Tomb Raider King
chapter-42

Translator: miraclerifle

There was no way that Yoo Jaeha was dead.

That was the thought in Ju-Heon's mind from the beginning. He apparently fell off a cliff in a car accident, but...

‘That bastard can survive falling off a plane so no way he died in a car.’

The scale was too small!

That was the case. Ju-Heon knew that Yoo Jaeha was scamming again. His pretending to be dead was too obvious of a scam. In simple terms, Yoo Jaeha was an amazing liar. It was obvious he was hiding in this gallery.

Originally, he would meet Yoo Jaeha five years later after he was already working for Chairman Kwon. That was why this was his first time at this gallery, but Ju-Heon’s instincts were spot on.

‘I can smell the scent of an artifact coming from above.’

It was probably an artifact related to counterfeiting or copying since he was going around selling counterfeits. Ju-Heon who realized that Yoo Jaeha was hiding decided to fish him out.

He was going to use a large bait to do that.

The bait was simple.

‘Yoo Jaeha is extremely greedy for artifacts.’

He was too scared to go into tombs but he was extremely greedy for artifacts. That was why he used his mouth and talents to do all kinds of different scams to steal, swindle, and receive artifacts before running away.

He was a different kind of thief than Ju-Heon who openly stole things.

That was why he considered them to be similar types, but...

Maybe that was the reason he could read the bastard’s thoughts even more. This was the reason Ju-Heon had prepared a fishing rod with artifacts as the amazing bait.

Yoon Min Hee was the first to bite.

‘Yoon Min Hee is greedy as well.’

Which of the people close to artifacts were not materialistic?

And lo and behold.

“Umm, can I first check the conditions of the artifacts?”

Yoon Min Hee who returned from the restroom smiled and picked up the backpack with the artifacts.

“I need to thoroughly inspect with a machine so I will need to go to the restoration room for a moment. Could you please look over this estimates sheet and the contract while I do that?”

“Sure.”

Yoon Min Hee looked at Ju-Heon after seeing him let her go so easily.

‘It looks like he’s not suspicious about anything.’

Suspicious people would say they would follow her to the restoration room or tell them to do the inspection here, etc.

That was why Yoon Min Hee lightly smiled.

‘This should be easy to swindle.’

People who didn't make things difficult were pushover customers for the Yoon Min Hee crew. Yoon Min Hee then took Ju-Heon's artifacts to the first floor restoration room Yoo Jaeha mentioned.

Ju-Heon and Oh Seung Woo were looking through the contract and estimate sheet as she did that. Oh Seung Woo could not close his jaw after looking at the estimate sheet.

The estimate sheet even had images, explaining things in detail so that customers would be able to make an educated guess on how much it would cost.

That was very good, but the problem was the price......

Oh Seung Woo's hands were shaking as he held the estimate sheet.

“Hyu, hyung-nim. Is r, restoration really this expensive?”

Oh Seung Woo wondered if he had counted the 0's wrong. However, the number didn't change even after he rubbed his eyes.

“10 million won per damage? And then an extra 50 million won based on the size of the damage...it’ll cost over 100 billion won at this rate!”

Even if artifact restoration was expensive, this was a total scam.

It was an unbelievable price.

However, Ju-Heon didn’t pay much attention to it.

Why?

‘An estimate sheet like this is useless.’

That was why Ju-Heon started to smile.

Yoon Min Hee who entered the restoration room at that moment quickly locked the door. She then immediately called out to someone in a quiet voice.

“Director-nim, director-nim! I brought them!”

And then, clunk, a chair in the corner moved.

It was Yoo Jaeha who had stealthily hidden in the first floor restoration room after coming down from the third floor. The man who had been hiding like a rat looked toward the backpack Yoon Min Hee brought with a bright smile.

“Is that it?”

“Yes, please take a look! And hurry!”

Yoon Min Hee quickly handed the black sports backpack to Yoo Jaeha, worried that Ju-Heon would find out. Yoo Jaeha dropped his jaws after quickly looking through the backpack.

There were definitely more than 10 artifacts in the backpack. Most were seriously damaged, but they were all real without any fakes.

And although Yoo Jaeha didn’t know much about artifact grades yet, he could clearly tell.

‘These are definitely above average items.’

Gold axe silver axe, the Rope from Heaven, Anubis's Ankh, Osiris's Hourglass, Set’s War-sceptre, Shakespeare’s pen, etc, they were all artifacts Yoo Jaeha had never seen before.

They looked like regular items at first glance, but the aura they gave off in his hand was different.

That was why Yoo Jaeha gulped.

He desired them.

He desired them way too much.

He wanted to quickly use them.

“Stand guard for just 10 minutes.”

“Y, yes sir.”

Once Yoon Min Hee stepped out of the restoration room, Yoo Jaeha brought out some scrap metal, plastic, wood, plaster and other materials.

He then bit down on the white autograph paper again and grabbed an artifact in one hand.

The first one he touched was the gold knife that was the Gold Axe. He then thoroughly observed the gold axe and started to touch it everywhere. Something amazing then started to happen.

Ooooooooong.

Once Yoo Jaeha, who touched the artifact, touched a piece of regular scrap metal, that slowly started to turn into the gold axe knife.

It was a perfect counterfeit without any flaws.

It was giving off a similar aura and the ability was the same as well. Even the destroyed areas were the same. This was only possible because of Yoo Jaeha’s genius sense of observation.

Of course, it was still a fake so it wasn’t as strong as the real deal and would disappear without a trace in half a day. But it didn’t matter to Yoo Jaeha.

‘I would have escaped by the time he realizes it is a fake. That poor idiot.’

Yoo Jaeha started to laugh while thinking that Ju-Heon shouldn't hold it against him too much.

‘Art is a scam and life is a scam as well.’

Yoo Jaeha had been a new artist who was being watched by many, but he had given up honestly painting anything anymore.

‘Why?’

It was because he felt it to the bones that living an honest life would only put you at a disadvantage.

One way to put it would be that he was stabbed in the back. The bastard of a professor who stole the style of painting that Yoo Jaeha barely managed to develop after many years was the representative of such a cruel world.

‘He claimed my painting was terrible and then went on to steal it?’

That wasn’t the only thing.

Yoo Jaeha’s style of painting that his professor had stolen was revered by many to the point that it would go down in art history, raising his professor to Picasso's level of fame.

However, no matter how many times Yoo Jaeha drew new paintings and put them on display, they all just called him a copycat.

The world who didn’t care about the truth buried the original creator while the famous bastard continued to profit.

That was why Yoo Jaeha was just doing the same thing.

He was stealing and selling other people's work. What was the problem when everybody else was doing it too?

‘Haha, the ones who get tricked are the retards.’

Yoo Jaeha who now had such a twisted mindset had committed many scams, and the counterfeit artifact had reacted and approached him. The artifact had placed wings on Yoo Jaeha's back.

And even now, thinking about screwing Ju-Heon over was making his lips twitch in joy.

‘There are 10 artifacts so......selling just a third of them to Chairman Kwon should give me enough to fool around with women for many years.’

He finished copying all of the artifacts at that moment.

Now all that was left to do was to run away.

Yoo Jaeha started to chuckle.

“I apologize. It does not seem possible.”

Yoon Min Hee who brought the fakes back in Ju-Heon’s backpack had a disappointed expression on her face.

“The artifacts are destroyed too much so I cannot restore them with my artifact.”

She then proceeded to lie with a straight face. Oh Seung Woo sighed in disappointment.

“It looks like we didn't manage to restore them in the end. Hyung-nim, what do we do now since that Yoo Jaeha person is supposedly dead?”

Ju-Heon just casually looked through the artifacts. The item he picked up was Anubis's Ankh. Yoon Min Hee seemed to feel sorry for Ju-Heon as she put on a bitter smile.

“I'm sorry. We tried to do whatever we could but these artifacts are on the brink of destruction...”

Of course, this was the truth.

The artifacts Ju-Heon brought would be destroyed with a single hit.

‘But Jaeha sunbae should be able to restore them like new.’

She would take a cut of the profits!

It wasn’t like Ju-Heon would realize that they were fake. Yoon Min Hee had compared the fake ones with the real ones just in case, but even she who was a qualified appraiser could not determine which was which.

Although she didn't want to admit it, Yoo Jaeha truly was talented.

‘Alright then, now to brush things off and get ready to run.’

Once Yoon Min Hee's sneer and Ju-Heon’s gaze crossed each other...

Crack!

Ju-Heon ruthlessly threw Anubis's Ankh.

“Uhh, uhhhhh?!”

That wasn’t it.

Ju-Heon kicked the table over.

Baaaaang!

The inside of the gallery quickly turned into pandemonium.

“W, what are you doing?!”

“Hyu, hyung-nim!”

Ju-Heon then started to smile.

“You’re asking me what I'm doing? That’s the question I want to ask you.”

“E, excuse me?”

“What the f*ck do you think you are trying to do?”

Yoon Min Hee's heart almost sank after hearing Ju-Heon's vicious tone.

‘N, no way.

Did he find out?’

However, Yoon Min Hee started to shake as she feigned ignorance.

"That, umm, I really don’t know why you are doing thi...”

“Did you think I wouldn't realize it if you switched them to others that looked the same?”

Yoon Min Hee's body started to tremble after hearing that.

‘H, he found out?’

Ju-Heon then took a knife out of his pocket. Yoon Min Hee shrieked once she saw the knife.

“Hold......don't come near...kyaaaa!”

She tried to call the cops but Ju-Heon had kicked her phone out of her hand.

“Y, you crazy!”

She then screamed as she ran away toward the door.

But it only lasted for a moment.

Boom!

Ju-Heon slammed the door shut with his foot.

“These damn bastards only learned the bad things.”

Yoon Min Hee subconsciously plopped down on the ground because his gaze was so scary. His gaze looked like he could have already killed many people!

Oh Seung Woo grabbed Yoon Min Hee so she could not run away.

She started to shout now that she could not run away.

“I, I'm sorry! The real ones are in the next room! Please don’t kill me!”

This was the truth. She felt like Ju-Heon would really kill her if she tried to scam him again. Ju-Heon then started to smirk.

“Oh, is that so?”

Ju-Heon then headed toward the restoration room where Yoo Jaeha was hiding.

‘I got you now, Yoo Jaeha.’

He had caught a giant fish with a simple paste bait.

And at the same time...

Yoo Jaeha who was listening from the restoration room almost fainted in shock. He had put his ear against the wall after finishing his preparations to run out of curiosity...

“Damn it, that crazy bastard!”

He fell over on the chair after being shocked by the unexpected chaos.

He didn't know for sure, but he felt something was clear.

‘I'm dead if I get caught.’

However, Yoo Jaeha still could not understand it.

“Damn it, that’s so weird. How did he realize it?”

Of course, Yoo Jaeha's fakes were perfect. He was that talented of an artifact user.

However, he just chose the wrong person to try to trick.

“Damn it!”

Yoo Jaeha then jumped up from the ground.

Running away was the best course of action right now.

Even with a genius restoration ability, he was a weak young man who didn't even know how to fight properly.

However, something terrible happened at that moment as the door was destroyed.