Chapter 129 - Be on Time! (4)

My sleep didn't last long. A deluge of cold water woke me.

"Since it's come to this, why don't we exchange some information?"

Water soaked my burning forehead. I spoke as I watched the droplets drip from my hair. The twins, approaching with something like a whip, looked down at me.

"Neither side has anything to lose. I get my questions answered before I die, and you get information on the Badgers."

"Still full of life, aren't you?" The woman smiled.

I'd thought she was pleased, but apparently not. The masked kidnappers flew into a rage.

"Still running your mouth like you don't know your place! You're just a lab rat!"

"Fine, forget it. Forget it. My mistake. Please, go back to doing your best to kill me."

"What do you want to know?"

The curly-haired man folded the whip neatly and knelt on one knee beside me. The hem of his dark suit brushed the dusty floor.

"If you tell us something useful, we'll grant you one last mercy."

His hand swept my bangs back again. He seemed to be admiring the brand he'd stamped on my forehead. I sat with the pain for a moment, then spoke.

"I've been asking for a while now. Who kidnapped me?"

The masked people vented their irritation, perhaps sick of the question. Only the twins smiled instead.

"You really want to know, don't you?"

"Of course. I'd like to know who led me to my death before I die."

The curly-haired man and woman exchanged glances. While they conferred without words, I let my gaze drift in boredom. Why choose their words so carefully in front of someone they were going to kill anyway?

Whatever. Just answer before Colton gets here, kids.

It was the woman who answered.

"A newcomer who joined our organization six months ago pulled it off."

"Huh?" My voice rose. "A civilian?"

"You really are arrogant."

The woman sneered at my surprise. She looked at me as though I were a clueless pup who didn't know his place.

"You think there's no way a civilian could kidnap you?"

To be honest, yes.

I didn't say it aloud, but my thoughts must have shown. The kidnappers burst out laughing at my expression.

"Look at that fucker's face!"

"Aw, what's wrong? Realizing you're completely ordinary apart from that enhanced body?"

"Hey, isn't it about time you ditched that arrogance?"

"Even the boss stamping him hasn't done any good!"

"I'm telling you, these things can't learn!"

The mockery went on for a long time. Laughter reverberated through the cold room, punctuated by the thuds of feet stamping in uncontainable delight. Smiling as he listened to his subordinates' gleeful jeers, the man stroked my white hair.

"After a life at rock bottom, becoming a Black Badger made you feel like the world was yours, didn't it?"

What bullshit.

Why would becoming a Black Badger make me feel like the world was mine? And I hadn't lived a particularly miserable life, either.

Still, I could see why these people, who would have researched me, might think so. On paper, I was an orphan who had never attended school or done anything that left a record before becoming a Black Badger. So they seemed to think I was some kid off the streets who hadn't even received a proper education.

"Did you even finish elementary school?"

"I thought those bastards screened for at least some intelligence. Never thought they'd go recruiting someone who'd never set foot in a school."

"Moving up in the world overnight like that, of course he doesn't know his place."

"A rookie who can't even go on missions alone, and you're so very shocked a civilian kidnapped you?"

"What's this newcomer of yours like?"

I doggedly kept asking questions through the barrage of prejudiced mockery.

The woman's eyes held derision, contempt, and delight as she looked at me.

"Ah. You still can't accept that an ordinary human kidnapped you."

Correct.

"But he really is an ordinary human. A scrawny boy who barely talks, always looks at the ground, and bites his nails when he's nervous."

Was it Jaeyeon?

Had Jaeyeon been posing as a civilian and helped kidnap me? Nothing else made sense. There was no way I really wouldn't have noticed an ordinary civilian approaching. It might sound arrogant to others, but it was the truth.

This really was strange!

Unable to accept the twins' explanation, I struggled to find a plausible one. The kidnappers reveled in my confusion.

"Bruised your pride, did it?"

That wasn't it.

"You still look like you can't face reality. Listen, you apparently haven't figured this out yet, but getting an enhanced body doesn't suddenly make you invincible."

"Why was it the newcomer who kidnapped me? Did you dump the work on the new guy?"

"No. He volunteered."

The male twin ran his hand along the whip.

"Asked us to trust him with it."

First they woke me by throwing water over me, and now they were going to whip me?

It really was a blessing they'd chosen me to kidnap. I'd lived long enough that I was confident something like this wouldn't traumatize me. But Tom or Heshy would have been deeply scarred.

A little relief spread through my chest.

"Why did he volunteer?"

"You talk too much."

CRACK!

The whip struck my wet body. Pain flared hot, but this, too, hurt less than I'd expected. I gave my head a small shake to clear the hair from my eyes.

Might as well finish asking.

"What's the name of the guy who kidnapped me?"

"What would you do with it? You're going to die anyway."

"At least I could shout my kidnapper's name as I die."

"That thing still can't face reality."

"Hey! How many times do we have to tell you? A loser kidnapped you, you fucking idiot!"

The masked people delighted in my denial. They laughed so hard the sound echoed, then pointed at me.

"You couldn't lift a finger against that pathetic nerd who stutters and never stands up straight!"

"Oh, I wish we could show you that fucker in person. You'd be even more shocked if you saw how pathetic he looks."

"He's still your new guy. Isn't that a bit harsh?"

"Still in denial."

Apparently, the kidnappers enjoyed mocking the rookie Badger who didn't know his place and couldn't accept that an ordinary civilian had kidnapped him.

But it wasn't that I didn't know my place...

Ah. No matter how I explained it, it really did sound arrogant.

At some point, I gave up trying to get any more explanation out of them. They didn't seem to know much about my kidnapper anyway. They just kept stressing how unimpressive he was. He stuttered, slouched, chewed his nails when he was nervous, and they'd never even seen him exercise.

When they started to tire of that, the male twin grabbed a fistful of my hair. He lifted my head with a smile.

"Our arrogant Taleb."

Madness and superiority gleamed in his eyes.

"Now I'll teach you just how insolent you are."

What a lousy line. Holding a whip while dressed in a pitch-black suit made for a very strange picture, too. I sighed as I watched the twin raise his whip hand.

"Even if you cry and beg for mercy, no one's coming to get you out," the man said, apparently taking my sigh as a provocation. "Even if Yehyeon saw the email, there's no way he could find this place in time."

"Oh, really?"

"And he wouldn't bother trying to rescue an insignificant rookie."

A flash of delight. The corners of his mouth turning up. Whatever convictions he professed, at this moment the man seemed to find ecstasy in the very act of crushing a Badger, not in his beliefs. He lashed the whip.

"Your arrogance killed you, Taleb!"

BANG!

His hand exploded.

BANG!

The other twin's hand was blown off too. The kidnappers froze as though a bomb had gone off. The man and woman stared blankly at their missing hands. I blinked at those who had forgotten even how to scream.

Ah.

This time, I really hadn't heard him because I wasn't skilled enough.

"Aaargh!"

A piercing scream stabbed my ears.

"Aaaaaargh! My hand! My hand!"

"Aagh! Aaargh!"

"A gun!"

"Help me!"

"How long have you been there?"

I let out a disbelieving laugh at the man standing like a ghost in the room's dark corner.

"I didn't even hear you come in."

Lee Seunghyeon didn't answer. Instead, he strode out of the darkness in the corner. Screaming in shock at the blood pooling on the floor and the scattered chunks of flesh, the kidnappers finally noticed him. Their terrified cries intensified.

He walked up to me as though he couldn't hear any of it.

"Thanks."

"Lab Rat?"

He freed me from my bonds with a single sweep of his arm, then raised an eyebrow at my forehead.

"You've been letting them stamp things like this on you?"

"They pumped me full of drugs. I wasn't sure I could control my strength."

With a quiet groan, I braced my hands against the floor and pushed my torso up. I'd been tied up so long my hands had turned bluish.

"And they kept filming... If I lost control and they spread a video edited to show only that part, we'd have a real problem."

Even the elders couldn't erase every copy of a video spread across the internet. I really didn't want to put Yehyeon in a difficult position.

Seunghyeon watched me slowly get to my feet and snorted without a word. He didn't need words to make his thoughts clear. He must have thought it pathetic that I'd been kidnapped in the first place.

He wasn't wrong, but...

The brands on my forehead and stomach still hurt. I let out a heavy sigh and met his eyes.

"I didn't expect you to come, though. I was waiting for Colton."

My student raised his eyebrows, never sparing the kidnappers a glance, no matter how they screamed or how the twins struggled, deathly pale, to stanch their bleeding wrists.

Yekaterina's agent. A man who looked just like Yehyeon, but without a trace of Yehyeon's pallor or fragility. He spoke in a low voice.

"Do you still not understand the situation?"

"Huh? What?"

"You seem to have no idea how the people around you are reacting."

My ears caught the sound of approaching engines. Several cars stopping. People getting out. Seunghyeon stepped back from me.

"You would do well to start recognizing it."

The door opened. Light stabbed painfully at my eyes, adjusted to the dark. People were approaching. Standing amid the kidnappers' panicked screams, I sensed a whole crowd drawing near.

They strolled inside, perfectly calm. Familiar faces. Eric looked delighted, in contrast to the blond, who looked thoroughly displeased. For some reason, Shashinsky looked just as unhappy as the blond.

As they crossed the threshold, Jaeyeon smashed through a wall, looking every bit as pleased as Eric. In a man's body this time.

"What the hell!"

The kidnappers shouted in panic, but no one even glanced at them.

"Who are you? Who the hell are you people?!"

This wasn't an elders' council meeting. Was there any reason for them to arrive one after another like this? I'd only been waiting for Colton. Such overwhelming hospitality.

The population density skyrocketed in an instant. Before I knew it, this cheap dump had become a gathering place for the elders.

Shashinsky and the blond knocked out the kidnappers as they tried to flee in panic.

"Ah, you're quite a sight."

Eric stopped in a suitable spot and spoke the moment he saw me.

"Enough to make me want a photograph."

"You've already seen the video."

"Of course. Why else would I have hurried over like this?"

"Oh, for fuck's sake."

Jaeyeon looked over Seunghyeon and Eric's party and swore.

"I was all excited coming in, and now Yehyeon's old man and these cultists have ruined my mood."

The foxlike man raked a hand through his hair in irritation. Seunghyeon didn't react to his rolling eyes, while Eric gave him a practiced wink. I watched Jaeyeon raise both hands and flip Eric off. Then I asked:

"What took you so long?"

"I came for you, and you're giving me shit?"

Jaeyeon turned away from Eric. His eyebrows arched as he glared at me, then he saw my forehead and burst out laughing.

"Oh, man! It's even better in person!"

"Yes. Thank you for your concern."

"What a shame. If not for your exam, we'd have left you to suffer a little longer."

His narrow eyes curved into fingernail crescents.

"That would've made a much better video."

So they had all seen the footage.

That meant Yehyeon and Ska must have seen it too. Both the first video and the second. As that reality sank in, embarrassment surged through me. I wasn't remotely ashamed that the people here had seen it, but for some reason, the thought of Yehyeon or Ska watching it was mortifying.

I closed my eyes for a moment to settle my troubled thoughts. With my sight cut off, I listened to Shashinsky and the blond methodically dealing with the kidnappers. They even stanched the twins' wounds, perhaps intending to take the man and woman somewhere alive.

Well. The elders would handle them now.

I took a slow, deep breath.

"Hey, hurry up."

Jaeyeon's irritated voice made me open my eyes.

"Aren't you taking your exam?"

Of course I was.

With my eyes open, I turned toward the tall, handsome man standing in front of the ruined wall. The one I'd briefly suspected of being the culprit, and still hadn't entirely cleared of suspicion. I took a step toward him.

"Ugh."

My body pitched forward. Seunghyeon reached out from beside me and caught me as I staggered. I felt his firm arm. If he hadn't caught me, I would have fallen flat on my face.

Ugh...

I smiled bitterly, smelling the blood on my student.

"Sorry."

Now this really was embarrassing.

"Thanks."

"Hildebert."

Another voice followed. The voice I'd been hoping to hear. And one I had never wanted to hear in a situation like this.

Elegant and commanding. The voice of someone who knew how to change the very air simply by opening his mouth.

"Get in the car."

Colton Wiseman.

He stood beyond the ruined wall, immaculate in every way, staring at me with eyes that blazed blue.