///
Two hours before Yu-Han's arrival...
Yu-Han immediately complained.
Like a skunk!>
<...Do you want to get punched? If you don't like the price, go somewhere else.>
Alice shoved Yu-Han aside and pleaded in his place.
More importantly, our colleague Yi-Rang was kidnapped by another euthanasia center!
Couldn't you help us out?>
Yang Su-Hyeon remembered Yi-Rang's innocent smile as she shared some meat with her when Su-Hyeon had come back injured, then sighed.
Yu-Han grumbled.
Yang Su-Hyeon gave Yu-Han a contemptuous look.
///
Back in the present, Yu-Han, wearing a gas mask, made a request of the people at Cheon-Rang Center.
"You people have cost me a lot of money, so I'm in a very bad mood.
Please make an official announcement that the accusations were a smear campaign. I even went out of my way to buy paralyzing gas for the occasion."
Park In-Hyeok and the beastkin transformed into their beast forms all at once, brandishing all kinds of weapons.
Apparently, they weren't particularly interested in granting his request.
"Furry Mode?"
"How dare you use the F-word, you beastkin-hating bastard!!"
The first to charge Yu-Han was the black panther beastkin.
Unlike when Yi-Rang had knocked her out, this time she even had a vicious-looking dagger in her hand.
But without so much as a change in expression, Yu-Han immediately sliced off one of her legs.
"GRAAAAGH!"
"There! I got rid of that bad leg for you. Just get a new one attached later."
At first glance, it sounded like a cruel joke, but modern biotechnology really could replace severed limbs fairly easily.
As expected, Yu-Han was clearly an upstanding taxpayer!
"You useless bastards! You can't even handle one beastkin-hater?!"
"Director, I wouldn't exactly call myself a beastkin-hater.
I prefer to think of myself as someone who hates everyone equally."
While everyone's attention was drawn to Yu-Han's ridiculous statement, the wall beside Park In-Hyeok suddenly exploded inward.
Kim Ga-Eun had smashed straight through it with her body, with Alice entering alongside her.
They were here for Park In-Hyeok alone.
"Damn. You bitches came up with one cute little idea!"
Apparently, Park In-Hyeok hadn't survived this long in the business for nothing.
In his wolf form, he dodged the claws of the monster that was Kim Ga-Eun, then coated one arm in mana and blocked Alice's beam sword.
"Director Park In-Hyeok! Are you doing all this under Kim Je-Hyeon's orders?!
If you stop now and surrender, nobody has to shed any more blood!"
"Huh? I'm not sure what you're talking about.
There's no way an office like ours would have anything to do with a major politician like that."
"You're really going to play dumb after kidnapping one of our employees?!"
"That tiger girl came here because she couldn't stand the beastkin hatred anymore!
Sa-Yoon! You keep that guy in black busy!
The rest of you, get over here and help teach these bitches who don't know their place!"
At those words, Ma Sa-Yoon stepped forward to face Yu-Han alone.
Now transformed into a lion through Furry Mode, he cracked his knuckles.
"...I've thought this ever since your duel with our Yuna Nim.
You're a man capable of nothing but underhanded tricks!"
"Mr. Lion, that's a huge misunderstanding.
Underhanded tricks are just one of thousands of things I'm good at."
"Shut up!"
Ma Sa-Yoon took up a single-edged axe in each hand and came at Yu-Han with enough force and skill to kill him.
But Yu-Han calmly met each attack one after another.
Again, Ma Sa-Yoon could lift even a multi-ton truck with his bare hands, though not without effort.
This situation was clearly abnormal.
'Just how much mana does this brat have...?
And this time, he doesn't seem to be supplementing it with some kind of tool.'
Yu-Han caught the instant Ma Sa-Yoon's attention wavered and immediately swung his carbon-coated knife.
Ma Sa-Yoon barely dodged, escaping with nothing more than a shallow cut across the back of his hand.
But Yu-Han did not stop.
He immediately went for Ma Sa-Yoon's gas mask.
'This bastard... He's trying to make me breathe the paralyzing gas!'
"You shouldn't celebrate just because you stopped the second attack, right?
I'm gonna keep attacking until you're dead!"
Every time Ma Sa-Yoon blocked, Yu-Han flowed seamlessly into another attack.
Watching him, Ma Sa-Yoon instinctively realized that something was wrong.
Meanwhile, the rest of the office rushed to stop Alice and Kim Ga-Eun.
Most of them went straight for Alice, who looked considerably weaker than Ga-Eun.
Alice dismissed her beam sword and summoned a carbon-coated knife instead.
"You bitch... Are you looking down on us?!"
"Wait, please don't misunderstand! It's just that the beam sword drains way too much electricity..."
A hyena beastkin, leopard beastkin, coyote beastkin, and several others charged Alice like wild animals.
Alice released electricity into the surrounding area with magic, blasting three of them away at once.
'Learning electricity magic first really was the right decision.
It solves my battery problem and makes it easy to deal with swarming perverts.'
A whole crowd of beastkin had piled onto Kim Ga-Eun as well.
They drove knives, spikes, and even chainsaws into her monstrous skin, yet Ga-Eun merely looked bored.
"Hey. I'm technically a kind of beastkin too, you know. This is a little much."
Park In-Hyeok stared at her incredulously.
"What part of a monster like you is supposed to be beastkin?!"
"You won't even include me? That's just so... HEARTBREAKING!!"
The monster violently swung her entire body.
The beastkin clinging to her went flying one after another and slammed into the walls.
Still, they were predators for a reason.
A few managed to hold on through sheer strength and refused to be shaken off.
"That's right! Don't let go! Keep holding her!"
Park In-Hyeok summoned a massive chunk of metal and took hold of it with both hands.
Amazingly, it was a minigun.
His subordinates, who knew exactly how powerful the weapon he had smuggled in through overseas contacts was, went pale.
"Director?! We're going to get hit too!"
"You useless bastards are only good for slowing her down anyway!
So sacrifice yourselves for beastkin!!"
The bullets poured out without mercy.
The beastkin clinging to Kim Ga-Eun desperately tried to escape, but several of them were hit.
"Even your own allies...!"
Alice amplified the electrical current flowing through her body with magic.
For a split second, she boosted her physical abilities and reaction speed to their limits.
She charged Park In-Hyeok at high speed and carved a deep slash across his torso!
"Graaagh... You bitch...!"
"No... How are you not dead?"
The cut should have been deep enough to reach his heart and lungs, yet Park In-Hyeok was still alive despite the agony.
No. He wasn't just alive—he was even regenerating.
But Alice could not sense even the slightest trace of mana from him...
"That regeneration isn't a beastkin ability at all!!
He's a rare species—a werewolf!!"
Yi-Rang, still paralyzed on the floor and able to do nothing but watch, shouted loudly enough for everyone to hear.
The moment she said "werewolf," murmurs rippled through the beastkin.
Park In-Hyeok grew flustered under their icy stares.
"Hey! Sure, I'm a werewolf, but we're not that different from beastkin!
Of course, werewolves are just a little—well, a lot—superior to beastkin!"
"You worked us to the bone while preaching about fighting beastkin hatred... You lied to us!!"
"I've been paying your salaries every month! Doesn't that count for anything?!"
"You were late with them all the damn time! What favor?!"
The atmosphere among the beastkin grew so hostile that a riot looked ready to break out.
Even Ma Sa-Yoon, still fighting Yu-Han, seemed unable to hide his shock.
Part of him still wanted to believe there had to be some mistake.
'First, I need to finish this fight...'
Amid Yu-Han's relentless barrage, Ma Sa-Yoon finally spotted an opening.
Yu-Han seemed strangely careless about protecting his own gas mask.
"I'll finish you first!"
Ma Sa-Yoon struck Yu-Han's gas mask with his weapon and knocked it away.
But that was a mistake.
"Why...?"
Yu-Han exploited the opening created by Ma Sa-Yoon's reckless attack and slashed clean through the tendons in one of his arms.
And this wasn't some last-ditch attack before the gas took him, either.
Yu-Han was completely fine.
"I've had most of my organs modified.
Paralyzing gas this weak wouldn't have worked on me in the first place."
"So you were just toying with me from the start..."
As Ma Sa-Yoon dropped to one knee, Park In-Hyeok realized the battle was hopeless.
"Damn it! I knew you beastkin were nothing but stupid furries!
No wonder everyone hates you!"
Leaving those final words behind, Park In-Hyeok drew on his full werewolf strength and fled.
Alice and Kim Ga-Eun tried to chase him, but perhaps because he was a werewolf, he really was damn fast.
In the end, the battle was over.
All that remained were the abandoned members of Cheon-Rang Center, now without a leader.
Ma Sa-Yoon knelt before the people of Cheong-Am Center and pleaded.
"...We lost.
As Deputy Director, I'll pay with my life if that's what it takes.
Just spare everyone else..."
Yu-Han looked down at Ma Sa-Yoon almost pityingly.
"I told you from the beginning that we came here to clear our names.
Stay alive and get ready for the press conference."
"...But if we reveal that Kim Je-Hyeon was behind this, he'll come after us."
"You don't have to go that far.
It probably wouldn't make much difference anyway."
"Thank you..."
"Of course, you'll still have to compensate me somehow for the losses you caused."
While Yu-Han and Ma Sa-Yoon spoke, Alice and Kim Ga-Eun approached Yi-Rang.
"You guys... You came to save me!!"
Yi-Rang tried to turn the moment into a touching reunion, but Alice and Kim Ga-Eun did not look nearly as happy to see her.
Alice asked her seriously,
"Yi-Rang. Why did you go outside less than a day after Yu-Han told you not to?"
"Uh... That's a little difficult to explain."
"Tell me the truth. Now."
"The fridge was out of beer, so I was just gonna run to the convenience store right around the corner for a second! Haha..."
At Yi-Rang's answer, everyone there gave her an icy stare.
Somehow, those looks felt even harsher than the ones they had given Park In-Hyeok.
Yi-Rang couldn't take it and quickly looked like she was about to cry.
"Everyone, please stop looking at me like that!!"
Anyway, the ten-million-won cost of the paralyzing gas was added to Yi-Rang's debt.
---
The next day, the news was everywhere:
The Director of Cheon-Rang Center had actually been a werewolf and had been responsible for all kinds of crimes and abuses.
The sordid allegations against Yu-Han were also revealed to have been false.
Of course, the Cheon-Rang staff still needed jobs, so the Center couldn't simply shut down.
With virtually no objections, Ma Sa-Yoon became the new Center Director.
He promised to fix all the abuses left over from the old regime.
Soon afterward, every employee gathered for a meeting.
"Director, shouldn't we change the name Cheon-Rang (天狼)?
It reminds everyone too much of former Director Park In-Hyeok."
"You have a point. Anyone have a good name?"
Everyone tried to think of something fitting, but no name seemed quite right.
Then an idea suddenly came to Ma Sa-Yoon.
Remembering Yi-Rang's words, Ma Sa-Yoon smiled faintly.
"How about Yong-Ho Center?
Yong (勇) means 'courage,' and Ho (虎) means 'tiger.'"
Everyone burst out laughing at Ma Sa-Yoon's suggestion.
"Well, it's a weird name, but I kinda like it!"
"Naming it that isn't going to make this place fill up with even more idiots, is it? Heh..."
And so Cheon-Rang Center disappeared, and Yong-Ho Center was born.
To celebrate their fresh start, they decided to hold a staff dinner.
"Baek Myo-Hee C! How about coming to dinner with us?"
"No... If a trivial person like me joined, I'd only ruin the mood..."
The black panther beastkin woman who had invited her laughed.
"Trivial? Myo-Hee C, you're good at your job, pretty, cute, and you've got big boobs...
Wait. How has someone like Myo-Hee C managed to go completely unnoticed this whole time?
Something about that is weird..."
For a moment, Baek Myo-Hee quietly fixed her gaze on the black panther woman.
"What are you talking about?
I'm a 'trivial existence,' remember?
Now, let's not waste time on such a 'trivial' thought."
"Ah... right... of course..."
The black panther woman stared blankly for a moment.
Then she walked right past Baek Myo-Hee without another glance, as if she were no more noteworthy than a pebble on the roadside.
Baek Myo-Hee let out a sigh of relief.
"Phew~ That was scary...
I really do feel more at ease doing trivial chores than going to some noisy staff dinner..."