The Civil Servant Who Concealed Their True Strength Turns Out to be a Master of Possession - Chapter 143
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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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A Civil Servant Who Hides His Strength Is Exceptionally Good at Possession – Episode 143
I played the footage again.
Watching it a second time made it even clearer.
Right after the collision, the truck driver—who appeared completely unharmed—tilts his head slightly.
As if that were some kind of signal, the truck driver vanishes in the next frame.
Then in the very next frame, the driver is bleeding, his face smashed against the steering wheel.
Even if the distance made it impossible to recognize his face, it was more than suspicious.
‘The moment of the swap was captured clearly on camera.’
Which meant, unless we were living in medieval times, he wasn’t a sorcerer—
‘He either used an item or activated a skill he possessed.’
Most likely, it was a Subspace.
The unharmed driver disappeared into the Subspace, and someone who was fatally wounded—or already dead—emerged from the Subspace item.
“That bastard died instantly in the driver’s seat.”
That’s what the official report would have said.
I clenched my teeth.
“They didn’t perform an autopsy? The family identified the body, but that’s unreliable. And right after that, the driver’s family left the country. Funny, isn’t it? Where did they suddenly get all that money from? Anyway, the swap of the driver only remains on this angle, this footage alone.”
“Did that money come from Choi Jun-gu?”
“Couldn’t confirm that. My father isn’t the type to spend money carelessly. People like us have a hundred different ways to make someone spend money without them even knowing who they’re spending it on.”
That’s bragging, damn it.
I couldn’t even finish asking how this connected to Choi Jun-gu.
Honestly, just the information I had so far was suffocating.
It felt like I was drowning, water rising all the way to my chin, gurgling.
The thought that my mother and father might have been murdered disguised as someone else’s malice made my head throb.
And of all things, it was entangled with the main villain of this world within the novel.
‘This is too strange.’
My mother saved the protagonist of the novel?
Thoughts began to chain together, but I steadied myself.
Think slowly.
Like standing in an arena, I calmly assessed both my opponent and myself.
“Then where’s the evidence that this is Choi Jun-gu’s weakness?”
First, I need to get everything I can from Choi Se-a.
Whatever it is, all of it.
“Anything, really. When you’re digging into someone’s past, you have to look outside the frame, not inside it.”
Choi Se-a smiled gently, looking at me.
Outside the frame?
In that moment, my mind raced.
A person outside the frame.
Someone who could never possibly be in this footage.
Yet someone who definitely knows this footage exists.
And therefore, the person who made it possible for Choi Se-a to obtain this footage.
The person who took this photo.
“So you’ve found evidence that the person who took this is connected to Choi Jun-gu.”
Whoever it was, one of Choi Jun-gu’s people deliberately captured this.
For whatever reason.
It could have been for blackmail, or to confirm it for their client.
“Quite the sharp mind, aren’t you? I thought you only knew how to exercise?”
Choi Se-a spoke while rubbing her rotator cuff from our earlier collision.
“Then who is it?”
Choi Se-a blinked.
“Someone killed a person in the middle of the city. A police officer, no less. That’s too risky, even for our father. You’d have to control all the traffic patterns and witnesses.”
That’s right.
My parents’ accident occurred near Gyeonggi-do.
Since it was a new city adjacent to Seoul, I remember the death being confirmed at a large hospital in Seoul.
It was such a high-risk location that I couldn’t even fathom why they’d choose such a conspicuous place for a murder.
Without an information source to collect all the vehicle traffic patterns and witness identities, clean-up would be impossible.
So they ended up getting caught on this weakness.
“I told you. You absolutely must make sure the Association Chairman doesn’t get information about this USB.”
Choi Se-a narrowed her eyes.
I swallowed hard, watching her gaze.
“Are you saying there could have been someone inside the police organization…?”
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know Captain Han would respond. There was no official support request filed at the precinct. Captain Han was….’
The face of my father’s colleague, now only faintly remembered, came to mind.
Along with the young detective retching in the background.
“It’s possible.”
My heart sank at Choi Se-a’s answer.
Come to think of it, I should have found it strange from the start that my father responded alone.
Even for detectives, the basic duty regulation is a two-person team.
Just as I have a partner.
But my father was always overflowing with a sense of justice, so he’d responded alone several times before, even getting stabbed once, and the sergeant came looking for him with an irritated face over that incident.
I thought it could happen.
Everything I carelessly overlooked remained as painful regret in my bones.
“But what if that connection isn’t just a police officer? The Hunter Investigation Unit can access the traffic CCTV control room too. Actually, that might be easier. They could have used items there. I heard someone from your equipment support division got ground up anyway, didn’t they?”
In that moment, a single name came to mind.
Along with the sound of a pigeon cooing, falling downward.
‘I want to die.’
When that was my only thought.
The name of the body I had entered.
Cha Jeon-hyeok.
“Are you saying Cha Jeon-hyeok took this?”
As I asked, Choi Se-a pulled up one corner of her mouth.
“Why are you asking me that? I prepared a meal, and now you want me to feed you too?”
Sigh.
So that’s where your responsibilities end?
You’re backing out?
Nonsense.
We haven’t finalized our contract yet.
I still had negotiating cards left to play.
“Then that means there’s no evidence whatsoever that this is Choi Jun-gu’s weakness.”
“What?”
Choi Se-a raised her eyebrows.
I didn’t back down.
I couldn’t back down.
Even amid this chaos, I hadn’t forgotten that whoever I was dealing with—whether a sacrificial pawn in internal Association politics or otherwise—was merely a suspect who had casually participated in crimes.
That’s what I had learned from Pee So-won and Kwon Ik-seong up until now.
‘I have to catch him no matter what.’
That was the only thought that mattered.
“I understand that the missing person is a Hunter. So they must have used that ridiculous ability. They probably had items too. But how are you going to prove that’s connected to Choi Jun-gu?”
“That’s something you—”
“If I could figure that out on my own, there’d be no point in making a plea deal. I’m a civil servant too, and I need to discuss this with my higher-ups.”
I pointed upward with a composed expression.
I felt my mind returning.
A sense of clarity returning as my breathing steadied.
During matches, after taking continuous hits, there were moments when my mind would suddenly snap back like this.
The moment when my brain, dominated by the urge to counterattack or evade, would reset, and suddenly I could see my opponent’s movements and read the flow of the match.
This was that moment.
My moment to counterattack.
“If that’s how it’s going to be, just take the USB.”
I ejected the USB from my laptop and tossed it toward Choi Se-a.
The USB slid across the flimsy plywood desk.
Choi Se-a’s expression became subtle as she watched it.
“No regrets?”
“Why would I regret it? Honestly, if you mess with something like this… it goes south. For civil servants, it’s better to do nothing and just pocket whatever falls our way.”
I smiled faintly.
Did the corners of my mouth tremble slightly?
Did Choi Se-a see through my bluff?
“We’re better off quietly accumulating small achievements and staying out of trouble than making big accomplishments.”
“But this is related to your parents’ deaths?”
Choi Se-a observed me quietly.
Her eyes fixed on mine, as if trying to read my agitation.
‘She’s just like her aunt and cousin.’
That face trying to read my innermost thoughts bears such a striking resemblance to mine that it sends chills down my spine.
“If that’s the case, then I have even fewer regrets.”
But I know how to deceive Choi Woo-jin, and I know how to deceive Choi Se-a.
“My father… and my mother—they would have done good things at every moment they could. They’re not the kind of people who would have felt wronged, even knowing this would be the outcome. They would tell me to back off here rather than create more victims who feel wronged.”
I’m speaking the truth.
Rather than fumbling through a clumsy deception, I’m laying out an undeniable truth.
That’s the hustle play that always gets past these bastards who do nothing but pile on lies.
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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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