Chapter 291 : Chapter 291
Chapter 291: Before the Storm
The Association.
No, to be precise, the Bureau Directors of the Association, gathered from the early hours of the morning due to the unexpected commotion.
Amidst the collective silence, someone let out a deep, ground-shaking sigh.
“How could such an unbelievable thing happen….”
The betrayal of the Legal Department Bureau Director—something they never truly believed would happen.
Of course, the Legal Department Bureau Director judged that the remaining Bureau Directors were blinded by power and betrayed the Association, the heroes, and, furthermore, society as a whole.
However, the Directors gathered here considered the Legal Department Bureau Director's actions to be the betrayal.
There had been some signs.
He had overtly refused to cooperate with Eclipse or hand over information about other heroes.
Thus, they had also prepared their own countermeasures.
They excluded him from important meetings, and to prepare for any unforeseen circumstances, they did not share detailed meeting contents.
This amounted to a virtual ostracization.
Furthermore, they attached tails to his family, ensuring continuous surveillance.
They had expected that to be sufficient.
Even though he continued to vehemently oppose them, they never assessed him as someone who would ultimately go against the tide.
They figured he would subtly insert himself into a new Association executive position once everything was over.
However, all their predictions were wrong.
Who could have possibly imagined that he would infiltrate the executive internal network, steal all the meeting-related content, and hand it over to Ho-cheol?
And that, too, while his life, and even his family's lives, were held hostage.
Immediately after the incident occurred, they ordered the immediate capture of the Bureau Director and his family, but the Director had acted even faster.
“So, you couldn’t find the Legal Department Bureau Director, could you?”
“That’s right. It seems he was fully prepared to betray us from the start.”
The Legal Department Bureau Director immediately went into hiding after meeting with Ho-cheol.
Having risked his life to leak the information, he had already sent his entire family overseas and personally hid in some mountain village.
Therefore, the Association had no immediate means to capture him.
Of course, they might succeed if they mobilized all of the Association's resources, but this incident was top secret.
They could not recklessly use the Association’s manpower or heroes.
“This is truly troublesome.”
Everything else was fine.
Ho-cheol must have already expected the collaboration between the Association and Eclipse.
And, according to current information, he wasn’t engaged in any external activities, so there was no immediate problem.
The issue was the leak of the plan to capture Ho-cheol.
Not only was the plan ruined from the beginning, but if this leak caused Ho-cheol to become enraged and resume hostile activities against the Association, that, in itself, would be a catastrophe.
If Ho-cheol overtly intervened, Eclipse might hold them accountable.
“So. What are we going to do about the plan?”
“First, we…”
While they were deep in discussion about their future course of action and changes to the plan.
Creak—
The conference room door opened without a knock or warning.
They wondered what lunatic would dare enter the executive conference room like this, but no one present could rebuke his action.
The one who opened the door and entered was Byeong-hoo.
He casually glanced inside and twisted one corner of his mouth into a sneer.
“You certainly made a grand mess of things.”
His voice was filled only with sarcasm and mockery, with not an ounce of sympathy.
To Byeong-hoo, who disliked the plan from the start, it was quite amusing that their scheme failed even before the stage where success and failure could be distinguished.
All the Bureau Directors held their breath and looked at Byeong-hoo.
Although they maintained a cooperative system for now, their equal status was merely a matter of position.
An overwhelming power gap existed between them and Byeong-hoo.
As if completely unconcerned with the tension, Byeong-hoo perched on the conference table.
He lightly tapped the table.
“You’ve spent your lives only clinging to theory and having meetings at your desks, and look at the state of you—you don't even know what's important and what's essential.”
Byeong-hoo clicked his tongue and looked at the empty seat in the conference room.
The only empty Director’s seat, the seat of the one they called the traitor.
However, no hostility or anger welled up within him toward the Legal Department Bureau Director.
Instead, he felt a hint of pity.
He, too, was a villain based on his conviction, aiming to collapse the current hero system.
But that didn't make him entirely an evil person.
“Pride, self-respect, stubbornness, regret, responsibility. I wonder what kind of human he is, carrying all that.”
He merely played the part of a necessary evil.
Because of this, he didn't dislike someone like the Legal Department Bureau Director who did his utmost for his work.
The ones he detested were the fools gathered here.
A new manager for the new hero system was simply essential.
He had only joined hands with them temporarily for that sake.
Given Byeong-hoo’s original nature, these people would have been his priority for purging.
“He’s still a betrayer regardless.”
At one Director’s remark, Byeong-hoo chuckled.
“Even if he’s a person bundled together with the essential conditions of humanity that you all threw away, do you still view him as a betrayer?”
“I don’t think you’re in a great position to lecture others, either. You were once a hero, but now you’re doing villainous things.”
A Director couldn't stand Byeong-hoo’s sarcasm and flared up.
However, he quickly realized how dangerous his statement was, sealed his lips, and nervously gauged the reaction.
Byeong-hoo, the target of the insult, dismissed it as utterly insignificant.
“I know.”
He got off the table again and looked around at the Directors.
“So, is the plan to capture Jeong Ho-cheol abandoned for now?”
“For now, yes. With the plan clearly leaked, it's not some random person we're dealing with; Jeong Ho-cheol won't be easily caught.”
“Do as you wish.”
The originator of this plan was the Association, which felt burdened by Ho-cheol's existence.
Byeong-hoo didn't particularly care for the plan anyway.
He was merely lending a hand because they requested cooperation.
He hadn't expected Ho-cheol to fall for such a simple plan in the first place.
Moreover, a conclusion reached in this manner was not what he desired.
He furrowed his brow and asked, as if unable to comprehend.
“But still, I truly don't understand. Why are you all so desperate to destroy Jeong Ho-cheol?”
Although Ho-cheol was exposing the corruption of the Association executives and trying to remove them from power, that was merely a squabble over status.
It wasn't something that warranted aiming for his life, no matter how much he thought about it.
In fact, the person they should be more wary of was himself, the one who regarded human lives as less than a fly's.
A momentary silence fell after Byeong-hoo's question.
As no one answered, the eldest, the Bureau Director of Finance, spoke for the first time since the meeting began.
“It's because he is neither a Hero nor a Villain. Rather, let me ask you: In your view, what category does Jeong Ho-cheol belong to?”
For a moment, Byeong-hoo was speechless.
What was Jeong Ho-cheol?
A hero?
Absolutely not.
But calling him a villain was also vague.
His underlying goal was justice and goodness.
And while his methods occasionally included illegal actions, he still maintained a clear boundary, preventing him from being equated with a villain.
Yet, to call him a hero was also impossible, as he had long surpassed the line heroes should maintain.
“You can’t categorize him. No, he himself wouldn’t categorize himself from the start. He’s the kind of man who would clearly establish his own standards, believing his actions are justice and goodness.”
“Exactly. That is the problem. A being who can forgive a villain if they meet his standards, and punish a hero if they cross his standards.”
His character differed from Byeong-hoo, who was an ideological criminal.
Byeong-hoo was merely warped; he sought to become the savior of this society and system.
He aimed to establish the standards for society itself.
However, Ho-cheol was a cold-hearted judge. And that did not extend beyond the realm of the individual.
Ho-cheol, who arbitrarily crossed the line between the categories of Hero and Villain, established his own standards, and destroyed anything that deviated from them.
The Association had no choice but to deem him a far more dangerous entity.
“Hmm.”
Byeong-hoo nodded, indicating he understood.
Ultimately, even the most formidable superhumans in this society functioned as a part of the vast national system.
Yet, Ho-cheol, specifically, broke away from that cogwheel role and attempted to judge the system itself.
However, that was merely a conclusion reached by people who didn't know Ho-cheol, observing him from a safe and distant place.
In Byeong-hoo’s view, Ho-cheol had no such grand mission or purpose.
He was just a person who was a little stronger than others, a moderately good person who fulfilled that responsibility and duty.
Perhaps they were being too afraid of a person who was only that much.
Of course, he had no intention or reason to tell them this.
Byeong-hoo lightly tapped the table again and spoke.
The reason he came here was only one.
“Since your plan has failed, now you will move as I command.”
Naturally, they had no right to refuse.
***
Ho-cheol, who had been sitting and resting on a park bench nearby, quickly scanned his surroundings.
Contrary to Ho-cheol’s troubled mind, the park was unbelievably peaceful.
Lately, he had been walking around alone more often, making it easier for an attack to occur anytime, anywhere.
Yet, his surroundings were too quiet.
In fact, when Ho-cheol confirmed the Association's plan through the Bureau Director, he had inwardly rejoiced.
The number of personnel the Association could mobilize would be extremely limited.
This meant they would have to gather most of their manpower through Byeong-hoo.
If he managed to beat them all, it would be a perfect opportunity to whittle down Byeong-hoo’s forces.
In a pure numbers-versus-numbers fight, regardless of the equilibrium of power, Ho-cheol would definitely be at a disadvantage as he had to worry about civilian safety.
The best course of action was to reduce the headcount one way or another.
And for the far-reaching future that Ho-cheol envisioned, reducing the absolute number of villains was also essential.
To that end, he had shifted all his sidekick office duties to Wolf Fang and was exposing himself unprepared.
But wow, they were being too cautious.
Ho-cheol muttered anxiously, a sudden doubt arising.
“Did they give up?”
Surely, they didn't just scrap the plan immediately after it was leaked?
That would be a bit disappointing.
As he was killing time, his cellphone in his pocket vibrated.
It wasn't the phone he used daily, but the phone for Villain Jeong Ho-cheol.
When this phone rang, it usually meant something seriously troublesome had occurred.
Opening the text message, he saw only a long string of meaningless numbers and alphabets.
“Tsk.”
Ho-cheol couldn't help but click his tongue at the cipher, which was more than twice as complex and long as usual.
Even if he had memorized all the cipher codes, deciphering this would take more than just an hour or two.
He took out the cipher table next to him and compared the codes to decipher the message.
After wrestling with the cipher for a long time, he wrote the decoded message in a notebook.
A little over a dozen numbers: 113.321n, 128, 551e, 291,124a.
At first glance, it was an incomprehensible sequence of numbers, but Ho-cheol understood its meaning clearly.
There was no way he couldn't.
They were the codes assigned to individual heroes and regional names.
The text message contained codes for approximately ten people.
He would have to cross-reference the codes with related information to know which heroes they corresponded to, but Ho-cheol distinctly remembered the code for at least one person.
111.111S.
The code for the Swordmaster.
This list contained heroes who opposed Byeong-hoo's new hero regime and were Byeong-hoo's primary targets.
“Unexpected.”
Ho-cheol twirled the pen in his hand.
Attacking the heroes was a matter of time, but he never thought they would target the Swordmaster too.
He thought that man would be left alone, as he was relatively neutral.
Did they try to deal with him because of the symbolism of being the S-rank No. 1?
While other opposing factions could be simply overwhelmed by sheer numbers of villains, the Swordmaster was different.
A truckload of mediocre villains would all be slaughtered.
In that case, Byeong-hoo would definitely have to move personally.
Ho-cheol closed his eyes for a moment, deep in thought.
Even if this intelligence was merely a disguise, fake information intended to lure him, it was worth being fooled by.
The contemplation wasn't long.
Unlike himself, Byeong-hoo was a person who wouldn't care how much blood was spilled for his objective.
He probably ordered them all to be killed.
The hero profession always required being prepared for death.
But that didn't mean there was anyone who deserved to die.
Ho-cheol opened his eyes again and stood up from the bench.
“I’ll have to get ready.”
The execution date of the plan written in the cipher was just two days away.