WeTried Translations
Translator: ZERO_SUGAR
Editor: Abstract
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
Chapter 99: Kang Mui (1)
──────
"How is he?"
Jin-hyeok, who had brought Hae Ryang to the infirmary, asked the academy physician about his condition.
The physician wiped the sweat from their brow with a towel and answered, "He's past the critical point. But he lost far too much blood, so it's difficult to say when he'll wake up."
Mo Il-hwa, standing behind them, bit down hard on her lower lip.
She regretted it.
If she had known this would happen, she should have stopped Hae Ryang when he said he would follow them in secret. If she had, his life would not be hanging in the balance now.
The two left the infirmary and sat on a bench in the corridor.
Jin-hyeok tried to comfort Mo Il-hwa, who looked utterly lost.
"He'll be all right."
"I should have told him not to go. Or told him to take Mumu along when Mumu said he was going."
"......Then they would have been discovered already."
Mo Il-hwa gave a bitter smile.
That stiff fool was trying to make a joke in a situation like this to comfort her. He was doing his best.
"He'll wake up safely, right?"
"He will. Didn't he wear everything from leather armor on his back to all sorts of things just to stay alive?"
When Jin-hyeok had removed Hae Ryang's clothes to treat him, he could only click his tongue.
Hae Ryang was covered in things he had never seen before. At that point, it was clear that Hae Ryang was determined to survive no matter what happened.
"But what was Hae Ryang trying to say?"
Before losing consciousness, Hae Ryang had left something on the ground.
They could only assume he had something he wanted to tell them.
[Jade Medallion......I x......↑ Il Hyeon]
"What even is this Jade Medallion? Then there's that x mark after I, the arrow pointing up, and Il Hyeon after that. None of it makes sense. I have no idea what he was trying to say."
As Mo Il-hwa said, what Hae Ryang had left behind was so difficult to understand that it might as well have been a code.
The only certainty was that he had left it to tell them something.
"What could he have seen to leave this behind?"
As the two put their heads together in confusion, someone walked down the corridor and spoke.
"I don't know about the Jade Medallion, but I think I know what he was trying to write after I."
"Hyung?"
"Jin-sung-nim!"
The man walking down the corridor outside the infirmary was none other than Jin-hyeok's older brother, Inspector Censor Yu Jin-sung.
Jin-hyeok asked, "What happened? Did you catch the culprit?"
"No. They escaped."
Jin-sung shook his head with a regretful expression.
He had searched the entire forest for the person who had tried to kill Hae Ryang. Yet the culprit had been meticulous, erasing every trace before disappearing.
"This has become difficult."
Jin-sung clicked his tongue inwardly.
It was difficult to tell them, but it was unfortunate that such an incident had occurred while he was here. They had thought the case would be resolved quickly, yet another cadet had been harmed by someone unknown.
Since this had been an attempt on Hae Ryang's life, Left Assistant Censor O Mu-yang would surely use it as an excuse to reopen the investigation.
Jin-sung looked at Jin-hyeok and Mo Il-hwa.
"I was too rushed earlier to ask. Can you tell me why that child was attacked?"
He wanted to know the circumstances.
Jin-hyeok briefly explained what had happened. Yu Jin-sung was the person he trusted most in the world after their mother, so there was no reason to hide it.
After hearing the situation, Jin-sung clicked his tongue.
"That was a truly dangerous thing to do."
"......"
"No matter how suspicious a fellow cadet may have seemed, you said they were connected to an organization that used unheard-of drugs to put cadets to sleep and even committed arson."
"......"
"Recklessly following an enemy when you're unprepared is dangerous."
"It was my fault. I got carried away for no reason......"
Mo Il-hwa lowered her head.
She had let her guard down too much because of how Ha Ryun treated Mumu. She should have accounted for the fact that the situation could turn at any time.
"It wasn't Miss Mo's fault alone."
Jin-hyeok tried to comfort her, but Jin-sung spoke to him.
"In any case, that cadet Ha Ryun is the most suspicious, and the circumstances suggest another group is involved?"
"That's right."
"Then the information your friend Hae Ryang left behind must concern that other group."
Jin-hyeok nodded in agreement.
Then he recalled what Jin-sung had said earlier.
"What did you mean when you said you knew what he was trying to write after I?"
"It's simple."
"Simple?"
"At the Censorate, I've handled many cases. Sometimes those who are murdered use every last bit of their strength, driven by resentment and anger, to leave information about the person who killed them."
"Then..."
"That friend of yours, Hae Ryang, probably did the same."
"But why leave it like that? If he had simply written the name..."
"It would have been easier to understand. But you can see that his writing became noticeably weaker after Jade Medallion."
Just as Jin-sung said, the writing after Jade Medallion was crooked.
It seemed Hae Ryang had lost strength while digging into the dirt with his finger.
Jin-sung continued, "When that happens, victims usually leave something as brief as possible so they can pass on information somehow."
"Then the x after that..."
"Kill."
"Kill?"
"He was probably trying to write the character for kill, but as he lost strength and his mind grew hazy, he tried to write down the identity of the person who killed him directly."
"Ah!"
It made sense.
The second phrase Hae Ryang had tried to write meant, "I was killed by."
He had been trying to identify the person who wanted to kill him.
"......Idiot. You should have just written the name."
Mo Il-hwa muttered, her eyes reddening.
The mystery of I x had been solved.
What remained was the Jade Medallion at the front and the ↑ Il Hyeon at the end.
Why had he drawn an arrow pointing upward?
"Was he trying to point somewhere with the arrow? The direction Hae Ryang pointed was..."
"Northern Heaven Residence."
Mo Il-hwa spoke through gritted teeth.
"Northern Heaven Residence?"
"It has to be Northern Heaven Residence. He couldn't have been pointing at the rear garden. I think he was trying to tell us the person is someone in our dormitory."
"I think so as well, Miss Mo."
Jin-sung agreed with her.
"Right?"
"Could that really be it?"
Jin-sung explained to the doubtful Jin-hyeok.
"That suspicious cadet, Ha Ryun, came to this dormitory to obtain that information in the first place. Then he entered the northern forest on the grounds of Northern Heaven Residence, not somewhere else. That alone makes it likely that any accomplice would be in Northern Heaven Residence. If Hae Ryang drew an arrow pointing upward in that situation, it could have held two meanings."
"Up is north on the arrow too, and the direction it points is Northern Heaven Residence..."
"That's right. That's it. The problem is what comes after."
[Il Hyeon]
Il Hyeon.
Even Jin-sung found it difficult to understand what that meant.
Mo Il-hwa suddenly said, "Ah! Could the culprit be a cadet in Northern Heaven Residence named Il Hyeon?"
"That's possible."
Jin-hyeok nodded in agreement.
There were hundreds of cadets in Northern Heaven Residence. They did not know everyone, but there might be someone among them named Il Hyeon.
Hmm.
Jin-sung had doubts.
There had been no need to draw an arrow pointing upward if that were the case. The arrow and Il Hyeon were both simple characters with few strokes, so Hae Ryang might have written them because he was losing strength.
Still, checking whether there was someone named Il Hyeon would not be a bad idea.
"We should look into it, and if there is no one with that name..."
-Kuuuuung! Rrrrrumble!
Before he could finish, a tremendous roar rang out.
At the same time, a faint vibration shook the entire corridor.
All three sprang to their feet.
"What was that?"
"I don't know. We should go outside and..."
"You two stay and guard the infirmary."
"The infirmary?"
"If that person learns Hae Ryang is alive, they will try to kill him somehow. I'll find out what happened and request protection from the academy administration. Wait until someone arrives. Please do the same, Miss Mo."
With that, Jin-sung hurried down the infirmary corridor.
They wanted to find out what the vibration was too, but as Jin-sung had said, someone seeking Hae Ryang's life might appear. They could not carelessly leave their posts.
* * *
"Guek! Haa... haa..."
The unknown man dressed as a guard warrior, whose head Mumu had been holding as he vomited blood for some time, finally stopped.
His pale face alone showed how severe his internal injury was.
Secret Agent No. 2 clicked their tongue inwardly, then cautiously spoke to Mumu.
"Young Master Mumu. Leave him to us. We'll interrogate him and find out who is behind this."
If he stayed in Mumu's grasp much longer, he might die.
They needed to interrogate him as thoroughly as possible before then and make him reveal everything he knew.
The unknown man, still breathing harshly, opened his mouth.
"Kill... kill me."
"What nonsense. Until you tell us with your own mouth who gave you the order, you will never..."
Before Secret Agent No. 2 could finish, the unknown man dressed as a guard warrior tried to bite off his own tongue.
Mumu's hand was faster.
"Urk!"
Before the man could bite down, Mumu grabbed his jaw.
"You can't do that."
"Uuugh."
As a result, the man could not close his mouth and had to sit there with his jaw hanging open in a ridiculous position.
Secret Agent No. 2 shook their head as they watched.
Seeing him go this far, the interrogation would likely be quite difficult.
A stubborn one.
Those who kept trying to kill themselves without valuing their own lives were difficult to make talk.
Yet Secret Agent No. 2 had specialized in such work since their days in the shadow agency.
Sa Mu-heo, one of the Six Stars of Heaven who was currently detained, had not spoken because treatment was still underway and they had not yet begun a proper physical interrogation. He had been on the verge of death himself. But Vice-Master Dan Pil-hu and the secret operatives could change the situation completely once they truly got to work.
"You need to keep his mouth held tightly."
Mumu said this as he handed over the unknown man dressed as a guard warrior, whose head and mouth he had been holding.
Secret Agent No. 8 approached and struck several pressure points.
-Tatatatatak!
"He won't be able to kill himself like this."
The unknown man's body stiffened with his mouth open after his paralysis point was struck.
Secret Agent No. 8 bound and held him, and Mumu said, "I'll leave this uncle to you two."
"Leave it to us."
"I need to go catch Senior Kang Mu-i."
"What?"
Kang Mu-i?
Wasn't Kang Mu-i a cadet competing for first or second place among the academy's third-years? Why was Young Master Mumu suddenly saying he would go catch him?
As Secret Agent No. 2 wondered about this, they noticed the guard warrior's agitation.
What was that?
No matter how much someone tried to hide it, their pupils often contracted when they were startled.
That was exactly what had happened to the man.
It had only lasted an instant, but Secret Agent No. 2 was skilled at this sort of thing and noticed it.
Mumu spoke to the man dressed as a guard warrior.
"Uncle, you're an idiot, aren't you?"
"......"
"It doesn't matter whether you talk or not. I came to check the traces Senior Kang Mu-i left behind, but all of them had been erased. Then you tried to kill So So, Master Dan Baek-yeon, and me by collapsing the building. Who do you think I'll suspect?"
......Damn it.
The guard warrior's eyes trembled.
A strange light appeared in Secret Agent No. 2's eyes.
If Mumu was right, Cadet Kang Mu-i was highly suspicious.
Mumu usually appeared simple despite his monstrous strength, so it was quite surprising to see him display such sharp insight.
Young Master Mumu is right. Then we must capture and interrogate Cadet Kang Mu-i at once.
Convinced, Secret Agent No. 2 spoke to Mumu.
"I'll immediately mobilize the warriors under the Vice-Master and have Cadet Kang Mu-i arrested as well..."
"No. I'll do it."
"What?"
"The sooner, the better."
The moment he finished speaking, Mumu bent his knees slightly.
The muscles in his thighs and calves swelled, and even more steam rose from his body.
"Young Master Mumu, what are you trying to..."
-Kwaaaang!
Before Secret Agent No. 2 could finish, the ground beneath Mumu's feet caved in nearly two jang.
In an instant, Mumu's body shot more than thirty jang into the air.
Secret Agent No. 8's eyes widened at the sight.
"Is it really true that he has not learned Martial Arts?"
He had leaped from a standstill with leg strength alone, yet rose to such a height. It was absurd.
From that high up, he could see the entire academy at a glance.
Still, Secret Agent No. 8 had no idea why Mumu had suddenly jumped.
Then their eyes widened.
Could it be?
Mumu, suspended in the air, stared somewhere in the distance.
Then he said, "Found him."
Mumu kicked both legs toward the empty air.
-Paaaaaang!
A sound like the air tearing apart rang out. Ripples spread through the sky, and Mumu's body flew northwest with tremendous force.
Secret Agent No. 8 spoke in disbelief.
"D-Did Young Master Mumu just kick off the air?"
"...My eyes were not mistaken."
When it came to the highest realm of Body-Lightening Technique and movement skill, no one disputed that it was called Soaring Through the Void or Walking on Air.
Yet what they had just seen was entirely different from either.
Kicking off empty air with sheer muscle strength...
Was that even possible?
Footnotes:
Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried
