-The Enemies’ Counterattack
“We arrested An Seokju last night.”
Yu Jaeseon spoke just as I had offered him a chair, accepted a cup of coffee, and taken a sip.
His manner was as calm as if he were saying he had caught a fish at sea.
“An Seokju? Last night?”
“Ah, I suppose I should say early this morning. It was around two a.m.”
Yu Jaeseon answered as though he thought what I was curious about was the exact time of arrest.
Of course, I had only asked because I was surprised he had moved so quickly.
“You’ve been busy. I think it was past ten when we finished talking yesterday. I didn’t expect you to act right away.”
“I didn’t think it was something we should drag out. Now that we knew An Seokju was a black mage, we had to arrest him immediately. There was also the risk he might flee.”
“You did well.”
From my position, there was nothing else I could say but praise him.
Arresting and interrogating An Seokju was the Bureau’s job, after all.
Yu Jaeseon continued.
“After that, I went straight to see Chairman Kim Seonho. He wasn’t at home but in the company penthouse.”
“Ah! You went to see Chairman Kim Seonho at that hour too?”
This reaction of mine, naturally, was not a question about the time either.
I was simply surprised that Yu Jaeseon was an even more diligent and passionate mage than I had thought.
Fortunately, this time Yu Jaeseon did not answer by telling me the exact time of his visit.
“I wanted to see his reaction to An Seokju’s arrest. Once time had passed, he would only show a prepared response. I wanted to see his immediate reaction.”
“So how did he react?”
“As expected, he denied it, saying it couldn’t be true. But then he quickly lowered his tail a little, saying that if An Seokju really was a black mage, the company would have to prepare countermeasures as well. I thought he would simply deny everything outright, but seeing him add that on, it seems he intends to cut An Seokju loose.”
“I suppose An Seokju wasn’t all that important a talent to the company.”
I replied lightly, as a joke.
But Yu Jaeseon did not laugh. Instead, he continued with a somewhat serious expression.
“I paid more attention to the chairman’s attitude than his words. His words were bound to be nothing but excuses, whatever came to mind.
But the chairman seemed rather unstable. The current situation must not be to his liking. That made me think he might make an unexpected move.”
“An unexpected move, as in…?”
“Well. That’s hard for me to predict too, but I got the feeling he might cause some unforeseen incident to divert people’s attention.”
“That could happen. We should prepare for it as well.”
Chairman Kim Seonho looked unstable, did he?
In truth, he had always been an unstable person. No matter how respectable he looked on the outside, he was strangely close to being a madman.
What, then, would that Kim Seonho try to do?
After hearing Yu Jaeseon’s words, I fell deep into thought.
The one fortunate thing was that I had sealed away Vanaheim’s test subjects.
At the very least, he wouldn’t be able to do something insane like unleash those test subjects upon the world.
But at that moment, something Kim Seonho had said before suddenly came to mind.
‘We won’t be able to use the test subjects for the time being, but fortunately, we’ve stored Golden Apple products in other places too, so we’ll have to continue the clinical trials.’
I also recalled Kim Seonho’s relieved expression when he said those words.
He had said he would continue the clinical trials.
Would the subjects of those clinical trials really be limited to humans?
Back then, I had gotten the impression that there might be other places where test subjects were being kept besides the underground cavern beneath the mansion.
If it was an ordinary laboratory, then of course there would be one at the company research institute as well.
Yet Kim Seonho had deliberately said “other places.”
Secret laboratories. Could he have been referring to the Magic Tower’s laboratory in Danyang?
There was no doubt that Golden Apple experiments had been conducted there too.
But that place was the Magic Tower’s laboratory and factory. Separate from Vanaheim, they had been producing Golden Apples on their own.
I did not know exactly what kind of relationship Vanaheim and the Magic Tower had, but they were probably not one body.
From the fact that they had hired me to prepare for Yasin’s attack, to yesterday’s terror attack, Vanaheim had been subtly getting on the Magic Tower’s nerves by creating that mass of amoebas in front of the Eternal Life Building.
They were likely in a prickly cooperative relationship, or else a competitive one.
In any case, what if Vanaheim—or Chairman Kim Seonho personally—had another place where test subjects were being kept?
What if he unleashed those test subjects into the world?
“What are you thinking so hard about?”
Yu Jaeseon asked me cautiously.
It seemed I had been lost in thought for quite some time.
I took a sip of coffee, then opened my mouth.
“I was thinking about what Chairman Kim Seonho might do next. I did seal the test subjects that were beneath the mansion, but I’m starting to wonder if there might be more of them.”
“You mean the test subjects used for the Golden Apple clinical trials?”
“Yes. But I have the feeling those test subjects weren’t created simply for clinical trials, but for a far more bizarre purpose.”
“Then do you think the chairman might use those test subjects to carry out a terror attack?”
“That’s exactly it.”
“That’s serious.”
This time, Yu Jaeseon seemed to fall into thought.
I waited for a moment, then threw out a question.
“Mage Yu, do you know how close the Golden Apple product currently is to completion?”
“According to the data, it was in the final stage of clinical trials. It was about to be released. The government’s final inspection remained, though.”
“Then what Kim Seonho is trying to do might be to release the Golden Apple. He might hurry and put it out into the world in order to recover the company’s reputation after the black mage incident damaged it.”
“That’s right. We absolutely have to stop that.”
“The release of Golden Apple must be stopped, no matter what.”
Yu Jaeseon and I hardened our resolve in one voice.
Although I had never discussed with Yu Jaeseon in advance what would happen if Golden Apple entered the world, he seemed to think the same way I did.
It was probably because he knew a black mage had been involved in the product’s development.
We could not know exactly what Kim Seonho had in mind, but we had to make all sorts of guesses and prepare countermeasures.
“Please have the government stop the release of Golden Apple. The clinical trials aren’t complete, so they can simply refuse to approve the product, can’t they?”
“We should. But there will be forces within the government who side with them, so it won’t be that simple. Golden Apple isn’t a pharmaceutical but a health supplement, so approval is relatively easy to obtain as well.”
“Please do whatever you can. I’ll look into the test subject side and try to stop it.”
“I’ll leave it to you.”
The work I had done as a mage until now had been to rush in and clear things after a terror attack had occurred.
Reading the enemy’s thoughts and movements in advance to prevent a terror attack before it happened was the kind of work an intelligence agency operative would do.
It was far more complicated and required many hands and feet spread out in every direction.
In other words, it would not be easy. The thought crossed my mind that it would be nice to have informants extending out like a spiderweb.
“Once Golden Apple is released, people will probably cheer. There are many who dream of eternal life.”
“That’s why the battle for public opinion is important. The reason I rushed to arrest An Seokju was to make people start questioning Vanaheim as a company.”
“You mean to damage the credibility of the product by revealing that there was a black mage inside the company?”
“Precisely.”
The battle for public opinion was important. He was right. I knew from experience that once rumors spread among people, the range of action one could take narrowed.
We had to shape public opinion first and tie the enemy’s hands and feet. Since we were trying to spread the truth, it wasn’t rumor-mongering or black propaganda.
“Black mages and the Magic Tower already have a bad image among the public, so that shouldn’t be a problem, but Vanaheim has been a major corporation praised by people until now. The public opinion battle won’t be easy.”
“That’s right. But the black mage side might not be simple either. A worrying report came up this morning.”
“What is it?”
“It seems the reawakened people in Daejeon are using magic and going around again. They’re causing disturbances and even spreading bad rumors.”
“The reawakened? Those people really are a constant headache. So what are these bad rumors?”
“I told you before that they had been resenting Mage Oudin, didn’t I? Now they’re taking it a step further. Apparently, an atmosphere of following the black mages is rising among them.”
“They’re following the black mages?”
That was a very bad sign.
Perhaps I had not completely removed their mental magic back then.
“They’re apparently going around openly saying that if it was black mages who gave them magic, then they’d rather follow black mages.”
“They can’t let go of that paltry power, so now they’ve even started following black mages.”
“They haven’t gained public support yet, but it could still have a negative effect on the public opinion battle.”
Both of us fell silent for a moment.
All sorts of thoughts endlessly wandered through my head.
But on closer look, Yu Jaeseon seemed quite tired. It was only natural, since he had spent the whole night unable to sleep, running around taking care of things.
This did not seem like something a simple cup of coffee could solve.
“By the way, you look tired. Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. I can endure a day or so without sleep well enough. I plan to stop by home for a bit now, take a shower, and do some training. Then my mana should replenish.”
“This isn’t a fight that will end in a day or two, and you’ll have many things to do from here on out, so you need to take care of your health. Hmm. Wait a moment.”
I opened a desk drawer, took out a bottle of potion, and handed it to Yu Jaeseon.
Cheon Danbi had packed plenty of potions for me, so I still had many left.
“Drink this. It’s a potion made by one of my team members.”
“Ah, the one who owns the herb shop?”
“Yes. The potion’s effects are excellent.”
“Then I’ll gratefully accept it.”
Yu Jaeseon accepted the potion without refusing and drank it down in one go. Then his eyes quickly widened as he looked at me.
“The effect appears immediately? This is truly amazing.”
“I told you.”
For some reason, I felt proud. Even though I hadn’t made it.
Suddenly, I thought Vanaheim were fools.
They should have been working with an outstanding druid like Cheon Danbi and producing medicine. Why on earth had they joined hands with black mages?
At that moment, Yu Jaeseon abruptly stood up.
I wondered what was wrong, and saw him taking a communication device out of his pocket.
“It’s an emergency alert.”
It seemed he had set it to vibrate instead of making sound.
As he checked the alert, he immediately told me as well.
“It’s a terror attack. It seems they’ve carried out multiple simultaneous attacks in the Incheon area. There appears to be trouble even at Incheon Airport.”
“What kind of terror attack is it?”
“There are explosions… and it looks like there are attacks involving strange lifeforms too.”
Was it Vanaheim, or the Magic Tower?
At last, the enemies’ counterattack had begun.