Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Clack!

The soldiers of the special mission unit raised their rifles all at once and aimed at Duhyeon.

“E-eek!”

Startled, Duhyeon dropped flat to the ground on the spot like a frog.

“It’s fine, so lower your guns. Quickly.”

“But......”

“It’s really fine.”

“Understood. Everyone, lower your guns!”

The platoon leader looked as though he was about to frisk him, but at my insistence, he had the weapons lowered.

Good grief.

Why did they have to scare the poor guy like that......?

Still, they were doing their best to carry out their mission in their own way, so I decided to let it pass without saying anything further.

“Duhyeon.”

“D-don’t shoot! Ugh!”

“Duhyeon.”

“I didn’t do anything wrong!”

“......”

Duhyeon had apparently been scared half to death, because he showed no sign of getting up.

“I told you it’s fine. Get up already.”

“R-really?”

“Yeah, idiot.”

Smiling, I helped Duhyeon to his feet.

“Come on, get up. Your clothes are going to get covered in dirt.”

“Are you sure that’s okay?”

“What, do you think I’m fooling you?”

“You lied to me before.”

“......”

I really did not have much to say to that.

“That was that. This is this. It’s fine, so get up already.”

“Yes.”

Once Duhyeon awkwardly hauled himself upright, I called over one of the soldiers and had him bring Duhyeon’s delivery motorcycle.

“Thanks. I used it well. Sorry for borrowing it without saying anything. You were sleeping so soundly that I didn’t want to wake you.”

“If you really felt sorry, would you have taken my motorcycle without a word? Because of you, I spent all day to......”

Duhyeon, still full of resentment and anger, was about to pour out his grievances when his eyes suddenly went wide.

Jingle, jingle!

“Do you know what this is?”

“Isn’t that a car key? A BMW?”

“That’s right.”

“Then why do you have it?”

“What do you mean why? Because it’s yours.”

“What?”

Vroom!

Right then, a driver from the special mission unit pulled up in BMW’s compact SUV model.

“Take it.”

“R-really?”

“Yeah.”

“Really?”

“What, do you think I’m fooling you?”

With a grin, I pressed the key to the X2 into Duhyeon’s hand.

“I rode the motorcycle well. This is a gift, so take it. I picked it out especially for you.”

“B-big bro!”

A moment ago he had been calling me every name under the sun, and now this?

The sheer speed of that change in attitude was ridiculous, but I understood things from Duhyeon’s perspective, so I did not bother picking at him over it.

“Big bro, from now on I’m really going to treat you like my big brother!”

“I’m younger than you, though?”

“Come on! If you’re buying me a car, that makes you the big brother! Big bro!”

“Are you really that happy?”

“Of course I am!”

Clutching the car key, Duhyeon bounced in place as if he might do a somersault at any moment.

“You little punk.”

Seeing how happy Duhyeon was made me feel good too.

And Duhyeon more than deserved a gift.

The truth was that when the Transference incident broke out, he had fought alongside me, and that had eased part of my burden.

“Take good care of it. And if anything difficult comes up later, tell me. I’ll help with whatever I can.”

“Yes, big bro!”

Duhyeon looked so happy his mouth seemed ready to split open.

***

“What is all this?”

Father looked more than a little stunned.

It was only natural. His son had gone off saying he was going to register as an Awakened, only to come back in a helicopter and under the protection of armed troops.

“That’s just how it turned out. Ha ha.”

“What do you mean, that’s just how it turned out? Explain.”

Father was not about to let me brush it aside with a laugh.

Then again, Father was no fool. There was no way he would not realize something strange was going on.

He might not be an Awakened, but he had fought monsters for more than ten years as an active-duty officer. There was no way he did not understand how this whole business worked.

“So you’re saying you’re an Awakened of a new role category that didn’t exist before? And that’s why the Defense Strategy Department is giving you special treatment?”

“Yes. More or less.”

“Good grief. Well now.”

Father made a dumbfounded face.

“Isn’t that a good thing?”

“What part of that is good? My one and only son looks like he’s only going to end up in more danger. Do I look like I’d be happy about that?”

“There’s still Eunha t—ow!”

I clutched my head and groaned in pain.

How could a knuckle rap hurt this much?

“I said son!”

“Ugh......”

“You little brat. Talking nonsense like that to your father.”

“S-sorry.”

“Anyway, all that special treatment is just the price of your life.”

“I know.”

“What parent would want to live in comfort off the price of their child’s life?”

“Still, can’t you just accept that a good thing is a good thing? If there’s something to enjoy, we should enjoy it.”

“That may be true, but......”

“I promise I won’t get reckless and throw my life away, so please don’t worry too much.”

“I’ll try.”

“And this is a new car. I brought it for you, Father.”

“It looks exactly like the one I used to drive. Is it a Sierra?”

“Yes.”

“Forget it. You drive it. I can live without a car.”

“I have my own car.”

“Do you? Hmm.”

“Since I already brought it, just take it. You don’t have a car right now anyway.”

By now, the car Father used to drive was probably buried under the rubble of the collapsed apartment.

My attention had been elsewhere, so I had not moved it in advance.

I should have parked it somewhere else.

“That’s right, honey. You’ve worked hard all this time, haven’t you? Think of it as a gift from the country and drive it.”

“That’s right, Dad.”

Once Mother and even Eunha joined in, Father let go of his pointless stubbornness and accepted the car key.

“All right, then. I’ll use it well. It’s a gift from my son, so of course I should.”

“You made the right choice.”

I turned to Mother with a grin.

“In a few days, we’ll be moving, so please just bear with things until then.”

“Is it really true that they’re even giving you a house?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“We’re going to move into the Hyperion Penthouse.”

“If it’s Hyperion...... there???”

“Yes.”

“No way!”

The Hyperion Penthouse.

A luxury apartment located in Bangbae-dong, Seocho District, one that would be worth over twenty billion won at this point in time.

Its safety grade was also Tier-1, making it one of the dream palaces everyone wanted to live in.

“Really? We’re moving to Hyperion?”

“Yeah.”

“Wow. Cha Eunseong really is an Awakened.”

The brat, Eunha, looked me up and down as though she were staring at a monkey in a zoo.

“But is it really right for you to be an Awakened, Oppa?”

“What kind of nonsense is that supposed to mean?”

“You’re not handsome, Oppa.”

“......”

“Isn’t Awakening supposed to happen to handsome people like Hobin?”

Well, this was so absurd I was speechless.

I’m not handsome?

Sorry, but I am handsome.

It was only because my role category had been Supporter, but I had belonged to the Rankers and enjoyed plenty of popularity.

At one point, people even misunderstood and thought I was just being dragged around as the team’s pretty face.

In my previous life, after Father died, she had been quiet and gloomy, not cracking a single joke, but maybe because that tragedy had not happened, she was now like a colt with its reins completely cut loose.

“Don’t go on about Hobin. That guy’s going to die soon. If he dies, are you going to die with him too?”

“Who’s dying?”

Eunha snorted as if I were talking nonsense.

“Why are you cursing poor Hobin like that?”

“You started it.”

“When did I?”

“You said I wasn’t handsome.”

“Are you handsome, though? What are we supposed to do with our Eunseong? Your self-awareness is this tragically bad.”

“You little......”

Clench!

I barely restrained myself from punching her.

For some reason, I did not dislike this immature side of her.

That was probably because she had not gone through the shock and grief of losing her family.

The thought suddenly came to me.

I hoped she would remain exactly like this—immature and carefree.

“Forget it. I won’t even bother. Whew.”

“You’re only saying that because you have nothing to say.”

“Should I leave you behind?”

“What?”

“I could move and leave only you behind. While you’re away at school.”

“Th-that......”

“Seems the refugee camp suits you.”

“Y-you......!”

Tremble!

I could see her gritting her teeth, trying to hold back her anger.

Heh.

Go ahead. Keep mouthing off.

‘Still, he really is going to die.’

If memory served, that idol bastard was supposed to die in about a month.

How had he died again?

I had not been particularly interested, so I could not remember clearly, but one thing was certain: that guy was going to die.

What was it that killed him again?

Bzz. Bzzzz!

The incoming call made me completely forget about the idiot for a moment.

Impatient Girl

010 ×××× ××××

It was Choi Yura.

I had told her to wait, but she could not even manage that much and called first.

This was not really a situation where I could take the call, so I pressed the side of the smartphone and dismissed it.

Because of the risk of interception, it was not exactly recommended for Awakened to use unencrypted communication devices with one another.

Just as I did not trust the Defense Strategy Department, the Defense Strategy Department did not trust the Awakened either.

Especially when it came to the Awakened, surveillance by government agencies was as basic as it got.

Particularly in the case of a formally contracted Awakened like me, it would not even be an exaggeration to say that all phone calls, text messages, and even personal social media were monitored under ordinary circumstances.

People had their suspicions, but since there was no hard evidence, no issue was ever formally raised.

‘If she really wanted to contact me, she could have reached me through Hunter Link...... Ah, right. I still don’t have an account yet.’

I finally realized why Choi Yura had risked the danger of interception and contacted me through a smartphone.

***

There was a saying.

That all Awakened were mentally connected.

If someone said that, they would not be entirely wrong.

And there was evidence to support it.

There was a very special network that only Awakened could access.

[Hunter Link].

It was a telepathic network, a space that guaranteed absolute anonymity.

The way to connect was simple.

All you had to do was close your eyes, focus your mind, and draw up Ether.

And the person who discovered this, astonishingly enough, had been a first-generation Hunter from Korea who used to be a monk.

Monk Taebong.

His callsign was [Maitreya], the Future Buddha.

True to his being a monk, they said he had happened to discover the existence of Hunter Link while meditating and then spread word of it to the world.

And as if to prove he really had been a monk, he apparently named it [Mind-Linked Karmic Net], but the name was too difficult, so everyone simply called it [Hunter Link].

In the dead of night,

After confirming that my family was fast asleep, I dropped down beside the camp cot and folded my legs into a cross-legged posture.

While connected to Hunter Link, I would be completely defenseless, so it could be dangerous, but the special mission troops were standing guard around our tent right now, so it should be safe enough.

I closed my eyes and slowly drew up Ether while focusing my mind.

Before long, I felt my consciousness shifting beyond reality, and an entirely different world unfolded before my eyes.