I Gave Up Being Stronger

Chapter 409

However, this was not enough. He couldn’t verify the potions’ performance by healing minor injuries alone. But the monsters in the Sareoga Mart Dungeon could not inflict serious wounds on the rookies.

Jin-Hyeok approached a group of rookie Players, his eyes gleaming with excitement. “Would someone mind stabbing me?”

“Excuse me?” The rookies stared at him in disbelief.

“Come on, quickly! The deeper, the better,” Jin-Hyeok said.

“You’re... joking, right?”

“As beginners, you won’t get many chances to stab someone. Go ahead. Do it now!” Jin-Hyeok insisted, spreading his arms wide.

“Ahhh!”

The rookies screamed and fled, leaving Jin-Hyeok feeling a bit deflated. He had hoped to test the holy potion on himself, but no one was willing to attack him.

‘Well, I suppose they’re just ordinary people unfamiliar with livestreams.’ Though Jin-Hyeok understood it intellectually, he still felt disappointed. It was a day that made him miss the Feyler Family.

Nevertheless, the holy potion created by the Cha siblings had proved its effectiveness. Despite some lingering controversy over them, even Garcia of the Feyler Family acknowledged them.

“This potion... It seems worthy of a name,” Jin-Hyeok said.

Naming their creations was an honor for Alchemists and Priests, especially when the name was certified by the head of the Feyler Family. This privilege was reserved for those who either invented something or significantly improved an existing item.

After some deliberation, Cha Jin-Sol named the potion Kim Chul-Soo Potion.

“Why didn’t you use your name?” Jin-Hyeok asked.

“Well...” Jin-Sol was now one of the leaders of the K-Force, and she was learning about business management. She explained, “I think we can sell it for an incredibly high price this way.”

She had already devised a marketing strategy.

“Imagine the hype. A potion infused with a drop of Chul-Soo’s blood! Wouldn’t Chul-Soo Landers pay a fortune for that?” Jin-Sol said.

Jin-Hyeok frowned. “Don’t drag Chul-Soo Landers into this. I’m not going to give you any more of my blood.”

“Isn’t it a bit underhanded to blackmail me with your blood?”

“How is it blackmail when it’s my blood?”

“What do you mean your blood? It’s our blood!”

“You’re being very unreasonable right now,” Jin-Hyeok said, feeling a twinge of concern. While he had become more rational lately, his sister seemed to be losing her grip on sanity. “You should learn to think and act more sensibly like me. Stay uncorrupted.”

As their banter continued, Jin-Hyeok’s eyes suddenly lit up.

‘They’re finally here!’ The creation of the holy potion had certainly caused a stir, but it wasn’t Jin-Hyeok’s true objective. ‘Come get me!’

***

Garcia had emphatically warned Jin-Hyeok.

“You must wear it. If others covet it and tamper with it... The robe’s influence might cause significant problems.”

As the saying went, forbidding something often tempted people to do it. A professional Thief would not be worthy of the title Thief if they did not covet such an item.

The one who had decided to steal Jin-Hyeok’s priestly robe was none other than Song Ha-Young.

She did not care about the robe’s value. Even if she succeeded in stealing it, she would return it later. The act of stealing Chul-Soo’s possession was more important to her than any profit she could make from selling the robe.

Jin-Hyeok was waiting for Ha-Young’s attack. ‘She’s here! Is she alone?’

The room went dark, and Jin-Sol frowned.

“What kind of dumbass dares break in here?” Jin-Sol could not believe a Thief was attempting to steal her brother’s item in Yeonhui-dong, where the Guardian Tree’s power was at its peak. Jin-Sol could easily guess the culprit’s identity. “Angel Girl!”

By the time Jin-Hyeok illuminated the surroundings with Broadcaster\'s Light, the neatly folded priestly robe on the shelf had vanished.

“That’s a fake.” Jin-Hyeok grinned. He had deliberately placed this decoy robe on the shelf, making it easy to steal.

Then a small piece of paper fluttered down before his eyes.

[Same here]

Ha-Young had created an avatar to pretend to steal the robe from the shelf while secretly approaching Jin-Hyeok. Her real target was Jin-Hyeok’s inventory. She had planned to create a momentary distraction with her avatar and raid his inventory in that instant.

‘It’s not here!’ Ha-Young thought.

The priestly robe was not in Jin-Hyeok’s inventory either.

“Angel Girl, is this what you call being a professional Thief?” Jin-Hyeok taunted her. Without hesitation, he swung Miri. A professional Thief should be able to dodge such an attack effortlessly. Jin-Hyeok figured that even if she got hit, it would be fine with a skilled Blood Priest nearby.

Whoosh!

Miri sliced through the air. Ha-Young barely avoided it and hid in the darkness.

‘He’s pretending it’s not in the inventory, but it must be there.’ She trusted her Thief’s instinct and observations.

Thievery required immense dedication and effort. She had already gathered extensive information by tailing Jin-Hyeok for a long time. He had never taken out the priestly robe.

‘It has to be in his inventory!’

Refusing to give up, she charged again. Ha-Young’s avatar threw a dagger at Jin-Sol, and while Jin-Hyeok moved to protect his sister, Ha-Young used her Skill.

[You have activated the Skill ?Shadow Sleight of Hand?.]

An invisible shadow, visible only to Ha-Young, stretched out and enveloped Jin-Hyeok.

‘I knew it!’ She was aware that even with his exceptional abilities, Chul-Soo could not deceive a professional Thief’s keen eye. ‘I got it!’

Inside Jin-Hyeok’s inventory, she found a note that read ‘I gotchu~’.

***

“...and he said you would let your guard down if you succeeded in stealing.”

Ha-Young fell on her knees, looking frustrated. Blood steadily dripped from her shoulder.

“Angel Girl, you‘ve lost.”

“You deceitful rat... Chul-Soo hired an Assassin!”

The one who had attacked the fleeing Ha-Young was Brick, a capable rodent-type Beastkin Assassin, standing about forty centimeters tall.

“Identifying an Assassin is part of a Thief’s skill, Angel Girl,” Brick remarked.

“You traitor!”

“And finding out the real Thief who is escaping is also part of an Assassin’s skill!”

“What does finding an escaping Thief have to do with an Assassin’s skill?!”

“Is that so?” Brick pondered the question. While it wasn’t really related, Brick was nevertheless proud of his accomplishment. After all, being an exceptional Thief, Ha-Young could skillfully elude her pursuers by using multiple illusions even while escaping.

“Anyway, catching a Thief can be considered a knight’s honor,” Brick said.

“I thought you were on my side... I shouldn’t have trusted you!”

“Do not cry, Angel Girl. It’s not that you were lacking, but that I was exceptional, hahaha!”

Tears of frustration welled up in Ha-Young’s eyes. She could not believe her theft had failed! Brick’s betrayal was something she hadn’t anticipated. The rodent-type Beastkin had been training the Black Thorn Alliance’s Assassins while building relationships with Ha-Young and Kwak Do-Hyeong. In the process, Brick had become Ha-Young’s friend and could monitor her every move.

“Who came up with this plan?” Ha-Young asked.

“Who else?”

“Of course, it must have been Han Sae-Rin.”

No one else but Sae-Rin could have cornered her like this.

“What are you talking about? Chul-Soo was the one who planned this,” Brick said.

Bang!

With a puff of smoke, Angel Girl, who Brick thought had been completely subdued, vanished.

***

“...and with this, I think even Angel Girl would let her guard down,” Jin-Hyeok said to the viewers. She had just escaped from the betrayal of her friend, Brick. Even the slightest lapse in attention could lead to a completely different outcome. “But what if she were to be betrayed by another close friend?”

Jin-Hyeok walked with light steps toward the Guardian Tree. Ha-Young was tightly bound with ropes before the tree, grinding her teeth in frustration.

“Brick! Kwak Do-Hyeong! You bastards!” she snarled. Ha-Young finally looked down in defeat.

Jin-Hyeok took the priestly robe from her and changed into it while exposing his upper body.

“Just untie the ropes already,” Ha-Young grumbled.

“Okay,” Jin-Hyeok replied.

“How on earth did you know I would come to the Guardian Tree?” she asked while dusting herself off.

“I figured you would want to show off that you had successfully stolen my item by coming here. Weren’t you planning to hang it on the Guardian Tree’s branch?”

“Did Sae-Rin tell you?”

When Jin-Hyeok tilted his head, Ha-Young trembled. A Ruler taking her actions into account was one thing, but an Eltuber being able to see through her plans was humiliating.

“Be honest... Sae-Rin told you, right? She came up with the plan, didn’t she?”

Jin-Hyeok remained silent. In the past, he might have replied, ‘What? Why would I need Sae-Rin for something like this?’ But he had now learned some social skills, so he considered how to answer in a way that would hurt Ha-Young less. “I was about to ask Sae-Rin for advice.”

‘That means you didn’t ask for advice before...’ Tears welled up in Ha-Young’s eyes.

***

The public opinion toward the Three Sister Prophets was unfavorable.

-Wasn’t their prophecy completely wrong?

-Chul-Soo’s priestly robe seems incredibly powerful.

They had prophesied that the Pangea Temple had nothing to offer to Players, yet Chul-Soo had acquired an extraordinarily powerful artifact there.

-And the universe-level Scenario is progressing smoothly! LOL

-Three Sister Prophets? More like Three Sister Frauds.

The Three Sister Prophets felt somewhat wronged.

“The tainted priestly robe destroys the wearer’s mind.”

“The purification is only temporary.”

“No matter how much you purify it, the relentless corruption will keep eating away at the mind.”

Even someone of Garcia’s caliber could not completely purify it. Fully cleansing the priestly robe would require at least a year of continuous purification. If even a speck of corruption remained, it would eventually spread throughout the entire robe again. The corruption in the tainted priestly robe was persistent and vicious. So, it was not entirely fair to say their prophecy was completely wrong.

-Nah, Chul-Soo is wearing it just fine.

-Actually, his views are skyrocketing because of that robe, lol!

-Just admit you guys were wrong instead of being stubborn.

Many people wanted to interview the Three Sister Prophets. They wanted to know if the prophecy was truly incorrect and whether they had hired Assassins to forcibly make their prophecy come true.

-Since the Three Sister Prophets hired Assassins first, doesn’t that make Chul-Soo hiring Assassins justifiable?

-Chul-Soo never forgives those who come at him first.

-Let’s go for justice!