The Market
After being forcibly thrown back into the past, Gong Won-goo had set himself a handful of goals.
One was to survive.
Another was to grow strong, and fast.
Yet another was to recruit promising talent.
And the last one was to hunt down the traitors who had sold off the Earth.
The group that would one day come to be known as Neo-Mason.
Even in the far future, the early activities of Neo-Mason remained shrouded in mystery. Who had started it, and when it had first begun—none of it was ever made clear.
The only thing that was certain was that Neo-Mason had played its part in turning humanity into food.
And so, to Won-goo—a Resistance man then, and a Resistance man still—they were a breed he could never forgive.
Unforgivable or not, though, in all the time since the apocalypse had begun he had yet to uncover any concrete evidence against them. All he could do was cast a suspicious eye on cult outfits like Cheonmok and 3B.
It hadn't amounted to much.
Then Yeom-gwi had come out with something completely unexpected.
Won-goo already knew the answer to her question.
Why had the world ended?
The answer was that the world hadn't ended. Not yet.
That was the truth as Won-goo knew it.
The apocalypse humanity was enduring now was the situation just before the fall—a suspended sentence, in effect. A reprieve. A chance handed down from above, and if that chance was squandered, the Earth would simply end.
And it was Neo-Mason who had driven that ending to its flawless completion.
Won-goo had spent years hunting them, and at last he'd found a thread to pull.
His hand clenched of its own accord.
"So what serious talk did you get an earful of?"
Sanghae asked as he set down a jug of makgeolli.
"No idea. Weird stuff. Say, do you know much about that old hag Yeom-gwi?"
"Course I do. Who doesn't? But don't you already know all this?"
"Never hurts to hear it again. Go on, run through it."
"Strongest psychic in the area. Telekinesis, and with that kind of gift two things matter. First is the range the power can reach."
"That matters, yeah. They say Yeom-gwi can control things within one meter."
"Right. And second, the big one—intensity. How much energy she can throw around inside that range. Word is Yeom-gwi could strangle an enhanced-type to death. You believe that?"
Enhanced-types were survivors who'd built themselves up by reinforcing their bodies, which actually gave them a decent matchup against telekinetics.
Those who'd grown along recovery or defense lines had a real chance of resisting telekinesis outright.
That said, they weren't a true counter to it either—at best, they were harder to kill.
"That everything?"
"What else do you want?"
"Gangs she keeps around. Contracts, a crew, anything like that?"
"Don't think so. Yeom-gwi's a true solo operator. She hires a pathfinder now and then when she's working a case, that's about it. Honestly I haven't done much business with her myself—she's not even Sabbath-based. What in the world did you hear that's got you looking this grim? You just wrapped up a clean job. What's left now?"
"The job's not finished."
"There's more?"
"Kane."
"Didn't you hand him over and take your payment?"
"Took it, sure. But you've got to smooth things over."
"Smooth things over? You did the job right."
"I turned those beastmen into charcoal, didn't I?"
At that, Sanghae let out a gravelly laugh. Charcoal-blackened beastmen were not a common sight.
"That was pretty harsh, even for you."
"Turns out during the examination their heads were in seriously bad shape."
"The only one whose head's diseased is you, Director Gong."
"Why are you talking about yourself like that?"
"There you go again, prickly as ever."
"Still, I dug up plenty."
"About Cheonmok?"
"Yeah. For better or worse, it looks like Cheonmok didn't swallow the Black Shelter."
"Oh... well, that's good news for me too."
"Nothing's certain yet. I'm going to dig deeper."
"Still, if you're willing to bring it up, the odds must be decent."
"They are. If Cheonmok had eaten the Black Shelter, Seok-bong would never have dropped that hint. Which reminds me—I should go see him too."
"Do you really need to pamper him? It's not like you signed anything."
"Relationships break down over the small stuff, don't you think? It starts crumbling from the tiniest disappointment. I'm known around here as a cheapskate, sure, but I've never once shorted a man his cut. I've never seen a guy who skims his people's share last long in this business."
"You really are meticulous. And who calls you a cheapskate anyway? Nobody in this line of work sees you that way."
"You. You're the one who sees me that way."
"I do not. You're not a cheapskate, you're just... thrifty—"
Sanghae stopped himself mid-sentence. Won-goo had placed a few gold coins on the table.
"These for Kim Seok-bong?"
"A bonus."
"You already collected the contract fee, didn't you? Gave you a hell of a discount too."
"Which is why I'm giving this. So—what were you about to say? Don't tell me you were about to call me a mooch."
"Of course not. I was going to ask if you like lamb ribs."
"Love them. Get the young lamb, none of that tough old stuff. By the way, didn't the Shelter Market skip this month?"
"There's an extra one this month."
With every piece of infrastructure destroyed, sourcing food was no easy matter. You either lived off canned goods produced before the apocalypse, or you relied on the market that opened periodically at the Shelter.
There, goods produced on the old Earth were put on display. In the early days the selection had been thin, but the range of goods kept growing.
The market operated under a single rule: only businesses registered with the shelter could use it.
Which meant ordinary survivors couldn't so much as set foot inside.
That was also why Sanghae was able to put out a different spread of food every single time.
"Good. Stock up on the good stuff."
"And Seok-bong? You'll meet him yourself?"
"I'll handle that. If I drag him along every time, it'll start looking plenty strange from the outside."
"What's wrong with a broker calling in a pathfinder?"
"Because that broker's way too famous in this business, and that pathfinder's way too small-time. That's why."
"Thorough as always."
"Seok-bong's already given people plenty to be suspicious about with everything that's happened, so I need to warn him. Watch your mouth too."
"I always do. Besides, I've signed a contract with you—and that contract's still in effect."
"Good enough."
Won-goo got up to go see the Shelter Master, Kane.
"Won-goo, sir. I told you dead or alive, but isn't this a bit much? You bring me back a pile of ashes—what am I supposed to do with that?"
As expected, Shelter Master Kane was grumbling up a storm.
"Named-types are like that. They can't control their strength. And why didn't you brief me properly, Shelter Master?"
"I'm sorry—what?"
"Those other beastmen were stronger than the ones serving as caretakers, you know. Even with all those Named-types swarming the place, we bled for it. I thought compensation payouts were coming out of my hide. It was genuinely dangerous."
"Was, was it now?"
"Feed me intel that thin and accidents are bound to happen. This time the Named-types were numerous enough to handle it, but it was close. If someone had actually died over bad information, the complaints would've come flooding in. You know how it is—nobody settles complaints with a few kind words these days. They come at you with a knife. And when a knife comes out, whose belly gets opened first? Mine, obviously."
"..."
"And what exactly would I be angry about? Where's the breach of contract? Look for yourself—not a single document's been doctored. Everyone who took part in this operation was contracted properly, and payment's been settled clean through. You'll notice my own people's fees weren't even included. Where was all this coldness back when I was begging you for one chance? And now you come at me with this sulking attitude?"
"It's not sulking. It's that your little mess has become harder for me to explain away."
"But making one's still no problem, is it? I brought him right in. Discipline's been firmly enforced. Shelter Master, I'd say we've got a relationship worth keeping going—so let's do this cleanly. I won't touch anything that puts you in a real bind. I won't breathe a word about certain practices that have become shelter custom either. So be generous with me."
"Hah... fine, have it your way. What do you want, Won-goo, sir?"
"Little drops of rain soak a whole coat, they say. So let's start with this entrance fee I pay every single time I come through the shelter gates."
"You want an entry pass?"
Survivors paid an admission fee to use the shelter on a 24-hour basis. There were other ways to make use of a shelter, and one of them was the entry pass.
"No. Register us as a partner business."
"Won-goo's Services, a partner business?"
"Yes. Shelter Master, how much have shelter visitors dropped these past few days?"
"...?"
"Barely at all, right? One service outfit tore up your plaza and visitor numbers held steady. Want to bet? I say they only go up from here."
"What exactly are you getting at?"
"I'm saying the visitors actually want this. They want to see incidents actively dealt with when they happen."
"Won-goo, sir, it's not as if we enjoy just standing by and watching."
"I know. There's a limit to how much the shelter itself can intervene. Push too far and it gets noisy, then the auditors come in, and then quite a few people find themselves in very uncomfortable positions."
"Exactly."
"So let us play that role. Register us as a partner business, and when the need arises, we'll step in and direct traffic."
"You're proposing a permanent presence in the shelter?"
"Nothing like that. But without the entrance fees, we'd be around a lot more often."
"Still, I can't make you a partner business, Won-goo, sir."
"There have been partner businesses before. And you're telling me it's still impossible?"
"You're not a beastman, Won-goo, sir. It's genuinely complicated. Register you under a front, and even that could get flagged for surveillance."
"Hah..."
"In exchange, I'll issue you entry passes."
"How many can you give me?"
"Three."
"Ugh..."
"And I'll let you use the Shelter Market."
"Oh?"
Won-goo's face brightened at that.
"You know what that means, right? Barely anyone inside this shelter even gets market access. That's worth a hell of a lot more than waiving my entrance fees."
"Deal. Done."
After his meeting with Kane, Won-goo went looking for Baek Seol. The rest of the crew, taking a breather, had all gathered there.
"Cheonchu Mountain again?"
"No. I've got other business this time."
"What kind of business?"
Won-goo beckoned Baek Seol closer with a flick of his hand—there were others around besides her.
She leaned in, and he murmured a single word in her ear.
"Poke."
"...?"
"What?"
"Didn't you already hand him over to me?"
"I did. Not asking for him back—just need to borrow his ability for a moment."
"Ah."
"The training's finished, right?"
"For now, but... his ability should still be in decent shape."
"Why?"
"The training hit him a little hard."
"Hard is good, isn't it? That bastard needs his head screwed on straight."
"That would be nice and all... but he hit him so hard his mind broke."
"He turned him into an idiot?"
"Yes."
"Yikes..."
"But he'll recover. We're keeping him on medication."
"So he's hard to use right now?"
"Right. Is there something you need appraised?"
"There is. But if I have it done here at the shelter, they'll slash the price to ribbons."
"Then wait a little longer, I suppose."
"Got it. Good work, everyone."