106
Ch.106 Storm Before
"Huh? I want to hear the details."
Intrigued by the story, Gu Seo-ryong poured more alcohol and poison for the two women, who hesitated before finally tilting their glasses.
"Ah… I shouldn’t talk about this…"
"But if we’re going to talk about this, shouldn’t we go further back?"
"Slowly, can you tell me from the very~ beginning? I became a superpower human not too long ago, so I don’t know any of the old stories."
"By the way, did you put something in this drink? I don’t remember it tasting this good before…?"
"It’s really sweet… Give me more!"
"Sure~ Just a moment."
Gu Seo-ryong poured mineral water into an empty bottle, shook it with the truth serum she had created, and refilled their glasses.
Gulping down the drugged drink without hesitation, the two began giggling and rambling about past events.
"Mmm… Before Yeo Ryeong, do we have to go all the way back to our school days…?"
"Back then, we weren’t superpower humans—we were students, right?"
In the early days of the monster era, when superpower humans first began appearing.
After Yeo Woon-jae proved the power of superpower humans, humans began to see them as weapons.
Soldiers who could fight powerful monsters were called superpower human soldiers.
Forcibly conscripted into the military, they were trained as weapons under the command of ordinary soldiers to combat monsters.
"Out of all the superpower humans taken back then, the ones still alive and who rose to A-rank or higher are just two, Yoo Anna, and Jung Ho-young."
"It was the absolute worst at first. Since ordinary people knew nothing about superpowers, they made superpower humans do standard military training, handed them guns, and told them to just imbue bullets with their powers. Of course, the gunpowder mixed with their abilities and just—bang, bang—exploded in their hands."
"The superpower humans were fine, but the people around them were screaming, bleeding… Kids were crying."
"I still don’t know what the hell they were thinking before Meister created a proper superpower training manual."
After some chaos, superpower human soldiers were reorganized under Yeo Woon-jae’s command, deemed beyond human comprehension.
Yeo Woon-jae and the superpower humans already fighting monsters, along with Meister, taught them how to use their powers and survive against monsters.
And among them, the most outstanding was Yeo Woon-jae’s daughter.
"If only she had lived… She would’ve definitely become an S-rank hero…"
"Her ability was ridiculously strong, too."
"What was her ability?"
"You know spatial manipulation? Cutting space itself, swapping locations…"
"Wha—?"
Sagugu blinked in shock at the mention of spatial manipulation.
Even among monsters, that was a rare ability—and a human had possessed it?
"You know, Kage? He was never that amazing from the start!"
"Inferiority, superiority—if we’re going by that, Jung Ho-young was the weakest at first."
"Right, all he could do was create barriers from a distance. Not a bad ability, but enemies could just go around them. His evaluation scores were the worst."
"But then Yeo Ryeong took him under her wing, taught him how to trap enemies inside them… That’s when people realized how strong his ability really was."
"Sigh… Back then, I thought if I lost, it’d be to you or Yoo Anna."
"The two of us used to be 1st and 2nd place… Yoo Anna’s ability was just pure monstrosity, but losing to Kage? That was all because of Yeo Ryeong."
"Without her, he’d still be stuck at B-rank at best. But he kept climbing until he was always in 1st place."
"I see~ If not for Kage and Starlight, you two would’ve been 1st and 2nd. That must sting."
When Gu Seo-ryong spoke to them like children, the two suddenly burst into tears.
"Waaah… Choi Seo-hyun, you’re such a good person…"
"We really were 1st and 2nd! We worked so hard, and even now, people on forums call us water rockets for not reaching S-rank!"
"How dare they say that to heroes who work so hard to protect them? They just hide in safety while we fight, and they call us water rockets? They can only say that because heroes are holding the monsters back!"
"Seeing stuff like that… Kage was right… He was right…"
"Yes, yes. So what happened to Yeo Ryeong?"
Perhaps because of the drugs, the two couldn’t hold back their emotions. Gu Seo-ryong released a calming scent from her fingertips.
As they drank more, their bodies slumped against their chairs, blinking slowly.
"Yeo Ryeong died during the experimental subject breakout incident."
"Experimental subjects…?"
"Wha—?"
Sagugu and I froze at the term, but Gu Seo-ryong raised a hand to calm us.
She spoke as if she already knew about it.
"The monster weaponization experiments?"
"Yeah. There were monsters that seemed docile, quietly hovering around humans, or ones that attacked other monsters… Quite a few, right?"
"So some idiots thought, Let’s capture and tame them!"
"Ordinary people couldn’t sense what superpower humans could from monsters. No matter how many heroes said it was impossible, they pushed ahead."
"And crucially…Meister concluded that it might actually be possible."
"Because of that, the government hyped up Meister while treating other heroes like incompetent fools…"
"Ah, I remember that. Heroes were treated like manual laborers, idiots, while government officials acted like their brilliant policies were saving the world. It was all over the news."
"Hmm, doesn’t sound like the test subjects we know about."
"It’s not entirely unrelated, though."
As I listened, I nudged Gu Seo-ryong’s leg under the table. She flicked her fingers.
The two were now so drugged they wouldn’t notice even if we used our powers in front of them.
"When I was at the lab, I overheard talk about this. Maybe they secretly tested monster control methods? Around that time, researchers were desperate to find a way to control you."
"Hmm?"
I thought it was completely unrelated, but maybe not.
Monster control through drugs.
Definitely similar to the experiments done on me.
I, who was pumped full of countless drugs, know the results best.
It was a failure.
"...Then the idiot governments decided to showcase tamed monsters in public, using the ones that seemed somewhat obedient."
"Like some kind of animal circus. Sit, lie down—they gave commands, boasting about conquering monsters, until the monsters saw the humans and— boom. "
"Spectators started exploding, high-ranking officials ordered their own protection, the monsters fled, and every civilian who came to watch died."
"They needed to quickly capture the monsters spreading through the city, but the idiots in charge treated superpower humans like tanks or helicopters, forcing them to move slowly alongside sluggish soldiers…"
"After days of that, even they realized it wasn’t working, so they dumped the problem on the superpower humans to handle."
"So Meister calculated the combat power of the monsters and heroes. Yeo Woon-jae gathered Yoo Anna and others to handle the western Despair, while Yeo Ryeong took Jung Ho-young and us to the eastern Disgester."
Despair and Disaster were early classifications for monsters—Despair-class and Disaster-class.
The heroes split up to hunt them down.
"But… By then, the monsters had already completed their existential evolution…"
From the sound of it, the team sent to fight the Disaster-class was one A-rank hero and three B-rank heroes.
More than enough for a Disaster-class, but suicide against a Despair-class.
"Yeo Ryeong told us to run while she bought time alone, and we tried to escape."
"If she had been alone, she could’ve held out until Yeo Woon-jae arrived."
"If Kage had just run away like she told him to, she wouldn’t have died."
At first glance, leaving a single A-rank hero against a Despair-class seems irresponsible, but with spatial manipulation, it was possible.
Used well, she could negate even the strongest attacks by tearing space open or instantly relocating.
If the monster’s attacks focused solely on her, it wouldn’t have been impossible.
"He knew that too… Yeo Ryeong’s ability was strong enough to hold out. She even kept dodging the Despair-class’s attacks, so he finally agreed to run."
"But then—why did he turn back? If he had just run when told… Why didn’t he listen? He got in her way and got her killed…"
The reason these two blame Kage for Yeo Ryeong’s death is that he refused to leave her alone.
Spatial manipulation is an ability that drains both output and mental processing power.
Even I find it exhausting to manipulate space in multiple places—for a human like Yeo Ryeong, it would’ve been impossible.
So if she used her ability to protect others against a far stronger monster…
She had to die.
"At Yeo Ryeong’s funeral, Kage just sat there blankly. Yeo Woon-jae went to comfort him, saying he was lucky to be alive, but suddenly— smack! —he slapped his hand away and yelled, This is all your fault!"
"He said Yeo Ryeong died because he protected humans, but not superpower humans. After that, Yeo Woon-jae, guilt-ridden, supported everything Kage did, pushing him forward."
"The public thinks he lost his arm and his powers weakened from accumulated monster-fighting fatigue. But the truth is, as Kage grew stronger, the government tried to suppress him. He kept blocking their moves untilthe villains injured him."
"Then… He really should’ve listened to him… At the very least, he shouldn’t have accepted villains as heroes…"
"Oh my, how cruel."
Gu Seo-ryong egged them on, and the two downed their glasses before slumping onto the table with a "Pwah!"
"Exactly! So cruel!"
"We trusted him… He had power, claimed to stand for superpower humans… But he’s just a dictator."
"He got a taste of power and changed… Superpower humans are still human, after all…"
"Ugh, drink! Drink!"
They snatched the bottle from Gu Seo-ryong, taking turns chugging before resting their foreheads on the table and muttering.
"The most frustrating part is that most of Kage’s actions are effective… Sure, there are side effects, but they do solve problems."
"Taking in villains as heroes did reduce the overall fatigue of heroes. Even A-ranks like us can drink and relax like this now."
"But the villains who turned heroes are only behaving because of Kage. Behind the scenes, they’re still doing whatever they want."
"And Kage always talks about necessary sacrifices. Because he keeps saying it, even heroes think sacrificing civilians to kill monsters is normal now."
"Kage only does it as a last resort in truly hopeless situations… But other superpower humans start thinking they’re Kage, acting like they can make those calls too."
"Superpower human supremacy… Honestly, it’s not wrong, but constantly dividing humans and superpower humans has led to crazies saying non-awakened are parasites, that humans who can’t awaken are just livestock."
"It’s all because of Kage."
Watching them, they reminded me of construction workers getting drunk and ranting about politics after work.
Suddenly, they pointed at me.
"Amuteu! Park Deun-deun! You must’ve realized—Kage isn’t looking for heroes to fight alongside him. He just wants superpower humans who’ll obey his orders, becoming shields and tools!"
"Now that Yeo Woon-jae can’t protect him anymore, he’s just looking for a replacement."
"If you become Kage’s subordinate, you’ll just end up like Yeo Woon-jae—taking the damage for him before being discarded!"
"Don’t you dare become Kage’s lackey…!"
"Stay out of the training hall!"