[KRRIK-KRIK— DRRRRRRK—]
The ceiling of Cure Medical Care’s research wing slid open, revealing a colossal structure.
[RUMBLE RUMBLE! THUD!]
A bizarre array of devices, staged against Busan’s night sky.
Aside from its vast scale and the addition of futuristic apparatus, it shared a similar logic with the device in the attic of Kim Sinhwa’s Hungry Mansion.
T’s Clock.
Terminus (the end, the last stop).
A clock that announces this world’s end.
As T’s Clock shuddered weirdly, it interacted with the night sky— and with the balefully gleaming full moon— to convey critical information.
“Yes. Today is the day.”
At Akiyama’s declaration, everyone in the control room moved in perfect concert.
A necromancer working a Ouija board; a geomancer peering into a fengshui disk; and researchers at computers— a strange tableau gathered in one place.
A gigantic tank set in the wall burbled with fluorescent slime pumped up from far underground.
And beneath T’s Clock:
Golden chains braided from hundreds of talismans and wards—
Enwrapping a strangely shaped brass mirror.
“Inject power.”
[VIIIIIIIIII—]
“Spin up the mana-stone circuit.”
[PAZZZZZZT!!]
The brass mirror thrashed, vomiting eerie sparks.
That was the artifact containing a shard of the [Source of Life]—
A special item that could substitute for medium, rite, and the sacrifice among sacrifices required for an abyssal advent.
[Mirror of Wisdom].
Unlike the [Blade of Flesh] or the [Soul Seal] that Kim Sinhwa had found elsewhere, the [Mirror of Wisdom]— for some reason— had been destroyed and remained unstable.
“Synchronization at seventy percent.”
“Proceeding is impossible.”
“Our forecast that the Great Yin (full moon) would help was correct— but we lack an absolute mass of gold.”
The Biomancers of Cure Medical Care briefed him.
“I see?”
He kept his usual tone, but Akiyama’s face twisted in a horrifying way.
Immigration had crashed the party and wrecked everything.
If it were only Immigration, there might have been room to use force— but Yang Seohu was in Busan now.
And the reason Yang Seohu was in Busan—
“Kim Sinhwa! By dragging in that fiend, you ruined my gold! My plan! The key to meeting Mother!”
He turned his back on the [Mirror of Wisdom] and ran to the quietly simmering tank in the corner of the control room, shouting,
“[Source of Life]! Ancestor of every species on Earth, bearer of all life’s forms upon the land at once, the oldest Mother who first bore offspring— LUCA! Why— after giving me a solemn calling— did you summon in that vile extra-terrestrial entity!”
Akiyama still could not accept why the [Source of Life] had called Kim Sinhwa to Busan.
He had served for decades, throwing away everything he owned. Why! Why! Why!
The [Source of Life] did not answer.
It only handed down revelations, showed omens, and set causality in motion.
Or else simply burbled in silence.
[BLORP— BLORB-BLORB—]
Fluorescent slime boiled in the great tank.
Akiyama’s rage burst, sudden and explosive.
“Mother! Mother of Life! My Mother! I will never let that devil Kim Sinhwa take you from me! As much as I love you, you must love me!”
With a rattling clatter, Akiyama’s body swelled.
Snake-like scales and tiger-like fur sprouted simultaneously beneath his collar.
“Hiyooooo! Hihyoooo!”
A grotesque howl tore out of Akiyama’s mouth.
The whole building shuddered and rattled at the sound.
“Calm yourself, C.E.O.!”
“There’s still time!”
The Biomancers shouted over each other.
“Haa... haa...”
Barely steadying his breath, Akiyama slowly settled back into the tall, handsome businessman’s form.
“Gold! Bring the gold! There is no tomorrow now! We must wake Mother before Kim Sinhwa arrives! I— with my own hands— not Kim Sinhwa! I will seize Mother’s love myself, and that love will be evenly distributed through me to all humanity, the two billion souls left on this Earth!”
About a kilometer from Cure Medical Care.
A large observation tower set up at a big outlet mall.
“Mmm— nice view.”
Dragged along by Seo Cheonseul’s decree that they needed reconnaissance, Park Gwangnim had been hauled up onto the lighthouse-like tower’s sloped roof.
“D-do you see anything?”
It was true nothing blocked their line of sight— but it was a dark night.
All Park Gwangnim could make out was that Cure Medical Care’s big building stood over there.
“Bahaha— of course I do.”
Seo Cheonseul curled his fingers into a ring like a toy telescope and raised them to his eye.
But there was nothing in his hand.
Park Gwangnim replied, hoping the motion was some ritual action to trigger an ability.
“Th-that’s good. Oh, please don’t move all of a... uaaah!”
Again— they were on the roof, not inside the tower.
No proper footholds, and the roof— damn it! Why make it this slanted?
“Hmm? But those Kim fellows... huh— how peculiar.”
Rather than saying that, he could’ve grabbed Park Gwangnim and steadied him. But as a matter of species difference, Seo Cheonseul didn’t grasp Park Gwangnim’s distress.
Clinging for dear life to Seo Cheonseul, Park Gwangnim finally regained his balance and asked,
“Is there a problem?”
“A wheeled conveyance is hauling away a load of Kim fellows.”
Squinting hard, Park Gwangnim finally made out that Cure Medical Care’s main gate had opened— and a big trailer was rolling out.
“What are they doing?”
“Who knows? But they aren’t the Kim fellows from earlier today. And it isn’t only Kim fellows. Something profane is mixed in.”
By “Kim fellows from earlier,” he meant Go Gyeongsu’s team.
And “something profane mixed in” meant vehicles carrying Cure Medical Care’s mainline— modified humans— or the monsters Seo Cheonseul had chased.
Barely catching up, Park Gwangnim worked his [Dowsing] ability to trace their route.
“Where are they going?”
The trailers were headed southwest.
Gijang County lay in the northeast of Busan. Go southwest and you pass Haeundae...
“Busan’s key nodes are all to the southwest. Hard to nail it down by direction alone.”
Seo Cheonseul leapt to a conclusion.
“They’re going to reclaim the gold the Kim fellows took.”
This time, “Kim fellows” meant Immigration— led by Yang Seohu.
“Thanks to Kim fellow dragging in Kim fellows, Kim fellows are in a bind. A sly one, that Kim fellow.”
“You mean because Mr. Kim Sinhwa brought in Yang Seohu, Cure Medical Care is in trouble?”
Whether Kim Sinhwa had planned that far ahead or not wasn’t clear, but Park Gwangnim was sure he had foreseen all this.
“Bought us time, anyhow... So, when’s Kim fellow arriving?”
“Mr. Kim Sinhwa...”
Dangling from Seo Cheonseul’s belt with a pained face, Park Gwangnim said,
“He isn’t picking up his phone.”
“Is he even coming?”
“I don’t know.”
“Hmm...”
At some point, Seo Cheonseul had produced a long kiseru and was drawing smoke.
‘So even goblins smoke when they’re on edge.’
Thinking that, Park Gwangnim reached for his own pack— then realized he’d misunderstood.
“Bahahahahaha— this is getting fun!”
[Hoooo—]
Golden smoke flowed from Seo Cheonseul’s mouth.
Lifting both hands as if to catch moonlight, he spoke.
“Does Kim fellow trust Kim fellow?”
Another of those indecipherable Kim-fellow loops. Grimacing, Park Gwangnim asked back,
“Do you mean— do I trust Mr. Kim Sinhwa?”
“Yes.”
Trust him? Of course.
In a voice mixing loyalty, friendship, and a touch of cultish zeal, Park Gwangnim answered,
“I do. What about you, Captain of Ten-Thousand-Gold?”
“I trust my friends.”
“Mr. Kim Sinhwa?”
“No— Kim fellow.”
Seo Cheonseul raised the kiseru and pointed it at Park Gwangnim.
“Me?”
“Kim fellow agreed to be this body’s friend, did he not? I trust Kim fellow’s judgment.”
Ah— the Kim fellow you trust is me?
I’m honored beyond words.
“I... believe Mr. Kim Sinhwa will make it here.”
Seo Cheonseul grinned under the moonlight.
“Good. Then let’s stall for time until Kim fellow arrives.”
[CRRRAAACK— CRUNCH— CRACK—]
An ominous noise came from Immigration’s response HQ set up in Busan.
No one assigned to this room was ordinary. Anywhere else, each would have at least led a small team.
Yet all of them only traded stiff glances.
Anxiety.
Imagine a bomb at your side that could go off anytime. It has never once exploded in the wrong place. But will that hold forever?
Fear.
A predator sits in the room, growling— no telling when it might get riled up and leap. It has never once bitten its handler. But will that hold forever?
Unable to stand the chilled atmosphere any longer, Shin Ujin put down the papers he’d been reviewing and approached Yang Seohu.
“Team Leader, is there a problem?”
“No.”
“Then... why are you making that noise?”
“Hm? This?”
Yang Seohu held up what she’d been kneading like clay.
[SQUISH— SQUELCH—]
A golden metal mass deforming comically under her fingers. Not just gold-colored— gold.
Some of Shin Ujin’s hair stood on end— exposing a few hidden eyes.
“That’s... gold, isn’t it?”
“Ah. Too loud? Didn’t think.”
[THUNK.]
Yang Seohu dropped the kid-head-sized gold nugget any old way.
“That... we seized that at the port, right?”
“Right.”
“Why is it here?”
“No room in the container.”
The gold seized at Songjeong Port had gone into a wooden container.
Yang Seohu said there was no space in the container.
No space implied she wanted to put something else in.
And some of the gold that had been in the container was here.
Which meant— into the empty space left by removing gold...
Finishing his chain of reasoning, Shin Ujin whispered low to Yang Seohu,
“What on earth did you put in the container?”
“What we seized in Buyeo.”
They’d fought a pitched battle with cultists in Buyeo and seized a massive haul of artifacts and heavy equipment.
“We seized more than a few things there.”
“TNT.”
“Eh? Sorry, what?”
“TNT. TNT. You don’t know TNT?”
“Eeeeh? Eh? Eeeeeeh?”
All of Shin Ujin’s hair stood on end— and the hidden eyes writhed into view.
Tri-nitro-toluene.
In other words: bombs.
They’d secured a large amount at Chilgapsan, where the cultists were running huge excavation work.
Like a cat puffed to twice its size, Shin Ujin yowled at Yang Seohu,
“W-why would you put that in there!”
“What was that guy’s name again? The lanky one.”
“W-who? Akiyama?”
“Yeah. That one. If that guy is honest, nothing will happen, so don’t worry.”
Shin Ujin’s pupils shook violently.
“I—I’ll go remove it right now!”
“Why? Leave it.”
“It’s not that ‘nothing will happen’— the fact there’s a bomb in there is the problem!”
Even if nothing happened, the problem remained.
A headline composed itself in Shin Ujin’s mind:
<Immigration plants bombs in Busan Customs!!>
“You’re going to be in the news again if this goes sideways!”
“So what if I’m in the news.”
“I— I just hate how everyone treats you like—”
Before Shin Ujin could finish, the door to the HQ burst open with a bang and an Immigration combat officer rushed in.
“B-big trouble!”
“Oh, Huiyeong. What is it?”
Im Huiyeong— the “tall one,” as Yang Seohu had called her earlier.
“Unidentified ability-users have infiltrated Busan Customs!”
With dozens of eyes, Shin Ujin looked at Im Huiyeong and Yang Seohu at once.
Im Huiyeong’s face was tight with urgency— and Yang Seohu’s form blurred in an instant. Huh? Team Leader?
[WHOOOOSH—]
Kicking up a tremendous wind, Yang Seohu finished gearing up and said,
“What are you doing? All units— deploy. Let’s go watch the fireworks.”
“Y-yes!”
Combat officers scrambled to their feet, belatedly gearing up.
“To Customs?”
At Shin Ujin’s question, Yang Seohu paused in thought— then said,
“No. Better to rip the nose off right away.”
“T-the nose?”
“We’re going straight to Cure.”
