Sucheol scoffed. He prepared himself to leap forward at any moment. Except for the one car parked in front, he couldn’t see anyone else, but you never knew.
It was also strange that Hongdo was attempting conversation so half-heartedly without showing Ian. Just then, Ganghyuk got out of the car. He slammed the door shut with a thud and walked straight toward Hongdo.
“Hyung-nim.”
Sucheol stuck close to his side, prepared for any situation. Although Hongdo wasn’t holding anything in his hands, he was the bastard who had kidnapped Ian. It wouldn’t be strange if he suddenly pulled out a knife and charged at them.
“Where’s Ian?”
Standing before Hongdo, Ganghyuk looked down at him and asked about Ian’s whereabouts. When Hongdo shrugged his shoulders, he gestured to Sucheol. Sucheol quickly ran to the car Hongdo had gotten out of.
After checking inside the car, Sucheol shook his head. Only someone was sitting in the driver’s seat; the back seat was empty. He went to the trunk and tried to open it, but only a rattling sound came out.
“Don’t you even know the basics of a hostage exchange? You should show me my son first.”
Seeing this, Hongdo wiped away all traces of the smile he’d been wearing. Ganghyuk lowered his head and laughed. Even as his shoulders shook with laughter, the surrounding air grew heavily oppressive.
Cold sweat formed on Hongdo’s forehead from the pheromones and murderous intent flowing from Ganghyuk. The tooth that had been pulled throbbed. Just as he was about to furrow his brow at the sensation of tasting coppery blood in his mouth, his throat was suddenly grabbed.
“Kkeheuk……”
“Seriously, this bastard and that bastard only choose to do shitty things.”
“You, you fuck, if you do this…… keuk……”
Hongdo tried to keep speaking, but the tips of his toes lifted off the ground. His face turned bright red and blue veins stood out above his temples.
Pheromones flowed from Hongdo as well, but they were buried under Ganghyuk’s. Not only was his windpipe blocked, but his pheromones were also suppressed, making it feel like his breath would give out at any moment.
Thud, thud, thud.
Suspicious sounds rang out simultaneously from all directions. From inside the cars parked in the lot, people holding various tools got out in unison.
Most of them had skin as black as if they’d been heavily tanned in the sun, yellowed teeth, and dirty hairstyles. Moreover, their clothing was uniformly flashy. Some, like Hongdo, had gold accessories hanging all over their bodies.
“Ha, look at these guys.”
Watching the bastards gradually gathering around him, Sucheol laughed as if amused. He was flabbergasted by the number—roughly twenty people.
This was supposed to be a place where they’d just exchange hostages. But seeing that he’d brought dozens of subordinates, his intentions were impure.
Sucheol, grinding his teeth so hard they made a crunching sound, pulled out a sashimi knife wrapped in newspaper from behind his waist. He’d brought it just in case.
When he unwrapped the newspaper, moonlight glittered on the sharply honed blade. The bandage wrapped around the handle was a dark reddish-brown color. Gripping the knife he’d had for a long time, his heart began to beat a little faster.
Jaehyun also got out of the car. He took out leather gloves and put them on both hands, then removed his suit jacket and tossed it onto the car’s hood. He also loosened his necktie, gripping both ends in his hands and rotating his fists. A sense of tension could be felt from the tightly pulled necktie string.
While Sucheol and Jaehyun were preparing to fight, the air between Ganghyuk and Hongdo heated up precariously, as if it would shatter at any moment.
“Your omega, keuk, is it okay if he dies……?”
Hongdo grabbed Ganghyuk’s hand and barely managed to open his mouth. Though a sense of fear arose at the thought that if Ganghyuk applied just a little more force, his neck bone would break, he had expected this much.
And the thought that Ganghyuk absolutely couldn’t kill him as long as Ian’s safety wasn’t secured also played a part. He’d never intended to make a fair deal with Ganghyuk in the first place.
He’d planned to bury Ganghyuk at this opportunity and extort a large sum from Nayeon and Minjae. While he was at it, getting a big foothold in the Hyoseong-dong redevelopment would be good too.
Even if he asked to just take a small portion of what would go to Ganghyuk, he’d gain tremendous profits.
However, what he hadn’t anticipated was that Ganghyuk had completely lost his mind. He had no patience left to proceed with such a worthless negotiation. It was the moment Ganghyuk’s eyes twitched.
Crack.
The sound of a neck bone shattering rang out. Hongdo’s eyes widened at the unbelievable pain, but the life quickly drained from them.
Ganghyuk flung away the body that had become a corpse. Hongdo sprawled on the ground with a heavy sound. Jaehyun, Sucheol, and all of Hongdo’s subordinates were shocked, their mouths hanging open.
“Find Ian.”
After giving Jaehyun an order, Ganghyuk turned toward those who had grasped the situation and were charging at him with screams.
From axes to sashimi knives, jacknives, and iron clubs. Even though dozens of enemies rushed at him with all kinds of weapons, Ganghyuk’s expression was calm. No, he looked dangerous like a powder keg about to explode.
“Uaaaah……!”
The man who reached Ganghyuk’s side first swung an iron club while screaming. His eyes were bloodshot with excitement after seeing Hongdo, already dead.
Ganghyuk moved his body to the side to avoid the club and struck the man’s temple with his clenched fist. With a cracking sound, the man’s head whipped to the side.
A few drops of bright red blood splattered in front of his face. The man, having spun half a turn, collapsed onto the ground with a thud. His writhing form was no different from an earthworm.
Seeing the man go down in one hit, the others hesitated. Following Hongdo, the man who had been his right-hand man was also no match for Ganghyuk.
But they couldn’t just stand still, so starting with a man holding a sashimi knife who charged forward cursing, the other bastards followed. They firmly believed in the truth that there’s no defense against a group beating.
“You son of a bitch! Die!”
“Uaaaah! Die!”
“That fucking bastard, our hyung-nim……”
Though each one said different things, they all barked fiercely like terrified dogs. The tip of the sashimi knife flew toward Ganghyuk’s uvula with precise aim.
Ganghyuk struck hard with his palm at the part where the arm bends. With the sound of bone breaking, the sashimi the man was holding flew through the air.
He then grabbed the man’s hair and swung him horizontally into the path of an axe being swung sideways.
Thwack! The axe blade struck the man’s side. The man who had inadvertently chopped his comrade like a tree was flustered and pulled his arm back, causing blood to gush out like a fountain.
“Kkeueuk……”
Another one became unable to fight. Ganghyuk then punched the side of the bastard who’d swung the axe, then threw the axe he’d seized from him.
The rapidly flying axe embedded itself in the forehead of a man wearing a floral shirt. The bastard who’d been holding a jackknife in his hand staggered and fell forward with a thud.
In an instant, the area around Ganghyuk was stained with blood. In the meantime, Jaehyun was quickly approaching the trunk of the car Hongdo had gotten out of. Sucheol had already sent the charging bastards to their graves one by one at a speed no less than Ganghyuk’s.
“Hiyaa!”
Two men also rushed at Jaehyun, who seemed the weakest of the three. Jaehyun avoided the knife tip, dove into the chest of the man in front of him, wrapped the necktie string around the man’s arm, then executed a forward throw.
Then with a spinning back kick, he precisely struck the nape of the man standing beside him. The man with the broken arm and the man whose vital point had been attacked both collapsed to the ground, groaning.
“Come at me all at once! Don’t bother coming at me one by one!”
Sucheol, covered in blood, swung his blood-soaked sashimi knife and provoked those attacking. He grinned wickedly and slowly ground his boot into the head of the man collapsed below.
“Uuuh……”
The man who’d been holding his bleeding stomach with his hand let out a pain-filled groan at the agony of having his face ground into the floor.
Thanks to Sucheol drawing attention, Jaehyun was easily able to climb into the car and press the trunk button. At the sound of the trunk opening, Sucheol swung his sashimi knife forward and quickly approached the car to open the trunk door.
“Ah, fuck! He’s not here!”
At Sucheol’s voice, Jaehyun muttered curses. His heart was anxious with the thought that he needed to find Ian as quickly as possible. From that moment, Jaehyun ran around all over the parking lot examining every parked car.
