The Chairman of Pharmaceutical Company is a Poison King - Chapter 64

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 64: Why Aren’t They Coming?

They arrested the demon hiding in Hapbin Correctional Facility.

Turns out it was Daigo Katsuya, a Japanese prison guard.

Naturally, they investigated him.

He wasn’t a native born in the Empire.

An Awakened immigrant who came from the colonies.

There were no problems with his identity.

Since he was an Awakened, it wasn’t too difficult for him to work as a guard at Hapbin Prison.

He had worked there for about 2 years.

If he had become a demon, he wouldn’t have been able to suppress his urge to devour people.

The investigation results came out.

Among the villains who completed their sentences and were released from Hapbin Prison, as many as 5 were missing.

They were all ex-convicts who lived in cities near Hapbin.

Those bastards had been eaten by Daigo Katsuya.

Villains are the best prey for demons.

Compared to ordinary people, when criminals go missing, the police and people around them don’t pay much attention.

Well, they probably committed another crime and ran off somewhere.

It’s better not to see them around.

Who would report that those bastards disappeared?

Daigo Katsuya targeted that point.

He obtained personal information of criminals scheduled to be released from prison and selected Adapters or Awakened villains weaker than himself as hunting targets.

And he hunted them during his days off or vacations.

Imperial Intelligence Agency Director Nam Il-bok read the report submitted by Department Head Moon Gyeong-sik.

“…He really identifies them by smell?”

“I asked him several times, but the answer was always the same. He said they stink.”

“It can’t be a skill either.”

If it were a skill, he’d understand.

The countless types of skills that Awakened possess.

Among them, couldn’t there be a skill called demon identification?

But Chairman Kim Tae-ju hasn’t awakened, so he probably doesn’t possess any skills.

“Anyway, he cornered the demon and induced the beast transformation skill?”

“That’s right. From demon Daigo’s perspective, he had no choice. Either die just like that, or at least try to resist with beast transformation.”

“In the end, he chose beast transformation but was subdued too easily.”

“I clearly witnessed the mana condensation phenomenon occurring in Chairman Kim Tae-ju’s fist. It was like…”

“Like a mana blade?”

“Yes.”

In the past few days, following demon Sergei, now demon Daigo too.

The Imperial Intelligence Agency achieved consecutive demon arrests.

“We can’t just sit back and watch this, can we? With 100 million in deployment fees, we can’t even make a good impression.”

“That’s right. His wealth is almost at chaebol level.”

“…Speaking of chaebols, what’s Lee Gi-eon from Mirinaei Group doing these days?”

“There haven’t been any special movements yet, but he definitely won’t stay still. Lee Gi-eon firmly believes that Chairman Kim Tae-ju killed his son Lee Dong-woo.”

At Moon Gyeong-sik’s words, Director Nam Il-bok snorted.

“Lee Gi-eon, what a shameless bastard! Why is he blaming Chairman Kim for his son’s disappearance?”

“It might not be a disappearance.”

“Evidence?”

“Do you remember the Board of Audit and Inspection’s Patent Office audit report?”

“I know, the missing President Lee Dong-woo bribed Patent Office employees to delay Taehong Bio’s new drug patent application?”

“The charges in that case were completely revealed. In the end, Department Head Jeon Ju-hak confessed too. But since Lee Dong-woo is missing…”

“The prosecution was suspended.”

He understood what this meant.

Bribing public officials is a serious crime.

Heavy punishment follows.

To prevent Lee Dong-woo from being summoned by prosecutors and sent to trial, they probably hid him away.

Claiming he was missing to divert attention elsewhere, and deliberately framing Chairman Kim Tae-ju to create justification for attacking Taehong Bio.

“We can’t just leave this alone. It seems like he’s acting recklessly just because he has connections to the Imperial Household.”

“That’s right. Mirinaei Group is part of the Second Prince’s support faction.”

“Should we blow up a few things?”

“No, just leave it. I’ll meet with him separately. A warning should be enough.”

“What if he crosses the line?”

“Then we’ll cross it too. This is a matter related to demons. Even the Imperial Family can’t do anything about it.”

Chairman Kim Tae-ju can identify demons.

Until the Empire can completely eradicate demons, the Imperial Intelligence Agency must maintain close relations with him.

“So when will you meet with Lee Gi-eon?”

“Why? Want to show off a bit to Chairman Kim Tae-ju?”

“Of course we should.”

“Alright. I’ll meet with Lee Gi-eon as soon as possible and settle this.”

Once Chairman Kim Tae-ju’s New Seoul schedule is finished, he’ll soon return to Gurye, Free City.

Then it’ll be difficult to meet him.

Even if they send an official deployment request, he might ignore it.

Therefore, the Imperial Intelligence Agency must constantly appeal their worth to Kim Tae-ju.

‘There’s so much we can do for you!’

* * *

The Samhan Empire Food and Drug Administration was a department united by pride.

Not all of them, but other government agencies in the Empire might be susceptible to pressure or lobbying from external forces.

It had actually happened several times.

Didn’t the Patent Office incident break out just a few days ago?

The Food and Drug Administration had never had such incidents.

At least not for 30 years.

Then what about 30 years ago?

It was a time when the Empire’s population was exploding.

So various new drugs for pregnant women were being introduced one after another.

A pharmaceutical company that’s now defunct but was well-known at the time developed an iron supplement for pregnant women and requested FDA review.

The FDA director at that time met with the pharmaceutical company president for dinner and received a bag full of 100,000 won bills, and that company’s iron supplement was quickly put on the market through expedited inspection.

And serious side effects occurred.

Pregnant women who took that company’s iron supplement lost consciousness or died without waking up.

The Emperor was furious.

Because around that time, the Emperor had also accepted the persistent appeals of his ministers that he must continue the Imperial bloodline, and was trying to bring in an Empress and concubines to have children.

He had the FDA director and pharmaceutical company president captured and beheaded, and sent all FDA officials involved to trial to serve prison sentences.

The FDA was blown up.

The famous pharmaceutical company also collapsed overnight.

Special laws regarding the FDA were enacted, and since then, not a single company has attempted to lobby the FDA.

The FDA also reorganized to ensure such incidents would never happen again.

A few days ago, the FDA received applications for sales approval review of two new drugs.

After starting component analysis and confirming that at least no substances harmful to the human body were included, they immediately proceeded to animal testing.

Squeak, squeak, squeak.

The cages containing the test animals shook frantically.

The director of the FDA Drug Research Institute asked a researcher.

“Why are the Long-tailed Saekkitokki acting like this?”

“I’m not sure.”

“Are these things crazy?”

The magical beast with the highest reproductive ability.

Even considering that these magical beasts do that thing right after eating, this was too extreme.

They do it all day long.

They don’t even get tired.

“What’s the health condition of the sex rabbits?”

“A week has passed and they’re perfectly fine. That’s probably why they keep going.”

“This is maddening.”

The sex rabbits had such weak physical abilities that even ordinary people could easily beat them up.

If they ate any substance with even slightly harmful components, they would die instantly on the spot.

“What kind of drug are you experimenting on them with?”

“It’s a health drink. Something called Saengibulkkun that Taehong Bio commissioned…”

“Geez! It really makes them energetic, huh. Does it contain aphrodisiac ingredients?”

“No. It’s a fatigue recovery supplement.”

“What about drug components?”

“None were detected.”

“How about drug dependency?”

“We fed some sex rabbits Saengibulkkun for 5 days and then stopped administration for a while, but there were no withdrawal symptoms or anything like that.”

The Research Institute Director pondered thoughtfully.

“How many Saengibulkkun samples came in?”

“300 came in.”

“Bring them over.”

The researcher brought a box containing the samples and placed it on the experiment table.

But then?

“Huh? There aren’t even 100 here. Did you use them all already?”

“Well, that’s… the researchers said they wanted to conduct human experiments on themselves.”

“Are these people crazy! A drug that hasn’t even completed animal testing yet.”

“But it’s a health drink, isn’t it?”

“Even if it’s a drink…! Give me one! Let me try it.”

The director gulped down the Taehong Saengibulkkun drink.

And the director returned to the research lab exactly 2 hours later.

“Hey, hey, Researcher Im, we have Saengibulkkun, right? Bring me one more bottle.”

“…H-here.”

“Huh? Why is this all that’s left?”

“The researchers rushed in and took them all.”

“These bastards?”

But the director couldn’t blame them either.

He was the same way.

“…Let’s quickly move to human trials. Contact Taehong Bio and ask them to bring more samples.”

“How many?”

“Tell them we want 300, no, 500. The more the better.”

“Yes! I’ll contact them right away.”

No matter how much the world had changed, herbal medicines like Sipjeondaebotang had meaningful effects, but those medicinal effects only applied to Aptitude holders or Awakened Guards.

After all, it was because the mana contained in the medicine worked.

So there was little effect on ordinary people.

But this Taehong Saengibulkkun was different.

It was showing fantastic effects even on ordinary people like themselves.

Was there a law saying only Aptitude holders and Awakened Guards could take good medicine?

In the research director’s view, this was something that should be released to the market quickly.

They should immediately proceed with human trials.

Drinking one bottle whenever things got tough.

* * *

What would be the conditions for ascending to immortality?

Would one become an immortal by practicing benevolence and righteousness, observing propriety, and accumulating virtue?

Absolutely not.

Benevolence, righteousness, propriety, virtue.

Those are the ways of Confucianism, not the way of immortals.

Of course, there are immortals called virtue immortals.

Usually, because they accumulated virtue, the character for “accumulate” is added, calling them accumulated virtue immortals.

But immortals are never good.

They are far from benevolence, righteousness, propriety, and virtue.

They didn’t become immortals because they were good, but rather those destined to become immortals. Most achieve ascension either because they were born with the sprout of immortal roots, or because of strong desire for their ultimate goal.

The Heavenly Immortal Realm, which is a higher dimension than the Seon Realm, knows this well.

The number of incidents that immortals have caused so far is countless.

So they sent Guardians, who are subordinates of the Supreme Emperor, to guard Dowon.

To prevent immortals who might come to steal Seon-do and Heavenly peaches.

Dowon is quite a vast place.

That area has five zones.

Zone 1 has 500 Seon-do Peach trees planted.

Zone 2 has 1,000 trees, Zone 3 has 1,500 trees, Zone 4 has 2,000 trees, and finally Zone 5 has only one Heavenly peach tree.

Guardians exist in each zone, making the defenses strict.

Not to mention the Heavenly peach zone.

But Dowon was robbed.

By about ten immortals.

The zones that were robbed were Zone 1 and Zone 2.

Though they were the same immortals, Jongni Seonin, a Heavenly Immortal in charge of managing Dowon, asked the wounded Guardian who had returned.

“…You’re saying the ringleader was a Swordsman?”

“That is correct.”

“No, what could he possibly be lacking?”

The Swordsman was one of the oldest and strongest immortals in the Seon Realm, along with himself.

He had never coveted Seon-do peaches, nor had any reason to covet them.

“How much was stolen? The trees weren’t harmed, were they?”

“They stole more than half of the Seon-do peaches from Zone 1 and Zone 2. Fortunately, the trees are unharmed.”

“Whew.”

A blessing in disguise.

At least the trees weren’t harmed.

Honestly, compared to what that damn monkey did, this was nothing.

That bastard actually stole and ate the Heavenly peaches.

Compared to the Heavenly peaches that bear fruit once every thousand years, and there’s only one tree, Seon-do peaches are just fruits of the Seon Realm.

Still, it was serious damage.

The number of Seon-do peaches that grow on one tree is about 50.

Zone 1 and Zone 2 combined have 2,000 trees, so if more than half were stolen, it means they stole at least 50,000 or more.

“How did such an incident happen? Was it by chance?”

“No. We were guarding the Dowon perimeter when suddenly the Swordsman came and attacked us. Meanwhile, other immortals broke through the barrier and stole the Seon-do peaches.”

“How did they take so many?”

“They brought gourd treasures. When they opened the lid and chanted incantations, the Seon-do peaches hanging on the trees were sucked right in.”

“So it was planned.”

They had to get them back.

And ask for the reason too.

Jongni Seonin looked at the Guardian and said.

“Take a few colleagues with you and bring back the Swordsman and the immortals. Don’t intimidate them, be polite! If you tell them I want to have a conversation, they’ll come.”

“Yes.”

Thus, ten guardians who were guarding Dowon went down to the Immortal Realm to meet the Swordsman.

Jongni Seonin waited for the guardians to bring them back.

He had maintained a friendship with the Swordsman for a long time.

He knew well what kind of person he was.

By now, he must be regretting the mistake he committed.

If he asked to meet, he would definitely come.

But?

One hour passed, two hours passed, and even after half a day, there was no word from the guardians who went to fetch the Swordsman.

‘…Could they be under threat?’

What on earth was the reason the Sword God was acting this way?

So he summoned Takdap Sinjang, who was like a general.

“Listen, Takdap.”

“Speak, Jongni Seonin.”

“It’s nothing major, but…”

Jongni Seonin explained the incident that occurred in Dowon and asked him to bring the Swordsman.

“Hmph! Just wait a moment. I’ll drag the Swordsman here. How dare he disturb the order of the Immortal Realm?”

Takdap Sinjang also went down to the Immortal Realm.

This time he would come.

Jongni Seonin firmly believed so.

But Takdap was the same.

‘Why isn’t he coming?’

Forget the Swordsman, even Takdap showed no signs of returning.

‘Well, really, it’s not like the Immortal Realm is some bottomless pit.’

Finally, Jongni Seonin rose from his seat and stepped out.

‘I’ll have to go see for myself.’

He needed to find out exactly what was happening.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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