Chapter 102
Junwoo and his companions cautiously made their way past the snake beastkin, who had volunteered to serve as porters, and headed toward the mod.
“E-excuse me... Are you perhaps Chikchikpokpok?”
The awkwardly approaching group spoke to her in voices taut with nervousness.
Their fingertips trembled, afraid that they might offend her and become targets for those terrifying drones or her spear.
She stopped walking and turned her head.
The mod’s face, seen from nearby, was that of a young woman, just as the rumors described, but her eyes held a chilling gaze.
Even so, her eyes widened slightly when she spotted Junwoo’s group, as though surprised.
She, too, seemed not to have expected to meet people in a place like this.
Junwoo swallowed hard and pointed at the heavy sacks, boxes, and furniture the snake beastkin were carrying.
“I-it looks like you have quite a lot of luggage! Would you like us to help you carry some of it...?”
“Huh? Really?”
Her red lips parted slightly, and a flustered voice escaped them.
She seemed surprised by the completely unexpected offer of labor.
She soon relaxed her cold expression and gave a light bow.
“Ah, I’d really appreciate that. Some of it is a little heavy... Are you sure?”
It was such a plain and gentle voice that it was hard to believe she was the merciless ruler who had been smashing the heads of otherworldly races only moments ago.
Junwoo’s group was inwardly stunned.
‘She used honorifics!’
‘Maybe she’s surprisingly warm toward her fellow humans, even if she’s merciless toward otherworldly races...!’
Come to think of it, the purified water and basic foodstuffs the mod listed on the Survivor Gallery marketplace were being sold at absurdly low prices compared to everyone else’s.
The group began to feel deeply moved, deciding on their own that although she was cold toward otherworldly races, she must have a deep affection for humans.
“Hng...”
“Ugh...!”
Junwoo’s group eagerly took the items from the snake beastkin and carried them toward the train.
Even while moving the luggage, their eyes were so busy sneaking glances at Nabi, the cat beastkin scampering around in front of them, and the drones watching the surroundings from the air that they could hardly keep up with their work.
“Beastkin...”
“No, more importantly, drones that shoot lasers...”
“No, the mod who controls all of them...”
Every one of them was an existence beyond common sense.
Finally, after safely loading every item and piece of furniture onto the train, Junwoo cautiously brought up the main point.
If not now, he would have no other chance to say this.
“I’m sorry to ask this of you, but may we make one request?”
“Go ahead.”
Junwoo swallowed hard and spoke carefully, one word at a time.
“Our original safe zone was completely destroyed recently, so we’ve been blindly heading toward Seoul along the railroad tracks. But as you can see, everyone’s stamina has reached its limit. Would you be able to drop us off at a safe zone somewhere nearby along the way?”
The group swallowed nervously and waited for her answer.
It was a request they had no grounds to complain about if she refused.
If she demanded payment, they were prepared to hand over everything they owned.
“You must be tired, and you even helped carry our luggage. Goodness...”
She put on an apologetic expression, then readily nodded.
“All right. I’ll take you to a nearby safe zone.”
“Thank you, really, thank you! Hey! Bow your heads.”
“Ah! Thank you!”
Just as the group was about to celebrate, she lightly raised her index finger and added something.
“But there’s one condition.”
At once, the atmosphere turned cold, and Junwoo’s group swallowed nervously.
As expected, nothing in this world came for free.
Though they had carried some of the luggage, they had been the ones to declare on their own that they would help first.
‘What could the condition be?’
Would she demand that they take the lead in hunting monsters, or ask them to hand over their possessions?
All sorts of possibilities flashed through their minds.
But the condition that eventually came from the mod’s lips was one the group had never imagined.
“You’ll have to ride in the passenger car together with those snake beastkin and get along with them. Is that all right?”
“...Huh?”
Junwoo’s group stood there with their mouths hanging open.
Then they all naturally turned their gazes away.
Toward the snake beastkin, whose scales gleamed brilliantly in the light.
Ride in one car with those snake beastkin, shoulder to shoulder...?
When he turned his head, the large snake beastkin was cradling a sack of mana stones protectively in its arms and looking at Junwoo’s group with a wistful gaze as it flicked its tongue.
Junwoo’s group didn’t know what that gaze meant, but they all hunched their shoulders as though chills had run down their spines.
Even so—
“I-it’s fine!”
“O-of course...! We’ll trust you to ride with us!”
At those words, the mod tilted her head.
“Huh? No, I’ll be in the cab...”
“But the drones will be in the passenger car with us—”
“Oh, the drones will ride in the front car.”
“...”
“Nabi will be in the passenger car.”
It wasn’t hard to figure out that Nabi referred to the cat-eared girl.
That was certainly reassuring, but it was also frightening in its own way.
They had witnessed her kick those snake people away with dropkicks, and the cat-eared beastkin girl didn’t look like someone who intended to protect anyone in particular.
The group’s expressions darkened.
***
KRRRROOOM—!
The train began running south again.
Its destination was Busan, the farthest place from Seoul, just as they had decided earlier.
...
“Shaaak.”
Inside the passenger car, an utterly bewildering scene was unfolding.
The group of survivors that included the man who had introduced himself as Junwoo outside the mart was sitting in the same space as the snake beastkin.
The reason I had deliberately put these snake beastkin on the train was very simple.
They had been the ones to earnestly ask first.
“...We did wrong, so we’ll hand the mart over to the rats. We want to start anew somewhere else.”
I handed control of IKEA and the mart over to the rat beastkin, who had rescued their families and companions.
Since the snake beastkin had been the ones to initiate the pillaging and kidnappings, they readily admitted their wrongdoing and gave up the mart.
They had also given up the mart, helped move and arrange the furniture and mana stones, so I decided to help them make a fresh start, at least.
...It also bothered me that I had killed their leader right in front of them.
At first, I considered taking them to the otherworldly town where the dwarf and elf lived.
But the snakes cautiously shook their heads at my suggestion.
“There are already too many others there. We are a species that values territory very highly... It would be difficult for us to move beneath someone else’s nest.”
Even as they said that, they kept sneaking glances at me, gauging my reaction.
They seemed to remember how they had attacked us in the name of protecting their territory, only to watch their companions fall one after another.
While I studied the map and watched the snakes out of the corner of my eye, red pins came into view.
Near the railroad tracks leading down to Busan.
There was an area on the Gallery map where people had marked danger with numerous red pins.
[Don’t go anywhere near it. There are an absurd number of goblins.]
[Fuck, what the hell, the goblins never end. This is as far as I go. Good luck.]
[It’s basically a goblin village. The streets are green, seriously.]
[Looks like the big marts haven’t been looted... There must be a reason they haven’t been.]
‘Was this what they called using one enemy to defeat another?’
I had been planning to clear the obstacles around the tracks while traveling by train anyway, and the snakes happened to want to start over somewhere new.
If that place had a familiar large mart, the snake beastkin would probably be even happier.
“...I happened to find a good place. But there’ll be quite a lot of goblins occupying it already. What do you think?”
“Goblins.”
Before I had even finished speaking, the large snake reacted first, and then all the snake beastkin’s vertically slit pupils flashed open at once.
“...Taking a place from someone else suits us better than an empty one.”
“Shaaah—!”
Maybe it was just my imagination, but they looked as though they were splitting their mouths into broad smiles.
The goblins might wonder what had hit them, but what could I do?
“If you claim the place and then attack humans—”
“W-we absolutely won’t... Only monsters. Monsters only.”
After giving them that warning, I felt much more at ease.
However, amid this warm conversation, the group from Junwoo’s side sitting next to us had turned completely pale.
In fact, they had been like that ever since boarding the train.
“U-ugh...”
“A snake’s tail just touched me...!”
Then several snake beastkin stealthily approached the trembling human survivors.
They began flicking their long, forked tongues in and out—lick, lick—at a distance just short of touching their cheeks, as if teasing them.
“Eek!”
“U-uhhh...”
When the humans recoiled in terror and huddled into the corners of their seats, the snake bastards shivered as though satisfied.
The sight was so absurd that I asked the large snake about it.
“...Why are they doing that?”
In response, the large snake beastkin scratched at its scales and answered in a voice mixed with a metallic rasp.
“They seem to rather like seeing those people afraid of us.”
“Huh?”
“...Earlier, you, the cat beastkin, and those flying lumps of metal trampled and shaved away our pride. But these humans are afraid of us, so I think they’re playing with them like that to gradually recover the pride they lost as predators.”
“....”
Hearing that answer, I was momentarily speechless.
So, in short, they were restoring the pride we had chipped away by frightening these easy targets—the human survivors.
Looking at the trembling Junwoo’s group and the snake beastkin, a tiny bit of guilt brushed past a corner of my heart.
Regardless of their intentions, the snake beastkin themselves seemed to like this group.
“Would you like to live with the snake beastkin?”
“Please spare us!”
“We’re sorry!”
“...I was joking.”
Seeing them desperately apologize despite having done nothing wrong, I gave a faint smile.
Had that joke been too mean?
One member of the group muttered under their breath.
“...A ‘It was a joke’ statement after the controversy...”
...Somehow, I had a feeling a post about this would appear on the community.
And the train announced that it had arrived at its first stop.
Thud—!
The train suddenly shook, then stopped.
“...What is it?”
When I rushed to the cab, I saw piles of rocks blocking the tracks.
When I turned on my phone, I saw that this was the very place where the red pins had been stamped all over.