Chapter 52
Watching the live feed from the reconnaissance drone on the monitor in Car 1, I swallowed hard.
So far I'd fought all kinds of monsters, but this was the first time I'd ever seen humans clash like this, group against group.
For no reason at all, my palms kept sweating, and every time I looked at the screen I had to take a deep breath.
"Don't take the lead. Stay behind cover and check the corners."
"Hey, hey. Breathe."
I had worried there might be trouble if the two old men went out there, but surprisingly, they were calming the excited survivors down from time to time and doing their part.
But the other side was a criminal group that had grown by committing every kind of evil deed.
"Die!"
A guy burst out from far away, summoned something spear-like in his hand, and launched it quickly.
It looked like he was combining two skills.
Among those occasional outbursts, there were sometimes guys who used multiple skills in combination.
Even so, the survivors kept dealing with them and advanced smoothly.
Then, when nearly half the search was complete, the ground in front of Suwon's survivors suddenly burst open with a thunderous boom.
"Agh!"
"Shoulder...! Damn it, get behind the building!"
One of the three in front seemed to have been hit in the shoulder by a flying shard, and he cried out in pain before throwing himself behind cover.
The reconnaissance drone looked straight at the blown-apart ground.
"...A bowling ball?"
The object that had shaken the ground was none other than a bowling ball.
Though it was broken into pieces and hard to identify exactly, I could tell from the finger holes and the number stamped on the fragments.
"Damn it... Did a land mine go off or something...?"
"T-there!"
When I looked where one of the survivors pointed, I saw a man standing on a rooftop.
I didn't know what skill he had, but he was throwing the heavy bowling balls with impressive accuracy.
As that heavy thing flew at tremendous speed, the instant it hit the asphalt it shattered and sprayed rocks and bowling-ball fragments everywhere like a fragmentation grenade.
"It's a little far—"
"Hey, don't stick your body out!"
Whoosh—BOOM!
Even when they tried to return fire, the distance was too great, and whenever they tried to line up a shot, the bowling balls crashing down broke the surrounding walls and hid their view behind thick clouds of dust.
With the terrain shattered and exploding into fragments, Suwon's Awakeners were left in a stalemate, unable even to properly lift their heads.
Then it happened.
The golem, which had been standing guard beside the two old men, stepped forward.
Clatter, clack—!
It caught one of the heavy bowling balls falling from the sky with both feet.
"...Caught it?"
It had practically been hit full-on, but its durability was so good that it seemed to have held up just fine.
Then it started compressing the bowling ball with both feet, until it made a crunching sound.
In an instant, the bowling ball had been compressed into a small, hard lump about the size of a shell, and the golem loaded it straight into the cannon on its back with a clack.
The survivors around it stared blankly at the golem.
Then it happened.
BOOM—!
The deafening blast from firing the shell shook the air.
The bowling-ball shell it fired back squarely slammed into the rooftop railing where the guy was hiding.
KWAANG! RUMBLE—!
He probably didn't even have time to scream.
As soon as the shell hit, the entire rooftop collapsed, raising a massive cloud of dust, and the silhouette of the man who had been relentlessly hurling bowling balls sank into the ruined debris.
"...Oh."
The Suwon survivors who had been advancing stared blankly at the scene.
"Uh... thanks..."
"I main Protoss."
"Me too. Me too."
"Hey, don't pat it there. That's where the shell comes out."
"Ugh, damn it."
A strange scene unfolded, with people giving the golem their grudging thanks.
Instead of replying, the golem gave the cannon a quick wipe, then returned to the two old men and began watching the surroundings again.
"Good, keep watch in all directions! Move up one by one while staying behind cover!"
At the two old men's command, the Suwon survivors once again sharpened their eyes and hurried deeper into the bastards' stronghold.
After that, the battle I watched through the reconnaissance drone's screen went, contrary to my expectations, almost blandly smoothly.
Of course, the bastards had threatening weapons and skills too, and some of them even attempted fairly sharp counterattacks.
But there was one thing I realized while watching this battle.
'There's a limit to skills alone.'
On the screen, a nimble man with a dagger rushed out from a blind spot and ambushed one of Suwon's survivors moving between cover.
It was insanely fast, as if he'd gotten a skill boost.
But the man who'd been ambushed didn't panic; instead, he twisted his waist on reflex and dodged the blade.
Clang!
He avoided the attack, but his gun was grazed by the dagger and fell to the ground.
Even after dropping his gun, the man didn't panic; he crouched low and raised his clenched fist.
The attacker didn't give up either.
"Die!"
Swish, swish—!
The man with his fist clenched dodged the dagger slicing through the air a couple of times in rhythm, then drove a short, heavy hook straight into the bastard's exposed ribs.
Crack—!
"Graaagh!!"
Even though it looked like a light tap, the guy who got hit clutched his ribs and collapsed to the ground.
Seeing that, the Suwon companions standing nearby tossed out a pointless joke.
"Hey. Is it really okay for a former athlete to just go around beating regular people like that?"
"Are those guys regular people?"
"Fair enough. Beat them more."
The man, who had originally been a former boxer, replied while shaking out his fists.
They'd rushed in relying only on skills and ended up getting a nasty surprise.
That said, they couldn't ignore the power of firearms, so fighting from a distance wasn't an option either.
At this point, one of them threw away his weapon and rushed out with both hands raised.
"H-hey! I surrender! Don't shoot!"
Starting with that man's cry, surrender declarations began to follow like dominoes.
"That bastard...!"
"T-then I surrender too!"
"...Me too!"
The rest of the resisting raiders, as if they'd been waiting for it, all at once threw down their weapons and came crawling out with both hands raised.
There had never been any strong bond of loyalty among those bastards to begin with.
They had no intention of risking their lives to defend this place, nor any comradeship to help a bleeding ally beside them.
As soon as the battle turned against them, surrender after surrender started pouring out.
There were far more of them than I'd expected.
If that many people had fought to the bitter end, the Suwon survivors might have taken a pretty painful hit too.
Thanks to the bastards' shallow loyalty, the situation came to a hollow end for now, with dozens of them laid face-down in the open lot.
"Can you help us out a bit? We still need to search the buildings inside."
"Yes!"
Once the surrounding area was completely subdued, the two old men took several Awakeners with them and began searching the two or three largest buildings in the safe zone.
"Uh... can you keep an eye on these guys for us?"
The chairman said that to the golem beside him before going into the building.
After hearing the chairman, the golem hesitated, then seemed to decide that keeping watch over the guys sprawled on the ground was directly tied to the two old men's safety, so it took up position and began keeping them in check.
And then, a little while later.
From the chairman's mouth as he walked out of the building came a string of curse words too vile to repeat.
"You bastards! Worse than animals! You beasts!"
The chairman shouted at the prisoners with bloodshot eyes.
At that reaction, I slipped the reconnaissance drone into the building to check the inside.
"Ah..."
I, too, wanted to look away from that horrific scene.
Inside one side of the building, torn clothes, blood-stained IDs, and smartphones that seemed to belong to victims lured in from the gallery were piled up like trophies.
Some rooms also had handcuffs, and others were smeared in blood.
Just as the chairman, on the verge of losing his mind with rage, drew his gun, one of the guys lying face-down on the floor crawled forward and begged.
"P-please spare me! I really only did it because I was ordered to! Please, just this once, give me a break!"
At that spineless excuse, the politician old man standing beside the chairman let out a long, heavy sigh.
He looked down at the bastards with a relatively calm expression and spoke.
"Fine. If there's anyone under fifteen among you, I'll spare only those kids' lives."
"...!"
"At that age, you could say they were just forced into it."
At that moment, heavy silence fell over the open lot.
Naturally, there was no way there would be any teenagers or children under fifteen among the group lying face-down.
"No one? Then anyone older than that will have to pay for what you've done like an adult."
At the politician old man's chilling verdict, another guy panicking shouted out.
"I, I've got an incredibly good skill! I can perfectly map out the inside of any dungeon!"
It was certainly a good skill.
"You can map out a dungeon? ...That's a good ability."
The politician old man nodded.
The instant hope lit up the guy's face, the old man's voice froze the open lot.
"Sorry. I'm petty. I'm just not the forgiving type."
"...You fucking bastard!"
"Everyone, get up!"
Realizing they couldn't talk their way out of this and that there was no chance at all of being spared, the guys all cursed in unison and sprang up from the ground.
It was a final desperate struggle.
But the Suwon survivors had already perfectly anticipated that the bastards would turn on them.
Ratatatata—! KWAANG! BOOM!
Before the bastards could even make a proper move, the guns and attack skills surrounding them from all sides opened fire at once.
"Cover them so they don't get hurt!"
With my orders from the cockpit, the combat drone and sniper drone hovering in the sky also unleashed merciless supporting fire.
It was over in an instant. The gunfire didn't last long.
I turned off the screen.
I didn't feel guilty, but it wasn't something my siblings or Ms. Ha-seon needed to see.
About two hours later, after everything had been fully cleaned up, they returned to the train looking refreshed.