Chapter. 17. Preparation for travel (9)
****
Huuuu-
“….That’s how it happened. “Woojin, a legendary mercenary doctor in the past, became the director of Woojin Urology, became a slave doctor for the legless Raptor, and is now the owner of Moby Dick.”
“…This old man is living his short remaining life in a truly spectacular way.”
A narrow corner of the warehouse in the by-product processing area.
The story, which started with people sitting around on a box, ended with thick cigarette smoke.
“…What about the two children in that story?”
“My eldest pregnant child ended up having a miscarriage. My younger brother’s body is not in good condition either. Both of them are close to idiots, so they need someone to take care of them, but if it’s not you, they get scared and scream. So, like before, I became a grandfather who had to go home when the time came.”
“It seems like you’ve changed a little.”
“It has changed. Quite a lot. A person who was thought to be a single person all his life becomes the head of such a large group. He retired because he didn’t want to kill people, but he must have killed quite a few people when he came here. There is no way there would be no friction for Moby Dick to grow to this size. “You can see that just by looking at the security personnel outside.”
“…He’s a guy who doesn’t really ask for favors, but he said it to me while laughing, pretending it was a joke. Kesselring. Before I die, I want to see that bastard’s head fall off my body with my own eyes. A person who was trying to live the rest of his life only with goodness, malice dripping from his eyes. The world is so… shitty. No matter how many times I see it.”
“Brother, why are you being so detailed? When has it ever not been like that?”
“[All area/enemy camp/air reported]”
“Look at me. Bex also agrees with this. Is a wasteland a wasteland for no reason? Right, Professor?”
“….yes.”
There was a feeling that something was unfair.
This is the reality that I came back to after such a great effort.
When I think about it, isn’t the wasteland of our reality a place that even at this very moment someone wants to escape, even by taking their own life?
“…The world is a mess. “Fuck you.”
“Hehehe, seeing those words come out, I see you’ve finally returned. “Welcome to the wasteland, Professor Park.”
Ian threw down the bottle with a smile that was a mixture of self-deprecation and desperation, an expression typical of a wasteland person. Cheer up! The cool sound eased the heavy atmosphere a little.
“I told you to leave it at that for now. “You should also know Old Man Woojin’s circumstances.”
“okay. “Kill all the raptors and, if possible, package the Kesselrings nicely and bring them back.”
“As expected, I understood it well. Well, there is no need to rush there. Anyway, Dom and Raptor will have a fight someday. All you have to do is prepare well until then, and then deliver it to the afterlife quickly and accurately when the time comes.”
The alcohol ran out and the atmosphere relaxed.
Everyone’s face was moderately red, but no one was drunk. In the first place, after hearing that I had come because I had something to do, it seemed like I hadn’t prepared to the point where I was completely drunk.
“Okay then. Now, it is time to look at the story of Professor Park, who was released from prison less than a day ago… Mutant by-products, and by-products of people who are close to humans, are still being distributed on the market, right?”
“Do you know?” “What about the rumors? I also don’t stay in the dome that long. “The owner here, Old Man Woojin, knows all about this… What time is it now?”
“[23:00]”
“Then that won’t work. If four drunk men barged in late at night, they might inadvertently cause trauma to the kids in the house. Hey, former inspector general. “Do you know anything about that?”
“What do you know about me? “Like my brother said, it’s a ‘job changer.’”
“But every time I come to the dome, I stop by the inspection department at least once. “I’m sure there are rumors to be heard, right?”
“Oh, if that’s the case, I can say there isn’t one. In fact, it is difficult to even see competent people in the Dome, including in the Inspection Department, these days. Everyone has to manage the suddenly widened sphere of influence of the dome, and also search for the suspiciously quiet raptors. They have also become invisible and inaudible, and the only way to find them is by ground vibrations and track marks. To find them, all kinds of monsters are needed. “We have to go deep into the infested wasteland… It’s clear that Dom doesn’t have enough time to pay attention to internal affairs.”
“You have a knack for saying ‘I don’t know~’ for an incredibly long time. Anyway, I’m saying that none of the people here know about the ‘human hunting’ the professor mentioned…”
Tak. widely. widely. Tak…
Four men sitting around in a narrow warehouse, putting their heads together. As the sound of fingers tapping on the wooden box gradually became more irritating, the shorter of the four suddenly stood up.
“Uh… Uh….”
“Hmm? All of it. “Do you know anything?”
“[Insider/Existence/Acquaintance]”
Vex continued making hand signals at a rapid pace as if something had occurred to him.
“Other than us and BDSM, who else do you know… Oh, by any chance, Jesu? Of course, Rabbit, that woman is also a big business person, so there is a possibility that she knows-” “
[Incorrect answer/applies to all acquaintances/all allies/radius of 20 meters]”
“If it’s within a radius of 20 meters…. doesn’t that mean she’s right next to you? If we all know someone who is here and works in the mutant by-products industry…” “
Ah. if?”
“Is he there?”
Bex nodded at Ian and Ezel’s reactions.
‘Someone that Ian Ezel Becks knows at the same time. Since I said it was all of us, I also know someone. Since you said there are people around, there are people who live in the dome and work in the by-product industry. Among the people I know, there are people like that…’
Oh, there it is. Just one guy.
“…Nephew? “The one in chat room 47?”
When I asked a question, all three responded in the affirmative.
“Does he look like him? That guy has definitely been in the by-product processing industry since the beginning. It is said that in the beginning, when mutant corpses piled up so much that it was difficult to burn them all, they jumped in and are now treated as quite experts. Doesn’t he know the dark corners of the by-product market?”
“That could be possible…?”
Jokas. Built-in chat room in District 47, known by the player name ‘Jokass’. Now that I think about it, I remembered that he had come over to the Dome and was working as a cleaner for mutant corpses, and that the by-product processing industry was an emerging trend. Certainly, someone who has personally witnessed the rise and fall of the mutant by-product business might know something.
“But is he here at this hour? It’s eleven o’clock at night now. There’s no way a guy who has a family would still be out at this hour-” “
[Subject/Night shift/Blood relatives/Weight]”
“Ah.”
“I’m here at this time because my family has grown.”
right. Didn’t you say that you roasted sesame seeds with roe deer and that you have now become a father?
It seemed like he was always being held captive like that, but he must have been cutting up blood clots in the factory until this hour.
“devil.”
“Well? You say you always smile and smile? In a world where the population has gone beyond extinction and the human race has come close to extinction, the number of families has increased. It’s like, ‘Families become copies!!!’ “He went around bragging about it all over the neighborhood.”
“Did she have that kind of image?” “Unlike in the chat room, she seemed a bit shabby.”
hmm. If you’re happy, that’s okay.
Anyway, since he was right next to me, there was no reason not to meet him.
Grumble-
“It’s my nephew…”
Now that I think about it, I heard that everyone is gathered at the dome, so I guess I should meet him at least once.
I put my hand on the doorknob of the warehouse where cigarette smoke was acrid, recalling the names of people I often saw in the chat room in my head one by one.
When I think about the person I need to meet, this comes to mind for a moment.
“Now that I think about it, when my Vex acquaintance was talking about something, the topic of Rabbit came up briefly… Are you two still dating?”
“Keck!”
At those words, Vex, who had just followed behind me, froze like a stone. The other two people who were roughly putting away the box they were sitting in also grinned at those words and approached.
“Professor Park.”
“why?”
“As expected, you are in third place.”
“….hmm?”
“When they are in the dome, they go out and sleep separately. “Aren’t we supposed to be with our sweaty kids?”
“?!!”
“First of all, the average line of the wasteland was roughly adjusted to our own.”
This time, on the contrary, I stiffened.
Rabbit.
One of the completer candidates who is deeply involved in Gedreutz’s plan.
A powerful individual who possesses GG’s [Save/Load] privileges and [Community Manager privileges] that allow him to directly participate in the GG community.
A cool-headed, talented, and ambitious man who is one of the most famous people in the wasteland.
“He?”
Taaaaah!
“[Party/Quality Goods]”
“No, if you know it, it’s real. We all know it, but… When it comes to dating, honestly, Becks, you’re a little bit-” “
[Field/Professor Park/No say/Beginner]”
Like lightning, it struck the back of my head. Vex gave a hand signal and walked out of the warehouse with a confident-looking gait.
“Brother Bex’s words are correct.”
“Hehehe. Cheer up, 3rd place. “The guy you’re meeting now was your friend a few years ago, but now he’s your kid’s father.”
The other two left the warehouse one by one, making mocking remarks.
I was the only one left in the warehouse, struck by the shock of the sentence.
“What are you doing! Come quickly dude! “I heard you’re going to see Jocas!”
“Uh huh…”
What can I say. I felt a deep, indescribable sense of defeat.
The guy wasn’t far away.
Hand movements that regularly divide varieties using various cutters hanging from the ceiling under bright fluorescent lights.
Empty!
When Ian knocked on the machine he was using, he seemed to have noticed us and turned off the cutter and raised his eyes with dark circles.
“We still have a long way to go to shift?!”
I looked at this for a moment and then closed my eyes.
Ian Ezel looked at Bex in turn, then back at me, then took off his thick gloves and rubbed his eyes.
The guy who showed a dramatic reaction, like a scene from a cartoon, finally opened his mouth after we had waited long enough.
“Why are you here?”
“How did it happen?”
Jokas. Speedwagon Ttekeoluk, roe deer, Heungan Mandu, my online friend of 7 years. He’s a guy who knows how to stay in line even when he jokes, and he’s a gamer who’s as good at GG as Danah, a professional information dealer.
“…This is Joe Case. “I’m different from Metal Joe, so I just call him Jocas.”
“Oh yeah. “This is Professor Park.”
The guy was wearing a transparent plastic apron covered in blood and clumsily raising his hand in front of the delicately severed corpse of the mutant.
****
“….You brought the hottest potato in the industry.”
“I’m sorry for talking about work as soon as I saw your face. “You must be tired.”
“It’s okay, dude. “It’s not like we’ve known each other for a day or two.”
“How do you know?”
“I know. “There are a few people around me who got sick because of that.”
A brief welcome after the happy ending. When I asked him how I came here and told him what I heard from Camilla, his face immediately hardened.
“…How much do you know about the mutant by-product business?”
“What do you mean it’s not something that can’t be used like a mute?”
“You’re saying you don’t know anything. “Let’s start with what’s going on?”
Drurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr –
Jocas hoisted the corpse he was working on upwards on a chain, sprinkled water on the blood-soaked desk and wiped it away with a rag.
“…Is it okay to do that?”
“uh. This is a type that doesn’t use blood, so you can throw it away. Sit comfortably. Mr. Metal Joe, please sit down too.”
“No, that’s not it…”
I was talking about hanging a decomposed corpse above one’s head like some kind of ‘mysterious exhibition of mutations’.
“then. First, let’s explain the market structure.”
Maybe it was because he was used to it, but Jocas started talking quickly with a face that looked like he was dying of exhaustion.
“Disposal of mutant corpses is largely divided into three categories. Hunting/decomposition/processing.”
“It’s not much different from catching a deer in the forest and disposing of it, right?”
“It’s no different. “It’s just a matter of catching and processing animals in the category of mutants.”
However, the expertise required for that simple process is said to be different from general hunting.
“The thing to keep in mind during the variant hunting stage is that there are too many different types of variants circulating in the world right now. Most of them have mutated based on humans’ broken imagination, or have been mixed with other living things around them in the process. “There are so many different types that it is meaningless to classify them by species, and even though they look similar, they are completely different on the inside.”
“but. “Because no two people in the world are completely alike.”
“So the ‘hunting’ stage of the variant requires hunters with sufficient expertise. “Regardless of the risk of the variant, only by using people who know which parts of the target are of high value and where they should and should not be touched can we secure marketable ‘variant corpses.’”
Jocas said this and shared his experience working as a cleaner and porter in the early days of the mutant industry.
I was just shooting without thinking and burst the gas bag, causing a huge explosion.
A hunter who spent a week rubbing mutant feces all over his body and ambushed him, pierced the target mutant’s forehead with unprecedented neatness and brought it back, but it turned out that the reason the mutant was being sold at a high price was because of the research value of its brain, so no one took the item. .
There was a rumor that among the mutants processed by the dome, there was one that was extremely expensive, so they dug up a pile of shattered mutants in front of an incinerator, etc…
“In the end, to obtain the products needed in the market, you need appropriately educated talent. The conclusion was that it was. Since they cannot be classified by species, they are classified by lineage. If it has an outer shell that can deflect a pistol bullet, the outer shell itself has commercial value, so suppress it with gas or chemical bullets. Guys with bulging chins have a high probability of having secretory sacs, so make sure they don’t burst. Well, it’s still close to a rule-of-thumb approach. However, since the emergence of professional companies that studied such classification tables, the amount of variant by-products supplied to the market has increased significantly.”
“Professional.”
“As I said before, it’s the same as hunting animals. If you catch a bear, but its skin becomes tattered and its gallbladder bursts, it’s of no use, right? Since it is a hunt to treat it as a product, talented people with specialized skills are needed. “Remember this.”
Next is disassembly.
“What I’m doing now. Same thing. When a mutant carcass that has been carefully captured enters this processing area, the owner is determined through an auction, and then a division expert like me receives a fee and distributes it according to its use. If you can figure it out by eye during the hunting stage, there are times when you need to disassemble it through direct experiments during the disassembly stage. Well, it’s probably quicker to see it with your eyes. “Do you want to see this?”
Jocas rummaged through the trash can and pulled out a neatly chopped piece of bone, placing it on the cutter’s belt.
“What would happen if I cut this with a laser cutter?”
“Um… will you get cut?”
“That’s all for non-experts.”
Click.
Weeeeeee-
I pressed the power button and the blade of the laser cutter that came down from above slowly passed over the bone fragment.
And
boom!
Ta-da-da-da-da-da-dak!
It exploded quite violently.
“Wow.”
“As you can see, it explodes. Since this is quite sharp, people like me who work without a transparent bulletproof plate around the cutter tend to get injured. Most of the bones of the multi-jointed variant are like that. Even when a hardened structure receives heat, its ductility remains the same but it expands. When heated – boom! So, there are many houses that use waterjet carving or do not use it.”
In addition, since we deal with mutant corpses made of all kinds of chemicals, it is easy for someone to die while working unless they are a proper expert. So it is said that the number of disassembly and processors is much smaller than that of hunters.
“Finally, processing. This is Gunsmith’s territory, where old man Woojin and a few Dome scientists risk their lives. “I don’t know much about this place.”
“What is certain is that this industry is structured so closed that only experts can intervene.”
“He’s an expert… So you’re saying it’s not something that can be messed with by a bunch of idiots coming from somewhere?”
“that’s right. As for the hunting stage, all people in the wasteland are human hunters, so even if you put professionalism aside, the disassembly and processing stage definitely requires experts. An expert who will dispose of objects that have some remnants of what used to be a person. “A guy who can handle things that just aren’t possible with good dexterity.”
Regarding matters related to by-products, Dom said that they have applied quite strict regulations. A variant that maintains a human-like form. Variant that walks on two feet and uses tools with hands. Mutants that attempt to communicate or show signs of intelligence should not be killed unless they pose a direct threat, and even if killed out of necessity, they should not be distributed on the market.
If you violate it, you will be taken to the inspection department.
“…You mean it’s not something that an individual can handle?”
“Experts who sell and auction objects resembling human hands or heads and even process them knowingly, and a space where they can work away from others. And to an expert’s eye, it’s obvious right away, right? A fool who can process such items into practical items without any hesitation. Unless you are a group that has it all, it is difficult to properly integrate such items. “This place has to be on the level of Moby-Dick.”
It’s not Moby Dick. There would be no room for such a human butcher in the group managed by Old Man Woojin, who had only a desire for revenge and the self-consciousness of still remaining a doctor.
For a group of this size and running a business of this size, there are only two things left.
“Let dormancy and… what was it?”
“Snaila Company. Neither of them are of good quality, but if you go deeper into the manpower business, the Snaila Company mainly deals with slave trade, drugs, electronic drugs, and add-ons for illegal connectors. “They don’t have facilities like this or they are small.”
“Then there is one left.”
Let human. Rat people….
“It’s clear that they are a group with a strong identity, right from their name.”
“Okay. It’s a let human… so the size is a bit difficult to handle. “Professor, should we contact the inspection department now?”
“Well, that’s as far as it goes. “It’s annoying when the kids are sleeping.”
The professor who was listening focused his attention on the clock hanging on the wall. midnight. It was already a time when quite deep darkness had fallen in the dark valley.
“Let’s do it ourselves.”
“what?”
“Hehehe. That’s good!”
Ezel, who was immediately lifting the communicator, was suddenly dumbfounded by the sight of the three people plotting a plot.
“how. Should I go undercover? Or should I start by destroying the front door?”
“By infiltration. You haven’t really looked into it yet. Oh right. Hey Metal Joe. Just give me some guns. “You didn’t bring it with you?”
“This bastard is missing. Let’s take some on the way. “I need to pack my bags for the first time in a while.”
“….he Hepburn…. hehe.”
“It’s been a while. “I kind of feel nostalgic, don’t you?”
The back of three men sitting around and shaking, as if they already knew where and how to attack and the structure over there.
For a moment, Ezel could feel the meaning of the letters engraved on the backs of the three neighborhood oddballs.
A beautifully embroidered pattern on a
BDSM leather jacket.
And unlike the regular members, their leather jackets had large initials engraved on them.
H
I
V
Hepburn. Ian. Vex.
The three of them are like an urban legend in the wasteland, having destroyed and taken over the underground bunker in Area 45, even though all Dom and Raptor elites were deployed at the time.
When such people face off against one of the top three back alley groups, which one should we consider more dangerous?
“Hmm… I’ll think about the rest as I go. Ah, Jocas, it was nice to meet you too. Next time, let’s meet somewhere quiet with the other kids. “I have some work to do today.”
“Uh um yeah. A real store?”
“You told me to go in writing, right?”
“No, that doesn’t mean I’m going to leave right away…”
The professor slowly relaxes and Ian cracks his neck from behind. The look in Jokas’ eyes as he looked at Bex stretching was not much different from Ezel’s.
“Um… let’s just say there was a gas explosion on the dome side. Oh, Ezel, please go to the inspection department right away. “It’s going to get really noisy, but please tell me that me and my kids are there.”
“You want help?”
“No, please come slowly. It’s a pain if police comes up for no reason and is treated vaguely. “These kids tend to have some grit.”
I was planning to go or leave it alone, and if I got hit, I would uproot it.
It is said that the back alley group is a necessary evil in its own way, and if a vacuum is created like this at a moment, confusion will increase as other people take their place there.
If it has crossed the moderately rotten line, it is better to scrape it off so that no trace is left.
“It will be my debut in this body.”
“Oh right. “Professor Park, aren’t beams coming out of your chest? I even bribed the doctor to do that.”
“This trash.”
I thought he would be a good partner to test out my new physical condition.
It also has some meaning.
****
