#228

Solitude – 2

#1

Jaehwang stroked Goongi’s hair and closed his eyes.

“Being natural is good.”

“Whatever.” Jaehwang shook his head.

Sometimes, he had sides of himself that he really wanted to hide from her.

Their resentful eyes dying in the explosion…

Most of them were drunk with madness, but some of their eyes had despair and sadness. Obviously, brainwashing would not be considered as true loyalty. Though drunk, what they had was a desire for life, but of course, he did not sympathize with them. He already knew what they were. Villains who only use terror and murder… if it wasn’t for Jaehwang, they would have been still reigning over the weak until they grow old and die.

His original plan was to attack Abdul Hussein and come out with a clean finish, but his problem was that he could not distinguish Hussein from the rest. Hussein was also a 7-star shape-shifting hunter who strategically placed doppelgangers around him. He didn’t also expect him to use a suicide squad. Hussein planned to bomb all of his guards and escape alone.

Of course, all of Hussein’s plan failed because of Jaehwang’s arrows, but 3,000 deaths were still too much for him. That was the main reason why he did not say anything to the press regarding their criticism. He was using this time as an excuse to take a break.

Jaehwang listened to the Prince’s advice that hunters need to live a life away from all the battles sometimes. Jaehwang was even considering taking a break from the raids too. Most of the urgent 9-tier monster requests were taken care of after all. There were many more 9-tier monsters around the world, but those ones would remain inactive as long as they would remain untouched.

The Martial Arts House was still busy granting raid requests, but they were requests for the benefit of the stakeholders so it didn’t matter if he ignored it properly. Either way, they’ll just press the World Hunter Secretariat and each of the other countries.

Not only that, celebrities from all over the world were now visiting the Invincible Palace. They all came with extravagant gifts along with a request to meet with Jaehwang but Irumi took care of them nonetheless.

*At the quiet cafe with a piece of soft music playing in the background…*

Goongi, who ate all the snacks, was sitting with her hand on her chin as she stared at him.

The customers kept entering the café but they did not notice them in the corner.

Jaehwang’s face was actually not well known because of his avoidance of the media, but Goongi’s beauty was exceptional and it was impossible for her to not attract any attention towards her. That’s why she used a spell to hide her beauty so that the other ones won’t notice her.

Some time had passed and now, Jaehwang closed his prep book with a big sigh. He was trying to concentrate on studying but Goongi’s eyes made him uncomfortable.

“Let’s go for a walk”

“Yes!”

They excused themselves to the cafe’s manager and came out on the streets for a walk. Goongi hooked her arms to Jaehwang’s as they walked side by side.

“I think it’s quite nice to come out like this once in a while.”

“I agree.”

The Great Fusion was not only a calamity to the human race.

Fossil fuels and nuclear energy had disappeared into history. It was replaced by Mana stones and the nuclear power plants were either destroyed by monsters or got wrecked over time due to its lack of use. Somehow during that time, the fine dust pollution was cleared up and now, the air quality became crisp and refreshing.

With Goongi on his side, he could go anywhere.

Just by being in the midst of ordinary people, Jaehwang felt a lot better.

But after their stroll when they were about to go back to the café, they heard a scream across the road.

When Jaehwang stopped to turn around, he saw a middle-aged woman running away from a crowd of three men chasing her.

“Get out of the way!!”

“Everyone, get away!!”

“AHHHH!!!”

Pedestrians walking down the street retreated away from the men who were running into them.

The woman was running through the street with three men chasing her, pushing anyone that would come their way. Some of them were able to step back while some fell to the ground.

The woman looked back and shouted, “You idiots!! Stop disrupting the peace and let it go!!”

“You bitch!!” One of the men shouted before taking out his gun.

“AGHH!! GUN!!!”

“Get away!!”

No matter how experienced someone might seem, there was a big difference between taking out a gun and using them. The civilians around the area got frightened and ran away, injuring many along with their path.

“You idiots!! Why are you pointing a gun at me??!”

“Seriously, you woman!!” The man then pointed towards her.

*gunshots*

“Geez! It’s dangerous!”

The woman did not dodge the bullets.

Maybe she figured that if she dodged, other people could be harmed so she took out a small disc from her jacket and blocked all of them. When the other men saw that she held her ground to stop the attack, they pulled out a heavy rod from their waists.

“You guys really want a fight?!”

She stretched out her disc in anger towards them. Then, a ball of air began to form around the disc. The three men’s faces hardened as if they sensed imminent danger.

“Damn it! I’m retreating for the civilians.” exclaimed the woman after looking around her. If she used her hunter powers now, many innocent civilians would be injured.

“Pfft! All talk!”

Whether or not they knew if their lives were in danger, the three men proudly approached the woman.

“3-star villain Han Yeonsoo! You are now under arrest according to the Hunter Law!”

“Don’t joke with me, I was living quietly all this time!!”

“Your charges are not cleared just because you were laying low for a bit!”

“At least I didn’t take out my gun where the civilians are at. Damn it… now that all the real hunters are out of Korea, the only shitty are left.”

The woman grumbled but she still raised her arms after putting her disc away. She chose to be arrested rather than resisting them.

*BAM*

“AAHHHHH!!”

But these men did not simply arrest her, they bashed her with their rods and after a few blows to the head that left her on the ground, they cuffed her hands behind her back.

“What? The villain catchers are worse than the villains themselves!”

“Shhh, these Hunter Secretariat guys totally ignore the Hunter Law…”

“But what the hell!? Does that make sense to you?”

As the crowd around them started dissing the men, the leader of the three frowned.

“Everybody stop! There may still be the villain’s remnants around, we must start a search!” He yelled at the crowd.

Then, the already agitated crowd started to curse the three.

“Hey! The Hunter Secretariat doesn’t mean jack shit!”

“Are you not the real villains??”

“What? Yo, take videos of them now!”

As soon as they took out their smartphones, their leader kicked one of them in their abdomen.

“AGH!!”

The man rolled on the ground and the leader, who didn’t seem to be satisfied, smashed the man’s phone as well.

“If anyone else tries to take a video again, this is what will happen to them!”

The people were frightened and stopped cursing them.

It would be a serious crime if an average hunter committed violence against a civilian, but these men had a special contract with the government as part of the Arrest Squad of the Hunter Secretariat.

In addition, the Korean Hunter Secretariat has been untouchable because Prince was its chief member.

“Someone help move this injured man!”

One man who was looking after all of the injured people cried but no one paid attention to him.

“No one can leave the premises until the search is over!”

“What kind of law is that!?!”

As the crowd started to murmur again, the leader smashed his rod to the ground.

*BAM*

“Shut it! If you don’t want to end up like this villain woman! Everyone should up with their identification card! You will all be released after checking!”

The middle-aged lady on the ground was bleeding from her head the entire time. The leader still did not have enough so he walked up to her and placed her feet on her head before swearing.

“Ugh, I can’t just watch this anymore”

Goongi and Jaehwang, who were both watching what was happening from the side, shook their heads.

They didn’t want to break their date, but this was too much. Jaehwang glanced at Goongi, and then, she grinned and waved her hand once, disassembling the magic that hid them.

Jaehwang walked towards the crowd.

The leader, who was threatening the crowd frowned as he watched Jaehwang walk towards him.

“Hey, you! Can’t you hear? You have to line up!”

But when Jaehwang showed no sign of obedience, the leader swung his rod against him.

Jaehwang frowned as well and grabbed the leader’s wrist even before he could swing it.

“You have no manners”

“What!”

The leader felt that the strength behind his grip wasn’t ordinary.

“Let… let me go!”

“Sure…”

The leader stumbled back as soon as he decided to let him go. He became conscious of the crowd once more and there, he shouted, “What, who are you!”

“I’m a hunter.”

“Ha? A hunter? Do you want to get your license suspended for disrupting our affairs??” The leader said in anger as he looked back at his colleagues. He knew that there were certain types of hunters who would butt their noses into everyone else’s business.

“You! Show me your license!” The leader held out his hand.

If he knew Jaehwang’s face, he wouldn’t have acted this way but unfortunately for him, there were very few in the world who knew what his face looked like. He was famous, but he never appeared in public and all of his information was tagged as top secret.

*sigh*

Jaehwang shook his head. He didn’t want to reveal himself, but now, he has decided to let them know who he was.

Jaehwang took out his hunter license and showed it to them. When the leader saw Jaehwang’s license, he became confused. It looked different from the hunter license that he knew. Normally, hunter licenses were transparent with one’s information displayed as a hologram and the number of stars shown in black.

The one he received from Jaehwang was just black and there was just a big gold star on it with a license number. If he looked a little bit closer, he could have read the word ’10-star’ engraved lightly on the card, but he did not have an eye for such details.

“Are you kidding me???”

The leader did not even think of checking Jaehwang’s license number and threw the card back at his face. The card bounced off Jaehwang’s chest and fell to the ground.

*Jaehwang sighs again*

Jaehwang thought at that moment, that it would have been better for him if he had kept his old card.

The card that was thrown by this ignorant man was a special card for Jaehwang which was given as a gift by the new secretary-general of the Korean Hunter Secretariat at the Invincible Palace.

Jaehwang was told that it was made for the world’s first 10-star hunter. Jaehwang pulled out a business card from his wallet and his smartphone.

Jaewhang looked at the leader before he dialed the phone number on his business card and said, “I’ll call the one who gave me this card.”