A Night in Seoul (2)
An unfamiliar ceiling.
Angular structures locked together at right angles. A primitive slab of raw, exposed concrete — and cars packed in so tight they barely left room to breathe.
The Gangbyeon Station Basement Parking Lot.
The exit I'd been worried about was completely jammed with cars crumpled like tin cans. From the looks of it, everyone had tried to get out first and all hell had broken loose.
When I glanced down, I found a familiar-looking coat draped over me. The kid must have put it on.
At least I'm not naked. Small mercies...
If it were up to me, I would have stayed right there on the floor. Five more minutes. Just five. But come on — like I had that luxury. I had a mountain of things to do.
I groaned and forced myself upright.
"Nnngh— ghh."
"Sis? You okay?"
I was not okay. I was cold, dizzy, and above all, in pain. I doubted even some old-timer who'd already been told his number was up would feel quite this wretched. Still, I wasn't about to start whining in front of a kid who'd just lost his father.
"Yeah. I'm fine. How long has it been?"
"Uh... about thirty minutes."
The kid checked his phone as he answered. I looked into those wide, alert eyes of his. I couldn't figure out how he was this calm. He looked like he'd barely started middle school — and this kid had just watched his father get his head torn off and eaten. How was he this composed?
Hmm...
It was strange no matter how I looked at it, but I decided to think about it later. That wasn't what mattered right now.
I shook my head once and surveyed the surroundings.
Dozens of people huddled together in the underground parking lot. Someone was hunched over, emptying their stomach onto the concrete. Someone else clutched their phone with tears streaming down their face. And then there were the ones jabbing fingers at each other, voices climbing.
"I'm telling you, we have to leave now! The monsters keep falling! If we're going to run, it has to be now!"
"Who's stopping you?! If you want to leave, go by yourself! Why are you trying to drag everyone else out with you?!"
The kid kept glancing nervously toward the people arguing. Then, with a vacant look on his face, he muttered, "They're going to attract monsters like that..."
The others seemed to share the thought — the murmuring quieted by a notch.
My already spinning head throbbed. The vehicle exit was blocked by cars, but I still hadn't checked the other entrances. We'd be stuck here for a few hours at minimum — the least we could do was make sure the place was secure. And yet here they were. Plenty of time to brawl over whether to go outside, apparently. No time at all to figure out how to actually stay alive.
I pressed my fingers to my temple. I was going to have to get this situation under control one way or another. I didn't particularly want to step up, but now was the time.
I tapped the kid on the shoulder. Come to think of it, I didn't even know his name.
"Hey, kid. Wait — student? Anyway. What's your name?"
"Jeon Hyojun."
"Alright, Hyojun. I'm going to go break up that fight. Think you can give me a hand?"
"Uh... I don't think you'll need to."
Jeon Hyojun pointed toward the people who'd been arguing. A tanned, solidly built man was already breaking up the fight.
"Everyone, please remain calm. Fighting among ourselves won't solve a single thing. And going outside right now is not an option."
"There are monsters out there. They stopped for a moment when that noise went off earlier, but that doesn't mean they'll stay still forever."
He held up an identification card.
"Ah — and this is who I am."
"Warrant Officer Kwon Wooseok? You're a soldier?"
"Yes. Nothing particularly impressive, but I've done a few overseas deployments, and I've been to the Philippines on medical volunteer work."
Jeon Hyojun let out an impressed little "Whoa."
"But sis. What do overseas deployments and medical volunteering have to do with anything right now?"
"Beats me. But it sounds more impressive than just saying he's a soldier, doesn't it?"
"Ah. Got it."
Jeon Hyojun nodded.
By then, Kwon Wooseok had already mediated the fight and was laying out next steps.
"First of all, as you all know, we still have cell service. It cuts in and out, but it works for now. Looking at the state of things, it won't last much longer."
"If you have family, make your calls and send your messages now. I'll come back with a situation report once I've assessed things."
With that, he walked back and sat down with what appeared to be his family.
"That guy's pretty cool."
"Yeah, he is."
"Don't you have anyone to call, sis?"
"I don't keep things like family."
"Ah. Got it."
That said — that soldier, Kwon Wooseok.
That man was an Awakened.
I watched Kwon Wooseok for a while.
I didn't know exactly what grade of Awakened he was. Compared to me, his power was a candle flame — hard to even gauge. But if I had to ballpark it, he could probably handle two or three of the smaller monsters. More than enough to get himself out of Seoul.
But Kwon Wooseok had a family. Two children and a wife. The son looked fully grown, but the daughter was a preschooler by any measure. His wife, who looked relatively young, kept coughing into her hand.
Either way, not a group that could move long distances easily.
It was a rather cold-blooded thought, but he couldn't run from here. Not with his family holding him in place. For Kwon Wooseok, the strength of a group wasn't optional. It was essential.
Having thought that far, I stood up.
"Sis?"
"I'll be right back."
"To that guy?"
"Yeah."
Jeon Hyojun tilted his head.
"Why?"
"I think that man might be an Awakened."
I swallowed the rest. Like you. This kid was a bomb right now. If he found out he was Awakened, there was no telling what he'd do.
"I'll be quick. Wait here."
"I'm coming with you."
"Why."
"You can barely walk on your own, sis. You gonna crawl over there?"
...This little brat.
I looked at Jeon Hyojun for a moment, then let out a long, heavy sigh.
"Fine. Let's go."
Kwon Wooseok was sitting apart from his family. I spoke to him as he stared at his phone, sighing again and again.
"Warrant Officer Kwon Wooseok?"
"Yes?"
"Do you have a moment? I need to talk to you."
"Ah, yes. Of course. Please, sit."
I sat down right there. Jeon Hyojun settled in beside me as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
"You go over there. The adults need to talk."
"Sis, you're barely older than—"
"Ah-ah. Where does a little kid think he's going."
Jeon Hyojun grumbled as he walked over toward Kwon Wooseok's family. Kwon Wooseok watched him go, the corner of his mouth ticking up.
"Your little brother?"
"No. I brought him in from outside earlier."
His expression hardened.
"You came from outside?"
"Yes."
"Could you tell me exactly what the situation is out there?"
I closed my mouth for a moment. We were a little apart from the others, but not that far. A normal conversation would carry. I couldn't tell him everything I'd seen.
"If we go outside, we'll die."
"I'm sorry, but I'll need you to be more specific. I did catch a glimpse of the outside on the way down from Gangbyeon Station, but it was just a passing look. I don't have an accurate picture."
I studied Kwon Wooseok's wrinkled, leather-like skin. He had deployment experience. He'd done medical volunteer work. A situation like this would be a first for him too, but he'd be no stranger to horrific sights. And most importantly, he was the kind of person who prioritized assessing the situation over anything else after hearing what I had to say.
He wouldn't panic. There was no reason to hide information about the monsters.
I lowered my voice and whispered to him.
"There are a lot of monsters. Specifically, there are at least several hundred in this area alone."
"...Several hundred."
Kwon Wooseok clicked his tongue.
"I figured there were a few dozen at most. I was being far too optimistic."
"It's fine. A few dozen or a few hundred — same difference."
Dozens or hundreds, it wasn't a number we could punch through easily as we were now.
"Want me to tell you how big they are, too?"
"I'd be grateful if you would."
"The smallest ones are about the size of a compact car. Average is a midsize sedan. The big ones... some of them are measured in kilometers."
Kwon Wooseok trembled slightly. The fact that the word "kilometer" could be attached to a living creature seemed to have shaken even him.
"...And one of those is around here?"
"It's in the middle of the Han River, a little over a kilometer out. Somewhere between the Olympic Expressway and Cheonho Bridge, I'd guess..."
At that, the look in Kwon Wooseok's eyes changed. The eyes of a man running the numbers.
"How do you know that?"
I answered without missing a beat.
"Because I saw it myself."
Kwon Wooseok was silent for a few seconds. He seemed to be choosing his words — whether that was the soldier in him or just who he was, I couldn't tell. He looked me straight in the eye.
"...Are you, by any chance, an Awakened?"
I grinned and pushed up my sunglasses.
There were more pressing matters than the small stuff.
"We can't stay here long."
"Because of food and water? There's a supermarket right above us. We should be fine for a while."
"No. The air is the problem."
Underground parking lots have terrible air circulation. They're underground — that's the whole problem. Installing ventilation fans is mandatory, and those run on electricity, obviously. Power was still on, so there had to be an emergency generator somewhere, but it wouldn't last more than two days. Factor in the chance of a short circuit, and we might have even less than that.
Gas seeping in from fires outside... better not to think about it. If that had already happened, everyone here would be a corpse.
"And there's no guarantee the electrical room will stay intact. To put it in extreme terms — the moment the power cuts, this place becomes a gas chamber."
"Then where should we go?"
"How should I know?"
Kwon Wooseok stared at me like he couldn't believe what he'd just heard. What, did he think he was talking to some kind of all-knowing god?
"For now, I don't think going all the way outside is feasible. If it were just us, maybe. But moving while protecting all these people? That's not happening."
"Didn't you just say we needed to get out of here?"
"We do need to leave. It just doesn't have to be all the way outside."
I pointed a finger upward.
"First, we get the situation under control, put together a search team, and sweep Techno Mart from top to bottom. How about it?"