The Villainous Director Is Raising a Child!

If you had to sum up the man that was Kang Taemin in a single word, that word would be "loyalty."

He had lived his whole life like an abandoned dog, desperate for someone to take up his leash.

Whether that desperate craving came from something innate or was a scar from a horrific childhood, no one could say.

Under the merciless violence of an ex-military father, young Kang Taemin had etched submission and obedience — and nothing else — into his bones from an early age.

Beating after beating, the boy's feelings and expressions were gradually washed away to nothing.

The blind obedience carved into his marrow didn't change when he grew to tower over his father, and it didn't change even after the tyrant who'd bound him died and was gone.

Still, he wandered on, hunting for a new master to take up his leash.

A friend who reached out a hand and asked, "You okay?" A teacher who kindly patted his shoulder. Anyone who seemed even a little better off than himself — it didn't matter who.

He would gladly throw himself at their feet and pour out everything he had.

They grew sick of that eerily blind devotion, and in the end, one after another, coldly shoved him away — practically fleeing.

He never gave up, though. He only kept wandering in search of another master.

What finally ended that long wandering was the existence of one man: "Chae Ganghyeon."

A man who reigned at the summit of the Awakened world with the body of a non-Awakened — not a scrap of mana to his name.

When Taemin happened to read an article on the man's life story, a thrill shot through him — as if he'd just received a revelation from the gods.

If it's him…!

On that single conviction, he volunteered for the Defense Corps without a moment's hesitation and worked like a dog.

His main duty was the grunt work: cleaning up after Hunters had cleared and left a Gate, and putting down whatever monsters remained.

And there was one strange rule he had to observe every time before starting a job.

Right before entering a Gate, he was required to drink an unidentified liquid handed down from above.

Every time he swallowed it, his memory would go blank; the next day, when he opened his eyes, only a dry notification would be sitting there — Mission Complete.

His colleagues shook with terror at losing entire chunks of memory like that, but he was different.

To be used as a blind tool, with even his own will erased clean.

That was the perfect "loyalty" he had longed for so deeply.

And then, at last, a miracle-like moment arrived.

Chae Ganghyeon summoned him directly.

Crushing down the pounding in his chest, Kang Taemin stood in the Bureau Chief's office and looked up in reverence, breath held, at his master flipping through documents.

"You…. Perfect scores on every training exam, and you've even Awakened, I hear?"

At that offhand remark, Taemin could barely contain his shock.

His Awakening had happened only the previous evening.

He hadn't even filed an official report to his superiors yet.

Not even a day had passed, and the man had already seen through a private change in a rank-and-file soldier. The overwhelming reach of his intelligence was staggering enough on its own — and on top of that, the personal attention set Taemin's loyalty ablaze all over again.

"Yes, sir."

At the short, unwavering answer, Chae Ganghyeon at last gave a satisfied nod and began to speak.

"Good. I'll be entrusting you with a very critical mission."

"!"

"My son is being placed as director of a research institute this time… and as a father, I can't help but be a little concerned."

The line was tender — the sort a doting parent would say about a child stepping into harm's way — but the face Chae Ganghyeon wore as he said it was pointedly cold and blank.

"So I need a hunting dog stationed close to the boy to watch over him. You're to conceal the fact that you're Awakened, get in as an ordinary researcher, and monitor his every move."

"Surveillance, or protection?"

"For now…… let's just say both.

"…"

"There's someone I've planted inside the institute in advance. For the time being, follow his directions and keep a general watch on the situation. In particular, if my son shows any behavior out of the ordinary, report it immediately."

"I'll bear that in mind, sir."

His first mission, bestowed directly by his master.

And so he infiltrated the institute as a researcher and met his new intake mates.

Lee Jinwoo — timid on the surface, but seemingly with a razor-sharp mind — and Han Soeun, cute-looking but with something a little off about her.

While he blended in with them, biding his time, he finally encountered the son in question — "Chae Junhyeok."

His first impression of the man was firm.

Trash.

The man was so awful Taemin genuinely wondered how such a hopeless piece of trash could have come from the great Bureau Chief.

But Kang Taemin buried his true feelings and carried out his mission in silence.

Under the direction of his accomplice, Park Wonjin, he cleverly used his intake mates to secure a place close to the Director, and kept up his thorough surveillance.

Even when Park Wonjin drew fistfuls of his blood, calling it research, he complied without a word of complaint.

The same when the unidentified liquid he'd known from his Defense Corps days was delivered, sitting quietly outside his door.

At first he'd been secretly surprised, but seeing it arrive on a set schedule, he assumed this too was Chae Ganghyeon's order.

And since there were no unusual symptoms in his body after he drank it, all the more reason to swallow it obediently, without suspicion.

He endured every one of those unpleasant, uneasy processes solely out of blind obedience — to follow his master's orders to perfection.

Yes — at first, that was certainly the case.

That man had been nothing more than a trivial surveillance target, a means of executing his master's orders.

And yet……

When did it start… feeling uncomfortable to disobey that man's orders?

Was it when he'd witnessed the overwhelming genius the man had so thoroughly kept hidden?

Or was it when he'd seen that foolish self-sacrifice — a frail non-Awakened body flung again and again into harm's way, all for those children?

Was it when — through the wiretap — he'd caught the man moaning all night from a throbbing wounded right arm, only to walk in the next day with a face so clear you'd never have guessed a thing… when he'd overheard that terrifying endurance of his?

Or maybe it was when he'd been faced with sheer nerve of it — the man passing off a ridiculous lie in front of dozens of cameras, claiming to be a secret auditor, and driving Park Wonjin down into the pit at last?

He couldn't pinpoint the exact moment his heart had been caught.

But when he had turned away from the Director's orders and dealt with Hwang Dushik on Park Wonjin's instructions, he had felt a self-loathing more vicious than anything he'd known in his life; and when Park Wonjin had driven the Director out and mocked him with contempt, the urge to shatter that arrogant skull had risen up in him too.

Even so, he couldn't be certain.

Whether the man really was his new master.

Whether it was all right to devote his whole life to him.

He agonized over it stubbornly, like a dog hesitating to accept an unfamiliar master.

The night before deployment to District Eight, deep in savage confusion.

He swallowed the drug — delivered without fail — in silence, and resolved:

Once this mission is over, I'll settle on my last master.

But the price of putting the decision off came back to him as bitter, bone-deep regret.

Because he'd never once dreamed that the drug he'd always swallowed without suspicion was a shackle stealing away his reason.

The moment he snapped back to himself on that horrifically wrecked rooftop, he grasped the whole truth in an instant.

The tip-off was that terrifyingly familiar gap in his memory — ever since his Defense Corps days, after drinking the drug he'd always come back to himself only after a set stretch of time had passed.

To atone for his mistake, he evacuated the twins and stayed alone on the rooftop to face the Fox.

Soon after, Cha Yul and Kim Sihyeok caught up, and together they'd been locked in a fierce standoff before the cocoon wrapped around the Director.

And then, at last, a miracle happened there.

Yes…… that was the moment.

The rooftop in District Eight.

The enormous barrier — which hadn't so much as stirred — suddenly began to pour out a brilliant golden light, and then, with a resounding crack, shattered to pieces.

In the middle of that dazzling waterfall of light, the instant Sea-ah and the Director spilled out into the open air.

Kang Taemin, eyes wide, had witnessed it clearly.

That unreal sight — tens of thousands of golden shards becoming a golden membrane, wrapping the Director's body without leaving a single gap.

It was as if the barrier itself possessed a will, and was trying to protect him.

By the time the twins had made it up and were carrying the unconscious Director to safety with their telekinesis, every last person there — even the Fox — could only stand spellbound and stare up at the sight.

And in the middle of that wondrous spectacle, Kang Taemin — of all things — found himself seized by a fierce jealousy.

It was aimed at those fragments of the barrier, the ones guarding his master with their whole being.

Catching himself feeling jealous of mere fragments, he finally understood who his heart had already chosen as its true master.

Ah — it's this man.

The one and only master he could serve with his whole life, the one he could gladly throw that life away for without a second thought.

It was the moment his blind loyalty set its firmest anchor at the feet of Chae Junhyeok — the man he had once mocked as hopeless trash.

The man was more delicate than he seemed; he'd probably find this heavy loyalty a burden.

But in the end, he wouldn't be able to bring himself to cast it off.

Because once he'd let someone inside his fence, that man was hopelessly, ridiculously kind to them.

Inside the dark basement isolation cell, where not a speck of light reached.

Even reduced to the pitiful state of a heavy restraint locked around his neck and both arms chained to the wall, Kang Taemin — thinking of the man with the brilliant golden hair — had a faint smile spreading across his lips.

Finally.

At the end of a long, long wandering, the dog who had at last found the master to hold his leash for a lifetime sat there, steeped in rapture.

Riding down to the basement on Sihyeok's shadow, I sent Number One and Number Two ahead with the kids up to the Sunshine Room.

"I need a bit to talk with him, so you all go on ahead."

Naturally, immediate, fierce protest erupted.

"Nooo! That ahjussi tried to hurt Director, remember!!!"

"Right! What if you go by yourself and get hurt again!"

They gripped my sleeve tight and held on for dear life.

No matter how I tried to reason with them — that he'd tied himself up, so it was fine — they wouldn't hear it.

In the end, only after I pulled out both the Warding Jade Talisman and the Mana Pistol and showed them I was armed did the kids reluctantly turn away.

Only after making sure the kids had faded down the corridor did I open the tightly shut isolation cell door.

This is where they used to lock up the test subjects, I heard.

Since it hadn't been used once since I'd woken up in this body, the interior was viciously stale, and a bone-deep chill hit me square in the face.

And Kang Taemin's state, locked up in there, was quite a sight.

A heavy restraint was fastened around his thick neck, and both arms were firmly chained to the wall.

Wait — where the hell did he even find those?

They were things I hadn't laid eyes on since I'd stripped off the children's restraints ages ago.

Where he'd dug them up and locked himself into them this thoroughly, I had no idea.

Kang Taemin, sensing my presence, raised his head.

His expression was as blunt as ever, but the moment our eyes met, somehow his eyes seemed to flash bright for an instant.

"Number Three, what on earth are you doing to yourself……"

Just as I was, incredulous, about to say something —

Kang Taemin, out of the blue, began pouring out a confession with no preamble and no cushion.

"In the past, I was part of the Bureau's Defense Corps. I took Chae Ganghyeon's orders and infiltrated here undercover to keep watch on you, Director. I'm a C-rank strength Awakened, and up till now I've been operating under Park Wonjin's instructions. I've been drinking an unidentified liquid that was delivered on a set schedule, and I drank it again the night before deployment to District Eight. It appears that drug had me brainwashed."

"Uh, wait…… uh……"

"But all of that is just excuses — the fault is clearly mine. I'll accept whatever punishment you see fit."

Before I could even get a word in, the grim, headlong pace of the confession completely bulldozed me over.

More than anything, having the normally taciturn guy pour out a massive confession all at once doubled my bewilderment.

I hurriedly waved my hands to cut him off.

"Wait — calm down. I'd already picked up that something was off with you. I know it wasn't your own will, so don't worry."

At my words, a brief flicker of emotion crossed Kang Taemin's stiffly set face.

Moved? Overwhelmed? What is it — Number Three's expression feels oddly readable today. Am I imagining it?

But I soon shook off the subtle unease and got to the real reason I'd come.

"On another note — there's one thing I've been curious about."

"Please, speak, sir."

I looked straight at him, chained to the wall, and said,

"Take a swing at me. Just once."

"…what?"

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