The Age of Adaptation
A conference room inside a darkened office.
The only light came from the beam projector washing across the screen.
The people seated around the long table were mostly middle-aged or elderly.
Unease was written across their wrinkled faces.
Some straightened their ties, others drummed their fingers on the tabletop, each of them letting their nerves show in a different way.
Then a man entered, and their expressions brightened at once.
They all reacted the same way.
"Sorry it took me a while to get the materials ready."
"Oh, no need to apologize. We all know you're working hard for the country."
"That's right. We all know it, so please, just focus on the presentation."
At their consideration, the man smiled faintly.
But he knew exactly what was on their minds.
They were terrified of the new apocalypse known as Dark Cover, and of the indiscriminate gun terror breaking out all over the place.
So this is only the beginning.
He was Igrato, the clan leader of Blood Rain, a fifth-ranked clan in the world.
He connected his laptop and began the presentation.
It was filled with countermeasures for the future and everything needed to rebuild the nation.
Once the dry explanations were over, he moved on.
What they had truly been waiting for was the tutorial.
"We've finished screening the candidates, and we've distributed invitations first to the soldiers from the special forces, starting with the high-ranking officers leading them."
"Good. And the results? Did they slaughter the Infectors while doing that tutorial thing?"
"Hahahaha."
For a major conglomerate chairman in South Korea to be this impatient...
Igrato wiped the smile from his face.
With a face gone cold, he brought up the next slide.
"Ah..."
"Cough..."
It was full of cripples.
Losing an arm was almost a light injury by comparison.
Some had no legs at all, others were missing arms or chunks from their sides and were barely surviving on machinery.
They were all the high-ranking officers and special forces soldiers he had just mentioned.
"The tutorial success rate is a simple 8 percent. Out of a hundred people who try, only eight make it through. What you're seeing here is only a part of them. Slaughtered? The ones who got slaughtered were the people who couldn't adapt and fell by the wayside. Do you know why I've been meeting with members of the National Assembly, the president, and conglomerate chairmen like yourselves?"
No one answered.
They only swallowed their dry saliva in silence.
With a benevolent expression, Igrato went on.
"Because I'm trying to save anyone with even a shred of political talent. I can't rebuild a country, and neither can the clan members."
Photos kept sliding by.
Humanity's mutation without physical enhancement.
Their transformation into Infectors. A world reduced to ruins.
"This is what will soon become reality. The tutorial survival guide I handed out—have you all memorized it?"
"Huh? Yes, yes, of course. We already had it practically memorized."
"What about exercise?"
"Well..."
They trailed off and avoided Igrato's eyes.
Everyone was the same. That was so absurd it almost made him smile more.
Who would look at these men and think they were the conglomerate chairmen, the very type who had spent their lives commanding others?
"Surviving the tutorial isn't the end of it. Physical Enhancement Level 1. At the very least, you need to reach level 1. Well, in the 2.0 world, the D-Virus in the atmosphere will probably already be dead. But."
He showed them photos of various Infectors.
"Without physical enhancement, if you even breathe near these fungal masses or take a minor wound, you'll turn into one of them just like this."
A few of them sucked in a sharp breath.
They were forced once more to recognize the reality they faced.
Their faces held no hope, only urgency and anxiety.
Igrato was the one giving them a chance.
And they had been chosen for it because of the lives they'd built up until now.
"Don't waste this chance. The tutorial isn't a place where your authority or wealth means anything."
"Now then, let's move on."
With that, Igrato flipped to the next screen.
It was a mission concerning the underground bunker beneath Gimpo Airport on Earth 2.0.
"We've set up the site and tried contacting numerous rankers. I guess our efforts weren't wasted after all."
"Oh? Any good news?"
"Yes. A South Korean user the government couldn't uncover no matter how they searched—Meteor."
"No way..."
"We're meeting him."
Color returned to everyone's faces.
The mission had been analyzed to have an attack success rate under 3 percent.
And now they had arranged a meeting with the user who could drag that success rate up into double digits.
"That's incredible. Truly incredible. Even the National Intelligence Service couldn't dig up information like that..."
"Because with a supporter, you can control personal information. There's still no progress yet. We'll know once we meet him."
Hrmph. Igrato cleared his throat and finished his report.
That concluded the regular briefing tour.
"Then I'll see you at the next report. If you're prepared—if you're ready—then you'd better hurry and earn your user qualification. We don't know when Dark Cover will arrive."
Were they waiting for some miracle news that would let them survive while sitting still?
Heavy silence settled over the room once more.
The chairmen only took out their invitation cards and absentmindedly stroked them with their fingers.
Because this was the age where the weak would no longer be able to survive.
A world where everything they'd built meant nothing.
The only thing that mattered was their own body.
And soon, that age would come.
Igrato left the conference room.
Rebuilding the nation is a huge opportunity.
He was an ambitious man.
A world where Dark Cover had occurred was nothing less than a lawless zone.
A strong user—the one who led the many—could found a new world order.
Wasn't that a two-for-one deal, since it would guide the overwhelming majority to salvation?
There were surely others who thought the same way.
But within South Korea, he alone was the one taking on the state itself.
If he could absorb their power, then absorbing the users and civilians who survived Dark Cover would be easy.
The problem is the tutorial success rate...
No matter how tough they were, it was a place where survival was difficult.
And a leader was supposed to push people to the limit, wasn't he? Yet they were so fragile it was ridiculous.
Still, can I really trust anyone but Assemblyman Lim?
As a young National Assembly member, he was the only person who had passed the tutorial at this point.
For now, Igrato intended to put him forward as a leader.
Well, he didn't know how many high-ranking officials would survive once Dark Cover actually hit, but...
Still, he's the most useful one.
He was the second-wave candidate who had obtained user status through an invitation.
Among them, Assemblyman Lim had the best abilities.
Igrato checked his smartphone.
It was about time to head to the meeting place where he was scheduled to meet Rotem.
***
"Hyung, is this Igrato guy?"
His younger brother held out a smartphone.
Yoo Sung-jun looked at the man answering an interview in the video playing on the screen.
"Yeah. He made a name for himself as the Blood Rain clan leader."
His real name was Choi Hyun-seok.
He was explaining the 8-level Infector, the 38ma Gulybolaz, that he had defeated on a game show.
-Its shell was so tough that even a Gigantic Blaster could barely pierce it. Three hundred people piled on, and all we managed to do was chip away at its HP. Then I saw this.
He played his own footage for them.
Gulybolaz was a monster Sung-jun had personally taken down as well.
-We found the answer in Meteor's hunt footage, and after that we went on to secure the kill with confidence...
"Enough, put that away. We're going to meet him soon anyway. What's the point of looking?"
"Why not? It's good to know a little more."
"Knowing his name is enough. And besides, it's weirdly embarrassing to watch your own videos again."
"So that's the secret of a full-time YouTuber."
Ignoring his brother, who was nodding to himself, Sung-jun looked around.
It was still peaceful.
Of course, there were signs of upheaval here and there.
Perhaps because it was a window seat, a man standing nearby holding a sign caught his eye.
—The end is coming. Repent before it's too late.—
He was a user.
One of those fools who'd been too scared to even try the tutorial and had instead fallen into despair and spread that message.
Repent my ass. You should be preparing.
He shook his head at the man's idiotic response.
Then his senses caught something.
An aura sharpened to the point that he could react to a surprise attack from anywhere, at any time.
Terrorist?
Wondering if a user had come to unleash his greed, he hurriedly looked that way.
The man was tall, with a side-parted perm and an easy smile that left an impression. He gave off the sort of vibe people called a squinty-eyed character.
He approached and greeted them.
"Mr. Rotem. Or rather, Mr. Yoo Sung-jun. And the person beside you must be your younger brother, Yoo Sung-hwan, yes?"
"Then you're Igrato. Choi Hyun-seok."
"Hahaha, it's an honor to meet you like this. To think I'm facing someone far more famous than I am."
"If we're talking fame, that'd be you."
They stood and shook hands.
Yoo Sung-hwan also greeted him with a dazed expression.
Seeing him like this, his first impression was that the man seemed very kind.
But Yoo Sung-jun didn't believe in appearances.
After everything the party with Hina had already proven, he was even more certain of that.
Let's take this slowly. We've still got several months before mission prep.
After ordering drinks, he sat down.
Choi Hyun-seok kept smiling as he asked his questions.
His gaze lingered on Sung-jun's wristwatch—his smartwatch.
"That's a nice watch. Is that it? The smartwatch Samsung Electronics released this time. Wow, it's the latest model, so you must've paid a few million won. YOLO, right? I guess this really is the time to enjoy the present to the fullest."
He talked a lot.
Frowning slightly, Sung-jun touched the watch.
"I put it on because I thought I might need it."
His guess was wrong.
This was only similar to a smartwatch. It was something entirely different.
With one hand resting on the table, Yoo Sung-jun cut straight to the point.
"We're both busy, aren't we? The reward transfer percentage. The advantages our party can gain. Please tell us everything."
"Haha, I like that kind of directness. But a party? What do you mean?"
"A three-person party, including my younger brother. I carefully selected the others myself."
"I see... A party organized by Meteor himself, the pinnacle of solo play. Now that's exciting... Good. We'll set the reward split at 80-20."
"Eighty for us?"
"Of course."
That was an extremely generous split.
Was he saying that out of the 1 million points meant for 100 people, 800,000 would be divided among three?
"You must really like the bunker if you're willing to take a loss on points like that."
"Didn't I say it already? It's the core of rebuilding the nation."
"You should also tell us about the advantages."
"Those are obvious, aren't they? The most important thing in Another Earth isn't the Infectors—it's other users. And that's a problem that applies in reality now, too."
Choi Hyun-seok leaned forward.
"I'll give you absolute trust. For one thing, I'll hand over the right of first command for operations and the user information of everyone participating in the mission."
The reward was already outrageous, and that was appealing as well.
Choi Hyun-seok. Was he really a good man?
Too early to tell.
He could always use this to threaten people by putting others in front of him.
Yoo Sung-jun shrugged.
"I haven't agreed to participate in the mission yet. Still, the terms aren't bad."
"Hahaha! Is that so? I'm glad to hear it. I was just so happy to meet you that I guess I got a little carried away. Then how about it—can I help you with anything, even aside from the mission?"
For the sake of trust. With that genial smile, Yoo Sung-jun lifted one eyebrow.
Was he serious?
He tested him.
"Can you arrange people to protect my younger brother in the real world? At all times?"
"Mm, mm. This is still a reality where terror attacks happen all the time, after all. Of course. We'll assign Blood Rain's elite."
He wondered if it had always been this easy to make a proposal.
One thing was certain.
Choi Hyun-seok absolutely wanted to hold onto him.
That just means the information about Infectors is worth an enormous amount.
It was a meeting that reminded him once again of his own position.
Yoo Sung-jun nodded.
"Then I'll take that as protection being arranged."
"I'll make absolutely sure nothing happens to Mr. Yoo Sung-jun's younger brother in the real world."
"Thank you. I'll contact you first for our next meeting."
For now, he was ambiguous. But he also had unmistakable ambition.
That was the conclusion Yoo Sung-jun reached before exchanging numbers with him.
It had been a short meeting, but through the most powerful weapon there was—information—he had secured not only highly favorable terms for mission participation, but safety in the real world as well.
For now, I should focus on the mission.
He planned to contact him again after that.
The underground bunker beneath Gimpo Airport.
That was a potential refuge Sung-jun also wanted.
Still, just in case, I should look for other refuge candidates while we're on the mission.
That process would probably be much easier than before.
He'd obtained what was called the best growth-type item among high-tech equipment.
Yoo Sung-jun touched the watch around his wrist.
He wanted to try it out as soon as possible.