You know how in spy movies, there’s always that scene? A dim room lit by a single light, a suspect cuffed to a chair, the detective throwing threats around, saying they’ll start by cutting off fingers if they don’t talk.
Maybe I expected something like that.
Not… this mess.
Kim Seong-jae fought back with everything he had. He used a water-related skill, flooding the hospital room entirely, soaking my patient gown as well. Lee Myung-won came by and knocked three separate times, each time saying he knew this would happen, only to be turned away again and again.
In the end, we finally managed to subdue Kim Seong-jae without injuring him.
“Puh, let me go… What the hell do you think you’re—mmph, mmrgh!”
Baek Tae-beom shoved a towel into Kim Seong-jae’s mouth and looked at me as if asking, Now what?
What else?
I looked down at Kim Seong-jae, tied to the bed and struggling. He’d even waterboarded me in the process, so emotion crept into my voice despite myself.
The truth that he was spying for the Association was something only I knew. If it hadn’t been me, no one would’ve caught on.
“What’s that? You want me to hit you?”
“Mmmpf! Mmrgh mmph!”
“Don’t worry. I won’t hit you. Once I get the info I want, I’ll let you go.”
Kim Seong-jae had already been hit multiple times with the sheath of Baek Tae-beom’s sword. He looked absolutely indignant, yelling behind the gag, but of course no proper words came out.
And with him completely drenched, the mood was all wrong to be intimidating. I started asking the real questions.
“What’s the connection between Red Apple and Gongmyeong?”
“……”
Kim Seong-jae suddenly went dead silent. His eyes rolled around in his deeply sunken sockets—it was painfully obvious he was deep in thought.
More specifically, trying to figure out how to get out of this.
[Someone wishes to visit your soul.]
[Do you accept?
(Yes / No)]
Didn’t even need to check. Definitely his Constellation.
“I already know that you’re a spy for Red Apple. And that you hold quite a high position.”
“Mmph…!”
“How I know doesn’t matter. What matters is: what exactly is your guild doing for Gongmyeong?”
Baek Tae-beom ripped the towel roughly out of Kim Seong-jae’s mouth. Coughing dryly, Kim Seong-jae shouted, his voice thick with resentment.
“I don’t know! I don’t know anything! How the hell would I know? You punks come in here, still wet behind the ears, threatening people out of nowhere—what the hell?!”
[Someone wishes to visit your soul.]
[Do you accept?
(Yes / No)]
Constellation and contractor—so damn consistent, the both of them.
“Just you wait ‘til I get out of this—I’ll kill you, you hear me? Do you even know who I am, huh?!”
Exactly what I’d been waiting for. Didn’t even faze me.
“Of course I know. How could I not?”
[Skill: Eye of the Dead]
[You have activated the skill: Eye of the Dead]
[Eye of the Dead is now in effect. The Constellation’s blessing is bestowed upon you.]
[You observe the information of a weakened target and access additional data.]
[Displaying target information]
[Kim Seong-jae of the Scrawny Voice]
[Title: Scrawny Voice, One Who Scraped the Edge, Crimson Tent… Grade: B
Status: Flustered
Contracted Constellation: Guardian of Clear Waters
Coins Owned: 41,220
Skills: [Water Ascend] [Leap] [Falling Divine Punishment]…
Contracted with a high-grade Constellation. Caution advised.
Additional Notes: …]
I slowly recited the information.
“Your current title is ‘Of the Scrawny Voice’, and you’re ranked B. Your contracted Constellation is Ha-baek. You’re holding exactly 41,222 Coins. As for your skills…”
“W-Wait. Wait, what?!”
Kim Seong-jae’s face went pale in an instant. He thrashed as if he wanted to shut me up, but Baek Tae-beom had him securely tied down—he wasn’t going anywhere.
“How do you know all this?! What the hell are you?!”
As I read the additional notes, a strange expression crossed my face.
“The last post you made on the community board was, ‘Thirty-something guy who’s a bit short but cleared an S-Rank dungeon—what do you think?’…”
“Stop! STOP! I said stop!!”
Kim Seong-jae’s face turned beet red. He thrashed in shame, grinding his teeth with a look of pure humiliation.
“Fuck, knock it off! What the hell are you trying to do to me?!”
“You asked if I knew who you were, didn’t you? That’s why I’m telling you.”
“You insane fucking psycho. You think I’ll talk just because of this shit?”
“Then I guess we’ll just have to keep doing this until you do talk.”
“What…?”
I never actually intended to torture him. If that had been the goal, Lee Myung-won never would’ve approved.
“You said earlier you’d kill us if we let you go, right?”
“Hah…”
“Then since you’d kill us if we untied you, I guess we can’t ever untie you.”
“…What?”
“Tae-beom, didn’t you have some spare rooms at your place?”
All I needed was to come off as completely unhinged.
“Any room you think Kim Seong-jae might fit in?”
“Of course, hyung.”
Baek Tae-beom chimed in smoothly.
“Looks like we’ll be living together now. I’m really looking forward to it.”
“Kim Seong-jae-ssi, what kind of food do you like?”
“W-what… What kind of bullshit is this, huh?!”
I opened my eyes wide and replied nonchalantly.
“You said you’d kill us if we let you go, right? So we’ve decided to stay with you until you open up and talk.”
“What did you say?”
“We’ll feed you every day, bathe you, even take care of your bathroom needs. It’ll be exhausting, sure, but since you’re so dead set on not talking, we don’t really have a choice.”
“W-wait… Are you serious?!”
“You’re unmarried. No family you stay in contact with. And since you’re acting as a spy for the Association, Red Apple won’t be able to report you missing, either. We can just tell the Association that you’re resting comfortably here.”
I gave him a deliberately cheerful smile.
“So how about we finish our conversation back home?”
“……”
Kim Seong-jae shook his head violently, his face turning pale as a sheet.
***
“Good work, Choi Ga-hyeon-ssi.”
“No need to thank me.”
I said as I roughly toweled my head dry with the towel Lee Myung-won handed me.
“This barely qualifies as work. Tae-beom did most of the heavy lifting anyway.”
Honestly, if I’d handled Kim Seong-jae alone, there’s no way he would’ve spilled so easily. Having Baek Tae-beom there added just the right amount of pressure to get him to talk.
I handed over the ID card I’d more or less wrestled off of Kim Seong-jae. Lee Myung-won chuckled as he took it.
“Seems like their guild actually puts more effort into internal security than we thought.”
“Would’ve been a mess if we tried to sneak in without a plan. What about Kim Seong-jae? Leaving him like that?”
“Most likely, yeah. We’ll move him to another room and keep him under tight security. We can’t have him slipping away while we’re infiltrating.”
Lee Myung-won handed the ID card back to me and crossed his arms.
“Still… this is even worse than we anticipated.”
Kim Seong-jae hadn’t said much—just a few sentences, really. But what he did say was shocking.
Gongmyeong was ordering Red Apple to kidnap children.
I asked him multiple times, convinced I’d misheard, but the answer was always the same.
Totally unexpected. Gongmyeong had always seemed like the type, as Baek Tae-beom once said, to donate to children’s foundations or run orphanages. They’d always portrayed themselves as child-friendly. But now—kidnapping?
‘Something’s off.’
Whatever Gongmyeong was really after, I had to figure it out. And since Kim Seong-jae didn’t seem to know anything more, our next move was clear—we needed to infiltrate the Red Apple guild.
‘It’s been bothering me for a while anyway…’
The fact that Yoo Jin-woo was still alive and that Red Apple was still standing seemed to gnaw at his nerves. And even beyond that, it was obvious Red Apple would only continue to be a thorn in our side. It was best to dismantle them entirely.
“Where’s Tae-beom?”
“He just stepped out to grab some food.”
[CH. Private / One More Dazzling Than the Sun: You’re ignoring my notifications again and only caring about your contractor, huh?]
Apollo grumbled.
I responded calmly while speaking to Lee Myung-won.
“Then I’m gonna step out for a quick breather too.”
[CH. Private / Free Wind: Jealous, Apollo?]
[CH. Private / One More Dazzling Than the Sun: Shut up! I’ve been sending all these notifications and he hasn’t even glanced at them!]
[CH. Private / One Who Seeks to Prevent Destruction: Didn’t you see how busy I was?]
[CH. Private / One More Dazzling Than the Sun: I didn’t see shit! So what now?!]
[CH. Private / One Who Seeks to Prevent Destruction: Ugh, you’re so childish.]
I strolled down the hospital hallway and replied.
[CH. Private / One Who Seeks to Prevent Destruction: So what did you want to talk about?]
[CH. Private / One More Dazzling Than the Sun: Just get back inside your soul. I’ve got something to give you.]
[CH. Private / One Who Seeks to Prevent Destruction: Is it money?]
[CH. Private / One More Dazzling Than the Sun: Is that all you ever think about?!]
[CH. Private / One Who Seeks to Prevent Destruction: Not true. I also appreciate the love Apollo gives me.]
[CH. Private / One More Dazzling Than the Sun: Tsk.]
[CH. Private / One More Dazzling Than the Sun: You just never shut up.]
[CH. Private / Free Wind: Apollo, if you smile any wider your face is gonna split.]
[CH. Private / One More Dazzling Than the Sun: Why you little—!!]
