abcnovels
Chapter 34
Chapter 34
Chapter 34: The Bait Is Exhaustingly Difficult
Nam In-hwang, who was approaching to inject Shin-woo, suddenly found himself gripped by the neck and wrist, unable to utter a sound.
Crack?
Simultaneously, his wrist was dislocated by Shin-woo’s overwhelming strength, making it impossible for him to move.
With his free hand, Nam In-hwang tried to push Shin-woo’s grip from his neck to defend himself, but he couldn’t budge it.
It was astonishing how such strength could come from Shin-woo’s slender frame.
“Ugh…”
In contrast, Shin-woo looked at Nam In-hwang and smiled.
“Thank you sincerely for coming to me first.”
Just then, the legs of Moon Tae-beom, who had been approaching through the gap between the open hood and the ground, came into view.
Shin-woo twisted Nam In-hwang’s wrist holding the syringe, plunging it into his own chest.
Nam In-hwang’s pupils dilated rapidly as he lost consciousness.
“Hey! What the hell are you doing over there?!”
The irritated Moon Tae-beom, still oblivious, grabbed Nam In-hwang’s body, which was blocking his view inside the driver’s seat.
Nam In-hwang’s body pulled back, sliding out like a stalk of radish being plucked from the ground.
It was then that he realized something was wrong.
“Oh no?!”
At that exact moment, Shin-woo, who had been hanging upside down in the driver’s seat, swung a yellow eight-sided dice wire he had prepared earlier.
It was swift.
Just before the wire could fully wrap around Moon Tae-beom’s neck, he managed to wedge his right hand into the gap, desperately struggling to create some space.
Although he had a knife under his left armpit, it was difficult to reach with his left hand.
As a result, Moon Tae-beom had no choice but to retreat.
Shin-woo unfastened his seatbelt, sliding out of the car by leveraging Moon Tae-beom’s strength.
“Argh! Ugh?!”
“Not bad reflexes for a pro.”
As if appraising him, Shin-woo tightened the wire even more between them.
Struggling against the wire, Moon Tae-beom’s face twisted as he pressed against it with his inserted hand.
“You… who the hell are you?”
“What do you mean? I’m the guy you tried to kill. Also, the guy who’ll kill you in self-defense.”
With that response, Moon Tae-beom began to suffocate as the wire tightened around his neck.
“Did you… know all along?”
“What if I did?”
“But the car definitely…”
Earlier, Shin-woo’s car had lost control and flipped over due to the hack on its vehicle control system.
“My driving skills aren’t half bad, right?”
“So you even knew the car was hacked?”
“For a professional, you sure talk a lot. Let’s wrap this up, shall we?”
“As if I’d let you!”
Moon Tae-beom, retrieving the knife from under his left armpit, cut through the wire.
At the same time, Shin-woo lunged at Moon Tae-beom, who was now holding the knife in his right hand.
Thud? Thud? Thud, Thud?
The two closed in, exchanging swift knife strikes and punches. Moon Tae-beom’s expression grew even more twisted than before.
“This guy… his speed…”
Shin-woo deftly evaded the knife and countered with strikes, each one delivering substantial impact.
For Moon Tae-beom, who was recognized for his knife skills and close-quarters combat within Unit 666, Shin-woo’s prowess was difficult to comprehend.
“What? Are you nervous?”
Thud? Thud?
Playfully, Shin-woo landed blows to Moon Tae-beom’s sides, finishing with a punch to his chin.
“Ugh?!”
“Careful, or you might bite your tongue.”
As Moon Tae-beom staggered back from the dizzying blow, he felt his right arm, which held the knife, suddenly restrained by something.
Shin-woo had retrieved a wire from another yellow die and wrapped it around Moon Tae-beom’s arm.
Simultaneously, he pulled Moon Tae-beom’s arm inward, striking his solar plexus with his knee and stepping on his ankle while tightening the wire.
Crack?
“Ahhh?!”
With a scream, Shin-woo forcefully twisted Moon Tae-beom’s right arm inward, bending his elbow in the opposite direction.
Snap?
Moon Tae-beom, unable to even retaliate, let out a chilling scream, twisting and writhing from the swift sequence of attacks.
The combination was so fast that he couldn’t pull back his captured limb or defend himself.
Without letting go of the wire, Shin-woo moved to the side, wrapping it around Moon Tae-beom’s arms and legs, tying him up with the wire around the knife in his hand.
Finally, Moon Tae-beom, overwhelmed by the intense pain, couldn’t maintain his balance and collapsed.
Thud?
“Ahh! Let me go!”
“Huff? If it were you, would you let someone go? It’s a pity about the car, though. I just finished paying it off.”
This was the first and last extravagant purchase Shin-woo made during his military days, used for getting out of the base on rare leaves or outings.
Now, after the incident, his first car had been reduced to scrap.
“Let me go?!”
Unable to move due to being tightly bound with the knife still in hand, Moon Tae-beom shouted angrily.
“What a nuisance.”
Mumbling, Shin-woo picked up a syringe lying near the unconscious Nam In-hwang and injected it into Moon Tae-beom.
Thunk?
“You… bastard…”
“Phew? Now it’s finally quiet.”
The drug they had intended to use on Shin-woo was Prilene, a muscle relaxant. Nam In-hwang and Moon Tae-beom had planned to completely subdue Shin-woo with it, then blow up the car to make it look like an accidental death.
Shin-woo then searched their bodies and vehicle.
However, he found nothing that could identify them. The rest was only tools and weapons, clearly intended for their purpose.
The only things of note were the two flip phones each of them carried.
“Emergency Clear.”
Speaking into his earpiece, he heard the voices of Jang Man-soo and Lillian.
[Did everything go smoothly?]
[I’m almost there. Coming right away!]
Lillian, who had been in the office, had started following Shin-woo’s signal as soon as the operation began.
“There were two of them. They’ve both been subdued. Should I move them to a safer location? Is there a safe house nearby?”
In response, he heard the sound of Jang Man-soo typing before he replied.
[For interrogation?]
“I have to get some information out of them.”
[Won’t they get even more dangerous?]
Shin-woo had narrowly escaped a deadly situation, fully retaliating in response.
Naturally, it was possible that his adversaries might feel the pressure and become even more dangerous.
“That’s why I’m going to throw them off the trail.”
With that, he powered off the phones of the two he had subdued.
***
Park Sang-kyu, his expression hardening, all but sprinted down the hallway and burst into Myung In-chul’s office.
“President! There’s been an incident!”
“What kind of incident?”
Park Sang-kyu immediately pulled his phone from his pocket, searching for the breaking news report, and held it out.
?Today, in southern Gyeonggi Province, the CEO of MH Tech’s subsidiary KITE, identified only as Baek, was rushed to the emergency room following a vehicular accident suspected to be intentional… At the scene, several unidentified devices, as well as a vehicle believed to belong to a suspect, were found… Baek’s current condition remains unconfirmed…….?
At that moment, Myung In-chul’s expression twisted in a way it had never before.
“…What is this?”
“It seems… they failed.”
“Failed? Did you just say ‘failed’?! Didn’t I specifically tell you to wait if there was any doubt about completing the job?”
Park Sang-kyu had assigned Nam In-hwang and Moon Tae-beom, specialists in “accidental deaths” from TSF, trusting their record of never having failed. He had waited confidently.
But now, the news coming to him was of failure.
“…I have no excuse.”
“Hah! So? Judging by the report, it seems they got away without getting caught?”
Park Sang-kyu hesitated to answer immediately.
Seeing his hesitation, the furrow between Myung In-chul’s brows deepened.
“What’s going on? Don’t tell me… are there problems with that, too?”
“We haven’t been able to reach them. TSF is searching for them as we speak.”
“Searching? How on earth did you manage things that this happened!!”
Nam In-hwang and Moon Tae-beom’s vehicle had been found at the scene… and Baek Shin-woo, their target, was alive.
No matter what they found in or around the vehicle, it would be impossible to erase the suspicions directed at the two of them.
If they moved hastily now, it would only raise unnecessary suspicion.
“I apologize……”
“Sigh?! All we’ve done is make things worse. Now Baek Shin-woo is about to be brought into the media spotlight, too.”
Until now, Myung In-chul had ensured that Baek Shin-woo’s name stayed out of the media, regardless of what he was involved in.
It wasn’t possible to suppress everything, but they’d done their best to keep him out of sight, away from public scrutiny.
But that was no longer feasible.
Now that the dam had broken, the media would start to uncover Baek Shin-woo’s existence.
“TSF has said they’ll monitor the situation for now.”
“What else can they do?”
“…….”
“Have you confirmed Baek Shin-woo’s condition?”
If he were gravely injured, hovering on the brink of death, it might even be better.
“He has minor lacerations on his arm and abdomen.”
“…Nothing seems to go right.”
Myung In-chul, feeling a headache coming on, pressed his temples in frustration.
***
At the same time.
Im Hee-yeon, accompanied by Song Tae-hoon and other bodyguards, arrived at the VIP ward floor of a major hospital in Gangnam, where Shin-woo was admitted.
As soon as she learned of the incident from the news, she tracked down the hospital.
However, the crowd of reporters gathered outside the hospital made it difficult to get in.
Eventually, she and her team spotted a room guarded by bodyguards wearing the same KITE badge as Song Tae-hoon.
When they entered, they found Shin-woo, who had just finished receiving treatment.
Shin-woo sat bare-chested, large bandages covering his left abdomen and forearm.
“…You… those…”
“It’s not serious, so there was no need for you to come.”
“No, that’s not it… your body…!”
Im Hee-yeon’s gaze was drawn not to the treated wounds but to the countless scars covering his chest, sides, shoulders, and more. Standing beside her, Song Tae-hoon was just as shocked.
“These? I got them in the military. Some rough work out there.”
At a glance, they were clearly no ordinary scars. Numerous punctures and gashes hinted at far more than simple injuries.
Im Hee-yeon suddenly felt a chill run through her veins.
“Does that make any sense to you?”
“What will you do if you don’t believe me?”
Would she storm to the military unit where Shin-woo had served and demand answers like a protective mother?
Yet, Im Hee-yeon hadn’t done anything for Shin-woo until now.
“…Forget it. Are you all right?”
“No problem. But it seems this incident is becoming quite the commotion.”
“Don’t worry about the media. I’ll try to keep it quiet…”
At that, Shin-woo’s expression hardened as he looked at Im Hee-yeon.
“No. Don’t do anything.”
“…What?”
“I said, don’t do anything. Just leave it alone.”
“Leave it alone?”
“If the media stirs things up, I’ll actually be safer.”
Hearing that, Im Hee-yeon’s expression hardened as well.
“Are you saying… that someone really targeted you intentionally?”
“They tried to kill me and disguise it as an accident.”
“Is… is that true?”
“Well, thanks to some help, I managed to survive.”
“Who are you talking about?”
At that question, Shin-woo let out a sigh of relief.
“There were several people. They were completely covered up from head to toe, so I couldn’t tell if they were men or women. They took down the ones who were trying to kill me and dragged them off. Only after that did I finally gather my wits and make the report.”
“…I see. And their faces?”
“I already told you, I couldn’t tell if they were men or women. They were covered in black clothing, masks, hats, even strange goggles. Identifying them was impossible.”
Of course, this was all a lie.
Had he admitted the full truth, the captured attackers would have had to be handed over to the police. That would reveal the hidden motives behind the incident, so Shin-woo had no choice but to fabricate the story.
“As long as you’re okay, that’s all that matters. Don’t worry about the company for now; just rest.”
“I wasn’t seriously hurt. Besides, there’s too much work for me to take a long break.”
“Oh, and from now on, don’t go anywhere alone. Director Song Tae-hoon will assign the security team from Team 5 to stay with you.”
At those words, Shin-woo frowned.
“I don’t want that.”
“Someone is out there trying to kill you. And you’re saying you’ll keep moving alone?”
Im Hee-yeon thought back to the people who had targeted her in front of the cafe. Although she’d managed to capture one, they had to abandon the safe house after its location was compromised.
Those attackers had been highly skilled, and she remained cautious ever since.
But this time, they weren’t after her; they had targeted Shin-woo.
“It’s just more comfortable this way.”
Honestly, it would feel more like surveillance than protection.
However, Im Hee-yeon wasn’t willing to back down easily.
“It’s too dangerous!”
“I refuse.”
Hearing Shin-woo’s cold response, Im Hee-yeon could push no further.
“…….”
“How long do you plan to stay here? Aren’t you busy?”
As the head of the Strategic Investment Headquarters, Im Hee-yeon managed business operations for the headquarters and was responsible for strategic investment projects across various affiliates. This workload kept her extremely busy.
“I should be going. But think about the security team. As a member of the owner family, even the other kids have security assigned to them.”
“I’m fine.”
With that, Im Hee-yeon sighed and left with Song Tae-hoon.
—