Holy Idol [EN]: Chapter 311

311. The Black Hawk Lord’s Wrath (2)

As Rembrary frowned while holding his phone, the Lion Lord next to him mouthed, “Who is it?”

“They say it’s the warden of the Awakened-only prison.”

The Lion Lord’s eyes widened considerably when Rembrary explained.

“Warden? Awakened-only? Why? Are they here to catch me?”

Rembrary shook his head.

“I don’t know.”

Unless they were already acquainted, a sudden call from the warden felt unsettling.

“Isn’t it a scam call? If they’re here to catch me, it must be a scam. Let’s hang up.”

At the Lion Lord’s urging, Rembrary shrugged and asked again.

“What’s the message? If it’s an order to capture the Lion, I won’t listen. The Lion is my comrade. I don’t sell out my comrades.”

“Rembr…”

As the Lion Lord looked at Rembrary, moved, Rembrary smiled contentedly and tugged on the Lion’s beard attached to the mask three times.

“Beard. Beard. Beard.”

Meanwhile.

Warden Kwon Je-gu, on the other end of the line, frowned for a moment, wondering what this nonsense was. What about the Lion’s beard? Why did that come up? He didn’t understand at all.

But soon, he remembered the rumor that the Hunter Rembrary was a bit of a nutcase anyway. He had openly committed the bizarre act of poking the eyes of the national hero on television, hadn’t he?

If so, there was no need to get involved. He cleared his throat and continued what he was about to say.

“Well…”

* * *

“Sardine. The warden who was mumbling about ‘Goo Goo’ earlier called.”

The moment Rembrary burst into the conference room, having found Shin Jo-woon’s location, the eyes of the Worldboom executives in the room all turned to Rembrary.

“…”

Shin Jo-woon, who had been frowning at the presentation from the head seat, also looked surprised to see Rembrary.

The newbie, who was trembling in front of Shin Jo-woon while giving the presentation, felt sorry for Rembrary. Before Rembrary came, he had made three big mistakes in a row, which had completely ruined Shin Jo-woon’s mood. And now, this Hunter trainee Rembrary had opened the door without knocking, not knowing any of this.

Perhaps the president would issue an expulsion order as if freezing the opponent to death without a change in expression: Get out of the office. Get out of Worldboom. Get out of Korea. Leave this world altogether. The newbie automatically teared up at the thought of Shin Jo-woon’s anger, which would unfold in four stages.

Of course, it was just his imagination, but it was a realistic fear for the newbie who was afraid of Shin Jo-woon.

However, unexpectedly, Shin Jo-woon responded in a calm voice, and without much change in expression.

“Let’s talk about that later. There’s pizza in the fridge. Take it out and eat it. Ask Tomato to heat it up for you.”

‘He’s… not angry?’ The newbie looked at Shin Jo-woon in surprise. He usually gets angry quietly without raising his voice, so why today…?

Of course, the Hunter Rembrary had recently gained tremendous fame by appearing on [the TV show title], and there were rumors that he might have two Awakened ability types, although he hadn’t confirmed it himself. For the first time.

‘In many ways, he’s an amazing person, but our president isn’t the type to be mindful of someone just because they’re amazing…’

“Understood.”

But the Hunter trainee Rembrary didn’t seem impressed, even though President Shin Jo-woon wasn’t angry and even told him to eat pizza so considerately.

Rather, he replied without much emotion himself, and then just closed the door and left. And he gave an answer that was close to disrespect, going beyond just speaking informally.

As the sound of the door closing faded and Rembrary disappeared, the newbie stared blankly at the closed door, feeling like something was unreal. What was that just now? What just passed by?

At that moment.

“Was the cut-off score for this entrance exam low? What are you standing there blankly for?”

President Shin Jo-woon’s voice, which had been replayed in the newbie’s head several times, was heard right in front of him, cold and chilling.

“!”

Realizing this, the newbie quickly grabbed the small pointer again and trembled.

He didn’t have time to worry about others right now.

* * *

Rembrary, unaware that an unknown newbie was crying because of him, thinking, ‘Why does the president pick on me, who officially joined the company, while leaving the Hunter trainee who hasn’t even joined alone?’ brought up the story of the warden of the Awakened-only prison as soon as Shin Jo-woon came after finishing the meeting.

However, Shin Jo-woon nodded before Rembrary could even finish telling the story he had heard.

“I heard about that too.”

“Is it true?”

“The story that the gang of the Awakened you caught, ‘Baek So,’ infiltrated the prison? Be careful in case they try to take revenge.”

“That’s right.”

It seemed that the warden had called both Shin Jo-woon and Rembrary.

Rembrary gave a pitiful expression and lightly tapped Shin Jo-woon on the shoulder.

“Be careful. Aren’t you physically weak?”

“…”

A statement that the newbie, who had his mentality half-crushed after giving a presentation in front of Shin Jo-woon, would have considered absurd, even shouting it out loud. However, Shin Jo-woon shamelessly nodded in agreement, even though he heard such nonsense.

“That’s right.”

But there was no one here to call Shin Jo-woon out on his lies.

“But the only pig always makes me, who is physically weak, do all the work. Where’s your conscience? Is this why they say it’s useless to raise a pig?”

“I misspoke. You’re weak in strength, not physically weak. You’re strong enough to run errands for me.”

“Why do you keep changing your words depending on what you need?”

“I’m better than a sardine who changes his physical condition depending on what he needs, aren’t I?”

For about 30 minutes, a conversation that Jang Tae-ri would have slapped both of them on the back for, saying they were both the same, went back and forth several times.

Rembrary, treating Shin Jo-woon with the heart of someone waving a fishing rod in front of a cat, sighed, “Ah,” remembering that there was one more person to take care of.

“Why?”

“Jeong Seo.”

“Tomato?”

“The gang of Awakened I caught. Isn’t Jeong Seo a target for revenge?”

“He didn’t do anything, so what revenge?”

“Didn’t he come along for the filming? From the perspective of that Awakened Baek So, it might seem like they’re all the same.”

“…Well, maybe. That could be.”

Shin Jo-woon nodded at Rembrary’s words.

The production team only followed along and didn’t do anything, but they filmed the scene of Rembrary easily subduing the Awakened and broadcast it nationwide.

From the Awakened’s point of view, that could also be a grudge. It’s no different from revealing their dark history.

“Looking at it that way, it’s clear. The production team could also be targets for revenge.”

Shin Jo-woon thought for a moment, then picked up his phone and called his secretary.

“Increase the number of guards in the building, and tell the [TV show title] production team to refrain from acting alone. When they go outside the building, make sure they request to be accompanied by a Hunter.”

Shin Jo-woon wasn’t very interested in the safety of the production team itself. However, if they were attacked within the Worldboom building, his company’s pride and reputation would be tarnished. Of course, he had to prevent it. What happens to them outside later is none of his business.

“Ah, one more thing.”

“Yes, President.”

“Ask if the warden has contacted them too. If they received a call, they’ll understand what’s going on without me having to explain it in detail.”

“Yes.”

* * *

The production team was not included among those who the warden of the Awakened-only prison called. This was because Warden Kwon Je-gu was literally the warden of an ‘Awakened-only’ prison.

The number of Awakened was infinitely smaller than that of non-Awakened. Of course, if you turn on the TV or go on the internet, it’s always full of stories about Awakened. They can defeat monsters, and even if they don’t fight monsters, they have abilities like superpowers, so they easily rose to high positions in a society where the laws are weak and flimsy.

Thanks to this, they stand out and are highly topical, but in terms of numbers, Awakened were an overwhelmingly small minority compared to non-Awakened.

Because of this situation, Warden Kwon Je-gu had the idea that he only needed to take care of the Awakened. Not because he ignored the non-Awakened, but because the non-Awakened would already be taken care of a lot elsewhere, even if he didn’t take care of them.

Since he had already reported to Shin Jo-woon and Rembrary, as well as related government agencies, wouldn’t they take care of it? This was Warden Kwon Je-gu’s thought.

In addition, Warden Kwon Je-gu thought similarly to what Shin Jo-woon had thought at first. The Awakened Baek So, who was caught by Rembrary, wouldn’t try to take revenge on the production team. The thought that the production team was not an object of resentment for Baek So or his gang.

For this reason, he didn’t bother to contact the production team. Of course, he didn’t know the production team’s contact information either.

However, this was clearly his mistake.

“What is this? You want to find Shin Jo-woon’s… weakness…?”

Around the time Shin Jo-woon was sending people to the production team, PD [Production Director] Gu had already found the note left by the Black Hawk Lord.

* * *

The Black Hawk Lord had identified four main groups as targets for revenge.

One was Rembrary. One was Shin Jo-woon. Another group was the [TV show title] production team. The rest were the lords who gave the order to capture Baek So, who he didn’t know exactly who they were yet.

However, the Black Hawk Lord didn’t suddenly rush into the Worldboom building and try to attack.

‘Going into Worldboom and fighting Shin Jo-woon is like scoring an own goal. Shin Jo-woon himself is strong, and there are many other Hunters around him. The Worldboom Hunters are already well-known for their skills… The same goes for Rembrary. He’s still a trainee, but he uses strange abilities, so I shouldn’t recklessly confront him head-on. If I ignore him, I’ll end up like Baek So.’

The Black Hawk Lord first targeted Rembrary and followed him around 24 hours a day, looking for anything that could be a weakness.

However, the only weaknesses of the trainee Rembrary were those that were already public: a personality that treats everyone disrespectfully, regardless of status, gender, or age; making crazy remarks.

As a result of following him around for 24 hours, he also learned another secret that ‘he often mumbles to himself while looking at the sky,’ but since Rembrary was already known as a nutcase, it didn’t seem like it would be a weakness even if it was revealed.

For this reason, the Black Hawk Lord first passed on Rembrary and changed his target to Shin Jo-woon. He thought that Shin Jo-woon, who was leading a huge company, must have some kind of corruption.

In the meantime, the Black Hawk Lord happened to overhear the production team’s conversation: a conversation about taking revenge by finding Shin Jo-woon’s weakness.

The Black Hawk Lord smiled faintly as he saw PD Gu finding the note he had written and looking around.

‘Shin Jo-woon and those involved in [TV show title]. You will fight each other and perish together.’