Chapter 156: A Major Scandal (?) (3)

Translator: miraclerifle

“Holy shit, what the hell is this?!”

The excavation team members’ eyes opened wide after seeing the sculpture in front of them.

It was a clay sculpture that looked like Ju-Heon giving them the finger.

It was extremely aggravating as the size and even the minor details, such as the wrinkles on his face as he sneered, were all identical to the real Ju-Heon.

"Wow, this crazy bastard. He may be the enemy, but he’s amazing. How the hell did he make something like this?”

"Damn it, should we at least take this to the Chairman-nim?”

“Excuse me?”

“There’s a bounty on his head. Wouldn’t we be able to get some money if we turn this over?”

It looked so real that they were even saying things like that.

It happened at that moment.

“Inform Pandora and tell them to arrest him right away! That son of a... No, Seo Ju-Heon has stolen a tomb!”

Yoon Shi Woo looked as if he was going to destroy his phone.

‘Damn it, we spent so much money to get this tomb assigned to us.’

That wasn’t all.

‘The Chairman-nim even put a bounty out for Seo Ju-Heon with his own money.’

That was why he shouted after sending their battle team members first.

“All of you slacking around, pack this away! Take it to the Chairman-nim!”

The TKBM excavation team members were shocked at what they heard.

“Excuse me sir?”

“You really want us to take this to the Chairman-nim?!”

Yoon Shi Woo glared at them.

"What, do you have any complaints?”

‘No... It’s not a complaint... But what is he going to do with this?’

On the other hand, Julian, who had entered the tomb after the annoying Ju-Heon, was grinding his teeth.

There was an annoying clay sculpture number 2 in front of him.

‘It really wasn't real.’

He had thought that something was weird since the middle of their battle, but it really was a fake.

The surprising thing was that it was so well-made that he needed to focus even with Zhuge Kongming's artifact to tell it apart. He usually only needed to use 60% of the artifact’s power to determine if things were fake, but it now required 80% to tell.

‘Yoo Jaeha has gotten much better than when he made that fake Nero's artifact.’

That meant that...

‘Seo Ju-Heon, that bastard is godly at coaching.’

Ju-Heon had grinded Yoo Jaeha and raised him up.

Why?

Julian and the rest of the world did not think that Yoo Jaeha would ever be a Monarch-Grade user.

He seemed to be a restorer, but well... The person who was famous for restoration was Yoo Jaeha's mentor, Jean Richard.

‘He would have gotten the international license if he was that skilled.’

Any semi-talented restorer would gain an international license to properly place their name on the International Official Restorer list. That would make him be treated better by society.

People like Yoo Jaeha, who did not have the international license, were generally lower-grade restorers.

‘Well, his restoring ability seems to be good though.’

Anyway, Julian was in quite a difficult situation.

‘Using Zhuge Kongming's artifact even stronger will make the risk activate immediately.’

The light risk that always showed up was fine. It was tiring because it made him do some extremely narcissistic things, but it didn’t matter.

The problem was that he would truly become a Monarch’s slave if he ran into a monarch during that time. He would say something like, ‘you don’t even know how to do this? I'll help you with everything. In fact, I might as well turn you into a Monarch in the process!’

That would be how it would go.

That wasn’t all.

‘Zhuge Kongming's artifact gives a special buff to its liege.’

There was no way he would let that happen. Especially if it was aimed toward Seo Ju-Heon.

But Julian soon shook his head.

‘No, it’s still fine. It’ll be fine as long as nobody has Liu Bei's artifact.’

The tomb shook at the same time.

Ruuuuuuuumble!

“We found him! It's Seo Ju-Heon!”

He heard voices around him. The excavation teams that had been chasing after Ju-Heon were happy.

Ju-Heon was standing in a large room as if he was waiting for them to get him.

They all smiled.

"We got you now!”

They charged toward Ju-Heon but Julian realized something.

“Hold on! Not there!”

But his warning did not matter.

“Hahaha, welcome!”

The tomb shook violently along with that wicked laugh.

“Aaah!”

Boom!

The chasers all screamed as they fell into a pit.

“Hahaha, those stupid idiots!”

This was one of the tomb’s traps. Yoo Jaeha was in the corner laughing his ass off.

Yoo Jaeha had used an artifact to create a fake path on top of the trap.

“Damn it, Seo Ju-Heon’s fucking lapdog!”

That made Yoo Jaeha pout like a duck and respond.

"What's wrong, are you jealous? Eat some more if you're jealous.”

Yoo Jaeha then threw a brown fluid, red fluid and yellow fluid into the pit.

“Aaaaaaaaaak!”

Those were the artifacts Ju-Heon had told him to use well.

In return...

“M, mmph!”

There were some desperate screams inside the pit.

“Ah, it smells like sweat!”

"Oh shit, it’s coming out, it’s coming out!”

“Fuck, t...this bastard shit his pants!”

“Which bastard was it?! You can't even hold in your shit?!”

"What the hell did you eat yesterday?!”

“You’re saying that when it looks like you shit your pants too!”

Julian covered his face as if he found this extremely embarrassing.

‘The gods really need to take these bastards away.’

He then said something to Yoo Jaeha.

“Hey, you over there!”

“Hmm? Aigoo, look who it is. I've been waiting for you.”

“It looks like you're suffering because of a weird slave contract from Seo Ju-Heon as well.”

“What?”

Julian started to smile as if he found an opportunity.

‘It’s easy to tell based on how Seo Ju-Heon usually treats this punk.’

It was obvious that Yoo Jaeha would have a lot of complaints about Ju-Heon. Ju-Heon was also not here right now. His offer should work.

Julian confidently started to negotiate a back door deal.

“Let’s negotiate. I'll get rid of your contract if you get rid of mine. Let’s steal each other’s contracts. Doesn't that sound beneficial to both of us?”

“What?”

"And you’re a restorer right? Your skills are probably not too good since you don’t have an international license. I'll help you get the international license if you help me with th...”

Yoo Jaeha's eyes opened wide before he started to sneer.

“What? I haven't gotten the international license because it is annoying... anyway, listen up.”

“?”

“You're number 5 while I'm number 1.”

“What?”

“What do you think you’re doing? Do you think you and I are at the same level?! How dare you try to negotiate with your senior who is like heaven when you are the earth!”

Yoo Jaeha then opened up an artifact that looked like a rolled up paper.

“Eat this!”

“Ugh!”

The open paper flashed and Julian was struck by the artifact’s power.

The screams coming from the shit pit was just a bonus.

Julian opened his eyes in a moment and felt a sandy breeze brushing past his skin. What he saw in front of him was a wasteland with tens of thousands of soldiers!

“Defeat the enemies!”

“Kill the enemies!”

They seemed to be Chinese soldiers. Julian put his hand to his forehead as he stood in between the soldiers.

‘It must be an illusion maze.’

He seemed to have been sucked into this war painting that Yoo Jaeha had drawn, but...

This was looking down at him too much.

“Hmph, did he really think I would get lost in this child’s play......”

It was at that moment.

“Liu Bei, you bastard!”

“!”

Julian's face instantly turned pale.

‘H, hold on.’

“Kill that bastard! Kill that Liu Bei bastard right now!”

Julian saw a familiar scene. Julian felt that he was fucked after seeing the man standing on top of the fortress.

‘Damn it, why did it have to be a painting of the Three Kingdoms?!’

Because of that...

“Fuck!”

Julian swore after seeing something.

On the other hand, Yoo Jaeha was stepping on the unconscious Julian and laughing.

He was kneeling and screaming while unconscious.

“My lieeeeeege! Please don't throw this subordinate away!”

“Ahahahaha! What a jackpot, this is working so well.”

That was right. Yoo Jaeha had heard an interesting story from Ju-Heon.

He had heard that Julian stayed away from anything related to the Three Kingdoms for some reason even though he used Zhuge Kongming's artifact.

He claimed that he had no interest in Asian war novels, but was that really the case?

There were a lot of games and movies related to the Three Kingdoms. Julian supposedly always found an excuse to avoid those things every time.

He didn't know when the Captain-nim spent that much time with Julian, but it didn't matter.

“Good, now that I'm certain about this, should I head over to the Captain-ni...”

But at that moment...

Grab!

“Mommy!”

Julian, who had woken up with his almost superhuman mental fortitude, grabbed Yoo Jaeha’s ankle.

“Hey.”

“Ekk, w, what the hell?! You’re already awake?”

Yoo Jaeha thought he really was a scary bastard and tried to use another illusion maze artifact.

“I'm sorry!”

“Huh?”

Julian urgently continued to shout.

“I'm sorry! I won't ever talk about recovering my contract anymore. Get rid of that Three Kingdoms painting first......please.”

Julian truly felt as if he was going to die. Yoo Jaeha tilted his head in confusion before starting to snicker as he asked.

“Are you perhaps weak against Liu Bei?”

“......”

“I'm right, aren't I? That’s the Zhuge Kongming artifact’s weakness isn't it? Right? Right?”

“......”

Julian slammed his forehead on the ground instead of responding.

“......Does Seo Ju-Heon know about this?”

“The Captain-nim shouldn’t know. I was just testing out a theory.”

Julian jumped up with a sparkle in his eyes.

“Don’t tell him. Please.”

“You mean, ‘please don't tell him, sir.’ You damn annoying junior.”

“.........!”

Yoo Jaeha smiled mischievously while patting his junior(?)'s back.

It was at that moment.

“Wow, it stinks. Hey, don’t go overboard. What are you doing in such a confined space?”

Ju-Heon and Seol-A appeared while pinching their noses. Julian flinched after seeing the two of them appear and asked.

“You, what about this tomb's artifact?”

“Ah, this thing?”

Ju-Heon took something out of his pocket. It was a small glass bottle.

“I haven't closed the tomb yet because I still have things to do, but...”

It was at that moment.

Grab!

“Ah!”

Julian had quickly stolen the bottle from Ju-Heon.

Yoo Jaeha's jaw dropped in shock.

“Hey! You!”

Julian laughed after stealing the bottle.

“I'm sorry, but I feel that I shouldn't care about the means or methods when it comes to you guys.”

But as Julian, who had learned an important lesson, was starting to run away...

“Make sure to recycle it properly.”

“......."

Julian had taken an empty bottle.

Ju-Heon started to sneer. The artifact that Ju-Heon had scammed to get this time was < The Art of War > artifact.

He was supposed to play the Xiangqi with weird rules and capture each piece one by one, but who cares? He realized that each of the Xiangqi pieces were part of The Art of War and abducted all of them.

And...

“The real thing is not in there, you idiot.”

It was at that moment.

“Then where did you hide the real artifact? Well, Seo Ju-Heon?”

“!”

They heard a different voice at that moment.

“We got you now, you thieving bastard!”

It was the other excavation teams.

The cave that seemed quite wide became filled once they surrounded Ju-Heon’s group.

The ones who stood out the most were the Monarch of Delicacies and a child.

The corners of Ju-Heon's lips started to twitch while looking at the kid.

‘Is that the kid that pushed Jaeha aside and became the Monarch of Fraud?’

He looked the same as Ju-Heon had looked as a kid, but well... It was obvious that he was using a transformation artifact.

“You're Seo Ju-Heon, right?”

“Hey kid, you need to speak respectfully to your elders.”

The kid just arrogantly snorted.

“Seo Ju-Heon, I don’t care about the others, but you must die in this tomb.”

“Ho. Come back with your parents.”

“It’s you, you're his dad.”

Ju-Heon frowned after hearing the Monarch of Delicacies mock him.

“Who the hell are you?”

He felt oddly familiar for some reason. The kid walked over toward Ju-Heon and started to speak again.

𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

“Think hard about it. Didn't you do something to earn someone’s grudge?”

“There’s too many to remember all of them.”

Ju-Heon was being serious. The Monarch of Fraud seemed shocked after hearing this.

“It happened recently!”

“What? I really have no idea if it was recently.”

He had caused quite a lot of issues recently.

The Monarch of Fraud started to grind his teeth and flicked his finger. They heard some noises before people started to gather around.

[The instigated people are gathering around.]

[The instigated people have recognized you as the subject of their animosity.]

[A black and white frame has been placed on the instigated people.]

Ju-Heon was shocked.

This was definitely Goebbels's artifact’s ability! He was right as Louie Martin, the Monarch of Fraud, took out a familiar artifact.

“Huh? That is!”

Yoo Jaeha was shocked. It made sense since the Monarch of Fraud was holding Goebbels' artifact.

“How does that kid have that thing?!”

A shocked Yoo Jaeha looked back and forth between the kid and Ju-Heon.

“The Captain-nim definitely destroyed that...! Did someone take the debris and restore it?”

That comment made Ju-Heon start to frown. He believed that wasn't it.

The only person who could restore such a destroyed artifact to perfect condition was Yoo Jaeha, the proper Monarch of Fraud.

A message popped up as well.

[It is a fake made with his imagination.]

[However, it is a 100% perfect replica of the S-Grade Goebbels's artifact.]

[It is able to use the same abilities.]

“......!”

It was clear what was going on.

This was a replica! However, the fact that it could do the same thing as the original...

Ju-Heon started to smile.

‘Ah, I understand why that kid became the Monarch of Fraud.’

The reason was obvious.

Why?

The item that had allowed Yoo Jaeha to become a Monarch... The artifact that was necessary for Ju-Heon to become the Monarch among Monarchs...

This item was created with the artifact of one of the three major Renaissance painters, Leonardo da Vinci’s artifact.