[11:03 a.m.]
Zurich St. Cathedral.
Matteo was dressed in a black suit,
delivering a eulogy.
The eulogy was reaching its crucial point.
He was moments away from proclaiming his authority.
With a thud, the power went out.
The lights died, and the microphone went dead.
Matteo’s voice,
which had been ringing through the speakers, vanished into the air.
The inside of the cathedral was filled with the faint light filtering through the stained glass.
Red, blue, distorted.
It was a strange, heavy atmosphere.
But there was no time to feel it.
Boom.
An explosion went off in the pipe organ.
Boom.
A bomb exploded behind a pillar.
Boom.
A bomb also went off among the flowers on the altar.
Fragments flew, and flowers scattered.
Bombs exploded all over the cathedral.
Shards fell from the ceiling,
and smoke rose.
Someone screamed,
someone ran for the exit,
and someone hid beneath a pew.
That was when it happened.
Kwaaang!!
A drone slammed into the outer wall.
A tremendous blast rang out.
The stained glass that had been creating those mysterious colors shattered into pieces.
Shards of colored glass broke apart and fell to the floor.
Light, glass, and smoke mingled together.
Bombs began to explode simultaneously inside and outside the cathedral.
Zurich St. Cathedral shook,
and screams rang out from every direction.
This place was no longer a funeral hall.
It was a battlefield.
.
.
.
From afar, Shin Junggi was watching the scene.
Beyond the scope of his sniper rifle, he could see the cathedral rising with smoke.
People were evacuating because of the explosions.
Shin Junggi gripped the detonator lying beside him.
All the explosions so far had been merely preparation.
Explosions meant to create cracks,
to shake people.
The real thing began now.
If he pressed this button, Zurich St. Cathedral would collapse as it stood.
It would become a massive tomb.
He opened the acrylic cover of the detonator.
Three. Two. One.
.
.
.
Matteo was reading the eulogy in front of the altar.
Now came the most important part.
He had to announce the part where he would expel Rodrigo,
but the power went out.
The speakers shut off.
His voice vanished weakly into the air.
At the same time, an explosion occurred.
A bomb went off right behind him.
The impact shoved him in the back.
Matteo fell forward.
The empty coffin toppled over, and Adrian’s photograph and belongings fell to the floor.
Glass shattered, and objects broke.
Matteo planted a hand on the floor.
His ears were ringing.
His vision went white.
For a moment, he could not grasp what had happened.
Boom, boom.
More explosions.
This time, from the side.
Fragments fell from the ceiling.
Instinctively, he curled up.
A chunk of stone fell right beside him.
He had barely avoided it.
If it had been a little closer, it would have hit him in the head.
Matteo raised his head.
He looked around.
He searched for his bodyguards.
He called for the Obsidian Unit.
But they were gone.
The Obsidian Unit, who had seemed as though they would always be guarding his side, were not there.
They had vanished in an instant.
The cathedral was chaos.
People were rushing toward the only door,
trying to escape.
They shoved one another, fell, and screamed.
He had to get up.
Matteo had to get up too and head for that door.
But his body would not obey.
There was no strength in his legs.
Then he sensed someone approaching.
Everyone was running toward the door,
but this person alone was moving the other way.
He was approaching Matteo.
Even without lifting his head, he felt he knew who it was.
In this situation,
there was only one person who would come to him.
Matteo clenched his fist tight.
At the very least, he did not want his signet ring taken.
.
.
.
Rodrigo toyed with the pistol inside his coat.
The gun hidden in the bathroom vent.
Eduardo had secretly brought it to him amid the chaos.
This one gun was enough.
He would end it here.
Matteo was a traitor.
A bastard who had tried to hand Parallax over to outsiders.
He had to make him pay for that personally.
He could have Eduardo do it,
but this was not something he could entrust to someone else.
He had to do it himself.
It was troublesome and annoying,
but a traitorous bastard had to be dealt with personally.
Parallax had to belong to Parallax.
Not to half-baked bastards like him.
Thinking that, he had been watching for his chance.
He had been glaring only at Matteo.
But it was not easy.
There were people guarding Matteo front and back.
He would have only one chance.
The moment he failed, the bodyguards would come and surround Matteo.
If he made any suspicious move, he could be subdued immediately.
Members he had brought from South America were standing by on the outskirts,
but inside this cathedral, there was no one to help him.
If he missed this chance, there would be no second opportunity.
One chance.
He had to focus.
That was when it happened.
Bang.
With the sound, the cathedral shook.
Explosions erupted here and there.
People screamed.
But even amid all that, Rodrigo kept his eyes on Matteo.
Because of the explosion, Matteo was lying collapsed in front of the altar.
There was no one around him.
No bodyguards,
no Obsidian Unit.
The corners of Rodrigo’s mouth lifted faintly.
‘This actually worked out.’
This was an opportunity.
A perfect opportunity.
Today, Matteo would not have died at Rodrigo’s hands.
He would have died because of the cathedral explosion.
No one would suspect Rodrigo.
He walked against the fleeing crowd, toward the altar.
There lay Matteo, collapsed.
His eyes met Matteo’s.
Fear was etched in Matteo’s eyes.
But his hand was clenched tight.
The hand holding the signet ring was trembling.
Rodrigo’s muzzle pointed at Matteo.
He placed his finger on the trigger.
At that moment,
the altar, already left unstable by the explosion, collapsed as it was.
The altar fell over Matteo, who was lying on the floor.
The remaining objects poured down onto Matteo.
A heavy structure that had been supporting the altar crushed Matteo’s legs.
“Aaagh!!”
“Help me.”
“Please save me.”
Matteo shouted.
Rodrigo looked down at him.
He slipped the pistol in his hand back inside his coat.
There was no need to use the gun.
He picked up the cloth that had been caught beneath the altar and wrapped it around his hand.
Then he picked up a sharply broken piece of stained glass.
He slowly approached Matteo.
“You died in the explosion. Stabbed in the neck by glass. Got it?”
His tone was calm and gentle, as though he were explaining something.
Matteo was terrified.
But he could not run.
His legs, pinned beneath the structure, would not move.
All he could do
was beg to be spared.
“Save me.”
“I’ll do anything you say.”
“Parallax? You take it. I don’t want it.”
“I mean it.”
Rodrigo listened to those words as Matteo’s last will.
Then he moved his hand.
The stained glass touched Matteo’s neck.
Slash.
He drew it across.
A clear mark from the stained glass appeared on Matteo’s neck as he screamed in agony.
His skin split,
and a vivid red line formed.
Then blood began to gush from that spot as if bursting out.
“Urgh…”
Matteo let out a low groan.
Matteo’s body trembled.
“Sa… save me.”
But Rodrigo no longer looked at Matteo.
He turned and ran toward the exit.
.
.
.
Shin Junggi was holding the detonator in his hand.
He had even removed the acrylic cover.
All he had to do now was press it.
At that moment, Zurich St. Cathedral would come crashing down.
Shin Junggi pressed his eye to the scope of the sniper rifle.
He wanted to see clearly the sight of the cathedral collapsing.
At the entrance, he could see people struggling desperately to escape.
It looked like pandemonium, chaos, Avici Hell.
‘Goodbye.’
With this, his revenge was over.
Shin Junggi brought his hand to the detonator.
That was when it happened.
Among the escaping people, he saw a familiar face.
“Bo… boss?”
Why was the boss here?
His hand stopped.
At the appearance of someone he had never expected, Shin Junggi was flustered.
He checked once more.
It was definitely the boss.
He was quickly leaving the cathedral.
The boss was a variable.
It was true that he had intended to kill all of Parallax.
He had intended to kill all the vermin parasitizing Parallax as well.
That much was certain.
But not the boss.
He had no desire to kill the boss.
If anything, he was someone he had to protect.
He had never once imagined that the boss would be there.
Why was the boss at Adrian’s funeral?
He watched the boss leave the cathedral at a brisk pace.
It seemed the boss had succeeded in escaping.
Could he press the button now?
The thought flashed through his mind, but he shook his head.
No.
Because he lacked information about the cathedral, he had not been able to calculate everything thoroughly.
He had crammed in too many bombs compared to the size of the cathedral.
If he detonated them now, the boss might be injured.
He had left the cathedral, but he could still be caught in the shock wave, the fragments, the backblast from the explosion.
He could be buried beneath debris.
He could not gamble on something like this.
Shin Junggi placed the acrylic cover back over the detonator.
Slowly, without a word.
He took his eye away from the sniper rifle’s scope.
With his naked eyes, he looked at the cathedral rising with smoke.
With that sight as the last thing he saw, Shin Junggi left the place.
.
.
.
I came out of the cathedral and was walking.
The moment the power went out and the lights died, I knew.
This was not a simple accident.
Someone had caused it deliberately.
In that instant, a chill ran through me.
And right then, Chen Zihao’s transmission came through.
A drone had appeared, but it was not showing on radar.
That one sentence was enough.
Shin Junggi.
It could only be Shin Junggi.
I thought of Shin Junggi’s empty, sorrow-filled eyes.
I remembered him asking whether that was enough.
I immediately ran for the exit.
When I passed through the doorway, I heard the sound of an explosion.
Part of the entrance collapsed.
People were crowded there,
and debris fell on top of them.
The collapsed door,
the people trapped beneath it,
the people trying to evacuate.
Shin Junggi had probably tried to block the entrance
and bring down the entire cathedral.
I could feel his emotions exactly as they were.
It was not simple revenge.
It was desperate rage.
My earpiece rang.
It was Chen Zihao.
— Are you all right? Are you out?
“I’m out. You can’t confirm that I’m out?”
— All communication networks are down. This is an emergency line, so this is barely connected.
“It’s Shin Junggi. I think Shin Junggi is here.”
— I think so too.
“Can you confirm Shin Junggi’s location?”
— No. I can’t get a proper read. I think he’s nearby, but I can’t pinpoint him.
“Keep looking.”
“Yes.”
I also scanned my surroundings.
I did not stop walking.
If Shin Junggi was attacking the cathedral,
he had to be nearby.
He had to be able to see the cathedral clearly.
He could use CCTV, but he had to control the drone and use the detonator,
so there was a high chance he was not far away.
A high place with a clear line of sight.
I moved my gaze mainly across the higher places.
For a moment, I saw something “flash.”
Like the reflection of a mirror, perhaps.
‘A scope?’
“Eleven o’clock, five hundred meters. Check the rooftop.”
I gave the order to Chen Zihao and the Obsidian Unit.
The Obsidian Unit moved first.
I ran with them as well.
That place was the most likely.
We could not be late.
But when we arrived, Shin Junggi was not there.
It was empty.
It had been cleanly cleared out.
The only thing left there
was a single detonator that had not yet been pressed.
It was not that Shin Junggi had failed to bring down Zurich St. Cathedral.
He had chosen not to bring it down.
.
.
.
Rodrigo headed for the airport.
He planned to leave this place and head to South America, to Mexico.
He had already reached a conclusion.
He could not stay here.
Remaining in Zurich
was the worst possible choice.
Returning to South America was the right move.
The incident at the cathedral had grown far too large.
It was not a simple accident.
It was terrorism.
An investigation would begin.
Not only the police,
but the press and the government would rush in and tear into Parallax.
In the end, all of Parallax would be shaken.
Of course, he had used this incident to eliminate Matteo,
but he was more worried about what would come next.
What Rodrigo wanted was an intact Parallax.
Not Parallax in tatters like this.
Of course, there was also the option of remaining in Zurich and rebuilding Parallax.
Perhaps, in order to become chairman, that might be the best method.
In terms of legitimacy,
and in terms of narrative as well.
But that process would be far too harsh and difficult.
He might even go to prison despite having done nothing wrong,
and during that time, the Middle Eastern bastards or the Europeans could declare independence,
or swallow Parallax whole.
He would suffer all the hardship,
while someone else licked up the honey.
Rodrigo shook his head.
For now, it was best to avoid this sort of thing.
Wasn’t it best to take shelter from a sudden storm?
Until the situation was sorted out, it was best to watch how things unfolded from South America.
He had to reorganize his group.
And then he would return.
Once the situation was settled, he could come back in then.
For now, avoiding it was the right move.
Rodrigo looked out the window from inside the car heading to the airport.
Smoke was still rising from Zurich St. Cathedral.
Leaving that sight behind, Rodrigo headed for the airport.