Chapter 139 – The Enemy Within (Part One)

Crack!

The man, struck in the face by Il-hyeon’s fist, was sent flying backward with a dull thud.

He crashed through layer after layer of walls, tumbling for some time before he could finally stop.

“Kuh… ugh…”

As he let out a ragged breath, blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.

That single blow had completely disabled what little defensive function his Defensive Coat had left, and his vision swam from the severe impact.

That wasn’t all.

Five or six of his teeth had been knocked out, mixing with the blood that soaked his lips, and warm blood flowed from his broken nose.

‘Impossible… he can’t be this strong…’

The man in the white coat, Jang Se-ho, supported himself with a trembling arm.

He barely managed to hold onto his hazy consciousness, but he couldn’t easily accept his current reality.

No matter how careless he had been, he had clearly felt the power behind that last blow. He couldn’t deny that, in terms of raw strength, his opponent far surpassed him.

According to the last data update, Il-hyeon was only a mid-tier B-rank. It made no sense that he could do this to him, someone on the verge of A-rank.

Jang Se-ho gritted his teeth, stood up, and drew his sword.

There would be no more carelessness.

“They may have let you live… but that doesn’t matter anymore.”

Jang Se-ho glared, radiating a thick killing intent.

But Il-hyeon didn’t even draw his sword, merely scoffing.

“I’ll kill you!”

Jang Se-ho kicked off the ground and swung his sword.

However, the attack, aimed precisely at Il-hyeon’s neck, was slightly off due to his movement and only managed to graze the edge of his Defensive Coat’s shield.

Whoosh!

Jang Se-ho swung his sword again in succession, but,

Il-hyeon simply retreated without even attempting to counterattack.

It seemed he was toying with him, and Jang Se-ho was well aware that the power gap between them was large enough to make that possible.

But a fight wasn’t decided by such things alone.

His own ability, which he had kept hidden and never revealed to the outside world.

Triple Acceleration.

Three rings appeared, wrapping around his outstretched sword arm. Each time his arm passed through a ring, it accelerated to a much faster speed.

A swift attack that had silenced two A-rank monsters in the past.

It was a decisive blow meant to end the life of his overconfident opponent.

A moment ago, he had been caught off guard, but this time, it was Kang Il-hyeon who was being careless, not even drawing his weapon.

So he thought.

“Ah…?”

But his attack missed its intended target by an absurd margin, and his arm was caught.

With his arm trapped, Jang Se-ho stared blankly into the empty air.

There, Il-hyeon, who had moved to his side at some point, had his arm raised.

“Now for the second one.”

CRACK! CRUNCH!

This time, it was his abdomen.

Struck in the stomach, Jang Se-ho flew a long way without even the coat’s cushioning effect, crashing into a wall and ending up spread-eagled.

He was completely incapacitated.

All he could do was barely cling to his fading consciousness.

However, Il-hyeon strode up to the fallen man and spoke mercilessly.

“There’s still one more.”

He had no sympathy for bastards who had harmed countless people.

CRASH!

Struck by the final blow, Jang Se-ho was buried deep beneath the floor.

After confirming his battered opponent had lost consciousness, Il-hyeon looked around.

The organization members, who had retreated far back, unable to interfere in the battle between monsters that surpassed their imagination, were staring at him blankly.

When Il-hyeon lightly stomped his foot, the surrounding floor cracked and gathered together, forming the shape of a giant snake.

The thick-scaled creature was so large that it reached the ceiling of the underground facility just by slightly raising its head; it was not a summon that the remaining lackeys could handle.

“Clean this up.”

As Il-hyeon spoke, the snake opened its massive maw.

***

“Hah!”

Astrid emerged through the portal and collapsed onto the floor.

A few seconds after she appeared, Marco also stumbled through into this space, nearly falling over.

Marco grabbed her back to steady himself, and Astrid, with an annoyed expression, slapped his arm away.

“Good work. Looks like you wrapped things up nicely.”

Il-hyeon said as he helped Astrid to her feet.

Having returned to Il-hyeon’s side using Hyeon-seo’s ability, they had managed to prevent major damage and annihilate the monsters from the Gate.

“We barely managed to finish it.”

“What about that guy?”

“I have him right here.”

In the direction Il-hyeon indicated with his eyes, the man in the white coat, Jang Se-ho, lay unconscious.

Seeing his ruined face, Marco reflexively frowned.

“You didn’t kill him, did you?”

“He’s breathing. Just breathing.”

Il-hyeon replied with a shrug.

“Next time, at least give us a heads-up before sending us off. You scared us.”

“Sorry about that.”

Il-hyeon apologized at Astrid’s words.

The urgent situation had been conveyed directly through Hyeon-seo’s telepathy, so Il-hyeon hadn’t had time to inform them individually.

More importantly, he didn’t want his fight with the man to be interrupted.

Thud! Thud!

Suddenly, people covered in a sticky liquid began falling from the ceiling.

When Astrid and Marco looked up, they saw the giant snake high above, spitting people out of its maw.

They were all organization members who had been subdued by the summon, and they were piled up in a heap on one side, forming a small hill.

“Haha, that’s amusing.”

Astrid laughed cheerfully at the sight.

Meanwhile, Il-hyeon tossed cores to the two of them.

“What’s this?”

“A performance bonus.”

This underground facility was filled with mass-produced Ether bombs and unprocessed cores.

Considering the power of the stockpiled explosives, they were extremely dangerous items, but to Il-hyeon, with his Devour ability, they were just a good source of Ether. The cores, of course, went without saying.

First, he absorbed all the explosives, turning them into empty husks, then devoured a large number of cores, including just under ten A-rank ones.

Even after leaving some for Astrid and Marco, he had reached a point where he couldn’t absorb any more.

“I’ll enjoy this.”

“Thank you.”

Having inherited their master’s Devour ability, the two eagerly accepted the cores.

Then, in the same manner as Il-hyeon, they crushed the cores in their hands and absorbed the Ether.

As the Ether seeped into their bodies, both wore expressions of deep satisfaction.

“There’s a big pile over there, so help yourselves. Ah, wait a second.”

Il-hyeon’s phone started ringing.

He looked at the screen and saw Jeong Jin-seong’s name.

Since they were on individual missions, they didn’t have their usual communicators, so he had to be contacted this way.

– I hear you caught the guy who seems to be the mastermind?

“Yes, I have him in custody now.”

– Good. A transport plane that was nearby is on its way, so it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes. Transfer the captured guy to Aegis headquarters.

“What? But I was told to send him to Raven. Isn’t that the standard procedure?”

– I thought so too, but orders came down from the Director. It seems Team Leader Yoon In-hye will be handling this investigation.

‘That makes sense…’

Yoon In-hye, Aegis’s D-Team Leader.

The world’s greatest mental ability user.

They had been relentlessly tracking this mastermind, who they suspected was within Aegis, but had always come up empty. Since this was the first time they had captured a tangible lead, it was only natural for Team Leader Yoon In-hye, their most reliable card for interrogating high-rank Awakened, to step in.

A transport plane descended through the gaping hole in the underground ceiling, and its door opened.

Leaving the cleanup to the other two, Il-hyeon slung Jang Se-ho over his shoulder and boarded.

***

“Hey, did you hear? The kid from A-Team pulled something big off.”

“Yeah. I heard he caught one of the masterminds and dragged him in. But is it really right to call him a kid anymore? He’s a major rookie who took down an Asu and a Marka by himself. At this point, no one would complain if he got a Team Leader position like us.”

“Don’t overreact to a lucky break. He’s a newbie who hasn’t even been Awakened for a year… It’s too soon for him to even lead a temporary team.”

Oh Ji-seok, the E-Team Leader, said in a dismissive tone.

The two team leaders, on a short break, were sipping coffee and chatting in the hallway. The man standing next to Oh Ji-seok was Han Sang-jin, the well-known leader of C-Team.

“Just admit you’re impressed by your successful junior. You’re just jealous.”

“What? Jealous?”

“Ah, speak of the devil, here he comes.”

Han Sang-jin pointed, and in that direction, they could see Il-hyeon.

Seeing him hurrying somewhere, Oh Ji-seok shut his mouth and glared at him.

Their paths didn’t cross, so they didn’t meet face-to-face, but Il-hyeon must have felt the hostile stare.

He simply ignored it without any reaction.

But as Oh Ji-seok fell silent while glaring, Han Sang-jin interpreted the situation differently.

“What’s this? The great Oh Ji-seok can’t say a word when the person he’s badmouthing is right there? You’ve gotten awfully quiet all of a sudden.”

“You bastard… Stop messing with me, it’s annoying.”

Oh Ji-seok reacted irritably to Han Sang-jin’s gentle prodding.

He then crumpled his paper cup, threw it into the trash can, and strode off in the opposite direction.

“Hmm… So the rumors about them having a big fight must have been true.”

Han Sang-jin sipped his coffee, looking amused.

Only four or five people had witnessed their fight firsthand and were asked to keep it a secret, but it wasn’t easy to completely silence the witnesses of such a major incident.

Besides, their fight had been so tumultuous that it left numerous traces, noises, and vibrations, and the rumors had already spread far and wide.

While Han Sang-jin was imagining all sorts of things about the strange atmosphere between the two, Il-hyeon, the person in question, wasn’t giving Oh Ji-seok a second thought.

‘She should have found out almost everything by now.’

After arriving at headquarters, Il-hyeon had been lightly questioning Jang Se-ho, who had just regained consciousness, before handing him over to Yoon In-hye when she returned from the scene.

He had since washed up and eaten a meal, and was now on his way back. He expected that by now, with her ability, she would have uncovered not only their identities but most of the relevant information.

After all, only Yoon In-hye’s powerful ability could delve not just into fragmented memories, but deep into the subconscious.

No one ever doubted her ability.

However, contrary to his expectations, a commotion could be heard from the other side of the hall.

“What, are you kidding me? You’re telling me the suspect was taken from right under our noses during an intensive interrogation, here in a place crawling with high-rank Awakened? And without any kind of struggle?”

It was Lee Soo-yeon, grabbing a flustered staff member by the collar.

Witnessing the scene, Il-hyeon’s expression twisted.

‘Dammit, what the hell is that about?’