I Became a Black Market Tycoon with an Inventory - Chapter 202

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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202 – Solitary Cell
202.
Thud.
Behind Kurokawa,
the iron door of the solitary cell slammed shut with a metallic clang.
Facing away from the small door, the solitary cell appeared cramped.
No—suffocating.
It felt as though the air itself was being strangled from my lungs.
I had visited prison several times before, but never solitary confinement.
The fluorescent light illuminating the cell was dim, and the air hung thick with moisture, carrying the stench of mold.
The bunk was thin, the blanket coarse.
‘Meeting the Boss has its perks—even special treatment like this.’
Kurokawa smiled bitterly.
There is a particular terror that emanates from solitary confinement as a space.
The kind that makes you want to surrender everything the moment you step inside.
But Kurokawa felt no fear.
I hadn’t been dragged here reluctantly, cowering in hiding.
This was the result of my own choice.
My own decision, my own selection.
And so I felt no shame.
My spirit remained intact.
I was interrogated every day.
Sixteen hours at a stretch.
Every moment of my life was laid bare across that table.
Things even I had forgotten were reconstructed through the investigators’ words.
The men I’d beaten in school.
The women I’d met and parted from.
The countless operations I’d conducted as a Yakuza member were meticulously reassembled in the investigators’ hands.
If their goal was to humiliate me, they succeeded.
The shame was so profound I wanted to die.
The questions circled endlessly, always returning to the same point.
“Why did you go to Tokyo Port?”
“I went to collect waste as I did every week.”
“You transported explosives.”
“I only transported waste.”
“Who gave you the order?”
“I simply operate a waste disposal business.”
The investigator thrust a photograph toward me as though discarding it.
The crime scene was captured in the image.
The moment of detonation, debris scattering, black smoke billowing.
The photographs alone looked quite devastating.
“This is what you did. Do you have any idea how much damage you’ve caused Japan?”
“That’s not something I did.”
Kurokawa looked directly at the investigator’s face as he spoke.
The interrogation continued.
It repeated endlessly.
Like an infinite cycle, it repeated until they got the answer they wanted.
The interrogation conditions grew increasingly harsh.
They wouldn’t let him sleep.
The lights stayed on through the night,
and they removed his bed under the pretense of construction work.
His meals were reduced.
He was starving.
The water was ice cold.
It was difficult to wash.
My body was breaking down.
Even a man in his twenties would struggle to endure this.
Kurokawa would be turning sixty the day after tomorrow.
This was no different from a death sentence.
My hands trembled.
My lips cracked, and the skin beneath my eyes darkened.
Yet my story never changed.
“I went to dispose of waste.”
The more my body deteriorated, the clearer my mind became.
And with each moment, my resolve only hardened further.
One mistake, just one, and it would all be over.
The moment I slipped up, they would seize on it and press forward relentlessly.
So I chose silence instead of answers.
I said nothing at all.
The investigators treated Kurokawa with increasing brutality.
Yet he refused to open his mouth.
A public defender was assigned to his side.
With a benevolent face, he tempted Kurokawa with every persuasion.
“You have to tell me. I’m your lawyer—how can I defend you if I don’t know what happened?”
“If you tell me, I’ll handle the rest.”
“I’m quite a capable lawyer, if I do say so myself.”
“If I get you acquitted here, my reputation will skyrocket, won’t it? That’s why I volunteered for this.”
He spoke with the most innocent expression imaginable, but Kurokawa knew the truth.
That every word was a lie.
This public defender was in league with them.
I chose silence with the lawyer as well.
I was exhausted.
I wanted nothing more than to lie down comfortably and sleep for just one hour.
But the public defender wouldn’t let Kurokawa rest.
He kept talking incessantly, waiting for any slip of the tongue.
He was deliberately preventing him from getting any rest.
Kurokawa lifted his drooping eyes and stared into the distance.
He hadn’t broken yet.
******
I came to the Incheon Warehouse.
I heard Aoi was here, so I came to deal with him.
Aoi.
The agent who came to kill Ana,
the only operative I’d spared from Kagero.
As I stepped inside the warehouse, humid air and a low groaning sound reached my ears.
“Uhhhhh···”
Looking toward the sound,
a man was hanging upside down.
His hands were bound behind him as he dangled precariously, swaying.
I stared at the sight for a moment, then
looked at the Organization Member standing beside me.
“What is this? Why is he hanging upside down?”
The Organization Member was startled.
“Sir? No··· I was told he couldn’t be allowed to rest comfortably.. that I should just keep him alive···”
“Sigh···”
I exhaled deeply.
“Lower him.”
“Sir?”
“Lower him down.”
As the Organization Members hastily untied the rope, Aoi dropped to the ground.
The sound of Aoi gasping for breath echoed through the warehouse.
The man’s condition didn’t look good.
There were no visible wounds, but he appeared to be in great distress.
“How can you hang a person like this?”
“My apologies. We did set time limits so he wouldn’t be strained too much.”
The Organization Member hastily made excuses.
“What are you talking about? I said to keep him alive, didn’t I? Did I tell you to let him rest comfortably like this? What do you think this is, a picnic?”
“Sir?”
“Are you going to keep doing sloppy work?”
“No, sir.”
The Organization Member stood at attention.
“Do I really have to explain this? What do you think ‘keep him breathing’ means? It means cut him up but don’t let him die. Cut off an arm or a leg, or if that’s not possible, pull out his fingernails—do something. You need to show action. You need to demonstrate your resolve to Aoi.”
“I apologize. I was insufficient.”
I looked into the Organization Member’s eyes.
“Can you do better?”
“Yes, I can.”
“How will you do it?”
“I’ll pull out his fingernails immediately and cut his ankles.”
Despite the Organization Member’s confident tone, Aoi’s complexion grew increasingly pale as he listened.
“With so little creativity, how do you expect to survive in this world?”
“Sir?”
“I’m not talking about what I told you to do—don’t you have imagination? You need to act on your own initiative, not just follow orders. Are you going to live your entire life passively? Do you need someone else to decide your dreams for you too?”
“No, sir. I do have creativity.”
“Then what will you do?”
The Organization Member’s mind raced.
“First, I’ll carefully fillet his eyelids. Then, if I sprinkle the salt scattered throughout this warehouse onto his eyeballs, he’ll experience continuous burning pain while unable to even close his eyes.”
Hearing this, Aoi’s expression suggested he might stop breathing at any moment.
These men looked ready to carve out Aoi’s eyelids right then and there.
I couldn’t help but imagine it.
The image of eyelids disappearing.
Unable to close his eyes?
The mere thought was agonizing.
My own eyes were already beginning to sting.
That couldn’t happen.
Absolutely not.
Aoi screamed.
Aoi wailed.
“I’ll tell you! I’ll tell you everything!”
But I found myself intrigued by this Organization Member’s proposal.
“Shut that bastard up. Why’s he interrupting our conversation? So what comes next?”
Another Organization Member gagged Aoi.
“In that state, I’ll wrap thin wire around each finger joint and connect it to electricity. I’ll gradually increase the voltage to test his willpower. Only enough to keep his heart from bursting.”
Clap clap. Clap clap.
“Ah, excellent. Truly brilliant. If you can do this so well, why were you being so passive before?”
“I apologize. It seems I failed to properly understand your intentions, Young Boss.”
“Right. People misunderstand each other sometimes in life. And look how good it feels to clear things up. By the way, what’s your name?”
“Han Seung-hyun.”
“Good. Let’s work well together from now on. You’ve got creativity. I like it.”
“I’ll do my best going forward.”
Aoi trembled as he listened to our conversation.
It seemed he had even urinated himself.
The floor was damp.
“I’ll tell you everything. I’ll tell you everything. Please, spare me. Sob… sob…”
Aoi was crying uncontrollably.
He pleaded desperately, shaking off the Organization Member’s hand that tried to muffle him, his voice trembling with anguish.
Aoi imagined it.
The image of his eyeballs being severed.
The image of wire piercing through each joint of his fingers, electricity coursing through them.
Aoi found the mere imagination already sufficiently terrifying.
It felt as though the pain itself became tangible simply by imagining it.
There was no desire whatsoever to make it reality.
Before he could even be asked, he began answering.
“I’m from a Japanese special forces unit. After my discharge, I joined Kagero. Kagero is an assassination organization composed of people like us, and we handled the tasks that Japan found inconvenient.”
“That’s all?”
“Kagero is primarily operated by the Cabinet Intelligence Bureau, and there’s a place that receives those operations and runs them. It’s called Arata Consulting, located in Tokyo. I can tell you the location. I know all the contacts.”
“Nothing else?”
After that, Aoi’s words continued.
Everything he knew, everything he’d seen, everything he’d heard.
Cornered in crisis, things that normally never crossed his mind suddenly became crystal clear.
Aoi didn’t hesitate and began spilling everything.
*****
I stopped by the Philippines and collected the container that Dennis had prepared.
The quantity had decreased, but the destructive power had become far more potent.
I removed all the miscellaneous items and filled it entirely with explosives.
There was no need to gift those bastards with carefully crafted, quality bombs.
I packed it full of ammonium nitrate, diesel, potassium chlorate, and the like.
Common materials that could even be found at the market,
but when properly mixed, they unleashed crude and devastating firepower beyond any conventional bomb.
Cheap, reliable, and brutal.
These bastards who turn people into “corpses”—aren’t they?
For such bastards, a “crude” bomb is perfectly fitting.
It didn’t need to be sophisticated.
It just needed to explode loudly and burn fiercely.
I carefully stored the container of explosives in my inventory and headed for Tokyo.
My destination was Arata Consulting.
Though it was said to be a front company for the Cabinet Intelligence Bureau,
its appearance gave off no sense of any intelligence agency whatsoever.
It looked like just another company among the countless ones housed in Tokyo’s forest of buildings.
It was far too ordinary.
Employees in business suits, employee IDs hanging from their necks.
People coming and going with coffee.
They looked like ordinary office workers.
Even I had tilted my head once at the sight.
But the 17th floor, where Arata Consulting was located, had a different atmosphere.
There were many cameras, and security was tight.
Entry required dual authentication,
and security personnel were standing guard.
Breaching the 17th floor alone seemed difficult.
I could do it if I really wanted to, but why bother?
What would I even do after going through all that trouble to get into Arata Consulting?
Data? Ledgers? Classified information?
I didn’t need any of that.
Why would I need such things?
I only needed one piece of information.
Who ordered Ana’s death.
That’s all I needed to know.
I had no intention of bringing these people to court.
I simply hated the fact that they touched my people.
There was no need to enter the 17th floor.
In fact, it was easier this way.
Sharing a single building meant they had to move in coordination.
While it was good for hiding, they couldn’t abandon ship alone if a problem arose elsewhere.
If the building had a problem, Arata Consulting would be affected too.
I put on work clothes and headed to the Machine Room in the basement.
A space like the nervous system connecting the entire building.
The offices used separate systems,
but electricity, gas, and air conditioning were shared.
I naturally entered the Machine Room with a maintenance checklist in hand.
No one suspected anything.
No one stopped me, no one objected.
Dozens of outsourced workers passed through here daily.
In work clothes, I was practically invisible.
I naturally entered the Machine Room and retrieved the materials I’d prepared from my inventory.
Nothing special.
Just smoke capsules.
I shorted the control panel’s circuit to force the fire alarm to activate.
Then I threw smoke capsules into each ventilation line.
I didn’t need to actually start a fire.
I just needed to create confusion throughout the building.
Beep.
Thick smoke billowed upward through the corridor.
Moments later, an ear-splitting emergency alarm shook the entire building.
Wee-wee-wee-wee-wee.
“Fire alert, fire alert! Evacuate immediately according to protocol.”
“Fire alert, fire alert! Evacuate immediately according to protocol.”
The announcement system crackled to life.
The smell of burning and the smoke made it appear as though a real fire had broken out.
The once-peaceful building transformed into utter chaos in an instant.
People began evacuating to escape the flames.
The seventeenth floor of Arata Consulting was no exception.
Even Cabinet Intelligence Bureau employees could not ignore the evacuation protocol.
The more one lived a fabricated life, the more faithfully one had to play the role.
I watched from a corner of the stairwell on the second floor as people descended.
Everyone’s attention was fixed solely on the exits.
Finally, my target appeared.
The Planning Director of Arata Consulting, as Aoi had mentioned.
He too was descending from the seventeenth floor to evacuate.
I seized the moment when the evacuation crowd created a bottleneck, slowing their pace.
I approached like a phantom.
I covered the Planning Director’s mouth and compressed his carotid artery with my other hand—he collapsed without even a cry.
In that instant, the Obsidian Unit blocked the path ahead.
Disguised as evacuating civilians, they shielded us from the sight of others.
Though everyone’s eyes were fixed on the exits, we remained cautious.
In the hellish chaos, only the Planning Director vanished without a trace.
I had become a major player in the black market through my inventory.
202 – Solitary Cell
E-book Publication
/ February 19, 2026
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/ Black Card
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/ Son Je-ho
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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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