Ep.161 Harvest

Cathedral.

A gathering of S-class villains, the strongest of the strongest villains from around the world.

After returning from the place, I was lying on my sofa in my beloved home in Korea.

“Ugh…”

Yeah, this is it.

Home is the best, after all.

“Da-in, here you go.”

“Oh, thank you, Soobin.”

As Soobin sipped her warm chamomile herbal tea, I let out a satisfied sigh.

Yeah, this is life. Maybe happiness isn’t so far away after all. It’s natural to long for home when you suffer outside.

“Da-in, so what happened?”

“What?”

“When you met the other villains this time. Was everything okay?”

I thought carefully about Seo-eun’s question.

Was everything okay? Well, besides a commotion caused by a communist who will die in three months, nothing really happened.

“Um…”

…It wasn’t a big deal, right?

Anyway, I didn’t want to worry Seo-eun unnecessarily, so I just told her that everything was fine. In reality, it wasn’t a big deal compared to what I had to do in the future.

After reassuring Seo-eun and our Ego Stream members, I could relax and savour my tea again.

“….”

The warm sunlight streamed through the large window in the living room. As I lazily sipped my tea, I once again reviewed the details of the meeting in my mind. It was the Villain Conference, Cathedral, led by the world-class villain Celest.

It was only the first day, so there wasn’t much talk yet. “…Definitely, everyone’s strong.”

Of course, I already knew their abilities through the original work, but there was a difference between knowing conceptually and actually feeling it in person.

There was an unmistakable sense of power that could be felt just by looking at them. Until now, I had only been in Korea, so I had no idea how chaotic things were in other countries. Of course, with many S-class villains in those countries, there were also many heroes who were strong enough to balance the power. It was a different standard from Korea, where there were no S-class heroes yet.

Especially Celest. As mentioned in the original work, she was simply on a different level. Her appearance, adorned with a veil that vaguely covered her face and a saintly white dress, made her look holy and sacred. With her flowing white hair, she could easily be mistaken for a hero. In reality, she was the most dangerous villain, according to the Association.

Of course, the other villains were also formidable, although they may have been slightly weaker than her. Strong ones always exuded confidence, right? Well, even the Atlas old man was intimidating at first.

…Well, that’s not important, actually.

What’s important is how I behave among the representative S-class villains gathered at Cathedral.

“Hmm…” I sipped my tea, lost in thought.

Honestly, I have to admit it. I’m the weakest among them.

I wasn’t even invited in the first place. I only got in by using Atlas. “…Maybe no one will even care about me,” I thought to myself.

Perhaps they would only be curious about my relationship with Atlas. Apart from that, they wouldn’t pay much attention to me. Especially Celest… She invited me at Atlas’s request, but she may not be pleased. “Why is this weakling here?” she might think. After all, she didn’t even send me a letter of invitation, so I had to come with Atlas.

And I’ll use this to my advantage.

If they’re not interested in me, that means they’re not even watching me or gathering information about me. In the first place, Korea is somewhat separate from mainstream criminal organizations in the hero-villain society, so there wouldn’t be any information, to begin with.

So, my goal is not something else.

It’s to devour the villain conference, Cathedral. Slowly, little by little.

What I have that falls short compared to them are information and the future.

And this is the best tool that will make me look more dangerous than anyone else.

In a few words, that flying meat is the only way to plunder S-class villains.

And the beginning of that is to make the Hitchkan of Germany scream.

In fact, it’s just that the one who would die would die even if I’m not there, but how would they know that? Some people will definitely suspect that I have some sort of influence.

And I will use that suspicion to my advantage and take advantage of Silly. Being A-class can be a greater advantage. Celest calling me A-class means he has an incredible ability. Well, they don’t even know I entered Atlas Back.

…Anyway, none of this will happen overnight.

Slowly, like getting wet in the rain. They will realize that something is strange.

“…..”

So, for a while, I sat on the sofa with my legs crossed and planned how to deal with Cathedral in the future.

If I have Atlas, it wouldn’t be bad to build a force around him. Bringing in villains from China and Japan… it would be good if possible. There’s no need to worry about Celest for a while. Although the list of participating villains in Cathedral will be obtained by the head of the International Hero Association, it won’t be a big deal anyway, as it is in the original work…

As I thought and thought, I suddenly stopped when I realized that my cup was empty.

Has time passed this much already?

…Actually, it wasn’t something to worry about from now on. After all, there are still four months left until the next meeting.

Lost in my thoughts, when I returned to reality, I suddenly looked up and met eyes with Seo Jayoung below.

“…?”

“Are you done?”

She asked me with a blank gaze.

When I thought about what I was saying, Seo Jayoung said with a smirk.

“No… I was watching because it was funny to see you muttering to yourself. Have you finished thinking now?”

“Hmm. Okay.”

Seo Jayoung chuckled even more deeply as she listened to my response, accompanied by a fake cough.

No, I didn’t think anyone would be watching us.

Jayoung was always so unobtrusive that sometimes I forgot she was even there, even when we were together.

“Uh-huh…”

Her purple hair sparkled in the sunlight, just as mysterious and inscrutable as the first time I saw her. She asked me.

“So… what were you thinking about?”

“Oh, just work stuff. You know, what we need to do at the next villain meeting and all that.”

“I see…”

Having heard my reply, Ja-young quickly lost interest and leaned her head back against the floor, wriggling around.

She seemed like she was about to say something more, but then hesitated at the last minute. Maybe it was just my imagination?

Anyway, I cleaned up my cup and lost myself in thought for a moment.

Hmm, what should I do next?

Since we’d had a recent terrorist attack, we didn’t need to worry about that for a while. Maybe I should prepare for PMC… but there probably wouldn’t be much to do for a while.

With that conclusion in mind, I decided to go down to the basement where Seo-eun was.

I heard they were working really hard to defeat Stadus this time, emphasizing that they could really win. I should pitch in and help out. Eun-wol and Se-hee were already doing their part. I should lend my face too.

Lost in idle thoughts like these, I went downstairs.

Yeah, let’s take it easy this time. Maybe I’ll hang out with the kids. They were singing about wanting to go to an amusement park last time, so maybe we could go to an amusement park or something. I could tell that Choi Sehee and Soobin were secretly looking forward to it.

Yeah, there probably won’t be any problems for a while. Except for Stadus, but let’s not worry about that.

***

The headquarters of the International Hero Association located in the United States.

The woman sitting in the director’s office slowly looked at the documents in her hand.

“….”

The Villain Meeting was held under the leadership of Celest, the enemy of the International Association.

Obtained was a list of the attendees of the meeting.

… And as she had expected, all of the people she had anticipated were on the list.

“… As expected,” muttered the director quietly.

As previously disclosed, there were no significant changes.

What should she do about this?

The dark circles under her eyes from overwork were pressed and the director of the association quietly contemplated. It was something she had expected anyway, and there was no need to stir up trouble over nothing.

There was nothing she could do immediately, and there were no particularly unusual famous villains in attendance, as all the predicted notorious villains had already gathered. The only problem was what these people were going to do… but it would be best to deal with it afterwards.

Taking a deep breath and reading through the documents, the association president suddenly hesitated at the name of one individual.

“Wait… Egostic?”

Who was he again?

Quickly recalling from her memory, she remembered that he was an A-level villain who was active in Korea. He was the villain who had formed an alliance with Atlas, a villain from South Korea, last time.

“… So an A-level villain is here?”

She raised her head, puzzled.

Except for Egostic, all of the other villains were leaders of S-level villain groups that were causing chaos worldwide. It was strange to suddenly have an A-level villain who only operated in Korea.

Feeling something was off, she took some time to carefully read through the information on Egostic that was stored in the association database.

After some time had passed, she picked up the phone as if making up her mind and contacted someone.

“… Uh, director. Can we call in one of the available S-level heroes here?”

As she had to go on a business trip this time.