Chapter 4: The Village of Crime
The other two cartel men stood tense, knives drawn with shaky hands. One of them licked his dry lips and whispered, "Bro... I think we've got an aura user here."
"No," the second said, narrowing his eyes. "I can't feel anything from him. Not even a ripple of energy. So how the hell did he—?"
Before the sentence finished, Baek Ri-hyun moved.
His hand seized the bald man's head with terrifying ease, lifting the thug off the ground like a sack of leaves. The bald man's limbs flailed, boots kicking at air. His partners froze.
"Let him down!" the third man shouted, stepping forward with false bravado, aura trembling at the edge of his blade.
Ri-hyun glanced down at the knife, his gaze disinterested but piercing. He tilted his head. "Hm? That energy... You're imbuing it with internal force. But that's not how you use internal energy."
"What did you just—?"
Before the question left his mouth, Ri-hyun's fingers twitched. A swift flick of his hand struck the man's temple with a force like a thunderclap. The sound echoed through the forest. The thug's body shot backward like a ragdoll and crashed into a tree trunk with a brutal crack. He slumped to the ground, unconscious before he hit the mossy roots.
"Brother!" the bald man cried out, helpless in Ri-hyun's grip.
"I'll give it! I'll give you food! Just spare us!" the bald man sobbed, tears streaking down his face. His legs dangled, powerless. "Please!"
The remaining thug dropped his knife with a metallic clatter and fell to his knees, hands raised. "He's serious! Don't kill us!"