Chapter.3 For that handful of silver (7)
***
If I were to sum up the impression of this man who calls himself ‘Metal Joe’ in one sentence,
it would be ‘heavily armed, macho white man.’
“Tell me straight again. “As soon as I saw my current item, this shotgun, which I have been using with care like my wife for the past few years, I thought, ‘I have to return it.’ Is this what you mean?”
Ah correction. ‘Heavily armed, extremely angry, macho white male.’
“You’re the one who decided to sell the goods over there, right? ‘DOOMgay’?”
“Fick dich selber! I’m a ‘professor’ and don’t sell things to people who don’t know their value. So, I made a condition that I would hand over the goods after seeing it in person, even though I suffered a slight loss.”
‘So that’s why I applied for direct transaction.’
You can often see guys like this in the wasteland. Guys who are obsessed with strange bullshit philosophy and take losses for the sake of the rules.
‘No. I guess this guy has enough money to take some losses?’
The explosives that just wiped out a bunch of mutants would be worth well over 100,000 shillings. It’s a spice dealer… It looks like there are still quite a few people looking for gourmet food even in this world.
“Hey, Metal Joe. Put that gun away for now.” ”
The answer comes first. What don’t you like about the muzzle that’s pointed at your head? This beautiful curve, the smell of metal that is fishy yet strangely stimulating to the senses of smell. This grip that’s soft and comfortable like a mother’s embrace. “At what point did you feel like you couldn’t use this?”
“No, it’s not that I don’t like it either, but the circumstances are a bit…”
“The circumstances may not be such that I can ignore this beauty!”
Ian’s voice, excited by the burning cavity of the mutant’s corpse, rang out.
“Look carefully! These wonderful twin barrels! A human has two hands, feet, and eyes! 2 is the most balanced and perfect number! These two “The barrel of the gun is like my wife’s amazingly plump breasts! I’ve loved this gun my whole life. But you see my love and say it’s like a refund?”
“No, so…” The professor opened his mouth for a moment
, but out of the corner of his eye, he saw Bex watching the two of them from behind with a look of ‘what is he doing?’
It’s not even a fact that needs to be said.’
You can tell me a little bit of your personal history:
“I really like that shotgun, but I need a lot of money, so I have to give it a refund.”
“….hmm!”
Ian, who glared at the professor for a moment, turned to the door and said,
“Then I guess I’ll have to listen to the situation and decide. Let’s move on. Since the fire started in an enclosed space like this, we’ll soon run out of oxygen.”
“…. Knowing that, you used explosives indiscriminately like that?”
“Then how can you explode if you care about such small things?”
“…Is this a concept?”
“It’s soul.”
Oh my god. Are you serious?
As he said that, Ian pulled out an angled backpack as big as his upper body and two burnt boxes from among the corpses. He shook off the pieces of flesh from his luggage and began to stride towards the door.
Bex had mentioned earlier. From then on, he looked quite worried.
“Hepburn, just in case, there are some scavengers who classify Metal Joe as a psycho gang…”
“I think I know why.”
The professor followed Ian, who was stomping away in the distance, recalling a phrase that was popular a long time ago, such as ‘Their way of thinking is different from ours.’ Anyway, they were not their enemies yet, and that crazy firepower was too attractive to refuse to accompany them.
***
While moving to the next floor, the professor quickly explained his situation:
“…That’s why it happened.”
“Something is complicated, but we don’t have time, so let’s sort it out quickly. profe… Oh, did you say they call you Hangman outside?”
“Hepburn.”
“Hangman is right, you bastard.”
“Hmm… Hepburn makes more sense. Anyway, Hepburn had no choice but to come out to refund my gun due to the debt created by that crazy AI, and then an event like this happened in District 45, so I decided to rob it with this little guy. “You mean you came?”
Thump! Thump! Thump!
What on earth was in that bag that Ian had? A sound echoed through the hallway with every step he took.
“That’s pretty much it… Can’t we go quietly? Is there someone here?” “No, I will gather all the local mutants.”
“Only guys with baggy underwear do prayer rain. Isn’t it a virtue for men to face their enemies with confidence and add their weight with lead bullets?”
“…Hepburn, do you really need to go with Metal Joe? Brain muscles that don’t know anything about this kind of strategy are like landmines in the wasteland.”
“Ha! Anyway, those guys drove off the mutants earlier, so there won’t be any left around! If the old man’s balls are getting cold, pick up a trowel, not a gun.”
The professor, who was paying attention to the possibility of mutants swarming around him, suddenly turned his attention to Ian.
Scavenger. chasing. This is important information.
“They drove mutants there?”
“okay. As you know, I have a very cool fighting style. It does attract some mutants nearby. “I tried to go down while clearing out just the ones in front, but suddenly a bunch of rag-like guys came down, handed the guys in the back to me and went down.”
“Why don’t you go down together?”
“I tried to do the same, but they first positioned themselves at the end of the hallway and then started firing so much suppressing fire that I had no choice but to get hit in the forearm or two and then retreat. Meanwhile, the hallways were filled with mutants, so we were pushed back there earlier.”
When Ian raised his arm, blood was seeping through the bandage wrapped around his arm.
“Well, I just need to figure out the situation up to this point. “We should sort out our relationship first, right?”
“I’ll organize it… specifically?”
“Let’s accompany each other for a while.”
After saying that, Ian held up two fingers.
“There are two things I want. First of all, I don’t mind having hundreds of walking corpses like that, but people are a bit annoying. “I hope my customer and his friend can help me.”
“hmm. “It’s not that difficult, but…”
It’s not a bad suggestion. Anyway, if we wanted to get to the shelter at the bottom, we had to fight against them.
“I want you to tell me exactly what you need help with.”
“You are asking the obvious. “It’s a romance!”
Coo!
Before he knew it, he had reached the end of the hallway, and with the stairs marked “Emergency Exit” in front of him, Ian looked behind him and grinned.
“It’s a warehouse for the old-fashioned rich! Do you really think those people only took care of what they needed to survive? you’re welcome! “Eye-poppingly expensive paintings, gold bars that are always a stable currency, and above all!”
Bang bang!
“here! A machine that makes a man’s heart boil! Lamborghini! jaguar! Ferrari! Harley Davidson! Ducati! Monsters with pulsating hearts made of engines! Phew! “I came to see them!”
Druddeuddeuddeuk-!
Ian, who was swinging his fist in the air and speaking passionately, put down the angled bag on his back and opened the lid.
“I want you to help me get the machine! Instead, I’ll let you guys use whatever you need. Especially you Hepburn!”
Cheo-eok –
Ian gave the professor the shotgun that he said he used with care like his wife.
“I’ll put the refund case on hold. Let’s use her. Feel with your own hands the difference between the trash you are wearing on your back and Meine Liebe (my love)! Even after that, if you want a refund, I’ll give it to you in the name of Metal Joe. This is the second condition.”
Hmm… I know roughly what type of person he is. Typical. He looks like he came out of a movie somewhere. It’s like a B-grade splatter movie.
“Why are you so anxious to sell your wife to me when you say you cherish her so much?”
“hmm? Oh, that’s right.”
After scratching his head for a moment, Ian pulled out a three-barreled shotgun from behind his back.
“I have a wife with three breasts!”
What is this trash?
“…I heard earlier that 2 is the most balanced number?”
“Wouldn’t that make it even more awesome! Three barrels! It’s imbalanced! It has a chaotic charm! It’s criminal!”
Coo!
Ian’s bag, which must have been made of metal, opened with a loud noise and was filled with all kinds of explosives and firearms ammunition.
“ruler! “If you need something, don’t hesitate and pick it up!”
“…You said you were a spice dealer. “Where are the items for sale?”
“hmm? “It’s here, right here!”
Ian grabbed a handful of shotgun shells from inside his bag with his big hands and stuffed them into the professor’s pocket. He rolled one of them between his fingers and said,
“These guys. Alcohol, cigarettes and gunpowder! If this is not the spice of life, what is it? This Metal Joe is someone who makes it his business to give hot spice to boring lives!”
Armed with all the ammunition and weapons he took out of his bag, he chuckled and started going down the stairs.
“Come on, friends! Get a taste of life. “Let’s go take a good look!”
***
Basement 3rd floor.
The noisy atmosphere that became noisy when Ian joined the place has long since subsided under a silence as heavy as the darkness that lies here.
Tuk-tuk.
“[Trace/ Left three / Move]”
“[Trace/ Right fifteen. / Move]”
I told Ian in advance as I came down. The enemies seem to be quite professional, so we will approach without revealing our location as much as possible, quickly hit them with explosives, and then start the fight. We can’t make a sound, so please follow us carefully from behind. Fortunately,
he seems to be completely lacking in common sense, and although he has a dissatisfied expression on his face, he is still following along quietly –
“feige Mädchen (cowardly girl)…. Like a rat in front of the enemy… Ugh, this is what my lady is doing. “I can’t show my face…”
Oh no!
I won’t lose. It seemed like Bex was desperately trying to hold back Ian, who was desperately looking at the gun with his eyes.
‘Anyway, these guys… are mutated. They are moving without processing them. They are even periodically sending part of their squad in a different direction. This is a tactic used to surround enemies who are following behind…’ The
professor saw the two people clicking quietly right behind them.
There was no trace. Looking at it, there was still enough distance to say something small.
‘There are three of us at most, so this is a battle area formed assuming a group other than us. Come to think of it, we found traces of battle while coming in, but we did not find a single trace of looting. Even if you just pass by to find something more valuable, isn’t it still possible to open a closed door? You don’t know what’s inside?’
As I traced the path I followed after them, the outline of the enemy gradually emerged.
‘…They’re not people whose only goal is money. They’re not scavengers.’
Who could it be? The professor recalled the things he had seen as he passed by. Strangely luxurious booby traps. Strategic and systematic movements. Movements that seemed familiar in urban warfare, where several shelters were placed regularly, waiting for the enemy on the third basement level with many blind spots and narrow roads… ..
“….It’s Dom.”
“what?”
“From now on, we will change each other’s names to phonetic symbols. Bex is V, Ian is I, and I am H. You will understand it right away.”
“Hey, what’s going on-”
“Lower your voice. The guys in front are from the dome. That means that if even one letter of our name is revealed, they’ll find out our real names and where we live in an instant and come after us.”
“…They are shaking. They move strangely well.”
“Hepburn, why are you in the dome…”
wrote-
“V, is this really a mouth problem?”
“….H.”
“Yes. I don’t know the exact reason. It’s just a guess, but… they are preparing for a large-scale skirmish here. They have created a battlefield that is familiar and advantageous to them. “Which of the enemies are coming here that the Dome’s elite can prepare for so thoroughly?”
“Raptor…!”
“That is correct.”
“Hehehe Scheisse! Now I understand. “We got involved in a fight with whales, right?”
In response to Ian’s question, the professor just nodded quietly. It was a guess, but it was a guess that was close to certainty.
‘Dome’s elite disguised as scavengers are targeting the raptor. I don’t want to leave any traces. Dom is trying to hide the fact that he is here. I was thinking about the aftermath of the battle. For what? If you want Raptor to pay less attention to this place… No way!’
The professor ran his hand along the wall against which he was leaning.
A sturdy exterior wall built in preparation for nuclear war. There are cracks here and there, but it appears that water is leaking through the wall, so there is a good connection to underground water, and most importantly, there will be a generator to supply the shelter for 70 households. It’s not the mobile type I’m aiming for, but the huge one stuck in the deepest part of the building. A building equipped with both a generator and durability.
‘Dome is thinking of using this opportunity to expand its territory. The plan would be to use the Raptor Society, which wouldn’t pass up such a treasure, to push out the scavengers, quietly kill the raptors that entered, and then secure the entire building for use. As long as we clean up the inside, the Dome’s technicians have the skills to repair broken facilities. Even if we just restore power, we will be able to prevent others from entering the facility, such as the internal bulkhead. If the main force of the dome arrives and defends this place while we are holding out like that, the second dome will be completed here.’
The thought was long, but there was only one conclusion.
I got caught in a real whale fight by mistake. If you take even one wrong step here, it will be difficult to return alive.
I felt a tap on my shoulder from behind and turned around to see Bex pointing towards the stairs with her thumb and telling me to just leave.
‘I wanted to do that a long time ago, but… I’m thinking about it because it seems difficult.’
The Dome’s elites prepared for battle.
If the distance from the raptors was far, they would not have tried to waste their fighting power through unnecessary tension in the battle. If the operation was prepared to this extent, there would certainly be troops monitoring personnel coming in and out from the outside, so this would mean that the Raptor Society’s troops entered the underground when preparations began.
Tuk-tuk.
“[Rear / Enemy / Many / Retreat / None]”
With the hand signal, Bex, who had been sneaking backwards, and Ian, who had been sneaking forward, were called in and they stuck as close to the wall as possible. Ian and Bex silently dealt with the two mutants they encountered while moving. Once the surroundings were secured to some extent, Vex asked in a nervous voice.
“What do you mean there is no escape route?”
“There is a possibility that the Raptor army has already entered. There is no problem leaving the third basement level, but you will encounter them on the way up.”
“If there are a lot of those bastards, there is no other way than for one of the three of us to charge in with a bomb-”
“Dismissed.”
That’s true, though. If they go somewhere to fight, they always bring either a minigun or a flamethrower. Breaking through from the front is close to suicide.
“How to escape?”
“…For now, I have no choice but to rely on luck.”
There are three hostile forces. Dom’s legion of elite raptors and their variants. What can be a variable is a variant.
“If they just aim for the head and shoot, I wouldn’t have to worry, but…”
“There are a lot of domes who insist on street fighting like sissies. “They’ll shoot you in the torso or something.”
Mutant viruses are closer to parasites than viruses. It does not show any symptoms until it is infected and spreads throughout the body, but when the person who becomes the host dies, it becomes active and takes over the entire body at the point when consciousness is lost, strengthening the body and controlling it.
Type 2 is a variant that appears in a fresh corpse that has just died. Type 2 is commonly seen as the body dies over time and the skin and muscles rot and become weak. Type 1 is a type that is commonly seen in cases where the body dies over time and the skin and muscles become weak, and the virus stops breathing in a healthy state and the virus invades the body. A type 3 completed mutant is one in which the body survives the mutation and the mutation occurs while the body remains alive.
According to Dom’s research, more than 90% of the population is already carriers of the mutated virus at this point. What this means is that when someone dies, unless they explode their head or set it on fire, they will be resurrected as a mutant.
‘In a melee like this, not everyone will be able to aim for the head, so it can be said that most of those who receive fatal injuries will be revived as Type 2.’
A type 2 variant with five senses more sensitive than humans and incredibly enhanced strength and agility. Even if only a few people mutate into Type 2 during the battle, chaos would quickly increase.
‘Take advantage of the chaos to create space in the battle area and escape.’
There is a clear advantage for professors.
The fact that no one knows it’s here yet. This side has a rough idea of who will be fighting and when. Lastly…
“Damn it. “I guess I’ll have to give up on the machine.”
A fool who carried a lot of explosives that was incomprehensible to the common sense of that wasteland. Considering the number of grenades and other explosives in the bag and the benefits that could be gained from a surprise attack, it was not impossible at all.
‘The best course of action is that this is all just my delusion and that the guys in front of me are just scavenger hunts…’
….Chuck, chuck, chuck, chuck.
“….Fuck.”
As I saw the regular sound of footsteps getting louder up there, it seemed like it would be a good idea to give up that hope.
***
