Chapter. 10 lead and silver coins (23)
****
rattle. Drop!
“Oh, it’s hot. I’m done with my hands. Ezel, are you hurt somewhere? Because it was a hastily made plan, it didn’t seem like it could be completely blocked…”
“Eup, eup?”
“Of course I opened it so I could breathe. Don’t relax. “There may be personnel who maintained their combat capabilities outside the range of the steam storm.”
“Puh-haa!”
At first, Ezel wondered what this was doing, but the moment he heard the unique sound of a plasma grenade and the screams of dozens of people simultaneously, he fell flat and covered his mouth.
….gulp.
When I opened my mouth, a puff of still hot air rushed into me. Even now, the sprinklers are still spraying water on the ceiling, and the air hasn’t cooled down. Ezel, who vaguely guessed how much the atmosphere had heated up in an instant, shuddered involuntarily.
“This is it, right? “That one from the textbook?”
“hmm. I don’t know if what you saw and what I saw were the same textbook. It’s probably right. “What you should never do when using a plasma weapon.”
This is what I saw when I was preparing for the inspection exam and was also taught after I passed and entered the inspection department.
‘Never use plasma-type high-temperature equipment in rainy weather or in environments where there is water! ‘Operate at a safe distance that is at least 10 times the existing risk range.’
Actual accident cases shown along with such educational content.
An agent was burned by the steam after spraying water on his exosuit’s overheated laser cannon to cool it down.
An agent who slashed a water purifier while wielding a plasma cutter and was blinded by the steam released.
An agent who threw a plasma grenade into a puddle of water and had his skin melt in the emitted steam.
I definitely knew that such a thing existed, but I never once thought of using it to deal with the enemy.
“Could it be…a fire alarm for this…?”
“no? At that time, all I could think was that if I left the turret like that, it would be destroyed. That’s a monster, a monster. It fires 7.62mm bullets at close to 8,000 rounds per minute. That swoosh – if you look through it once, it doesn’t create a hole, it cuts a person down. “What kind of operation are you doing in a place with your eyes open like that?”
“Then this is-”
“It’s an improvisation. Fucked. What do you have? What is the situation? What kind of environment is it? “If you think about these three things carefully, they come to mind surprisingly quickly.”
The professor chats in a calm tone, as if he’s just visiting somewhere, and puts his ear to the wall with sharp eyes. Ezel realized that his actions were a feint to let down his guard in order to attract the survivors of his fallen enemies.
The professor lifts the iron plate used to block the hot air by dragging his feet so that the location cannot be determined due to the sound of treading water.
Clap, clap, clap.
[I secure you, you shoot]
The professor, who instantly divided roles with a pin signal, quickly leaned out through the open bulkhead when he confirmed that Ezel was raising his gun.
Tadang! Ta-da-da-dan!
“15 meters below the corpse! “Scratch it with a rapid fire!”
As soon as he heard the sound of bullets hitting the steel plate, Ezel rolled over and moved behind the professor and started swinging his electromagnetic rifle at the enemies who were struggling on the ground.
Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta!
Paba-bak, plop-bub, paba-bak!
People who were trembling and moaning or calling out the names of their family members fell into silence one by one amidst the sound of an electromagnetic rifle being fired, which was as quiet as beans popping.
At a glance, Ezel knew that the enemy who was aiming the gun was dead, but Ezel could not let go of his finger on the trigger.
People whose skin melts and whose lungs ripen and exhale the breath they received. All I could think was that I had to kill them.
“Hey, stop, stop!”
Tutatatata-clap! Clap, clap, clap!
“I just confirmed a confirmed kill! Just as I learned from the textbook! Because we are dealing with the enemy! “He might just get up and shoot us like before!”
“You…”
After emptying all the bullets in his rifle, Ezel leaned back against the wall as if exhausted.
He was clenching his mouth as if he wanted to say something but couldn’t express it well, and eventually expressed his feelings through tears instead of words.
“….professor.”
“okay.”
“These people…were they our enemies?”
Ezel dropped the empty gun and looked down at his arms, which were covered in scratches.
Traces left by the Inspector General’s agent desperately resisting strangulation in the auxiliary control room. When Ezel felt the vibrant life force that he had been desperately resisting slowly fading away at his fingertips, he stopped looking at his name tag.
[Inspection Department – Larry Posch]
He was also an agent of the same Department of Inspection. He must have had his own definition. Perhaps it was the idea that someone would do what had to be done, since earning money so diligently was actually saving the District 38 Dome.
“Because we really… need to resolve this situation. “Is it right to kill so many people just to use communication once?”
“….”
Ezel looked like he was almost on the verge of collapse. Now that I think about it, this guy has often looked weirder than usual since he came to Area 38. That crooked smile that he wore all the time disappeared, and he became silent, and then, strangely, he started talking a lot. It’s not like he hasn’t killed someone before. Whenever the sense of murder tormented him, he consoled himself with the excuse that ‘it was for justice’, but when he came here and saw the 3rd division of District 38 operating with different ideologies, the foundation of that justice was shaken.
I’m not a guy with weak fundamentals, so I won’t spread the word that I can’t do it here. I’m just doing this because I’m confused and want to hear ‘It’s okay’.
“…Does it make sense to do the right thing? “They boiled people and shot them to death.”
However, instead of giving him the answer he wanted, the professor decided to make him carry the entire burden that he had placed on the shoulders of the group called Dom.
“Where is justice in killing people? If you kill righteously, the person above you won’t count it, right? You’re saying things that don’t even sound like words. If you kill someone, you are a murderer. “I’m not going to question whether it’s right or wrong, I just killed him.”
Ezel looked like he couldn’t believe what I was saying.
This is truly the typical image of a well-fed Dom. People who live in a city of the past, pursue the values of the past, and are comfortable enough to consider the legitimacy of their actions.
People living in the wasteland have long since put these worries aside. because? I’ve already seen myself cheering when I killed someone and held the by-products in Han Areum’s arms. Those who couldn’t endure it would have died long ago.
“Then why did those people… die?”
“You shot me. “Those guys.”
I am also a person who makes efforts to live a good life, but this was certain. Regardless of good or evil, whoever tries to kill me is the one who will kill me.
“oh my. That’s why they say it’s tiring to work with kids from Dom.”
I leaned next to him, muttering something like “I brought you here for no reason.” What should I do? Managing the mentality of party members is one of the leader’s jobs.
I stood next to him, tapped his arm, and then pointed with my finger to the passageway where the corpses were strewn about. The blood flowing from the corpse mixed with the water in the passage, staining the entire area red.
“how is it. “It’s like hell, right?”
“….”
Nod
“This isn’t something I borrowed from anyone or came up with. I burned them and you finished them off. You have to accept this. If we were in the old world now, we would have become bizarre murderers and mass shooters who would have been featured on the nine o’clock news as well as overseas topics. step! “There is an important fact you are forgetting.”
“What if I forgot…?”
“When I first came here, the only thing I did in front of them was ‘run down the aisle like a crazy person.’ “How did these people react to me like that?”
At the professor’s question, something that happened just ten minutes ago came back to me like an old memory. The professor came down from the vent and told us to run. I suddenly ran after him. And….
‘It’s an intruder! ‘Kill me!’
‘Don’t look at the circumstances! ‘Only one of them needs to be alive!’
The people at the inspection department here pulled the trigger without a single hesitation. Even though I had plenty of opportunities to subdue or fight since I learned bare-handed fighting.
The important thing is that I didn’t think they were bad. What if two gunmen jump into the District 47 Inspection Department building and they start running to the president’s office?
It occurred to me that Ezel himself would pull out a gun first.
“how is it. “It’s not as difficult as you think, right?”
“…That’s right. “I just… killed him because I shot him.”
“The way people treat others is based on social promises. In the old days, if there was a trespasser, the way to do it was to catch them and hand them over to the police. These days, that promise is to cut off the head of the guy who dared to invade my living space and threaten my life and decorate it on the front door. Someone in the community said that. [At least among our generation, everyone who can go to heaven has already arrived. The only thing left is to get a ticket to hell and wait in line.] Since there is no one who hasn’t killed someone to survive, it means that for our generation, the ticket to heaven has already expired.”
“It’s a very… meaningful expression. “Who said that?”
“Someone you know well. ‘takealook’.”
Poof!
At that moment, a surprised breath came out of Ezel’s mouth, who had a blank expression the whole time.
“’takealook’? A bunch of people? “The guy I know?”
“Yes, that human. “It may seem like a long time to live without thinking, but it means that everyone who survived has had a similar problem to you at least once.”
“….shit. I can’t believe I fell behind that guy. …. I feel like I was treated like a child.”
Once Ezel was able to speak, he gradually returned to his normal state. Perhaps I burst out laughing and realized something in this hellish scene.
The professor felt sorry for Ezel as his expression gradually improved.
His worries as he carries the justice of the past in his heart and suffers from the guilt of murder, says, ‘That’s just the way the world is.’ Because I dismissed it as a cheap rationalization. I also thought that perhaps I had corrupted a young man who had a truly pure and good heart, one of the few in this era.
‘But what can I do? If you are at that level, you are no different from a real angel in this era, but angels quickly go to heaven.’
Whether you solve it yourself or let someone else do it. In the end, everyone who tried to protect my innocence left, and I have no intention of letting my few friends go in vain like that.
“But don’t be too quick to kill me. Among the people like you who couldn’t overcome the guilt, there were people who became murderers to overcome the pressure. Well… I can’t explain it. “When you think rationally that you really shouldn’t do it, think about it.”
“Okay, stop it. “If anyone sees it, they’ll think it’s my mom.”
“Hehehe. You may not be my mother, but you are my older brother, right? Because I’m twenty-four. Try it bro. Professor~”
“Ack, fuck! Stop talking nonsense and get up quickly! “They knew something was going to happen to the kids down there, so they were taking their time!”
“Hmm. “Judging by Brother Lee’s long experience, he dragged almost all of them towards us and killed them, so the two remaining friends downstairs may be taking a nap.”
As if he was somewhat convinced, Ezel stood up, tore off the name tag on his military uniform, threw it away, and walked away, splashing blood. I don’t know what the meaning of that action was, but it was clear that the wasteland survivor’s terrible self-justification had settled into his good heart.
‘….Father in heaven. Well… I’m sorry, but there’s probably too much there, so let’s just borrow one person. If you’re going to just sit back and do nothing, we’ll have to rebuild the world ourselves. Don’t we need at least one guy like that?’
After saying a small prayer in his mind, the professor, like Ezel, quickly skipped between the corpses and caught up behind him.
“boy. You look cute today. “Hyung~ I told you to try it?”
“Fucking shoot me! “I will kill you without any guilt!”
The professor giggles and makes fun of him, and Ezel throws a fit and expresses his disapproval at the words.
“….brother.”
“huh? what? Hehe, really. Is it because I survived 365 days longer than Ezel Raiden? “I’m deaf so I can’t hear very well?”
“@#*(#(*@^!!!”
Thank you, brother….
It may be a bit of an odd sentiment to feel in the middle of enemy lines, but the professor felt proud and thought that he had done a great job.
That’s right. What’s difficult about this? You can do things that make you feel like, ‘I did a good job,’ and not do things that make you think, ‘I can’t do this.’ It seems like my conscience is still quite sharp. I ended up doing
something similar to counseling new recruits, but I was a professor who felt lighter at the same time.
[….This is how it was done.]
And Hyde, who had been quietly observing the scene from inside, just grinned as he packaged the memory of this moment and carefully hung it in a corner of his dark space.
****
The goal was achieved, and Ezel’s shattered mentality was repaired by wrapping it with duct tape called ‘Wasteland Life’, so it was time to move again.
“Hey. You’re late. How did you resolve the incident? It was very noisy.”
Downstairs . When I came down, I saw Ian and Bex, who had piled up corpses similar to what he and Ezel had done above, dodging the firewater pouring down from under the wooden table.
Ezel was looking at the cleanly decapitated and blown-out private houses.
“Why. Is it still taking you a while?”
“…A little? I think I may have been worrying about something pointless.”
“Hmm? Hey, professor. What do you mean by that?”
“Oh, it’s nothing special. Our Ezel shot and killed some people from above, and it’s so sad.”
.
.
.
. .
Bex,
who seemed to have heard such words for the first time in her life, and
Ian, who had a strange and indescribable expression on his face.
The two of them, who were squished under the table, made strange faces and came to Ezel’s side…
“Puuup! ”
“Puhahahahahaha! Ahhh! Cough! Hahahahahahahaha!!! Oh my god! Hey Ezel. Is this really true? Ezel Raiden of the inspection department, whose main job is to use the greatest killing weapon of this era, is that really true!” With a palm the
size of a pot lid . He tapped Ezel on the shoulder excitedly and started laughing.
Ezel, who was so embarrassed that he was laughing so hard that Tower would leave, said something, but Ian didn’t even listen and just looked at the professor and Ezel.
“Oh my god. yes. Someone has to take on the cherry boy position within the team. Now that the professor has a great partner, I will call you Cherry from now on. Cherry gel is better than homogel, right? Congratulations on your promotion! “Cherry-fu-hum-gel!”
Ian twitches his upper lip and bursts into laughter again, as if he can’t bear it anymore, and Bex laughs while tapping his arm.
“At least I can’t say I didn’t get anything up there. Yes, professor. Other than evolving homo-gel into cherry-gel. “What other achievements are there?”
“There are a lot. quite.”
The professor said, recalling his brief conversation with the president. Reinforcements. That is a natural result of the seriousness of the situation.
As always, when talking with President Young, the real meaning behind it was more important than the conversation itself.
‘Things went completely wrong. You must have noticed that there was a disruption in the transport of the box from the first time we contacted you from the radio tower with all the noise of the battle. However, he said that he was quiet at the time, but when he said that the box was completed and passed into the hands of Happy Blind, things went wrong. What could have gone differently from his intentions? Is the box complete? Or did it fall into the hands of Happy Blind?’
One more suspicious thing. The first question he asked as soon as we contacted him.
[Where are you now?]
I asked twice during our short conversation. In the first place, it is clear that the radio tower is the only place where the signal reaches areas 38 to 47 with wide-area jamming not turned off, so why bother asking that twice?
‘…It means that there is a way to contact the president other than the radio tower. ‘Who else are you stringing?’
Roll, roll, head. I think I’ve found almost everything. what? Where did I miss one?
A direction that benefits the president. If we are to be honest, there is no benefit in the box containing the Orpheus Project being handed over to a fanatic, so let’s assume that it was the president’s plan for the box to be completed. I don’t know how on earth he was sitting in Area 47 knowing how it would be completed, but let’s just assume he knew! Let’s say we waited for that.
For now, Happy Blind is excluded from the president’s policy of following suit. Their ultimate goal is the destruction of the old human civilization, so they are located at the exact opposite point of the Dome.
Then, the group that finally got the box. The inspection department seized the unfinished box taken out by the executive branch and completely destroyed the eastern part where the inspection department was located….
‘Executive department?’
What if these friends were originally supposed to cooperate with BDSM locally? However, what if I confirmed that Radio Tower contacted me by doing a live show on my own, rather than using a pre-determined collaborator’s contact method?
[….Damn it. It’s completely twisted.]
‘Here it is. From here on, the president’s big picture was shattered. Originally, this human’s plan was for the box, completed through a certain process, to be in the hands of the executive branch, and for us to receive the finished product and return to Area 47, but it was destroyed from the root, and the Artists’ Union intervened, and it ended up being 5 minutes away! ‘
After hearing the situation, the commander-in-chief said he would send all the remaining troops without a second thought.
Since the original plan has gone awry, they plan to seize the box even by force.
“…First, let’s leave Area 38 quickly. “When the main unit of the inspection department that was out on the farm comes back, it won’t be as easy as it is now.”
“Where are we going?”
“36. “I’ll join forces from Area 47 and play Happy Blind.”
“….It means the time of playing tricks is over. I like it.”
Ian, who was taking out a cigarette with a grin, threw away the completely wet cigarette and briefly cursed.
The end of the situation in Area 38, which had been unpredictable for some time, was starting to come into view, but I still couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being dragged along by someone’s will.
The president’s plan completely collapsed. But if the incident is still ongoing, who was behind the wheel of the collapsed vehicle?
And the executive branch, so obsessed with justice, suddenly moved alone, letting go of the hands of the president of District 47, who is closest to justice at this point?
‘….You’ll know when you come across the box.’
It was an unfounded guess, but the professor had a feeling that it was likely.
****
