Although a Villain, My Wish is World Peace

“Use your talent.”

At my words, Kim Jae-ho silently melted into the shadows.

If you look closely, you might notice something rippling in the shadows, but people don’t usually examine shadows that carefully.

As he was already skilled at hiding his presence, when he started moving between shadows, the phrase ‘appearing and disappearing mysteriously’ naturally came to mind.

‘It’s an optimal ability for surveillance and assassination.’

That’s why in the past, Kim Jae-ho fully utilized this ability to gradually eliminate Seol Rok-jin’s political opponents.

Perhaps because he’s maintaining his sanity without being brainwashed. He melted into the shadows more naturally than in the past, but weaknesses still existed.

I don’t know about entering, but when coming out of the shadows, Kim Jae-ho’s body was exposed without any defense.

Noticing that point, I gave Kim Jae-ho a signal.

“Try again. This time, you need to come out when I gesture.”

Kim Jae-ho who had completely melted into the shadows jumped out at my gesture.

Now.

I gathered snow around me and threw it at Kim Jae-ho.

It was a speed Kim Jae-ho could sufficiently avoid, but the snowball I threw hit Kim Jae-ho’s head directly.

“Urgh.”

“This is your weakness.”

“Weakness?”

“Yes. How was it just now? Could you avoid the snow?”

“No. Even though I could clearly see it, I couldn’t move my body.”

“Yes, so if you’re attacked at this moment, you have no choice but to be hit.”

If we can just reduce this weakness, it will become even more perfect.

The method is…

“Let’s try until we can eliminate this weakness.”

We’ll figure it out if we keep doing it, if we keep doing it…

—You don’t know either?

‘How would I know how to handle shadows?’

Even if I tried to experience it myself, it was 4 strokes or more, or the circuits laid in my body weren’t visible at all.

—A boss who tells you to do something without knowing the method is the worst.

‘But you keep helping from the side.’

I diligently made snowballs and threw them. Kim Jae-ho glared at me and gritted his teeth. Seeing Kim Jae-ho’s face full of dissatisfaction, I bit my lip and held back laughter.

‘This is more fun than I thought.’

—What is? Beating up that guy?

‘No, watching someone grow.’

If he keeps growing like this, someday there will be nothing left for me to teach.

Well, when that time comes…

I shouted while making and throwing snowballs:

“Too slow!”

It’s still far off, so I’ll think about that later.

* * *

After a few days of combining training and education like that. Finally, the news I was waiting for arrived.

[Come, I’ve made everything you asked for.]

It was a call from the lovely engineer.

Upon receiving the contact, I immediately headed to Professor Geum’s house. There were many boxes placed in Professor Geum’s living room.

“Looks like you made a lot.”

“Ah, I already drew funds from your share in advance. Don’t worry. You still have a lot left. The stocks really hit big.”

Well, of course they would hit big.

Hyeonmu Pharmaceutical’s stock literally crashed. 30% or 40% evaporated, was it? When someone loses money, someone else can become a nouveau riche. Stocks are really unpredictable.

Hyeonmu Pharmaceutical’s future wasn’t very bright going forward. The son of Chairman Kim Seong-deuk, who was a member of the National Assembly, is being investigated under arrest, and dozens of related people are being investigated. Since it became such a big incident, it probably can’t just fizzle out like before even if public interest cools down.

But despite all this, Hyeonmu Pharmaceutical won’t go bankrupt.

-Pick up a few shares when it hits rock bottom.

-Why?

-The stock price will recover eventually. Not like before, but it will rise.

They probably can’t do human experiments like before anymore, but with the data they’ve already accumulated, Hyeonmu Pharmaceutical will continue to prosper going forward.

It would be nice if the bad guys went completely bankrupt like in fairy tales, but the world doesn’t turn so conveniently.

Moreover, it’s a problem if Hyeonmu Pharmaceutical goes completely bankrupt. Despite everything, it was the best performing pharmaceutical company in our country.

Still, that Kim family probably can’t get a share anymore. That’s enough.

The first thing Professor Geum took out of the box was the mask he said he wanted to make so badly for me.

—He made it quite nicely.

Looking at the three masks placed side by side, I swallowed my complicated feelings. Since it’s come to this, we really have to go as a mask trio. Cha Song-jin’s face flashed through my mind briefly, but since Cha Song-jin isn’t an official Weltschmerz member and is someone we’ll have to part with someday, there’s no need to prepare a share for Cha Song-jin.

By the way, these masks. They were a bit unusual.

“They’re black?”

Unlike the mask with a smiling face drawn in black on a white background, the newly made masks this time were black. The design was like looking at a fencing helmet.

When I tapped the side of the mask, a smiling face drawn with brush strokes appeared.

The texture was vivid as if painted with a brush fully dipped in red paint. The brush stroke texture isn’t bad, but the color is a problem.

“This is red.”

“The leader is red.”

This guy, he ended up adding color after all. And red at that. The meaning of the color was obvious.

“Change it back to a normal color right now.”

“Red is normal! It’s not rainbow-colored or anything.”

“It’s pretty dog-like now.”

“Kuhh! Such harsh words!”

Professor Geum rolled on the floor clutching his cheeks like a hurt protagonist in a romance manga. I gaped with disbelief looking at Professor Geum, who I hadn’t even touched.

Seeing my shocked face, Professor Geum got up again clumsily.

Why does he pretend to be weak when he’s like that.

“…You didn’t add color to the other masks too, did you?”

“Ah, is that not okay?”

“Make them all the same color!”

Multicolored masks! It feels weird because it looks like a knockoff Power RaXgers to anyone who sees it! Besides, that’s a hero group! What are we villains supposed to do benchmarking them!

“Tsk.”

Professor Geum who clicked his tongue at my words unified all the mask colors to green. By the way, green huh. It wasn’t fluorescent green but a low-toned blue-green that matched well with black, but it still felt uncomfortable. It looked like an ominous color that anyone would think would spew poison.

“Why green?”

“I like green.”

You made it green for that reason!

“Can’t you just make it a plain white?”

“That’s too boring. Besides, there aren’t many colors that can be set. Hmm? It’s not easy.”

It’s an obvious lie to anyone, but I decided to go along with it. Right, green is better than that. It looks like it’s been soaked in poison once, but that’s better than shining in the colors of the rainbow.

By the way, now that I look at it, the expression is a bit off too. Before it was a properly smiling face, but maybe because it’s brush strokes. It looks too grotesque.

“Was this the best you could do?”

“Isn’t it cute?”

It’s not cute, it’s a face that would make you scream if you saw it at night.

When I tapped it once more, a smiling mouth appeared. One corner of the mouth seems particularly raised. This must be intentional.

It was a grotesque design to the point where you’d naturally say it’s in really bad taste.

Well, but still. You certainly won’t be able to forget it once you see it.

“I added a lot functionally. From recognition reduction function that wasn’t in the 1st generation to voice modulation function. You must have had a hard time straining your vocal cords until now, right?”

“Well, yeah.”

I did deliberately lower my voice when talking. Sometimes I varied it by raising the tone of my voice slyly. But now I don’t need to go through such trouble. How fortunate this is.

“Plus now it can also create fake faces by appropriately absorbing surrounding data.”

It was an upgraded version of the shape-shifting skin mask I made. Unlike what I made, it perfectly reproduced even the tactile sensation.

The black particles that made up the mask in basic mode moved three-dimensionally according to the mode. I opened my mouth seeing the mask particles scatter and create a human face.

“This is really amazing.”

“Right? It’s a recently developed technology. The so-called infinity particles! The things you can do with this are endless.”

Ah, come to think of it, it wasn’t unfamiliar. Many products like bikes you can carry in bags came out using this. Though they were all discarded later when it was revealed that the durability wasn’t very good.

But for a mask… it’s certainly usable.

“If you make moving figurines with this, it would be really incredible.”

“Yeah…”

Anyway, now that it perfectly reproduces even the tactile sensation, it’s to the point where you’d be fooled even if you look closely or touch it.

Before it was just an optical illusion.

“Plus these particles will naturally cover the boundary lines of the neck and forehead.”

Certainly when I tried it on, there were hardly any awkward parts. There were many other functions too…

“Why on earth did you put a MacGyver knife function in the mask?”

“You never know. You might suddenly drop on a deserted island or in a Gate with just this mask!”

They say preparation is better than cure, but aren’t you preparing for too much? Professor Geum prepared 3 masks. Each had a special design built in to match the characteristics of the members.

Just as a smiling expression was drawn on my mask, Han Seo-hyeon’s had a skull, and Kim Jae-ho’s had ears and fangs drawn.

The skull is one thing, but what’s with the ears and fangs. There weren’t even eyes. At my gesture, Professor Geum rubbed his hands like a fly and said:

“That friend has a somewhat wild image, right? So I took the image from a wolf.”

“There are no eyes.”

“It’s a sleeping wolf concept.”

“Isn’t a wolf with open eyes better than a sleeping wolf?”

At my words, Professor Geum pouted. He snatched the mask from my hand and after fiddling with the machine a few times, he created eyes.

“I didn’t remove the eyes for no reason.”

“Wh-what is this.”

“Doesn’t it become too cute with eyes?”

It certainly was too cute. It reminded me of a puppy rather than a wolf. The eyes are unnecessarily sparkling like this.

“Who would make the eyes sparkle like this?”

“You see? Design isn’t something that just pops out perfectly when you input keywords. When you actually make it, the result often comes out different from what I thought.”

I finally proposed a compromise.

“How about drawing closed eyes? It looks strange with nothing at all.”

“Oh, that’s not bad.”

After tinkering a few times like that, the face of a wolf with closed eyes appeared.

Good, that’s the end of these three masks. Though Cha Song-jin weighs on my mind, I have the mask I used before, so I can put that on him in case of emergency.

What Professor Geum prepared wasn’t just masks.

“What’s that?”

“I was also concerned that you always dress casually, you know. Besides, wouldn’t it be good to have something like a uniform?”

The word uniform sent chills down my spine. Surely he didn’t prepare latex bodysuits? I had doubts for a moment, but fortunately the clothes Professor Geum handed over were ordinary black clothes.

If I had to categorize them, they had an appearance close to techwear. The design didn’t matter much, but I really liked that they were all black.

There were pockets and belts for weapons, and overall they had some roominess but the inner wear underneath fit snugly so the fit wasn’t bad either.

Certainly if we all wear this together, it might be quite good.

Compared to the past days when we just went out wearing clothes we wore at home, it certainly felt like something was coming together.

Plus a coat to wear on top. It was very welcome in this cold weather.

“Were you a coat person even if you freeze to death?”

“Well, do villains want to go around hot in long padded jackets?”

“I guess that would be a bit…”

That would be a bit much.

“Even though it looks like that, it’s clothes bought from a top-class armory and modified.”

“Why modify it, just give it as is.”

“Whaat?”

“I’m joking.”

If I tease him more, Professor Geum will get upset.

“Basically it’s waterproof, flame-resistant, and even has temperature maintenance function. Plus the durability is so good it’s bulletproof and knife-proof. Ah, of course it’s useless against magic-imbued attacks.”

Though it can’t withstand magic, it was amazing that it had defense to block bullets with a material that looks like cloth. He said he bought clothes from a top-class hunter armory, but it was almost artifact-grade.

“This alone must have been extremely expensive.”

“That’s right.”

To think he prepared three sets of these.

“Thank you.”

I readily expressed my gratitude. Professor Geum who smiled at my thanks handed me the last completed product from deep inside the box.

“And here.”

“This is…”

“What you asked for so earnestly.”

It was a smartphone.

“As you requested, I added a reception blocking function to all but one, but then there’s no point in it being a mobile phone.”

“There’s someone I want to contact one-sidedly.”

“Oh, I didn’t see you that way, but Kang Yi-sin is quite a bad person, huh?”

I frowned looking at Professor Geum who winked at me saying that. I don’t know how I should react.