The Academy’s Unrivaled Professor - Chapter 22

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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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Academy’s Absolute Professor Episode 22
A bit late.
“How’s the brush?”
“It writes beautifully. So much softer than my old one.”
“Sigh……”
Lee Se-ah exhaled a sigh deep enough to crack the earth beneath her feet.
“Mine was a brush I’d worked up the nerve to buy, you know. A luxury brand from the department store. What kind of brush costs five hundred thousand won?”
Anyone could see that the brush Yoon Tae-jung had given him looked far more refined.
“Stop showing off about it now.”
Kang Hyeon set down the brush and waved his hand dismissively.
“Let’s finish reviewing what you were looking at. You said you had a mission to request?”
“Oh, right!”
Lee Se-ah’s face brightened at once.
She retrieved the tablet again, and they were scrolling through the screen together when——
“Hm?”
Kang Hyeon’s finger stopped on a specific entry.
‘Taejeong Logistics?’
“Oh!”
Lee Se-ah was startled too.
Overseas S-Class Hunter Illegal Entry Detected
Threat Level: Critical
Suspected Offense: Assassination / Terrorism
Likely Targets
1. National Defense Hunter Technology Institute
2. Taejeong Logistics Headquarters
“Taejeong Logistics is listed? Could it be……?”
Lee Se-ah’s expression grew serious in an instant.
“Could it be connected to that poisoning attempt you mentioned earlier?”
“Something does smell off about it.”
“It sure does.”
An overseas S-Class Hunter slipping across the border undetected amounted to a national emergency.
Strategic assets like these had entered covertly, circumventing all official channels?
Nine times out of ten, they’d accepted a dirty contract.
“Usually it would be an assassination of a key political or economic figure. That’s where the real money is.”
“I suppose.”
It had been the same in the Martial World, after all.
If a master of the Heterodox Sect slipped into Orthodox Sect territory undetected, it meant someone’s head would roll—no question about it.
Kang Hyeon himself could eliminate someone without leaving a trace if he set his mind to it.
“That’s why when the state detects this kind of illegal entry, it causes an immediate uproar. Emergency orders go out to the Management Bureau and the National Intelligence Service, and it’s sensitive enough that immediate termination is authorized upon discovery—not capture.”
“But why would this one target Yoon Tae-jung?”
“I don’t know. And these are just suspected targets anyway.”
“Hmm.”
Probably he was being targeted.
The poisoning attempt from within made it clear someone harbored a grudge.
“I’ll take this one.”
The decision came instantly.
He’d only exchanged a brief conversation moments ago, but he’d formed a good impression of the man.
A man of virtue who knew how to bow to his son’s benefactor, and possessed both talent and integrity?
He felt it would be a shame for such a person to die ignominiously.
Besides, he was Yoon Hyun-jong’s father.
Creating a sound educational environment for the cadets was part of a professor’s duty, after all.
“Understood. Then I’ll report to the director immediately and coordinate operations with the Special Operations Unit!”
“No.”
Click.
Kang Hyeon closed the tablet.
“No need to report.”
When he handled matters, he preferred to move alone.
Especially the state apparatus—he had no faith in it.
“Just answer me one question.”
“What is it?”
“An illegal entry hunter.”
“Yes.”
“Should we bring him in alive? Or kill him?”
‘Hah…!’
Lee Se-ah drew in a sharp breath.
Now that she thought about it—the man before her was Code Name Black, wasn’t he?
They were speaking calmly now, but mere weeks ago she’d been trembling in his presence.
The operations the state required its agents to stake their lives on, this man discussed as though success were inevitable—and he had the skill to back it up.
“I think it would be best to capture him alive if possible.”
“Understood. I’ll do it.”

* * *
That night.
The office of Taejeong Logistics’s representative.
Yoon Tae-jung, who hadn’t left work, stared at the monitor screen.
‘Too clean.’
He’d traced every external contact Park Dong-chul had made recently, tracked every flow of funds—and found nothing.
Normally he would have let it slide.
But the utter absence of a single speck of dust made him suspicious instead.
As if the traces had been deliberately erased.
A soft swish.
He pulled up the internal organizational chart on the monitor.
From the personnel team leader to the finance director.
More than half the key positions had been replaced with Park Dong-chul’s people.
“Hah.”
A sigh escaped him.
It wasn’t that he hadn’t seen this trouble coming.
Park Dong-chul was an ambitious man.
He’d known for some time that such ambition could one day cross the line.
‘…I’m softer on emotion than I thought.’
In the past they’d scraped and sweated through the early days together, and he’d been grateful for it—grateful enough to give Park the title of executive vice president and maintain a controlled grip on his authority rather than cast him out.
But that small mercy had become poison, slowly squeezing his heart.
‘Is it true? Park Dong-chul?’
Were you truly planning to kill me and swallow this entire company whole?

* * *
At the same moment.
A private lounge overlooking the Seoul skyline.
“Executive Vice President.”
A man emerged from the darkness and bowed his head.
“It appears the representative has grown suspicious. This afternoon, he activated a private intelligence team to backtrack three years of company funds and the executive vice president’s external meetings.”
“Is that so?”
Park Dong-chul stopped swirling the glass he’d been turning idly in his hands.
‘How did he find out?’
Hah, my friend.
You should have gone quietly with a convenient sudden death—why did you have to dig into it?
‘In the end, there’s no choice?’
His Superior Strategy had been to kill Yoon Tae-jung, then manipulate the inexperienced Yoon Hyun-jong until the right moment came to absorb all the shares completely.
But if Yoon Tae-jung had figured it out?
He would need to shift to the Middle Strategy.
He was a friend, but no ordinary adversary.
When he was ignorant he might be manageable, but the moment he knew, he would systematically exclude Park from everything.
‘Good thing I took out insurance.’
When he’d chanced upon the foreign contract killer and casually put out feelers, it had seemed unnecessary at the time.
But now the blade was drawn—and it could cut through even iron.

* * *
The next morning.
“Representative, you have an inspection of the Incheon Port Logistics Center at ten in the morning, and a lunch meeting with the board executives scheduled for the afternoon.”
“Understood. Let’s go.”
Yoon Tae-jung nodded and picked up the teacup sitting on his desk.
Fragrant Tea—the same one he’d sipped each morning out of habit.
The familiar aroma brushing past his nostrils made his gaze turn cold and distant.
‘So poison was in this all along. Poison meant to kill me.’
The moment his secretary turned away to organize some papers.
Glug-glug-glug.
Yoon Tae-jung pretended to just wet his lips, then poured the entire contents of the cup into an orchid pot sitting on the windowsill.
“Let’s go.”
“Yes, sir.”
When Yoon Tae-jung descended to the lobby, the scene that greeted him was far from ordinary.
Three large black sedans waited in a row, ringed by men radiating a menacing aura.
The company’s own security team was there, along with A-rank mercenary hunters they’d hired at great expense in an emergency.
Security measures of a severity he’d never see on a routine inspection.
Something had made him uneasy.
Settling into the back seat, Yoon Tae-jung watched the car door shut tight and made a silent declaration.
‘From this moment on, Park Dong-chul, you are my enemy.’
Since there was no telling what move he might make next, he would prepare for everything.
The vehicle slipped out of the city and merged onto a suburban road heading toward Incheon Harbor.
They reached a desolate stretch, lined on both sides by thick trees and empty of people.
Thwick!
“Ghk!”
At that blood-curdling sound of piercing air, dark red blood gushed from the driver’s chest like a fountain.
An arrow that had come from nowhere punched through the windshield and impaled his heart.
Screeeeeech!
The sedan, now uncontrolled, skidded with a tremendous screech.
“Ambush!”
The security guard beside him scrambled to draw up his Qi, shielding Yoon Tae-jung.
Crash!
The vehicle couldn’t overcome its momentum and smashed into a utility pole on the roadside, but Yoon Tae-jung suffered no serious injury.
“Get out!”
“Battle stations!”
A mercenary shouted urgently into his radio.
Breathing hard, Yoon Tae-jung peered out through the shattered window and felt his alarm spike.
‘Park Dong-chul.’
He’d been prepared, but he never expected him to move so swiftly, so decisively.
So when he’d played the poisoning card, it hadn’t been to keep his hands clean—so what had changed?
‘What’s made you so desperate?’
Gritting through the heavy ache that pressed down on his body, he crawled out of the car.
Traffic on this road was sparse, and there were no security cameras—a blind spot.
‘He picked this place as a hunting ground and waited for his moment.’
Screeeee, screech!
The two security vehicles behind him slammed on their brakes and skidded to a halt.
Car doors flew open, and armed security personnel and A-rank mercenaries poured out, surrounding Yoon Tae-jung.
But the chance to counterattack never came.
Whistle!
Whistle-whistle-whistle-whistle!
From somewhere, the sharp sound of arrows cutting through air rang out in rapid succession.
“Argghhh!”
“Ghk!”
Before Yoon Tae-jung’s eyes, a terrible scene unfolded.
The barrier formed by A-rank hunters who’d drawn their Qi and drawn their weapons crumbled pathetically.
Arrows flying at a speed invisible to the naked eye found their marks with absolute precision—directly into the mercenaries’ brows and hearts.
A One-hit Kill with not a single arrow’s breadth of error.
……
Yoon Tae-jung’s lips trembled.
These were supposed to be A-rank hunters.
How could their barrier be pierced by a single arrow and their bodies fall like autumn leaves, even in an ambush?
That should have been impossible.
Unless their opponent occupied a realm far, far above them!
‘S-rank?’
Who on earth could it be?
Which guild, which mad S-rank Hunter would commit a massacre of this scale in the heart of South Korea?
With this many casualties, they’d be caught even in the outskirts with no CCTV coverage, wouldn’t they?
Don’t tell me they smuggled in illegally from overseas?
In the blink of an eye, dozens of escort troops lay scattered across the ground.
The stench of blood thrummed across the asphalt.
Only one man had survived: Yoon Tae-jung alone.
In that eerie silence that fell over the scene,
Rustle.
The thick brush beside the road parted, and someone stepped into view.
“Sigh, Tae-jung. Why’d you have to do that? You could’ve just let it go quietly.”
A man whom he’d regarded as a brother for decades—sometimes as much a part of himself as his own limbs.
Park Dong-chul.
And beside him stood a blond foreign man holding an enormous Black Bow, grinning toward them.
The moment it became clear he was an overseas S-rank Hunter,
Yoon Tae-jung’s blood ran hot.
“Park Dong-chul! Even if you’re hungry for the company, would you go this far? Kill all these people in the process?”
“What, you’re acting surprised? You knew about it—that’s why you prepared like this, isn’t it?”
Now that Park Dong-chul’s true face was laid bare, he bore no resemblance to the friend Yoon Tae-jung had known.
“And hunger? You’re the one who was hungry.”
“What?”
“Frankly, I’m the one who did all the dirty work—bloodied my hands, cleaned up the mess—from the very bottom. Don’t you think I deserved half the company? Why are you the representative and I’m just the executive vice president?”
It was infuriating, but Yoon Tae-jung forced himself to think clearly.
If he died here, what about his wife? He’d never see Hyun-jong again.
“If you were hungry for half the company, you should’ve said so. I would’ve given it to you.”
“Yeah, right.”
Park Dong-chul let out a derisive snort.
“A man like you throws Fragrant Tea into a flowerpot and hires mercenaries?”
‘Ah.’
Yoon Tae-jung sighed.
What did that mean?
The secretary who’d reported this morning’s schedule—he was Park Dong-chul’s man too.
“So that’s why you pulled this desperate move.”
“That’s right. Since you’ve caught on, today was now or never—my head would roll first otherwise. Don’t hold it against me. When you’re dead, I’ll take good care of Hyun-jong. He’s still an innocent child who doesn’t know the ways of the world. I’ll raise him to be an excellent figurehead, and I’ll make sure the company thrives under my hand.”
“You miserable bastard!”
As Yoon Tae-jung’s rage flared, Park Dong-chul tilted his chin.
A gesture: finish it now.
Creak-creak!
The enormous Black Bow the blond man held drew taut.
Yoon Tae-jung felt it in his bones.
‘It’s over.’
He didn’t even think to beg for his life by offering up the entire company stake.
They’d butchered dozens in broad daylight on the city outskirts—Park Dong-chul and his allies had already crossed a river from which there was no return.
Letting him live would be far too reckless given what they’d done.
Yoon Tae-jung slowly closed his eyes.
‘Dear wife. And Hyun-jong. I’m sorry.’
The faces of those he loved flickered past like a lantern show.
“I apologize.”
A languid voice brushed against his ear.
Yoon Tae-jung’s eyes snapped open in shock.
A broad back now stood between him and the bow.
“I came as fast as I could, but I’m a bit late.”
It was Kang Hyeon.

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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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