Chapter 114
The Divine Power Unit was a special forces unit made up entirely of non-commissioned officers.
However, perhaps because of the unit’s unique nature, the daily life of its NCOs was not all that different from the lives of ordinary enlisted soldiers in other units.
“So, this goes here, and you put this in like this.”
“Kim Ba-da!”
“Sergeant Kim Ba-da! You called for me?”
“Are you trying to prove you’re a [Supporter]? At this snail’s pace, when do you plan on being ready for evening roll call? Get back to your spot. The duty officer will be here soon.”
“Yes, understood!”
He learned various things about life in the unit from his immediate senior, Sergeant Kim Ba-da.
Having experienced military life in his past life, and now being in a place occupied only by NCOs, it was, in some ways, more comfortable than the regular army, with fewer restrictions.
Then came evening roll call.
The gazes of the seniors around him all turned to Hyuk-min at once.
“Did you learn everything from Ba-da?”
“Private Bang Hyuk-min! Yes, I did!”
“What’s my name?”
“You are Sergeant Lee Sang-hyuk!”
“Ooh~ Then what’s my rank here?”
“You’re the King!”
“Then what about him?”
“That is Sergeant Seong Ji-su!”
“Not bad. So he’s a tough one. Who’s the First Sergeant?”
“That would be Sergeant Park Dal-mo!”
“And the senior in charge of supplies.”
“That would be Sergeant Kim Ji-hoon!”
“What the? Shouldn’t this guy be transferred to the supply section? He’s smart.”
A lot of the seniors looked genuinely impressed.
It was understandable, since it had been less than ten minutes since Sergeant Kim Ba-da had told him about the seniors.
Yet he knew not only all their names, but also their ranks and order of seniority, so their amazement was only natural.
‘Well, I’ve been confident in my memory ever since my past life.’
It was one of Hyuk-min’s hidden talents.
Whatever he saw, he could capture like a photograph and store away in his mind.
He could say with confidence that, more than [Regression Mode], this was his real hidden trump card after returning to this life.
“He’s coming! Everyone, quiet.”
This was a place where only superhumans gathered.
As such, even the faint footsteps of the duty officer, who had deliberately muffled his steps to catch them off guard, were picked up by a few people using traits that let them catch every sound.
The words had barely been spoken before the duty officer appeared without a sound.
“Sixth Squad!”
Sergeant Kang Ki-dong entered the barracks with perfectly disciplined, crisp movements.
“To victory!”
“To victory.”
“Sixth Squad, report for evening roll call!”
It was then.
In an instant, the eyes of all the seniors, including his immediate senior Kim Ba-da, shot toward Hyuk-min, the anxiety in them multiplying.
Why?
‘Kim Ba-da, that son of a bitch…’
‘Ah, right. We’re screwed…’
Among the many things he had taught Hyuk-min, the details of evening roll call had not been one of them.
In other words, he had to get through roll call without having been taught a thing about the procedure.
And of all times, it had to happen with Sergeant Kang Namu, the sniper squad leader known for being the scariest person in the Divine Power Unit when angry, serving as duty officer.
‘Of all people, it had to be Sergeant Kang… Ah, fuck…’
Just as everyone realized they were doomed and stared at Hyuk-min, who was standing right next to the door.
“One!”
The moment Hyuk-min began perfectly, the seniors’ eyes widened like rabbits’.
“Two.”
“Three.”
“Four.”
“Five! Count complete!”
“Total personnel: seven. Excused: one. Reason for excuse: one member on 22:00 and 00:00 duty. Present personnel: six! Evening roll call preparations complete!”
He had not been taught.
Naturally, they had all assumed disaster was coming.
But Hyuk-min’s flawless report, worthy of an A-class ace, planted deep relief in the hearts of every senior present.
“At ease.”
“At ease!”
Sergeant Kang Namu approached Hyuk-min with a smile that had suddenly appeared on his face.
Then he touched Hyuk-min’s ear and spoke.
“You’ve learned well, haven’t you?”
“Private Bang Hyuk-min! Yes, I have!”
“Any difficulties?”
“None, sir!”
“Come on, what do you mean none. Sang-hyuk.”
“Sergeant Lee Sang-hyuk!”
“I hear Gwak-Gwak is back.”
Gwak-Gwak?
“Sergeant Gwak returned early from leave today, sir!”
Ah, so he meant Sergeant Gwak.
Then did that mean sniper squad leader Sergeant Kang Namu far outranked him?
“Why’d he come back so early? Then again, what would a guy who can’t even get a date do outside? He’s always been a headache.”
“Th-that’s right, sir!”
“I heard he held a welcoming ceremony as soon as he returned.”
At the words “welcoming ceremony,” all the seniors flinched.
Forcing himself to ignore the anxious gazes of his seniors, Hyuk-min answered.
“Yes, sir.”
“That bastard Gwak-Gwak, we shouldn’t give him any more leave. I even told him to come back later and gave him extra time, yet he still returns early?”
“I’m not sure, sir.”
“What would a new recruit like you know. It’s all… It’s all because of those bastards.”
Did he know something?
Sergeant Kang Namu’s gaze swept across the surrounding seniors.
“Sang-hyuk.”
“Sergeant Lee Sang-hyuk!”
“Then again, what fault is it of yours. It’s just one loach muddying the waters. Isn’t that right, Sang-hyuk?”
“Th-that’s right, sir!”
One loach muddying the waters.
The moment he heard those words, Hyuk-min’s eyebrow twitched.
However.
“Tell that loach bastard to come see me after evening roll call.”
“Yes! Understood!”
Hearing that, he realized he had misunderstood something.
The loach muddying the waters that he had mentioned in the morning was not Hyuk-min after all.
“Then.”
“To! Vic-tory!”
After Sergeant Kang Namu left, the seniors finally let out the breaths they had been holding, and the tension melted from them at once.
“Ah, I’m fucked.”
Sergeant Lee Sang-hyuk, who had been standing there giving the report, scratched the back of his head with a troubled expression.
“Excuse me, Sergeant Lee Sang-hyuk?”
“What.”
“May I ask who the sniper squad leader was calling the loach?”
“Who else could it be? Sergeant Gwak. Ah, I’m seriously fucked. How am I supposed to tell him…”
A strange light flickered in Hyuk-min’s eyes.
= = =
Was everything really because of Sergeant Gwak?
Even during the conversation with the sniper squad leader, the moment Sergeant Gwak’s name came up, all the seniors had shrunk into themselves like turtles.
And now that Sergeant Gwak was absent, the attitude of the seniors had changed noticeably.
It seemed Hyuk-min had been right to think that all the seniors were walking on eggshells around Sergeant Gwak.
But he could not ask why.
The moment he asked, it was obvious that the short-lived bond they had formed would be severed instantly.
After that tightrope-like conversation with the seniors came to an end, evening roll call was finally over.
A clattering noise echoed down the hallway, as if someone was up to something.
And, as expected.
An announcement immediately rang out throughout the barracks.
[No using [Skills] in the hallway. And Sergeant Kim Yong-hwan, who just used a [Dash Skill], report to the administration office.]
‘Nothing’s different.’
Well, if there was one difference.
There was no fixed lights-out time or late-night study period.
And they could freely use their phones.
‘Now’s the time.’
He sat up from where he had been lying down and slipped on his slippers.
At that, Sergeant Kim Ba-da asked him,
“Huh? Where are you going?”
“I’m going to make a phone call.”
“Let’s go together. You’re a new recruit, you can’t be walking around alone.”
“No, I can go by my…”
It was then.
“He’s not a child, let him go alone. He made enough noise just entering the unit, so what, is he going to desert?”
The King of the barracks, Sergeant Lee Sang-hyuk, spoke in an irritated tone.
“B-but.”
“I said let him go.”
“Understood…”
After Sergeant Lee Sang-hyuk repeated himself, Sergeant Kim Ba-da had no choice but to lie back down on his bunk.
“Thank you.”
“What’s there to thank me for. Just make sure you don’t cause trouble for us.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
After thanking the seniors, he carefully stepped out into the hallway.
He had walked about halfway down the corridor.
Then, in a way no one would notice, he generated only the faintest trace of Internal Energy.
And the moment he converted that Internal Energy into a [Skill], the positions of his body and the Death Knight’s soul, which he had been sharing with since earlier, switched places.
In an instant, he was outside the base.
‘Found him.’
Outside the barracks.
He saw Gwak Cheol-seop taking a phone call in a dark, secluded corner.
In truth, ever since meeting Wi Gwakdu, Hyuk-min had attached the soul created by devouring the Death Knight’s Helmet to Gwak Cheol-seop.
What he was doing, what he was saying.
He had stayed by Gwak Cheol-seop’s side, seeing and hearing it all.
Because of that, Hyuk-min had quickly figured out what kind of person Gwak Cheol-seop was within the Divine Power Unit.
‘The cancer of the Divine Power Unit.’
It wasn’t just the military.
Wherever a large number of people gathered, there were always cancers.
There were the selfish and inconsiderate ones, but the most serious kind of cancer was something else entirely.
They were the devilish bastards who took pleasure in hurting others.
Why was it that there were always people with demonic natures in the military?
It had been like that in his past life, and it was still the same in his current life.
Mad psychopaths who got a thrill out of tormenting those weaker than themselves.
Gwak Cheol-seop was exactly that sort.
‘Perfect timing.’
He spread out his Ki Sense and moved the Death Knight’s soul, confirming that no one else was around.
At a time when everyone was preparing to sleep, in a deserted place without CCTV.
“I’ll take care of it soon.”
He focused on the voice from the quiet phone call.
“I’m sorry. I know. I had some fun thanks to you.”
What? Who was he apologizing to?
‘Does it matter?’
Not wanting to drag it out, he decided to end it quickly and moved the Death Knight’s soul closer to Gwak Cheol-seop.
And just as he was about to switch places with the soul again.
‘Uh…’
Something that absolutely should not have been there entered the vision he shared through the soul.
An ornate, high-grade [Magic Stone] emerging from Gwak Cheol-seop’s pocket.
More precisely, it was the symbol inside the [Magic Stone] that made Hyuk-min’s eyes widen.
‘That’s…’
That rune, shaped like a spiral shell.
The moment he saw it, goosebumps spread all over his body.
‘The Maivan Rune!’
There were a few things in this world more forbidden than drugs.
The Maivan Rune was one of them.
The reason was simple.
Because it could steal and extort something from another person’s System.
The fact that the Maivan Rune existed for that purpose alone was why it had been included in the world’s prohibition treaty.
And yet it had appeared not just anywhere, but from the pocket of someone from the Divine Power Unit.
Faced with that impossible reality, Hyuk-min’s expression twisted together with the goosebumps crawling over him.
“I’ve been told how to use it. I’ll proceed soon. But… you have to keep your promise.”
Was he planning to use it even while knowing what it was?
What promise?
And who was he planning to use it on?
‘Don’t tell me.’
Just as the scattered pieces behind everything that had happened so far were beginning to fall into place.
An [Inventory] window popped up in the air, and a text message arrived on his phone.
Since it was on silent, and nothing should have mattered more than this moment, he tried to close the [Inventory] again.
But the contents of the text message that had flashed past for an instant surfaced in his mind.
[Sender: No Death]
[Photo]
[I saw a strange orc while clearing a Dungeon. Could this be one of the Body Eaters?]
He immediately took out his phone and checked the message.
And the moment he saw the contents, his brow furrowed on its own.
The photo was clear beyond doubt.
It was definitely one of the Body Eaters.
[Yeah, that’s one of the Body Eaters. Kill it on sight.]
Memories from his past life slowly rose to the surface.
Among the corpses he had gone to dispose of after the war, there had been many young children.
And among them, he had once seen one of the Body Eaters wedged between the two halves of a bisected corpse.
It had probably infected the child’s body, used it as its own, and then died.
At the time, the moment he saw that child, Hyuk-min had been reminded of his younger sister.
To think that a scene so horrific could have been caused by a single bug, depending on how one chose to see it, was what had made Hyuk-min dwell so much on the war.
What had made him particularly sensitive to the matter was the news report that had aired most frequently at the time.
「This is breaking news. A major incident has been prevented thanks to the swift response of the Divine Power Unit, which discovered an individual infected by one of the Body Eaters attempting to cross over by boat. According to experts, if the infected one of the Body Eaters had made landfall on the mainland, the damage would have been beyond imagination…」
That report had thrown the online communities into chaos.
All sorts of theories about what would happen if one of the Body Eaters made landfall had been brought up, and a fierce debate had raged without end.
But none of the scenarios ended well.
[You have to kill it. Don’t even let yourself get curious. Just kill it and dispose of it.]
Even in his past life, when he had had nothing to protect, his awareness of how dangerous the Body Eaters were had been extremely high.
The image of that child he had seen back then was still vivid in his mind.
Now, he had so much more to protect.
‘I don’t want any regrets.’
He did not want to lose anything.
No matter what, he would protect everything.
“What are you?”
The terrible memory of that day, triggered by the photo of the Body Eaters, had simply been too vivid.
When he turned his head at the sudden voice, Gwak Cheol-seop was standing there, having approached without him noticing.
Click.
And then cold metal pressed against his temple.
No, before even that, what caught his eye first was the ornate [Magic Stone] in Gwak Cheol-seop’s other hand, engraved with the Maivan Rune.
“This just got easier.”
So it was as he thought…
Was he the one Gwak Cheol-seop was targeting?
Then the person on the phone was…
“Park Chung-ho?”
Gwak Cheol-seop’s smile deepened.
Then Gwak Cheol-seop drew up his Mana and activated a [Skill] he had prepared in advance.
“[Silence].”
A hemispherical domain of blue Mana swallowed all surrounding sound.
The domain of [Silence], where mouths moved but not a single word could be heard.
Without hesitation, Gwak Cheol-seop pulled the trigger of the pistol pressed against Hyuk-min’s temple.
“…….”
No sound rang out.
Only the blood splattering across the dirt explained what had happened.