Chapter 16
Pow! Crunch! Tututung!
"Ooh..."
I rested my chin on the windowsill and blankly watched the brutal, yet dazzling slaughter.
At first it was gross, and a little frightening, but after it repeated for dozens of minutes, I gradually got used to it.
There was nothing for me to do.
All I had to do was rip open a bag of snacks and watch the brilliant mana stones and items they scattered across the floor pile up as they died and collapsed.
"This really feels like I'm playing a defense game..."
Humming to myself, I went to the second car's kitchen and made one of the instant mix coffees I'd been saving.
I hadn't really liked coffee, but maybe because the world had changed, or maybe because my body had changed.
Sometimes I found myself craving this sweetness and bitterness.
I sipped the hot coffee and enjoyed the fireworks outside the window.
"Phew... looks like it's almost over."
Just as the mix coffee I was sipping was running out, the nonstop gunfire from the external turrets finally died down.
The grotesque howls that had filled the window and the monsters shambling toward us were no longer visible either.
I turned off the monster lure's power switch on the cockpit panel.
Once the heavy rumble disappeared, deathly silence returned.
"Help me pick up the mana stones."
I made a short request to the drones, geared up, and went outside.
Hiss- thud.
When I opened the train door and stepped outside, the coppery smell of blood and the smell of gunpowder hit me with the wind.
But rather than feeling disgust, I felt a strange sense of accomplishment first.
The 50-meter radius around the train had become a veritable field of items.
Monsters riddled like beehives. Smoke rising as the corpses vanished.
And countless loot items gleaming brilliantly between those corpses.
"The investment in the lure was worth it."
Humming, I started picking up the mana stones scattered on the ground.
Lowest-grade mana stones were scattered everywhere, enough to trip over, and now and then I saw low-grade mana stones and materials from monsters I'd never seen before.
"If I do this one or two more times, I might even break even..."
Watching the emptied storage room of the second car fill back up with mana stones, I smiled.
***
Same time.
An alley in an abandoned shopping district about 500 meters from the train.
"Haa... haa..."
The man trembled violently, his hand gripping a broken longsword.
Behind him, his blood-soaked younger sister was slumped down, gasping for breath.
"Oppa... I really can't run anymore..."
"Just a little more, Jiyeon. Please, just a little more..."
Despair seeped into the man's voice as well.
Unluckily, the trouble started when they disturbed a group of monsters hiding in the corner of a convenience store display shelf.
They ran like crazy, but couldn't shake their speed, and in the end they were trapped in this dead-end alley.
"Grrrr..."
"Kyaang!"
More than ten monsters packed the alley entrance, narrowing their encirclement as they drooled foul saliva.
The man's stamina was already exhausted.
The longsword he'd gotten from an item had already broken, and the skill's cooldown still had a long way to go.
It's over. That intuition flashed through his mind.
"...Jiyeon."
"...Huh?"
"I'll rush them and draw their attention, so you run straight into that building and hide. Got it?"
"...No! What are you going to do by yourself, Oppa!"
His younger sister wailed and grabbed the man's collar, but the man bit his lip tightly and raised the broken sword.
It was the moment the largest monster among them tensed its hind legs and finished preparing to leap.
Just as the man shut his eyes tightly and was about to dash forward.
Vwoooom— Paaang!
Suddenly, a bizarre, heavy vibration that shook the ground sliced through the air.
"K-krrrk!"
"...Huh?"
Crash!
The monster that had been about to spring at the man faltered in midair, then fell grotesquely onto the ground.
And then something unbelievable happened.
"Kwoooargh!"
"Kieeek!"
The monsters that had been cornering the siblings in the dead-end alley and drooling all the while suddenly snapped their heads toward one direction.
Their bloodshot eyes gleamed as if under a spell.
The monster that looked like the leader was the first to start running.
Then, completely ignoring the siblings, they burst out of the alley and started sprinting at full speed.
"...Huh?"
"W-what... What's going on? Why are they doing that?"
The alley was empty in an instant.
The man stood there blankly, broken sword in hand.
The death that had been right in front of them just moments ago had vanished like a lie.
"O-Oppa? What happened?"
"...I don't really know either. Let's get into the building quickly first!"
And a moment later.
From far in the direction the monsters had run, an explosive boom unlike anything I'd heard since the apocalypse began started ringing out.
Drdrdrdr-!! Thud!
"Aaaagh!"
"Gunfire... maybe? What is that sound... Did the military come or something?"
Gunshots that seemed to tear the sky apart and the sound of something crashing echoed through the night sky.
The noise was coming from where the monsters had rushed to.
It sounded like the noise of the military—the sound I'd once desperately hoped to hear.
Maybe because of that.
Even though it was violent enough to make me want to cover my ears, it felt incredibly reassuring.
The noise continued, then suddenly stopped.
When I looked out the window, an enormous amount of smoke billowed up.
"That smoke..."
The smoke they give off when monsters die.
The man could tell that all the monsters that had been rushing at him were dead.
Whoever it was, they had saved them.
The man's legs gave out as the tension left him, and he collapsed to the ground.
"O-Oppa... are you okay?"
"Yeah."
The younger sister crawled over and, worried about him, hugged him tightly.
The siblings sat down on the alley floor and clung to each other.
"We're alive... Jiyeon. We're alive."
Having miraculously survived the moment of life and death, the siblings confirmed each other's warmth.
***
"All right, the cleanup's done, so let's move out."
I checked the second car, now packed to the brim, and sat in the cockpit.
After warming up the engine, I gently pushed the lever up.
Wiiing- clunk!
"Huh? What?"
The train, which should have glided smoothly, stopped in place with an irritated metallic screech.
It felt like it had snagged on something hard.
I hurriedly checked outside.
"Ah..."
There was something I hadn't thought of.
The train itself hadn't gotten a single scratch even from the monsters' bodily charges and headbutts, but the tracks on the ground were a different matter.
Because of the impact of dozens, even hundreds of monsters rushing in and colliding with it, the iron tracks supporting the train had bent a little.
"This... what am I supposed to do about this."
But I didn't panic.
Rather, I had gotten to experience one of the things I'd have to go through in the future ahead of time.
First, I canceled the train's summon.
"Recover it for now."
Flash-!
The massive train turned into particles of light and disappeared.
Once the train disappeared, the devastation of the bent tracks was laid bare.
I placed my hand on the warped rails and used the Repair skill for the first time.
"Repair."
A faint blue light burst from both my hands and enveloped the dented rails.
The skill some people in the Gallery had called a dud.
Kikikik- clang!
As if rewinding time, the steel rails bent like taffy straightened themselves and returned to their original shape.
Even the sections that had been cracked as if they might break joined together smoothly.
"It works..."
Honestly, I thought it might not work.
I wasn't entirely sure what fell within the scope of Repair.
"It's been repaired."
I nodded in satisfaction and summoned the train again.
Rumble-!
My sturdy train settled back onto the straightened tracks.
"Hah."
Throwing myself back onto the sofa, I took out my smartphone as usual and opened the Survivor Gallery's marketplace tab.
I was planning to put up some of the loot I'd just obtained at market price.
But my finger stopped as I scrolled through the marketplace listings.
[Buy] Seeking the corrupted blood dropped by the ghoul dungeon boss in Busan Dalmaji-gil
- Reward : [Skill Enhancement Ticket] x1
"What's this?"
Among the trade posts from ordinary survivors, that post felt a little out of place.
There were two major oddities about it.
The first was the level of detail in the quest.
Fine, there being a ghoul dungeon on Busan Dalmaji-gil I could accept.
But how did they know that the item the dungeon boss dropped was exactly corrupted blood?
'Did someone already clear it once? Usually a cleared dungeon disappears after a while...'
The second was the trade post itself.
Unlike other users' writing, this post's title was written thick and bold, almost like an announcement.
It was as if it were forcing every survivor using this marketplace to pay attention to it.
What's more, every bold-faced trade post was offering a reward that was obviously rare and hard to get at a glance.
Even the nicknames of the people who posted them were grandiose across the board.
[Master of the Battlefield]
[Moving Island]
[Flame and Hammer]
"...Should I ask?"
I immediately opened a private whisper and sent Signal a message.
Also to check in on him.
[Did you make it back safely after going out?]
Given that this Gallery was still up even after I sent him equipment and time had passed, he was probably fine, but I asked again anyway.
The reply was quick.
[Yes, I'm safe thanks to you.]
Signal also sent a lengthy thank-you message afterward.
So long it was a pain to read all of it.
He said he was so grateful that he'd make me a sub-manager of the Gallery.
"Why are you trying to repay a favor like that?"
I refused.
A sub-manager... meaning a blue icon next to my nickname, didn't really have any advantages.
It would only amplify the attention already flocking to me.
If it benefited me, I'd take it, but otherwise there was no need to—
Since I'd checked on him anyway.
I decided to ask about what I was curious about.
[What are those bold-faced posts on the marketplace?]
A moment later, a fairly urgent-looking reply arrived.
[I'm confused about that too.]
[A few hours ago, my skill was suddenly forced to level up. Then it said special beings had taken an interest in the Gallery...]
[Their posts can't be deleted or edited.]
"So those special beings wrote those posts."
I frowned.
Special beings, huh.
"Kind of like NPCs, maybe...?"
Since they were writing trade posts that were basically quest-like, I did wonder if they might be NPC-like beings from a game.
With monsters and skills, NPCs wouldn't be strange either.
Other Gallery users were interested in the situation just like I was.
---
[Title : Hey, what's with that bold text on the marketplace?]
How do I do that? I want to do it too.
[Comments]
ㅇㅇ : Don't know, I don't think there's a feature like that.
ㅇㅇ : The font aside, that reward is insane...
---
Amid countless guesses and conspiracy theories flying around, one post that grabbed my attention went up.
---
[Title : My analysis from spending 300,000 won a month on novels alone]
People who post trade posts like that in a situation like this are one of three types.
Regressor, possessor, or constellation.
But there are more than one or two people posting those trade posts, right?
Then they're constellations. No way there'd be multiple regressors or possessors...
Tsk, there are actually novels where there are multiple ones, but I hope that's not the case.
[Comments]
ㅇㅇ : Now that the world is like this, spending 300,000 won a month on novels has become a legit skill lol
ㄴ ㅇㅇ : For real;
---
"A constellation..."
Honestly, I couldn't believe it.
Still, I decided to leave it in the realm of possibility for now.
"Either way, it's a trade post with not-bad conditions."
I began searching among the bold-faced trade posts for any quests I could handle.