When I Returned to Farming, National-level Big Juniors Flock - Chapter 89



Only Krnovel

89. Past Rivals

Thud!

Han Su-yeon got out of the car.

Her expression was stiff as she closed the door, somewhat nervously, unlike her usual self.

“… let’s go.”

A few attendants followed her as she began to walk.

She heads across the underground parking lot to a morgue in northern Seoul.

It was a secret national facility located deep underground, the existence of which was unknown to the public.

At the same time, it was a place subject to stricter control than the First Relics Depot, which houses national treasures.

From the perspective of someone who doesn’t know, it might be questionable why a storage facility that simply stores monster corpses would be kept so secret, but the reason was valid.

Not only Korea, but other countries also set up facilities to collect and store the bodies of dead monsters.

By dissecting and studying the monster’s corpse, one can determine its weaknesses and habits.

At the gate, species that had appeared in the past often appeared, so they were researching countermeasures to effectively suppress the numerous identical species that would appear in the future.

In this day and age when we are accustomed to fighting monsters, this is a very natural concept.

But this confidential storage facility was not a place where ordinary corpses were stored.

Unlike the corpses that were disposed of after the research was completed, the corpses of monsters that had once entered this place were never taken out.

Those who entered this place were the ‘Named Monsters’ who had been threatening humanity since the Gate incident and were the most powerful.

For Korea, which faced the massive monster wave from China right in front of its eyes, it had the most dangerous collection in the world.

Thanks to this, this place is a national asset, but it is also full of the corpses of extremely dangerous named monsters.

If the management of this place was poor and a large-scale exposure to turbid air occurred, a disaster would occur.

Just by exposure to the atmosphere, an area the size of a small city in the middle of Seoul disappears.

That is why the South Korean government has kept the existence of this repository strictly secret and has given it the highest security level.

This was to the extent that even Han Su-yeon, the deputy director and de facto head of the management bureau, could not access it with her own authority alone.

No one was allowed inside unless there was a special reason.

Combined with the director’s firm belief in eliminating access from the outside as much as possible, there were virtually no outsiders who set foot in this place.

“No matter what, we didn’t know you wouldn’t cooperate even though we told you so much.”

The aide standing nearby shook his head and said.

Not only did he ignore several requests from the Disaster Management Agency, but he didn’t even nod when Deputy Director Han Su-yeon came to see him in person.

Even entry for simple confirmation, let alone removal of the body, was completely refused.

“I’ve heard that you have a bad personality, but I didn’t think it would come out like this…”

“It doesn’t matter. If you want to follow the proper procedure, then just follow it.”

Han Su-yeon said stiffly.

Even though I was met with strong rejection, I had no intention of backing down from there.

‘I really have to see inside there.’

I had no intention of stirring things up here from the beginning.

She wasn’t a researcher, so she had no reason to rummage through the corpses of monsters that had died in the past, and it was a facility she had no reason to get involved in.

However, while reading through the materials about the queen at Oh Hyeon-seong’s request.

She felt a strange sense of foreboding about these materials.

She felt something was strange and that was why she came to this place.

To see with my own eyes the body of the ‘Queen’ that was secured 5 years ago and has been sleeping here.

Of course, she had to leave because of the stubborn attitude of the repository, but when she returned, she even received the president’s approval.

No matter how much a single agency head recites regulations, he cannot tackle the authority directly approved by the president.

“… there is no response.”

“Then open it.”

Kkwadduk!

The guards stepped forward and forcibly opened the thick iron gate that had been lowered.

As she entered through the open front door, she could see the manager standing alone in the hallway.

A skinny old man wearing a white gown.

“If you heard everything, why didn’t you respond?”

“Unless you’re an internal staff member or researcher, the more outsiders come and go, the more vulnerable this place becomes. You know that too.”

“In the face of due process, your personal opinion is not needed. You are just a person who is assigned to manage this place, and whenever the country needs it…”

“It’s a system I designed and built!”

An angry roar poured out from the old man.

“Do I look like a security guard guarding a warehouse or something?”

“You… something’s strange.”

Han Su-yeon’s expression turned sour at the sight of the manager getting angry.

She had met him in the past.

It wasn’t a great relationship, but at least I had a clear impression or memory of him.

It was a time when all of the country’s systems, including those for special forces, gates, and awakened people, were not properly established.

It was this old man who realized the importance of collecting data on monster species early on and promoted related research.

The creation of these storage facilities was also one of his representative achievements.

He is a pioneer in Korea who did not simply suggest building a facility, but built the system himself through trial and error.

But that past appearance was nowhere to be found.

In his eyes, where he had lost his gun, there was only a mixture of anger and fear.

“We’ll talk about disciplinary action later.”

Han Soo-yeon snatched the access key hanging around his neck.

Then I quickly passed the manager, and when I put my key in the locker, the door to the storage room slid open with a hiss.

Then she stepped inside.

“… what.”

But Han Su-yeon was greatly embarrassed.

Even she, who had been through a lot, could not hide her expression at all and was filled with embarrassment.

What unfolded before her eyes was an empty storage room with nothing in it.

It was supposed to be a space where the monsters’ corpses were contained along with the preservative, but the large glass containers were filled only with green liquid and there were no corpses anywhere.

Kkudangtang!

The management office agents arrested the manager in an instant.

The restrained old man fell to the floor with his head down.

“You… what the hell have you done?”

“Hehehe…”

The manager let out a hollow laugh.

I asked him several more times, but he just smiled and didn’t say anything.

“Take it and go.”

As Han Su-yeon nodded, the management office agents dragged the old man away.

A shocking sight inside the storage room that was completely unexpected.

It was a major incident that could have turned the country upside down.

As her gaze turned, a name written on an empty case right in front of her caught her eye.

The place where the corpse of the named monster ‘Chattergil’ was stored.

In the past, it was a corpse that Oh Hyeon-seong had personally handled and secured, and she had seen it too, but Chattergil’s corpse had also completely disappeared.

“… Wait, does that mean…”

Han Su-yeon walked anxiously.

Although the inside of the storage facility was very large, it was completely empty, with nothing intact.

Also, when she entered the last room she reached, she realized that her ominous premonition was correct.

“… doesn’t exist.”

Inside the largest facility within the repository.

Inside the empty glass window, where only the preservative remained, the queen’s body was completely gone.

*

Krrrrrr!

A monster with drool dripping from between its sharp teeth.

The guys sniffed around the lobby of the building, but they couldn’t find any scent of prey and left.

But there was a gaze watching the guys disappearing in droves.

“Really, there is no place that isn’t there.”

Oh Hyeon-seong, who had been hiding, appeared behind the desk.

After briefly parting ways with his group, he began to wander through the abandoned city and make his way to the center.

To figure out what’s going on here.

Then, I tried to catch and go after the boss-level monsters I encountered, but I still hadn’t seen them while I was moving.

Instead, like the wolf monsters just now, the remnants of the group encountered a large number of them.

A group of beast monsters, each of their own, roaming the city.

Since the monster type of the nest discovered here was a beast type, the monsters that poured out from there were also of the same type.

One of the characteristics of beast-type monsters is that they generally show a high population, and indeed, I felt that there were a considerable number of them while coming.

It’s hard to believe that these are the remnants of a nest that has already been conquered.

This is a number that has been greatly reduced, but he chose to avoid them because he did not want to fight them one by one.

Rattling!

Oh Hyun-seong crossed the lobby, opened the locked door, and moved through the passage to the building next door.

The city view was visible through the windows on both sides.

It was something I felt as I walked across the street, but it was even more tangible when I looked down at it to see just how much of a large city had disappeared.

Tsk tsk tsk!

But, at that moment.

Cracks began to appear in the ground of the scenery I was looking down on.

A crack so small that an ordinary person would not have been able to see it from this distance.

‘What is that?’

Oh Hyun-seong’s expression became frowning.

And at that moment, the crack spread rapidly and became a huge crack that swallowed up a corner of the city.

Kwakwakwakwang!

‘crazy…!’

A shock that shook the entire city in an instant.

The ruins came crashing down, and the building he was in, located a long way from where the cracks first appeared, began to tilt.

The high-rise building almost collapsed in an instant, but the crack was not blocked.

A view of a city where huge swathes of ground have collapsed.

As if a violent earthquake had occurred, the ground was turned upside down, exposing the terrain underneath.

‘Is that… the place where the nest that was conquered this time was?’

No, it wasn’t the nest side.

The nest that was conquered this time was located in the exact opposite direction from the epicenter where the tectonic shift began.

‘That location is rather…’

Oh Hyun-seong felt a sense of unease at the location of the epicenter, which seemed familiar.

Even though more than ten years had passed, the abandoned city looked almost the same, so I could tell right away.

In the past, the place where the S-rank gate was created.

It was also the location where the gate opened, releasing named monsters, which were modifiers that could only be obtained by inflicting enormous damage on humans.

Creepy!

Oh Hyeon-seong felt a strong sense of alienation from the epicenter.

At the same time, he moved his legs and quickly twisted his neck and waist at the sharp anticipation that was coming.

Oh my god!

The projectile cut through an entire floor of the building and narrowly missed Oh Hyeon-seong’s neck.

An attack by a monster flying in from this distance with absurd speed and power.

At that time, there was no law of destruction, so the method used at that time was the same as that used to prevent the city from being recaptured.

In all his experience, there was only one guy who had used this type of attack.

“That kid…”

Named monster, Chattergil.

A monster that had long since died, and had probably been killed by his own hands, was staring down at him from below.

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