxury Freak.

It was Team Leader Choi.

A large café in the heart of a downtown forest of high-rises.

“Here are the materials you requested.”

Butler Kim held out a thick binder. Even at a glance, it looked like a massive file of more than a hundred pages.

“That’s a lot.”

“I investigated just as thoroughly.”

Choi Minwoo nodded and started flipping through the pages. What he was reading was one person’s life.

Jin Taekyung’s twenty-seven years were packed into those hundred-plus pages.

Birthplace, background, how he had grown up—even account inquiry records provided by the bank. Nothing was missing.

Unusual or suspicious parts had been highlighted in bold, so Choi Minwoo finished the entire file in under thirty minutes.

“What do you think, Butler Kim?”

“He’s clean.”

Butler Kim answered in a definitive tone.

“He isn’t an illegal Awakener, and he didn’t approach you as part of some plan.”

Choi Minwoo nodded. If Butler Kim said so, that was how it was.

He was the one who had spent the past two weeks using every means available to look into everything about Jin Taekyung. Likewise, every page of the hundred-odd-page file on the table would have passed through his hands.

“So this was all a coincidence?”

“For now, yes.”

“Butler Kim.”

“Yes. Please go ahead.”

“Do you know the odds of reawakening?”

“I understand they’re around one percent.”

One in a hundred.

From an ordinary person’s perspective, that might not seem impossibly rare. But those hundred people were not ordinary people. They were Hunters who had already been born through similar odds.

And among them, only the chosen enjoyed the luck of reawakening.

“Then what are the odds that an F-rank Hunter reawakens in one jump as a C-rank Hunter?”

Choi Minwoo did not wait for an answer.

“What about the odds that a C-rank Hunter could clear a Gate of the same rank alone?”

“Alone, it would be impossible. He’d have to be at least B-rank…”

“And yet there’s someone who can.”

“Could it be…?”

“Ten C-rank Gates. Ten D-rank Gates. Across twenty raids in total, all I did was sit with my arms crossed and watch. I never even needed to step in.”

His long fingers tapped the thick binder.

Everything about Jin Taekyung was written inside it, and in another sense, nothing was.

After a moment of silence, Butler Kim spoke.

“I’ll investigate him again.”

“No.”

Choi Minwoo shook his head.

“Keep scratching and you’ll only raise a sore. I intend to keep him close and watch.”

“Do you intend to recruit him into the Guild after all?”

“I should. If something smells fishy, I’ll dig into his background. If it doesn’t…”

Choi Minwoo’s eyes gleamed.

“I’ll make him one of my people. Even if I have to pay him three personal visits.¹”

And in the next moment—

Jingle.

As someone came into the café with the doorbell, Choi Minwoo gave a quiet laugh.

Zhuge Liang—or rather, Jin Taekyung.

A signing bonus of 500 million won.

A fixed monthly salary of 50 million won and a seventy-percent settlement split.

A roughly 132-square-meter officetel² and a sedan came as extras, and the four major social insurances were a given. After reading the contract through, I had exactly one thought.

This is insane.

What kind of outrageous terms were these?

They were giving me a home, a car, and more money than I knew what to do with.

The average annual salary of a C-rank Hunter was 200 million won, including fixed pay and raid pay.

And me?

The signing bonus alone is 500 million.

This was the kind of contract a B-rank Hunter could get, at minimum.

It also meant my skill was valued that highly. And it was proof I had found an employer with the insight not to judge a Hunter by rank alone.

And he has the money, too.

I stared across the table at Team Leader Choi. As always, his expression gave nothing away, and his eyes were deep.

Team Leader Choi spoke without warning.

“This is the third time.”

He had made two offers before. I had turned both down. This was a roundabout way of telling me not to refuse him again.

“I’m sorry about that. There was a minor issue.”

“Have you resolved it?”

“Yes. For now, it seems that way.”

“Then there shouldn’t be any problem now.”

“…Of course.”

Even as I answered, I still had doubts. Was there really no problem now? Was it okay to leave it like this?

What the hell am I thinking?

I had to knock this out before my mind wandered.

“I’ll sign.”

I started signing with the fountain pen Team Leader Choi had handed me.

One page, two pages, three…

The contract was five pages long. All I had to do was write the three characters of my name on the last page, and it would be done.

At that moment, the question came back.

Is this really okay?

The fountain pen that had been moving without hesitation slowed. One thought caught on the next.

What if it isn’t? Isn’t this what I wanted?

It was. This was exactly what I had dreamed of so desperately for seven years.

A massive salary and high social standing.

Becoming a son and older brother they could be proud of, and treating my family to an easy life.

Becoming someone to envy and admire instead of someone to ignore and look down on.

I can have it all now.

I could live enjoying every bit of it. Goodbye to my grimy life. Goodbye to that shitty Murim.

Crack.

And goodbye to the fountain pen, too.

I let the strength out of my grip. Ink spilled from the shattered pen and soaked the contract.

“Mr. Jin Taekyung. Let me ask you again.”

Team Leader Choi pulled out a white handkerchief and wiped the ink that had splashed onto his chin.

For all the sudden mess, he looked calm.

“That problem from last time. Have you really resolved it?”

“No.”

Once I said it, I felt a weight lift.

“If it’s something I can help you with…”

“I appreciate it, but I have to handle this myself.”

Team Leader Choi studied me with an odd look, then gave a small laugh.

“I didn’t know a contract could be this hard. I didn’t expect to get turned down three times, either.”

He sounded amused by the situation rather than angry.

“When would be a good time to make the fourth offer?”

He had probably meant it half as a joke, but my answer was serious.

“Tomorrow, at this time, in this place.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Yes. Tomorrow.”

Only one day.

But for me, it would be a month, or maybe several.

Team Leader Choi had no way of knowing that, and he furrowed his brow.

“I don’t much like jokes like that.”

“Neither do I. Not jokes like this.”

He didn’t know what my words meant.

“I’ll be sure to see you.”

That was a vow to myself.

A vow that I would come back alive.

And…

“Tomorrow, you’ll have to raise the contract terms even further.”

I left the café, leaving Team Leader Choi behind with his eyes wide.

“Phew.”

I drew a deep breath and opened the capsule.

The sunken seat and VR headset made my heart hammer. Even after coming this far, temptation kept lifting its head and whispering.

Don’t go back.

Just forget everything and live content with your reality.

Everyone you met in Murim is an NPC, and Murim is nothing more than a game.

Right. There had been a time I thought that way.

But after thinking it through, I realized I was going back, one way or another.

I’d already reached my conclusion a long time ago.

On the night of the blizzard, I had gone back for Gong Yacheong.

I had brought along two young siblings who were nothing but baggage, and instead of using the reconnaissance squad as a shield, I had fought Jopil and barely made it through.

It probably started then.

That was when the three letters NPC, lodged in my head, began to fade.

That was when I saw the two-character word for family in Jin Wikyung’s back as he told me to survive and turned away.³

“Fuck, life really is a variety show.”

With a hollow, complaining laugh, I climbed into the capsule. The moment I put on the VR headset, a single line of text appeared in front of me.

Ding.

System

Would you like to connect to Murim?

Accept / Decline

“Yes.”

My consciousness faded. My vision darkened.

I logged in.