BXBX NOVEL Chapter 193: Predator (3)
Yoon-seok hand froze, and his head creaked toward the door.
‘Was she waiting for me…?’
She was there from the start.
‘Why didn’t I notice right away?’
Nevertheless, Yoon-seok didn’t even know she was in the room until she spoke. Yoon-seok, staring at Ragna as if he’d been seen through, realized the reason.
‘Is it because she’s too weak?’
It was quite ironic, but… he didn’t notice because his opponent’s level was low. As soon as Ragna Hambledon collected 200,000 AP, she tore the complete return ticket. In addition, her combat style before that hadn’t involved raising stats. She won by throwing combat supplies at immobile enemies. In other words, her current magic was Rank F.
Unlike Earth, in Seheranbad, a world rich in magic that served as camouflage.
“How did you find out?”
Yoon-seok decided to cut to the chase. Contrary to his expectations, Ragna answered smoothly.
“The person you’ve been aiming for has an unusual power. He sensed her sniffing around on the second day and told me.”
“…”
“I thought it was suspicious, so I searched about her. I didn’t know, but it turned out that she’s a pretty famous assassin on the continent.”
‘Is that why things turn out that way…?’
Thanks to {Planet Guardian}, Ragna shared Lee Su-yeon’s identity with the others and agreed to subdue her during the meeting. In addition, knowing that the target was him, she had someone else enter the meeting in his place. As a result, Yoon-seok, who registered the wrong person on the list, flew all the way here for nothing.
According to her, this was the whole story. Of course, it was unconvincing.
‘…It doesn’t make sense, though.’
Of course, she wasn’t lying. However, the answer to his previous question was missing. How did she know that he would come here today when the rewinder Lee Su-yeon didn’t even know about b Death God}’s effects? As soon as he stared as if asking for further explanation, Ragna parted her lips.
“I wasn’t sure.”
“…”
“Don’t worry. Before you left, you told her that you had something in mind, right? At that time, I thought there was more to this. Although I didn’t know you would come out from under the bed, not through the door….”
The truth was simple most of the time. It was a disheartening answer. Was this the so-called merchant’s intuition?
“Then can I ask you a question now?”
A secret room in the middle of the night. Even though she knew that no one could protect her, she looked at him head-on without cowing. Yoon-seok nodded, wondering if he could figure out why she waited here alone.
Ragna asked carefully.
“Have we met before?”
It was an unexpected question. It didn’t look like she found out who he was, but had she sensed something?
‘Now that I think about it… when I opened my mouth for the first time, she looked at me strangely.’
After pondering a moment, Yoon-seok shook his head. Somehow, she looked disappointed.
“Is that all you want to ask about?”
“No. Tell me the reason why you’re aiming for him.”
“I reject.”
“Then you’ll never find out where he is.”
Yoon-seok was speechless. He wondered why she came to see him with such confidence but was she relying on this? There were many ways to dig for information. In the past, he had made many sinners confess their sins even though they knew they would die in Hanguk Hospital.
Of course, he wouldn’t do that to Ragna, but she wasn’t aware of their shared past.
“Do you think I won’t hurt you?”
“No. I’m not sure.”
“Not sure…”
“I don’t know why, but the moment I heard your voice, I had that feeling. That you’re not dangerous.”
Yoon-seok smiled dejectedly.
“Aren’t you relying too much on luck for a famous merchant?”
“Our family has a good instinct for people.”
There was nothing to refute. She believed in her senses, so what more could he say? Wasn’t it because she had a good feeling that this happened? Yoon-seok sighed.
“Tell me why she’s aiming for him. We might end up finding a win-win for each other.
“Win-win…?”
“Don’t you know?”
Was that possible? Yoon-seok shook his head. He felt somewhat sentimental at her proposal.
“We’re after him because of the Unique Skill {Planet Guardian}.”
“So that’s the reason. But how did you find out? It hasn’t even been a few weeks since I met him either….”
“Because my colleague has talent in that field.”
“She does seem outstanding.”
“Anyway, I need that Unique Skill.”
“It sounds like you have a way to take it.”
“Yes. But the man will die as a result.”
“…Have we never met before?”
Yoon-seok was consistent in making no comments on difficult questions. He wondered if he had to hide it, but as Yoon-seok wanted to gain b Planet Guardian} for his benefit, it was difficult to reveal his identity. But the bigger reason was that he was ashamed. If it weren’t for her advice back then, Lee Chang-hoon might’ve ruined his family.
“You said win-win, right. If you hand him over to me, I’ll come over to help you whenever you need help.”
Seheranbad had quite several rankers. Therefore, they wouldn’t be targeted by as many dimensions as Earth, even without b Planet Guardian}. So, he was confident that they could solve it on their own. However, Ragna flatly refused.
“No. Seheranbad needs his ability.”
“Then the negotiations are over.”
Yoon-seok smiled bitterly at the expected result. But then, Ragna shook her head firmly.
“No. I still have my suggestion left.”
“…?”
“Let me confirm first. Do you need {Planet Guardian} to protect your dimension from external enemies?”
“That’s right.”
“Is it Earth or Moorim?”
For some reason, he thought that the purpose of this proposal was to bait information from him, but Yoon-seok answered honestly.
“Earth.”
“Then we’ll make sure that his Unique Skill is used on Earth.”
“…?”
“You can take him to Earth if you want. He is a curious person so he will be satisfied if you treat him well. Instead, you have to guarantee his safety no matter what happens.”
Yoon-seok couldn’t hide his confusion. Guarantee his safety? It was both easy yet difficult, but he could promise to do his best. However, he couldn’t understand it at all.
“How does that benefit you?”
“As expected, I guess that woman didn’t find out that much.”
“…?”
“I didn’t think highly of him because of his Unique Skill.”
b Planet Guardian}, the extraordinary Unique Power that could manage the access of challengers from other dimensions. But that wasn’t the end to his value.
“What’s that?”
Ragna replied after a small pause.
“It’s the power of the Last Ark.”
“Last Ark?”
Yoon-seok tilted his head. First of all, it was a cool name. Then, what about the effect? What ability did it possess for Ragna to value it more than {Planet Guardian}?
Yoon-seok listened attentively.
“There are some restrictions, but if that’s resolved, it will become a power that enables convergence between dimensions.”
“Can you go into detail?”
“For example, a part of Seheranbad can become a part of Earth. And vice versa.”
He still didn’t understand. Maybe that was obvious, as Ragna offered a specific example.
“In other words, it means that you can move a whole territory in my country to any of the five oceans on Earth.”
Even if it was easily said, it was impossible to understand such an absurd explanation. Yoon-seok soon realized one thing.
“…Do you perhaps want to move to Earth?”
Ragna didn’t deny it.
“I’m just preparing for an emergency. After seeing that yesterday, my heart is leaning towards this… yes. But not now.”
A Unique Power that could take both land and people to another dimension. This was the insurance she prepared.
“Instead of handing him over, I hope you will accept us on Earth someday when the time comes. Do you have the authority to do that?”
He didn’t. However, if Yoon-seok wanted to, no one would stop him. But, well, he wasn’t a dictator.
“I need to discuss this with my colleague.”
Therefore, he decided to listen to Lee Su-yeon’s opinion.
“That’s nice. Especially since we don’t suffer any losses.”
Lee Su-yeon said this after hearing Ragna’s suggestion and the Unique Power of the {Planet Guardian}. She first summarized the strengths:
-
- If we coordinate well with Ragna Hambledon in advance, we can bring a considerable amount of power to Earth.
-
- The power is not limited to Seheranbad and can be used in other dimensions, such as Moorim and Kilian later on.
-
- In contrast, it can be used as insurance even when Earth is in danger.
-
- Since there was no longer a need to steal {Planet Guardian}, they could hunt for other challengers instead.
Of course, there were disadvantages too. There were trivial problems such as social issues caused by differences in culture and race, but it was difficult to say that it was a disadvantage compared to what they could gain.
“I didn’t know he had this power, but it’s probably the truth, right?”
First of all, that was correct, according to Ragna. Of course, there was a possibility that she only believed it to be true, so they had to go through the process of meeting and checking with him in person.
“But should we not discuss with Ashton?”
“Do we have to? I’m sure he’ll like it, though?”
That was true. He could imagine Ashton’s happiness when Yoon-seok told him they had caught a big fish. He was that kind of person. Following that, Yoon-seok exchanged more opinions with Lee Su-yeon and made a final decision.
The Last Ark. If that power was real, they would accept the proposal.
“Then let’s go.”
Afterward, Yoon-seok headed to the meeting place, met b Planet Guardian} in person, and even confirmed his authenticity. The Unique Power of Last Ark was real.
“Now, this is a phone. When you arrive on Earth, grab anyone and borrow or take it away. Then, as I said, press the buttons like this to make a phone call. Then we’ll come to meet you.”
As soon as they set a plan, Lee Su-yeon began preparing to take the Planet Guardian to Earth. And in the meantime-
“Can I talk to you for a second?”
Yoon-seok sat Ragna down to chat. It was about how to contact each other in the future, and when something happened, they decided to communicate through challengers on standby on the 10th floor.
‘Win-win…’
Yoon-seok felt strange. Benefitting both sides, this was what Yoon-seok told her. From some point on, Yoon-seok stopped pursuing a win-win. When someone benefited, someone suffered. This was the providence of nature he learned while climbing the Tower.
‘Does that mean I don’t always have to resort to that?’
Yoon-seok realized something about this incident: he was the one who dismissed the possibility. Yet, there was no way to tell what might happen.
For some reason, he began to laugh. The future in which Moorim people would discuss the world’s top 100 masters on the Internet and argue online, and beast-people or fairies appearing on TV…
Among the countless parallel worlds stretching tens of thousands of branches, he thought that there might be a world that had such an ending.
“Well, that won’t happen… right?”
Well, honestly, he couldn’t imagine it.