Reclaiming Busan (2)
Hsss… hssssss…
BOOM!
Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat!
The blade hummed—then CRUNCH!
KRA-KOOOOOOM—
There were so many goblins that dozens came pouring out of a single commercial building alone. If South Korea was in this kind of state, I could only imagine what had happened to the rest of the world. And was this just Busan—or was the entire country like this?
"Find the citizens for me. You can do that, right, Pitasha?"
"Of course I can! Recon units, over here!"
In an instant, Pitasha was implanting fresh data into the recon units, ordering them to locate human survivors. Half would search for people, while the other half would hunt down goblins and wipe them out alongside the combat units.
As we advanced on our drones, survivors began turning up all around us.
"Please… please save her! My baby!"
We rushed over to find a child already unconscious on the ground, one of her legs half-eaten away. One look told me she wouldn't last long—she'd bleed out before we could do anything else. Pitasha stared at the wound for a moment, then pressed her own fingertip against it.
Ssssssss…
"AAAAAAAAGH!"
Grrrrrgle…
The woman who appeared to be the child's mother fainted on the spot. Well, of course she did—Pitasha's index finger had split open, and a faint heat was searing the girl's severed stump shut. It looked like something out of a nightmare, but it was the only way to stop the bleeding.
"We still don't have the technology to open up bio-mechanical grafts at this level…"
"I know. Nothing for it, then. I'll just have to push myself harder."
For now, we loaded the girl and her parents onto a transport unit.
"…Thank you."
The girl's father said nothing else—only that. He cradled the unconscious mother and child in his arms, eyes closed as if in prayer, all the way onto the transport. I watched him for a moment, then summoned more transports and began evacuating those who had barely clung to life, all under the guard of dozens of combat units lining the column.
"What exactly happened here?"
I asked the man who seemed the most lucid of the group.
"…Dozens of gates just… appeared in Busan all at once. That usually means dozens of deaths, but this… this was different. It wasn't easy."
The gates that had been springing up across the entire nation had, for a time, opened only in Busan. And that fact alone had been more than enough to turn the city into ruins.
"I didn't see it myself, but they say orcs came through. Just five of them, but suddenly the goblins formed up into a horde and attacked the military first… And I think I heard that the orcs actually withstood artillery shells."
"Then the shelters…?"
"The shelters should be safe. There are Returnees in them."
"Ah, I see… So the term 'Returnee' has been standardized, then?"
"Yes. We decided to call them Returnees rather than following the American terminology. And apparently most of Busan has already been retaken—this area is just about the last of it."
"Thank you. Here, eat this first."
"Ohhh… cream bread… thank you!"
Busan had fallen in only three days. With civilians everywhere, they couldn't fire missiles or drop bombs. The soldiers had known their own families could be caught in the crossfire, so they couldn't move freely—and the officers were in exactly the same position. Worse, some of the goblins were reportedly armed with guns, which must have made things absolutely agonizing for the troops. And with gates now opening nationwide, there was no spare manpower to divert here even if they'd wanted to.
"Hit them all at once. Keep pushing forward, all the way."
Rat-at-at-at-at-at!
BOOOOOM!
Krzzt… Master! One orc down! Four orcs remaining!
"Confirmed. And on Earth, it's 'Master,' remember."
Krzzt… right, soooorry…
Word came in that another orc had been eliminated. And not long after that—
Krzzt… Two orcs eliminated. Two remaining. We've also successfully retaken the military base. One military installation left.
"Keep pushing in. Personnel losses are acceptable."
Acknowledged.
CRUNCH.
CRUNCH.
Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat!
Goblins came flooding out from every direction. But the civilians who had once cowered in terror at the sight of these things now wore nothing but bored expressions. And no wonder—
the goblins had been reduced to nothing more than punching bags.
Heavy Weapons Units simply ground the charging goblins into paste, while the four guns held in the four arms of the lower-tier golems swept them away wholesale.
The last two orcs have been eliminated. All that's left is cleaning up the remaining goblins.
"Good. From now on, focus on finding the civilians. We've killed well over several thousand of them by now."
Understood. Krzzt.
When her transmission ended, we arrived at our destination—the military headquarters. Waiting to greet us at this so-called shelter was, of all people, a fellow Returnee.
"So you're the Mechanic. A pleasure to meet you. Incredible… truly incredible. Commanding an army this size. Defense must be nothing for someone like you…"
"Thank you."
"Ah… God, that sounds pathetic. Sorry. Haha… I really didn't mean it to come out like that."
If I'd barely scraped my way back from the trials alive and then come face-to-face with a gap this vast, I'd have felt exactly the same. I just nodded and headed inside. In the truest sense of the word, I had led tens of thousands of mechanical soldiers and rescued thousands of people first.
"Give it everything you've got from here on. You'll operate in teams of two transport units and thirty combat units. Move out."
Confirmed… haaaah… You PROMISED you'd buy me honey-glazed sweet-and-spicy chickeeeeen! All work, no chicken!
"Haha, I'll buy it soon. Just hang in there a little longer, okay?"
"Heheh… W-wait, that's not it… I'm doing this because I want to serve you, Master!"
"Sure, sure."
At long last, the Machine Legion began spreading out across every corner of Busan. We advanced, slaughtering every goblin in sight—and a mere five hours after my arrival, Busan was liberated.
And everywhere I looked, citizens stood in stunned, disbelieving silence.
"First, let me thank you. Director Lee Jin-seok will be arriving by helicopter shortly. You'll be traveling with him to Daegu."
"If I leave, what happens to this place?"
"Ah… well. We lost a lot of soldiers this time, so we'll probably need to request reinforcements to rebuild our combat strength."
"Then I'll leave a thousand Raptors behind. They'll naturally be gone twenty days from now, when I return from where I'm going."
"Oh…! Then… thank you. Truly, thank you!"
"Of course. I'm technically a special forces operative right now, after all. For the people."
"…Really… *sniff*… thank you so much…"
Watching an officer old enough to be my father shed tears, after everything he must have been through over those three days, made it clear just how hard this had been for them all.
Leaving the awkward atmosphere behind, Director Lee Jin-seok popped down out of the sky. He hadn't been sleeping properly, by the look of him—his dark circles were practically painted on. But his face was genuinely bright as he came over and shook my hand.
"Welcome! And you liberated Busan on top of it! You've done something tremendous!"
With that, he guided me toward the helicopter.
"We'll be presenting your commendation in two days. Korea needs heroes like you right now! Come on, let's go—I'll personally escort you to Daegu."
With those words, the helicopter lifted off, and we reached Daegu in no time at all. When I got home, I embraced my mother, who greeted me in tears, then stopped by a café with Director Lee for a private conversation.
"First, North Korea is actually growing rapidly—with China's help. As for the North Korean people… honestly, most of them are dead. The country is now packed with Chinese citizens."
"Hmm… so it's finally come to that."
"I'm afraid so. But the damage isn't limited to South Korea—every nation is suffering enormously. China especially… they're drafting policies designed to let only high-ranking officials survive."
"And the United States?"
"America's holding up reasonably well, but the landmass is simply too vast. Right now, the country handling it best is Japan."
"I see. I can believe that, actually… Oh, right. Let me show you this first."
We left the café and stepped out onto the enormous athletic field, empty now—nobody exercised outside anymore. Run into a goblin in a wide-open space like this and you were as good as dead, so the streets had gone deserted.
"I'll show you here. Now—do you know what this is?"
"Huh…? No, I can't say I do."
Fwoosh.
"It's an artifact called a Flame Sword. Runs about 170 coins apiece."
"Ohhh… then all the swords over there—!"
"That's right. And I can mass-produce them."
"That's… incredible! But if these were distributed recklessly inside the country, it would be a disaster."
"No need to worry. Using my own special technique, I've made them impossible to activate here on Earth."
"Ah… well, that's a bit of a shame, actually."
"They're simply too dangerous to use on Earth. Maybe once there are more Returnees, but right now the enemies here are almost nothing but goblins—suppressing them with guns is the right call."
"That's certainly a fair point. Thank you, truly."
"Don't mention it. I'll be taking payment for all of it after delivery, of course?"
"Hahahaha! You don't seriously think the current government would fail to pay properly for artifacts, do you? And now, please take a look at this."
The data he showed me displayed the profiles of everyone currently being summoned. Ages sixteen to thirty, no exceptions.
"Only people in this range are being summoned. Once they've all been summoned, who knows… Oh, and the current summoned count is about to break ten thousand."
I had brought back roughly tens of thousands of artifacts—and that was tens of thousands per type. If we distributed spears, swords, and daggers at one or two per person, there would be enough for every single Returnee.
"If we ensure they don't fall into the wrong hands… we can keep this sustainable for another decade or so. The current president is a genuinely capable one, you see. Under emergency martial law, he can push legislation through immediately."
"That really is a relief."
There was no denying it—the current administration knew how to get things done. And just like that, the artifact contract was settled. Roughly one million won per unit. That was only the first contract; the second round would bring in far more.
One week later, the balance sitting in my bank account was…
"…Insane."
Tens of billions of won.
Overnight, I had become a rich man.