Rust - Chapter 261



Only Krnovel

RUST [RUST]-261

Chief Dan Brown added one more thing.

“Tell them our kids can’t do that.”

“Manager!”

“What do you want me to do? Are you going to kill all of our children by doing whatever those loser kids tell you to do?”

“But this isn’t it.”

No, no. No. No. Everyone’s gone crazy.

“If there’s another way, tell me. The Strategic Command must have eaten something wrong and is going crazy, so tell me a way to buy time. If there’s a way to prevent our children from dying en masse, tell me.”

“······.”

Can’t you tell the answer just by looking at the basic design? There’s an automatic turret inside, and you want to occupy the central control room and open the entrance?

The automatic turret management is done by the supercomputer’s AI, and the decision to open and close the doors is made by Yania Kim, so what are we supposed to do about that?

Capture Yaniya Kim and torture her? And then what? When Vladimir returns? Are you talking about lying down with your head up in your hands?

Hack it open? You want to hack the latest supercomputer in the Meta-physics lab that has not one but three AIs attached to it?

What? What on earth are you going to do?

Getting to the central control room is difficult enough, but let’s say you enter the hallway. Waiting at the end of the hallway is an automatic turret with a 20mm to 40mm Vulcan cannon.

Are you telling me to die in a line? In a straight hallway with nowhere to run, you can do it if you keep pushing until you run out of bullets and rush until the gun barrel melts.

If you think about it seriously, it wasn’t impossible.

Wasn’t trench warfare possible in World War I? You just had to push your troops through the machine gun positions until they were breached.

But is that what our guys at the Department of Homeland Security are supposed to do?

It had been a long time since the agents in the Bloody Ark Tower were redeployed due to a lack of manpower. Even if all the current members were sacrificed, it would be impossible to break through the defenses of the central control room.

“And I’m on sick leave.”

“yes?”

Yes, right now. Chief Dan Brown put everything down and collapsed comfortably. Thud!

“Manager?”

Chief Dan Brown.

I was diagnosed with gastric ulcer, angina, and high blood pressure··· R··· but I was in a dangerous condition due to extreme accumulated fatigue and stress, so I needed to recuperate.

As a result, the Strategic Command’s operation to seize Vladislav Tower was temporarily suspended.

Strategic Command Conference Room

“It’s clear that you have negative thoughts about the military!”

United States Armed Forces.

It is almost the only army that lives up to the term “army that lives on honor.” It is an army where you greet soldiers returning home at the airport with gratitude, and where citizens voluntarily show courtesy while the bodies of fallen soldiers are being carried away.

Economically speaking, it wasn’t that well-received. A trainee’s salary was less than 2 million won, and a regular private’s salary was a little over 2 million won.

Although there are various allowances, including training allowance, it is not that high compared to the average income in the United States.

If your goal is simply to make a living, then other jobs will pay more. That’s why choosing the military and serving in it is bound to be a source of pride.

“Isn’t it because of your experience serving in the Korean military?”

“but.”

The Korean military’s uneven service environment and experiences were so absurd that anyone who knew about them would be shocked. I don’t know about today, but even 20 years ago, there were many cases that were quite absurd.

Even though he wrote that he was supporting the people and went out and did things like a public servant, he was ridiculed. Hahaha. A guard dog. It was to the point where they broadcasted this in real time.

“I think it’s better to think of it as a kind of PTSD state.”

“PTSD?”

“What if you were treated like a would-be murderer? Imagine being treated like a brat who’s just trying to make a living while you’re out and about.”

What kind of hell were the Korean soldiers serving in? Even with the conscription system. For one reason or another, those who had been slandering Vladimir Kalin were silent for a moment.

“That is no excuse.”

Are you loyal to the United States of America enough to bury your painful past? Only then can you be trusted. How can you trust someone with the red stain of a North Korean-made Chinese-assembled Korean-activated mercenary killer?

“Given that you participated in the nuclear security code decommissioning operation, shouldn’t we now consider your loyalty proven?”

“The operation wasn’t a success. Let’s not pass it over.”

“How can you judge with just one look?”

“It doesn’t matter how many times you follow orders.”

“We need to look at our hearts to see if they truly have the spirit and attitude to devote themselves to the United States of America.”

“How do you see that and how do you prove it?”

A general who had been listening quietly recited a verse in a low voice.

“And God said to Abraham, Offer as a sacrifice your most precious possession.”

“Are you asking me to give up my most precious thing?”

The things that Vladimir Kalin treasures most. The Vladislav Tower and Jania Kim. Touching them will reveal his true nature.

“Loyalty and honor are neither objects of doubt nor of faith.”

“Do you think all of you sitting here are confident enough to step on the same scale? Are you confident enough to pass the same test now?”

“Tests should have clear criteria and be fair, what is being done to Vladimir Kalin now is not a test.

“That’s true. But… what he has to go through isn’t a test. It’s a trial.”

Heroes are born through overcoming trials, just as villains are born through being twisted by trials.

A hero who fights against absurdity and seeks to restore society and order. A villain who ignores and seeks to destroy society and order because they are absurd.

If you look at the combat footage of Vladimir Kalin, he was already a tactical weapon in his own right. So should we treat him as a weapon? Or should we treat him as a truly honorable hero?

“That is why he must go through trials.”

Even if the ordeal is absurd and unreasonable, if you can’t endure it and become a villain, the best way to minimize the damage is to get rid of it as soon as possible.

‘Trials? Ha- A soldier who dies with a smile is a loyal and honorable soldier? A hero who passes trials by being betrayed and getting stabbed in the back of the head without a care in the world?’

Colonel Gilbert Brown, a man who had risen from lieutenant colonel to colonel and was rumored to be on the verge of getting a star, was repulsive.

The colonel touched the medal on his shoulder. The honorary medal smelled like rusty iron.

The events in Japan, the loss of his subordinates to mutant monsters, the clash with Chinese special forces, the traitors within and the influx of infected people.

If it weren’t for Vladimir Kalin, we might have been wiped out. Most of the survivors, including himself, would have died without being able to escape the hellish Japan.

Did he fight for honor? Gilbert Brown saw Vladimir Kalin as a typical petty bourgeois. He was not particularly greedy.

Are you drunk on heroism? No, you are not. That is why I could see how absurd the words coming out of the conference room were. Those who put forth unreasonable and absurd conditions.

‘Are you scared?’

Because those who slander honor end up longing for it, and those who value honor end up using honor as a leash.

In the midst of his near-death experience in Japan, Colonel Gilbert Brown realized: The world was changing. It would change. That was a certain future.

The mutant monsters that were in Japan are spreading to their home country. They are being stopped now, but how long will they be able to stop it?

Even with the mutant wheel, it was the same. What if you sprayed toxic pesticides to kill the wheel? What would happen to the food chain if you killed the bees, the flies, and everything?

Humanity would gradually decline. Even if humanity survived, it was clear that the current form of the state would be difficult to maintain. And Vladimir Kalin clearly saw through that. The construction of the Ark Tower was proof of that.

Don’t those sitting here know what they know? Yes. They were afraid. The future. A world where superhumans like Vladimir Kalin would appear.

So you probably want to put on a leash even more.

Colonel Gilbert Brown looked at the man who had quoted the Bible and mentioned the ordeal. The number of stars shining on his shoulder was three.

You quoted the Bible, but what do you really want?

Whatever it is, it won’t be faith or loyalty.

It wouldn’t be even more embarrassing for a hero to do something like that.

======

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A swaying shadow leaping from wall to wall, building to building.

“There is no one.”

[Because the Northern Theater Command’s superhuman force invaded Beijing and issued a curfew.]

In April and May, yellow dust and smoke were severe, but the sky in Beijing was unusually clear and clean.

“Still, that’s true. The weather is so nice···.”

It was neither night nor day, and the streets were so empty that it seemed as if all the people had evaporated, and there was not a single sign of life. It felt strange.

“Are there any people in Beijing?”

[There are records of electricity and gas usage. Can you tell me the exact numbers?]

“No. Rather, it seems like their traces suddenly disappeared?”

[It seems that during the week it does not move and hides its body.]

Move and engage only at night and rest during the day?

Maru suddenly looked up at the sky. He saw something spinning high in the sky far away.

Jiying-

The footage captured by the helmet camera appeared on the HUD. It was the image of a high-altitude reconnaissance drone.

“I won’t be detected by the infrared detector, right?”

[Yes. It wasn’t caught on CCTV or heat detectors with infrared capabilities.]

Are you lacking in stealth equipment? In terms of defense, armor made from monster hide is overwhelmingly superior, but it would be hard to ignore the effectiveness of stealth equipment.

Anyway, it was a good thing if they weren’t moving. We could close the distance, and if we were lucky, we could even launch a surprise attack.

Beep beep-

[4 o’clock. Friendly identification code confirmed. Shall we mark the location?]

In every place where there was a friendly identification code, there were horrific corpses. I’ve seen more than 10 corpses so far.

“Show me.”

A map appeared on the HUD, with four red dots clustered on one side. The distance was an empty lot between apartment complexes, about 2km away.

“What about CCTV?”

[No CCTV footage found nearby.]

Then? Diana showed her flexibility at level 3. She used the information that there was a car among the cars that had a black box installed that was connected to the internet.

[Check the nearby area for friendly identification codes. Search results for black box records connected to the Internet. There is a high probability that the enemies are resting in a nearby apartment.]

“Yeah? Good job.”

[Check CCTV records from surrounding apartments.]

Diana analyzed the CCTV footage in an instant and marked the likely location of the enemies. They were not gathered in one place, but were scattered in groups of three or five. In this way, even if they succeeded in a surprise attack on one, they would not be able to ambush the rest.

‘Let’s see, individual defeats seem difficult.’

They were too close to be considered apart. It was an exquisite distance that would be tiring if they surrounded and rushed at them, and a problem if they were to scatter in all directions. If they took hostages and filmed the hostage situation, it would be an annoying situation.

‘They took up positions inside so that even if their location was discovered, they wouldn’t be bombed or shelled hastily.’

In order to drive them away without thinking about anything else, it was important to capture the leader. The guy in traditional Japanese armor sitting on a pile of corpses. Maru decided to start by capturing him first.

“Can you tell me where the guy in Japanese armor is?”

[The guidance begins.]

Maru followed Diana’s instructions and went up to the rooftop of the apartment building where the guys were. As expected, he felt that there were people standing guard in hiding on the rooftop.

‘One person? No, two people?’

Maru approached, his footsteps muffled.

A blade extending straight towards a vaguely felt location.

Krrrrrr-

The space was torn apart by the rippling sound of Eclipse’s signature crackling.

Puhwaaaaak-

The transparent space was torn apart, and red drops of blood splattered everywhere, dyeing the stealth equipment red. Before the pieces reached the floor, Maru stomped his feet toward his next target.

widely-

A rippling space.

I couldn’t see it with my eyes, but I felt it looking back.

Maru burst out in a fit of murder towards that place. The thick murderous energy spread like waves.

Ugh! Ugh!

A groan that was stifled and breathless.

A blade that flies in the direction of the sound.

Eclipse cried like a hawk stalking its prey.

Kkieeeeeeet-