Chapter 6: The Coup

“—so it seems you’ll have to choose a different guild.”

“Ah… just a moment.”

I pressed my temples and sank into thought.

Now that Haetae hadn’t applied, there was no way to add them to the list. The application period had already ended yesterday.

I quickly ran through the other guilds that had been my next-best options.

“I’ll send you the list, so you can take some more time to think about it and call me back. I was surprised, too.”

“Ah, thank you. I’ll do that.”

Thankfully, the kind Association employee gave me some time.

I ended the call. By the time I hung up, I had arrived in front of my counseling office.

As soon as the call ended, my phone buzzed briefly. It was the file from the Association. I opened it without hesitation.

The familiar logos and names of guilds filled the table.

I scrolled down and down, but Haetae wasn’t there.

“It’s really not here.”

It seemed Jin Se-ah had definitely been mistaken about something.

I called her.

*

In the heart of Seoul, at the Haetae Guild headquarters.

Wi Jae-wan, chewing on a stiff, cold convenience store kimbap, dragged his exhausted body into the office.

He just didn’t have time to eat properly.

The point at which he, a team leader and scout, had been saddled with all this indiscriminate guild paperwork and even on-site support was probably…

Yoo Seon-woo.

It had all started the day his cherished junior walked out of the guild on his own two feet.

This unfair fieldwork was, perhaps, the price he had to pay. The raid plans they had made were shattered after that day. And he, as the team leader, had to bear the “responsibility” the higher-ups talked about.

I’ll just have to endure it.

He had prepared himself for this to some extent. He felt he had to. He didn’t particularly regret it.

He entered the office with a bitter smile.

However, his seat was already occupied.

In the innermost part of the office, the team leader’s seat with a panoramic view of the city.

She was sitting in his chair, a phone held in one hand.

“Mhm… I guess there was some kind of mix-up. I didn’t check, either.”

Long hair, the color of moonlight, somewhere between gray and silver. And golden eyes that shone with an eerie, gem-like light, even in broad daylight.

The heart of the Haetae Guild.

The one they called a one-person army.

S-class hunter Jin Se-ah.

She was sitting there, holding her phone and talking. The tone of her voice was bright and laced with affection.

“Yeah, well, it can’t be helped…”

The voice on the other end of the line was Yoo Seon-woo’s. In truth, he knew that without even having to listen.

“Yeah! I’ll make sure they apply next time. I think the team leader made a mistake. Sorry to bother you when you’re busy! Call me when you get home!”

And just like her voice, her face was filled with happiness and excitement. Her cheeks were slightly flushed, the corners of her eyes gently curved.

Anyone could see it was the face of a girl in love.

Click.

But the moment the call ended, all expression evaporated from Jin Se-ah’s face. It was impossible to believe she was the owner of that sweet voice from just a moment ago.

She slowly, very slowly, turned her head to look at Wi Jae-wan, who was standing by the door.

And quietly, she opened her mouth.

“Team Leader.”

Her cold, golden eyes scanned Wi Jae-wan. Her earlier affectionate tone was nowhere to be found.

“Why did you do it?”

Her tone made it clear she was already certain he had done it.

And she was right.

He forced a composed expression and spoke in the calmest voice he could manage.

“Haha… Se-ah… I think there’s been a misunderstanding.”

Forcing a smile, he began to lay out the logic he had prepared. He had an excuse ready, knowing this would happen. He knew she would come here the moment she found out. He just hadn’t expected it to be so soon.

“Seon-woo is from our guild, right? He’s the number one counselor, so he’s already incredibly popular. Imagine if his very first house call was to our guild. People would immediately start accusing us of favoritism and whatnot, picking fights.”

He nodded as he continued.

“Other guilds would complain, and some would suspect a cozy relationship. So… I decided to skip the first application. The higher-ups approved it.”

Thinking it over, it was a plausible excuse.

“……”

He paused for a moment, observing her reaction. But Jin Se-ah simply listened quietly with her chin propped on her hand until he had finished all his excuses.

So, Wi Jae-wan hastily added one last sentence.

“It’ll be better for Seon-woo, too. He needs to have a long career, so we should be protecting him, not becoming a burden, right?”

At the mention of Yoo Seon-woo’s name, Jin Se-ah’s icy expression softened a layer, like snow melting in the sun.

“Hmph…”

She lowered the hand propping up her chin and whispered softly.

“Still, you’ve crafted a pretty good one this time.”

Her voice was laced with a very faint mockery.

“Team Leader.”

She was clearly smiling. But her eyes didn’t move an inch.

“You don’t have to worry about Seon-woo anymore. I’ll take care of him.”

With her chin still propped on her hand, she asked as if genuinely curious, “Besides… he’s not your team member to look after anymore, is he?”

To that, Wi Jae-wan could not say a word.

*

“Okay, bye.”

I closed my phone.

It was just as I expected. It wasn’t that there was a problem; Jin Se-ah simply didn’t know anything. She didn’t even know whether Haetae had applied or not.

When she wasn’t in combat or on a mission, she sometimes showed this clumsy side.

I smiled and poured myself a glass of water.

The waiting room was empty. As expected, there were no hunter patients visiting in the afternoon.

I could understand why. It was the first day, and it was always the guilds’ responsibility to feel that their hunters and Outsiders needed mental care. It’s not easy for successful hunters or Outsiders to think there might be something wrong with them. Even with the promise of confidentiality, they wouldn’t want to admit their own weakness enough to go through the trouble of coming here themselves.

Since Haetae was out, I had to choose my next-best option.

I looked at the list of formidable guilds on my computer screen.

Aegis, Hwarang, Polaris…

The strongest guilds in the Republic of Korea, whose names alone were awe-inspiring.

However, I had a slightly different idea.

If I have to do this anyway, wouldn’t it be better to choose something that helps me, too?

The world’s guilds at this point could be broadly divided into two types.

First, guilds centered around Awakeners who were not Outsiders. These guilds always treated Outsiders like me as a secondary factor in their scouting, or they excluded them altogether. Guilds that rejected Outsiders and only accepted pure, local-born Awakeners were also called pure-blood guilds.

And second, exclusive groups like the Azure Sky Alliance, where Outsiders from a specific world banded together.

But there was one guild, a strange breed that didn’t belong to either category.

I scrolled down and stopped my gaze on the name of the guild ranked 6th.

‘Union Guild.’

True to its name, ‘Union,’ it had the strong characteristic of being a coalition of Outsiders. Originally, Union was just a small-to-medium-sized guild. But in the early days of the Transfer phenomenon, when other guilds were wary of and ostracized Outsiders, Union was the first to accept and absorb them, rising to its current position.

They didn’t ask about one’s origins. They only looked at ability and the will to survive in this world. It was also an excellent guild with an environment structured to allow Outsiders from different regulated worlds—martial artists from Jungwon, knights from the Empire, even beast-humans—to rely on each other.

Since I was also an Outsider, I felt a sense of kinship and thought conversations would go well. Most importantly, as a Hunter Counselor, I would be the first to greet the Outsiders who came to this world. Getting to experience their characteristics firsthand would be a good experience.

The decision didn’t take long.

I called the Association again.

“This is Yoo Seon-woo.”

In the brief silence as the employee on the other end waited for my next words, I spoke the name of the guild that would be my first patient.

“I’ll go with Union.”

The confirmed date was… next Monday.

*

That night, when all the lights in Pandemonium were extinguished and a deep darkness had fallen.

In a training hall deep in the cult’s basement, two shadows gathered. And behind them, dozens of demonic followers stood in formation, holding their breath.

The Ten Demons were now five. Among them, only two faced each other in the heavy silence.

One was Hyeok Yeon-bo, the Left Protector of the cult and a member of the Ten Demons.

The other was Muk Un-hyeon, the Dark Venerable, known as the most insidious and inscrutable of the Ten Demons.

Finally, Hyeok Yeon-bo muttered quietly.

“Did you see, Dark Venerable?”

His low voice echoed eerily through the empty training hall.

“Was I not right?”

A few days ago, Hyeok Yeon-bo had secretly told the Ten Demons: ‘I believe the Supreme One has fallen to a Heart Demon.’

One of the Ten Demons had been enraged and refused to believe it, while another had dismissed it as nonsense. And the last one, the Dark Venerable, had come to stand with Hyeok Yeon-bo here.

But what happened in Pandemonium today had changed everything.

Ja Hwa-yeon had made the first move. Placing Geumgang as the Right Protector was a clear maneuver aimed at the Left Protector.

Hyeok Yeon-bo continued, “The Supreme One is so precarious… that she would place a mere bodyguard in the position of Right Protector.”

His voice began to take on a heated edge.

But then, one of the demonic followers spoke up cautiously.

“But, Lord Left Protector… even if that is so, if she is the Supreme One who inherited the will of Heaven…”

“Foolishness!” Hyeok Yeon-bo roared. His eyes glinted menacingly. “Is it loyalty to stand by and watch your master be bitten by a venomous snake?! The true path of a loyal subject is to draw out the poison that has entered the lord’s body and set their mind and body right!”

He spread his arms toward the one member of the Ten Demons who followed him and the dozens of demonic followers lined up behind. In his eyes, a terrifying flame burned, a mixture of ambition and a great cause.

“We must save the Supreme One from the terrible suffering of the Heart Demon! And before her illness deepens and leads this cult to ruin, we must be the ones to set it right!”

This was not a rebellion. It was for the future of the cult… and for the master of the throne.

“This is a coup.”

To set everything right.

His declaration filled the underground hall.

This time, no one opposed his words.

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Translated By: Meher (RaidenTL)

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