The TF Team's First Deployment

Please, just let him win…

Sitting at the long table in the meeting room, I jiggled my leg. The Liger Villain’s first deployment. The TF team’s first piece of work, and its masterwork. Future Observation hadn’t fired either, so I had no read on whether he would win. The one factor that decides a Villain’s win or loss is, without question, the ‘Hero’.

The announcer’s urgent cry came as the picture on the TV switched. The Liger monster had brought the roads near Yangjae Station to a standstill, and now someone had appeared in front of him. A woman in a skin-tight racing suit and a helmet.

The moment I saw her, I clenched my teeth hard.

Cha Huigyeong…

A B-rank Hero, and the piece of trash who had toyed with me. She took off her helmet and waved to the people around her with that sickening smile. I’d landed a blow on her a while back with the fake recording, but there were still plenty of people cheering her arrival. She’d built her name recognition up far too solidly for one incident like that to bring it down.

“Ah… of all the Heroes, it had to be Speedgirl.”
“We drew a Semi-A-rank. This is going to be rough.”
“And the Directors will all be watching, too.”
“Oh dear… tch, tch.”

The mood in the meeting room was grim. And this was no ordinary Hero, but Speedgirl, who rated as good as Semi-A-rank. Worse, what the Liger Villain had going for him was sheer bulk and overwhelming brute force. Strength counted for nothing against overwhelming speed.

“No. 1, is the Villain I made… gonna lose? Hunh?”
“…Let’s watch a little longer for now.”

Amos, eating snacks beside me, asked as though she too were uneasy. However much she acted otherwise, she held a Director’s post at Beyond Villain herself. The TF team’s results here were as good as her own.

If only Future Observation would fire at a time like this. Cruelly, it didn’t.

I looked away from the TV, opened my tablet PC and logged into my company account.

I’ve been so busy with TF team work I haven’t even done Hero Gamble properly.

Making Deputy Manager had pushed the account balance and the target amount up together. Today was the first I’d known the account had been upgraded to a Deputy Manager’s. A week was more than enough to fill the target amount anyway, so I hadn’t bothered logging in.

I worked the screen and checked on the gamble now in full swing.

└ not just a tiger or a lion but a liger? cant pass that up;
└ ditching speedgirl? go on then, lose some money lolol
└ how do you trust some trash-tier who plays on her phone at work?
└ honestly facts
└ yeah that soured me on her a bit
└ what kind of hero takes a call
└ guess gen z heroes answer the phone mid fight now hm;
└ ‘gen z hero’ my ass lolol

Public opinion is bad, but money doesn’t lie.

There’s a certain cryptocurrency betting site where people gamble on the outcome of a country’s presidential election. Because they stake their own real money on who wins, its accuracy is said to be high. I think the same logic can apply to Hero Gamble. Public opinion on Speedgirl is bad, but the money is a separate matter, and it says they still acknowledge her as a Hero.

And she goes down here?

If only the first opponent hadn’t been Speedgirl. Suppositions like that drifted through my head in a messy tangle, but in the end supposition was all any of it was.

Even at this moment, Speedgirl’s kicks were exploding into the Liger Villain. To settle my nerves, I went back to the Hero Gamble comments for more.

— Bzzzt—!!

It’s here!

With a pleasant shimmer, my vision blurred. Inside the now-familiar vision I was looking at the Hero Gamble screen. The tablet PC was showing me the exact result of the fight between Speedgirl and the Liger Villain.

└ still not rigged? still not rigged? still not rigged?
└ ah ffs this is unreal
└ is speedgirl actually washed up?
└ that last attack was kinda unfair bs tho; how is anyone dodging that
└ ngl him suddenly dropping to all fours was pretty sick; yep
└ the Superior guys cant do stuff like that tho
└ hes not with Superior you moron cant you read?
└ these beyond villain guys hit a new high like this every so often lolol underdog bets are yummy

…The Liger Villain won?

Once the vision ended, I swept both hands down my face. A come-from-behind win that overturned the mood of the TF team and the mood of the community alike. They were all fixed on that ‘final blow’.

I don’t know what it is, but let’s hurry.

I worked the tablet PC and placed my stake.

I went big and bet my whole fortune. Remaining balance: 0 won.

Even though I’d seen the win itself through Future Observation, my heart was pounding. Because if my bet set off some strange butterfly effect, my life was over as of today.

“Uwah?! No. 1, wha’re ya doin’?! Are you dumb?”
“…Sorry?”
“Ya can’t go dumpin’ all that money on that!!”

I was letting out a breath of relief when a noisy voice came from behind me. Amos, peering into my tablet PC. She pounded my shoulder with cotton-soft little fists.

“Dummy! What’re ya gonna do if they throw you out!”
“…That hurts, Director.”
“I hit ya ’cause I wanted it to hurt, duh?!”

“Director, what’s the matter?”

Jo Eunhye, the TF team’s overall team leader, had heard enough and asked Amos directly.

“No. 1 went an’ put Hero Gamble on the Liger Villain…”
“Hero Gamble?”
“Uh-huh, I saw it, he put in all the money in his comp’ny account…”
“H-, his whole fortune?”

Hong Jangwoo, standing nearby, stared at me as though he couldn’t believe it.

“Are you insane? You blew your whole fortune? On that half-baked Villain going up against Speedgirl?”
“…”
“Idiot. I wondered how you’d survived this long — turns out it was luck after all. Heh heh.”

Hong Jangwoo burst out laughing and patted my shoulder. The face he made was genuinely relieved, and it gave me the strangest feeling. Well, from where he stood I must have looked like a thorn in his side, enough to needle me openly like this, in a place where everyone could see.

“Don’ pick on No. 1!!”
“…Uwaaaagh!!!”

— Krrrunch!

With that ominous sound, the hand Hong Jangwoo had left on my shoulder twisted. In the blink of an eye, one of his arms turned into a hideous reptile’s. If someone had told me it was a lizardman’s arm out of some fantasy story, I’d have believed them.

“An’ did you say half-baked Villain? You… ooooh.”
“S-, sorry! I’m sorry! Director!”

Hong Jangwoo flattened himself to the floor and groveled in front of the furious Amos. With her temper through the roof, there’s no telling what Amos might do. She might even turn him into something that wasn’t human.

“Director, please wait a moment.”
“…Hunh?”
“I’m not angry.”
“Really?”
“Yes. Instead, there’s something I’d like to propose to Senior Hong Jangwoo.”

Still flat on the floor, Hong Jangwoo lifted only his head a little.

“You said putting money on the Liger Villain was an idiotic thing to do. I don’t think you’re wrong. Once your balance hits zero you resign — that’s the Strategic Analysis Office’s basic rule.”
“…S-, so?”
“Let’s you and I make a bet.”

I showed him the tablet PC screen.

“I’ve put down four million won, so you put four million won on Speedgirl, Senior.”
“…Four million won?”
“You’re Team 2’s Senior Staff, so your account balance must be plenty. It isn’t your whole fortune the way it is mine — you can put down four million, can’t you?”

Hong Jangwoo’s eyes wavered. If I’d told him to go all in with everything he had, he’d have had to think about it. But a mere four million won? For a man whose target amount ran far higher than mine, there was nothing to lose.

“And if I win, what are you putting up?”
“If you win, Senior, I’ll be fired from the company. And… well, you can do whatever you like with me. If you want, you could have me Villainized and send me out to fight under the Beyond Villain name.”

The corners of his mouth twitched, as though just imagining it pleased him. Well, for this bastard my downfall was pure dopamine. Betting a measly four million won and getting to watch me fall into the abyss. Of course he’d enjoy that.

He straightened the corners of his mouth and asked.

“…And the other way around, if I lose?”
“What I want is simple. Stop swaggering around as my senior, act as though you’d become my junior, and do your work quietly. From now on, permanently.”
“…”
“How about it? Seems like a fairly decent offer to me.”

Hong Jangwoo was silent. He’d come up the elite track from university straight into the company, so the wheels in his head would be turning fast. By his calculations there was nothing wrong with the offer at all. The odds of Speedgirl losing converged on zero percent to begin with.

“Deal.”
“Good. Then place the bet where I can see it, and shall we watch the result?”
“Don’t go changing your story afterward.”

He pulled out his tablet PC and bet four million won in one go. I’d had my doubts, but apparently even a Team 2 Senior Staff had a bankroll in the tens of millions. Having put the four million down exactly as asked, Hong Jangwoo thrust the screen out for me to see.

“There. Four million won, placed.”
“Now let’s watch.”
“I’ll watch. I’ll watch how a man who got cocky without knowing how high the sky is comes apart.”
“…”

Feeling no need to answer, I stared at the TV screen.

In a way, it’s a boring business. Gambling when you already know the result.

I knew the outcome regardless, so I was taking it easy, picking the sleep out of my eyes, when someone poked my cheek.

“No. 1… are ya really okay?”
“Sorry?”
“Even if your balance went to zero I can fill it back up… or should I tell another Director an’ ask ‘em to stop you gettin’ fired at least?”
“…”

Amos was fretting over it more than I was, and as I watched her, a question came to me. I’d looked after her well enough this past week or so, but was that really enough to explain it? Was there any reason for her to go this far for me?

“I’m fine. More to the point, what’s brought this on all of a sudden?”
“It’s been fun with No. 1 around… If No. 1 goes away it won’ be fun!”
“Fun?”
“Uh-huh, ya give me snacks, an’ we draw pictures, an’ we make reeeally big Villains just like the pictures!”

Amos drew a circle with her tiny little arms and laughed.

“It’s been sooo much fun!”

Seeing that guileless smile, I found myself thinking I must have taken decent care of her after all. Of course, without Future Observation, one of my own arms or legs would have been turned into something strange too. Even so, I couldn’t help the swell of satisfaction.

“…If that’s so, I’m glad.”
“Not glad! Let’s keep playin’ fun stuff from now on too! Hunh?”
“We should.”
“Not ‘we should’!”

Amos glared at me as though exasperated, but I calmly pointed at the TV.

“Looks like the result’s about to come in.”
“…Huh?”

Even while I was squabbling with Amos, the fight had gone on. Naturally, the picture showed Speedgirl overwhelming the Liger Villain. That was how it had been, right up until a moment ago.

A savage howl, krwoaaaar, came pouring out of the speakers. A chilling sensation, as if every fine hair on my body were standing on end. The Villain inside the TV was no longer the Liger Villain. He was the liger itself, lion and tiger fused into one.

“Insane…?”
“What is that?”
“D-, did he have a combat pattern like that? Did he have a skill like that?”
“No, this is the first we’ve seen of it too!”
“Just write it down! Write it down, quickly!”

The research office team members were suddenly busy. A pattern of the Liger Villain’s nobody had seen, an attack nobody had seen, an evolution nobody had seen. All of it was a new variable, and the key to overturning a losing situation. But from where Speedgirl and Hong Jangwoo stood, it was a tragedy.

“Well, that’s a shame. Junior Hong Jangwoo.”
“…”
“Transforming like that out of nowhere. Nobody knew, did they. Not even our junior here. Right?”

Hong Jangwoo, out of his wits, only stared at the Speedgirl on the TV. Her suit, slashed to ribbons, no match for the Liger Villain’s speed. She had been reduced to a rag, sprawled on the asphalt road.

“Your senior asks you a question and gets no answer. Why is that?”

His state of mind was probably much the same as hers.