Going Out in Style
"..Damn it, when the hell is this mana wavelength going to stabilize?!"
Mirinae's frustrated voice echoed around her. It had already been two hours since the gate appeared. The mana interference device still wasn't working, leaving them completely in the dark about what was happening inside. The chaotic voices around her, her subordinate clutching a tablet beside her, the Management Bureau agents fiddling with the interference device—everyone must have been feeling the same pent-up frustration.
'Damn... two hours. Two hours..'
She was getting antsy. Two hours wasn't a short time at all. There was no way the civilians caught up in the gate's emergence could still be alive after that long.
"..I should have just gone in. It didn't seem like I'd die right away anyway..!"
"Calm down, Team Leader. If you get like this, it makes us anxious too."
"..Ugh.."
Mirinae ruffled her hair and squeezed her eyes shut. Even with her 14,000 mana—top-tier among A-rank awakeners—she was powerless in this situation, and it was driving her insane.
That was when it happened.
Bzzt—
"Wha—what?"
"Something's coming out!"
The dark blue vortex that looked like a portal inside the gate began to ripple. Someone was passing through the gate.
'A survivor? Or a monster? No, monsters can't come out unless there's a break phenomenon. So who? Must be a survivor, right?'
Mirinae instantly condensed her mana into an ice sword, gripping it familiarly. It was her skill, [Ice Sword]. With her combat prep complete, she waved off the agents operating the interference device and focused on whoever was emerging from the gate. No break phenomenon meant it probably wasn't a monster, but you never knew. The gate's location alone screamed abnormality. There was no guarantee it wouldn't happen again.
"..Team Leader."
"I know."
Bzzt—
Her subordinate Seha's voice cracked with tension as she called out, wrapping Mirinae in an inexplicable wave of unease.
After about a minute.
Shoooaaa—
"Ah, we survived. We survived!!!! We survived!!!!!!"
"Seoul, it's Seoul. We're alive!!!"
Bursting out of the gate weren't monsters or awakeners, but civilians who'd been enjoying their leisure time inside the cafe when they got swept up.
"...Huh?"
Her tension deflated, and her own voice—two tones higher than usual—sounded utterly foreign to her.
"Hey, survivors! Come over here first!"
"Hic... We survived.. We really survived..."
The two men were overwhelmed, reveling in the miracle of their survival amid the chaos.
Bzzt—
Shoooaaa—
A moment later, a woman emerged. After a short wait, one last man came out, and then... nothing. No one else for a long time.
"..Is that it?"
"Did they just happen to escape?"
"No idea. Start taking statements first. Call me if anyone else comes out."
"Yes, ma'am."
But there were more important things. She stationed Seha at the gate and prepared to question the survivors.
'We need to figure out what kind of gate it is from their stories before our agents can move in.'
She had to extract the info as quickly as possible. Mirinae tossed aside her ice sword and headed to the tent where the survivors had gathered.
Their testimonies were remarkably consistent.
"Uh, I'm... Park Junhyeok."
The first of the two men who'd emerged—a college student type. After several deep breaths, Junhyeok finally spoke, his hands clenched tight on his knees, still trembling.
"After the gate appeared in the cafe, there was this flash in front of my eyes. When I came to, I was in this really dark cave-like place... There were other people besides us, but we all got scattered, I think."
"You weren't together the whole time?"
"No. Not at first. I was alone, then I ran into the others while fleeing."
"Fleeing from what?"
"...Living Armor."
Just saying the name seemed to dredge up horrific memories; Junhyeok's face paled visibly.
"The armor... it was moving. Nothing inside, just... the armor itself. There were tons of them. Way more than dozens. No way regular civilians like us could handle them."
Mirinae's expression darkened. Living Armors were typically solitary. Packs of them were rare, let alone dozens.
'Gonna need S-rank backup for this.'
The questioning continued.
"And then?"
"We ran. Nonstop. I saw people die... I was about to give up."
Junhyeok bit his lip, then looked up at Mirinae with trembling eyes.
"That's when I saw the light."
"...Light?"
"Yeah. Golden light. It felt so warm. Weirdly, the moment I saw it, I thought, I can survive this."
Mirinae noted it down silently. Junhyeok's voice grew softer, but that only made it ring more sincere.
"We followed the light... and found this temple-like place. And there, floating in the air—a woman."
"...A woman?"
Mirinae's pen paused briefly.
"Yes."
Junhyeok spoke with conviction.
"It's her. The one from the news. God's Proxy."
"At first, it was just light. But as we got closer... I could see a person. A woman, and she was... like, how can a human be that beautiful?"
The Management Bureau agent sitting beside Mirinae coughed awkwardly for a split second. Mirinae shot him a brief glance but said nothing, listening on.
"She was huge, with these sparkling wings... and a halo behind her. Like an angel from a church painting."
"Did you see her face clearly?"
"A bit, yeah."
The woman closed her eyes as if recalling, then opened them.
"She was beautiful. No, beautiful doesn't cut it... Just looking at her made me want to drop to my knees."
"..."
"Sorry. Sounds weird, right?"
"No. Go on."
"She told us to come this way. And she opened the exit for us."
Mirinae's pen stopped again. Opened the exit? The gate?
'Is that even possible?'
"You're sure she opened it? Not just guiding you to an existing one?"
"Uh, well... Not sure. Probably the latter? It was already open when we got there.."
"What exactly did she say?"
The woman hesitated, then mimicked the voice softly, trembling as if reliving it.
"And after?"
"...She told us to go first."
Tears welled up in the woman's eyes again.
"She said... she'd stay behind to clean up and come after..."
"I'm Kim Woo-hyun, high school student."
The man who introduced himself as Woo-hyun seemed relatively calm, but up close, his face was ashen. He'd just barely survived too.
"Like the others said, inside was a dungeon-type gate. Structurally, less like a natural cave and more like an artificial ruin... close to an underground temple."
Mirinae widened her eyes in surprise. The testimony was unusually technical.
"How do you know that?"
"I read a lot about gates as a hobby."
Woo-hyun wiped sweat from his glasses, then put them back on.
"But that's not the point. The number of Living Armors was abnormal. By my knowledge, that's something you'd see in an A-rank or higher gate."
"You're certain?"
"Yes. Odds of civilians surviving? Near zero. We should have died long ago."
He paused, then added firmly.
"But we lived. One reason."
"..God's Proxy."
Woo-hyun said it like a verdict.
"From the moment that golden energy spread, the Living Armors slowed down—not completely, but noticeably. They couldn't approach either."
"...Some kind of ability suppression?"
Mirinae muttered, and Woo-hyun nodded immediately.
"Don't know the exact mechanism, but it bought us time to escape, for sure."
"Did you see her fight directly?"
"Not for long. But..."
His voice dropped.
"I heard it at the exit."
"Heard what?"
"She looked at the Living Armors and..."
A brief hesitation. Then, he reproduced it clearly.
The tent fell silent.
"...And then?"
Woo-hyun let out a short, hollow laugh.
"I was hesitating to leave, so she said [Begone] forcefully. I'm no awakener; I wouldn't help anyway.. So I left. But her.. she'll be okay, right...?"
"I... worked at that cafe."
The cafe employee looked the most exhausted—the other of the first two men. His throat was hoarse from crying; he could only speak properly after gulping some water.
"Honestly... my memory's not crystal clear. Things got too chaotic midway."
"That's fine. Just what you remember."
"Everyone panicked at first. Running, screaming, no idea what was happening..."
He hung his head, lips twitching for a long moment before continuing.
"And I saw people die."
Mirinae and the agent's faces darkened briefly.
"Then a woman with us said to follow the light... We went that way. And we saw her. For real."
"Saw what?"
The cafe employee swallowed hard.
"That person."
"...God's Proxy?"
"Yeah."
He nodded.
"I was skeptical even after the news. Thought it was all hype. But seeing her up close..."
He paused, choosing his words.
"I get why everyone's talking."
"In what way?"
"Her presence... it was on another level."
Mirinae's eyes narrowed ever so slightly. The employee pressed on.
"Beyond strong or beautiful... Just her standing there made you think, She can handle this."
"Did she open the exit for you?"
"Yes. Told us to go first, clearly."
"She didn't come with?"
"...No."
"..I see."
Having heard all four testimonies, Mirinae sat speechless for a while. Each saw slightly different things, felt different things. But the conclusion was singular.
A mysterious woman with golden wings spread wide.
An overwhelming presence.
Golden energy that suppressed the Living Armors' movements.
The rescuer who sent civilians out first and stayed behind in the gate.
And that name.
"...God's Proxy."
Mirinae murmured softly.
"Team Leader, any leads?"
Her subordinate approached as she pondered. His stiff expression suggested bad news.
"Yeah. Testimonies are surprisingly detailed; we could probably go in now.. But dozens of Living Armors, they said."
"What, Living Armors?"
Her subordinate was a bureau agent too—of course he knew what they were.
"Might be best to request S-rank support before entering."
"God's Proxy, huh? No telling how long she can hold out. Time's critical. We need to hurry. Dungeon-type, so we'll sweep whatever we can.."
As Mirinae spoke, Seha's hand appeared before her face, signaling no more words needed.
"..Why?"
A foreboding chill hit her as she asked, and the shocking reply came.
"The gate closed."
"Not by the interference device—it just vanished."
Mirinae's face hardened.
"..Anyone else come out after?"
"..Pardon? No. No one."
"..."
At that moment, inside the gate.
"..Ehey, nailed it!"
A line I'd heard in so many Mutube Shorts. Always wanted to say it once. Maybe not the best words while buried under temple rubble, but...