Chapter 150
Chapter 150: Fight (1)
Before the climb to the 38th floor.
[Fake Ghost, go to hell!]
That was the kind of cursing the Bell Tower Sect had been spewing.
To them, who worshipped the Murim Tower, Ghost and the Nameless Hero had become almost divine figures.
Word had it that the Bell Tower Heavenly King, leader of the Bell Tower Sect, had completely changed her stance.
At first, she had treated Ghost as a heretic.
But within the sect, those who worshipped Ghost kept sprouting up one after another.
And when the French Murim Tower incident made it impossible to hold back any longer, she had gone so far as to officially grant Ghost a rank and appoint him.
[Ghost is the 'Archangel' sent down from the Murim Tower for our Bell Tower Sect!]
The three highest tiers of the Bell Tower Sect consisted of the Sect Leader, the Prophet, and the Evangelist.
The newly created 'Archangel' sat between the Sect Leader and the Prophet.
In other words, it was the rank of second-in-command.
The lobby on the first floor of the Bell Tower Sect's headquarters had originally held only the marble statue of the Sect Leader blessed by the tower, but two more figures had since been added beside it.
Two guardian angel escort statues, as if protecting the Bell Tower Sect Leader.
Well, all that was fine enough.
But when word spread that Ghost was none other than Park Je-hwang, the Bell Tower Sect Leader was said to have erupted in fury.
[An angel is an angel precisely because it can't be seen! If it shows up as a real, living person right in front of me, my position is in danger!]
And so, a noisy protest began,
—Park Je-hwang is not Ghost.
There was even a reason behind it.
If Park Je-hwang really were Ghost, why would the Nameless Hero have fought Ghost?
But things were different now.
Park Je-hwang had entered the Murim Tower alone.
The 37th and 38th floors had turned into the Golden Tower.
And I had walked out wearing Park Je-hwang's Golden Helm, raising the Iron Instrument God's Sword before everyone's eyes.
Park Je-hwang, writing legend after legend.
Not even the Bell Tower Sect Leader could deny this any longer.
* * *
"It's the Archangel Ghost!"
Someone grabbing a microphone pointed at me from a distance.
"Archangel! Archangel!"
"Park Je-hwang! Park Je-hwang!"
Voices that had once cursed now turned to worship.
When a rejecting heart is flipped, it becomes all the greater in devotion.
"……"
I walked straight toward them, my expression hardened.
Dozens of broadcast cameras all tracked my every move.
Tens of thousands of people parted to my left and right.
National Murim Bureau agents and police approached me, but they didn't block my path.
Instead, they escorted me.
‘Interesting.’
I glanced to the side.
President Park Jae-yeol was smiling.
It was on his orders that my path had been cleared.
[President Park Jae-yeol laughs heartily, saying 'I don't think I'll ever forget this moment for as long as I live'. +10,000 Happiness]
Thud. Thud.
I didn't stop.
And just like that, I stepped up onto the Bell Tower Sect's stage and stood squarely in the very center of it.
"……"
On the stage was a large screen broadcasting the live feed in real time.
And there were the three marble statues that had stood on the first floor of the Bell Tower Sect's headquarters.
The Bell Tower Sect Leader in the center had been sculpted as a peerless beauty.
Ghost and the Nameless Hero on either side had been given the hulking forms of guardian deities.
The Bell Tower Sect Leader, who had been extremely averse to public appearances lately, was rumored to be so rotund as to bring a hippopotamus to mind—yet the marble statue was a gorgeous beauty that could rival any idol.
The person gripping the microphone pointed at me and shouted.
On their chest was a nameplate reading 'Evangelist'.
"The, the Archangel has descended before us!"
The full-faced Golden Helm gleamed under the stage lights.
I glanced at them once, then turned to look at the tens of thousands of faithful gathered before me.
Eyes filled with reverence, directed at me.
The Bell Tower Sect was an enemy of the Choi Brothers—and also an enemy of Red Dragon Gate's Lee Won-ryong.
A target that would need to be dealt with someday.
The 'Evangelist' extended the microphone toward me with a trembling hand and asked,
"Archangel! Please grace us with a divine word."
"I don't like it."
"Pardon?"
I walked toward the statues on the stage.
Then I bent down and picked up a large photo that had been crumpled and torn beneath one of the statues.
It was a photo of Park Je-hwang.
An 'X' slashed across the face, and the word 'FAKE' written in red letters.
"You called me a fraud?"
"……!"
A look of bewilderment flashed across their eyes.
I reached out and stroked the Nameless Hero statue on the right.
"Probably because I fought the Nameless Hero."
"Ah, th, that was……"
The Evangelist flustered greatly and couldn't continue.
Just then.
Smack!
I slapped the Evangelist across the cheek.
A nosebleed burst out, and they staggered—then thud!—sat down hard on the floor.
"Wh, what on earth—"
"Friends can fight sometimes."
"……!"
Even those holding cameras jolted.
Shhrrring—
I drew 'Ro-dam'.
The Evangelist's eyes flooded with horror.
And I swung the sword without hesitation.
Schwick—! Thunk—thunk thunk—
Of the three statues on the stage—
Only the head of the Bell Tower Sect Leader in the center was severed and sent rolling across the floor.
Roll roll roll…… thud.
The place where the rolling head of the Bell Tower Sect Leader's statue came to rest was—
Right at the feet of the Ghost statue.
"That's a bit more to my liking."
In an instant.
The mouths of tens of thousands fell open.
And the venue went ice-cold, as though a bucket of freezing water had been thrown over it.
[Kim Tae-yang groans and nods slowly. 'Pleasure without responsibility…… So this is it.' +10,000,000 Happiness]
"He desecrated the Sect Leader!"
"Our beloved Sect Leader!"
Enraged members of the Bell Tower Sect leaped up onto the stage—
But I wasn't worried at all.
Because—
"Pr, protect Ghost!"
"Guard Park Je-hwang!"
The police and National Murim Bureau agents rushed forward and cleared my path.
"Hahahahat!"
I grabbed the severed head of the Bell Tower Sect Leader's statue, laughed loudly, and disappeared under their protection.
* * *
"……Ah."
The moment Ghost knocked off the Bell Tower Sect Leader's statue's head—
Park Jae-yeol's thoughts came to a complete halt.
"Your Excellency! The Bell Tower Sect followers are growing agitated."
"You must evacuate immediately!"
His security detail agents shook Park Jae-yeol's shoulders without ceremony—
But Park Jae-yeol's mind had gone blank.
‘That…… Isn't Park Je-hwang.’
"It's Ghost."
He understood it only now.
Not that Park Je-hwang had become Ghost—
But that Ghost had become Park Je-hwang.
There was no denying it anymore.
Ghost could now go about causing trouble freely without restraint.
And all of it would……
……Become Park Je-hwang's doing.
A long while later.
President Park Jae-yeol was waiting inside his grandson Park Je-hwang's home.
Park Je-hwang returned home only in the early hours before dawn.
Turning on the lights of the darkened house, Park Je-hwang spotted Park Jae-yeol sitting on the sofa and startled.
"Grandfather."
Park Jae-yeol had emptied more than half a bottle of whiskey from Park Je-hwang's home.
He looked at him with a hardened expression and asked,
"How did you get here?"
"Took a taxi."
"Looking like that?"
The clothes Park Je-hwang wore underneath were black, so the blood soaked all over his body might not have been visible—
But his face was a complete mess, as if he'd been beaten up somewhere.
That he'd taken a taxi alone……
Park Jae-yeol was utterly dumbfounded.
It had been a stage he'd prepared for his grandson.
The 38th floor turning into the Golden Tower—all the attention, interest, and applause should have gone to his grandson.
But everything had fallen to pieces. The area had descended into chaos, and Park Jae-yeol had hastily mobilized police to disperse the crowd.
In the midst of that, large numbers of Bell Tower Sect members were making a fuss claiming injury—
And while he'd been dealing with that, the Ghost who had impersonated Park Je-hwang had vanished somewhere without a trace.
"What happened?"
"Exactly as you saw."
Park Je-hwang already knew.
About the mess Ghost had made wearing his Golden Helm.
"The Golden Armor?"
"I don't need that kind of thing anymore."
His voice was nonchalant.
Thump.
Park Je-hwang sat down on the sofa across from him.
"How exactly do you intend to handle this?"
Park Jae-yeol asked in an angered voice—but Park Je-hwang seemed entirely unconcerned. As if his mind were elsewhere entirely.
"Is it a problem?"
"How dare you say such a thing!"
"It's a good thing, actually. Those Bell Tower Sect bastards had crossed the line anyway—you were planning to deal with them yourself, weren't you, Grandfather."
"Ha!"
Park Jae-yeol's head throbbed.
"The Bell Tower Sect followers number over a million! They're approaching one and a half million now!"
Enough heads to easily sway the next presidential election.
Their financial power was immense as well.
Yet Park Je-hwang, as if none of it mattered, came back even more boldly.
"Grandfather's dream…… It's to become king, isn't it?"
"What are you saying!"
"You enrolled in the military academy because you intended to seize power if a coup ever broke out—I've heard that much."
"Utter nonsense!"
"Father told me everything."
"Laughable—"
Grab!
Park Je-hwang seized Park Jae-yeol's left wrist.
"What do you think you're doing!"
Park Jae-yeol tried to wrench his wrist free—
But the strength of Park Je-hwang, an S-rank Tower Climber, was incomparable to that of the old man.
Park Je-hwang removed the wristwatch his grandfather wore and flipped it over.
Two characters engraved in intaglio on the back of the watch.
'Emperor.'
"I was also told you named me yourself. That you received the name from a skilled fortune-teller. They said that for the energy of an emperor to flow through the family, it would bring you good fortune."
"……"
"Isn't that why you've carried these two characters close to you your whole life?"
Tap. Tap.
Park Je-hwang tapped the back of the watch.
'Emperor.'
Park Jae-yeol fell silent as his innermost thoughts were laid bare.
"When it comes to becoming king…… a mere one and a half million votes. Or two million, or even more than that—what does it matter?"
At that, Park Jae-yeol narrowed his eyes.
Park Je-hwang's confidence.
His attitude, distinctly changed.
His face was swollen and a complete wreck—but his eyes shone more brightly than they ever had before.
The difference between who he had been before entering the 38th floor and who he was now was stark!
Park Jae-yeol quietly withdrew the wrist his grandson held.
"Something happened. In the tower."
"I……"
Park Je-hwang slowly closed his eyes and answered.
"I saw a god."
"……!"
"The moment I witnessed the true power of a god, everything else lost its meaning."
Park Je-hwang's closed eyes.
Within them, only the overwhelming martial might Ghost had displayed played on repeat, like a film.
"Have you forgotten what Ghost did, impersonating you and causing that havoc?"
"It doesn't matter, I said."
"Je-hwang!"
"Ghost said something to me."
Park Je-hwang opened his closed eyes.
"That everything done was for my benefit."
"……!"
"He must have had his intentions behind it as well."
"Je-hwang. You mustn't be so easily swayed by words like that!"
"I have proof as well."
Clack.
Park Je-hwang set a bead down on the table.
The Crimson Violet Poison-Warding Bead that Ghost had placed in his mouth.
"This is—!"
"A Poison-Warding Bead. The same kind that the Nameless Hero gifted to France."
Park Jae-yeol let out a low groan.
"The moment Ghost entered the tower, he gave me this. Its efficacy was remarkable as well. The poison energy was thick and heavy, yet I was completely unharmed. And furthermore—"
Clatter.
Park Je-hwang additionally placed a shattered fan on the table.
"He protected me."
Park Je-hwang gazed at that fan as if it were the most precious thing in all the world.
To Park Jae-yeol's eyes, it was nothing but a blood-soaked and ghastly thing—
"Grandfather! I think I……"
Park Je-hwang leaned forward and took Park Jae-yeol's hand.
"I'm going to become Ghost's disciple."
"Wh, wha, what?!"
Park Jae-yeol's eyebrows shot up, and his mouth fell wide open.
His trembling hand touched his parted lips.
He was even more shaken than the moment Ghost had struck off the Bell Tower Sect Leader's statue's head.
"Ghost's martial arts! His abilities! If only I can inherit all of the secrets behind creating the Golden Tower—!"
Park Je-hwang flipped Park Jae-yeol's left wrist over again, revealing 'Emperor'.
"Making a single seventy-year-old man into a king is easier than turning one's palm over."
Park Jae-yeol looked into his grandson's eyes.
Eyes without a single tremor.
Like the North Star in the night sky—pointing to an unwavering, precise bearing.
After a long moment, Park Jae-yeol asked his grandson,
"Ghost and Hwangbo Geom…… If you were to compare the two?"
Park Je-hwang answered easily.
"Master Hwangbo is powerful. He's someone who could singlehandedly cut down a hundred people if they came at him."
"And Ghost?"
Swish.
He picked up the fan.
"Even if ten thousand people came at him."
Rustle—
The fan Park Je-hwang swung stirred the air.
"He'd annihilate them all in a single stroke."
Rustle—
The breeze ruffled Park Jae-yeol's bangs.
"……"
Park Jae-yeol stared quietly at his grandson, then reached out and pulled a wet wipe from the dispenser on the table.
"Je-hwang."
His aged, wrinkled hand moved gently, wiping away the blood stains on his grandson's hand.
"Is there anything…… This old grandfather can do to help?"
An affectionate tone.
A smile spread across every inch of Park Je-hwang's face.
He quietly slipped a mobile phone out from inside his clothes.
Buzz—!
Even in the early hours of the morning, messages were pouring in without pause.
—Je-hwang! Are you all right?
—Je-hwang. You were really amazing today.
—I'm planning to climb the 37th floor today.
—You haven't forgotten, right? Just wait a little longer. The 39th floor—let's do it together, just the two of us!
All of the messages were coming from one person.
"Kim Do-han."
Park Je-hwang raised his head.
"I'll need to deal with this clueless bastard first."
Park Jae-yeol smiled as well and replied,
"Easier than turning one's palm over."