CH 144

Chapter 144

Contrary to my worries, nothing happened on the way to the villa.

After driving on the well-paved roads, we arrived at an area that seemed like an expensive village, lined with beautiful houses. Near the end of that road, a three-story mansion with impressive open windows appeared before me.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’ve received a call from the guildmaster regarding your arrival. I’m Kim Cheol-gyun, the representative of this villa’s maintenance enterprise.”

As soon as we dismounted in front of the mansion, ten people–were they contacted in advance?–were standing in a row. I awkwardly nodded; the man named Kim Cheol-gyun politely guided us to the villa without another word. After handing over a tablet PC and telling us to call him whenever we needed anything, he left for someplace else.

‘…He’s probably being considerate, allowing us to move as we please?’

The servants scattered and settled in; Jung Garam went straight up to the third floor and found Park Hoseok’s villa, which was quite near this mansion.

Honestly, it wasn’t close enough to see with the naked eye, but Jung Garam drew an ellipse on the window. The glass inside the line began to shine blue.

Soon enough, Park Hoseok’s villa, which I recognized from the previous photos, appeared on the glass clearly. It was as if the window became the lens of a telescope. The road connecting to the entrance of the villa and the license plate of the parked car were clearly visible, so we could infer that Park Hseok was currently present at home.

“It seems that he’s hung a security skill inside the window. I could probably break it down in about six hours…” the Assassin murmured.

Park Hoseok’s presence couldn’t be confirmed due to the security skills installed that forbade others from looking inside the villa.

However, after contemplating for a while, Seo Dawon shook his head, “There’s no reason to expend energy early. We’re going to kill him before he can return to the Seoul Hub anyway.”

According to the information we obtained, Park Hoseok will return to the Seoul Hub the day after tomorrow, so we shouldn’t waste our precious time looking inside the villa.  Instead, we focused on identifying the location and environment outside of his vacation home.

“If the battle is carried out at Park Hoseok’s villa, there’s a high possibility that there will be noise complaints. In particular, there’s a family of more than 7 that lives in that white-roofed mansion close by. Even a little disturbance could attract their attention.”

“In addition, behind the villa there’s also the Jeju City Hunter Management Office; dozens of Users go back and forth along that road daily. It may be a small distance away, but, if powerful spells are used, it may draw their notice.”

However, since the location was situated in such a wealthy residential area, overpowering Park Hoseok in the villa would prove to be a problem due to the prevalence of security facilities or neighbors nearby. As both Jung Garam and Park Hoseok are close in combat ability, the conflict is likely to be back and forth. They would easily be noticed if the house were to break or if Park Hoseok runs outside to ask for help.

However, Jung Garam soon opened the map and found a suitable place to lure Park Hoseok, “Here–a road that runs along this coastal cliff. If we lure him here at night, I don’t think we’d need to worry about witnesses.”

Famous tourist attractions along that road were closed at 6 pm, so there was bound to be less traffic. In addition, it’s hard to identify us in the dark of the night; even if Park Hoseok wanted to turn and run away, his back was to the cliff.

After deciding on the location, we decided to find a way to call out our target. Of course, news regarding Koo Kyungman would be the perfect bait.

It was obvious, seeing how close the two were–how Koo Kyungman helped to develop the spearman–that the two had intimate, dirty knowledge of each other.

If Koo Kyungman is alive and is caught on suspicion of murder, the ensuing investigation may uncover other criminal charges. Someone with Park Hoseok’s personality would constantly worry about loose ends. In such a situation, if Koo Kyungman were to contact him, the spearman would be unable to sleep without checking it out.

“But, if we contacted him pretending to be Koo Kyungman without any evidence to back that up, I feel like he’d just ignore it. After all, he’s such a cautious person.”

“Let’s search for something we could use around here. They built this villa to be close to each other, and they met up often.”

So, we began to search Koo Kyungman’s villa indiscriminately. At first, I looked passively through desk drawers and cabinets, but, when I saw Seo Dawon kick over the study’s desk and open the wood floor below, I eventually began to search thoroughly–to the extent that I may be accused of dismantling the mansion.

Kim Olim mercilessly cut down the decorational ornaments; Jung Garam used his skills to check the gardens outside the mansion. I took charge of the dressing room and attempted to find something suspicious, but ended up looking at Koo Kyungman’s several million won watches to my heart’s content.

“There was a safe, but nothing useful in it.”

“It seems he really came to Jeju island for vacation. There’s nothing special…except that most of the art here are imitations.”

“The garden’s also clean.”

Like that, after investigating the insides and outsides of the mansion for two hours, we gathered in the third-floor living room again.

I also raised my hands, “I found out nothing except that Koo Kyungman is dirty rich.”

At the very least, Kim Olim had found a picture–Koo Kyungman and Park Hoseok fishing on a yacht–in a study on the first floor, but there was no conclusive evidence on those two’s relationship.

However, since we didn’t have much time, we decided to write down a time and location behind that picture, and, along with the expensive brand name watch that Koo Kyungman liked to wear, packaged them to be sent to Park Hoseok.

Everything was feasible until this point. The problem now, however, was sending these things to the spearman without going through a middleman.

Every villa in this luxury village, including the one we’re using, had guards standing at the entrance. The same was true of Park Hoseok’s villa. Even if we left this package at the entrance, the security detail would find it first, and its contents would be exposed to others. If Park Hoseok was found missing or his corpse was discovered, there was sure to be some guard’s testimony on the suspicious box and the picture containing the specified location and time.

However, while we were searching for another method since sneaking and entering Park Hoseok’s villa seemed too difficult at the moment, Jung Garam suddenly raised his head and looked out the window. “Oh, it looks like we won’t have to think about that?”

“What?” Following the Assassin and looking out the window, I could see Park Hoseok exiting the main gate and entering a luxury sedan. He left the villa in a chauffeur-driven car; perhaps he had an appointment?

We exchanged glances and immediately ran down to the first floor.

It was time to shadow him.

* * *

We contacted Koo Hui-seo shortly afterwards, and he immediately sent us a driver. He was a large, bulky man who looked more like a gangster than a chauffeur, but he didn’t engage in unnecessary conversation. Furthermore, instead of a luxury sedan, he pulled up in an ordinary car.

It was a common car that would be unnoticeable in a crowd except for the deep tints on its windows. Though it took about 15 minutes, we were able to catch up with Park Hoseok without much difficulty, thanks to Jung Garam’s tracking skills.

Park Hoseok passed over the road to the downtown and entered a coastal path; after another 30 minutes, he got off in front of what seemed to be a cafe. The driver escorted Park Hoseok in and then disappeared–perhaps to go and park the car?

I searched the name of the cafe and found that it was a luxury restaurant that only accepted reservations. “What should we do? Should we just go in?”

“No, look there.” Kim Olim suddenly pointed in a direction. I followed her hand with my eyes and found Park Hoseok approaching some people.

The people that Park Hoseok greeted so happily…was none other than miss sporty haircut and Mr. green hair that we encountered at the airport today. Surprised, I reflexively hid my head. “Did they just meet up simply for a meal?”

“It seems like it, judging from their expressions. That restaurant doesn’t have the structure to support sensitive conversations either.”

Though the three looked like dots on the horizon for me, Kim Olim answered as if she could clearly see their faces. Blinking, I stared at Seo Dawon. I wondered if we really needed to sit here and wait until they finished their meal.

Then, watching them slowly disappear into the restaurant, Seo Dawon asked me to get out of the car.

“Are we going in?”

“No. We should go to the parking lot.”

He said it’d be nice to leave a surprise gift in the car.

It was only then I realized why we kept waiting, and hurriedly pressed my hat deeply over my head; I held the box containing our invitation snug in my arms.

TL: If I were Lee-kyung-ie, I’d be stealing so many of those watches and things to sell.