Chapter 343

“Came to see me?”

“Exactly! To be precise, I came to ask for your cooperation.”

“Cooperation… Cooperation regarding what?”

“A lot of Paladins will be coming and going through Sinchon from now on.”

“That’s not exactly welcome news.”

“Ah, don’t misunderstand. This time they’re not coming for missionary work.”

It was Johan who had tried to seize control of Sinchon Mall while taking advantage of Zeon’s absence. Even aside from that, Zeon never trusted Johan as a person to begin with.

“You’re saying there won’t be any missionary work? And you expect me to believe that?”

“It doesn’t matter whether you believe it or not. There’s no reason for me to force you to believe me. I’m merely informing you. The circumstances have become such.”

“That sounds like a completely one-sided notice.”

“From your perspective, I understand why you’d be displeased. But even so, it can’t be helped.”

The smile at the corner of Johan’s lips deepened.

“So even if I object, you’re still going to send Paladins into Sinchon?”

“For the time being…”

“And why is that?”

“You have no need to know the reason.”

“Then I can’t cooperate either.”

Zeon answered coldly.

Johan’s eyes turned icy at Zeon’s unexpected response.

“It seems you misunderstand. What I said wasn’t a request.”

“So if I refuse, are you saying you’ll start a war?”

“That’s not impossible.”

“How interesting.”

“If you brush my words aside so lightly, it won’t stay interesting for long.”

“Then go ahead and try it. War!”

Zeon openly provoked Johan.

Johan glared at Zeon with terrifying eyes.

Behind his glasses, the small eyes swirled with immense hostility and killing intent.

It was the kind of aura people commonly called madness.

Even under that madness-filled gaze that could make anyone’s legs tremble, Zeon showed no intimidation whatsoever.

“A lot of people in Sinchon will die.”

“Even more people will die in Dongdaemun.”

“Is there really a need to take things this far?”

“You’re the one who crossed the line first and informed me afterward.”

“You’re stubborn. Keep that up and you’ll snap someday.”

“Your neck will be cut off before I snap.”

“Very well! Then let’s do this. I’ll prohibit the Paladins from operating in Sinchon. In exchange, allow only ten lay believers of the Order to operate here.”

“Lay believers?”

“Yes! Ordinary followers, exactly as the name implies. If you guarantee that they can operate in Sinchon, then the Paladins will stay out.”

Zeon frowned.

He didn’t believe Johan’s words.

There was no way the people Johan intended to send were truly ordinary lay believers.

They were most likely forces secretly cultivated by Johan. But if he completely blocked even their entry, then he would truly have to wage war against Dongdaemun.

No matter how elite Johan’s hidden forces were, it would still take time for merely ten people to gather information.

Zeon decided he had to be satisfied with buying the minimum amount of time needed to raise Jeto.

“Fine. But only ten people. I’ll give you exactly one month. If they continue operating in Sinchon beyond that, I’ll personally drive them out.”

“Good.”

Johan answered readily.

A smile lingered on his lips.

Because he had achieved the goal he wanted.

In truth, he had never expected Zeon to allow the Paladins of Dongdaemun to move freely around Sinchon.

The Zeon he had grasped was more viciously difficult than anyone else.

There was no way such a man would tolerate the Paladins of Dongdaemun freely roaming what was essentially his territory.

That was why Johan had deliberately provoked him.

First, he sent priests and Paladins from the Order to strongly agitate Zeon, then presented a compromise afterward.

As a result, Zeon accepted his proposal.

The one-month limit bothered him, but it was still more than enough time to gather information.

The people he planned to dispatch were absolutely not ordinary believers.

Dark Saints.

Saints who protected the Order from the shadows.

They were Dongdaemun’s secret weapon, comparable to the City Hall’s Numbers or the Northern District’s Punishers.

Until now, Johan had kept the Dark Saints completely hidden.

They were secret weapons in the truest sense, which meant they could not be exposed.

The very fact that he was mobilizing them now showed just how important Johan considered this matter.

‘I must secure the Saintess no matter what.’

It was the first time he had heard the voice of God since establishing the Order.

Originally, he believed no god existed.

If a god truly existed, then the world would never have become so ruined. That was why he had proclaimed himself a god instead.

Outwardly, he claimed to serve God, but inwardly he believed he himself was the god of the new world.

But he had been wrong.

God truly existed.

What he heard was neither delusion nor hallucination.

Such a holy voice was not something anyone could fabricate.

God existed above the heavens, and through Johan, sought to make His will known to the world.

The beginning of that will was the Saintess.

Together with the Saintess, the Order would grow explosively.

Zeon silently stared at Johan’s sinister face.

He could roughly guess what Johan was thinking.

‘This will be a good opportunity to find out the extent of Dongdaemun’s hidden forces.’

Chensi possessed an extremely complicated bloodline.

A father born between a Chinese grandfather and a Korean grandmother.

A mother born between a Russian grandfather and a Czech grandmother.

The child born between those two was Chensi herself.

Before the Great Cataclysm, such a lineage would have been considered very special.

It wasn’t common for different bloodlines to come together and create such a beautiful being.

That was why Chensi possessed such mysteriously beautiful features.

Her unique beauty, impossible to hide even beneath a nun’s habit, drew people’s attention wherever she went.

Such an appearance brought many inconveniences, but it also had advantages.

Namely, everyone treated her kindly.

Not a single man was an exception.

Every man wanted to impress her and answered her kindly.

Thanks to that, she displayed exceptional talent in gathering information.

That was the reason Chensi had come to Sinchon.

Chensi was a member of the Dark Saints.

Because of her specialized information-gathering abilities, Johan had sent her into Sinchon first.

Even now, Chensi was conversing with a man while collecting information.

“So you haven’t seen anyone particularly suspicious?”

“That’s right, Sister!”

“If you happen to hear any strange stories or rumors later, could you let me know?”

“Of course. If I hear anything like that, I’ll run to tell you first, Sister.”

“Thank you.”

Chensi smiled faintly at the man’s answer.

It was far too alluring a smile to belong to an ordinary nun.

The man looked utterly captivated by her smile.

Deciding there was no more information to gain from him, Chensi coldly turned away. But the man couldn’t take his eyes off her retreating figure until the very end.

Feeling the man’s gaze on her back, Chensi’s expression turned icy.

‘Trash…’

She forcibly held back the nausea rising within her.

Receiving gazes filled with such filthy desire was torture to her. But she endured it somehow, believing this too was a trial given to her by God and Johan.

What mattered to her was not the filthy stares of men.

What mattered was carrying out the mission Johan had entrusted to her.

Find the Saintess.

That was the mission Johan had given to her and the Dark Saints.

To accomplish it, the Dark Saints had scattered throughout the slums, gathering information through every possible means.

But so far, they had discovered nothing noteworthy.

‘Can we really obtain information about the Saintess in Sinchon?’

Honestly, Chensi was skeptical.

Every district was hostile toward Dongdaemun, but Sinchon was especially so.

Partly because Zeon existed here, but also because Sinchon had once nearly fallen under Dongdaemun’s control.

As a result, the people here were exceptionally hostile toward clergy from Dongdaemun.

Only someone like Chensi could seduce men with her appearance and gather information. Everyone else was struggling badly.

They had already spent ten days searching through Sinchon, yet they had not obtained a single meaningful lead.

Because of that, even Chensi and the other Dark Saints had begun wondering whether it was time to withdraw from the area.

“Does the Saintess even truly exist on the surface…?”

As Chensi muttered absentmindedly, her gaze suddenly changed.

Within her field of vision was the entrance to an underground sewer passage blocked by thick iron bars.

“If she’s not on the surface… could she possibly be underground?”

The thought suddenly crossed her mind.

She already knew.

People lived in the underground sewers as well.

People who had nowhere left to live above ground and had dug their way below.

The people living the most miserable lives in all of Neo Seoul.

Chensi approached the iron bars.

An unbearable stench flowed out from between them.

Simply smelling it was enough to make one’s mind go hazy.

If Chensi had been an ordinary person, she would have retreated at this point.

Unfortunately, she was not ordinary.

To Chensi, an A-rank Awakener baptized by Johan and gifted with special abilities, this level of stench was no problem at all.

Instead, she felt a strange sense of duty.

“That’s right! If not me, then who else would enter a filthy place like this? Isn’t it in the filthiest and harshest places that God descends?”

Crack!

Chensi grabbed the padlock hanging from the iron bars and twisted it with her hand.

It broke far too easily.

The iron bars swung open weakly.

Just before entering underground, she suddenly turned around.

“That’s strange. I could’ve sworn I felt someone watching me.”

But no matter how widely she opened her eyes, she saw no one. Feeling uneasy, she even activated a detection skill, yet still sensed nothing.

“Was it just my imagination?”

Muttering to herself, Chensi stepped into the underground sewer.

The moment her figure completely disappeared into the darkness, something rose from the corner of the alley.

It was a Sand Soldier made entirely of sand.

The Sand Soldier quietly stared at the underground sewer Chensi had entered before collapsing back into sand once more.

***

“So she found it after all.”

Zeon let out a bitter smile.

He had attached a Sand Soldier to every Dark Saint who entered Sinchon and monitored them.

The Dark Saints never even imagined that Zeon would use Sand Soldiers to spy on them.

Thanks to that, Zeon could sit at home and observe every single one of their movements.

That was how Zeon gathered information about the Dark Saints.

“Total personnel: fifty. All of them received Johan’s baptism and operate in the shadows. Normally they gather intelligence, but whenever Johan commands it, they can instantly become assassins. Among them, the ten upper-ranked members are the most dangerous. The woman who just entered the underground sewer, Chensi, is one of those ten.”

That was why he had been monitoring her movements especially carefully.

Controlling Sand Soldiers remotely from home was quite burdensome even for Zeon.

Sand Soldiers were, by nature, soldiers created for battle—not autonomous observers with free will.

Because of that, Zeon had to expend even more mental energy controlling the Sand Soldier attached to Chensi.

But the results were worth it.

He had confirmed that Chensi entered the underground sewer.

“So now I have to decide?”

Once she entered the underground sewer, it would only be a matter of time before the identity of the Saintess Johan sought was exposed.

And Zeon knew all too well what would happen if the Saintess fell into Dongdaemun’s hands.

Dongdaemun would undoubtedly use the Saintess to expand explosively.

If that happened, the existing order would be completely overturned.

And that was not what Zeon wanted.

Zeon had two choices.

The first was to kill Chensi.

The second was to kill or hide Remura.

Both options carried enormous risks.

It was then, as Zeon’s worries deepened, that—

Clack!

The door suddenly opened, and Brielle’s voice rang out.

“We’re back, Zeon!”

Brielle strode in proudly together with Levin and Jetoya.

The moment Zeon saw the three of them, he made his decision.

‘Dongdaemun… I’ll put an end to it.’