The Female Lead Saves the World - Chapter 408

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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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Yeo Joo Saves the World
Part 3, Episode 12

“Let’s move somewhere else for now.”
As the eyes of Hunters returning from the auction turned toward them, Sa Ma Jung spoke while conscious of their surroundings.
“Why? This place is perfect.”
The Restroom Corridor.
It was an ideal location for a conversation with Sa Ma Jung.
All that was needed to prepare for the discussion was to slip the phone into my pocket.
Sa Ma Jung caught the hidden meaning in the curt refusal and struggled to suppress the rising anger.
It was humiliating to have to initiate contact with Sa Ma Young in front of all these people, but if I backed down now, I couldn’t escape Father Sa Ma Jin’s displeasure.
In the end, Sa Ma Jung asked with a deliberately lowered voice.
“What are you thinking?”
“About what?”
“You won’t even take Father’s calls, and you’re saying we should communicate through a lawyer. When exactly are you going to apologize?”
“Apologize.”
Sa Ma Young let out a soft laugh.
“I’d need to have done something wrong to apologize.”
“You’re lying!”
Sa Ma Jung’s voice rose involuntarily, but I quickly glanced around and lowered it again.
“Do you have any idea how much the Sama Group’s stock price dropped because of your ridiculous lies about Father being brainwashed? And on top of that, you took your people and defected to the Justice Guild!”
Though it had been quite some time, thinking about it again made me shake my head in disbelief.
Sa Ma Jin, the chairman of the Sama Group, brainwashed by someone?
“So did you verify it?”
“You think we’d be swayed by your baseless claims?”
“Sounds like you didn’t check.”
“There’s no need to! He carries several defensive items…!”
Sa Ma Jung stopped urgently once more.
It was already common knowledge that Chairman Sa Ma Jin, a non-Awakened, constantly carried all manner of defensive equipment, but it was still classified information for the Group.
Watching the half-brother make a fuss, Sa Ma Young could only scoff.
Naive. Utterly naive.
All of Sa Ma Jin’s defensive items are S-rank.
After all, S-rank defensive equipment like what Yeo Joo possesses doesn’t circulate in the market.
It’s not that Master is the only S-rank craftsman in the world, but others simply can’t produce defensive items of that caliber.
Defensive items are far more difficult to craft than offensive ones.
That man has simply reached a monstrous level of mastery, casually producing them whenever needed.
“Anyway, you made a grave mistake. The Sama Group isn’t something that shakes just because you rattle it.”
“It seems to be shaking plenty. Enough that the great Sa Ma Jung had to attend an auction himself.”
Sa Ma Young struck a nerve.
Though he pretended otherwise with empty boasts, the Sama Group—particularly the Sama Guild—had been suffering from severe personnel shortages since Sa Ma Young’s departure.
Team leaders who had left the Sama Guild alongside him in the first wave, along with key personnel, continued to trickle away even now.
The reason was simple: they could no longer risk their lives entering Gates without Sa Ma Young in the Sama Guild.
“Fine, it’s not without impact. But we’ll recover soon enough.”
Sa Ma Jung’s bitter smile carried an air of self-satisfaction.
Witnessing such pathetic arrogance, Sa Ma Young felt contempt at the fact that even a fraction of his blood was shared with this man.
“You’re going to copy me again, aren’t you?”
“What?”
“Merging with a moderately-sized guild to fill your numbers—that’s already a method I used before, isn’t it?”
He flinched.
Though he tried to maintain composure, Sa Ma Jung’s agitation was transparent as glass—a vessel barely larger than a soy sauce dish.
“I can’t divulge the Sama Group’s critical matters to an outsider who walked out on his own feet. Understand? You’re an outsider now.”
Yet his snarling remained pathetic nonetheless.
But a dog with ten tails will simply flee in the end.
“In any case, I’ve done my part. It was you who refused to apologize to Father.”
Sa Ma Jung glanced around at the onlookers and witnesses, preparing to make his exit.
“The Justice Guild, how congratulations. A gathering of defeated dregs—it must feel like home to someone who’s abandoned the succession struggle.”
His parting words were the perfect finishing touch.
“Still have that habit of running when things look bad.”
Sa Ma Young murmured, watching Sa Ma Jung’s retreating figure.
Calling the Justice Guild “dregs” revealed that his meager intellect remained unchanged.
That was fortunate.
Moreover.
“Give it up? Never.”
Sa Ma Young lowered his head, concealing his expression.
If Sa Ma Jung believed he had abandoned his ambitions for the Sama Group, there was no need to correct that misunderstanding.
Prey that lets its guard down is all the easier to hunt.
Today’s unexpected conversation with Sa Ma Jung confirmed it once more.
It was only a matter of time before the name Sa Ma became entirely his own.
What truly demanded his focus now was something else.
‘How should I use this opportunity that fool Sa Ma Jung has given me?’
Watching Yeo Joo’s anxious gaze as she couldn’t even enter the restroom, Sa Ma Young exhaled a bittersweet sigh.

* * *

An old favorite restaurant, or so I’d heard—the Italian Restaurant near Awakener Association turned out to be quite decent for something I’d found through an internet search.
I was even satisfied when the server, recognizing Sa Ma Young and me, offered us a secluded corner table by the window where we’d draw less attention from the surrounding patrons.
But Sa Ma Young, who had been so excited about this “date,” was unusually quiet.
“Sa Ma Young, are you alright?”
“Yeah, it’s not bad. The pasta suits my taste.”
“I know you’re not talking about the food.”
I chided him for dodging the subject, but I had no intention of forcing him to discuss something he didn’t want to talk about.
Since we were nearly finished with our meal anyway, I was gathering my belongings to suggest we leave when he spoke.
“Facing Sa Ma Jung has never been pleasant, whether then or now.”
Sa Ma Young, who had been quietly turning his glass of carbonated water in his hands, suddenly let slip what was really on his mind.
“Do you know, Yeo Joo? This pasta—when it cools and swells up, you have to eat it with a spoon instead of chopsticks or a fork. Otherwise it breaks apart and you can’t even get it in your mouth.”
“…I doubt Sa Ma Young has ever actually eaten something like that.”
“Before I awakened, the only food I could eat was what Sa Ma Jung left over from the day before.”
“What?”
I was genuinely shocked.
I had once overheard a conversation between Sa Ma Young’s father, Sa Ma Jin, without meaning to.
It was the day I visited the Sama Guild to tackle a Gate containing a praying mantis infected with parasites together with them.
So I already knew that Sa Ma Young wasn’t particularly welcomed in that household, but even so—his older brother’s leftovers?
“At least I could eat pasta on those days. When summer came, the food would spoil overnight. But I ate it anyway. A stomachache was better than hunger.”
“Until how old?!”
“I was thirteen, I think. I awakened pretty early.”
“That’s insane?!”
They raised that child worse than an animal?!
“At least after I awakened, I was treated like a person. I could even go to school.”
“I’m sorry for the harsh language, but Sa Ma Young’s family—they’re really going to hell.”
“You don’t need to apologize. I think the same way.”
Even I, a man, was so angry I could barely contain it, yet Sa Ma Young simply smiled and poured cool carbonated water into my glass.
Only after I gulped it down until my throat burned did the roiling anger inside me finally begin to settle somewhat.
But the sorrow remained unchanged.
I had never known what suffering young Sa Ma Young had endured.
A spoiled chaebol heir living off his own arrogance.
That’s what everyone believed.
No one knew how fiercely Sa Ma Young had fought to survive the abuse from his own blood relatives and reach where he is now.
“You turned out well, all things considered.”
I was a reader who despised giving narrative depth to villains, but now I finally understood Sa Ma Young’s ruthlessness and his obsession with success.
I didn’t agree with it, but I understood why he was that way.
Under the dim lighting of our secluded corner, I carefully chose my words as I looked at Sa Ma Young, who seemed lost in thought.
“They say that what you desperately desire is never easily achieved.”
Look at me—I’m struggling hard to prevent the apocalypse.
In that sense, this was comfort born from experience.
“It’s always more thrilling to seize something through fierce struggle, so bear with me just a little longer.”
“Seize?”
Sa Ma Young lifted his gaze from wherever it had been wandering across the table, looking at me intently.
“Why? You haven’t given up on the Sama Group trophy yet, have you?”
Though I didn’t know about his unfortunate past, I understood Sa Ma Young better than anyone else.
“Coming to the Justice Guild is just like taking one step back for every ten steps forward.”
I was certain Sa Ma Young had never once taken his eyes off the Sama Group.
“If necessary, what’s one step back or even ten? You’re the kind of person who knows how to retreat boldly when needed, which is why you’ve survived this long. Isn’t that right?”
Sa Ma Young seemed to freeze for a moment.
Just when I began to worry he wasn’t even breathing, he exhaled deeply like someone whose strength had drained away.
Yet he didn’t seem angry.
‘He seems… thrilled by this?’
The trembling shape of his crimson lips was obscene.
And that’s when Sa Ma Young extended his large, pale hand toward me.
“What.”
His crimson eyes suddenly darted toward the window.
Following his narrowed, displeased gaze, I looked outside as well.
“Guild Master Yoo Myung Hwa?”
Yoo Myung Hwa of the Dongbaek Guild appeared equally startled, watching us from the adjacent street.

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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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