Hahoe Mask (1)
Hans stealthily moved into the chaotic scene that had erupted.
Guardians were already on-site, tidying up the mess.
“Damn, how many times is this? Is there ever a day without chaos?”
“…Work keeps piling up, and we’re so understaffed. I can’t even remember the last time I got home.”
They grumbled as they talked.
Looking around, my go-to chicken shop was the only place that had been damaged, with its glass shattered and everything inside in a wreck.
‘It must be the fallout from the recent terrorist attack nearby. Shouldn’t take long for them to reopen.’
Anyway, incidents had been happening at an alarming rate lately.
Coincidentally, the Guardians were discussing the same.
“Thanks to those guys staging organized terror, the peace is in shambles, and other troublemakers are running rampant.”
“It’s tough just capturing those guys… At this rate, it’s going to get dangerous.”
After eavesdropping on them for a moment, I decided to move on.
‘So there was a cause. Have villains started to form a faction?’
Of course, they had already been operating as criminal organizations.
But unlike other countries, we had managed to respond fairly well…
It seemed this time, though, they had failed to control things, getting completely off the leash.
I hid in the encroaching darkness and sped through the city.
Activating my increasingly stealthy detection magic, I scanned the area.
‘It feels odd to return empty-handed after making all this effort.’
I needed to grasp the state of peace for myself.
Besides, Hans didn’t need sleep, and with plenty of magic power, wandering around all night wouldn’t tire him out.
Then, I sensed a small commotion with my enhanced senses.
‘Hmm… what is this…?’
I stopped to assess the situation and hesitated for a moment before altering my direction.
The reason for my hesitation wasn’t that it was dangerous, nor was it that I feared getting exposed.
“Hey, do you want me to shove this in your face? You want it, punk?”
“U-uh, no, it’s not that…”
“Are you not talking straight? You want to get punched, huh?”
A group of boys in school uniforms had gathered in an alleyway.
One of them was surrounded by a group that had a cigarette dangling from his lips.
It was a scene of school bullying.
‘…I came out to hunt some villains, and here I am dealing with punks.’
That was the main reason for my hesitation.
If I drew my sword, I should cut something, but isn’t it excessive to use this power to scold some kids?
“Hey! I’ve got a great idea. Let’s strip him down to the waist!”
“Why? For what?”
As I was assessing the situation, one of the bullies, while puffing on a cigarette, approached the boy who was getting picked on.
“Let’s tattoo the Big Dipper on his chest. Wouldn’t that be cool?”
“Ha ha ha, crazy bastard… That’s awesome! Let’s do it right away.”
The bullies grabbed the boy in the center and started ripping open his buttons.
His body, now exposed, was already covered in bruises and cuts.
“Stop! Don’t do it!”
“What a funny guy. You think if you say stop, we have to stop?”
“Looks like you still can’t get a grip, huh? I’ll tattoo Orion on your back.”
“O! Do you know what Orion looks like? It’s sick!”
“I don’t know. Just search it online. Catch him! He keeps resisting.”
A boy crying and resisting while the others battered him.
A bully moving in with a cigarette and others cackling while filming the scene.
After watching it all, I finally made up my mind.
Villains become villains for a reason.
If you harm others and commit crimes, aren’t you already a villain?
And they were already excellent villains.
Once I made up my mind, it was just a matter of acting.
“…Huh?”
The guy holding the cigarette froze in place.
Not just him; the resisting boy and the cackling bullies all froze, too.
The entire alley was suddenly engulfed in silence.
“W-what’s happening to my body…?”
“I-I can’t, I can’t move…”
I simply unleashed a little energy while hiding my form, and everyone froze like a frog in front of a snake.
Crack!
Then, the smartphone of one of the bullies filming the incident shattered into pieces.
There were no CCTV cameras in this alley.
Well, that explains why those thugs felt free to act recklessly here.
“Eh? Suddenly, I’m feeling…”
Whoosh— Thud!
I cast sleep magic on the victim and slowly revealed myself before the bullies.
“…Eek!”
“A-ah, ugh…”
Drip—
As I revealed myself without holding back, everyone began to wet themselves at the mere sight of me.
I took the atmosphere and approached the bullies slowly.
Tap tap tap…
The sound of teeth clattering, their bodies shaking like aspens.
Looking straight at me, their eyes were bloodshot and wide.
One particularly weak soul had already lost control of his pupils.
‘The effect is pretty impressive!’
I meant to scare them, but this seemed a bit too much.
Well, even though they thought they were invincible, they were just powerless minors, right?
Staying like this could break their minds.
I adjusted my intimidation a bit and reached my fingers out towards them, casting magic.
‘Debating how severe the punishment should be…’
Even if they were bad guys, killing them wouldn’t be right.
But if I merely punished them moderately, they wouldn’t learn a thing, or they wouldn’t engage in this behavior in the first place.
So I chose this method.
[Seeds of evil, remember this moment. When you are fully entrenched in darkness and sprout, you will meet me again.]
Though I called it magic, it was actually a curse.
Being overwhelmed by the terror of facing me head-on.
I planted a trigger in their trauma and embedded it into their psyche.
Swish—
Thud!
The bullies, who had hardened like ice, simultaneously rolled their eyes back and collapsed.
Some were foaming at the mouth as they fainted.
‘Hmm, leaving them like this seems a bit off…’
Swish—
One bully’s smartphone flew out of his pocket, pulled into my hand.
I dialed 911 with it, then tossed it back onto the bully’s body.
I had done enough.
‘Now don’t do any bad things and try to live honestly. Though I bet you can’t.’
Feeling a sense of pride for doing something good, I melted back into the shadows.
The night was still long, and there was plenty of time left.
*
“Ow… my head hurts.”
Choi Ho-sik struggled to open his eyes.
His head felt heavy, and he couldn’t think straight.
“Hey! Ho-sik, are you awake? Over here, here! Oh, hurry over! My boy opened his eyes!”
The shrill voice right next to him made his headache worse.
He wanted to scream for some quiet, but his throat hurt, and no sound came out.
“Patient, are you awake?”
In the meantime, a nurse approached him and began to check on him.
After sipping some water and regaining a bit of strength, Choi Ho-sik finally looked around.
“W-where am I…? A hospital? Why am I here?”
His head was in chaos, and he struggled to grasp the situation.
“Oh, Ho-sik! We received a call that you were in trouble! We were so scared! What happened? Who did this to you?!”
Choi Ho-sik frowned at his mother’s dramatic voice.
But it helped him piece together the situation.
A call made to 119, an unanswered report, and the responders who came via GPS.
Students who had all collapsed together in the alley.
And himself, transported to the hospital, waking up.
“…So I ended up in the hospital after a call came in, and my mom raced over like it was a drama. What’s going on! What’s the police doing? They keep taking our taxes but what the heck…”
He ignored the continuing complaints from his mother, focusing on his resurfacing memories.
‘Right, smoking in the alley, and then trying to teach that loser a lesson…’
The moment he realized how serious the situation had gotten.
He froze in place, unable to breathe.
The fluttering black cloak, the eerie blue flames in twisted eyes, the approaching black hand, and…
[Seeds of evil, remember this moment. When you are fully entrenched in darkness and sprout, you will meet me again.]
“Ahhhhh!”
“Eek! H-Ho-sik? What’s wrong?”
“Patient? Stay with us, patient!”
Overwhelming fear embedded in his very soul.
The medical personnel who had come too late seized his twitching body and administered tranquilizers.
“A… ah…”
As his consciousness gradually drifted away, Choi Ho-sik wished he could have just kept sleeping.
*
The punishment was fundamentally a curse steeped in trauma.
The mechanics were simple: it replayed the fear he felt when facing me.
The activation condition was harboring bad thoughts.
What made this wicked was that even if they didn’t act upon it, just thinking negatively triggered it.
Self-hypnosis wasn’t an option, either.
I mixed in my intent to prepare for those with twisted notions.
Even if they didn’t consider their actions wrongdoing, the curse still activated according to my standards.
‘Still, when it’s only a thought, it triggers weakly as a warning, so they might try to be good.’
Repeated exposure would lead, by survival instinct, to automatically excluding bad thoughts.
Should the curse activate correctly, it could shatter one’s very self.
That said…
Hmmm, this is too inefficient.
After a deep sleep, I opened my eyes and murmured as I took in the situation.
Of course, it was regarding Hans, who had roamed the city all night.
‘Even though I’m quick and my detection range is broad, just aimlessly wandering isn’t efficient.’
It was true I had solved many issues last night.
From school bullies to robbers, and even rapists.
I had drawn on curses, draining the life of the thugs, and castrating the rapists, making quite an impact…
‘But too much time is wasted unnecessarily.’
I was doing volunteer work sorting trash, but Hans was a top-tier asset, no matter how you looked at it.
‘And I can’t just spread undead all over the city.’
As I stared blankly out the window, contemplating, I suddenly saw a flock of birds flying across the sky.
‘Wait? I don’t necessarily need to turn them into undead.’
I realized that I didn’t need undead to make henchmen.
I could also use Familiars, or even the concept of a familiar.
And I knew that magic through the “Forbidden Knowledge.”
I shifted my focus to Hans and began concentrating.
The pigeons scattered across the city and the stray cats roaming the streets at night.
‘I can’t make all of them into familiars or servants. I’d have to modify the magic.’
It could be set up to behave normally but send information under certain conditions.
‘Let’s simplify the spell and focus only on the necessary parts. Then, optimizing it would minimize the activation power as well.’
Not to mention subtlety was crucial so that other returnees wouldn’t catch on.
‘For that, curses are the best. If I base it around that, it’d be easier to hide as the activation magic would decrease.’
Since I couldn’t cast spells on each of them, it might be good if the effects transmitted to other animals through contact.
‘I think it should be possible if I mix the curse with plague magic.’
Hans began to combine new magic using the synergies of “Forbidden Knowledge” and “Malicious Wisdom.”
I summoned my avatar, which allowed me to summon one more being with “Persona,” focusing all resources on Hans.
[Had I been in Auterica, I could have used time much more efficiently… How unfortunate.]
But the moment of regret was brief.
In just a few hours, I would be able to use the Dimensional Teleportation Circle again.
‘Hainz is on a smooth journey, and let’s use this transport for Hans’s magical research.’
When the cooldown for the teleportation circle returned, Hans moved to Auterica.
