Gate Break (2)
KRAKOOM!
While I zigzagged in and out of classrooms, desperately trying to escape, the thing came straight at me — smashing straight through the walls.
"You son of a bitch! From now on I'm eating nothing but beef until I wipe out your entire bloodline!"
Spitting curses at the brute charging mindlessly after me, I ran for all I was worth and finally reached the school science lab. I snatched up a few flasks, mixed their contents on the fly, and hurled them at the thing.
"Chemical warfare, you cattle bastard!"
Crash!
Hisssss!
The chemicals spilled from the shattered flasks and hit the minotaur's hide with a vicious sizzle — but it didn't seem to do a damn thing. The monster bellowed and came charging at me all over again.
KRAAAASH!
"Whoa—!"
I threw myself sideways just in time, dodging its straight-line charge, and the second it slammed into the wall I bolted for the window. If I didn't get out while it had lost track of me, it would chase me to the ends of the earth. But if I slipped away now, while it couldn't see me, it wouldn't be able to follow.
That was the plan, anyway — right up until I reached the window.
"Oh, you've got to be kidding me…"
Something came striding toward the window beside the stairwell, each step heavy and deliberate.
An ogre.
A gorilla-shaped monster — also classified as A-Rank. The fact that a thing like this was casually touring the school halls told me just how massive this Gate Break really was.
"There's a song about how we can all be friends even if we look different. Buddy, how about you just keep walking?"
Ugyaaaaaaaah!
Apparently the evolutionary gap between us was a little too wide for mutual understanding.
And then the other one — the one that had just been making out with the wall like some kind of tough guy — decided it wanted to be friends too, stomping closer with thunderous footsteps. Suddenly I was stuck in the middle of a straight corridor, receiving the passionate affections of both monsters from either end.
In other words, I was trapped between them.
A desperate, life-or-death situation. I swept the area for anything that might help — and spotted a red safety vest lying discarded in the corner. Looking at it, I remembered something from the novel.
The reason they classified cow-type monsters and gorilla-type monsters separately wasn't just about appearance. Their instincts ran along similar lines too. Whether this would actually work, I had no idea. But right now, I didn't have any other options to try.
"Never thought I'd end up bullfighting in my lifetime."
I scooped up the vest, unfurled it, and waved it in front of the minotaur.
Grrrrrrngh!
It reacted instantly — snorting rough blasts of air from its massive nostrils, glaring savagely not at me, but at the red vest I was holding. It scraped its hooves against the floor, pawing and kicking. Seeing that, the less-evolved specimen on the other end apparently decided it couldn't wait any longer and started pounding its chest.
The ogre launched itself into a massive leap. At the same time, as if they'd planned it, the minotaur charged at full speed. I flung myself into the classroom beside me.
KRAAAAAAAAAASH!
An earth-shaking roar of impact rattled the entire building. A moment later the tremors faded, and a dead silence settled over everything.
"Wow… I might actually be a genius."
I was busy congratulating myself for somehow surviving two A-Rank monsters in a kid's body when—
Grrrrrrr.
With a bestial growl, the minotaur shoved its head through the classroom doorway.
"So dual-horn A-Ranks really are built different, huh?"
Cold sweat poured down my face as my delightful afternoon lesson with Professor Minotaur officially began.
There weren't many options available in a situation like this. Either go out through the window and figure something out from there, or somehow shake the thing off inside the classroom, get back into the hallway, and lose it there. The first option might improve my situation somewhat — but ditching a monster in wide-open space would be nearly impossible. The second would be far better if it worked, but the odds of shaking it off in this cramped room and making it back to the corridor were slim at best.
"Hoo…"
I forced out a breath and steeled myself. If I drove the monster outside, it might aggro onto someone else. That left only one real choice — get back into the hallway.
Move the second it moves.
I was watching its every twitch when—
"Yeon-chan, run!"
A shout rang out behind the minotaur, and my teacher swung a chair at it.
Crack!
Of course it didn't so much as flinch — but it was enough to get under its skin. Its gaze swung away from me toward the rear.
"Get out of here!"
It was way too dangerous. I yelled for her to run, but the minotaur was faster than my voice. It flicked its long tail like a whip, and the teacher took the full force of the blow and went flying.
"…!"
Before I could even process the shock, its eyes locked back onto me. Looking at that stare, I couldn't help the bitter smile that tugged at my lips.
"You bastard. You've got a thing for me, don't you?"
The way it had casually swatted her aside with its tail made one thing clear — it had no intention of ever letting me go. I was just starting to think I really might have to bail through the window when—
"Park Yeon-chan!"
A familiar voice called from the far side of the corridor. A voice that absolutely should not have been here.
"…Are you insane?! What the hell are you doing here?!"
"Park Yeon-chan!"
The first thing that hit Lee Yeon-hui's eyes was Park Yeon-chan's tattered appearance. He didn't look injured, but it hadn't been long since she'd last seen him badly hurt — and that alone was more than enough to set her emotions on fire.
He got hurt again…
Her gaze shifted naturally from Park Yeon-chan to the minotaur standing in front of him.
"You animal bastard!"
As if answering the fury boiling up inside her, a golden aura erupted from Lee Yeon-hui's body. The minotaur must have felt it too — its eyes, locked solely on Park Yeon-chan until now, snapped toward her.
Mmooooooooh!
It let out a monstrous bellow and charged straight at Lee Yeon-hui — or tried to.
Crack!
In a blink, Lee Yeon-hui appeared right in front of the minotaur and drove a fist into its skull.
KRAKOOM!
The force that came out of that small frame was nothing short of monstrous. The minotaur's massive body went flying like a scrap of paper and tumbled across the ground. True to its A-Rank status, it wasn't dead — it immediately tried to push itself back up.
But—
"And just what do you think you're getting up for?"
Lee Yeon-hui's ice-cold voice came from right in front of its face. The minotaur lifted its head—
CRAAAAACK!
—and her punch slammed into its face, punching a massive hole clean through.
Thud-thud-thud.
Her fist didn't stop at the minotaur's head. It punched a gaping hole through the wall behind it as well, and for a moment the entire building shuddered.
"Park Yeon-chan! Are you okay?!"
As if none of that mattered in the slightest, Lee Yeon-hui rushed over to him and started checking him over from every angle.
"Huh? Uh… yeah. I'm fine."
Park Yeon-chan answered with the face of a man whose soul had left his body.
"Thank god… No — more importantly! What the hell do you think you're doing?!"
"…That's my line…"
"No, it's mine — you, I—"
"Lee Yeon-hui?"
Right in the middle of what seemed like a full-blown scolding, Lee Yeon-hui's body swayed. The golden aura faded, the strength drained from her limbs all at once, and her consciousness cut out.
Lee Yeon-hui crumpled as if her soul had been yanked out of her body. I reached out to catch her — and in that same instant—
"Found you at last."
A chilling voice whispered behind her. A small Gate tore open at her back, and a grotesquely misshapen hand clawed out from within, groping for her.
"Oh, you have got to be shitting me…!"
I yanked her away before the hand could touch her. So that's why nothing had shown up yet. In the original story, the Gate Break didn't hit until around the mid-point — and what came through weren't just monsters. Intelligent life-forms. Humans from another world. I'd assumed that with the situation changed, we'd only be dealing with a mass monster outbreak.
I pulled the limp Lee Yeon-hui into my arms and backed away from the Gate. But my efforts meant nothing.
"Come here."
An invisible force seized my body all at once, dragging me forward, closing the distance whether I wanted it or not.
"You… son of a biiitch!"
I strained with everything I had, but the gap kept shrinking. The Gate itself was growing larger by the second. I was about to be grabbed by that hand and dragged off to god-knows-where when—
"That's far enough."
A familiar voice — and yet somehow strange — rang out from the classroom doorway. I turned toward it and saw Lee Yeon-ah standing there, her expression utterly serene.
"The farce ends here."
She extended a finger and traced a slow circle in the air. In answer, the expanding Gate began to shrink.
"Impossible. That thing over there is clearly—"
"Shut up."
Lee Yeon-ah cut off the voice from beyond the Gate with a voice like ice, then clenched her fist.
Crrrk-crrrk-crack!
The Gate, which had been large enough for a human arm to pass through, shrank to the size of an ant hole.
"Don't even think about coming out for a while. This stage isn't yours to take."
"Keh. All you're doing is buying time. How long do you think you can last? Ten years? Twenty?"
"I don't have a hobby of entertaining noise."
Her voice dropped to something cold and final. She clenched her fist even tighter — and that was the end of it.
Shhhhhh.
The Gate's opening vanished completely.
"Yeon-ah…?"
When I called her name, Lee Yeon-ah looked at me with an apologetic face.
"Sorry, oppa. I know you've got a lot of questions."
The ice-cold voice from moments ago was gone without a trace. What came out now was soft, drained, almost fragile. The same golden aura Lee Yeon-hui had been radiating slowly faded from her body.
"I think… the talk will have to wait."
And just like Lee Yeon-hui before her, she lost consciousness.