Hoarding In Hell [EN]: Chapter 141

141. Unfair Negotiation (4)

Ryoo Soo-ah scoffed at Hyun-woo’s question, throwing mockery back at him.

“It’s a group formed to maintain the sustainable future of humanity and to prevent the impending catastrophe with minimal sacrifice.”

But she froze at her own words that had spilled out in an instant.

‘What did I just say?’ It was as if she were a dog obedient to Kang Hyun-woo, answering as soon as he opened his mouth.

And she revealed the core values of the Alliance all at once.

“Sustainable future? Minimal sacrifice? What is this? I thought it was a bit cult-like, but is it a group of conspiracy theorist utilitarians?”

Hyun-woo muttered in disbelief. Ryoo Soo-ah shouted in embarrassment.

“You, you! What on earth are you doing to me!”

“Tell me everything you know about the Alliance members besides the Teacher.”

“The Alliance members I know are Swibin, Ha Soo-yeon, Park Hwi-so, and Robert Lee. What are you doing to me? Aaaagh!”

The last words were a scream.

Ryoo Soo-ah couldn’t even understand what she was saying.

The moment Kang Hyun-woo asked a question, her mind became hazy, and she couldn’t help but spit out the answers.

It felt like she was hypnotized. ‘Is this some kind of enchantment skill?’

Hyun-woo pulled the chain, making Ryoo Soo-ah sit down. His eyes were cold.

“Ryoo Soo-ah, your life is already over.”

“What… what?”

“Did you really think you survived by a fluke? Ah, well, you almost did. Yoo-min sprayed you with potions in time and did a good job with first aid. Well, until I arrived.”

Hyun-woo pulled the chain around Ryoo Soo-ah’s neck.

“You are now my thrall [a person under the power or control of another]. Of course, it’s very unpleasant, but live bait is more likely to lure fish than a dead corpse used as bait. You will be the bait to expose the roots of the Alliance.”

The thing around Ryoo Soo-ah’s neck was the Shackles of Covenant. Just making her a thrall would force Ryoo Soo-ah to obey, but the Shackles of Covenant amplified the effect even more.

Ryoo Soo-ah’s eyes were filled with terror. Hyun-woo whispered softly.

“Now, tell me about the Teacher. Who is the Teacher? What does he do?”

Ryoo Soo-ah’s eyes widened.

Her eyes were bloodshot, and her jaw trembled. Hyun-woo was slightly impressed by the sight.

Ryoo Soo-ah was resisting Hyun-woo’s command with her own will. It wasn’t just a matter of enduring.

In Ryoo Soo-ah’s mind, all concepts and will were in chaos, and she was defying every desire a human could feel.

For her now, obeying Hyun-woo’s command was like a starving person filling their belly, or someone who hadn’t slept for ten days finally getting a good night’s sleep.

But Ryoo Soo-ah was resisting all those desires.

“Guh, uh, Tea, Teacher is…”

“This makes it seem like I’m torturing you.”

The continued resistance was eroding her mental strength and the vitality of her body.

Ryoo Soo-ah’s jaw began to tremble and open. At that moment, an unbelievable word reached Hyun-woo’s ears.

“What?”

He couldn’t hear properly because Ryoo Soo-ah’s jaw was trembling, but for a moment, Hyun-woo heard a word he couldn’t miss.

The moment Hyun-woo leaned in to encourage her to answer, Ryoo Soo-ah suddenly dropped her head and vomited blood.

Hyun-woo quickly forced Ryoo Soo-ah’s mouth open. Blood gushed out between her bitten tongue.

“No, how….”

Hyun-woo felt dumbfounded by this blind loyalty, but he was also suspicious.

The Ryoo Soo-ah that Hyun-woo had seen seemed like a realist. But she was attempting suicide just because she couldn’t say the Teacher’s name.

Hyun-woo stuffed a towel into Ryoo Soo-ah’s mouth and poured potions into her.

But Ryoo Soo-ah seemed to have broken not only her body but also her mind. No intelligence could be found in her limp body and hazy eyes. Hyun-woo clicked his tongue.

‘Is this Teacher such a great person?’

But Hyun-woo didn’t believe that someone could be so blindly loyal to someone else just out of personal affection or respect.

Something else must have been involved.

***

Seeing that Ryoo Soo-ah’s condition was stabilizing, Hyun-woo snapped his fingers and called the person standing outside.

“Old man.”

Park Hwi-so walked into the room. His clothes were torn in places, and he was covered in wounds, but he was in relatively good condition.

He looked at Ryoo Soo-ah’s condition and made a bitter expression.

“I didn’t lay a hand on her. You saw that, right?”

“…I saw it.”

“What are you going to do?”

Park Hwi-so sighed and said.

“I have a promise, so I have to send her back.”

“Then deliver her to that Swibin or whatever. It doesn’t matter since she’s useless now. There’s nothing more to find out.”

Hyun-woo surprisingly gave his permission easily. But soon, when Hyun-woo released his thrall over Ryoo Soo-ah, she would die on her own.

Park Hwi-so approached Ryoo Soo-ah, examined her wounds, and lifted her up to move her.

Animal fur could be seen through the torn edges of Park Hwi-so’s clothes. Hyun-woo looked at it and opened his mouth.

“You said you ended up like that fighting that Swibin guy?”

“That’s right.”

“And in the middle of it, you received a call from the Teacher, scolding you not to fight?”

“…Yes.”

Hyun-woo tilted his head and asked.

“Even after all this, you still seem to be an Alliance member loved by the Teacher, Mr. Park Hwi-so. He even said he wouldn’t ask or hold you accountable if you safely returned Ryoo Soo-ah.”

“Ryoo Soo-ah provoked it first.”

“Okay. But.”

Hyun-woo gave a chilly smile.

“It sounds like he’s doing you a favor.”

“……I think it’s to prevent unnecessary conflict.”

Park Hwi-so said defensively, but if Hyun-woo went out and told him to resume the fight, he would start fighting again.

Hyun-woo had no intention of fighting any further.

From the beginning, the disposition of Ryoo Soo-ah was to be left to Park Hwi-so, and Park Hwi-so had decided to stop here.

But Hyun-woo didn’t forget to warn him.

“From now on, I’d appreciate it if that Teacher of yours has something to say to Mr. Park Hwi-so, he should do it through me. I don’t like him telling my people what to do as if they were his subordinates.”

Hyun-woo smiled at Park Hwi-so.

Park Hwi-so knew that it would be easiest for Hyun-woo to ask him the Teacher’s name.

But Hyun-woo didn’t ask that name anymore. Park Hwi-so didn’t know if that was a sign of respect, a sign of distrust, or if he didn’t really care.

“Kang Hyun-woo-nim [Korean honorific suffix].”

“‘-nim’ is too formal, you can call me ‘-ssi’ [another Korean honorific suffix, less formal than ‘-nim’].”

“Why don’t you ask me the Teacher’s name?”

Hyun-woo wasn’t surprised or flustered by Park Hwi-so’s words. He had expected it.

“Would you like me to ask?”

“It’s not that, but……”

Park Hwi-so had already crossed the point of no return. No matter what the Teacher thought, it was now difficult to call him an ally.

If Hyun-woo asked, he felt that he would hesitate, but eventually tell him.

“Old man, I think this is a kind of challenge.”

Hyun-woo said with a smile.

“I don’t want to coerce or harass my people. Unless they betray me first. In that sense, I think that one day, old man, you will tell me who the Teacher is first. And I’m very much looking forward to that moment.”

“Even if it complicates Kang Hyun-woo-ssi’s path?”

“Well, I don’t know what will happen if it becomes a really urgent situation. I’m saying this because I have the 여유 [yeoyu – Korean for ‘余裕’, meaning leeway or余裕] right now.”

Hyun-woo chuckled.

“Don’t think too highly of me. Ah, and seeing what happened to Ryoo Soo-ah, I suspect that you guys might be under some kind of compulsion or curse. Actually, I don’t believe in this kind of blind loyalty. You guys seem a bit abnormal.”

“All the Alliance members owe the Teacher more than their lives. It’s natural……”

“There’s no such thing as ‘natural’, old man.”

Hyun-woo said leisurely.

“I don’t believe in predetermined futures, absolute beliefs, or eternal loyalty. If I believed in such things, I wouldn’t have tried to seduce you in the first place.”

“……”

Park Hwi-so’s eyes wavered.

Sometimes, he felt that Hyun-woo was trying to shake all values and rules.

Of course, he thought that such a point might be Hyun-woo’s greatest weapon.

Park Hwi-so walked away to take Ryoo Soo-ah to Swibin, who was waiting outside again.

Hyun-woo looked at the receding Ryoo Soo-ah and thought about what she had said at the end.

He might have misheard, but Ryoo Soo-ah had definitely mentioned that word.

Difficulty: Hell. He didn’t expect to hear that word on the day he returned.

It seemed like a clue connecting the future and the present had finally emerged.

“The Star of the Apocalypse……”

***

Mars Mana Industrial Complex, a factory belonging to the Pan-Human Alliance.

It had only been a few weeks, but the factory, which had undergone a major remodeling in the meantime, no longer resembled its former atmosphere.

The loose atmosphere of the factory, which only did primary processing, had disappeared, and the conveyor belt turned under strict hygiene control and strict surveillance, like a company handling high-tech equipment.

The cause was in the raw material rather than the items made here.

Right here, you can’t even see it anywhere else, the highest grade of Crystal Moss, which is not enough to be called the best.

Do Won-kyung lifted the Crystal Moss and had a dazed look. Hyun-woo made a disgusted face at the expression.

“No, aren’t you tired of looking at it like that? You’re going to lose your eyes.”

“If I could take it, I would hug it like an egg and sleep with it.”

“Please refrain from doing that……”

Hyun-woo and Do Won-kyung were both wearing thorough protective suits. In fact, Hyun-woo, as an ability user, didn’t need to worry about mana poisoning, so there was no need to take such measures, but he didn’t want to be told that he was slacking off just because he was the boss.

“By the way, how is the technology transfer from D&W going? There’s no way those guys will hand it over completely.”

“Yoo-min is filling in the gaps while looking at the blueprints, right? She’ll be able to fill them in quickly. They must have used tricks to prevent the transfer of core technology, but. There’s me and Yoo-min in Korea. Oh, and Lee Si-won too. Anyway, I’m glad I could get her a job.”

“Who is Lee Si-won……?”

“……Have you already forgotten? Well, there’s a guy like that. Anyway, this factory is really…… like heaven.”

Do Won-kyung looked around the factory with a proud expression. The factory, which had been thoroughly renovated according to Do Won-kyung’s advice without sparing money, was like her ideal place.

Thanks to this, it became closer to making it like a workshop in a laboratory rather than mass production, but even so, the speed of making it was several times faster than that of an ordinary factory.

Because she could use high-quality, high-purity Crystal Moss to her heart’s content, there was no need to go through unnecessary processes.

“Of course, it’s a pity that the things churned out in this heaven are crap.”

Do Won-kyung took out one of the completed prototypes and said.

Throwing dagger.

It was the most basic form of item. It is a common grade, but the durability and sharpness are different from other daggers.

It was thanks to the lavish use of the highest grade Crystal Moss. It’s almost comparable to a rare grade, but it didn’t seem to satisfy Do Won-kyung.

If she had used the ‘Manufacturing’ skill, a rare grade would have come out, but Hyun-woo didn’t care.

The important thing is that this will now be released on the market.

The price will be set slightly higher, but hunters don’t spare money on equipment that their lives depend on.

From the bottom to the top, monopoly is instantaneous.

The highest grade Crystal Moss, which is almost free to Hyun-woo, is starting to be converted into cash.

Hyun-woo said to appease Do Won-kyung.

“That’s why there’s also a level 3 platform.”

Do Won-kyung’s expression, which had been lifting the dagger as if it were crap, instantly relaxed.

If the level 1 platform is here, a place to mass-produce goods to encroach on the market, the level 2 platform is a place to make high-quality equipment to rip off Hyun-woo’s direct hunters, and the rich or high-level hunters who have nothing but money.

And finally. The level 3 platform was top secret among top secrets.

It was a heaven on earth created for Do Won-kyung. Do Won-kyung’s core research was started and created there.

It was also a place to experiment and mass-produce Do Won-kyung’s exoskeleton and technology transplanted from D&W.

“Speaking of which, the prototype of that thing transferred from D&W is out, right? Let’s go check it out.”