Chapter 25: Punsu (1)

Walking down the first-floor hallway of the darkened building, Lee Do reached for his back.

It was lumpy flesh.

He dug it out.

More accurately, he inserted his fingers into the bullet wounds.

“…Ugh.”

Grimacing as he bit down on the filter, a few bullets emerged behind his wriggling fingers.

The bullets clattered onto the spot where blood was dripping heavily.

It was a temporary emergency measure.

It was an action perfect for causing excessive bleeding or sepsis, but as always, this body belonged to the Great Daehyup.

The excruciating pain, like dozens of branding irons searing his flesh, was something he could never get used to, and conversely, the option of a hospital was also unfamiliar to him.

Steadying his trembling breath, Lee Do completely exited the building.

The black tactical vehicles surrounding the rain-swept vicinity all belonged to F24.

Even when someone walked out of the building on their own, they only gave fleeting glances; their attention was focused on other radio communications.

“Temporary standoff with OMSEPT, yes. Yes, that’s right. The current situation of the 2nd Security Team, that is. Well, that is to say….”

“…Requesting a cleanup team… Ah, yes.”

Whatever it was, Lee Do continued walking, taking a drag from his cigarette.

The earbud in his ear was either broken or there was no sound or briefing.

It was around the time he passed the unmanned holographic control line.

The bluish lights beyond the hazy surroundings, and those tactical vehicles endlessly blaring their sirens.

It was the center of a rainstorm, the downpour so heavy it felt like the sky had torn open, sending chills down his spine.

Screeech-! A vehicle quickly approached Lee Do.

A sedan, an old model easily over 30 years old.

However, it was commonly seen on the streets, and more importantly, Lee Do himself had ridden in it several times.

It belonged to Vivian.

The face that appeared as the car window opened was also Vivian’s.

And Vivian herself was staring blankly at Lee Do with eyes that couldn’t possibly get any wider.

“…You, you.”

Lee Do averted his gaze from hers.

He was about to flick off the cigarette ash, but instead, he flicked the butt far away.

Because the cigarette had just gone out.

He then leaned his head into the car window.

He put a new cigarette to his lips.

It was the jumper he had taken off on the top floor, and the blood on his whole body clung to his t-shirt, about to drip with the raindrops.

The rain and wind showed no signs of stopping, even hindering the act of lighting a lighter.

Only inside the car could he properly light his cigarette.

Then, with smoke curling from the corner of his lips, Lee Do spoke.

“In the morning, let’s meet at the secondhand shop.”

“…What, what are you talking about?”

“Literally. Let’s meet at your shop in the morning.”

“Hospital, you, I think you need to go to the hospital first.”

“I’m fine.”

“Get in the car, quickly.”

“The seats will get dirty. Let’s just meet in the morning.”

“No… Get in quickly, hurry.”

Lee Do patted her slightly trembling shoulder and pulled his head out of the car.

It was the moment he was about to step back into the rain.

Vivian suddenly got out of the car.

Clack- thud, the door closed, and hurrying up behind him, she grabbed him and stopped him.

“…Is, is the seat the problem now? Get in quickly.”

Her once fluffy hair was instantly soaked and disheveled by the moisture.

Lee Do, finishing his cigarette and looking back at her, thought for a moment and then compromised with a moderate nod.

He had gauged the distance to the motel and also read her confused expression.

Of course, the fact that his eyes felt heavy as if sleepy, perhaps due to his depleted internal energy, was also included.

Silence filled the interior of the car he thus entered.

They departed from the street.

Immediately after, a few F24 agents stopped them for inspection, but Vivian’s car was quickly dismissed and allowed to leave.

It had begun as a temporary alliance, and it truly ended as temporary.

Preoccupied with the government’s warning accompanied by OMSEPT, they no longer acknowledged him.

Had they not even been informed that one of their team leaders had tried to kill someone?

Or were they just pretending not to know?

Silently gazing out at the purple-tinged window, Lee Do opened his mouth.

“Not the hospital, take me to the motel.”

It was less a matter of distrusting the world and more a matter of habit.

Vivian, while continuing to drive, wore an expression as if she couldn’t comprehend.

More accurately, it was an expression as if she had heard something she shouldn’t have.

Vivian, who had insisted until the end that he should go to the hospital, eventually followed Lee Do’s opinion.

Finally showing an expression that was either horror or concern, she reached the door of room 1801, then clutched her forehead and left as if fed up.

Lee Do opened the guest room door. He flicked the finished cigarette butt into the hallway, and with a beep- sound, the keypad unlocked.

The spoiled smell of the pizza he had left behind a few days ago greeted him first.

Ignoring it, Lee Do stripped off his damp, clinging clothes and then washed himself under the thumbtack-like stream of water.

His body was clearly marked with claw marks here and there.

After washing and sitting on the edge of the bed, Lee Do looked out the window.

As he slightly opened the window frame, the sound of rain, shwaaaa-, drenched his ears as if the city itself were submerged underwater.

“…”

He silently listened to the deafening sound of nature.

His body ached.

All over.

He lay naked on the bed, feeling refreshed, but it stung as if he were lying in a jungle teeming with fire ants, so he soon got up.

So a few hours passed.

He waited for the pain to subside enough for Qi cultivation to be possible, and Lee Do was able to recover his internal energy somewhat.

Originally, rushing to recover in such a severely injured state would have twisted his entire body.

It had happened a few times before, but of course, Lee Do didn’t particularly pay attention to it.

In the first place, it was probably thanks to this excessive use that he had reached the level of a first-rate martial artist’s internal energy in less than two years of rolling around.

After morning came, his vision, when he opened his eyes, was clearer than hazily ripe.

Bright light seeped through the slightly open window frame.

Perhaps the dust that had covered the sky everywhere had been cleared by the rain.

Beyond the vast sunlight and blue sky, holograms, and the neons of the building forest, where all things were peaceful, it was as pure as if it didn’t even know what had happened last night.

‘Too much pretense.’

Putting aside the leisurely sentiment, Lee Do got up from the bed.

He bandaged the areas on his chest, abdomen, and side, which, excluding minor wounds, were still oozing blood.

He got dressed and left the room.

After buying a sheath and more spare staves at the market, he bought a bottle of alcohol and ate it with pizza.

Then he went to Vivian’s secondhand shop.

It was a crowded street with many pedestrians carrying raincoats or umbrellas, perhaps because rain was forecast again in the afternoon.

It seemed like a few drops were already falling, tok, tok.

The eaves above her secondhand shop were likewise.

The tok, tok sound occasionally changed to thuk, thuk, and at some point, raindrops began to slide down from under the eaves.

Vivian was leaning blankly against the counter, tapping her fingers.

Watching the rain begin to fall outside the window.

“……?”

Her eyes, lifted at the jingle- of the bell, soon fell on Lee Do.

She shot up.

“Wh-What. What on earth… What happened?”

She asked sharply.

The bruises and minor scratches etched on his face had since healed.

His appearance wasn’t vigorous, but at least it wasn’t as gruesome as the blood-soaked figure of the previous day.

It must have looked strange enough in Vivian’s eyes.

“There’s something like that.”

“What, what on earth is ‘something like that’? You looked like you were about to die just a moment ago….”

Lee Do dismissed her words and tossed a seat-cleaning sponge he had bought at the mart onto the counter.

“…What? This?”

“Tell me what happened yesterday. Stop with the clichéd talk.”

Her face was deeply displeased.

But there was no helping it.

Vivian led Lee Do into the inner room.

OMSEPT was not some !diot that could move recklessly.

She began with that.

Then she roughly explained the relationship between F24, its parent company Metalmix, and the government, their affiliated companies, the relationship between Red Stream and Core Works, and even its parent company Aishio.

Lee Do also remembered Metalmix as a name he had heard from the Dokkebi mask back then.

[ TL Note: A Dokkebi is a mythical creature from Korean folklore, often translated as goblin, but it’s not the same as Western goblins.]

Wasn’t it the arms dealer that had interfered in the chaotic area of White Street?

They weren’t particularly important stories, and perhaps because of that, Vivian continued speaking nonchalantly, with her arms crossed and legs crossed.

“…It just seems like a petty power struggle. From what I see.”

No one kills people over a petty power struggle.

It might have been common sense that only applied to Lee Do.

“F24 did find their headquarters, but as luck would have it, since they’re a Metalmix subsidiary, the government must have suspected them. Metalmix has a notorious reputation for conducting strange experiments with Specters these days.”

In the end, wasn’t it just a predictable dispute over profit and loss?

“But… I didn’t expect them to dig into F24’s back. Are they that thorough with their own work? To even bring OMSEPT along immediately.”

Vivian, who seemed to be deeply pondering something herself, soon stared intently at Lee Do.

“…If you don’t want to, I won’t pry into that monstrous vitality of yours… But tell me what happened yesterday. What happened on the top floor?”

Had she also lost contact through the earbud?

L-Q3’s transformation into a Specter, and the annihilation of the 3rd Security Team.

She had heard about that much near the scene.

She must have also grasped parts of the situation up to just before the meeting room was wrecked by the assault team, by tearing apart the packets from the surveillance cameras.

Lee Do hesitated for a moment, then put a cigarette to his lips first.

“Those OMSEPT b@stards killed them all.”

“…OMSEPT did?”

“Yeah, the 2nd Security Team. Didn’t you hear last night? The F24 guys in front of the building were rambling about annihilation or something.”

Vivian scratched her eyebrow.

Scratching, she rested her forehead on her hand and seemed to think about something for a moment.

It was clearly a look of hearing it for the first time.

It was such a look, but Lee Do strangely felt that it was less so than when she had appeared in the car last night.

It was when the tip of the cigarette was quietly being tinged by the flame.

“…Why?”

“How would I know.”

“Then, it wasn’t just a simple power struggle?”

“I thought so too.”

“Did Metalmix do something to get on the government’s bad side?”

“I don’t know.”

Vivian closed her mouth tightly.

Then, as if having given up as quickly as possible, she blurted out such words.

“Still, you survived.”

“That’s right.”

“That’s what’s most important right now, I guess.”

“Right.”

Vivian forced herself to nod and added one more word.

“That’s a relief,” such words.

However, her complexion soon took on a serious color.

If it was a situation she couldn’t understand as a former white hat hacker, Vivian tended to calculate first.

Her mind was still busy.

The government could even wipe out F24 entirely and eradicate its existence, but for that blade to be aimed at Metalmix was a different matter.

The world of politics is not simple enough for a single human to predict.

It is bound to be unimaginably vast and as deep as an abyss.

Even at this very moment, it was unknown which factions might be colluding under the name of the government, or opposing them.

While Vivian was considering various options, Lee Do simply took a drag from his cigarette.

Exhaling, he said.

“Server.”

“…Huh?”

“Let’s get registered soon, on the Server.”

Such political problems were not his concern.

At least not right now, right?

Though foolish, Lee Do once again recalled the old game, Gangho Jangpaerok.

A benefactor of the world.

It was the ending he had seen in all 19 playthroughs, and the ending of the 20th playthrough, which was just before, was one he had invested over 100 hours in.

Gangho Jangpaerok had a very long playtime per playthrough.

More accurately, it was short if short, and long if long.

Because depending on the build and stats, or potential and even difficulty, defeating the Demonic Cult could be delayed or expedited.

Lee Do exhaled smoke briefly.

So, he thought simply.

It was the beginning of the 21st playthrough, and a weak character at the beginning with only the trait Thousand Refinements, Worldly Experience, Reasoned Skill, which only consumed unnecessary costs.

The current Great Daehyup was like that.

Going to the Demonic Cult’s main hall without hesitation, when it was unknown how long the playtime would be, was not a hero but a lacking fool.

The Great Daehyup might be half-baked, but he was no fool.

‘The way to defeat those psycho b@stards.’

Isn’t it too easy a path?

From a third-rate martial artist to a second-rate martial artist, from a second-rate martial artist to a first-rate martial artist, and from a first-rate martial artist to the pinnacle of mastery.

If not, then he just needed to recruit the bright and righteous heroes of the world with outstanding eloquence and strategy.

Chivalry is not an illusion.

Qi, likewise, was simply real.

He opened the palm of the hand that had been holding the cigarette, and his instantly trembling body still ached from the side effects of internal energy.

That was the true proof of Qi and chivalry.

Lee Do met Vivian’s eyes again.

It was the eaves outside the window, reflected in her orange-colored artificial eye.

A few streaks of rain falling below it.

The moment it poured down, shwaa-, the sound of rain began to whip the ground like a lash.

Just then, the smoke Lee Do exhaled scattered in all directions into the empty air.

“How do you do it? That Server thing. Let me find out too.”

Lee Do asked.

Becoming a benefactor of the world.

The bad habit of retracting spoken words, unfortunately, whether by nature or something else, he didn’t have.