Chapter 12

Chapter 12

Oh Yuhwa was one of the many negotiation officers serving in the Defense Strategy Department.

A negotiation officer was an officer whose job was to secure contracts through negotiations with those who came to register as Awakened, thereby transforming them into Hunters.

This was an age in which Hunters were treated like asymmetric strategic weapons.

The more formally contracted Hunters a nation had, the greater not only its national competitiveness, but also its ability to respond to monsters, so it went without saying that the role of a negotiation officer was critically important.

For better or worse, Oh Yuhwa was someone who would become the most famous among the negotiation officers.

By now, she was probably in about her second year serving as a negotiation officer, and she was likely beginning to build her infamy little by little.

Put nicely, she was an iron-blooded negotiator. Put badly, she was a swindler.

She ruthlessly pushed gullible Awakened into contracts with absurd terms, while with the clever and crafty ones, she soothed and coaxed them into accepting the most conservative contracts possible.

I got taken in too.

At the time, I had lost my father and was wandering around in a daze, half-mad with my desire for revenge against the monsters.

Seeing right through that, Oh Yuhwa shoved an absurd contract in front of me, and without much thought, I signed my own slave contract.

That was how it was back then.

It was a time when I did not care in the slightest about contract terms.

From the Awakened's perspective, she was the worst negotiation officer imaginable, but from South Korea's perspective, she was the best.

She was notorious for being vicious, yet her results were outstanding, so there was no doubt that she was an exceptional talent.

That was Major Oh Yuhwa, the woman known by the callsign [Shylock].

“For now, I already have a rough grasp of your personal details, Mr. Eunseong, so I’ll skip over those.”

Naturally.

The Defense Strategy Department was probably recording everything on video from the moment I arrived at the guard post until now.

Captain Im was the same.

Guiding a prospective Hunter who had come to register as an Awakened?

What a joke.

Captain Im was a kind of watcher and observer, someone tasked with monitoring my every move.

His job was probably to assess me face-to-face—what I looked like, my tone of voice, my speech, my gait, my manner of speaking, and so on.

It would be a serious mistake to think the Defense Strategy Department of a fairly advanced country like South Korea was some easygoing bunch.

“First, I’d like to know what role category you awakened into. That way, we can adjust the contract terms.”

“That would be a little difficult.”

“Yes?”

“I don’t think I can tell you.”

“......”

Oh Yuhwa fell silent for a moment, as if she had been left speechless.

But only for a moment.

With a gentle smile, Oh Yuhwa spoke. “You came here to register as an Awakened, didn’t you, Mr. Eunseong?”

“Yes.”

“Then you do need to tell us what role category you awakened into. If we’re going to offer you favorable terms, shouldn’t we at least know the most basic information?”

“I fully understand what you mean, Major Oh. But I still don’t think that will be possible.”

“Ahaha.”

Oh Yuhwa wore the expression of someone thinking this was the first time she had ever met such a troublesome customer.

It probably was.

Most Awakened were dying to boast about their awakening, after all.

A bastard like me, someone who started exhausting people from the very beginning, was probably a first for her.

“Then how are we supposed to proceed with the negotiation? Why don’t you tell me, Mr. Eunseong?”

“I’d like you to make an offer. For an Awakened with a new role category.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Exactly what I said.”

I answered breezily, as if it were nothing.

“If I awakened into a new role category that has never existed before, what would you do?”

“That seems unlikely...... but if it were true...... then I would have to offer you the best treatment possible, Mr. Eunseong.”

“Then you can do exactly that.”

I said it with a grin.

All right, now it was my turn.

I was going to make her regret having swindled me in the past.

***

Inside a tent in the refugee camp.

There was a trace of worry on the face of Cha Eunseong’s mother, Song Chanmi.

Her son had become an Awakened, and early in the morning he had gone alone to the Defense Strategy Department to register, so it was only natural for a mother to worry.

“I wonder whether he should’ve at least looked for a lawyer before going. You could have gone with him, at least.”

“Eunseong is already a grown man. What are you talking about? We can’t stand over him like he’s some snot-nosed little kid and tell him what to do.”

Cha Eunseong’s father, Cha Geunwoo, smiled.

“But what if he signs a slave contract or something?”

“It’s his first time, so I repeatedly told him not to sign anything longer than one year. It’ll be fine. Besides, sometimes a person needs to taste a little bitterness to learn how the world works. A boy who wanted to become a special warfare officer ought to be able to handle at least that much.”

“But......”

Song Chanmi spoke as if she simply could not put her mind at ease.

“You know our Eunseong is such a kind and upright boy. He’s exactly the kind who’d be easy to scam anywhere he goes.”

“Hmm.”

Cha Geunwoo stroked his beard, looking as if that worried him a little too.

“Eunseong does have that side to him. Honestly, he’s the sort best suited to just putting in his time in the military like me. He’s easy to take advantage of. That also makes him easy to get hurt.”

“Exactly.”

“What can we do? That’s just the kind of world this is. Still, maybe his personality changed a little over the past few days, because our son has been far bolder and more decisive than I ever imagined.”

“That’s true.”

“For now, let’s wait quietly.”

“All right.”

Cha Geunwoo and Song Chanmi desperately hoped that their son, Cha Eunseong, would not get taken for a fool by the Defense Strategy Department, while also hoping that he would handle everything properly on his own, and they forcibly suppressed their anxiety.

That was this couple’s way of raising a child.

Sometimes, even knowing that their child might end up in trouble, they would step back by one pace and simply watch.

***

“Is that really true? That you awakened into a role category that has never existed before?”

“Yes.”

“Then can you show me your crest?”

“That much is possible.”

I loosened my shirt and showed her the crest engraved on my chest.

A snake biting its own tail to form a circle, and the star contained within it, came into view.

“......!”

Oh Yuhwa’s eyes widened as if they might pop right out.

Yes, of course she was shocked.

There was no way she could not be.

Even for her, who had seen the crests of countless Awakened while serving as a negotiation officer for the Defense Strategy Department, my crest was a form she had never seen before in her life.

But she was a consummate professional.

Before long, Oh Yuhwa recovered her rhythm and smiled as if it were nothing.

“It certainly is a crest I’ve never seen before. Very well. I’ll do my best to match you with the best terms possible.”

“I’ll be looking forward to it.”

“As you can see if you read this, if you sign the contract, you’ll be provided with a signing bonus, housing, a vehicle, and a monthly salary.”

Oh Yuhwa smoothly slid the contract over.

“Since you’re an Awakened with a new role category, as you can see, the housing provided will be an apartment in this area of roughly one hundred square meters. As for the vehicle, an imported foreign car will be provided.”

At a glance, the conditions themselves did not seem bad.

It was a little small in terms of floor area, but the apartment Oh Yuhwa was offering was a Tier-1 safety-rated apartment.

The housing that the Defense Strategy Department provided to Hunters was called [Safe House], and it was graded by rank.

Grade 1 was the safest rank, and the apartment I had my eye on was Grade 3.

Of course, that did not mean much.

As time passed, the monsters’ attacks would continue to defy humanity’s expectations.

An imported foreign car was not bad, but it was only there to round out the package.

Once you started working as a Hunter, you ended up using motorcycles, helicopters, and four-wheeled ATVs far more often.

Even the monthly salary of ten million won, paid without taxation, was not exactly bad.

The problem was that all of those things were merely nice-looking window dressing.

A good house, a good car, and a tax-free salary?

Fine, all of that was good, but that was not the core of the contract.

‘A 5:5 split on spoils? What a fucking joke. The Hunter ought to take all of it and still come up short, and they want to skim fifty percent off the top?’

The ratio was not the only problem.

‘Seven years, and fifteen times a year? Even a servant would get better terms than this.’

A Hunter’s life was not something that could be promised even one day at a time.

They were always thrown into perilous live operations, so it would not be an exaggeration to say they lived side by side with death. And for people like that, what? Seven years?

A Hunter contract was supposed to be one year by default, and three years at the very longest.

And she was handing me a seven-year contract?

Just as she had always done, Oh Yuhwa was naturally trying to take me for an easy mark.

“There are a lot of problems with this contract. The ratio, for one, and the contract period seems far too long.”

“Then I can lower it by about one year. Normally that wouldn’t be possible, but because it’s you, Mr. Eunseong, I can make that special exception. I can also adjust the ratio from 5:5 to around 6:4. For a first contract, being offered terms like this is......”

“I’m sorry.”

“Then how about five years and a 7:3 split? Even this is a stretch for me.”

“I’ve heard enough.”

I rose from my seat.

“I hear Japan and the United States offer better treatment. I suppose they’d be the better choice.”

“M-Mr. Eunseong?”

Oh Yuhwa’s face turned deathly pale.

An Awakened was a national asset and a strategic weapon.

A newly appeared Awakened bearing a form of crest that had never existed before, and she failed to secure him and let another country take him away instead?

That was not the sort of incident a mere negotiation officer like Oh Yuhwa could handle.

If things went wrong, her personal information might be exposed, she might be branded a traitor, hounded with death threats, and forced to live the rest of her life in hiding.

In fact, Oh Yuhwa’s end had been extremely gruesome.

Was it about five years later?

There had once been massive headlines about the incident in which Oh Yuhwa was found as a dismembered corpse.

Anyone could tell she had been murdered by a Hunter, and most people’s reaction had been that it served her right.

“Mr. Eunseong.”

Oh Yuhwa spoke in an earnest tone.

“Other countries may offer better conditions, but if you’re Korean, you should still sign with South Korea. You were planning to enlist as a naval officer, weren’t you? We’ll pay a little more attention to you, so please give us a chance......”

Whew.

This was starting to disgust me.

She shoved a slave contract in front of me, and now she was appealing to patriotism?

“I’m sorry, but let’s stop here. The more I listen to you, Major Oh, the more even the patriotism I did have disappears.”

“It seems there’s been some misunderstanding. The treatment for new contractors is fixed. Then let’s make the contract term five years and......”

Ruthless. Truly ruthless.

Even now, she was still trying to reel in a sucker?

“Mr. Eunseong! Just a moment!”

Oh Yuhwa grabbed onto my arm and clung to it.

“If I offended you, I’m truly sorry!”

“Sorry?”

“Ah, no, my apologies!”

“First, please calm down and listen to what I have to say. Mr. Eunseong, this isn’t something I can handle at my level. So please calm down and wait just a moment, would you?”

“And if I do?”

“I’ll speak to you after reporting this to the Minister. There’s a high chance the Minister will come personally.”

Yes, that was more like it.

If it was the Minister of the Defense Strategy Department at this point in time, then he was someone worth speaking to.

Ahn Gukseon.

His callsign was [Iron Blood].

He was a first-generation Hunter, a man who had awakened ten years before this point, when the monsters first invaded Earth.