The Villainous Director Is Raising a Child!

Her large eyes were glinting with a fierce, obsessive curiosity and madness — nothing anywhere near innocence.

"Han Soeun, from the Monster Research Team! I've genuinely, sincerely... been wanting to meet you!"

She was breathing hard, apparently unable to contain her excitement.

"So — are all the rumors going around the institute right now true? That every one of the Director's antics was really an act — a performance meant to carry out some huge, grand plan—! Mmph!"

Before she could finish, Lee Jinwoo — face bone-white beside her — clapped a hand over Han Soeun's mouth.

"What are you saying — right in front of the Director!"

Lee Jinwoo scrambled to shut her up, but Han Soeun — mmph! mmph! — kept squirming, determined to finish what she wanted to say.

In the end he dragged her off into a corner of the room and whispered something to her.

His voice was very low, but I could catch words like acting..., big picture..., genius... mixed in here and there.

...What on earth is he telling her?

A little later, Han Soeun walked back out looking subdued, as though nothing had happened.

But I saw it.

Behind her glasses, the eyes she had trained on me were burning with an even more dogged, manic curiosity than before.

I was curious what they'd said, but I was afraid I'd flip that clear-eyed switch again... so I decided to just play dumb.

Just then, the huge man who'd been standing there quiet as a shadow the whole time stepped forward.

He spoke in a curt voice, with not a trace of emotion in it.

"Kang Taemin, from the Energy Engineering Team."

He bent at a perfect ninety degrees in a bow.

"Pleased to serve, sir."

Even his greeting is basically military.

Looks and manner both... the man was remarkably consistent.

"Well... right. If you're Lee Jinwoo's intake mates... you're all newbies too, correct?"

Han Soeun and Kang Taemin both gave small nods.

If I want these two doing my bidding... I'll have to keep up the delinquent act, won't I?

I shot a glance at Lee Jinwoo.

He was the only person in this institute I could trust — but the reason he was willing to follow my orders in the first place was that I'd been ordering him around like a delinquent.

I pointed a finger at Lee Jinwoo, then Han Soeun, then Kang Taemin, one at a time.

"Good. As of today, you're Number One."

"You're Number Two."

"And you — you're Number Three."

"...Sir?"

The naming sense of a bootleg Pok*mon knockoff.

Both Lee Jinwoo and Han Soeun let out dumbfounded sighs.

Their faces made me flinch inwardly, but I pretended not to notice and got right to the point.

"A question. Anyone here know Project R's actual objective?"

Kang Taemin answered curtly.

"I understand it to be research related to... awakening."

Lee Jinwoo's eyes went round at that.

Han Soeun saw his face, and her eyes went round in turn.

"Huh? You didn't know? Watching them pit the subjects against simulated monsters and measure awakening energy every single day?"

"My field is computer engineering! Not energy science!"

Ignoring the two of them squabbling loudly, I went on.

"Right. That's about as far as any of you know. Injecting awakening energy, and pitting the subjects against simulated monsters."

I paused a moment, running my eyes over the three of them, each one gone still.

"But this institute's real objective isn't simple awakening."

"...?"

"It's an artificial Second Awakening."

That one line froze all three of their faces at once.

But each face meant something slightly different.

"...Second Awakening!"

Han Soeun's face filled with the awe and ecstasy of a scientist who had just come face to face with the impossible.

Kang Taemin, in contrast, was frowning deeply.

Only Lee Jinwoo... wore the bewildered look of a man with no idea what was going on.

"Um... Director. A Second Awakening — does that mean the rank gets reassigned... something like that? Even after someone's already awakened?"

"No! It's nothing as simple as addition!"

The one who answered Lee Jinwoo's question wasn't me.

"A Second Awakening isn't addition — it's more like multiplication, or squaring! No, actually... it's basically evolving into a whole different species!"

Unable to contain her excitement, Han Soeun poured the words out, voice shaking.

"You were on the Data Analysis Team, so you'd know better than anyone. A single rank up among Awakened — how utterly, insurmountably huge that gap is."

She held up her fingers.

"A hundred D-rank Hunters together can't beat one C-rank. A hundred C-ranks charging a single B-rank could be wiped out. They split it F to S for convenience, but honestly, a single rank's worth of difference is... about as wide as the gap between humans and apes."

She clenched her fists.

"And a Second Awakening! It's a phenomenon that vaults you over that wall by two or three ranks in one stroke! Not simple strengthening — the very grade of your existence changes!"

Really?

Her words caught me off guard, too.

In the original it felt more like a level-up... turns out it's a way bigger deal than I thought.

"What?! No way!"

Lee Jinwoo shot back, almost shrieking.

"The rank of an Awakened cannot change — that's the law, isn't it?! A C-rank is a C-rank forever, and an A-rank has been an A-rank since birth!"

Kang Taemin's low, curt voice cut through his flustered outburst.

"There is documented precedent for a rank changing."

"What?"

"The world's Number One, Julia Morgan. She re-awakened from B-rank to S-rank. There is also a record from three years ago — Akash, the sole survivor of the Delhi Gate Break in India, went through a Second Awakening from C-rank to A-rank."

"Those two are just mutations! One was at the brink of death, in an extreme situation, and the other took the full energy of an A-rank Gate on his own body! Those are unreproducible, freak coincidences—!"

Lee Jinwoo got that far, then abruptly shut his mouth.

At the brink of death, in an extreme situation.

Massive amounts of injected awakening energy.

That matched, exactly, the hell the subjects had been put through over the past several months.

And it wasn't just Lee Jinwoo.

Han Soeun's face had gone white, and even Kang Taemin's eyebrow twitched faintly.

...So the three of them hadn't known, apparently.

Bitter, and at the same time, just a little relieved.

It meant they weren't monsters who had lost the last of their humanity.

To break the heavy silence, I gave a single clap.

"Whether you knew or didn't — the fact remains, this project's objective is 'artificial Second Awakening.'"

"..."

"But that isn't the real problem. For years now they've been pouring in energy, driving the subjects into extremes, throwing them at simulated monsters — the same idiotic thing over and over — and... has any of it produced results?"

"..."

"A Second Awakening? That method's never getting one. A hundred more years of it and it still wouldn't."

At my confident declaration, Lee Jinwoo asked, flustered:

"But Director... how are you so certain?"

Because I've read the original.

But of course I couldn't say that.

Nice thing about the delinquent act — it's convenient at times like this.

"Do I really have to explain that to you all step by step?"

My obnoxious line made their expressions shift in some strange way, but I made a point of not noticing.

"Still — you three are my first minions, so as a special favor, I'll let you in on the first step of my plan."

"...!"

"I'm going to make my dolls... the strongest in the world."

That declaration dropped a genuine silence over the Director's office.

Lee Jinwoo and Kang Taemin just looked at each other, faces asking what did he just say.

But Han Soeun's eyes, unlike the other two's, were flashing with a fanatical light.

"T-the — the strongest in the world?"

Her voice trembled faintly with excitement.

"How exactly do you intend to achieve a goal like 'strongest in the world'?"

"How, you ask... The plan is..."

She held her breath and waited for what I'd say next. I savored the tension for a beat, then broke off mid-sentence.

"Sign this, and I'll tell you."

A flicker of disappointment crossed Han Soeun's face, but when she recognized the parchment I'd tossed out, it shifted at once into shock.

"Th-this...! This is a B-rank artifact — the Deceiver's Contract! Once you sign, you have to carry it out no matter what—!"

That yelped protest got a small laugh out of me.

"You think I'm going to spill my plan to people I just met, on trust? So I prepared this. Cost me a fair bit, too."

The truth was, all of this had come about thanks to a single black card I'd found in Chae Junhyeok's coat pocket a few days back.

Half wondering no way, is this the thing I've only ever seen in dramas?, I'd logged into an online auction site — and that had been the start of everything.

Every night from then on, I'd snapped up every rare item I could get my hands on.

Honestly, I'd wondered whether it was really okay to blow through Chae Junhyeok's money like this — but the second I remembered it was money he'd earned by abusing children, the worry flew right out the window and I just decided to spend it.

The Deceiver's Contract I'd bought was, in the same way, part of an investment in the children.

I pushed the parchment across to them.

[Article 1: Party B (the Signatory) shall carry out all orders from Party A (Chae Junhyeok) as their highest priority. The following cases shall be exceptions.

One. Cases in which Party B's life is directly threatened.

Two. Orders impossible to fulfill by any reasonable standard.

Article 2: Party B (the Signatory) is prohibited under any circumstances from any act that would inflict harm on the subjects designated by Party A (Chae Junhyeok): Cha Yul, Lee Sea-ah, Kim Sihyeok, Park Suho, Seo Hayun, Seo Hajun.]

"As you can see — just two clauses. Simple, right?"

I tapped a finger against the writing at the very bottom of the parchment — text written in a color as red as blood.

"The penalty for breaking them, of course, is anything but simple."

[1. Loss of voice for five years, along with inability to express thought through language.

All pain (physical and mental) inflicted on the subjects returned upon the offender tenfold.]

"Oh — and for your information, whether or not a clause has been broken is up to this scrap of paper to decide. Very fairly, at that."

I looked at the three of them standing there, faces frozen, and thought to myself:

I gave it a lot of thought... but right now, this is the only way.

How was I supposed to build a personal team — one that wouldn't betray me — in an institute full of enemies?

The ideal would be to win subordinates who'd give me their sincere loyalty, but...

There was no chance in hell delinquent Chae Junhyeok was going to get subordinates like that.

So the artifact was what I'd come up with instead.

I rolled a pen onto the desk.

"All right. Decide. Sign onto my plan, or turn around and walk out just as you came."

I added:

"Just so you know — there's no shortage of others who'd love this seat. You've got exactly one minute."

Naturally, a sane person wouldn't sign a slave contract like this.

Which was why I'd decided to throw out some bait.

Curiosity.

A trait of what one might call the researcher species, which I'd learned from observing Lee Jinwoo.

When they came up against phenomena they couldn't explain or unknown data, they'd twist themselves into knots trying to solve and prove it.

For a species like that, the keyword Second Awakening and the bait of turning the subjects into the strongest beings in the world — that had to land.

...Or so I'd analyzed, plausibly enough, in my head.

Honestly, my real feelings were closer to I'd cling to their pant legs and beg if that's what it took.

Please... please, sign it...!

I hid all of that anxiety and looked down at them, doing my best to seem unbothered.

A minute — no, not even thirty seconds — had passed.

"I'll do it!"

The first to snatch up the pen was Han Soeun.

Eyes bright with the mania of a scientist handed her dream experiment, she scrawled her name across the page.

Right after her, Kang Taemin came up without a word and, without a moment's hesitation, pressed his own name onto the page.

This fast?!

I was the one who'd offered it, but for a moment their sheer speed of decision left me speechless.

As I thought — researchers really are impossible to figure out.

Marveling inwardly at their manic curiosity, I turned my eyes on the last one left.

Just Lee Jinwoo now.

"Huh? Do I — do I have to do it too?"

"Obviously."

I tapped the tip of the pen at him.

"Don't tell me you were thinking of backing out this far in?"

"N-no! I'm your right hand, Director — how could I be the one to sit this out?!"

Lee Jinwoo all but snatched the pen from my hand and, with resolve, wrote his name in.

The moment the last signature was in place—

Fwoosh—!

The Deceiver's Contract burst into a blinding light, and the red letters on the parchment slithered up off the page like snakes.

The letters cut through the air, wrapped tight around the three researchers' necks, and then seeped down into their skin and vanished.

"Eek!"

"Whoa!"

All three of them let out short cries in unison and clutched at their necks.

Lee Jinwoo went ashen and patted frantically at his own neck.

"D-Director! Something just went inside me — am I going to die?!"

Han Soeun's eyes, by contrast, gleamed with mania.

"Haa... incredible. Biological interference from a high-density energy body... Director, could I cut open my neck and take a sample of this?"

I did my best to pretend I hadn't heard the chilling suggestion that she cut into her own throat.

Then I tucked the parchment — now signed by all three — into my coat.

"Good. As of today, you're officially my direct-report team... and my minions."

Lee Jinwoo shook off his terror in an instant and, eyes brimming with anticipation, asked:

"So — what's the first order we're to follow?"

"Simple."

I grinned and jerked my chin toward the containment room.

"Starting now — we're stealing my dolls out of there."

"Sir?"

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