Hiding a House in the Apocalypse - Chapter 360



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Episode 366 149. Long-term (2)

As with most research on rifts, it is still unclear exactly how Awaken can produce waves similar to monsters. The most popular theory is that Awaken is a person whose frontal lobe has been altered by the rift, known as the mutation factor.

The exact differences vary from person to person. Some say that the prefrontal cortex is enlarged compared to the average person, while others say that there are bumps. Some even claim that the color itself is different from the average person. However, unlike laboratory animals, Awaken is a human, so it is not possible to obtain a specimen by dissecting a living human.

Of course, because it was such a serious matter, countries around the world continued to secretly research Awaken, but there were no visible results. One thing that is certain is that Awaken cannot be mass-produced.

Just like food that cannot be cultivated, Awaken was a being that appeared on its own under conditions that humans could not understand. At that moment, out of the blue, Heo Jong-cheol made an absurd claim.

There might be a fabricated Awaken. A hunter who is neither a scientist nor a doctor, but a second-rate one. When I found Heo Jong-cheol in the hospital hallway, he was being scolded by a doctor in a white coat.

“No, Jong-cheol. Didn’t I explain before that there could be thousands of causes of pain on the Appderman side? Even patients don’t know exactly where they are hurting. I don’t know what you based your Hepatitis diagnosis on, but what you see isn’t everything.”

Who is it? It’s Kim Da-ram’s husband. Back when they were married, he had the impression of a Gangnam gentleman with a carefree smile, but now he’s become quite rough and has a sharp look.

“No, I can see it. Your liver is swollen.”

“Do you know how many causes there are for Hepatomegali?”

“No, what do you want me to do with what I see? I see the same thing as someone who died from hepatitis before.”

“Excuse me. Mr. Jong-cheol. Do you have your textbook? Okay, I’ll tell you from the beginning. The cause of an enlarged liver is······.”

I watched silently, but it didn’t seem like it would end, so I coughed. Soon, two people found me.

“oh.”

Heo Jong-cheol shows his delight. Well, I guess he would welcome anyone else, not just me, since I’m being nagged by someone I don’t know if he’s my boss or a superior. Kim Da-ram’s husband also recognized me at a glance, but the moment our eyes met, he rolled his eyes elsewhere.

“······Let’s talk next time.”

Was it called a “birds of a feather flock together”? Or should I say “birds of a feather flock together”? Our Squirrel’s husband seems to have a similar personality to Squirrel. Back when he was a young master, he used to welcome me so excessively that I felt embarrassed. I approached Heo Jong-cheol, feeling the bitter taste of the million won I had blown as a wedding gift lingering in my mouth.

“It’s been a while.”

I had a dramatic encounter with Heo Jong-cheol, who still had an impressive sideburns and a stylish beard, but in fact, we have some bad blood between us. It’s a silly story about a guy who tried to kill me and I easily chased him away.

Anyway, maybe because of that episode, there was a sense of burden in the way he looked at me. I didn’t really intend to blame the past, but I came here because I was very interested in his argument.

“Can we talk for a moment?”

“Okay.”

He came out. Soon he brought out two paper cups containing coffee mix.

“Oh. Is this still the case?”

“But isn’t it a hospital?”

“Is the work worth doing?”

“So-so.”

I have a lot to say, but it would be rude for me to give him advice, and we are not close enough to each other to give him advice, so I got straight to the point.

“I heard that you have a friend who was baptized by John the Baptist.”

“Ah. Yes.”

Surprisingly, without much hesitation, Heo Jong-cheol revealed the patient in question. The patient was sitting alone in a hospital room with the window open and the curtains fluttering.

The reason why it is called a video and lets in cold outside air like a refrigerator is because of the strong stench that can be felt as soon as you open the door. The stench of excrement was strong.

As you can see from the urinals strewn about everywhere, this is a patient who is not being properly managed.

“I was diagnosed as incurable.”

Heo Jong-cheol said while putting on a mask.

“······Where did the problem arise?”

“My whole brain was gone. It shrank like a walnut, like a terminal alcoholic.”

“I don’t think you’re at that age.”

He was a young boy, rather than young. Half of his ear was blown off, a dark scar was engraved on his eyebrow, and several fingers that he unconsciously covered were bluntly cut off, suggesting that he had not lived an easy life, but the rest of his life was also heading towards a predetermined destruction.

“I plan to observe him for about a week and then have him leave.”

“Do you have a guardian?”

Heo Jong-cheol shook his head with a bitter expression.

“You came empty-handed, so you will leave empty-handed.”

“What happened?”

We left the hospital room and walked down the empty hallway together.

“His name is Jin-ho. I don’t know his last name. He had already been suffering from brain damage since he came here.”

“It seems like things were better at first than they are now, right?”

“yes.”

One day, a boy with no known connection suddenly came to the hospital. The boy, complaining of severe pain in his head, displayed the typical characteristics of an Awaken.

“······Not only did it have the simple test results, but it also had the widely known characteristic of having luminous eyes. It wasn’t at the level of creating waves, but it seemed to be below that. It’s a phenomenon called knocking. It’s the phenomenon that is seen when an Awaken with a level 5 or higher quality is about to open the wave gate.

“Heo Jong-cheol was certain that the boy named Jin-ho was undoubtedly Awaken. This was a fact that even Kim Da-ram’s husband, who was not on good terms with him, acknowledged.

Of course, what’s important here is not whether the boy was Awakened or not. It’s the process by which the boy who received the black test paper became Awakened.

During the conversation, there was a slight incident where Kim Da-ram’s husband approached me with nervous steps, but when I stared blankly at him, he turned around. One of Heo Jong-cheol’s previously unseen strengths was revealed.

This guy is incredibly sensitive. Even though Kim Da-ram’s husband is clearly nagging him, he doesn’t even blink an eye.

If someone were to honk their horn maliciously on the road, the Defender siblings would get out of their car and take out a baseball bat, and this guy would ignore them and just do his job. Well, it must be because he has such thick nerves that he was able to maintain such an absurd mentality.

“······Jin-ho clearly said that he had never passed the litmus test in the past. But then he suddenly passed. Yes.” Heo Jong-cheol smiled with a different light in his eyes than Awaken.

“John the Baptist. He has the technology to turn ordinary people into Awakens. It’s still unstable though.”

“Does it have anything to do with the boy’s condition?”

“Yes. I don’t know what substance he injected, but it definitely has the effect of promoting conscious changes in the frontal lobe. However, as a countermeasure, it causes rapid damage to the cerebral cortex, and eventually turns people into idiots like Jin-ho.”

“······It’s poison.” People’s thoughts cannot all be the same. Heo Jong-cheol said.

“Well.” It wasn’t just Awaken’s glare that made his eyes sparkle behind his glasses.

“Perhaps it could be a weapon that can break through the gloomy present.” I have seen such a person. Of course, a guy like Heo Jong-cheol has no real power and is just fantasizing, but if a person who can decide on policies thinks like this, it would be dangerous. For example, like Kang Han-min. Many images of a savior and a hero, a clown and an inferior student obscure his true nature, but the essence of Kang Han-min that I understand is extremism.

He hates cracks as much as I do. * It’s not surprising that there are plenty of guys who want to die.

To make a short video to post on the internet, or to show off their courage in a group, some foolish people – perhaps they had no intention of dying – choose death. I remember that the Darwin Award was created for such people. However, most people who choose death in this way are confident in themselves. They are strong, active, and influential friends in their peer group.

There is no way a person with nothing can act like a guest. But Kang Han-min was different. Although he didn’t have even a speck of talent to become a hunter, he tried his best to stand in the same line as us.

The reason Jang Ki-young tormented him so much was not only because he hated Kang Han-min as an individual, but also because he foresaw that Kang Han-min would one day push not only himself but also his teammates to their deaths. People who are incompetent but are motivated are much more likely to cause accidents. However, Kang Han-min caused accidents in a different way.

Few people know this fact. Probably only me, Kang Han-min, and Na Hye-in.

It was a very common and dangerous mission. The Chinese government had ordered them to attack the rebels by breaking through the monsters’ stronghold in the rebel-controlled city center and attacking the stronghold.

When they first came to China, the once powerful Chinese military was greatly reduced in number and was showing problems in terms of the quality of troops and equipment overall. Inversely, the Chinese showed a fanaticism for drones, but drones are convenient tools, but they are not a magic wand that can do everything.

After three failed drone reconnaissance missions, we hastily formed a hastily assembled reconnaissance team. Kang Han-min and I took the vanguard, while Na Hye-in coordinated us from the rear, taking on the role of spotter, who discovered and identified various threats, including monsters.

In the beginning, Kang Han-min was extremely ambitious.

“Okay. Okay. I feel good today! Lucky chance!” I thought it was a show of affection for Na Hye-in and a way to show off my good side in front of Na Hye-in. In a place where you have to risk your life, a little show of affection is like salt.

It’s good, as long as it’s not excessive. In front of the monster’s stronghold, we found civilians who were presumed to be rebels.

There were no adults, only three children. I asked Kang Han-min to interpret. Unlike me, who did not know Chinese and had no intention of learning it, Kang Han-min spoke Chinese as fluently as Kim Da-ram.

Not only that, he also had the talent to treat Chinese people kindly, just like Kim Da-ram. In Kim Da-ram’s case, it might be pretense, but Kang Han-min, at least in my eyes, seemed to have such a warm attitude because of his innate nature.

After exchanging common greetings that even I, who don’t know Chinese well, understood, Kang Han-min returned to me.

“I told you to go somewhere else. If we go back to where we came from, the soldiers won’t leave us alone anyway.” Anyone in the rebel area, regardless of age or gender, is summarily executed. At the beginning of the war, they were treated as Chinese citizens and refugees, but as fanatics mixed in with the civilians in the rebel area and committed various acts of terrorism, the zero-tolerance principle became the only policy toward civilians.

I nodded and watched the children leave, not having any interest in seeing unarmed people die unjustly. A boy with a doll of a mobile game character that Gong Kyung-min enjoyed looking back at us with frightened eyes.

“Let’s go inside first. According to the last drone reconnaissance results, it looks like a candy box type.”

“Okay! Aniki!” After we became close to a certain extent – to be exact, in Kang Han-min’s opinion – Kang Han-min started calling me by a strange nickname, “Aniki” (兄貴). At the time, I wasn’t familiar with it, so I checked on the internet using the eagle typing method, and it turned out to be a Japanese word meaning “older brother”, but Kang Han-min’s birthday is earlier than mine.

It seemed to be the result of him accepting the terminology from the Japanese game he enjoyed playing at his lodging without any resistance. I don’t know if it was cleverness or calculation, but Kang Han-min only used that nickname when he was alone with me and in situations where there wasn’t much tension.

Anyway, I didn’t plan on working with Kang Hanmin for a long time, and I had already received a promise that the juniors with higher grades in the home country would be given priority, so I didn’t put any special restrictions on them. What’s important is their attitude on the battlefield.

Since instilling confidence in him, Kang Han-min has been showing himself to be able to do his part.

“I’ll go in and take a look.”

“you?”

“I’m a bit slow at running and my overall physical strength is lacking, but even Principal Jang Gi-yeong acknowledged that I have the talent to crawl quickly.” The Candy Box type, an early infiltration type that is not seen much these days, built a stronghold made up of narrow passages like caves. Since its combat power is so low, anyone can deal with it without much trouble if they engage in close combat, but the stronghold’s defense and annoyance were more annoying than the Spider type that would appear later.

No one wants to go to a narrow, grayish-white passageway made of an unidentifiable substance, and where there are servants who look like jelly-like wrigglers. I also waited for the results, secretly hoping for his resources.

“Okay! No!” He spoke to Na Hye-in, keeping a close eye on his surroundings and gun ready, as he crawled slowly through one of the honeycomb-like passages.

“The rebels?”

“It’s clean. There’s nothing around there.”

“good.”

“Check the nest?”

“Kang Han-min is in. He’ll be out soon.”

“Confirmed.” While waiting for Kang Hanmin to come out, something came into my sight. It was a doll.

A character doll of a Chinese game that Gong Kyung-min enjoys. He has no interest in it, but he was so encouraged to try it that he couldn’t help but know about it. By the way, that doll is the exact same model as the civilian boy had earlier. It was exactly the same, even down to the fact that the left armpit was torn and the cotton was sticking out.

“······.” All sorts of doubts began to arise, but I decided to watch in silence. Soon, Kang Han-min came out.

“It’s hard. It’s hard.” It was an unusually quick time to finish reconnaissance.