Chapter 160 Baek Jemin in Times of Chaos

We Supreme Archmages left the supermarket without delay and headed for Gyeonggi Provincial Government Office Station, where the soldiers from Supreme World were supposed to be staying.

This was where my thoughtfulness really shone through.

I, Baek Jemin.

A man who knows full well that if you’ve received something, you should repay it. I was well aware that thanks to the refreshing concessions and acknowledgement of my companions, I had usually enjoyed everyone’s attention all on my own. So before opening the supermarket door, when we reached the entrance where the shadows were darkly retreating, I gladly yielded the opportunity to walk in the lead to them.

I smiled warmly as I did it, the broken freezers and carts scattered chaotically behind me.

"Anyone want the honor of going ahead of me?”

Surprisingly, the first person to answer was Go Ryeoha.

While the other Supreme Archmages looked at me like, “What the hell is this bastard on about?” Go Ryeoha narrowed her eyes, curled one corner of her mouth and glared at me.

"Hubae-nim, you’re not saying that because you don’t want to go first, right?”

"Of course not. Master, what kind of person do you take me for?”

I’d be disappointed if I looked like that much of a coward. After rational consideration, I had devised a tactic where I’d put Lee Sejun or Go Ryeoha, who looked like they could take a hit, at the very front, while I stayed on the second line ready to respond flexibly.

At that point, Go Ryeoha suddenly let her shoulders droop slightly and pouted.

"No, I was just wondering if Hubae-nim still had some of your former self left in you.”

"?"

Wondering what the hell she meant, I used Ears-branch, Stage 1 [Mind Reading].

'No matter how I look at it, Hubae-nim was better when he was all pathetic. If he grows too fast, he won’t cling to me going “Master~” anymore. I should get in his way a little. Hubae-nim really was at his best when he cried and clung to me!’

...

As my expression stiffened instantly, Go Ryeoha finally noticed the strange atmosphere and pretended to jump in surprise. As expected of a Stage 4 wizard, she was experienced. She immediately smoothed out her expression with incredible ease, though something about it felt off, then returned to her usual kind smile.

"Hubae-nim! You’re not just reading people’s thoughts whenever you feel like it, right?”

'If two Stage 4 wizards fight, I don’t limit myself to fighting head-on either. You’re not actually going to keep reading my mind, right?’

I don’t understand why people hate people with telepathic powers so much.

If anything, I felt like I should be the one receiving compensation here, and yet the actual perpetrator was waving her hands and laughing cheerfully.

"There are some boundaries we need to respect! Hubae-nim, just because you’re an Ears-branch wizard doesn’t mean you can go around reading people’s thoughts~.”

'Hubae-nim. If you really are still reading, I could also make sure you learn what it really means that I can make medicine from blood. All day, every day.’

The moment I heard that thought, I started coughing.

I actually choked.

"Ahem, hmm. Ahehem! Cough!”

I coughed so hard I nearly gagged, drawing everyone’s attention. Naturally, they were looking at me as if I was the strange one here.

The pastor, who had been watching my reaction closely, was the first to frown.

"Baek Jemin, what the hell? You became a heretic and now you’re really going around reading other people’s thoughts willy-nilly? You’re not creepily reading a girl’s thoughts or something, are you?”

"Girl my ass…”

A few words Father Kang Peter had once said flashed through my mind. Careless words that had sounded a warning bell for Baek Jemin the man. Naturally, I remembered him saying that she had felt a base sort of rapture while executing wizards for the sake of non-wizards.

Fear always tended to grow stronger when the unknown was involved.

But when only a tiny bit is revealed instead of everything, the fear takes on a much clearer shape.

Go Ryeoha.

I’d secretly suspected she might have been an executioner used by the 66 Society…but fuck, now that I could hear how she thought, she was terrifying as hell. I could see why the 66 Society abandoned her. My noble mindset of constantly keeping my distance from Go Ryeoha had once again proven its rationale today.

That was when Go Ryeoha lightly tapped the rabbit brooch attached to her poncho raincoat and smiled brightly.

"Hubae-nim. I told you to start by cutting back on that kind of bad language, didn’t I? If you just make the way you speak prettier, you’ll become popular in no time!”

That smile only made me raise my guard even further.

Her eyes looked rotten like a dead fish’s, yet sometimes sparkled and moved around smoothly. Despite all those long expeditions, her hair was so neatly maintained that not a single stray strand was out of place. Her figure was mostly hidden beneath the heavy poncho, yet the soft curves beneath it moved lightly and occasionally stood out. And even in combat boots, you could still sense the shape of her legs just from the way she stood.

Haah, fuck…

I resent the weakness of Baek Jemin the human.

"Fine. This is so dirty and petty, so I’ll just go.”

"Jemin-ssi. The way your eyes are moving really is hideous beyond words. To think you’d be ruled by your disgusting nature and leer like this even in a situation like this.”

"Shut up."

Instinct and desire.

There was no point deciding which of the two was more disgusting. Humans had both. Still, if I had to choose, I’d rather go with instinct. Human instincts are innate, while the desires Lee Sejun harbors are acquired, which makes them even worse.

In the end, I clicked my tongue and decided I would simply take the lead myself.

Of course, without Hamza’s rational and logical argument backing that decision, I might have made the wrong choice.

"Jemin-ssi, since you’re both an Ears-branch wizard and an Eyes-branch wizard, if you think about it normally, having you take the lead and scout ahead is better for the group’s safety in many ways. It’s a suitably Supreme kind of job that only you can do. And I want to add that it’s not so strange for you to get caught up in your instincts in such an extreme situation either.”

"Hmph."

I scoffed, but acknowledged the logic in Hamza’s argument.

Quite a few of the other Supreme Archmages agreed with him too.

Go Ryeoha, Lee Sejun, and even the fanatic zealot pastor subtly gave Hamza a thumbs-up. Hamza’s intellectual side had managed to unite all of us again.

And so, I, Baek Jemin, ended up taking the lead once again.

Naturally, no matter how great a sense of duty you possess, it all becomes meaningless  when your life is actually threatened. Even a Great Archmage such as myself occasionally felt fear of death or eternity well up inside of me.

It was even worse while putting on my gas mask for outdoor activities.

I removed the filter canister, lightly rinsed the gas mask with water, and as I put it back on, the distinctive smell of damp raw rubber greeted me. Then I reattached the filter and picked up my custom AR-15.

-Click.

Amid the sound of metal locking into place, I slowly started walking.

I’ll admit I was tense when I cautiously pushed open what remained of the supermarket's glass door, which was pretty much nothing but the frame. Raising my gun toward the sky the instant I opened the door had become an ingrained habit. In Supreme World’s Seoul, there had been all kinds of disgusting things flying through the sky like Human-Skin Jellyfish.

But it was completely quiet.

Aside from vehicles crumpled and abandoned after accidents, the streets were surprisingly clean and tidy. There were relatively few signs of looting too. The high-rise and commercial buildings lining the six-lane road were completely deserted. All I saw were curtains fluttering from open 2nd-floor windows and heavy bags tossed onto the roadside.

The only obvious signs that anyone had looted the area were two convenience stores facing each other across a crosswalk. Fallen shelves and merchandise spilled behind shattered windows showed that people had come through there after the disaster.

It was still hard to tell whether those traces had been left by survivors from 5TB Phone World or by unlucky survivors from Supreme World.

I wondered whether I should investigate, then shook my head and changed my mind.

Joining up came first.

-Huuuff—.

A short exhale passed through the gas-mask filter and took on its distinctive breathing sound.

"Pastor and Hamza in the center. Go Ryeoha in the rear. Lee Sejun follows directly behind me, ready to intercept.”

"That’s unexpected. I figured a horny bastard like you would keep Master beside you. What? Are you into manly girls now?”

"What the hell are you talking about?"

Maybe because Go Ryeoha was originally a Seoul wizard, she had extensive experience with using magic. She was excellent in close combat and at providing ranged support, and her ability to respond flexibly meant she could freely deal with surprise attacks aimed at the rear. Most importantly, she was hard to control.

Lee Sejun, in contrast, used magic with the rigid mindset of a non-wizard, but he was excellent at hauling around luggage and providing fire support. If I pointed at something, he was the kind of bastard who would immediately shoot at it. As damn annoying as he was, I could use him.

Humans tended to prefer a villain they could bargain with over a benevolent absolute being that acted however it pleased.

That was also the only reason Go Ryeoha, who made me grin just by looking at her, and Lee Sejun, who pissed me off to no end by just standing close to me, could coexist in the same world. If Lee Sejun acted however he wanted as well, I would have personally shot him already.

"Enough of this bullshit. If I detect an enemy with Ears-branch magic, I'll raise my left hand. The moment you see that, stop moving, immediately drop to one knee, secure the surroundings, and aim your weapon. Master, rather than kneeling down for long-range engagements, focus on knocking back or killing anything that gets close. Without military support, we should avoid close combat and indoor entry as much as possible because of the high risk of infection and injury.”

"Wow. No, seriously, wow. How can a person change this much? You were definitely nothing more than an idiot not too long ago.”

"If indoor entry is unavoidable, I’ll make an initial check with Ears-branch magic. Until I’ve checked it with Eyes-branch Stage 1, everyone’ll cover the flanks and rear. Once safety is ensured, I’ll enter first, followed by the pastor and Hamza. Go Ryeoha and Lee Sejun hold the entrance and prepare for a possible encirclement or ambush. It could be dangerous for all five of us to stay gathered together in one spot. So if we have to split up, the pastor will act as section leader with his power as a Dogma-type wizard and take Go Ryeoha and Hamza with him. If you’ve all engraved that into your thick skulls, let’s go.”

We traveled aboveground.

It might have been easier for us to defend underground, but if there was any leakage onto the tracks, the risk of infection would rise far too much.

Even I, who was immune to mutation, avoided that shit like the plague because it would make my experience points vanish. Ordinary wizards without a pentagram and non-wizards were obviously far worse off.

Even if it meant accepting the risk of greater exposure outside, I judged the surface to be far safer because an ambush would still leave us other routes to move through.

Fortunately, I wasn’t the only one who had to account for every danger. The pastor, who served as the emotional pillar of the Supreme Archmages, looked reluctant, but still did his part.

"Everyone, don’t get too close to buildings or vehicles. Until that heretic Baek Jemin finishes his detection, keep your distance and maintain enough space to shoot or respond.”

"Yes."

"We’ll do as you say, Pastor!"

The only Supreme Archmage whining was Hamza, who had a backpack strapped to his back. Lee Sejun had stuffed his backpack full of bottled water too, while Go Ryeoha was using [Telekinesis] to float bundles of water along with us.

"Uuuugh."

"Hamza. Don’t worry. You don’t have to cry.”

"The angel says this place is dangerous too. How am I supposed not to cry…?”

"If anything happens, I’ll send you off first. Don’t worry.”

Unfortunately, that only made Hamza recoil even more and put more distance between us.

I was really disappointed in Hamza for doubting our friendship. I don’t understand why someone who believes in heaven freaks out so badly when offered an express trip there. If I sent him to heaven before he racked up any more sins, he could even consider me his benefactor. Tsk.

Enough with the distracting thoughts.

I consciously cut off my stray thoughts and began taking light steps forward, heel first, to minimize any unnecessary noise. At the same time, I darted my one remaining left eye around as quickly as I could, taking in my surroundings.

Several more intersections lay along the long, straight road, but there were so many crashed vehicles that driving through was basically impossible. At the intersection one block ahead, a double-decker tour bus had fallen onto its side and blocked the road.

There were skid marks leading up to it and several cars had crashed into it, so it looked like the bus had sharply turned the wheel and lost its balance.

But even as I rapidly scanned the area and used Ears-branch, Stage 2 [Hearing Monster Voices] to prepare for a possible ambush, one fact was obvious. There were extremely few monsters. I focused on the road filled with trash, broken glass, and car wrecks, the empty storefronts, and the sky visible beyond the high-rise buildings scattered here and there.

The sky, stretching over the uneven green hills and the distant city, was filled with thick gray clouds.

Considering it was October in 5TB Phone World, even with the abnormal climate, it was undoubtedly fall. And what was fall? The season of clear skies and abundant harvest. The sky should have been wide open overhead, yet all of Seoul was covered in dark clouds.

Thankfully, it wasn’t raining.

However, the streets inevitably looked extremely gloomy without any proper sunlight. Heavy air pressed down on my shoulders and the crown of my head as I continued forward. I could feel the other Supreme Archmages gradually dropping their playful attitudes and genuinely heightening their vigilance.

The important point here was that we were heading toward the Gyeonggi Provincial Government Office.

The route from Yeonghwa Station on the Shinbundang Line to Gyeonggi Provincial Government Office Station was more or less the same as heading north toward Seoul. And yet there were no traces of monsters. Aside from the occasional muffled noise traveling through the water pipes beneath the road, the closer we moved toward central Seoul, the more suitable the area actually seemed for human survival.

What was flowing through the water pipes was probably that monster whose official name was so damn long that I just called it Human Slime for convenience.

Surprisingly, none of the other monsters were around.

There were no Human-Skin Jellyfish drifting through the sky. And without Human-Skin Jellyfish, their subspecies, the Human-Skin Tapeworms, probably weren’t around either. Even if some were lying in ambush, there were plenty of functioning electronic devices nearby, so the Human-Skin Tapeworms' attention would be divided, increasing our chances of survival.

There were no Blood Nets, the Amalgam subspecies that tended to settle in underground spaces, either. There had been an Amalgam, and I can’t deny that it was dangerous, but there was only one. Even that had been exterminated once Go Ryeoha, Lee Sejun, and Hamza joined up.

The truly dangerous one was the Human Slime.

It was slow as hell, so all you had to do was avoid touching it, but now that it had taken over the water pipes it was more or less like a waterborne plague. I exhaled to calm my slightly labored breath and continued through the streets where every person had vanished. Categorize. Organize. Respond. Humans can endure fear by identifying and analyzing unknown phenomena or threats, then figuring out how to deal with them.

I pondered that fact and thought through practical countermeasures.

We absolutely had to use sealed bottles of water. We also needed to check their manufacturing dates. We had to avoid anything bottled in October, and if supplies allowed, even water bottled in September, to eliminate the risk of infection at its root.

I could detect it with Ears-branch magic, so I was fine, but it would be fatal to exposed non-wizards or ordinary wizards without Ears-branch magic.

That alone, that desperate train of thought, was what kept me walking toward the empty center of Seoul. In the face of fear, my reason grew colder. The more I thought through what I needed to do to survive, the more my heart froze, and as it froze, the weight of the fear gradually increased as well.

I was beginning to understand why Supreme World had the concept of a critical point, and why they had decided to abandon Seoul once Human Slime was discovered in the water and sewer pipes. The moment infection spread through the water supply, containment became effectively impossible, unless you shot every last one of them dead.

Was that why they called the point where infection could no longer be controlled the critical point? The limit beyond which they couldn’t hold out anymore?

I already knew the Reality Survival Command had been founded by members of the 66 Society, but hearing the word President from the owner of the grimoire only deepened my suspicions. The President. The President of the Republic of Korea in Supreme World had definitely been in contact with the 66 Society.

And then disappeared.

Perhaps the President was a wizard as well. At the very least, I suspected that Supreme World’s President knew more about the 66 Society than anyone else.

Karwarak Shutet.

Hoping that this ridiculous, ominous spell would lead me to the clue I wanted, I crossed the intersection. As I passed the overturned double-decker tour bus, an eerie chill suddenly swept across my shoulder blade.

-Click.

I reflexively raised my gun and aimed at the bus. The Supreme Archmages reacted just as quickly. Without a word, every one of them stopped dead and secured our surroundings. Even though I hadn't raised my left hand, they had all pushed their alertness to the limit.

Everyone was focused.

Only then did I relax a little. And only after relaxing did I realize it.

The cold sensation running down my shoulder blade was my own sweat. Feeling my shirt growing damp, I lowered the muzzle slightly. I was too tense. Heart-branch, Stage 1 [Endurance Enhancement] would keep me from tiring quickly, but this would still wear down the other Supreme Archmages’ concentration.

I humbly acknowledged my own shortcomings.

It was simply a mishap caused by my lack of experience using Ears-branch magic for detection. I wasn’t accustomed to detecting enemies with Ears-branch magic, and because I normally relied on Eyes-branch, Stage 1 [Cognitive Expansion], this was my first time borrowing another branch of magic for reconnaissance purposes.

But it was a trial I needed to endure.

My battle with Father Kang Peter had driven a powerful sense of danger into me. If I relied only on human vision, there were bound to be sinister monsters or counter-magics that targeted it. I needed multiple means of detection to avoid counters like that.

Even Shin Nain, who relied exclusively on Ears-branch magic, had once been thwarted when Yellow-Bandage Straggler used Human Slime to interfere with his detection.

The advantage of having all five branches was that, unlike other wizards whose options were limited, I could use magic in versatile ways depending on what I needed. If I couldn’t take advantage of that, I was no better than a non-wizard. I needed to keep practicing whenever things were relatively safe but the tension remained high.

-Huuuuff…

After calming my pounding heart with a long, deep breath, I gave a brief answer and signaled the Supreme Archmages to loosen their defensive stance.

"It was nothing. Let’s keep moving.”

"What? Heretic, you nervous?”

The pastor tossed out that dry joke with a complicated expression on his face, which I answered with a faint grin.

"Yeah. I’m freaking terrified.”

I started walking again, and the Supreme Archmages followed me with sighs, their guns clattering softly as they moved.

But the cold sweat that had run down my spine didn’t go away so easily. The overturned double-decker tour bus. There was a monster inside it. Not something terrifying like an Amalgam or Predator Spine, but a Human Slime that wasn't all that threatening.

I didn’t want to hear it, but the backlash of Ears-branch magic forced itself on me like clockwork.

Freedom. Freedom. Freedom…

To humans, the word freedom is regarded as an incredibly noble and sublime value. But unlimited freedom is inevitably bound to clash with the freedom of other beings. Human Slime was the embodiment of that contradiction.

If the things that once made up a human gained freedom, would they still want to keep making up that human?

Yum, yum. Freedom. Tasty. Freedom.

Dozens, hundreds, thousands of childish, primitive voices overlapped until counting them became meaningless, all praising freedom. They had gained freedom by dismantling the human they had once come together to form. Each became a single-celled microorganism, multiplied, competed with other microorganisms, formed colonies, yet refused to be reduced to mere components.

Surprisingly, even these childish, primitive human microorganisms possessed something like goodwill.

Freedom. Together. Freedom. All together.

And at the center of the colony of human microorganisms was a human eye.

Everything that had once made up that person had rejected them and scattered, yet the eye alone remained trapped inside until the very end, rolling around. Among the shattered and fragmented pieces of the human soul, only the eye remembered that it had once belonged to something larger and whole, thoughts flickering through it like a mind trapped in delirium.

Ah...

A short sigh. A trace of a human that echoed after forgetting even why it sighed, after losing even its emotions. I couldn’t feel pity or sympathy for it. Anger born from unadulterated disgust and hatred born from fear tangled together and produced a single reaction.

Disgusting.

That was when Lee Sejun’s serious voice reached me.

"Jemin-ssi.”

I came back to my senses.

Only after turning around did I realize that about 15 meters had opened up between me and the rest of the group. While I’d been lost in thoughts, my strides had grown too long, and Hamza and the pastor had started falling behind.

I shook my head and waited quietly, then made sure not to let my stride get too wide, preventing our group from splitting apart again.

We kept moving for quite a while, and every so often the pastor, acting as section leader, would raise a hand and point at Hamza.

"Islam’s tired.”

"Hah, huff…”

When I looked back, I saw that even the pastor was soaked enough beneath his gas mask that it was obvious. All of that was sweat. With three Heart-branch wizards together, I sometimes forgot what ordinary non-wizard stamina was like.

Because of that, we had to work 5-minute breaks into our march.

During these breaks, we relaxed a bit. While I alone stood guard with my gun, we exchanged information. What worried me most was the fact that the soldiers had settled inside a subway station.

"Why the subway, of all places?”

With all the dangers I’d mentioned earlier scattered around, it was strange that they would deliberately choose a subway station.

Lee Sejun soon answered my question. It wasn’t the best hideout I had in mind, but apparently Gyeonggi Provincial Government Office Station had been the best option for the soldiers. According to Lee Sejun, a former sergeant and the Supreme Archmage most familiar with the military, this was why.

"After fighting hostile survivors, the soldiers who came with us decided to prioritize avoiding exposure outside. Defense comes first, basically.”

"Even though they know they can’t use the water supply?”

"That’s been causing ongoing conflict. And separate from the fact that the soldiers respect us, if our Aphorism is going to operate properly, the soldiers really will be a burden…”

"Ahem. Hey! Lee Sejun! A burden?! Only when everyone is united under the Lord can we finally drive back evil!”

"Yeah, yeah. I know. That’s why we came out on our own to scout like this. It’s quite a distance away as well.”

While Lee Sejun dealt with the pastor, his narrowed eyes visible through the lenses of his gas mask, Go Ryeoha was looking after Hamza.

"Are you okay? Want me to carry you?”

"Absolutely…Absolutely not…”

Pfft.

Even with the gas masks hiding their faces, I could tell exactly what expressions they were making. I clicked my tongue, but at the same time, I rationally considered the difference between the pastor’s and Lee Sejun’s views.

I wasn’t denying that organized resistance was important. It was better if there were many people.

But in an isolated state where supplies had to be consumed continuously, an excessively large group would only repeat the mistake made by non-wizard hoarder Go Ryeoha. The number of survivors Lee Sejun had mentioned kept circling in my head.

41. Far too many.

Even including the 14 special operators, that still left 27 non-wizards. If they were former special forces, they might have been dependable, but they were blockade-line soldiers whose morale had already collapsed once before, and they were conscripts to begin with. It was a burdensome number.

A burden.

Yeah. A burden.

Of course, if they applauded me, I’d save them. Obviously I’d make an effort to save them. Fuck, who doesn’t know it’s basic human decency to assume people are innocent and rescue them as long as they aren’t pulling some bullshit right in front of you?

Of course I’d try to save them.

I would, but…

"...."

I couldn’t ignore the cold reality.

I can’t save everyone.

That was when I felt some strange looks on me. I glanced sideways and saw the pastor and Lee Sejun staring at me with unusually serious expressions.

"Baek Jemin. What are you thinking about so hard?”

"We can go there first, assess the situation, and think about it afterward. It won’t be too late.”

-Huuuff…

I lowered my head as my breath escaped through the gas-mask filter. They seemed to have figured out what I was thinking. The pastor and Lee Sejun didn’t get that serious over just anything.

And then I realized it.

The pastor and Lee Sejun had chosen to put it off. Whatever the outcome, it was too much to deal with right now, so they had decided to look away.

But I, Great Archmage Baek Jemin, was different.

I smiled and tightened my grip on the gun again.

"From the sound of you, everyone’s had plenty of rest. Let’s move.”

I’d already finished thinking it through.

I’m only human.

So I accepted that I couldn’t save everyone.

I wouldn’t turn away from the reality of this dying world out of some shallow, selfish sense of morality.

If I couldn’t save them, then at the very least, I’d shoot them dead with my own hands before they became trapped in eternity.

* * *

5TB Phone World, October 21st, 2038, 6:17 PM.

We passed a huge stadium and university district. At first I wondered what kind of stadium it was and rolled my left eye around to check, but the sign said World Cup Stadium.

"Wasn’t our country’s World Cup Stadium in Sangam?”

"Guess there’s another one.”

I clicked my tongue at Lee Sejun’s indifferent answer and decided to just keep moving quietly.

The other Supreme Archmages looked like they were getting by. Hamza kept glancing around, apparently unable to trust [Angel’s Intuition], while at some point the pastor started muttering what he called a prayer for me.

"Father who art in Heaven. Please take pity even on Baek Jemin, who has fallen for the temptations of Satan and the devil. Punish him fairly, but before casting him into the sulfur flames of hell, forgive at least some portion of his sins…”

Judging by the pastor’s prayer, it looked like I wasn’t getting into heaven even if I dropped dead.

I should definitely never go to church.

With that resolution in mind, I glanced over to Go Ryeoha as well.

She looked as cheerful as if she were out for a stroll, smiling with her eyes while holding up her Fire-spewing Hand, ominously woven with five-colored thread, and fiddling with a bottle cap. When she noticed me looking over, her eyes widened and she even gave me an awkward imitation of a salute.

"Hubae-nim, all clear!”

"...."

Go Ryeoha was a wizard specialized in fighting and killing people. Seoul wizards really were terrifying. Reminding myself once again just how outstanding my own character was, I focused on moving forward.

Right after we passed the World Cup Stadium, we were greeted by a neat apartment complex.

Living up to the nickname Apartment Republic, sleek, restrained, practical-looking apartment complexes stood spaced apart, strictly adhering to sunlight rights requirements. At a glance, it looked like the kind of neighborhood where wealthy people lived.

Even the roads were far better maintained than the ones we had passed so far. There were rows of trees dividing the road instead of a painted center line, and the tiles along the pedestrian paths were finished so cleanly there wasn’t a single gap between them. I couldn’t imagine how much money they had poured into the place.

It was a sight I’d never gotten to see through the fog covering Supreme World’s Seoul, so it felt strangely fresh.

"Back in my neighborhood, forests grow out of cracked tiles. Seoul really is different.”

"Hey, heretic. This isn’t Seoul yet, you punk.”

"Seoul’s basically right next door. Don’t nitpick.”

Ever since I made a contract with the Double-Semicircle Grimoire, the pastor’s nitpicking had gotten a lot more childish.

I clicked my tongue but kept moving, and before long we reached a cluster of large, boxy buildings with glittering glass windows. Even though I was a Gyeonggi resident, the unfamiliar sight of the provincial government offices immediately made me frown.

"It looks exactly like a brand-new commercial building in some new town with a 90% vacancy rate.”

The person who responded to my remark was Hamza, the foreign worker who knew Seoul and the surrounding geography better than anyone else here.

"Jemin-ssi. That’s just a commercial building. The Gyeonggi Provincial Government Office is a little farther ahead. You can get there if you keep walking, but you can’t see it from here.”

"Hey. As expected of our honorary Korean. You know this place better than me, and I’m the actual Gyeonggi resident here.”

"We call this place, well, in Supreme World at least, Gwanggyo Jungang Station. So it exists in our world as well. Just under a different name…”

"Really? Let’s make a note of that later.”

Hamza’s meticulous habit of scouting escape routes came in handy in ways like this as well.

Fortunately, Gyeonggi Provincial Government Office Station was right in front of the shopping district.

It looked pretty far from the provincial government office itself, but I let that slide. The only people actually going straight to the provincial government office would be civil servants commuting to work and citizens filing complaints, and both groups could stand to walk a bit. The commercial district was more important.

And so, we Supreme Archmages headed down the stairs without a hint of hesitation.

I, Baek Jemin, was at the very front.

Lee Sejun naturally took my right rear flank, keeping watch while carrying the machine gun and our gear.

The pastor and Hamza stood side by side, looking around and keeping watch.

Go Ryeoha used the backpacks floating around her to provide cover for our allies while also guarding against attacks from the rear.

It annoyed me that the formation was more stable and effective than I’d expected. It’s only natural for a human to feel uncomfortable when they work this well with these types of people. I was still human after all.

Then, on basement level 1, in a concourse with a small underground shopping area, ticket machines, and ATMs, I heard several noisy voices.

"Drainage."

"Yes, Warrant Officer Lee."

"Do you think those bastards who left are coming back?”

"No."

"Idiots. Think scattering will keep them alive?”

Cigarette smoke.

I frowned slightly and looked deeper into the basement-level concourse. Soldiers were lying around or standing guard, still unable to fully relax. The moment I came down the stairs, I quickly swept my eyes around and started by counting them and figuring out the group’s composition.

The soldiers wearing fluorescent armbands were special operators. Wizards like us.

The soldiers wearing dog-tag armbands were non-wizards from the blockade line.

In total…

"23 people?”

-Step.

I deliberately made my footsteps audible as I asked out loud. The Supreme Archmages were following behind me, so naturally the soldiers’ attention shifted toward us. Then even the people who had been exchanging a few words behind a pillar just now came into my view.

Military policy was to remove name tags and cover their faces, but these people had only removed their name tags. The scarves that had been covering their faces were pulled down around their necks.

The first person to appear was a staff sergeant in his mid-to-late 30s, wearing thick-rimmed glasses over badly swollen eyes. When he saw us, and then Go Ryeoha, his expression brightened slightly, and he managed a salute despite looking extremely exhausted.

"Loyalty. Staff Sergeant Kim Seonghun. I was assigned to this subway-track reconnaissance mission."

The other was a bald man with an extremely intimidating appearance.

His head was shaved clean, his eye sockets were sunken in, and his brow ridge protruded so strongly that his eyebrows were barely noticeable, giving him an incredibly menacing face. The man, who looked to be in his early 40s and like he would’ve become an illegal loan shark if he hadn’t joined the military, had a cigarette between his lips.

One yellow diamond.

That signified a Warrant Officer in the Korean Army.

Instead of introducing himself right away, he glanced us over and tried to look all cool while taking a drag from his cigarette.

"Sssssp...."

He took an impressively deep drag, but before long, started coughing as if it had gone down the wrong pipe and threw the cigarette away. Even while hacking and clearing his throat, he unexpectedly made sure to stomp the fallen cigarette butt out thoroughly to prevent a fire.

"Cough, kgh, cough, cough.”

"Warrant Officer Lee, I knew something was up the moment a man who never smoked suddenly asked to borrow one. That’s what happens when you smoke a 5mg cigarette.”

"Kgh, kgh…I don’t even know when I’m gonna die. Might as well try something I’ve never done before while I still can.”

While we Supreme Archmages watched in cold silence, Warrant Officer Lee rinsed his mouth with some water from the bottle Staff Sergeant Kim Seonghun handed him, straightened his clothes, and snapped into a crisp salute.

-Smack!

He corrected his posture so sharply that we could hear his combat boots strike together.

"Warrant Officer Lee Seongchun. I’m in charge of this reconnaissance mission. Uh…though at this point, I’m not sure that means much anymore.”

That was when Lee Sejun returned the salute and strode forward with his machine gun in hand.

"Warrant Officer Lee, why are there even fewer people now?”

"Haah…We found traces of people, so I sent Sergeant Park out with seven others to investigate, but we haven’t heard from them. We can’t split our numbers any further than this. And if we go down to basement level 2 and try to hold out there, we don’t know what might come crawling out onto the tracks, so staying on basement level 1 is our best option.”

Then Warrant Officer Lee Seongchun’s eyes began to shine with hope and expectation as he looked at us.

"The people that Sejun-ssi, Ryeoha-yang, and Hamza-ssi brought with them. You’re the other members of Aphorism, right? Did Command realize we went missing? Did you come to rescue us?”

At that, Lee Sejun turned toward me and the pastor with an indescribable expression.

Go Ryeoha and Hamza seemed no different. I could practically feel their gazes boring into the back of my head.

Hsss...

In a situation like this, it was probably better to tell the whole truth face-to-face, right? The pastor would have trouble saying it directly and just talk in circles again. This was where Manly-Jemin had to step up.

I tucked my gun under my right arm, pulled my gas mask up with my left hand to reveal my bare face, looked Warrant Officer Lee Seongchun directly in the eye, and answered firmly.

"No."

We were also trapped.

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