Chapter 123 – Terrorism (1)
A man in a suit opened the door late at night, when only the student department’s weekend staff remained. An employee who had once handled this man’s complaint frowned and openly showed displeasure. The dark-complexioned man with a long beard walked straight to the kiosk, then turned abruptly to meet the clerk’s eyes.
The staff knew what he was up to, but out of politeness they asked.
“What are you here for?”
There was not the slightest hint of politeness in the tone of the question. The staff just wanted to shout out loud. Please stop asking for the restoration of the academic records while pushing such a fucking name as ‘Youngmi Booji Owner’, please let me rest in peace on the weekend.
The staff did not understand the weekend work with students in the first place. Why on earth do students and staff have to come out and work on weekends when no one comes? To deal with such a lunatic, the academy’s system must be fundamentally wrong.
The man swept his long hair and stared at his staff. There were only two employees in the office now, including him. Moreover, the opponent is an expelled hunter who does not know what he will do. The employee suddenly felt very afraid of this situation.
He looked around cautiously, pulling back his chair so that he could escape at any moment. And he asked the man.
“What are you here for? Regarding the application for restoration of academic records, as I said before…”
“Do you believe in fate?”
“Yes?”
The man paid no attention to the employee’s puzzled expression. Behind him, several more people with similar costumes entered before he knew it. People wearing masks and sunglasses naturally stood behind the man. The man looked at the employee and asked again.
“Fate. I asked if you believe in fate.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about. Well, we can’t do complicated paperwork right now because it’s the weekend. So, tomorrow…”
“I once heard a very interesting story. Is it leadern mythology? That’s what I’m talking about now, they say that the results of my life in the world are all the result of the tangle of karma and good deeds I’ve done in the past. Therefore. The fact that Youngmi got caught up in the gate and died, and that I was expelled from the academy, all happened because of some karma I had done in the past.”
Behind the man, another handed him a gas mask. In the meantime, a heavy lump of metal was spinning behind it, making a strange noise. The man said while wearing a gas mask.
“Aren’t you embarrassed? Doesn’t it feel so unreasonable to have to face such a miserable future because of one mistake?”
“I’m going to call the police! What, what are you doing!”
The staff noticed that things were going out of the ordinary. A lump of metal spinning with a strange sound, and people escaping from this place without saying anything first. A door that suddenly closed and locked. A gray gas spewing out of a lump of metal. The man tapped a lump of iron and said.
“Call me. Because I wonder how many more victims will increase. Do you know what this is?”
The employee felt his head spin. He kept closing his eyes and losing strength in his body. Another employee sitting next to him had already passed out with his head on his keyboard. The employee somehow opened his eyes and found his cellphone. Academy staff could call waiting hunters through an app installed on their phones in case of an emergency.
“Ah, that… What, what… Yo. This?”
But he couldn’t touch his phone. Her vision blurred, and her head ached. She started blatantly rummaging through her bag in order to somehow pick up her phone. At the same time, the employee continued to talk as if he was going to pass the time. It’s a clumsy trick, but it felt like a sensible strategy for an employee who was gassed and unable to make good judgment.
“It’s called Volcanic Gas found in the Gate Volcanic Zone. It explodes with tremendous firepower at the slightest impact. To exaggerate, it contains the amount that the entire building, including this staff room, would be blown away if I just clapped my hands here.”
The employee somehow lifted the phone. But at the same time he took out his cell phone, the man lightly snatched it from the employee’s hand. The employee groaned and reached out, but could not take the phone out of the awakened person’s hand. The man looked at his phone and smiled.
The employee raised his head and said.
“All right, so are you… All right… You can’t… It is.”
At the employee’s words, the man giggled. The muddy laughter through the gas mask overlapped with my dim mind and resounded as if it were coming from inside a cave. The employee was now on the verge of falling asleep. The man stopped laughing and pulled a small ball-shaped device from his waistband. An emergency escape device that was abandoned as scrap. It was an object that immediately bounced the user out of 400M and caused a strong impact in all directions at the moment of the bounce.
The man said to the staff.
“I’m okay. You do not have to worry.”
Ironically, the device created to save lives was now being used as a detonator for bombings. The employee was now on the verge of falling asleep. He asked with force.
“Why are you doing this… How…”
“Why are you like this? Well, why is this? I asked do you believe in fate therefore…”
The man pressed the button on the escape device and said.
“Ask the sky.”
The man’s figure sparked and disappeared. At the same time, the employee’s head fell on the desk. The man’s figure disappeared, the floor dented, and a strong shock rang through the space. The air around them burned as if a candle had lit it, and in an instant it was colored with pure white light, filling the room with intense heat.
Bang!
The sound of the explosion, strong enough to be heard from 400 meters away, shook the entire academy.
*****
“Haha… ! Haha… !”
The fatal flaw of the forced escape device. That is, the user’s physical safety cannot be guaranteed. The function of blowing the user out of 400M was clear, but since it does not discriminate whether or not there is an object in the transmitted location, if used in a city with many buildings, there is a high probability that it will get stuck between the walls of buildings and suffocate under the asphalt.
Kim Hyun-ki was also now facing a fatal flaw. He was smiling now, with his body half embedded in the wall of the building. He had already been cut in half or had to be shocked by the mix of asphalt and guts, but he burst through the wall unharmed with a hearty smile.
Haha! Haha!”
As if becoming one body with the wall, the limbs that had turned red brick red regained their original color and jumped out of the wall.
The disadvantages of the escape device, which would have been fatal to anyone who was an Awakener, did not matter to Kim Hyun-ki. His ability was the ability to unify objects, and to integrate and apply any type of solid that touched his body.
He walked out of the alley with a smile, and people passing by looked at him in amazement. Kim Hyun-ki started running, brushing the dust off his clothes. Luckily, it landed near the place where he had parked his car.
Hyeon-gi climbed into his car at a parking lot in the corner of a city alley and started laughing while holding onto a picture of Young-mi.
Haha! Haha! Under… Haha… !”
The corners of his smile gradually twisted. The corner of his eyes, which had been curved round, frowned, and the brow furrowed. Tears started to fall, and Hyeon-ki grabbed Young-mi’s picture and started to sob.
“Hey, Youngmi… !”
His shoulders started to tremble. The hand holding the photograph of Young-mi was carefully wrapped around it, fearing that the photograph would fall off the driver’s seat. Only the cries of Hyeongi filled the car. He just cried without speaking. Ambulances and police cars could be heard in the distance. Kim Hyun-ki raised his head. In the photo, Young-mi was smiling brightly at Kim Hyun-ki.
Hyungi thought the picture was talking to him. So he laughed and said.
“I, I will definitely send that bastard up. Uh? So wait a bit. Got it?”
I started the car. The old car rattled and emitted black smoke. Hyeon-gi’s car was moving away in the opposite direction of people and ambulances rushing by.
*****
“What are you saying?”
“It will be the work of those groups. Maybe.”
We were heading to the academy. It was because the academy bombing accident caused a call order to all nearby hunters. After roughly changing our clothes, we got into Yoo-jeong’s car and stepped on the accelerator in the direction of the siren.
A car driving wildly beside us was speeding in the other direction. I glanced at the old car and then again at the smoke rising from the academy.
