Hiding a House in the Apocalypse - Chapter 278



Only Krnovel

112. Faith (7)

“How can you shoot so well from so far away?”

There was a 1km sniper class in school.

Although I ranked high in other subjects, sniping was not my strong suit.

Unfortunately, he gave the top spot to Lee Sang-hoon in this part, and he was so disappointed by that that he asked Kim Da-ram, who later became a teammate, about the secret to sniping.

“It’s not just about seeing and shooting. As we learned in school, the Earth is constantly rotating, and its magnetic field is corresponding to it, and it affects everything, and the winds that are affected by it also change from time to time.”

“How do you measure wind?”

What I asked was not the wind blowing at the firing point.

The spotter can measure that for me, or I can get a rough idea and include it in the calculations.

The problem is that the wind does not blow in one direction, and there are countless factors that affect the path of the wind that cannot be calculated with the human mind.

Even if the west wind blows from my side right now, the east wind may blow at the target.

That’s something no one knows.

Those who set the so-called longest-range sniping records use heavy bullets to avoid being affected by such wind and other variables.

The fact that the bullets of sniper rifles in common use are around 7.62mm instead of 5.56mm is also the result of a compromise with a huge customer called nature.

For me, who mainly shoots 5.56mm and has no need to use other types of ammunition other than shotguns, this isn’t a big deal, but the problem is that there will inevitably come a time when I need to shoot at long range with such an average rifle.

“Hints are everywhere, aren’t they?”

Kim Da-ram answered my question with a bright and trustworthy smile that he had now lost.

“If the target is wearing clothes, look at the direction in which the clothes are shaking. If there are trees, you can use that as a reference. Don’t just look at the target, but also observe the objects around the target. Then you can tell what kind of wind is blowing there.”

If she had lived her life according to her answer at the time, wouldn’t we have had a better relationship than we do now?

Relationships crumble and all that remains is the cold skeleton of knowledge.

Standing on the precarious edge of that knowledge, I take a deep breath and, holding my breath, stare at the target.

man.

Boy. Mid-teens. Short and skinny.

He blinks his eyes intermittently, as if he has a tic, but he doesn’t move his body.

That’s all I think about that boy.

He aimed the gun just short of the boy’s temple.

“There. I know everything that’s hidden!”

A fanatic got out of the car, grabbed a loudspeaker and shouted at the Defender.

“You’re going to die anyway. You can’t escape from us. You’ve probably heard rumors about the cult’s trackers and guardians, right? You can’t not hear them. There are some of our followers among your soldiers, and they spread our information to you. Just like that sad radio broadcast you used to do.”

I saw the fanatics armed.

Some men are armed, but most are unarmed.

There are no guns, to be exact.

A significant number of the cultists were armed with crude weapons such as spears, jungle knives, and sickles.

They looked for the best opportunity, adding to their confidence that they were Awaken.

“If you surrender now, I promise to give you a less painful death in the name of the profession. I will provide you with a decent meal, alcohol, and if necessary, drugs and women. There will be no torture, and I promise to provide you with special painkillers when you are executed.”

The man talking through the loudspeaker took a step forward.

bang!

A burst of excitement without hesitation.

At the same time as the gunshots and the ringing.

thud!

A shock wave bursts out.

The man standing behind the man with the megaphone created the shockwave.

The bullet dug into an invisible dimensional rift and came out like a wormhole, the exit of a black hole, grazing the side of my head.

“It’s a surprise attack!”

The fanatic shouted.

“It’s away.”

He spoke quietly.

And then he fired his gun again.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

A single shot with a timed burst.

All threat shots.

It’s not even an intimate date.

At least in this part, it reveals the possibility that humans may be weaker than monsters.

Monsters only deploy a reflection field in close situations where they would be hit by a gunshot, but humans, unlike monsters, deploy a reflection field just from the sound of a gunshot.

thud!

Since the first Awaken, two more have revealed themselves to be Awaken.

But it was just revealed.

“Implementation of threat.”

He gave orders to Ha Tae-hoon and Cheon Young-jae.

The two hunters began to threaten each other with their guns.

Blind bullets that couldn’t even reach the Intimidating Center split the night sky, but the fanatics reflexively sent shockwaves whenever gunshots rang out.

“Drone.”

He gestured towards Da-jeong, who was sitting quietly behind him, holding the remote control.

Dajeong nodded and activated the secret weapon hidden underground.

Wheeeeeeeeing—

It’s a robot vacuum cleaner.

For some reason she brought along a robot vacuum cleaner, and it seems that it has its uses.

The vacuum cleaner is loaded with explosives, including a bunch of grenades.

“Unlike regular drones, this is a type that moves by primitively setting coordinates. It’s simple, so it requires less work, and there’s no risk of hacking or wiretapping if you cut off the radio here other than setting the coordinates.”

Don’t be intimidated just because the other party is an away group.

In the end, it’s a fight between people.

More than half of the victory went to us because we forced them into a favorable battlefield.

Of course, if there were monsters like Kang Han-min or Na Hye-in among them, the story would be different, but that is an inevitable factor that always exists.

A drone flew over our heads.

It’s a drone armed with a mortar.

Take coordinates and send the robot vacuum cleaner to the enemy while simultaneously threatening it with a drone.

The enemies’ eyes were turned in all directions.

They were now forming a circle around the car, loosely aiming for the Defender’s hiding spot.

I watch calmly as the fanatics take up their formation.

The moment their guide leaves them.

“Who are you?! Who dares to stick their teeth into us? Is Kim Byeong-cheol your subordinate? Are you doing this even though you know what happened to Kim Byeong-cheol?”

A fanatic holding a loudspeaker shouts in the direction where the gunshots rang out.

No one answers.

Only drones carrying mortars fly noisily over their heads.

Bang! Tata tang!

A gunman opened fire on a drone.

A man looked up at the sky and stopped them.

thud!

Shock wave.

At the same time, something intangible, yet clearly perceptible, like an electric current tore through the air.

Pick!

The drone that was flying happily begins to crash.

Santa (scatter blow).

This is a symbolic power that sentenced China, which was pouring all of its national power into developing drones, to death, as one of the monster’s powers that shoots out large drone waves.

As expected, it was first discovered in China and the Chinese named it after its power.

“Defender.”

He spoke into the communicator.

“Can you jump backwards?”

“okay.”

The hidden defender turned its back to the slope and started running at full speed toward the tall reeds.

“Run away!”

The boy shouted.

“You’re running away!”

The fanatic did not listen to the boy.

Rather, they seem to be bothering the boy.

“Be quiet!”

The situation is already as clear as day.

You never know when a bullet might fly or another drone might come.

“Over there!”

It’s not that I don’t understand why the boy keeps yelling.

It is a struggle to get some kind of reward in a group where it is difficult to build one’s own body.

The struggle caused a small rift among the fanatics.

Some approached the Defender while others remained in the car.

There is a boy in the gap.

“Threat. In 3 seconds.”

Three. Two. One.

Bang! Tata ta tang!

Ha Tae-hoon and Cheon Young-jae both make threats.

Every time,

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Shock waves emanate from all directions, creating waves, but beyond the maximum distance each wave can travel, there is an unprotected gap.

He pulled the trigger, glaring at the boy who was left alone and shouting for the Defender’s location.

bang!

It’s not a threat or an intimidation.

The bullet hit the boy’s heart squarely.

The boy, who had been shot in the heart, fell down like a tree and did not move any more.

Said to the defender.

“Target. Neutralize.”

At the same time, he gestured to Da-jeong.

The robot vacuum cleaner has already approached the bottom of the vehicle and is waiting for a command.

When she pressed the button,

Boom!!!

Cars fly out with a loud explosion.

In the ensuing shock, the fanatics formed a circle and began to retreat in an orderly manner, shouting the same chorus of shock waves they had seen from the lighthouse.

The moment I saw it, I vaguely recognized it.

This Awaken group isn’t so ridiculous.

The ability to cleanly abandon a target and retreat as soon as you recognize a tactical disadvantage is a skill that only a well-organized organization can achieve.

As he watched the fanatic leave, he spoke into the communicator.

“Situation terminated. Retrieve Hong Jeong-ho and return to the territory.”

Dajeong looked at me blankly.

“What about the skeleton?”

He pointed towards a motorcycle lying in the distance among the grass.

“I have to take that with me.”

There is no need for long words between us.

Boooooooooooooooooooooo—-

The buggy car rocks and races briskly toward the rough terrain.

The fanatics split up into surviving vehicles and began to withdraw from the area.

All that remains at the scene is a cold, cooling corpse and a young girl guarding the corpse.

The girl just stared blankly at the dead boy, showing no emotion.

The empty face seemed to suggest that the girl had no more emotions left to express.

I hesitated for a moment.

“······.”

I briefly fell into temptation.

I am a doomsday person who wants to survive.

However, he did not have a heart so cold as to kill unnecessary people.

Even the Defender feels uncomfortable with his own actions, so I shouldn’t be thinking like this.

The girl who was standing there blankly suddenly turned her head.

She was looking north.

Monsters are coming.

The girl took steps toward the vehicle.

None of the cultists took care of the girl, but she found her own place and got into the car.

I hid in the grass and waited for the vehicle to leave.

The vehicle started.

According to the fanatics’ beliefs, their vehicle should be heading towards the horde of monsters rushing from the north of the city.

The vehicle was headed southeast.

They also ran away from monsters, even though they were talking about monsters as if they were Buddhas and wanted to be like them.

There was a gaze looking at me in the midst of the treacherous procession.

It was too far away to tell exactly, but the girl who had been staring blankly at the boy’s corpse, which was already swarming with flies, was leaning against the back window and glaring this way.

It will take time to determine whether it is an illusion created by my conscience or regret.

*

As the vehicle approached our territory, the sun had already risen in the east, casting a cool glow over the deserted, yet still green, land.

“Really. I feel so refreshed.”

The one who mostly talks on the radio is Cheon Yeong-jae.

“Throughout my time in China and Korea, there have been few instances where things have been handled this cleanly. But I always feel like everything is handled well when I’m with Senior Park. As for me, the moment I heard Senior Park say he’d leave Jung-ho behind, I thought, “No, this guy. Is he abandoning my classmate? That’s how I took it.”

Despite his cheerful personality, his heart is full of shadows.

As Ha Tae-hoon hinted, he must have experienced a traumatic event and built a wall in his heart that was not easily visible to others.

I have two types of communicators.

One is used for communication with Cheon Yeong-jae and Ha Tae-hoon, and the other is our exclusive communication device, which was modified from US military equipment by Defender.

He spoke to the quiet radio while one radio was chattering away.

“What happened to Kim Da-ram?”

No matter how unpleasant he may be, he was once the junior I trusted the most.

He was also the first one to come to me on the day I was isolated.

Besides, I gave him a million won as a wedding gift.

Of course, you can’t help but be curious.

“Kim Da-ram?”

Defender snickered when he heard the name Kim Da-ram.

An attitude that shows neither respect nor pity.

“That woman, you know. She’s a woman who will live tenaciously no matter where she is. Really. I felt that when I looked at her. Even if the world were to end, that woman would somehow manage to live with her husband and her fat child.”

“That’s a bit difficult.”

“What? Are you wishing for Team Leader Kim Da-ram to die?”

“That’s not it.”

I have to be the last one.

It would be unfair for someone like Kim Da-ram, who isn’t even a doomsday activist, to be given the honor of being the last human being just because he’s so tenacious.

“I have to live longer than that woman.”

“That’s a skeleton-like remark.”

The Defender, sitting on a seat attached to the top of the buggy ahead, smiled at me and waved.

Still a sad, beautiful appearance.

“You, haven’t you met a woman?”

It was Defender’s younger brother who answered that question.

“We met. Of course. Oh my. Seriously. I told you, I was so disappointed.”

“Why? What’s going on?”

“Ha······. I really thought my oppa, no, Jeongho Ham, was a heavenly man. You know the kind of man who slaps a woman who clings to him and says, “Get out! You bitch!”?”

“Is that totally me?”

“No, I’m telling you, he was fooled by a woman who wasn’t even that pretty and did buffalo things.”

“What?!”

“You really have to see this for yourself. That’s when I first understood what cosmic horror was.”

Defender interrupted Dajeong’s excited chatter.

“Shut up.”

Defender guy, when he gets cornered he acts like a kid.

Anyway, the short and intense journey is over.

There are many difficult problems ahead of us, but let’s not think about them now.

There, beyond the barren plain, I can see my territory rising up gracefully.

I told everyone to tune the radio frequency to a common frequency.

“Welcome.”

Da-jeong and Defender waved their hands from the buggy running alongside each other.

In their eyes I see strong trust.

Yeah, I feel faith.

A pure form of faith that fanatics do not possess.

“Please take care of me, Skeleton.”

“Are we finally one?!”

The Defender siblings joined.