Chapter 324
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 324
Chapter Title: 130. Connection
Those who hold power make the laws.
An unchanging, simple truth, but we'd forgotten it for far too long.
Perhaps because those in power had worn the masks of the weak, wielding their strength without us realizing it.
Four years had passed since the war began.
More than enough time for most formalities, facades, pretenses, and rituals to vanish.
Under the shadow of The Hope, Woo Min-hee established a new law.
"All the supplies here are property of the Republic of Korea government. No unauthorized removal will be permitted."
Of course, a law without power behind it is meaningless.
Woo Min-hee demonstrated her full might before thousands of onlookers.
BOOM!
A shockwave that seemed to shake the heavens and earth.
And then.
KABOOM!!!
In a single focused blast, the shabby building across from them crumbled to dust.
It was such an intense strike that The Hope itself swayed precariously for a moment.
No one could utter a word of protest before the overwhelming power of an Over Level 10 Awakener.
Not even Kim Byung-chul, who had once proclaimed himself the ruler of Korea.
Having lost his formidable army, artillery, subordinates, and equipment, reduced to a mere petty warlord, he had no choice but to bow before Woo Min-hee.
If he were more self-destructive, he might have chosen suicide, but we all knew he had a daughter—a family.
Kim Byung-chul quickly lowered his head.
Woo Min-hee, having occupied high positions for so long, didn't blindly drive out Kim Byung-chul or the gathered crowd.
She appointed his faction as warehouse managers and gatekeepers.
"I'll send over proper managers later. You need to understand how things run here too. Oh, and could you lend us a truck?"
People whispered that Woo Min-hee had known about this secret warehouse from the start, but I saw it differently.
She probably had the intel.
She was one of the key figures in the Jeju government, after all.
But she clearly hadn't expected this much stock to still be here, untouched.
In apocalyptic times, warehouses like this are usually ransacked by looters who hear whispers and clean them out.
Cynical and pessimistic as she was, she must have assumed it was empty by the time it was built.
That's why she was grilling Mgu upon finding it surprisingly full.
"Hey? Mgu? It's Reporter here."
"...R-Reporter?!"
Our Mgu had to endure a brutal initiation from Woo Min-hee.
"Yeah. Mgu. Didn't I tell you to take that post down...?"
Let's appreciate Mgu's survival instincts here.
"S-Sorry, I didn't recognize you!"
Mgu apologized to Woo Min-hee at an angle even steeper than The Hope's tilt.
Whether that angle softened her heart, she didn't press him further.
"Got it. Oh, and my story—if you go blabbing, you know what happens, right?"
"Yes, ma'am!"
"Good. Captain Mgu. Ha."
Woo Min-hee gave a wry smile as she gazed up at the leaning apartment.
"You, how long are you planning to live there? It looks like it's gonna collapse any second."
Woo Min-hee was indeed one of the strongest Awakeners left on the peninsula, but our Mgu was no slouch in the internet world.
A bit below me in rank, sure, but he'd climbed to rival status.
Whether that backbone extended to reality, the ever-grovelling Mgu stood tall before his own apartment, proudly declaring his conviction before The Hope could tilt further.
"No way. I can't leave. That place is me."
I'd been ready to step in if she got angry, but it wasn't necessary.
"Hmm~. I see."
Woo Min-hee just gave him a sidelong squint.
"Just worried about you. Not an order. Anyway, anything you need? Food, fuel. They say this winter's brutal."
Setting aside his somewhat pitiful face, Mgu definitely had a knack for evoking sympathy.
For her to offer help unprompted—something she rarely did, from what I knew.
Emboldened by her charity, Mgu brazenly laid it all out, face like steel.
"Heat's fine with the boiler, but we need food, clothes, daily sundries! Oh, and with more people, ammo would be great!"
I could guess why.
"Speak freely. We're both internet folks, after all."
Right.
Woo Min-hee was one of our board buddies too.
Anyway, everyone knew it was my turn next.
"And SKELTON."
Woo Min-hee turned her gaze to me.
Screeech—
Her hook-like finger scraped up and down, making a gruesome sound.
"We have a lot to talk about, don't we?"
I looked away.
"Who's SKELTON...?"
*
This was an incredibly important conversation.
The one we were about to have.
SKELTON's identity was important too, but the facts I'd uncovered were a discovery directly tied to humanity's survival in this crumbling world.
Woo Min-hee might have a sharp personality, but she separated personal grudges from business clearly.
The location was inside a small building across from the leaning The Hope.
There was a cafe on the 4th floor.
The furnishings were smashed and dust-covered, but some chairs and a table remained usable.
Recent use suggested Mgu had set them up.
In the cafe where the wall—more than a window—had been blown out, offering a clear view below, we sat across from each other with documents and a tablet on the table.
"...Hmm."
Woo Min-hee sipped hot tea while meticulously reviewing my combat logs.
Unlike Kim Byung-chul's cheap synthetic sweetener brew, this was real quince tea from Jeju.
"So, the Praetorian types tracked you by following the Necropolis signals your senior was broadcasting?"
"Yeah."
The records were solid.
Verifiable.
Plus, she'd witnessed my fight firsthand from not far away.
"And this Dead Man Walking guy foresaw it?"
"Yeah. He told me right after, annoyingly enough. Just as we activated the device."
"I've seen reports that Necropolis signals affect Awakeners a bit, but not to this extent."
"America's huge, and it was full of Necropolises from the start—maybe that's why?"
Interpreting Dead Man Walking's words: Necropolis signals become an issue when you use high-output gear like this to pull in signals to an area they haven't reached yet.
Big ones drive monsters, but in areas already saturated—like air—small signals just enable casual comms without much effect.
Woo Min-hee felt something similar.
"Anyway, you stopped the equipment now? I don't sense that voice anymore."
"Valentine says they've locked onto the signal and are stabilizing it."
"Valentine? Who's that?"
"John_nenon's subordinate."
"John_nenon?"
Woo Min-hee let out a chuckle.
"Oh, the PaleNet guy?"
I nodded.
"He's dead."
"Yeah."
"I see."
Woo Min-hee set down her cup and stared blankly at the scene below.
Soldiers controlled the warehouse entrance, where crowds still lingered, milling about.
Expecting handouts, maybe.
Or knowing they'd get nothing elsewhere.
Probably both.
"Anyway."
Woo Min-hee put down her teacup.
Her faintly glowing, planetarily cold eyes fixed on me intently.
"Won't you finally tell me?"
The air around us froze solid.
"What you were thinking, orchestrating all this."
I didn't know why, but she suspected my motives.
I knew Woo Min-hee well.
So I wouldn't drag it out.
"What source are you basing that on?"
I needed to know too.
Why she was reacting like this.
Our views of the world differed.
We saw and heard entirely different things from entirely different positions.
There was overlap in Viva! Apocalypse!, but it was just that—overlap.
For me, the net weighed as heavy as reality, but someone like her might not see it that way.
I met her piercing gaze head-on and waited for her lips to part.
"You met Senior Na Hye-in in Jeju, right?"
I nodded.
But her intent remained unclear.
From what I knew, Na Hye-in and Woo Min-hee weren't close, but not enemies either.
Some internal conflict I didn't know about?
"What did Senior Na order you to do?"
Woo Min-hee curled her hook finger and smirked at that point.
"No, wasn't it a request? To investigate Necropolis."
Good call asking her angle first.
She was spouting stuff I had no clue about.
Classic misalignment from differing perspectives.
"True, I met Na Hye-in. But she never ordered or asked me for anything."
"Really?"
She still looked skeptical.
It only seemed to stoke the faint madness glinting in her eyes.
"Then you got orders from Jeju itself?"
Woo Min-hee pressed again.
That's when I realized her relationship with Jeju was icy.
"..."
Playing separate games, as expected.
Made sense—with her personality, better isolated with sycophants fawning over her than mingling where she hated half the people.
Pure Woo Min-hee self-centeredness.
"I think I get why you're suspicious. But Woo Min-hee, I take orders from no one."
I declared it boldly, facing her.
If her paranoia exploded and she killed me, so be it.
But her suspicion wasn't just her quirks or habits.
"Senior."
Screeech—
Woo Min-hee scraped the marble tabletop with her hook finger as she spoke.
"Honestly, you're selfish, right? Only care about yourself."
"..."
"We can talk casually now, but back then? Senior, you were something else. Sometimes I was in awe of how you could think and act so self-centeredly."
I wouldn't deny it.
I was that person.
I'd thrown countless people into the fire for my goals.
Knew they could die, but didn't stop them—left the responsibility on them.
Low team mortality wasn't an excuse.
I could've made it lower.
If I'd wanted.
My choice.
Her words continued in the silence.
"You were great at self-PR too. Lee Sang-hun, Daram—they all fumed about it."
Unfair, but if that's how they saw it, fine.
I just took more risks, reported in detail, and proactively explored the unknown.
If that's PR, so be it.
"Golden Fleece."
Woo Min-hee uttered a past badge now seemingly worthless.
"I think the Golden Fleece you got says everything about who you are."
She stared straight at me.
Like a massive serpent glaring, she continued calmly.
"I wondered if your old habits were flaring up again this time."
"They're not."
Woo Min-hee tilted her head.
For a moment, I felt lost.
How to convince this twisted junior, bundled in suspicion and narcissism?
No confidence, then a small device beeped on its own.
The communicator.
As I hesitated, Woo Min-hee gestured for me to answer.
I put it on and connected.
"Ah, SKELTON!"
Could any voice be more welcome?
Valentine.
"Busy right now? You went up with that terrifying lady...?"
"Terrifying lady?"
Woo Min-hee smiled whitely.
Sharp hearing.
I shushed him quick and heard the rest.
"No, just—Necropolis reception complete! The voices of the dead are settling in around us now!"
Woo Min-hee must've heard Valentine too.
Not intentional.
"Necropolis?"
Woo Min-hee cocked her head.
"What? So there was another agenda?"
Her suspicious nature bred many thoughts.
Valentine's brief comms surely offered her a new angle, eyes fixed on Jeju.
But the real thaw to her killing intent? Probably in our four-year overlap.
"You know John_nenon, right?"
"Yeah. Gu Ssang-hyo or something. Weird name."
"I like John_nenon."
Woo Min-hee's face twisted for the first time.
Like ugh!
I pressed on regardless, sincere.
"Always wanted to be like him."
I checked my phone.
Signal was up.
My junior still looked baffled, but now I had logic and justification to convince her.
I stood and looked down at the people below through the missing wall.
"Watch."
People checked their phones.
"Huh? What's this?"
"Signal's up!"
"What the...?"
Invisible signals—or voices—passed through the crowd.
The most curious boy raised his phone to check the net.
"Whoa?! What's this?"
What unfolded before him was the world he knew, yet newly opened.
"Necropolis? What? This? Huh?!"
True to his age, insatiable curiosity and passion drove him to crash into the unknown.
"It's all in English? Why's everything in English?"
Necropolis's language was indeed English.
Dead Man Walking localized titles, but not user languages inside.
No resources for that.
Auto-translation was a luxury from Melon Mask's Viva! Apocalypse! service.
Still, the boy sought his path in the unfamiliar world.
His stumpy, fingerless hand fumbled the cracked screen until it uncovered buttons and functions hidden in the foreign tongue.
And then.
...
"What...?"
Woo Min-hee stared at her phone with an uncharacteristic expression, then fixed her gaze on me.
"No way... this is the picture you wanted...?"
I nodded calmly, smiling at her.
"Yeah."
The world was connected again.