49 – HGL 49

Unexpected Kindness

After finishing the story, Ga-eul got up, saying she had to go to school tomorrow. Black energy was still swirling in the hand that was tidying up the chair, so Eui-jae repeatedly suggested that she go to the emergency room, but she kept refusing and put her hand back into her pocket.

“I won’t come looking for you in the future unless it’s a Fragment I absolutely have to deliver. You must be anxious.”

“You don’t have to go that far.”

“I’ll be on my way then.”

Ga-eul bowed her head and headed for the sliding door, and Eui-jae quickly walked over and opened the door for her in advance. He was about to see her off, telling her to be careful, but a thought suddenly struck him, and he urgently opened his mouth.

“Hey, can I ask you something?”

“Yes! Go ahead.”

According to Ga-eul, she seemed to be working closely with the Management Bureau. However, there was no guarantee that she would know about the guys Sa-young was chasing, but Eui-jae opened his mouth with a hopeful heart.

“Do you happen to know anything about the guys who are artificially creating Awakened…?”

“Yes? Ah… Yes! I know.”

An answer came back that he hadn’t expected much. Eui-jae stared at Ga-eul with a slightly dazed face and asked again.

“…You know?”

“Yes! I heard Jung-bin Ajusshi talking about it a little. I think they said they were also working to prevent Doomsday….”

Ga-eul frowned slightly as if she didn’t like even thinking about it, and muttered.

“They’re the ones who kidnap people and experiment on them. Even if the goal is the same, I don’t want to get involved with them as much as possible.”

Drugs, kidnapping. Doomsday is just an excuse, this is nothing short of a criminal group.

“Did you hear anything else?”

“Yes? Hmm…. Ah.”

Ga-eul rolled her eyes and answered.

“I think they said there’s something at Incheon Port…. I only overheard Ajusshi’s phone call, so I didn’t hear the details.”

Eui-jae said it was okay and thanked her when she apologized for not knowing the details. He watched her until Ga-eul, with her hands deep in her pockets, completely disappeared from the alley.

Eui-jae, left alone in the store, deliberately stayed up all night preparing for business while mulling over the Fragments he had unintentionally seen.

If he hadn’t been able to enter the Fragment of the world directly, and if the background in the West Sea Rift and the Fragment of the world hadn’t been the same, it would have been a story he couldn’t easily believe. He would have thought Yoon Ga-eul was charming him with a mental skill.

‘Another world.’

Could another world, similar to this one, really exist? A world where J died, Jung-bin died, Mok Taeo, Matthew died, and Bae Won-woo lost his left arm. There must have been numerous events leading up to that. What Yoon Ga-eul and Cha Eui-jae saw was an extremely short, extremely small moment in the past.

It is impossible to know when or how Doomsday will come. Preparing for an uncertain future is like closing your eyes and walking forward blindly. That’s why the Awakened Management Bureau is so desperate to find J.

‘…….’

What should I do when Doomsday comes? Will I be able to fight then too? That was also unknown.

Anyway, Eui-jae was confused in many ways because of the gift shower from his regular Hunters and the sudden approach of Doomsday. While erasing the confusion that came like a teaser event for Doomsday with his busy daily life, a text message arrived from Sa-young.

Sa-young: I have something I want you to do

Sa-young asked him to track down the guys who were bringing drugs into the vicinity of Incheon Port and check the route the drugs were taking. Originally, it was Seo Min-gi’s job, but he was on a business trip abroad. Could Lee Sa-young have been the person Yoon Ga-eul overheard on the phone?

Eui-jae: Yes

Sa-young: Can’t you give a longer answer?

Eui-jae: oooooooo

Sa-young: p

‘That young crazy brat.’

Eui-jae chuckled and put down his cell phone. Sa-young’s proposal was welcome to Eui-jae.

Since meeting Yoon Ga-eul, he had been thinking too much. And complicated thoughts disappear when you move your body. If he had a little free time, he would unknowingly do useless things like worrying about how to deal with Doomsday when it came.

So, from the afternoon of the day he accepted Sa-young’s job, Eui-jae took the Wave Guild corporate card from the counter and headed to the vicinity of Incheon Port every dawn.

He didn’t have a car or a license, so he took a taxi, and the late-night surcharge was no joke, but Eui-jae didn’t care. The Wave Guild Master had always been a big spender anyway.

On a quiet weekday dawn, a black van slipped between the containers at Incheon Port, where cargo was being loaded. Soon, several burly men wearing hoods and carrying heavy backpacks got out in a rush. They surveyed the surroundings and headed into a secluded container.

Cha Eui-jae, a young man lying on the roof of the container across the street, watching through binoculars, lowered the binoculars and squeezed his eyes shut before opening them.

As if they had drilled through the container floor, the figures of people going down to the floor below were visible. Eui-jae turned on the earpiece. The sound of people’s footsteps, the sound of opening a heavy iron door. The sound of greetings. A hoarse voice, full of phlegm, asked.

“How much is today’s shipment?”

“Three.”

“It’s been coming in a little less lately….”

Clang. There was a sound of something like a crowbar or an iron pipe hitting the floor.

“…You’re not skimming, are you?”

“What kind of hurtful words are those…? We’re risking our lives to move it too. The Bureau of Rift Management and Wave Guild bastards keep catching us like rats.”

Eui-jae groped around and picked up a roughly discarded leather notebook. On the sticky note attached to the cover, it was written in neat letters:

Min-gi Seo’s Beginner’s Guide to Stealth Infiltration

Eui-jae found the bookmark labeled ‘Slang’ with his fingertips and opened the page. ‘Bureau of Rift Management’ is the slang for the Bureau of Rift Management, and ‘Wave Guild’ is the slang for the Wave Guild. Okay, he wrote down everything.

Before leaving on his business trip, Min-gi Seo handed him this notebook as an apology for the previous job not going smoothly. It seemed that Lee Sa-young had foreseen that he would be assigned this kind of job. He even put rice in the warmer without being asked that day and gave this as a free gift, his customer satisfaction A/S was very reliable.

Eui-jae closed the notebook and focused on the voices.

“That’s right. The Busan side is completely wiped out. Incheon is the only place that’s still getting through.”

“Damn it, where are those bastards smelling us out from?”

“The higher-ups are already talking about it. They say this side won’t last long either, so they’re moving out tomorrow. Before we get caught.”

“Damn it, we’re going to have to move again.”

“Should we start packing?”

“Pack the big stuff now. We have to get out of here before the Bureau of Rift Management comes crashing in. Deliver the drugs to each room.”

“Yes, sir. They said there’s a guy in Songpa-gu who’s about to enter the Mutation stage, so they asked us to increase the quantity a little more.”

Each room… Eui-jae’s eyes quickly scanned the contents. That means they’re going to entrust the goods to suppliers in each region.

Mutation expected to occur soon in Songpa-gu.

Eui-jae scribbled in his notebook, rested his chin on his hand, and fell into thought.

Has it been about a week since I received Lee Sa-young’s request? It was easy to find suspicious guys with the Eye of the Tracker. Eui-jae had been watching them every dawn while munching on convenience store kimbap. This criminal group had a certain pattern of behavior, so it was fun to watch.

But the guys he had finally found were about to pack up and leave as a group….

Eui-jae put the empty kimbap bag in a black convenience store bag, held his cell phone, and tapped his fingers on it as if hesitating. The apron he hadn’t taken off fluttered in the dawn breeze.

‘I’m going to report to Lee Sa-young….’

If he contacted him, Lee Sa-young would send support personnel. He had that much shallow trust now. But those guys are going to pack up and run away soon. Eui-jae unlocked and locked his cell phone again, staring at the container below.

‘Can support really arrive on time?’

Now Eui-jae had two options. First, track down the guys who are packing up and running away. Second, Eui-jae throws himself in to stop the mass migration.

The first option is all good, but there was one very big problem. He could track them down easily enough with the Eye of the Tracker, but no matter how S-class Eui-jae was, and even if he had a skill to hide his presence, it was impossible to chase after guys who were escaping by car or boat with his bare body.

‘It’s not like I have a flight skill….’

This was the first time he had ever envied guys with flight skills so much. Eui-jae pouted and considered the second option.

That is, the method of stopping the mass migration by throwing himself in. If he chose this, Eui-jae would jump into the middle of the guys. The advantage is that he can reliably tie up the guys’ feet instead of sacrificing his own body.

He had never been kidnapped, but he was confident that he could tie up the guys’ feet. If necessary, he could just subdue them all.

‘Huh?’

He rubbed his chin.

‘It might be better that way.’

As expected, if your body is good, your head doesn’t have to suffer. Eui-jae turned on his cell phone and sent a text message to Sa-young.

Eui-jae: (map link)

Eui-jae: They’re cleaning up and running away tonight

Eui-jae: I’ll hold them back

Sent. Eui-jae put his cell phone in his pants pocket and bravely jumped into the container.

A heavy sound of boots was heard. Soon, the owner of the footsteps that stopped nearby clicked his tongue.

“Is this the crazy brat? A guy who jumped in like some crazy psycho.”

“Yes, sir.”

He was going to naturally faint after being hit on the head with a wooden stick, but unfortunately, the wooden stick broke instead, but anyway, Eui-jae succeeded in pretending to be unconscious and being tied to an old steel chair inside the container.

Perhaps judging that only an Awakened would dive in so bravely, the criminal bastards tied ten cable ties to each of Eui-jae’s arms and legs.

“Any connection with the Bureau of Rift Management?”

“Doesn’t seem like it?”

“Why are you asking a question? Didn’t you check properly?”

“He doesn’t have a civil servant ID, and I checked his Hunter ID in his apron pocket, and he’s a common D-class.”

“What kind of guts does a D-class bastard have? …He looks too neat to be an Addicts who smelled the drugs and crawled in.”

“He doesn’t show any signs of Mutation either.”

“Well, we’ll find out if we ask him.”

The man who was muttering put a cigarette in his mouth and flicked a lighter.

“Hey, wake him up. We don’t have time.”

“Yes, Hyung!”

The movement is hectic. Someone roughly grabbed Eui-jae’s hair and raised his upper body. The sound of waves, faintly heard, was mixed with the sound of water sloshing in something. Eui-jae twitched his closed eyes. Don’t tell me they’re going to wake me up by splashing water on me like savages….

Splash! Cold water flew violently.

‘Damn it, they really did it.’

It seems they just scooped up seawater and poured it on him, as he could feel the saltiness. His head, as well as his upper body, were all wet. I’m not asleep, you bastards. Eui-jae gritted his teeth without showing it.

‘Should I have just beaten them all up from the start….’