Chapter 212: What I Want to Do (1)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 212: What I Want to Do (1)
Following the terror incident, various issues had prevented Team Hunter Killer from holding their meetings. Before that, however, they had met consistently every week to devise strategies for their duels.
Between the incident itself and the fact that the duels had been suspended, Team Hunter Killer had even less reason to meet. Of course, more than the incident or any underlying reasons, the primary factor was the members' lack of motivation.
Then came yesterday. The first duel since the terror incident took place, and Team Hunter Killer had triumphantly secured a victory against Spacetro’s Seoul Branch Team 3.
Since the tide of battle had never once shifted in the past, Team Hunter Killer didn't get drunk on their victory, nor did Spacetro’s Seoul Team 3 fall into despair over their defeat.
The members of Spacetro Team 3 simply went home after work as usual, treating it as no big deal. Team Hunter Killer felt the same, holding a meeting the day after their victory as if it were just another part of their routine.
Since going to headquarters felt a bit awkward and they had gathered at Su-ah’s place several times before, Team Hunter Killer decided to hold the meeting there.
Su-ah, the homeowner, had no complaints about hosting. In fact, she seemed to prefer it since she didn't have to go far and could just stay home.
As the meeting commenced, there was one major difference from before: I was there, sitting in on a meeting that usually only consisted of the five members of Team Hunter Killer.
"……But is it really okay for me to listen in like this?"
"It’s fine."
The only time I was their enemy was during a duel. However, being part of a conversation regarding their combat strategy during daily life felt awkward, and my gaze grew restless.
Yubin answered as if it were truly nothing, spreading the documents she had brought out on the table. The members took the papers and began reading.
I was curious about the contents, but I was already too flustered by the awkwardness to focus on the text.
"Then, let's start the meeting. Please look at the first page."
Whether she noticed my awkwardness or not, Yubin announced the start of the meeting to the members.
The members, who had been skimming the documents, turned to the first page and reviewed the information.
"First, the biggest change is the update to Spacetro’s suits. They look different on the surface, and while we can't verify every performance metric, we've confirmed they've been improved."
"The power output seems to have increased significantly."
Su-ah added to Yubin’s point, and their discussion began in earnest.
The general conversation revolved around the differences each of them felt while fighting the Spacetro soldiers after the suit change.
Just by discussing what they felt during combat, they were able to grasp parts of the enemy's strategy and deduce certain weaknesses.
The newly changed Assault Suits had the effect of standardizing the soldiers' physical abilities and increasing mobility for better coordination. Team Hunter Killer had identified that point with pinpoint accuracy.
"However, there were some who didn't seem to have adapted to the suits yet. Because of that, their coordination was off in many places."
"The person acting as the command tower among the soldiers must be gone. I think it's an aftereffect of the last terror incident, and that's causing confusion in their links."
Hayoung’s analysis was also spot on. First of all, the new recruits hadn't adjusted to the team itself, and some were struggling with the functions of the Assault Suit because it was their first time wearing one.
Even I, who had experience with the Assault Suit, struggled to adapt after putting it back on for the first time in a while; there was no way the new recruits could adapt instantly.
Having observed the Spacetro soldiers' fighting style while providing support from the mid-to-rear lines, Hayoung accurately read their lack of adaptation and the breakdown in coordination.
But what surprised me even more was Yubin’s analysis.
Just by watching the soldiers' movements during the duel, she had figured out that the person who previously acted as the command tower was gone, and that the lack of a replacement was making their coordination clunky.
She didn't know yet that the "command tower" was Kruger, whom we had visited in the hospital together.
I assumed they had analyzed Team 3 from various angles in countless past meetings and created a manual to counter them based on those analyses.
While this could have been a prediction made on the spot, the expressions of the other members suggested they already knew this.
I knew Hunter Killer met regularly, and I had expected them to have analyzed Team 3 to some extent. However, seeing their meeting in person, I realized for the first time that they were analyzing Team 3 from far more angles than I had imagined.
I hadn't heard everything, but the quality of information embedded in their exchange was incredibly refined.
As I realized one of the reasons why Team 3 couldn't beat Hunter Killer, I felt a sense of admiration—and at the same time, I felt like I was sitting on pins and needles.
This was because I noticed my girlfriends' gazes frequently drifting toward me during the meeting.
"Hm? What is it?"
"No, it's just... it's the first time we've had someone else watching us while we hold a meeting."
Even though they said it was fine for me to be there, it seemed they couldn't help but be conscious of the fact that I was technically their enemy during duels.
"Speaking of which, is it really okay for me to be here? In a way, you're exposing Hunter Killer's information to the enemy."
"It’s fine."
Yubin answered firmly to my cautious question.
What I felt from her answer was a confidence that they could win even if information leaked.
It wasn't that they were looking down on Team 3 or dismissing their skills. They simply had overwhelming confidence in their own abilities, and that applied not just to Yubin, but to every member of Hunter Killer.
Even the usually passive Eunha didn't look particularly bold, but the lack of hesitation in her eyes suggested she was just as confident in not losing.
"And we have something to talk to you about, Oppa."
"With me?"
"Yeah. I was wondering if you had a concrete plan for the Superhuman investigation."
Since I had returned after a sufficient rest, I also needed to think more specifically about the Superhuman investigation I had been working on.
Of course, I had a rough outline, but investigations into Superhumans never quite went as planned, so I felt the outline would only become clearer once I started investigating again.
"I have something planned for now, but before that, there's one thing I'm curious about."
"What is it?"
Upon hearing that it was something related to the Superhuman investigation, my girlfriends' eyes all turned toward me.
"I heard that Superhumans undergo various experiments in the laboratory. So, when I went to the ship last time, I did some research into biological experiments."
For two weeks after waking up on the ship, Seira and I had investigated Superhumans without a single day's rest. There wasn't much information on Superhumans that could be confirmed even with Seira’s access level, and there was nothing particularly special within what we could see.
So, the choice I made was to change the direction of the investigation.
"The biological experiment I know best is Spacetro’s Bioroid experiment. They are artificial lifeforms created based on the DNA of inhabitants from specific planets, and they conduct various experiments on the lifeforms born from that foundational DNA."
The words "lifeform" and "experiment" weren't particularly pleasant to my girlfriends. I didn't know exactly what kind of experiments Superhumans underwent, but seeing their expressions sour at the mention of experiments, it was clear they weren't exactly benign.
That was why I had intentionally avoided asking them about the experiments until now, but since we had started talking about the Superhuman investigation, I couldn't avoid the topic any longer.
"Since the information I can confirm right now is limited, I plan to investigate that area for the time being. The problem is, just investigating Bioroids won't reveal much on its own."
"You need a point of comparison."
Yura, who had been listening silently, spoke the words I was about to say.
Confirming information about Bioroid experiments was much easier than gathering data on Superhumans.
Above all, since there were Kaijin of Bioroid origin around me, I could concretely verify things I didn't know well.
It seemed my girlfriends didn't know the specific details of the experiments from when they were in the Superhuman Research Institute. They had simply gone to the lab at a young age and been subjected to various tests.
I wasn't looking for detailed data right this second. If I could just learn even a fraction of what kind of experiments they underwent, I could compare it with the various experiments Spacetro had conducted so far.
"Yeah. So, could you tell me what kind of experiments you underwent at the laboratory?"
The girls were silent. It wasn't that they didn't want to tell me. They just didn't want to remember those times.
"It was very painful."
Eunha was the first to speak into the silence. Her brow furrowed as she stared into space, recalling those days.
"No matter how much I screamed to be sent home, no one would listen."
"I remember it hurting a lot."
"Me too."
Yubin nodded at Yura’s words.
"It hurt?"
"Yeah. They gave us these injections, and after getting them, my whole body would ache."
Experiments accompanied by pain. Perhaps experiments even more unethical than I had imagined were being carried out.
As I listened in silence, Yubin continued her explanation.
"I don't think it was a narcotic drug. There weren't any aftereffects. I think it was an injection to activate our Superhuman abilities."
"Actually, after the pain from the injection subsided, our physical abilities would skyrocket."
Even if one possessed the compatible genes, they wouldn't become a Superhuman without undergoing the Superhuman experiment.
Until they underwent the experiment, they were just ordinary people who happened to have the right genes.
In other words, the Superhuman experiments were conducted on ordinary young children who possessed the compatible genes.
This was information I already knew, but I had just learned that the Superhuman experiment included a stage of activating genes through drugs.
It seemed they started with weak drugs and increased the intensity, gradually giving them stronger bodies. In that process, the subjects were subjected to immense pain.
"That's a very unethical experiment."
There was a rule that seemed universal no matter where you went in the galaxy. The universe was filled with various races, and within those races, there were diverse classifications. Naturally, there were distinctions of age and gender.
Of course, there were occasionally races without gender distinctions, but even those races had children and the elderly.
For mortals living limited lifespans, the distinction between young and old was inevitable.
And no matter where you went in the universe, the unspoken rule was that you must never harm a child. Even beasts without intellect did not harm newborn infants.
"And what other experiments were there?"
I had asked about the experiments first, but I didn't want to listen to a long story about how my girlfriends suffered as children, so I asked about other types of tests.
"It was more like training than an experiment, but we did a lot of aptitude tests. Especially for fighting."
Superhumans possessed physical capabilities far beyond those of ordinary people. Since the experiments were originally started to oppose Spacetro’s arrival on Earth, it might be natural that they were trained to specialize in combat.
It still bothered me that the subjects of those experiments were young children who hadn't even reached puberty.
"But that's all the experiments we received. For as short as a few months or as long as nearly a year, we got shots, had our blood tested, and received training."
The others seemed to agree, as no one contradicted Yubin.
I learned that the experiments themselves were conducted in a repetitive routine. The important things were the content of the experiments and the components of the drugs injected into them.
If possible, I wanted to know the details of the experiments conducted on Superhumans before and after them, but there was no way my girlfriends, who didn't even know the specifics of their own experiments, would know about others.
Even after hearing that the experiments followed a certain routine, I couldn't see any immediate similarities to the Bioroid experiments I knew, so nothing came to mind right away.
"I understand. I'll talk to you in more detail about the Superhuman investigation after I've looked into it a bit more."
"Okay. Let us know if you need help."
After that, there was no more talk about my Superhuman investigation. My girlfriends discussed various strategies and proposals to counter Team 3 in the future, and I just sat a little distance away, watching them.
"Red, are you going to your part-time job?"
"Yeah. Pink, you too?"
"Let's head out together."
As the meeting ended and things wrapped up, Yubin and Yura began preparing to leave as their work shifts approached.
"Are you leaving? Should I walk you there?"
"It's fine. It's not like we're going the same way anymore. Just stay home."
Yubin and Yura waved off my offer to walk them to work. I felt a bit awkward and said okay, but feeling bad about just letting them go, I saw them off to the subway station.
Watching my girlfriends head to work on the subway, I wished I could solve their financial problems, but since that was beyond my current capabilities, I returned home with a sense of regret.
*
Arriving at the convenience store and standing behind the counter, Red recalled the experiments she had undergone in the past.
They were experiments so physically painful that she never wanted to think of them again, so she had intentionally avoided the memories until now. But since her boyfriend, A, had decided to start a full-scale investigation, she tried to force herself to remember and find information.
However, she didn't know the contents of the injections she received back then, the specific purpose of the training she underwent, and she certainly didn't know the location of the laboratory.
Just as she was feeling a sense of helplessness at the fact that she knew nothing, the convenience store door opened with a chime.
"Welcome—"
Red, who had looked up to greet the customer, stopped mid-sentence when she saw the black-haired woman in front of her.
"What? So you were here."
Seira, who had suddenly appeared at the convenience store, was looking at Red as if she had been searching for her.
"Can we talk for a moment?"
Realizing that Seira had come with a specific purpose, Red glared at her and spoke firmly.
"Wait until my shift is over."