Episode 70: Time River (1)

The Ferrari was about halfway across Wonhyo Bridge when ability users began to appear, one by one, at the outermost edge of my Spatial Perception.

Whoa. What is this? Phase Power past a million, and they're swarming. One, two, three, four — a full twenty-seven of them. Plenty more over a hundred thousand, and the ones under ten thousand I can't even cou— oh. Right. 22,631. So Spatial Perception doesn't do "roughly."

My own Phase Power was a mere 3,714. Seeing how many people sat well above me, I had to wonder whether they actually possessed abilities worthy of those numbers. Probably not. If this were a game, they'd be Normal class, and I'd be Rare. Unique, even. So is Phase Power nothing but an energy tank? Fuel you spend in order to use an ability?

I was turning that over when I caught a familiar figure: 11.07 million. A discreet look at the face confirmed it. Hwayeon-noona.

Ugh. I scanned Noona's naked body again... Cut me some slack...

And the moment I think that, the naked bodies of female ability users rise up in front of me all at once. Naked women whose faces I haven't even seen — aaagh! I can see the faces too!!

...! ...!!

I wrenched the Mana Sieve up into my head in a desperate bid to calm down and belted out the national anthem in my mind, and the Spatial Perception that had been running wild finally settled.

I was half-hunched over the obscene tent pitched in my pants when Director ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Lee Hyeryeong glanced at the side mirror, and I resettled in a hurry so nothing stuck out. Good. She didn't see—

"......"

"...Franc. How long have you been watching?"

I smiled awkwardly at Franc, her face flushed, her lips pushed out in a pout. C-caught.

Once we crossed the bridge and entered Yeouido, most of the island fell inside my range, and with it a little over ten thousand ability users. This country holds just under 140,000 of them, and more than ten thousand are gathered in Yeouido alone. The heart of Korea's raid teams, sure enough.

The types scattered across the island weren't especially varied. The largest share were Physical Reinforcement users, their Phase Power swirling — 48 percent. Amorphous Phase Power accounted for 32. The form where it clumped here and there across the body, which I started thinking of as spotted, was 13, and 7 percent were shaped like a Möbius strip, the way I used to be.

A Möbius strip would be a Special Type that included Detection. As for the amorphous and the spotted — they'd said Elemental came second only to Physical Reinforcement, so was amorphous the Elemental type? Then spots would be Recovery. The spotted type came in two kinds itself: Phase Power gathered in the torso, and Phase Power spread through the torso and the limbs. Healers were supposed to come in two kinds as well, ranged and melee. Which one was the ranged healer?

I studied the Phase Power patterns of the amorphous and spotted types for a while, then turned to the Möbius strips. Looking closer, the thickness of the band, its position, its shape — all of it differed a little from person to person. Some had a circle given a single twist. Others were twisted over and over like a cruller. Does the ability change with the number of twists?

Director Lee must have noticed I was fixed on something. From the moment we'd entered Wonhyo Bridge she had only stolen glances at me, and she hadn't said a word. Perceptive, that one.

First I sought out the highest number in each type. Physical Reinforcement topped out at 11.07 million — Hwayeon-noona was the high— she was?! Third in the country wasn't an empty title.

Elemental was 6.12 million, a young woman with a face as haughty as a princess's. Recovery was 7.54 million, a man who looked like the second son of a conglomerate family. Special Type was 3.26 million... What? That isn't even B-Class. And the man who ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠held it was just... ordinary-looking.

The sort of man you'd see anywhere, if you happened to turn your head on the street.

More to the point — Special Type. Before I obtained the Mana Sieve, my pattern had been a figure-eight Möbius strip, and that man had the exact same figure-eight. The difference was that mine had been a figure-eight close to straight lines, while his was a figure-eight closer to a streamlined curve. I wondered whether the kind of ability changed with the curve as well.

Still, 3.26 million — not even B-Class — being the highest figure among Special Types left me a little disappointed. Of course someone higher might be living in another region, and Korea had at least two more people past 11.07 million, so one of them might be Special Type. Even so, it looked as if the Special Type's standing wasn't particularly high beside the others, and that sat wrong with me.

You know how it is in online games. Healers are few, so in peacetime they get treated like nobility, but the moment a fight starts they're nothing but heal slaves. I was wondering if Special Types were stuck in the same role. I crossed my arms, tapped my foot, and folded the thought in half. I was still the owner of a miserable Phase Power that hadn't even left four digits. Arrogant thoughts like these could wait until I had Phase Power in the tens of millions, the way Hwayeon-noona did.

I went back to watching the amorphous and spotted patterns through Spatial Perception. Those two were definitely Elemental and Recovery. How to actually use either ability, though — simply looking, I couldn't get a grip on it. I was turning all of this over, reading the Phase Power of the ability users spread across Yeouido, when the Ferrari Director Lee was driving turned onto Yeouidaero. Hwayeon-noona was in a twenty-story building near Yeouido Station, and the car was racing toward it.

So that building is the Time River headquarters.

When we arrived, crowds were coming and going at the entrance, and inside the building alone the ability users numbered over three hundred.

...Hadn't Noona said there were 113?

Director Lee parked in the underground garage, and Franc and I followed her straight up to the nineteenth floor, where Hwayeon-noona was.

"The boss's office, the reception room, the VIP waiting rooms — they're all gathered on the nineteenth floor. The floor directly above is the boss's private space."

"A private space?"

"Yes. She renovated an entire floor and combined a live-in suite with a training room."

Hoh... Curiosity stirred, and I meant to sweep the twentieth floor with Spatial Perception, but Director Lee's account of the building went on, so I turned my attention back to her. Floors eighteen, seventeen, sixteen, and fifteen served as Time River's offices. From the fourteenth down to the tenth were party rooms assigned to Time River's parties — not banquet halls. From the ninth down to the fifth were private offices assigned to Time River's raiders. From the fourth floor to the first, she explained with some enthusiasm, there was a reception desk for guests who came on business, offices and waiting rooms handling support work for the raiders, and warehouses that issued the consumable supplies needed for operations in the Phase World.

Well. There didn't seem to be much point hiding it anymore.

"There are over three hundred people with Phase Power in this building. Noona told me a hundred and thirteen. How's that work?"

She explained that most of the ability users currently standing by in the building were supporters.

"What's a supporter?"

"People whose aptitude is too low to grow past G Class, so they've stagnated."

"Ah..."

So ordinary people couldn't enter the Phase World, and the volume of goods you could bring in on entry was fixed — which meant they'd hired those unfit for combat as porters. Supporter was the polite word. Porter. Living aide. That was what it was. Oh, and come to think of it, how did you even enter the Phase World together?

I was just about to ask when the elevator doors opened and people who looked like Time River employees moved to board, then flinched at the sight of me and Director Lee.

"Oh? Ah, Director — is that child perhaps..."

"I believe I warned you yesterday. Forgotten already? What did I say would happen if you talked carelessly?"

Director Lee smiled a frightening smile, and not only the employee who had brightened and opened their mouth, but the people behind them as well, stiffened like logs. The doors shut on them without mercy, and the elevator began to rise again.

"Have people already heard about me?"

"Yes. In more senses than one, you've become rather widely known."

"...If I ask what senses, you won't tell me, will you?"

"Hehe. Ask the boss yourself."

Tsk... It's not something weird, is it?

A gothic chime sounded, and from the speaker in the elevator ceiling came the notice that we had arrived at the nineteenth floor.

The doors opened. Stepping out, I found a plain, straight corridor of some sixty-five feet — simple enough to call up the Ability User Association building — with eight rooms lined along the walls to either side. The corridor was a generous sixteen feet wide, and a potted plant stood beside each door.

"The rooms you see on either side are all VIP waiting rooms."

"Ah. Yes."

Perhaps because my eyes had gone to the doors, Director Lee read the moment and explained. At the end of the corridor stood antique wooden double doors, and beyond them Hwayeon-noona sat at an executive desk that looked outrageously expensive, reviewing documents.

"Beyond the door ahead is the boss's office, which doubles as a reception room."

At the entrance was an L-shaped reception desk, where two women who appeared to be secretaries sat at their work. Seeing me and Director Lee, they sprang up, pressed folded hands to their lower abdomens, and bowed their upper bodies to forty-five degrees in silent greeting.

"Good work."

"Yes, Director."

We passed the desk and stood before the boss's room, and through Spatial Perception I saw one of the secretaries stealing glances at me with a face that said she knew who I was. I didn't know who they were. They acted as if they knew me. It was rather unsettling.

Director Lee stopped at the door, straightened her clothes, and raised her hand with crisp precision. Knock, knock. Twice.

"General Affairs Director Lee Hyeryeong. I've brought the scheduled guest."

Hwayeon-noona's voice came faintly through the wood, and Director Lee opened the door with force and went in. I followed, and a broad office of nearly eighteen hundred square feet opened before me, threaded with a clean, fresh scent. White floors, white walls, furniture in a deep amber whose grain still lived — a modern office, crisp and bright. One entire side was windows, and the reddening light of the sinking sun poured in so fiercely it stung the eyes. Every other wall was packed solid with bookshelves, and the shelves were packed solid with books. Every volume worn by hands. Not decoration. Has Noona read all of these?

Hwayeon-noona watched me looking around, then spoke as she put away the documents she'd been signing off.

"Welcome. I've been waiting. Sit on the sofa for a minute, will you? I'll finish this and be right there."

She raised a hand toward one side ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠of the office. A carpet of the finest wool was laid there, and on it sofas upholstered in a hide I couldn't begin to place were arranged in a U around a solid-wood table. I sat, and my body sank in as softly as if I'd settled onto down. It looked like leather. Remarkable.

"Then I'll get ready and come back up."

"Please do."

Director Lee watched me take the sofa, bowed to Hwayeon-noona, and left. Noona lowered her eyes to the documents. I was looking over the office again when Franc sat pressed right up against me, an old feeling stirring on her face. Had the knight-commander's office in the order she once belonged to felt something like this?

"Seeing the office — does it feel nostalgic?"

"Ah? Not quite that, no. Only, an office is a place that reflects its master's heart and tastes, and I was thinking that this one truly suits Miss Hwayeon's image."

Hoh. Is that how it is? I'd always figured an office was something you had the people under you roughly fill with furniture. Hearing her and looking around again, sure enough, I felt it — cold, and yet warm. A contradiction, both at once.

I stole a glance at Hwayeon-noona. She was busily writing something down. I could have read it through Spatial Perception, and somehow it felt as if I shouldn't, so I pulled my attention awa— no, I didn't. I looked. At once.

Under the title: that they had sortied on Friday night at the government's request. That for three days they had helped form the encirclement on Yongmunsan. That on Monday they had left their post on Yongmunsan at my request, and by Noona's own will. And that at Iljasan, in Dunchon-dong, Gangdong-gu, Seoul, they had found the Energy Eater that escaped the encirclement, and captured it...

So it wasn't a report. She was writing an explanatory statement. The hand was calm and flowing, beautiful script. The prose wasn't beautiful. It was stiff. Is this going to Auntie?

Perhaps feeling my gaze, Hwayeon-noona opened her mouth with her eyes still fixed on the page.

"There's someone who's supposed to come. I'm sorry, but wait just until they get here."

"And if I wait, what will you do for me?"

I maintain that getting sulky was an irresistible force. She wouldn't even look at me — only at that statement. So I said something that ought to have flustered her. The one who got flustered wasn't Noona.

The secretary who had quietly opened the door and was coming in with the tea froze solid and stared at me in pure shock. A pretty young woman, the sleek secretary uniform of white and black suiting her well — but with her eyes gone that wide, it was a little funny. Hwayeon-noona faltered too, shot me a glance, then dropped her eyes again.

"What do you want me to do?"

Crash!

Something broke behind me. I turned, and it was the secretary — she had dropped the tray. I was watching the color drain from her already ashen face when Spatial Perception caught Hwayeon-noona's expression tightening. The secretary was going to catch it because of me. Afraid Noona might actually get angry, I spoke first.

"Let's see. You've wronged me a little... haven't you?"

Noona knit her brow, sighed, and went back to writing the statement.

"I'll think about it. Jo Huiseon, a little more care."

"Yes, yes! I'm sorry, Boss!"

She bolted from the office, came back with cleaning things, and while she cleared the broken cups and glasses, the plates, and the wreckage of the food and wiped up after it, the other secretary brought tea in. This one pretended not to look as she set a cup down in front of me, stole a perfectly natural glance, bowed with elegance, and set about helping the one who had made the mistake.

Since she'd stolen a look at me, I wondered whether I ought to steal one back — then reached for the tea instead. The hot tea went down, and the indecent thoughts seemed to rinse away in the heat. Right. If I was going to steal glances, stealing them at Franc or Hwayeon-noona would be a hundred times better.

"So who's coming?"

"Mother and Siha."

"Oh."

...Oh?!

"Aunt— no, the President is coming?"

At the word Auntie, Noona let out a short laugh. Sunlight streamed in behind her and seemed to give her a halo. It was a smile so bright it dazzled.

"You can call her Auntie. She said she absolutely had to see you, and that I was to summon her without fail when we sign the contract. Siha agreed to stand by and notarize."

"My sister's coming too?"

"You're still a minor. A guardian has to be present."

"Sis isn't a guardian, though."

"But your uncle and aunt are busy. Siha's an adult, so she more than qualifies."

True enough. On Tuesdays, the outpatients do pile up at Dad's hospital. After that Hwayeon-noona was busy with the statement and paid me no mind, so I watched the pretty handwriting for a while. I got bored quickly.

Franc, beside me, had her eyes softly closed and her head resting on my shoulder. Thanks to the Mana Sieve her touch was faint, but I could feel it for certain, and it felt good. The chest against my arm. Her hair against my cheek. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I quietly gathered the Mana Sieve at my fingertips and tickled her side, and felt her twitch. A few more times, and Franc laughed under her breath and gently caught my finger.

Oh, right. Jeral Packard. I ought to look up the man said to be the only S-Class in the world. I switched on the Certifier. Franc stroked the side I'd poked, then leaned in beside me to look at the hologram.

"Jeral Packard... an Elemental-type ability user. Light, lightning, and wind — a Triple List? Whoa. Three attributes. That's incredible. Born in Year 7 of the New Phase Era. Went missing in Year 162? When he disappeared he looked to be in his late thirties, a handsome man whose mark was metallic platinum hair... So even an Elemental lives this long, if the class is high enough. Amazing."

"You're interested in him?"

"Yeah. I heard the Director talking about him on the way. You know about Jeral Packard too, Noo— of course you do. What kind of person is he?"

"Hm. Jeral Packard is, without any doubt, a great man worthy of respect. He was American, but he contributed more than anyone to the World Phase Ability User Association being founded as a transnational body. When the United States federal government was trying to woo him and pressure him, he had a line."

"And he was a man who took every unpleasant task upon himself without a moment's hesitation."

Whoa... Incredible. What would I have done in his place?

...I can see that future clear as day. I'd have thrown the duty away and enjoyed nothing but the rights.

"By unpleasant tasks, you mean lawful retaliation?"

"No. When you run an organization that large, there are times you inevitably have to reach into filthy work. For example: retaliation in the shadows against kidnappers. Retaliation in the shadows against terrorism. Retaliation in the shadows against the exploitation and abuse of ability users."

"Nothing but retaliation..."

I muttered it with a sickened look, and Hwayeon-noona paused her pen, gazed at me steadily, and gave a faint smile touched with self-mockery.

"There are a great many things that have to be met with force. They say he stood at the front of every task that demanded strength — hunting down and restraining the kidnappers who had taken ability users' families, physical strikes on the small absolute monarchies that tried to crush ability users with education little better than brainwashing, and with armed force."

"If you solve everything with nothing but force, you can just provoke more backlash, can't you?"

"The Earth of that time was a world of material worship, where those who had exploited those who had not. Naturally, the few power holders who possessed more than half the wealth of the world tried to annihilate Jeral Packard for attempting to change the system. Could that have been solved by a creed of nonviolence? Against supremely individualistic beings, above the law, whose heads were filled with nothing but the thought of killing?"

Words left me. Gandhi's nonviolent, nonresistant movement, from a man of the age before the New Phase Era, was an admirable thing in terms of character. But the world is littered with problems that cannot be solved that way. They say violence bears a yoke of violence. I'm of the side that believes overwhelming violence can sever even that.

"Jeral Packard rallied the ability users and the weak, turned aside every attack with his own overwhelming ability, and with the counterstroke succeeded in bringing the great capitalists down. And with the capital he gained, he established the World Phase Ability User Association in every country."

"Whoa."

"Historians say the history of that time was a situation words could not resolve. If there had been no Jeral Packard, they say, a tiny few would have held all of it — the power of money, the power of rule, and the power of arms — and afterward the worst dark age would have come, in which only a handful of people ruled the Earth."

"A real hero..."

"Yes. He achieved feats worthy of the name. But if you asked whether he was happy as a person, I would say no. Because the only way to stand against those who have is for another who has to step forward and be sacrificed."

"Huh? Sacrificed?"

"Sacrificed? You mean an S-Class Elemental ability user got ambushed and died for it?"

"I think my wording invited a misunderstanding. I am not saying he was killed. He was the only S-Class in the world, and yet he poured all the wealth and honor that should have been his into the safety of the socially weak, and of ability users. He himself gained nothing but honor and renown. It was in that figure that I saw a sacrifice."

So a thing becomes a sacrifice if others see it as one, even when the person doesn't think so...? I don't know.

"How do you know all that so well, Noona? I don't think I see stories like that on the Certifier."

I asked it while flicking through the search pages of the Certifier's community.

"I heard it from Mother. That woman is past seventy now, and she's been a C-Class ability user for a long time, so I heard she had occasions to meet Jeral Packard."

"Oh. That's impress—"

Bang!

Hiek! Wh-what?

The boom startled me upright. I looked toward the entrance, and the office door stood flung open as a woman walked in, her stride without the slightest hesitation.