Chapter 22 - Retaking Suwon Station’s Underground

Wearing a gas mask makes your skin feel damp.

It also made me start drooling like Ttori, the mutt at Grandma’s house, with a dog chew in front of him.

I sucked in a breath and swallowed the saliva that kept trying to escape between my lips.

Maybe it was a conditioned reflex from all the tears, snot, and drool I’d shed during chemical-defense training. I think I’d pissed myself a little during that training, too. Thank God that part hadn’t become a conditioned reflex.

HUFF, HUFF.

After a few short breaths, I quickly surveyed the first-basement concourse.

Apparently, coming in really was different from going out. Instead of the red emergency lights that had dimmed ominously during our escape, the place was flooded with brilliant white fluorescent light. It gave us an unobstructed view of the dump of broken glass tangled with smashed ceiling panels.

But we couldn’t let our guard down.

Alteration-Type Eye—Stage One.

There was no fog here, but I decided to use it and check anyway.

Who knew? Maybe using it would build up some invisible experience points and make it stronger.

Besides, if I wanted to cheat at cards in Las Vegas or some other gambling establishment later, I needed to get used to it ahead of time. It was also practice at enduring that unpleasant, squeaky, burning sensation, like getting shampoo in my eyes.

Still, the backlash was definitely... stronger than when I used it in the fog.

THUMP, THUMP.

With every beat of my pulse, the tiny blood vessels throughout my eyeballs seemed to writhe along with it.

How could I describe this sensation...? Like my eyeballs were wrapped in very thin plastic, except the plastic was slightly crumpled, so it didn’t lie flat and felt a little scratchy...

In a word, it was fucking awful. But since fucking awful came in a whole spectrum of varieties, I resolved, as a magician studying magic, to examine these pains and sensations very carefully.

The one consolation was that my eyes didn’t sting as badly as when I’d looked at the road. After briefly wondering why there was a difference, I realized the answer.

People and vehicles traveled along the road, but this wrecked underground concourse was utterly deserted.

Apparently, the fewer things the magic had to perceive, the weaker its backlash.

The backlash dropped dramatically inside the fog, and dropped again when the future ten seconds ahead wasn’t much different from the present. I looked around to see how many footprints would appear in this first-basement concourse ten seconds from now.

Fortunately, there were none. Apparently, the biochemical warfare had done its job.

But I remembered what an earlier briefing had told us about predatory spines: monsters sensitive to light that usually hung from ceilings or pipes, or lay in ambush in hidden gaps before lunging out.

A monster like that was more likely to stay patiently in ambush even ten seconds later than rush out the instant it sensed a human presence.

Without relaxing my guard, I shouldered my rifle. Shin Na-in and Lee Se-jun stayed alert as well, watching different directions to maintain all-around security. Had we waited about twenty seconds? For now, there were no footprints at all near the concourse entrance.

"Shitpants. Hear anything? That grumbling bastard Park Se-hyeok could hear heartbeats."

"Perhaps my faith was true. I started hearing what you might call the monsters’ instincts—their simple voices. That’s what allowed me to survive."

"Stage two of the alteration-type ear branch?"

"Probably. But I can’t hear anything here. They really must be dead."

Still maintaining stage-one eye magic through the burning discomfort, I quietly committed this to memory.

The alteration-type ear branch heard sounds. Park Se-hyeok had heard heartbeats. This lunatic Shin Na-in had been able to hear the voices in people’s minds when he concentrated, and now he claimed he could hear the monsters’ instinctive inner cries.

I wasn’t sure whether it was true, but it seemed we could rely on him for detection, at least.

CLACK.

With a metallic clack, the three of us took the lead.

Of course, we could have sped up the search by throwing First Lieutenant Baek Han-seong and his soldiers ahead of us like human detectors or living armor. But the lieutenant and his thirty soldiers had probably been dragged into this, too. I didn’t want to shove them into danger indiscriminately.

I, Baek Je-min, was someone who studied magic and merely wanted to enjoy its power—not one of those vicious people who hurt others at random. Unlike Shin Na-in, I knew how to respect human life even without laws to make me.

Anyway, that made our search of the first-basement concourse a little slower.

The officers aboveground said they’d already cleared it using biochemical warfare, but in this bizarre situation where monsters attacked people, taking precautions was only natural. Baek Han-seong and his soldiers sensibly moved only through areas we’d explored, concentrating on securing the broad central passages and open spaces.

"The Operators seem to be excellent at detecting monsters, so we’ll concentrate our firepower. Stay sharp. If those monsters catch you, you’ll be begging us to kill you instead."

At Baek Han-seong’s dire warning, the soldiers checked the area’s safety again, huffing through their masks with rigid eyes.

Rather than charging ahead, the three of us matched the soldiers’ pace, working to establish safe zones and eliminate potential threats. Having spent my free time learning every cliché in horror, creature features, and zombie stories, I wasn’t about to tolerate a half-assed cleanup.

To reduce the backlash, I limited my magic to reactivating it near corners and doors. Combined with Shin Na-in’s ear-branch magic, this let us be thorough about detection and preparing for danger.

That preparation paid off outside the women’s restroom.

Normally, I wouldn’t even have loitered anywhere near it. But if we skipped it out of complacency and monsters attacked the soldiers, things would obviously go to shit. We went to search it, and Shin Na-in’s voice changed noticeably.

"Fingernails scraping a blackboard... A monster inside."

"How many?"

"One... But let’s prepare as though there are at least two, Mr. Baek Je-min."

On the other hand, I couldn’t see any footprints coming out of the restroom.

Was an Amalgam waiting in ambush inside? But if it was a predatory spine, it might spring from somewhere unexpected and sever someone’s spine. More importantly, something had survived even after they’d thinned the monsters out with biochemical warfare...

They were every bit as hard to kill as humans.

"Should we use a grenade here?"

Enduring the magic’s unpleasant backlash, I asked Lee Se-jun and Shin Na-in with my muzzle trained on the restroom.

Unexpectedly, Lee Se-jun stepped forward. To compensate for his lack of detection abilities, he briefly explained his alteration-type magic—the heart branch—and made a case for his usefulness.

"Let me handle dangerous work like this. I don’t tire easily. We might need a grenade’s firepower later, so let’s save it for now. I’ll go in first."

"It’ll be incredibly dangerous..."

"We’ve got someone who can see ten seconds ahead and radar ears that can hear monsters. I’ll leave the cover to you. Besides, we can’t use a grenade every single time."

"Before that, let’s talk to First Lieutenant Baek Han-seong. Would you speak to him, Mr. Lee Se-jun?"

"Yes, sir."

While Shin Na-in, who could hear monsters, and I, who could see ten seconds into the future, waited with our rifles aimed at the restroom, Lee Se-jun spoke to Baek Han-seong after volunteering to make the entry.

The fact that a specimen had survived roughly two weeks of biochemical warfare seemed to make Baek Han-seong even more frightened and wary. He nodded stiffly, then barked another order to his soldiers.

"We’ve determined there’s a monster in the first-basement concourse, too. Don’t let those fluorescent lights make you complacent. Check again for fog around you!"

Fog...

True, fog invariably formed where monsters were present. But the air in the first-basement concourse looked perfectly clear. Had three days of ventilation sucked out the fog as well?

It wasn’t quite that simple, though. It was hard to tell whether the heavy layer low in the concourse was a dust cloud or fog. A very thin layer, about five millimeters above the floor, swirled around. It looked like fog, but also like nothing more than a little accumulated dust.

Still, now that we’d confirmed a monster was here, we ought to treat it as fog.

After a little preparation, we decided Lee Se-jun would enter while Shin Na-in and I took diagonal positions at roughly forty-five-degree angles, aiming into the restroom. Lee Se-jun checked his rifle once more, then steadied himself with heavy breaths.

HUFF, HUFF.

Those breaths through his gas mask might be his last.

Under artificial light untouched by even a speck of sunshine, he might end up desecrated and ravaged by a monster, wishing he’d simply been murdered instead. Yet despite his hesitation, fear, and wavering resolve, Lee Se-jun stepped forward.

"Going in!"

Shin Na-in and I moved at the same time.

But since I could see ten seconds ahead, I was bound to be faster. The moment Lee Se-jun entered, he lowered his body to clear a line of fire for those behind him. Over his back, I saw footprints.

Red footprints stamped chaotically across the ceiling. They were familiar, and I knew instinctively.

Amalgams moved much like humans at a full sprint, so this erratic movement...

It was a predatory spine.

Instead of aiming at its body, I aimed at the footprints and immediately pulled the trigger.

My accuracy was better suited to suppressing it than killing it, but I wasn’t ashamed.

Even a perfect marksman’s aim would have gone to shit in this situation.

BANG! BANG-BANG!

As spent casings clattered onto the restroom tiles, ribs flashed across the red footprints. It looked like a stark white centipede scurrying across the ceiling.

But the skull at its front, with its pale eyes, missing lower jaw, and dangling tongue dripping cold saliva as it crawled along the walls looking for an opening, made me want to hug a centipede instead.

Twisting its long body this way and that, the predatory spine flowed along the restroom walls on its ribs. Its gaze was already locked on Lee Se-jun, who hadn’t yet managed to react properly.

Fast.

The moment I aimed ahead at its footprints and fired, I hit its ribs rather than its head.

"Aaaaaagh!"

I fired, and the crouching Lee Se-jun joined in, half-panicked, but it did little good. The predatory spine moved just a fraction faster than our muzzles could track it.

Its pale eyes remained fixed on Lee Se-jun. With its head bent as though watching his hands and shoulders directly, it raced nonstop over the walls and ceiling.

Ricochets and falling casings rang out all around us, but we couldn’t inflict any meaningful damage.

RAT-A-TAT-TAT!

The sound of its ribs tapping the wall sent a trickle of cold sweat down the bridge of my nose.

Its speed was... no fucking joke.

Speed? Was that really it?

It was different from an Amalgam. Amalgams feared my sight, but this thing... was tricking it?

Fuck... Even aiming ahead and firing along its footprints ten seconds into the future, I couldn’t hit it properly!

Without hesitation, I crouched and slammed my left hand against my knee.

Alteration-Type Eye—Stage Two.

My suffering is longer than any age, longer still...

"Aagh!"

The instant I screamed, the predatory spine slipped off the wall and fell.

It had been moving above the mirror over the sinks. It landed on a sink, unable even to writhe, its pale eyes trembling. Only then did we see the dreadful monster’s entire form with our own eyes, not in some briefing footage. Even Lee Se-jun, who’d bravely volunteered to go in, lost his nerve.

But however hopeless Lee Se-jun was at social etiquette, he knew when to shoot.

Without hesitation, he emptied his remaining rounds into the monster’s head.

BANG-BANG, BANG... BANG-BANG...

The gunshots stopped only when Lee Se-jun’s trigger would no longer fire.

CLICK, CLICK, CLICK.

Acrid gunsmoke drifted in the air. Even after the last chambered round had been fired and its casing had fallen, Lee Se-jun kept pulling the trigger. Only then did I finally close my eyes.

I blinked.

Have you ever seen a dead insect keep moving its legs before curling them up? That was what the predatory spine did.

It tangled and knocked its mutated ribs together to make its joints scrape and clatter, trying desperately to swing its tail.

Like a bedbug or flea thrusting its hips in one last attempt to breed before dying.

But Lee Se-jun, Shin Na-in, and I all kept our distance.

An opaque mixture of very pale pink bodily fluid seeped over the sink and gurgled down the drain. The sight killed my appetite, and without realizing it, I raised a hand to my face.

THUMP.

Only then did I remember I was wearing leather gloves—and a gas mask.

I squeezed my eyes shut.

It wasn’t the magic’s backlash. Now that I’d truly grasped one aspect of the fucking monster we were facing, I just wanted to close my eyes.

For fuck’s sake. I almost found myself agreeing a little with China’s view: start by dropping three one-megaton hydrogen bombs on Seoul, then baptize the entire Korean Peninsula in nuclear fire until nothing could live here.

If foreigners saw this, they’d forget aid and all that shit and start dancing all over the nuclear button.

They might even try to wipe out the Koreans who’d already evacuated.

Why, out of eight billion people and some two hundred countries, did these fucking things have to emerge in Seoul, in the Republic of Korea? If the fuckers had to come out, they should’ve done it somewhere like Africa, gotten a nice nuclear roasting, and fucked off.

But I soon found peace of mind.

Right. What in this world was easy? I’d be facing these creatures often from now on to obtain the omnipotent power of magic, so I might as well get used to them early. Who knew? See them often enough, and they might become more familiar than I expected.

Maybe someday I’d be walking even a fucking monster like a predatory spine around like a dog, calling it Spiny.

I detached my magazine and estimated how many rounds remained. Apparently, I’d poured twelve of its twenty rounds into this encounter. Not bad for firing semiautomatically while half-panicked, though it was a bit much to spend on killing one monster.

Today was the first time I’d learned I could move my index finger that fast.

Anyway, I wasn’t wasting eight rounds, so I had to load it back in.

I laid a hand on Lee Se-jun’s shoulder as he continued clicking away at the trigger, then looked at Shin Na-in.

"Mr. Shin Na-in. Can you hear what’s going on in Mr. Lee Se-jun’s mind?"

Shin Na-in shook his head from side to side as though finally coming out of a daze, then checked his own magazine.

Apparently, he’d been firing from behind us, too. Acrid smoke drifted from his muzzle. All three of us seemed to have fired in a trance. He hesitated briefly, seemingly with a fair number of rounds left, but then swapped in a fresh magazine without regret before speaking.

"Mr. Lee Se-jun is thinking we should just toss in a grenade next time."

"Hmm."

A reasonable opinion.

Using one grenade was much better than getting your spine severed and raising a monster inside your body while trying to show off your abilities.

"Let’s go, Mr. Lee Se-jun. We should report to First Lieutenant Baek Han-seong."

* * *

A little later, after hearing our report, Baek Han-seong immediately contacted the surface by radio.

Before long, another squad came in: officers and soldiers from the chemical-defense unit. The follow-up force was commanded by Major Jang Sin-myeong. He’d brought only about fifteen soldiers, but they handled the situation with evident experience.

"Operators, and the unit under First Lieutenant Baek Han-seong, please maintain security. We brought a flamethrower, so we’ll incinerate the monster’s remains."

"Yes, sir!"

With Baek Han-seong’s resounding reply, the search resumed.

Fortunately, we saw no more living monsters.

There were monster corpses, though, so the biochemical warfare hadn’t been entirely ineffective.

Most were Amalgams. Perhaps they’d tried to escape the gas by climbing higher, only to suffocate anyway. They lay dead in a tangled heap in a corner, leaking pus-like fluid. Looking at that sickly yellow liquid, which resembled vomit mixed with human blood, made nausea rise in my throat.

The bright red spots on the Amalgam corpses—especially on the limbs that retained their human shapes—were utterly bizarre as well.

Thanks to our trio’s magical detection and Lee Se-jun’s increasingly paranoid readiness after facing the predatory spine, nothing unexpected happened.

There, I realized that the giant Amalgam pursuing me during our escape hadn’t been just one creature.

One had been shredded by machine-gun fire, one was lying here, and... one had eaten the priest.

"There should’ve been another one besides this."

"How do you know, Mr. Baek Je-min?"

Shin Na-in, who was in better shape than Lee Se-jun, asked.

Instead of acting tough or putting on a mysterious air with something like, ‘Is that so... You don’t know...,’ I freely shared the information with my fellow members of Supreme Mages.

"I don’t see Madam Geulmun’s or Father Jeong Yong-hwan’s bodies."

"Both of them are heretics."

"Their being heretics isn’t the point... No, I suppose it is important to you."

I changed my mind after remembering Shin Na-in’s motto, all that talk about resisting the power of Satan and his devils.

To someone, that might be the most pressing concern of all.

In any case, we’d secured the first-basement concourse again. Baek Han-seong immediately stationed sentries at the stairs leading to the second basement, while Major Jang Sin-myeong and his chemical-defense troops busied themselves carrying various pieces of equipment around.

The three of us guarded the area near the stairs to the second basement alongside Baek Han-seong.

"Mr. Lee Se-jun, we’re all right for now. You don’t have to keep your rifle shouldered."

"No. I think I’ll go crazy if I don’t."

Lee Se-jun had become a thoroughly meticulous soldier, reborn as a sentry who aimed down the stairs alongside the troops with a fearsome look in his eyes. I tried to stop him, thinking he’d tire himself out quickly, but then remembered he was a heart-branch magician.

Wasn’t it an advantage to have someone with the stamina to sprint flat out for thirty seconds without tiring volunteer to keep watch? I left him alone.

Several dozen minutes later, with the vents running and the sickening smell of burning Amalgam corpses in the air, Major Jang Sin-myeong approached. He’d finished checking the fire-prevention sprinklers, fire hydrants, and extinguishers.

He called Baek Han-seong over by radio, then removed his gas mask where the three of us stood.

Major Jang Sin-myeong had a somewhat M-shaped receding hairline that left his forehead exposed, but his features were handsome. Apart from showing a little wear from the years, he looked like a respectable working professional.

"Whew... The first basement is safe. We finished without needing much decontamination, either. You can work here without gas masks."

"Loyalty! Thank you for your hard work, sir!"

"Yes, yes. You did well, too. More importantly, I need to speak with the Operators and Lieutenant Baek. You think there are still more monsters left?"

"Yes."

I was the first to nod.

Of course, my eyes were still fixed down the stairs. Beneath the crushed and torn emergency shutter, it looked as though I’d now be descending the escalator stairs I’d climbed with Father Jeong Yong-hwan.

"I know for certain that two Operators had their heads eaten by Amalgams, but their bodies weren’t in the first-basement concourse."

"..."

Baek Han-seong’s shoulders twitched. He hadn’t even thought to remove his gas mask.

Major Jang Sin-myeong frowned, then stroked his clean-shaven chin and let out a troubled groan.

"That’s concerning. They survived even after we used cyanogen chloride..."

"Major, is there anything we should watch out for?"

"We’ve ventilated the area, but be careful approaching enclosed spaces. There could still be blood agent left. Leather gloves... Whew. I suppose even those are better than nothing for preventing biological contamination from the monsters? You’re not normally supposed to issue things like that..."

Muttering his concerns to himself, Major Jang Sin-myeong looked around the concourse full of shattered windows.

"Just in case, I think you should establish a base here and take spare filters before going down. I’ll contact the surface. We’ll get more spare filters for Lieutenant Baek and his soldiers, too."

"Thank you, sir! Loyalty!"

Baek Han-seong’s voice sounded a little brighter.

Anyway, hearing an expert say we could remove our masks in the first-basement concourse made me feel as though I could breathe again. I pulled mine off to peel away the damp rubber, and the first thing to greet me was the revolting smell of burning bodies.

"Mmm. Aren’t there any corpses that burn with a nice forest scent?"

"Mr. Baek Je-min, stop talking such ridiculous shit."

"Why don’t you take off your mask, too, Mr. Lee Se-jun?"

"I’m fine."

The memory of nearly falling victim to the predatory spine must have hit him hard. Lee Se-jun remained stock-still.

What could I do if he didn’t want to? Despite the foul smell, Shin Na-in and I decided to focus on breathing without our masks.

The touch of the underground air against my damp skin felt decidedly strange.

Then Shin Na-in beckoned me with a small gesture.

"I need to speak with you privately."

At that, I thought the moment had finally come.

Had that fucker Lee Se-jun finally had enough and decided to frag me? Abandoning our Supreme Mages oath, our very own Oath of the Peach Garden? Shin Na-in had probably heard it with his alteration-type ear magic.

Having jumped to that conclusion, I watched Lee Se-jun warily and quietly leaned my ear toward Shin Na-in. What I heard was completely unexpected.

"Mr. Baek Je-min. You said you couldn’t find the bodies, right?"

"Yes, well..."

"I can hear it."

"Hear what?"

Unlike my intuitive, clear, utterly transparent way of speaking, this bastard seemed more interested in looking cool. Just as I was considering giving him a tap with my rifle butt, Shin Na-in whispered with a distinctly serious expression.

"Among the sounds of scraping blackboards, I can hear a voice calling for the Lord. This..."

I held out a hand toward Shin Na-in, cutting him off.

The priest was alive? That thought never even occurred to me.

I’d seen his head melt away. If he was still alive after that, he was already a monster.

Suddenly feeling parched, I took out my canteen. One swallow, two... no, three, before I could finally moisten my dry lips.

"Good thing we saved the grenades."