-Anti
Loki, who had once been a close friend of Odin.
But now, he had become a completely different person. He had turned into such a suspicious wizard that it was impossible to know how far he had dirtied his hands.
No, perhaps it was time to call him a black wizard.
The zombie disturbance and the monster rat swarm terror were almost certainly Loki’s doing. Even the terror incident in the Namsan dwarf district could have been committed by him.
Whether he had joined hands with the black wizards of the Magic Tower was still uncertain.
But it was clear that he had been traveling between Jeondang and the government’s schemers, as well as Banaheim, acting as a connecting link and causing various incidents.
‘Just why did he change like that?’
No. I wasn’t the least bit curious about why he changed, why he was scheming, or why he was going around causing terror with black magic.
Listening to the backstory of a villain would only be pathetic.
I simply thought that, if only for the sake of old times, I wanted to capture Loki with my own hands.
Since he had acted as a connecting link, capturing Loki seemed likely to make evidence of numerous schemes pour out.
The problem was that I didn’t know where Loki was or what he was doing now.
Loki used to appear without fail at terror scenes, but he hadn’t shown himself at all in Incheon.
“You said you kept following Loki? So what did you see? Where is he now?”
Wondering if Jang Pil-du might know something, I listened closely to what he had to say.
“He wandered all over the place. Ah! Come to think of it, maybe that bastard is a black wizard. Remember the building the Wizard-nim mentioned on broadcast last time, where suspicious magical spaces were hidden? You know, during that giant amoeba terror incident. Isn’t that the Magic Tower of the black wizards? Anyway, that bastard called Loki was coming and going from that building too.”
“You mean he was even going in and out of there.”
“Really suspicious, right? I kept following him without fear because his movements were so strange after watching him for a few days.”
“You really did. Doing something dangerous even though you’re not a wizard?”
“That’s right. I went around doing things befitting a hero, not knowing my own place and neglecting my livelihood. Then I suddenly fell into danger.”
Jang Pil-du lowered his head and let out a deep sigh.
It seemed the main point was finally about to come out.
Unlike before, I wasn’t annoyed by Jang Pil-du going into such detailed tangents now.
Rather, there was a chance I could glean information from the minute details.
So I didn’t urge him to get to the main point quickly.
“Anyway, while doing that, I witnessed him making contact with biohackers. After the monster rat swarm incident, mutated pigeons and cats kept appearing, right? That was the biohackers’ doing, and Loki went to find those guys, trying to add something more on top of it or something.”
Loki had made contact with the biohackers too.
Come to think of it, I remembered how before we went down to Daejeon, when the false accusations against the dwarves were at their peak, Gil had blocked the biohackers who tried to kidnap the dwarves.
Loki had probably been trying to hatch a bigger conspiracy using the dwarves.
Fortunately, Gil had stopped them, and afterward, I cleared the dwarves’ false accusations.
By the way, I was truly curious how far this story would go.
I never dreamed I would hear information about Loki and the truth behind various incidents from Jang Pil-du of all people.
I even felt thankful that Jang Pil-du had come to find me, even if by chance.
Though we had been close since he was the director of the mercenary office, I had thought he was just an ordinary friend; I never imagined he would be this useful.
“The biohackers’ headquarters had relatively lax security compared to Banaheim or Jeondang, so I approached it closely. That bastard Loki was suspicious, but I had no way of knowing what he was plotting, so I approached to try to overhear their conversation. Then I ended up getting caught.”
“You got caught by Loki?”
“No. By the biohackers. I didn’t get caught at first, but afterward, I had our mercenaries keep watch several times. Then they ended up getting caught by those bastards.”
“When was this?”
“Not too long ago. Right before the Incheon terror incident?”
“So Loki was still in contact with the biohackers even then?”
“Yeah. He visited them several times. I listened in to see what trick he was plotting, and it turned out he was scheming an anti-Wizard-nim campaign?”
“What? An anti-me campaign?”
The last time I saw Loki was during the amoeba terror incident.
Right then, by putting on a show in front of the broadcast cameras, I had simultaneously cleared the rumors about me and the false accusations against the dwarves.
Though I hadn’t ascended to being a hero like I am now, at any rate, from that day onward, no more rumors or anti campaigns against me had emerged.
But it seemed Loki hadn’t given up even after that and had continued plotting in the shadows.
‘Why on earth is he trying to drag me down that much? Weren’t we friends?’
Of course, it wasn’t that I couldn’t understand.
I had been investigating Loki’s suspicious identity, and for whatever reason, I was someone who interfered with the jobs Loki tried to do.
He must be coming at me with a do-or-die resolve.
But isn’t his method too despicable? If only he had appeared before me and suggested a head-on confrontation, I wouldn’t find him so contemptible.
“Before long, the biohackers will definitely step to the forefront with an anti-Wizard-nim campaign. Moreover, since Wizard-nim is now being praised as a hero, they’ll appear soon, right? And behind that is the bastard called Loki.”
“Got it. So what’s the situation with the mercenaries now?”
“The leader of the biohacker group contacted me. Asking what I was going to do with the mercenaries, asking if they could use them as test subjects.”
Jang Pil-du’s face darkened rapidly.
He knew very well that what the biohackers said was no joke or empty words.
If they were people who took zombies off the streets and used them as test subjects, they were fully capable of doing the same to humans.
“Those bastards are complete trash! They used to mess around with genetic modification like it was a joke, but now they seem to have become the black wizards’ underlings. They’re the type who can do truly terrible things and then some!”
“The fact that they contacted the director means there are some demands, right? What do they want?”
“Money. A huge amount of money. The kind of money we couldn’t make even if we sold our company. If I don’t bring the money, they’ll use the mercenaries as test subjects and track me down to kill me. I went chasing after whether they were black wizards or wizards for no reason, and now I’m going to die.”
“You’re not asking to borrow money from me, are you?”
I threw out a joke. To make Jang Pil-du laugh since he was making such a gloomy face.
But far from laughing at the joke, Jang Pil-du suddenly fell to his knees on the floor and even rubbed his hands together obsequiously, beginning to beg me.
“Wizard-nim, please save me. Even if we give them the money, those guys will definitely kill us. And they’re the ones scheming an anti-Wizard-nim campaign. You can’t leave them alone. With Wizard-nim’s skills, you could wipe them all out by yourself, right? You should save our poor mercenaries too. They’re just people who did as I told them to make a living.”
“I got it. Since I got it, get up and sit down. Why are you begging and embarrassing me? When did I ever say I wouldn’t help?”
At that, Jang Pil-du barely got up and sat in the chair.
It was pitiful to see a man who was the director of a mercenary office trembling in fear after being threatened by thugs.
But if there were black wizards behind the biohackers, it was understandable that he was afraid.
“Thank you so much. I’m ashamed to show you this side of me. But those guys are really different from before. Since you said you’d grant my request, I’ll tell you properly. There were body-modified ones among them, right? The ones who attached mechanical devices to their bodies. But now they’re beyond that level.”
“Did they strap bazookas to their bodies? Or did they undergo biological modification?”
“Exactly. They underwent biological modification. And it seemed they did so by borrowing the power of black wizards. There were guys with truly terrible appearances.”
“What were they like?”
“I couldn’t see clearly since I was peeking, but at a glance, there were guys who had connected and fused zombie and orc bodies to their own.”
“They became chimeras?”
“Ah! So that’s what chimeras are? That’s right. Those bastards volunteered to become chimeras.”
Since Jang Pil-du wasn’t a wizard, he probably had never met a chimera right before his eyes, but I had already seen so many that I was sick of them.
There was nothing new about chimeras.
Still, it was somewhat surprising that the biohackers had voluntarily chosen to become chimeras.
Well, since they were people who had been obsessed with genetic manipulation, synthesis, and body modification from the start, they had more than enough qualifications to choose the path of volunteering to become chimeras.
“Okay. Anyway, I got it. Then I just need to go to the biohackers and bring back the mercenaries, right?”
“And you need to wipe them out or beat them up. That way they won’t come to get me later.”
“That’s a given.”
“Really, thank you. To accept the request so readily, you really are a hero. But now that Wizard-nim has become a hero, how much should I pay as reward?”
I glanced at Jang Pil-du.
Seeing him trying to secure the reward even in this situation meant he hadn’t completely lost his mind.
Jang Pil-du’s expression had brightened a bit.
“Just give me the basic rate. The same as before. From what the director has told me, it seems I need to meet the biohackers and Loki anyway.”
“Right. They’re people we absolutely can’t leave alone. But really, the basic rate is enough? That can’t be. Okay. I’ll make sure to take good care of it.”
“Just hide well until I handle this.”
“I will. I’m already being extremely careful.”
Jang Pil-du, having finished talking, returned with a greatly relieved face.
After sending Jang Pil-du off, I went on the internet and searched for the biohackers.
As expected of people living in the shadows, detailed information about the biohackers was hard to find.
The only thing at the top of the search results was news from when mutated pigeons and cats had spread, mentioning that it was probably their doing.
I was thinking it was fortunate that they hadn’t done anything particularly notable yet and was about to close the internet when a post on a community caught my eye.
[Odin is not a hero. He’s just an attention seeker who’s only good at putting on a show.]
The word biohacker wasn’t in the title, but it seemed to be in the post content.
It seemed they had already started anti activities against me, modest as they were.
“They say I’m an attention seeker? That’s not right. I don’t really like it when people’s attention focuses on me. Though it’s not like I hate being a hero, either.”
Let me see what kind of anti incitement they were cooking up.
I stretched once and then clicked on the post.