Chapter 19
“Kim Suyeon, let me ask you once again. Do you truly remember nothing after that light erupted?”
The government investigator’s voice was low and persistent, while the hospital room’s lights shone indifferently.
I deliberately let my gaze go unfocused, fiddling with the sheet on the hospital bed where I lay and giving my shoulders a slight tremble.
“Yes…. The Awakened escorts collapsed in an instant, and I was so scared I looked away. Then everything just went white. When I came to, I was lying on a mountain trail. It’s true! I thought I was going to die….”
I let the end of my voice quaver and pretended to cry, and the young assistant investigator standing beside the senior investigator looked at them with sympathy.
But the seasoned investigator wouldn’t back down so easily. The investigator turned the tablet computer on the table toward me.
“Take a look at this footage. This is data recovered from one of the damaged body cams whose lens was still intact.”
The screen showed the desperate moment when the Hell Snake opened its jaws wide and was about to spew fire and poison at Doa.
And the very next moment.
Fwaaaash-!
The entire screen was engulfed in white light, and even the camera stopped working.
The flash completely blocked out all visual information, leaving only harsh, crackling static on the screen.
Then, a little while later, a bizarre sound began to emerge through the static.
—Guhk…?! Cough! Grrrakk…! Cough! Gurgle! Guhhhh! Aaaaaagh!
It wasn’t the sound of someone fighting.
All that could be heard was the Hell Snake. It was gasping as something choked it, then let out a dying cry as it spat blood and writhed in agony.
And then, a very faint sound.
—Shhk.
That was all. Not footsteps, not the sound of someone chanting a spell, not even a trace of anyone else’s breathing had been recorded.
“We analyzed the audio in detail dozens of times, but all we found was the monster’s death throes. There was no other sound at all. It was as if a ghost, or some invisible, incorporeal being, had clamped the monster’s mouth shut and cut its throat.”
The investigator asked, staring at me with sharp eyes.
“Did you perhaps hear anyone’s voice or sense anyone’s presence just before or after the light erupted?”
“No. Not at all.”
I sighed inwardly with relief.
The body cam had been in such bad shape that, however good its performance was, it seemed impossible for it to record my voice.
So…. If I could just get past these two investigators, all my problems would disappear.
I put on an even more innocent expression and shook my head.
“Not at all. I only heard a high-pitched ringing loud enough to make my ears go numb, and when I came to, I was outside the Gate. Did someone really save us?”
My flawless performance of clueless innocence made a deep crease form between the investigator’s brows. Every survivor’s account matched: their memories had gone blank along with the blinding flash. The only evidence left, the body cam, also pointed to the existence of an ‘unseen ally.’
In the end, the investigator made a note reading ‘Likely intervention by an unknown ally with transcendent concealment abilities’ and closed the file.
“All right. We’ll end the questioning here for today. I’m sorry you had to go through something so terrible. Get some rest.”
Only after the investigators left and I heard the door close did I straighten my hunched shoulders and sink deeper into the hospital bed.
It was a perfect cover-up. Now they’d waste their intelligence resources searching for someone who didn’t exist, while I could hide behind my identity as an ordinary female college student again and enjoy some much-needed peace.
For now, I’d take it easy at the hospital and play on my smartphone until I was allowed to leave.
I’d already explained everything to my parents and brother, the government seemed to have taken care of my admission and hospital bills, I’d bought a cheap charger at the hospital convenience store, and the professor and assistants were hospitalized in the same place. I’d get to rest without a worry in the world for a while.
It would be a perfectly peaceful break, as long as I could overlook how absolutely awful the hospital food was.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
After spending several days resting at the hospital and then being discharged, I returned to campus to find that it had a completely different atmosphere from just a few days earlier.
The government had apparently tried hard to keep news of the sudden Gate changes under wraps, but there was no way to silence people so easily.
On top of that, with a prestigious university lab at the forefront of research on Gates and Awakened people, news of the crisis must have spread even faster.
A week had passed since ‘Gate environment mutations’ occurred simultaneously all over the world. Humanity was now painfully aware that Gates were not simply ‘resource mines,’ but ‘mouths of calamity’ that could swallow them at any moment.
But our lab, which stood at the center of that chaos, was the one exception. The professor and assistants seemed to have completely lost their minds.
“Suyeon! You’re here! Now, take a look at this! Look at these mana wave readings! The mana-concentration curve right before the Gate changed is a work of art!”
The professor, who had been discharged a few days before us, had bloodshot eyes as if he hadn’t slept properly in days, but his voice was filled with madness. Anyone would have thought he was a mad scientist.
It was extremely rare for anyone to have records of mana fluctuations from the time of a Gate environment mutation, and we were the only ones in the world who had managed to secure any meaningful data.
Naturally, the professor’s data had become a treasure trove, capturing the entire process of the mutation.
Thanks to that, the lab had been elevated to a national strategic hub with the government’s full support, and our freshman trio had been exempted from all classes and practicals, earning an indefinite vacation.
The reasoning was that this was the only lab with data on the Gate environment mutations, so now wasn’t the time to do run-of-the-mill Awakened research!!!
Well, I was happy about that.
After giving the professor, who was obsessed with data, a perfunctory greeting, I returned to my comfortable single dorm room, locked the door, and sat on the bed.
The evening sun was setting outside the window, but I no longer had the luxury of caring about a sunset.
After all, for some reason, I could still faintly sense the mana mixed into the air, even though I’d left the Gate.
Because mana that hadn’t existed on Earth had begun to appear.
The Gate environment mutation, or something related to it, had probably affected Earth as well, since it was connected to the Gates.
I calmly gathered the mana within me and focused on the three mana rings, or Circles, revolving around my heart.
After fighting the Hell Snake inside the Gate… Well, it had really been more of a one-sided beating. Anyway, the dense mana I’d absorbed into my body after that battle had spread evenly throughout me.
With delicate control, I shaped the freely dispersed mana into a ring surrounding my heart.
Woom—woom—!
As if resisting the newly forming ring, the three Circles already in place let out a shrill cry and increased their speed of rotation. My heart felt as if it would burst from the pressure, but I didn’t stop.
Instead, I forcibly drew in even the faint mana in the surrounding air and pushed it into that vortex.
KABOOM-!
A tremendous thunderclap rang out in my head. Then, outside the three Circles, a distinct fourth Circle radiating a blue light gradually settled into place.
The Fourth Circle. A realm that marked the beginning of surpassing human limits—the threshold to becoming superhuman.
Of course, I was still nowhere near my prime in my previous life, but at least no Awakened person or monster on Earth would be able to mess with me.
Fang Wolves? Let’s set those aside; you could take one down with just a Third Circle. Beast-type monsters weren’t all that strong until they acquired a distinct attribute.
Well, it seemed there were some monsters that pursued the utmost in physical strength, but those were exceptions.
With a Fourth Circle, I could now take down even a Hell Snake in a contest of strength, instead of relying on the trick of choking off its air supply.
I slowed the rotation of the Circle around my heart a little, then snapped my fingers lightly. A small flame bloomed at my fingertip, feeding on the mana in the air and blazing brilliantly.
“I can finally relax a little. At least I can stop lava from pouring into my home.”
Of course, I was still a long way from becoming a great mage. But at this level, I should be safe on Earth.
So….
“I’d like to look into why Gates opened on Earth….”
It seemed like it was time to seriously consider the problem I’d been ignoring because I’d been busy with one thing or another.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Earth was changing at a frightening pace.
The Gates had changed, and many people were injured or killed by the powerful monsters that suddenly appeared. The resulting damage was serious enough to surpass what had happened when Gates first appeared.
But there hadn’t been only damage. The powerful new monsters dropped mana stones, and those were changing many things.
The high-grade mana stones pouring out as the Gates rose in rank contained far more mana than the stones that had come before.
A new field of study based on those mana stones and mana—the technology known as magitech—was beginning to emerge.