How to go to another world
How to go to another world
Perhaps the experience at Checkpoint 1 helped.
Even though this opponent was wearing the Pregnant Woman's Skin, we were able to subdue it without much difficulty.
"...Damn it."
"Lord......"
But we weren't given the luxury of rejoicing in our victory.
We each looked at the half-peeled Pregnant Woman's Skin and the Mimic Beast, which was wriggling while neutralized.
"......"
The Mimic Beast was a type of colony. In other words, inside the Pregnant Woman's Skin, very small Mimic Beasts were moving while tangled together.
It's quite ironic.
That a mere newborn baby was wearing its mother's skin and acting like her.
It wasn't a very pleasant sight to behold, so we turned our gazes away.
'If only I could handle Holy Power better.......'
Could I have saved these children, even if only in the afterlife?
A bottomless, endless regret washed over me.
Watching these children who had turned into monsters not long after being born as humans.
"...Yes. You will certainly be able to do so. So, please do."
It was Kim Ji-hoo. He was looking away as if he couldn't bear to see this tragedy, yet he spoke with strength.
"If you harbor compassion and love, then do so. Hone the ability granted by the Lord and save those children."
"...If it works."
"If you set your heart on it, it will happen as you wish."
At those words, I looked at the wriggling Mimic Beast.
...Ha, it feels like there hasn't been much in my life that went the way I wanted.
I woke up and my body is like this, and my pig-like little sister fell into this living hell.......
Yeah, I did get a military exemption. At least I'm a civilian right now.
Though it's not like that makes much of a difference from being a soldier.
For some reason, my mouth felt bitter and dry, so I smacked my lips for no reason.
*
"...For now, according to the testimonies of the soldiers who came before, there isn't much we can do on the 1st floor."
Captain Kim said in a low voice.
Just as he said, the 1st floor was quiet.
Of course, there are probably several Mimic Beasts still remaining, but they aren't at a significant level.
So, there is only one thing we must do.
"Therefore, we must find a way to enter the 2nd floor."
Of course, the process won't be smooth.
The interior of the building was jumbled up, twisted while ignoring even the laws of physics.
In this situation, there's no way the stairs would be intact, so we have to find a route to go up.
"Previously, when soldiers came here, they discovered two methods. One was using the emergency stairs on the building's exterior to go up. The second was finding a hole in the ceiling and going up through it."
Of course, it's uncertain whether those methods will still work.
Because they said this damn building changes its structure every time as if it were alive. There's no way the existing methods would remain intact.
"For now, let's gather the information about the 1st floor that we can grasp with our own senses. Even a very minor sense of discomfort is fine."
As Captain Kim said, we decided to first organize the current situation and information of the 1st floor.
Because we couldn't just blindly point a Sledgehammer at the ceiling to try and break through.
We began to explore around the lobby in our own ways.
The first to speak was the Owl Bear Elder.
"The space beyond the walls is inconsistent. In some places, I hear the echo of an empty vacant lot, but on the wall right next to it, there's a muffled sound as if submerged in water. It seems the space itself is jumbled and mixed up."
"The smell is also strange."
Min Ah-ji sniffed and added to the Elder's words.
"The smell of blood and disinfectant are mixed together, stinging my nose...... I can feel the source of the smell from all directions. But the strongest place is definitely above."
Seo Do-yoon, who had gone out for a physical search, returned from the emergency stairs in the corner of the lobby, bending his massive frame.
"The stairs have completely collapsed. No, 'collapsed' isn't the right word; it's more accurate to say the space itself has been crushed and blocked. The walls and stairs are tangled together like clay. We can't go up this way."
"The emergency door leading to the exterior wall was also fused and blocked in the same way."
Kim Ji-hoo reported, pointing to the other side.
As the information was gathered, the conclusion became clear.
In this Obstetrics and Gynecology Building in the Blackout Zone, where normal laws of physics do not apply, all general passages we could use to go up to the 2nd floor were blocked.
"Then there is only one method left. Like the previous unit members did, find a hole in the ceiling, or we ourselves......."
It was right around the time Captain Kim was looking up at the ceiling, about to order the next operation.
Ding-.
While we were searching the 1st-floor lobby thoroughly and gathering information.
A single, incredibly clear and mundane sound cut through the thick darkness and silence.
"......!"
In an instant, our movements, as we were gathered as if for a briefing, stopped like a lie.
The Owl Bear Elder immediately raised his shield, and Seo Do-yoon's K3 Machine Gun muzzle pointed toward the direction the sound came from.
I also reflexively drew the Glock from my waist.
The source of the sound was the Elevator located in the center of the lobby.
'...Elevator?'
A cold chill ran down my spine.
This is the Blackout Zone.
The external power supply is completely cut off, and it's a bizarre alien space where even the generators inside have no reason to work properly.
Yet, on the elevator's top indicator in a building where all power was cut, a bluish LED light was on.
[1]
A mechanical sound signaling that the elevator, which had come down from the floor above, had arrived at the 1st floor.
And soon, in the heavy silence, the sound of mechanical parts engaging was heard.
Srrrk-.
As if a beast were opening its maw, the heavy iron door opened to the left and right, revealing the darkness inside.
"...An elevator?"
Someone muttered that.
That voice contained the absurdity and shock that we were all feeling.
Srrrk-.
The interior of the fully opened elevator was empty.
A stretcher elevator, spacious enough to fit a patient bed, commonly used in hospitals.
"It's a trap."
Captain Kim said in a low, firm voice while holding his pistol.
"A mechanical device operating normally in a Blackout Zone where all power is cut. The intention to lure us in is obvious."
"Agreed. I'm not stupid enough to walk into a place that's so obviously saying 'please get on'."
Orc Mister, Seo Do-yoon, snorted while adjusting his K3 Machine Gun.
With tacit agreement, we turned our backs on the elevator and scattered back into the 1st-floor lobby.
If it's so obvious that it's a trap, we had no choice but to force a way to bypass the trap.
"Step aside. I'll try to break through the ceiling."
The Owl Bear Elder gripped the heavy Sledgehammer tightly with both hands.
He swung the Sledgehammer upward toward the ceiling in the center of the lobby that might lead to the 2nd floor, with monstrous strength approaching 1 ton of force.
Kwaang-!
A tremendous roar echoed through the lobby. It was a strike that should have shattered ordinary concrete instantly and punched a large hole through it, but.......
"...Damn."
A sigh of frustration flowed from the Elder's mouth.
The ceiling that the Sledgehammer struck directly, far from breaking, sank in like living rubber and then violently bounced the Sledgehammer back.
Furthermore, the wall around the area that was hit wriggled grotesquely, and red lines like veins sprouted, repairing the wound in an instant.
"...It seems we can't break through with physical strikes."
The Elder shook his head while shaking his numb wrist.
"The stairs are the same."
Orc Mister spat out a curse after mercilessly striking the crushed emergency stair wall with the butt of his machine gun.
All sides were blocked.
Every normal, or abnormal, physical passage leading upward was being rejected by this bizarre spatial law.
"Ms. Min Ah-ji, are there any other gaps or air currents?"
At Captain Kim's desperate question, Min Ah-ji sniffed and pointed toward the elevator.
"The air coming down from the floor above, the smell of blood, and the foreign energy....... It's all flowing out only from inside that elevator. Everywhere else is blocked so tightly it's suffocating."
At those words, a heavy silence settled over the lobby once again.
Everyone's gaze turned toward the inside of the bluish elevator, which was blinking as if mocking us with its maw wide open.
'...Fuck, are you kidding me?'
I swallowed a string of profanities inside.
It felt like I had become the protagonist in a third-rate horror game.
"...Do you think there's another way?"
No one could easily answer that.
Everyone here half-realizes it. That this damn space is inducing us to ride the elevator up.
The building, built by human hands, was no longer the exclusive property of humans.
After a moment of deliberation, we finally decided.
"...Let's ride it."
In this linear building, all we can do is go straight.