WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Dionysus
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ The Newbie Civil Servant Hunts Villains Before Going Home ◈
Chapter 91: I Know You (3)
──────
* * *
<What are you talking about?>
Sinu asked.
<I mean, what are you saying?>
Nayun agreed.
Hyeonyul said he would deal with that suspicious man.
<I have a bad feeling about this.>
Hyeonyul gave them a vague excuse.
This was not the time to argue.
Jihwan did not look pleased by Hyeonyul's message.
Hyeonyul had good instincts.
<We were told to avoid confronting Villains whenever possible, but we can't leave things as they are. We have to fight.>
Hyeonyul insisted more firmly.
They could not bring White Sparrow out without fighting.
So fighting was the right choice.
<Once the battle begins, security inside will tighten. Baek Sinu needs to save both of them.>
<Choo Nayun. How many are inside now?>
Sinu asked with a hardened expression.
<Five.>
<No matter how many there are, I'm the right person for this. Going through the door would be too obvious. Isn't that why we went to the control room and disabled the CCTV? Didn't we use Choo Nayun's eyes to examine the Villains because this was an infiltration mission from the start? I'll go in and launch a surprise attack.>
Hyeonyul persuaded them.
There was no time.
That White Sparrow was suspicious, but there was a chance he would die.
<Right now, they're only using violence, but they may use drugs later.>
That was the usual order.
They were interrogating White Sparrow too gently.
Hyeonyul found that suspicious.
There was no reason for Villains to go easy on anyone connected to Black Eagle.
<Get going, Hyeonyul.>
When Sinu spoke, Jihwan was startled.
“Hyung!”
<Hey, Baek Sinu!>
Nayun sent the message as if horrified.
<Do you know what you're saying? If Hyeonyul causes a disturbance, the Villains will swarm over there. There won't be just five. There'll be more. He'll be cornered. And that's not all. We don't even know how strong they are, but you're telling him to go alone?>
<I'll get there quickly. Trust me, Nayun.>
Nayun did not reply immediately.
<Damn it, Baek Sinu. You'd better not take your time.>
<I said I'll be quick.>
<I'll help too, Hyeonyul. I'll use my gun.>
<Yes. I'm going.>
After replying, Hyeonyul looked at Jihwan.
“Conserve your mana.”
Just as Hyeonyul seemed about to walk forward, he melted into the darkness.
“...Hyung.”
Jihwan looked at Sinu as though glaring at him.
A bitter smile appeared on Sinu's lips.
“I'm sorry.”
“No. I was angry, so I gave you a dirty look. I respect your choice. I would've done the same.”
Jihwan understood Sinu.
Making a choice was painful.
Neither he nor Nayun had been able to make one.
Sinu had merely taken that burden upon himself.
“Don't worry, Hyung. I'll protect them properly with magic.”
They had not separated White Sparrow because they could not afford to be discovered, but that changed once they were found out.
“Okay. I trust you.”
“Don't worry.”
After answering Sinu, Jihwan said the same thing to the anxious White Sparrow.
“Don't worry. I'll protect you.”
* * *
Hyeonyul went down to the basement and looked below from the ceiling.
‘One door.’
There could not be any windows in a basement.
‘Five people.’
Just as Nayun had seen.
“Good. This is as far as I'll go in treating you like a former employee.”
The man, wearing his jacket like a cape, held it out to a subordinate beside him and tilted his head.
“For you...”
The man suddenly stopped speaking.
He seemed to look around before raising his head.
‘...He saw me?’
How?
The moment that thought crossed his mind, Hyeonyul reached out.
Crack.
An invisible force surged forward.
Claw-like gouges appeared across the ceiling.
But the force did not reach Hyeonyul.
Something was blocking it in front of him.
‘...Magic?’
It seemed to be Jihwan's magic.
“Who are you!”
When the man shouted at the ceiling, his subordinates tensed and looked around.
If that magic belonged to Jihwan, there was only one way that bastard could have noticed him.
‘...An ability user.’
Hyeonyul quickly grasped the situation.
Ability users usually had something like a defensive barrier around them.
It was invisible and difficult to detect until someone actually touched it.
That bastard's barrier extended much farther than other ability users'.
Hyeonyul stepped back a little farther and lightly reached out.
The instant he touched it, a tingling sensation like an electric shock told him he had found the ability user's barrier.
The magic had been erased, but he had not felt that sensation.
‘How far does it extend?’
Hyeonyul slowly moved closer.
“...Aaaah!”
A scream rose from below, as though one of the subordinates had been injured by the man's earlier attack.
The man looked at his subordinate and reached out.
“...Boss.”
The subordinate could not finish speaking.
Crunch.
His head was crushed by force.
“Come out if you want to die nicely.”
The man smiled.
He looked pleased.
His eyes were like those of someone certain he had caught a rat.
‘His power is concentrated in one place.’
Knowing that, Hyeonyul continued to approach.
Crack.
Another harsh sound rang out, and claw marks carved into the ceiling.
‘About this far.’
Hyeonyul roughly determined the range.
It was just under one meter.
Hyeonyul looked at White Sparrow.
He had already been beaten, and his eyes were so swollen that it was difficult to recognize his face.
Was he really the real one?
It was hard to be certain.
‘What if he's already dead?’
Considering that possibility, Hyeonyul pulled out his phone from the darkness.
The gender was the same. Male.
He could not recognize the voice.
The face was unrecognizable, and the hair color was similar.
Even if this was a fake, they would certainly have brought someone similar.
Hyeonyul moved to the wall and appeared behind one of the subordinates.
He did not stab him right away.
He only held a dagger to his neck, using him as a hostage.
“...!”
The subordinates saw Hyeonyul, and the man laughed.
“Puhahaha!”
Whether the man laughed or not, Hyeonyul took the man's subordinate toward the person believed to be White Sparrow.
<I'll block them.>
Jihwan's message appeared.
Magic was taking shape around White Sparrow.
“Release him if you don't want your subordinate to die.”
After saying something that did not suit him at all, Hyeonyul felt awkward.
“Right. It always goes like this, doesn't it?”
The man looked at Hyeonyul calmly.
He did not seem to care whether his subordinate died.
“I'm Black Eagle. Which team are you with?”
Hyeonyul quietly asked White Sparrow.
“...Uh, well...”
White Sparrow hesitated.
Did he suspect Hyeonyul?
Or did he really not know?
Which was it?
“When you take a hostage, some foolish eagle brat always comes along like this. Why is that?”
“Exactly.”
Hyeonyul spoke as though agreeing, and the man charged at him.
Ignoring the supposed White Sparrow, he came at Hyeonyul.
Hyeonyul watched calmly.
‘That one's a fake. The real one's already dead.’
If he were real, the man would have needed to care about White Sparrow.
There was no longer any reason to keep up even an awkward act.
“What a shame. He's already dead.”
“Yes. Understood.”
Hyeonyul answered calmly.
It was only helpful that the man told him directly.
As the man looked ready to swing his hand, Hyeonyul threw the subordinate at him like prey.
“...What?”
The man, startled, cut off his subordinate's breath.
He could not stop his hand.
Hyeonyul was no longer in the man's line of sight.
He had already appeared before another subordinate behind the man.
Smoke rippled around Hyeonyul's body.
<He's already dead. That's a fake.>
As he informed them, he moved the hand holding his dagger.
In the simplest way.
The fastest way.
He pierced the subordinate's neck, then hid in the shadows.
When the man turned around, only his dead subordinate remained.
The man smiled.
“...What are you? What the hell are you?”
He was Black Eagle.
The clothes he wore certainly said so.
But what in the world was this?
Black Eagle, who were supposed to save people, was killing them instead.
Carefully avoiding the man's barrier, Hyeonyul targeted the one remaining subordinate.
He reached out and grabbed the man's leg.
“...!”
The moment the subordinate lowered his head to look, he fell into endless darkness.
When the man turned his head, no one was there.
His eyes darted around.
“...You bastard.”
This was no ordinary opponent.
But there was no reason for him to lose, either.
Black Eagle's greatest weakness was exactly this.
The man looked at White Sparrow, whom he had not killed or even touched.
Grabbing him by the neck, he spoke.
“You'd better come out. This guy isn't one of us.”
Those stupid eagle bastards. They'll try to save him anyway.
The man thought to himself, unable to stop smiling.
“Before I really kill him.”
“You can kill him.”
At the voice from behind him, the man felt a chill and turned around.
Crackle.
Something snapped at his fingertips, and his hand moved.
Muscles bulged beneath his clothes as he tore apart the figure before him.
It was not that bastard.
It was his subordinate who had disappeared.
Something burst out along with the severed flesh and the feel of skin beneath his fingertips.
Something black and dense.
Crunch!
The man's eyes widened at the harsh sound.
‘...What?’
He instinctively stepped back.
Something shattered.
Surely it could not have been the force surrounding his body.
“As expected, that force surrounding an ability user's body is annoyingly sturdy.”
Hyeonyul's voice came from behind him.
The man flinched and turned around.
Black power coiled around the two daggers in Hyeonyul's hands.
Its fluttering shape resembled an ominous demon.
The man's eyes shook.
‘Uh...?’
It felt like he had seen it somewhere before.
Where had it been?
In the brief moment he thought about it, the eagle had already approached and brought down his dagger.
Sparks flew from its unseen tip.
‘One more.’
Expecting it to be blocked, Hyeonyul swung his other hand as well.
A line was drawn.
As the line abruptly thickened, the sound of force breaking rang in Hyeonyul's ears.
Just as the dagger blade was about to slice across the man's neck, the man's hand moved quickly.
A heavy force followed the hand raised in haste.
The surging force seemed ready to drive Hyeonyul upward, but he sank into the ceiling.
Crack.
The sound of flesh being forcibly torn apart rang out.
‘Heavy.’
Hyeonyul looked at his hand.
It was trembling from the fairly heavy force.
It did not feel like gravity.
As expected, it seemed to be a force with its weight concentrated more strongly in one place.
‘He isn't a major player yet, but in a few years, he could become one.’
The earlier mention of a boss had not been false.
After steadying his breath, Hyeonyul gripped his dagger.
‘Next time, I'll kill him.’
He planned to separate the man's head from his neck.
Before stepping outside, he heard a sound.
It was a different sound.
As a window shattered, a bullet punched through the man's shoulder and made his body stagger.
“...!”
The man flailed and used his power toward the place the bullet had passed through.
Only the rest of the window and part of the building wall exploded.
He panted.
The unexpected attack seemed to have shaken him.
‘Good timing.’
Hyeonyul approached without hesitation.
The barrier was broken.
It would take time to recover.
Even ability users had different powers.
For this bastard, power-related abilities were all he had.
He aimed for the arm.
Black smoke spread behind Hyeonyul's dagger like wings.
There was no sound as he swung the dagger with force behind it.
Everything was silent, as if all things had died.
The dagger drew a thick line from the bastard's outer arm inward.
Nothing obstructed it as it cut through the arm and dug deep inside.
He considered cutting deeper, but stopped because they might need time to question him.
“Aaaaargh!”
Even after Hyeonyul lowered his dagger, the bastard's scream shattered the silence.
Hyeonyul heard another sound.
Something was digging into the bastard's leg.
Judging by the way it was embedded in the ground, it was a bullet.
‘Her accuracy is incredible.’
As Hyeonyul briefly looked toward Nayun, the bastard staggered, then collapsed.
His duck-like quacking made Hyeonyul frown without meaning to.
He was loud.
‘It seems I overestimated him.’
He seemed to be in confusion.
Hyeonyul revealed himself.
The bastard, apparently unable to see him, stared in shock at his severed arm.
<Don't let your guard down, Hyeonyul.>
<Yes.>
As Nayun said, Hyeonyul did not let his guard down.
There was a strong chance that this confusion itself was a tactic.
“Where is the real one?”
Hyeonyul asked.
“...Ptooey!”
The bastard spat out blood-tinged saliva.
His eyes had turned red.
“I heard them call you boss. Doesn't that mean I only need to catch you? Think carefully before you die.”
Hyeonyul looked at the blood pouring from the severed arm.
Judging by the amount of blood he was losing, he might die from excessive bleeding.
“Is he dead?”
“...Should I tell you?”
“Yes. Please tell me.”
“There's something else I want to tell you first.”
The bastard smiled.
Now he understood.
Why had he felt such a sense of familiarity?
Why had he hesitated when he saw that bastard?
He had thought it was humiliation, but it was not.
Only now did everything feel clear.
“What do you want to tell me?”
Hyeonyul tilted his head.
If it was information, there was no reason not to hear it.
“...I know you.”
At those words, everything stopped for Hyeonyul.
It was the first time he had heard those words since escaping that place.
Was it true?
Hyeonyul even stopped breathing.
Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried
