Real Heroes
It was exactly one hour before the appearance of the White Giant.
Kim Pung, the boy who had barely been rescued from the Erosion-class monster he had just witnessed the Bone Mask man wipe out, sat in the interrogation room of the Monster Countermeasure Information Agency, SIRD.
The official reason was “light preliminary inquiry,” but the actual atmosphere was unmistakably that of a full interrogation.
“You saved me! No, even if you just check the CCTV footage, you can see it for yourself! Why aren’t you looking at it?!”
Instead of a teacup, a thick stack of documents lay on the table.
The light fell straight from above, flooding the room in harsh white fluorescent tubes that bleached Kim Pung’s face bone-white.
The three interrogators facing him said nothing.
At first he had understood.
All civilians who had witnessed monsters went through this same process.
He was a graduate of the SHAS officer training program, and if the nation asked for cooperation, it was only natural to give it fully.
But as time passed, the atmosphere shifted in a strange way.
What had begun as simple fact-checking questions gradually began to twist.
“Is that man with the bone mask… really human?”
“Could it be that Kim Pung was controlled by that entity?”
“Should we run a brain-wave test? It might be an illusion.”
It was clever.
At the end of every sentence lurked suspicion and manipulation.
The interrogators’ tone remained calm, yet their intent was brutally obvious.
It was as if they wanted to portray the Bone Mask man not as the hero of that day, but as something negative.
Only then did Kim Pung narrow his eyes.
His hand resting on the desk slowly clenched.
*These people… have been planning to treat the Bone Mask as a monster from the very beginning…!*
But why?
The man with the bone mask was exploding across every SNS and community right now.
He was the very definition of the “superhero” who had suddenly appeared in this shitty world.
If the government allied with him, it could be the turning point for the monster war that had been in deadlock for forty years.
Even someone who hadn’t yet enlisted could predict that easily.
Then, suddenly, Kim Pung understood.
*…Could it be that the government is afraid of the Bone Mask?*
They feared change, guarded against anything they couldn’t control, and above all believed that only by preserving their own power base could they keep their bowls safe.
They were the very ones who were refusing the only chance this world might have ever received to be saved.
To brand the Bone Mask an enemy.
Kim Pung slowly lifted his head.
The interrogators mechanically read the questions printed on the paper, but he noticed a flicker of doubt in their eyes as well.
*Is this really right?*
Yet orders were orders.
In this world where military strength and control had become absolute since the monster outbreak, if the top said jump, they had to jump for any reason.
The boy who had always dreamed of heroes simply gritted his teeth at that fact.
His breath scorched his throat.
Just as he was about to shout, “Cowards!” despite everything.
*Whoop!*
“?!”
“Monster alarm? That’s impossible—monsters only appeared in Jongno-gu yesterday!”
The interrogation room was swallowed by red emergency lights and a wailing siren.
Beneath the white lamps, every pair of eyes turned toward the ceiling at once.
And what came next was even more absurd, an utterly ridiculous report.
[Catastrophe-class monster currently detected in Jongno-gu. All citizens in Seoul and nearby Gyeonggi Province are to immediately seek refuge in designated shelters. Once again, I repeat…]
*“Cat… catastrophe class?!”*
Someone murmured.
It was impossible.
Catastrophe-class monsters were the kind that made the nation tremble—creatures so rare they might appear only once every few decades.
Not even a week had passed since the Belial Bird Incident had declared a national emergency, and now another catastrophe?
The faces of the interrogators simultaneously drained of color.
Cold sweat slid down their cheeks.
A new wave of terror spread through the air: this time it might truly be the end.
The defense capability damaged by the Belial Bird Incident had not yet recovered.
This time, Korea might become the very first advanced nation in the world to be wiped out by monsters.
At that moment.
*Knock. Knock. Knock.*
A knock sounded from the door.
Without waiting for permission, it swung open.
The regular, metallic scrape of boots echoed across the floor.
Cold light spilled through the gap.
Kim Pung turned his head, and his breath stopped.
There, standing at the doorway, was the “real-life hero” he had always admired.
If the man with the bone mask was a mythical existence, then the woman now at the door was a living legend born of reality itself.
A red targeting reticle flashed in her left eye.
A smooth alloy left arm moved with quiet precision, its surface catching the light and gleaming like glass.
Where flesh met machine, the boundary was astonishingly flawless—elegant, almost artistic.
Her scarlet hair cascaded over her shoulders, and with every step the air itself seemed to shift.
Both the hard metallic resonance and the warmth of humanity reached him at once.
She was the sergeant first class known throughout the nation as Super Soldier Gang Ji-hyeong.
“Right now a catastrophe alert is flashing, so does anyone here know how to drive a tank? Damn, even the nearest military base is ten minutes away. Time’s critical.”
*“Sergeant Gang, ma’am?! Are you seriously going out there personally?!”*
“…If a super soldier appeared and I didn’t move, what exactly would I be doing? Maybe I should just sit here and drink coffee?”
Her words were rough, yet not a trace of hesitation lingered.
A woman who had lost half her body after pushing past human limits through serum injections and surviving dozens of battles.
Yet the monster who had endured at the boundary between machine and flesh was right in front of him.
Among super soldiers, she was one of the names that defined the battlefield.
But even so, she remained human.
Her power was still only an ant’s struggle against monsters, and against a catastrophe-class opponent the probability of returning alive was, of course, zero.
That was why the interrogators desperately tried to stop her.
“Sir, it’s impossible! Catastrophe class! We must issue a standby order—”
That was when Kim Pung spoke up.
Everyone looked at him.
The voice had come from Kim Pung.
“Kim Pung student?! Are you out of your mind?!”
“I’m an SHAS-affiliated student. I earned an S-grade in tank-driving class. If anyone in this room can handle it better than anyone else, it’s me.”
The words were practically a suicide declaration.
Stepping into the field of a catastrophe-class monster was, in essence, walking a one-way path from which there was no return.
She stared at him for a moment.
The mechanical hum ceased; the air grew deathly still.
“…For the record, once we arrive on site it’s every man for himself. Opponent is catastrophe-class. There’s no room to spare for protecting you.”
Kim Pung flinched for an instant, yet the next moment a smile bloomed on his face.
In his eyes burned not fear but certainty.
*Could I really become a hero like you?*
He remembered the question he had asked the man with the bone mask.
And he resolved to answer it himself.
“On the contrary… that is exactly what I hope for!”
Kim Pung’s voice rang out.
At that moment the air in the interrogation room seemed to shift direction.
No one laughed, but everyone felt it.
That boy was about to become a real hero—right now.
***
The thing before their eyes was exactly the catastrophe-class monster they had only heard about in stories.
A petite human-sized frame, the entire body painted white, with one enormous red eye blinking in the center—a grotesque appearance that might even have looked comical if it weren’t for Gang Ji-hyeong’s internal sensors.
Her super-soldier neural network screamed differently.
The combat radar directly linked to her nerve endings fluctuated wildly.
The forward-detection circuit hummed like it was overheating, and the HUD flashed crimson.
[WARNING! WARNING!]
[THREAT LEVEL: 9.8 — CLASS “CATASTROPHE” DETECTED]
[SYSTEM ADVISE: RETREAT IMMEDIATELY]
— ⚠ BIO-SENSOR OVERLOAD ⚠ —
“Huu…”
Gang Ji-hyeong exhaled slowly.
“The pressure… there’s no doubt. Catastrophe-class.”
She had worked in Korea for ten years.
This was the first time the air itself had felt so oppressively heavy.
Vibrations rose from the ground and climbed her ankles, while electromagnetic instability signals seeped beneath her skin and tickled the chips inside her body.
“Ma’am, are you worried?”
“Mission begins.”
“Yes!”
Yet the instant her order left her lips, the Super Soldier Unit “Hwarang” sprang into motion.
The drive motors of the reinforced suits let out a low *wing—*, and every soldier’s bio-sensor linked one by one to the neural network.
Across the entire communication network, the heartbeat of machines replaced that of flesh.
[NEURAL LINK: ACTIVE]
[TEAM UNIT: HWARANG]
[SYNC RATE: 91% → 96% → STABLE]
Gang Ji-hyeong scanned the HUD and issued a short command.
“Everyone, combat protocol A-3. Project Cheonmu—operation start!”
[PROTOCOL A-3: ONLINE]
[K2-Powered Exo System, Drive Initiated]
[ALL UNITS—MOVE OUT]
The concrete beneath her feet sank inward.
Compressed air exploded like thunder, and Gang Ji-hyeong and the members of Hwarang vanished simultaneously.
Each pilot’s propulsion system erupted in flames as they encircled the monster in perfect formation.
The shockwave that tore through the ground, the metallic crash of alloy boots shattering concrete.
“…!”
“Faster!”
A speed no human eye could follow.
While Kim Pung and Ha Min-ah watched the scene with bated breath, Gang Ji-hyeong’s targeting reticle had already locked onto the monster’s center.
And the real battle began right then.