Rust - Chapter 391



Only Krnovel

RUST -391

Maru read the signals of the crows that decorated the sky.

‘automobile.’

‘A large number.’

‘This way.’

Ha- Maru let out a small sigh and put back on his ripper suit after roughly wiping off the sweat. He frowned at the awkwardness of putting back on clothes he had taken off even though he had just taken a shower.

A moment later, a line of black vans, the signature color of those used by American intelligence agencies, began to approach us from afar.

Zooming in on the HUD image, we see a few vans with the Department of Homeland Security emblem stamped on them, among other unmarked black vans.

‘Homeland Security? Because of Erica?’

Phew-

That’s fast.

‘The U+ program is good, and the capabilities are good, too.’

I was wondering if this had any strange ties to the Department of Homeland Security.

‘I need to buy some time first.’

“Control the elevators and emergency stairs.”

“Okay, what if they try to use physical force?”

Maru nodded to the question of the bodyguard who accompanied the nurse. Seeing them rushing in like that, it seemed like they were planning to force their way in if necessary.

“First, tell her that Erica Lisbon is being treated for an injury and may need to be evacuated to Detroit. If she still wants to drag you, just tell her that I’ll be there. If you still use physical force, just take it without dying.”

“yes?”

“The armored exosuit will be able to withstand most attacks. Just shoot or hit it. Be careful not to die. And record the entire situation.”

“···All right.”

Maru, who had bought some time, immediately rushed into the infirmary.

“From now on, answer the questions I ask you truthfully.”

When the atmosphere on the floor suddenly became uneasy, the nurse patted Erica’s hand and continued with the treatment.

“Cannibal leader. Brett Vaden’s behavior is strange. Do you have anything to say?”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“Like being possessed by that guy.”

“······.”

Maru didn’t trust cannibals. So he didn’t care what they said or did, or what they did or what they babbled about. The cannibals’ unique charm, aura, and dominance would find an opportunity to break people’s minds.

From what I’ve seen of the situation at the time, the fighting was too intense for Erica and Julia to have been possessed or eaten by cannibals.

The cannibals on the Baden family’s side were completely wiped out, and the cockroaches controlled by Brett Baden were also greatly reduced in number, but it’s a bit much to say that it was planned.

Objectively speaking, it was the same. If the cannibal had psychometry and telepathy, it would have been easy to annihilate the pursuers. As suspected at the beginning, all they had to do was drive the pursuers into a trap.

But the two of them didn’t do that and instead drew out the cannibals and cockroaches that were lying in wait. How should we interpret that?

The damage done by the cannibals was too great to be attributed to Brett Baden or to the cannibals being possessed. In particular, the annihilation of the Baden family’s cannibals was difficult to understand.

Still, there was something strange about it. If he had a brain, he would have noticed the two women’s abilities and ordered the cockroach not to kill them, but who knows?

“Tell me honestly. Why didn’t the cockroaches attack you?”

“······.”

‘Huh? How did you know? Julia and Brett Baden must have spoken telepathically.’

It was a question I asked roughly, but Erica couldn’t figure it out.

To begin with, Vladimir was the type that was difficult for her to understand. He was someone that psychometry didn’t work properly with, and Julia’s telepathy didn’t work properly with him either. So, what if he had figured out Julia’s thoughts, even though he didn’t know how?

Maru quietly cursed at Erica, who was sweating profusely and trembling without realizing it.

What the fuck-

The nurse, who had been holding Erica’s hand tightly as she flinched, spoke to Erica. Seriously and sincerely.

“You have to tell me exactly what happened, okay? Be honest. Don’t lie.”

Then, Erika explained the whole story to Nanae, who seemed to be saying that she would not let go of her hand no matter what happened.

“···That’s why. Julia is in fear of death, not knowing when she might die···”

The nurse finished the story while patting and calming down Erica, who was sobbing intermittently. Maru, who had to hold back his tears and listened to the story, was dumbfounded.

Are you in your right mind?

No, I guess it was because I wasn’t in my right mind.

under-

I heard that the culprit behind the situation was telepathy.

It was absurd that the reason she became so attractive was because of the necklace.

“No, that’s not true. Think of it as wearing a bomb necklace that could explode at any moment.”

“···No. It’s not like I have a hobby of blowing people’s heads up. Why would I kill someone who is doing fine?”

“How would the other person know that? They would think that if they make a mistake, they will die.”

“You still don’t understand even after hearing this? If you hadn’t put on the necklace, who knows what would have happened?”

The nurse was on the side that understood Julia’s actions and Erica’s situation, but Maru was not. She should be grateful that she was saved, why would she do such a stupid thing…

That’s that, but the problem was the Department of Homeland Security that had arrived at the bottom of the building.

What should I do with this?

They say that Director Den Brown, who had turned his back on the top, came in person.

The simplest thing would be to just throw psychometry at it. It’ll figure out how to boil it or boil it.

But then the damage would be huge. It’s one thing if the Department of Homeland Security takes U+’s whereabouts, but if they find out that telepathy is the culprit, it would be another blow to this side of telepathy. Psychometry went to confession, but it was obvious that he would harbor resentment toward this side for abandoning him. The nurse who was still holding Erica’s hand would also not be happy.

If they had simply killed him in the culvert, there would have been traces. Even if they had burned him with napalm, there would have been bone fragments left behind, and judging by the cut marks, it was clear that he had been stabbed to death…

for a moment.

If you kill him, there will be a trace…

A cut mark on the bone fragment?

They only thought about burning the body and didn’t care about the cut marks on the remaining bones. They just burned the body and there was no reason to consider the marks left on the bones.

So what that meant was that if the Department of Homeland Security went into the sewer to search, they would find the bones of Brett Baden and Julia Burton, and there would be signs of mutilation.

It was a mistake to miss the evidence, but it seemed like it was this mistake that made the story worth telling.

‘···If I do it right, it’ll be fine. Since I have a tactical camera, if only there was video···’

Maru checked the things he had picked up at the scene. Maru took out the tactical camera attached to the pursuit team’s exosuit that recorded the fight between the pursuit team and the cannibals, and after watching it at 32x speed, he finally found a video he liked.

Jerome? Jerome?

At the end, there was footage of the agent who shot Julia.

“Erica Lisbon is receiving treatment and cannot be called?”

“Yes.”

“Then let’s go see for ourselves.”

“You cannot go up because the treatment is not finished yet.”

Bodyguards and Homeland Security agents in armored exosuits began to bicker.

“What are you doing? Get out of here right now.”

“Please understand. We are also doing as we are commanded.”

A scuffle broke out, but the agents were unable to break through the bodyguards, who were armed with armored exosuits.

“···Do you know that this kind of behavior is in violation of the National Security Act and the Patriot Act? You can be arrested and detained without a court warrant.”

“Even so, I cannot get out of the way without orders.”

Perhaps because he was heavily armed with an armored exosuit, or perhaps because he was going to Detroit anyway since his affiliation was different, he didn’t flinch even at the threatening remarks of the Homeland Security agent.

‘It is an order from above.’

The nurse was bold. She didn’t look like she was. Director Dan Brown, who had been watching the situation, stepped forward.

“This is Director of Homeland Security Dan Brown. We have an urgent need for the safety of the psychometric Erica Lisbon. Contact upstairs and let her know that the Director of Homeland Security is here in person.”

“Please wait a moment.”

After a while, the security guards stepped aside next to the elevator and said.

“Only the director and his staff may go up.”

“What the heck? These guys are really.”

“Stop. Good. Let’s do that.”

“Director!”

“Okay. Let’s go.”

The person sitting in front of the director, who came up with eight people, which was a bit too many to be called an attendant, was not nurse Ono Nanae, but Vladimir Kalin.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve seen you in person like this, Director.”

“···okay.”

The director’s face hardened. And he didn’t hide it.

“I don’t know what to think about this situation. Could you explain it to me?”

Maru laughed bitterly at Director Den Brown’s straightforward question.

“Okay. First, let me explain my position.”

The combination of psychometry and telepathy is predicted to be quite powerful. The cannibalistic forces have been defeated, but this increases the possibility of a power struggle in New York.

People are likely to target psychometry and telepathy abilities. If they can just steal the two abilities, they can gain overwhelming information power over their opponents. If they fail to acquire them, they will definitely try to assassinate the two people.

“The psychometric and telepathic people are important to us, so I came in secret to protect them.”

“···It sounds like you don’t trust the Homeland Security Department’s security.”

“Yes, to be honest, yes.”

Director Den Brown’s expression cracked at Maru’s answer.

“Okay. But you call that a story? Then you were also present at the scene where the pursuit party and the cannibals were fighting. What should we think of that?”

If Vladimir Maru had followed the two women into the sewer to protect them, he would have crushed the cannibals with overwhelming killing power.

Then what should we think of the current situation? Should we think that he intentionally did not help the pursuit team? That he watched until all the pursuit team died? Maru did not blink an eye even when the director’s tone changed.

“I don’t know what you think, but I would like you to watch this video and then talk about it.”

“Tactical camera recording footage?”

“Yes. This is Agent Jerome Randall’s tactical camera footage. I think he’s the commander. I’d like to continue the conversation after we see the footage he took.”

Director Dan Brown nodded at the mention of Agent Jerome’s footage.

The combat footage that started like that was brutal. The combination of telepathy and psychometry allowed them to counterattack without falling into the enemy’s trap. With the help of the two ability users, they exploited the enemy’s weaknesses, but the enemy’s immediate counterattack was clearly captured.

If we look at only the cannibals and the pursuers, the battle situation was advantageous for the pursuers, but the scene in the video was flowing in a two-way battle.

‘Kill the damn cockroaches first!’

At Jerome’s command, the war of attrition turned into a brutal all-out war.

Director Dan Brown closed his eyes for a moment. When he set out on a pursuit, he had anticipated that they might encounter rats or cockroaches. That was why he had supplied flamethrowers and insecticides.

However, it was unimaginable that a cannibal could control a cockroach. A cockroach that moves according to orders, isn’t it essentially a biological weapon?

“As I said before, I went into the sewer to protect the two people, but I ended up in the middle of the fight because I was following them. Don’t get me wrong. What I saw there was a scene like this video, where the cockroaches were allied with the cannibals and were attacking the pursuing party.”

“······.”

In the video, they were seen celebrating their victory, saying that they had finally defeated the bastards. But that joy was short-lived, as the cockroach invasion began. A swarm of 10-inch-long cockroaches fell from the ceiling.

“I found out that there was a man-eater controlling the cockroaches. How many cockroaches can you kill with a knife? Hundreds? Thousands? I figured that the only way to be sure was to kill the man-eater controlling the cockroaches.”

A desperate situation where even the flamethrower flames and insecticides ran out. The footage showed the pursuers being trampled by cockroaches.

“I thought that if I let go of the man-eater controlling the cockroaches, it would be a bigger risk. Even if it meant losing my psychometry and telepathy, I had to catch the higher entity controlling the cockroaches at any cost. That was my judgment.”

“······.”

Director Den Brown and Maru’s eyes met.