"Thank you."
"Thank me? I’m just sitting here staring blankly at the sky. Anything worth thanking got done by the others."
The ten who stayed with Sergeant Park Taejun at the unit.
Most were from the Radar Section—Park Taejun’s close juniors.
"For us? Assisting Sergeant Park Taejun is the job, isn’t it."
"Heh. Still, when he ordered us to hang those tassels measured out by the centimeter, that really was rough."
Much like we’d knit our camaraderie together down on the ground,
the ones who’d remained up on the mountain seemed to have forged their own bond.
They laughed easy and loose.
‘Is it because they’ve been in the mountains so long?’
Or maybe it’s because they’ve spent so much time with Taejun, who’s taking on a [Shaman]’s role.
Even the soldiers felt as if they’d put something down,
with a relaxed air like natural folk.
‘Same for Chuncheon, where Vimana is. Same for the Ammunition Battalion where Alraune has taken root.’
What should I call it.
We are, unmistakably, maintaining our identity as a military unit.
Officers and enlisted alike.
Our rank structure is the same as any military unit’s, carried over intact.
But.
‘We’ve become something completely different from the units of the past.’
Its shape—
it felt a long way off from an ordinary military unit.
‘The world changed, is that it.’
A world that’s been altered.
And the shape that world demands for survival—
it must be exactly this.
‘Well, it’s not bad.’
To survive in a ruined world,
each of us is changing with our own traits.
It’s true the look of it has changed a great deal,
but there’s no need to mope over that.
A look different from past units.
This, precisely,
is the Legion’s own strength we’ve stacked up.
****
Talking with the soldiers like that,
oddly enough,
there was one thing that had been catching my eye since earlier.
‘Those uniforms.’
They looked similar to the ones we were wearing,
but with a peculiar worn and shabby feel.
No wonder.
Back when those clothes were made,
Team Lead Lee Sanga, the maker, was still a [Newbie Tailor].
‘No help but for the quality to lag.’
Back then, even those were treated like huge morale-boosting items.
[Ingredient Appraisal (Enhanced)]
[Collaboration wrought with the devotion of an Intermediate Tailor, an Intermediate Blacksmith, and Intermediate Engineers — Iron Legion Commander’s Combat Uniform Ver.9 — Corps Commander Custom Improved Type]
‘What an absurd mouthful.’
Compared to the clothes we’re wearing now, there’s a bit of a gap, that’s for sure.
The production crews have leveled up a lot since, and materials have diversified.
[Combat uniform made from the hides of the Lizard and 12 other monster species.]
[Overlayed laminates were refined and processed by a special method after minerals were strengthened with the ley-line’s mana.]
Its performance—
it wasn’t even comparable to the early version they were wearing.
And,
one of the reasons we came here was exactly that.
"Well, I heard your story."
The radar room, where the Radar Section mainly lived.
Once I stepped inside—
"Resupply time, brats!"
"Ooh...!?"
I pulled the goods from inside the [Shadow Veil].
"New uniforms...!"
"Looks way cleaner than the old ones."
"Holy—this is like a winter long parka, isn’t it? Is this an equipment item too?"
Back when Team Lead Lee Sanga made their clothes, he’d taken down their body measurements.
The latest uniforms for these guys were issued first.
"Why does this weapon have stats...!"
Since Grandpa Park descended the range and only Awakened once he was topside,
these guys hadn’t even gotten a taste of weapons as [items].
"Feels like my level went up by ten."
Having received his gear, Sergeant Park Taejun spoke as he shrugged on the uniform.
And that wasn’t all.
"Heave."
"Uh... what’s this?"
"Solar panels and batteries."
From the solar power plant we’d recently secured.
Solar panels brought from there.
"Solar panels, huh."
They stared at them, startled.
Power’s been out for a long time.
They must have been living with no small inconvenience.
"Up here in the mountains you’ve got all the firewood you want, sure. But more electricity never hurts."
Winter’s coming now, on top of that.
There aren’t any fire-line mages here.
They were in a situation where they had to leverage some conveniences of civilization.
"...But we don’t know how to use these."
"How would I know. The engineers who came with me will install them. That’s why I brought them."
From the start,
one reason I’d planned to swing by for a resupply here
was to issue various equipment to get through the winter.
"My god..."
"While we’ve been up here doing this, just how much has the unit down below grown...?"
They received the supplies,
and the soldiers were floored by the performance.
‘A little hurt they’re that impressed by just this.’
We hadn’t even delivered the most important resupply yet.
Lastly—
"Combat rations."
"...!"
Rations I’d made myself.
Combat rations emerged from the shadow.
The combat rations I drew out—
seeing them, Sergeant Park Taejun widened his eyes and spoke.
"...So it’s not all jerky?"
"Heh. Take it as an honor."
Just like Taejun said.
The combat rations I’d brought out now—
most of them weren’t jerky.
"Lunchboxes, huh."
"You’ve been busting your asses up here. Felt a bit wrong to just toss you jerky and call it a day."
They were in lunchbox form.
"Now that you’ve got electricity, you can even use a fridge or microwave, right?"
"So like a frozen meal?"
"Well, strictly speaking you won’t need to refrigerate them, but—just in case."
For eating quickly in combat, jerky is still unmatched.
I won’t be giving up that form.
‘But these guys—there are few cases they need combat rations for fighting.’
For cases where you simply need preserved food like this,
I tried making combat rations in lunchbox form.
The skill name of [Combat Rations] is [Combat Rations], not ‘jerky.’
I’d already practiced using the skill in other ways when I made calorie bars for the monks of Myohyangsa.
After all kinds of trial and error, this lunchbox set was the result.
The soldiers of the 423rd Battalion—
they’ll be the first customers.
"This one doesn’t lag much even compared to food I cook fresh myself. Taste, obviously, is a given."
"Ah...!"
"Yeah, it’s been a while since we had Sergeant Shin’s cooking."
They examined the packaged lunchboxes with a look of curiosity.
"It is a bit labor-intensive, which is the downside, but that’s just me putting in the work."
But—
their reaction was oddly flat.
I could guess why.
‘They’ve only ever eaten my cooking from my low-level days.’
Even if I say it tastes similar to my proper cooking now,
it’s hard for them to know what that means.
Well.
No worries about that.
‘One bite and that reaction will flip 360 degrees.’
As I was thinking that,
Taejun picked up one of the lunchboxes and started looking it over from every angle.
"...Heh."
I watched to see what he was doing,
and suddenly Sergeant Park Taejun let out a soft laugh.
"What’s so funny?"
"Nothing. Just—feels like ✪ Nоvеlіgһt ✪ (Official version) you’ve become a chef to the bone, Youngjun."
"...Ahem."
In truth,
it’s something I’ve been getting lightly called out for lately.
‘Occupational hazard or whatever.’
Whenever something happens,
I’ve developed a habit of tying it back to cooking.
"Hard to believe that Shin Youngjun turned out like this."
"Come on."
"What do you mean ‘come on.’ Remember? When we first transferred in, you got ridiculously depressed after doing one day in the mess."
"Ahem. That was..."
It’s a bad old practice that’s gone now,
but when I was a newbie, every awful job got shoved onto the junior.
"From day one in the mess, I had to haul food waste. How are you not supposed to crash from that? Thinking of that rank stench still—"
"And now the guy who was like that is a chef through and through. Hard not to laugh."
This guy—
Sergeant Park Taejun is my only same-intake peer.
Now that both of us have ended up late-term sergeants,
he’s the only soldier who’s been with me since my Private days.
To a guy like that, how I am now must look pretty funny.
"Hey, by that metric, you were moaning about getting chewed out unfairly by the senior you reported to."
"Back then Park Snake was the weird one!"
After that,
I shot the breeze with Taejun for a while.
An army peer I hadn’t seen in ages.
Late-term sergeants shackled to the army without even being able to discharge.
‘Equal footing.’
Lately,
maybe because the overestimation of me has spread too far,
even when they try to come up to me like a friend,
most of the unit treats me as someone high up.
Corps Commander this, Guild Leader that.
Not long ago I was just an ordinary cook.
To those who see me as someone high up, I have to respond as someone high up.
Honestly, sometimes it’s a bit burdensome,
but—
‘Not with this guy.’
Ninety percent of what we said back and forth was empty small talk,
but a conversation with a friend I hadn’t seen in a while—
because it was nonsense, it was all the more fun.
****
"Youngjun, you know what?"
"What, man."
As that conversation was wrapping up,
Taejun spoke.
"I knew you were going to come here."
"Ah... from that astrology?"
"Yeah."
Well, I’d half-expected that.
Even though I hadn’t told him I was coming,
he was waiting at the gate in advance.
"For an ability that triggers randomly regardless of your will, it sure fires on pretty trivial stuff, huh?"
I chuckled as I said it.
Sergeant Park Taejun shook his head with a wry smile.
"Not this time."
"...Huh?"
"It does sometimes trigger on trivial things like you said, but not this time."
"What do you mean."
"It fired on something quite important."
Those words—
it didn’t feel like they meant an old peer was that important.
"When I first saw that movement of the stars, I even thought of contacting you to stop you from visiting."
"..."
"But as I kept using the ability, I realized it might actually work to our advantage. I can’t say whether my judgment is right."
What followed
was even more meaningful.
"...What are you trying to say?"
"Youngjun, I’ve got nothing but admiration for what you and Minjae did."
What Minjae and I did—
through the radio,
we released information about monsters and zombies.
"It was tremendous. The number of humans saved because of it will likely be considerable. But."
He looked up at the star-lit sky
and murmured softly.
"Unlike me, there are those who will find what you did offensive."
"That much..."
I’m not an idiot.
That there would be people who didn’t like what we did—
I knew that well enough.
And I did it anyway.
"I did it because I believed it needed doing. I figured I could accept that much."
"I know. I don’t think it was the wrong call either. It’s just... you said you could accept it?"
"...?"
He said it in a light tone.
"That moment to accept it came a bit early."
"What?"
"Not mentioning the 423rd Battalion when you listed various bases on the radio—that was the right move."
The radio broadcast included talk of the Legion’s bases,
meant to draw survivors to us and bring them under our influence.
But
this place was a poor fit to house survivors.
We spoke of the Ammunition Battalion, the bunker, Chuncheon City,
but we didn’t mention this place.
"By now, a guest is probably on the way."
Other than our own unit,
no one knows
that this place—
the 423rd Radar Battalion—is where the [Iron Legion] began,
and that Legion soldiers are still here.
"A guest who really didn’t like what you did... and wants to wreak havoc."
"...We finally meet, and there’s no time to talk."
I sprang to my feet.
"Where are they?"
To go out
and greet the guest he’d mentioned.
