A Threat Befitting the New Era
The news that Yu Seong had stopped a terrorist attack late last night finally reached my ears. The weapon had apparently been a grenade disguised as a revolver. I had never even known such a shaped grenade existed in my life, but it drove home the thought that there were plenty of people in this world with deranged imaginations.
“No injuries, I see. Well done. There may have been casualties among the ordinary people, even if none among the Awakened.”
“Master…”
“He’s a madman who put a bomb in his teeth because he was afraid you would heal him if he used poison. And that grenade too—he couldn’t have done something like this alone. There must be collaborators. An organization with technology that makes the old mafia look like amateurs.”
“Master, what exactly did I do wrong? Was that person willing to commit suicide and drag innocent people into it just to target me?”
Yu Seong looked utterly dejected. There were no colleagues in the room at the moment; it was just the two of us. Still, since I was the elder here, if she wanted some kind of answer…
“The day before yesterday, didn’t I tell you about stalkers? Those people have no personal relationship with me whatsoever. Why do you think that is?”
“Because Master is beautiful, of course?”
Beautiful. Come to think of it, back when I was a man I used to hate being called that, but as I grew older I had grown indifferent to it. Besides, now I was unmistakably a woman who had to hear it, so the sensation felt strangely fresh.
“The point is that human hearts are diverse. Some see love as nothing more than a tool to satisfy lust, others as mere possessiveness, and still others as an emotional trash bin. When you perform good deeds, there are those who feel gratitude, those who admire you, those who call it hypocrisy and despise you, and those who try to drag you down to their own level. You can’t divide the world strictly into black and white, yet there are people who clearly remain in one or the other. And most of them are shades of gray leaning heavily toward black.”
Negative human emotions are sticky. Ever since I was born with this face, not everything had been pleasant. Desires that refused to communicate were genuinely repulsive to the recipient, and it was precisely because of that I had abandoned any illusions about the entertainment industry long ago.
“Then what should I do?”
“Keep people you trust and love close by, or build a strong pillar in your heart. After all, the highest one is watching over you.”
Yu Seong lifted her head and gazed into the air—no, toward the sky where Jogwangshin might be.
“Now that you mention it, I did hear a voice.”
“A voice?”
A voice. It sounded as if there had been another person present at the scene.
“He warned me that the grenade was a trap. This… it’s ‘that,’ isn’t it?”
“…You are a Divine Maiden, so calling it ‘that’ feels a little disrespectful, don’t you think?”
No matter what, treating the voice of a god like some ghost seemed slightly inappropriate. Especially since it was clearly watching us.
-Click. Creeeeak.
At that moment, the black messenger pigeon—Pigeon 4—opened the door and entered. Society had gone to hell, making tracking difficult, but I had hoped we would catch at least something.
“We’ve secured the collaborator. We’re about to begin the interrogation. Would you like to observe?”
I had thought even catching a minnow would be good, but it seemed we had reeled in a flatfish. Yet despite this stroke of luck, Yu Seong wore a slightly worried expression.
“Will there be… torture involved?”
“There are plenty of ways to loosen his tongue without going that far. Especially now, the options have increased considerably.”
Torture. We weren’t desperate enough to resort to that yet. We were simply furious, in a situation where even the slightest prod would set off a bomb with no fuse.
We followed Pigeon 4 and soon arrived at an interrogation room that looked like something out of a movie. Inside sat a man in his late thirties, slightly built with dark skin and a sinister aura like something lurking beneath water. He was handcuffed to the chair.
“He’s a civilian? Has he spoken yet?”
“No. However, there’s a subtle Chinese accent in his speech, which suggests he’s likely a Joseonjok criminal. In the worst case, he may not even be a domestic resident but came from abroad. We’re running his face through the database now, but the volume is so enormous it will take some time to get a match.”
“Leave it to me. I can’t make any promises, but I can at least make him talk.”
“What method do you have in mind? So far all we’ve done is sit him here and leave him alone.”
“Well…”
When I explained my plan to Pigeon 4, he let out a small gasp of admiration.
“As long as it doesn’t cause permanent disability or render communication impossible, it should be fine. What about the rest of you?”
“Pass up the chance to see it with my own eyes? I’m in favor.”
“Me too. If it’s only meant to scare him, there’s nothing more effective.”
“Anyone want to bet on whether the first attempt succeeds or fails?”
The other agents seemed to agree as well. Even Yu Seong consented once she understood it was only to frighten him.
I opened the door and stepped into the interrogation room. The air, neither dry nor humid but lukewarm, greeted me. If I stayed here too long it would grow as cold as a refrigerator, but I had no intention of lingering.
“Hah.”
The man laughed when he saw me. It wasn’t genuine amusement—more like a sneer at something ridiculous. It didn’t particularly bother me. Things were about to get interesting.
-Shiiing.
I drew the first-grade moonstone blade from its sheath. Its material was closer to black jade than metal, with a subtle light sleeping within. It resembled a ceremonial sword more than a practical weapon, and its beauty was undeniable. The moment it emerged, the man tensed visibly.
“Oh, it’s nothing special. I’m just… going to leave this sword here.”
I smiled faintly and set the blade down on the interrogation desk with a casual thunk.
-THUD!
The original two-meter greatsword’s immense weight made the desk scream in protest, barely holding together. The man’s eyes widened in shock at the realization that I carried such a thing.
“Ah, I should remove the handcuffs first.”
I didn’t have the key, so I simply channeled energy into my hand, shattered the cuffs, and stepped back.
“Have fun.”
I smiled at the man and closed the door. Just in case he tried to break it by force, I quietly affixed a talisman to it before returning to my position.
“Sigh. By my common sense, I’m wondering if it’s really correct to remove a suspicious man’s handcuffs and leave a blade right in front of him?”
One of the agents voiced a reasonable objection. Indeed, the situation was abnormal, which was precisely why the man himself sat frozen, unable to process it. But that didn’t last long.
-Creeeak.
“Huh? Did the sword just make a sound…?”
-SCREEEEEEECH!
“UAAAAAAGH!”
It began with a grotesque sound like nails scraping across glass from the moonstone blade. The noise gradually intensified. Soon it reached the level of a speaker turned to maximum volume pressed against the ear, accompanied by vibrations so violent it seemed like an entire herd of horses was stampeding through the room. The desk shattered, its weight driving into the floor and creating a small earthquake.
“UAAAAAAGH! Let me out!”
The man screamed and tried to open the door, but not only was it locked—I had reinforced it with sorcery. An ordinary person could never open it. Then, at some point, the phenomenon stopped with an abrupt snap.
The sudden cessation left the man frozen in overwhelming unease. Even someone dull-witted would realize it. Something was behind him now.
Cold sweat poured from the man’s pores like mad. Even from outside the room, we could see his breathing and pulse racing wildly. He tried to turn around. In horror stories, that act is practically taboo, yet in the end the rule held true—he looked.
“Eh?”
But what met the man’s eyes was only the shattered desk and the moonstone blade. There was no noise, no earthquake. Apart from the broken furniture, it was a perfectly peaceful scene.
“…You! You bastards! Playing this kind of prank on me?! Open the door! I’ll rip your fucking necks off right now…!”
Only then did the man realize that bone-masked spear ghosts were densely staring at him from every direction his eyes hadn’t reached. The ceiling, the walls, the floor, the shadows—even a tiny one poking its head out from inside his clothes.
“Oh, he just wet himself.”
An agent pointed at the man. The color of his pants was darkening around the crotch. Soon his legs gave out and he collapsed with a thud. As if sensing his own death, he no longer even screamed; he simply stared back at the spear ghosts’ gazes. No—he had fainted.
“Hmm. Was he always afraid of ghosts? Anyway, this should be sufficient.”
I retrieved the talisman, opened the door, and used it as a catalyst to create a gentle circulating breeze around myself. Since I had no peculiar fondness for the smell of urine, I recovered the moonstone blade in that state and sheathed it.
“Honestly, if I purify it the blade loses its edge, but if I release control this kind of mess happens.”
If someone who hadn’t reached a level similar to mine tried to wield this thing, that sticky presence would surely cling to any opening. And at the crossroads between life and death, such a sticky shackle would undoubtedly be a shortcut straight to the grave.
-SPLASH!
“Puaah!”
Pigeon 4 threw a bucket of water into the man’s face. He shot upright as if resurrected from the dead and shouted.
“The Black Society! The Black Society commissioned it!”
This incident had just escalated from a simple act of terror into something far more complicated.