Academy’s Villain Professor-Chapter 140 : Chapter 140

Chapter 140 : Memory (2)
Jeong Ho-cheol frowned.
It wasn't a simple headache.
Along with a splitting pain, his vision was also blurred.
But what followed was the kind of thing that made him miss the earlier headache.
Malice and anger, intense emotions that he didn't know where they came from or where they should go, enveloped him and permeated his entire body.
The problem was, he was also quite familiar with these emotions.
And he soon realized.
It wasn't that they came from somewhere; these emotions had originated from within him in the first place.
There was no morality, no good, no discipline, no rules.
An incarnation of indiscriminate and impulsive anger.
The emotions that were the identity of the villain Jeong Ho-cheol of that era and the driving force that pushed him forward.
Ho-cheol closed his eyes again.
The powerful identity of his past self was trying to influence his present.
However.
Jeong Ho-cheol muttered very softly.
“Are borrowed beliefs and morals inferior to those established alone?”
It was a fatal question that pierced the core of his ego.
And at the same time.
“Of course not.”
It was also the best answer that affirmed himself.
The negative emotions that had been trying to completely change him just a moment ago were no longer felt.
No, to be precise, even if he felt them, he now felt that he could control them completely.
Ho-cheol, who had barely suppressed his emotions, sorted out his thoughts even in the midst of the pain.
The situation until now, the current situation, the future situation.
His head still hurt, but his emotions and thoughts were organized.
Who he was, why he was here, why he was still alive, everything.
The moment he recalled that, the headache that had been like a continuous axe blow until just a moment ago, disappeared.
Identity confusion and headache.
Was this also one of the side effects the villain had mentioned?
In any case, as long as he remembered that his goal was a clue to the keyword ‘transcendence,’ there was no problem.
“Boss.”
At the voice from his side, Ho-cheol turned his head.
A man with his face completely covered by a pure white mask.
But for some reason, Ho-cheol clearly remembered who the man in front of him was just by hearing his voice.
“Vulture.”
“Yes.”
One of the organization's executives.
Of course, it would have been impossible to remember him just by his voice, but the memory was strangely vivid.
It seemed the pheromone that maximized memory was definitely working.
“Right. It was Vulture.”
Ho-cheol muttered, touching his face with his hand.
Likewise, his face was also covered by a mask.
He looked around.
A dark space, reminiscent of a narrow box where not a single point of light entered.
But the faint vibration felt from the floor he was sitting on was enough to tell him that this space itself was moving somewhere.
“Where are we going today?”
“We are on our way to plunder the biological weapon stolen by the terrorist villain organization you mentioned, Boss.”
It was a question that could have raised suspicion, but Vulture answered without any doubt or question.
“What about the ones who get in the way?”
“You said to clean them all up neatly.”
Was it then?
This time too, just by vaguely recalling the situation, the detailed situation and memory were drawn.
It seems I can find the transcendence keyword quickly this way.
The problem is, I don't know how much more time has to pass from this point.
Ho-cheol, who had grasped the situation to some extent, now stared at his own palm.
His expression changed strangely as he clenched and unclenched his fist.
His body wasn't moving as he wanted.
Not only was the response a little slow, but he even felt discomfort as if he were wearing ill-fitting clothes.
In the first place, this was all a kind of lucid dream, rummaging through past memories.
A certain degree of discomfort was natural.
But this felt like a greater distortion.
Before he could even realize the identity of that unease, the space surrounding them shook violently with a thud sound.
The front wall split in half, and bright light poured in from outside.
The container opened, and Ho-cheol naturally stood up.
As he got down from the container first, and Vulture followed behind.
Someone who had been hiding on the side rushed at Ho-cheol.
A sharp blade fell from above his head.
“Die!”
But Jeong Ho-cheol was not surprised.
No, in the first place, he didn't even pay attention.
He just extended one hand with great skill, caught the falling sword, and twisted his index finger and thumb to break the blade.
Conversely, he swung the broken blade and embedded it in the neck of the enemy who had attacked him.
“Keoheuk.”
Gurgle—
Bloody foam spewed from the pierced throat.
The enemy with the blade in his neck fell with an expression of disbelief.
A perfect death with not even a sliver of a possibility.
Even though life had disappeared so simply, Jeong Ho-cheol walked on without any emotional turmoil.
In the first place, he didn't even have the awareness that he had just killed someone, let alone emotional turmoil.
As if it were a more trivial matter than kicking a crumpled can he had seen on the street.
Of course, this situation was not what Ho-cheol had intended.
“Heo.”
He let out a hollow laugh as if dumbfounded.
He had also found the reason why his body and mind were not in sync until just now.
This body was his, but it was not his.
He could control light words and minor movements at will, but in a rather important scene like this, his body's reaction was faster than his will.
His mind was not yet in complete control of his body.
No, to be precise, the villain Jeong Ho-cheol's initiative was superior.
Thanks to that, he could only watch quietly as his past self killed the attacking enemy.
“Good grief.”
Lamenting, Ho-cheol continued to walk.
After that, the terrorists attacked him several more times.
And Jeong Ho-cheol slaughtered the enemy perfectly and efficiently without any waste.
By the time his hands were soaked in blood, there were no living enemies around him.
Ho-cheol stopped in front of a small container box.
The subordinate standing next to him entered the password for the container.
“This is it.”
Chiiik—
The box opened with a hiss of white steam.
In the center, four transparent cylinders the size of a finger were neatly placed.
“This is the virus they brought for biochemical terrorism?”
“Yes.”
Villains from a foreign country.
No, terrorists.
Jeong Ho-cheol took out one capsule and tilted it back and forth.
The contents sloshed around.
“What were their demands?”
“They proposed 50 billion to the government.”
“What should we do?”
At another subordinate's question, Ho-cheol, who had put the capsule back in its place, answered shortly.
“Contact the government. 80 billion. If they don't give us 80 billion, we'll release this virus in a government facility.”
“Yes.”
“And contact the enemy country of these guys. The conditions are the same.”
“Understood. Ah, then should we send the virus to the side that transfers the money first?”
“You idiot.”
Jeong Ho-cheol clicked his tongue.
After being his subordinate for so long, to still be so naive.
He said as if it were a matter of course.
“We'll get the money from both sides. And we'll keep the virus. This money is just the price for not releasing it. It's not the price for the virus itself.”
“…Understood.”
The subordinates around him were all slightly impressed.
It was certainly 80 billion offered as a price for not releasing it.
It was not the price for the virus itself.
The two governments would be furious, but in any case, they were an S-rank threat villain organization.
They were already enemies of the state.
And in the end, they would become enemies of the world.
With those words, Ho-cheol turned around and walked away as if he had no more interest.
And Ho-cheol, watching this scene from a third-person perspective, smiled bitterly as if dumbfounded.
Looking at it now, I was so mean.
A long time passed after that.
Ho-cheol finally learned more about the rules of this lucid dream.
It was a lucid dream, but he was not omnipotent.
If he had to say, he was just a spectator watching a video titled ‘The Villain Jeong Ho-cheol.’
The good thing was that, like a video, the playback speed moved in perfect sync with his will.
He could get through nearly a month's worth of time in just an hour.
And even in that rapidly flowing time, his memory was clearly grasping and accepting all the situations of that time, so there was no fear of accidentally skipping over anything.
How many more years had he spent in his memory?
Ho-cheol let out a long sigh.
“This is going to ruin my personality.”
To call it a simple reproduction of the past, the side effects were by no means trivial.
Past malice and anger, he had thought he could control them perfectly at first, and he had, but as time passed, that too was slowly shaking.
The villain Jeong Ho-cheol, who had lived with only past malice and anger as his driving force.
The ego of that era was slowly and faintly seeping into the personality of the current Ho-cheol.
He had to find the clue and escape as soon as possible.
Honestly, if it were up to him, he would have liked to hold on a little longer after finding the clue and meet that guy, but he would have to postpone that for next time.
As he was speeding up the playback of the past, he fought a battle with the past The Sun.
The Sun, who had finished his preparations perfectly and was fighting under the sun, was a formidable enemy that even the past Ho-cheol could not gain an advantage over in a fight.
Most importantly, the current Jeong Ho-cheol was not even in his prime.
In the end, his side was pierced by the sun of his sword, and more than half of his internal organs were cooked well-done.
Even Jeong Ho-cheol, who usually got over most serious injuries with just some red medicine and a bandage, needed treatment.
So he went to the medical room.
The organization's exclusive doctor, with a magnifying glass in one eye, greeted him.
“I heard the story. The Sun is indeed a formidable enemy.”
“Just treat me.”
“Yes. I'll treat you right away.”
As he was removing the pieces of clothing that had completely melted and stuck to his skin, the doctor adjusted the magnification of the magnifying glass in his eye with one hand.
Between the blackened, dead tissue, something like a silver thread sparkled.
Of course, it wasn't a thread.
The doctor sighed.
“Boss. Stapling a wound is not a treatment.”
“It's enough as first aid.”
“First, I'll administer anesthesia.”
“No.”
Jeong Ho-cheol immediately cut him off.
“No anesthesia. Treat me right away.”
“…It's a surgery that needs to reach the internal organs.”
“Just. Do it.”
He would never receive anesthesia.
For Jeong Ho-cheol, even the inside of the organization he had established was not a safe place.
He had prepared almost perfectly against external intrusions, but he couldn't even trust his own subordinates.
It was a matter of course that even a local anesthetic would dull the body, and he could not tolerate such carelessness.
After the surgery was over.
As the doctor was suturing the surgical site, he opened his mouth again.
“Boss.”
“What is it?”
“Do you have any plans after achieving all the goals as an organization?”
Jeong Ho-cheol's goals and the Organization's goals were slightly different.
Of course, if one was achieved, the other would naturally be achieved, so the members of the organization didn't pay much attention to it.
Jeong Ho-cheol thought for a moment and answered.
“No, I don't.”
His goal was simple revenge.
He had come this far with the sole intention of making others experience this anger and despair, all these terrible emotions.
There was no great cause, no goal.
That's why he hadn't thought about what came after.
“In that case, I have a good story for you.”
The doctor said in a suggestive voice.
“Do you know about transcendence, by any chance?”
“Is the treatment over?”
“Ah, it's over.”
Jeong Ho-cheol stood up.
“I don't know. And I'm not interested.”
The doctor, who hadn't expected to be rejected so firmly, could only smack his lips in disappointment.
But Jeong Ho-cheol, who was about to turn back, turned his head again.
“Found it.”
He grinned.
It took a damn long time.
But, it had come back to him clearly.
“Right. He knows my real face, he wasn't caught by the Association, and he's someone who can talk to me personally, so there aren't many of them. Of course, I was only thinking of the executives. This was a real blind spot.”
He grabbed the doctor's wrist.
Ho-cheol warned, applying strong pressure as if to crush his wrist.
“I remember your face.”
He was quite old.
But creating a merely old-looking appearance was not that difficult in modern society.
Especially if he was as skilled in all medical arts as Ho-cheol acknowledged.
Of course, right now, he was an opponent in a memory, so such warnings or words had no meaning.
But Ho-cheol warned in a low voice.
“Wait. I'm coming to see you now.”
Ho-cheol focused his consciousness.
At the same time, the world turned black.