The Neck-Snapping Statue
After dealing with the swordsman’s corpse on the day I roamed the otherworld, I checked the newly updated section on the hologram.
Neck-Snapping Statue (New)
Rank: C
Trait: Neck Snap
Penalty: Temporary Loss of Self
▼ Neck Snap: Snaps the neck of any breathing human within a 300m radius of the user.
▼ Enhancement Conditions (New)
1. Kill with Neck Snap. (Complete)
2. Experience Temporary Loss of Self. (Complete)
3. Instill fear in the target. (Complete)
4. Kill with Neck Snap 1/5
Caution
1. This trait applies only to humans.
2. Cannot be canceled after activation.
3. Temporary Loss of Self lasts for 5 minutes.
4. Once all enhancement conditions are met, Neck-Snapping Statue will evolve.
The hologram informed me that killing people with this ability would make it stronger. Even after committing murder, my heart remained cold. I looked down at my hands. Would I ever have to snap someone’s neck with these hands again? Murder was a rather convenient solution. The dead didn’t bare their teeth or make a racket. Still, what bothered me was Naram noona. Contact with the swordsman had only ended up angering her.
After explaining everything to noona, I wrote five full pages of reflection on my reckless actions—cutting communications so suddenly, injuring myself, and all the other foolish things I’d done—before she finally forgave me.
“Hmph.”
One fortunate thing was that Naram noona only had audio and the entrance surveillance camera to observe the outside, so she didn’t know the details of the fight. The swordsman’s corpse looked brutal even to me. A rotting body with a snapped neck wasn’t exactly a pleasant sight. Of course, my own corpse was an even bigger problem than his. I’ll… skip the detailed description of that.
“I’ve updated the permissions to Kang Naram… Battery’s fine, signal reception’s good too! And I like how cute it is. Starting today, I’m going to seriously explore the outside!”
Anyway, Naram noona’s drone was finally working properly. I felt like giving myself a gold star for cleaning up all the corpses of the researchers and everyone else inside the institute. There was no chance the sparrow-drone camera would capture any bodies. I had protected Naram noona’s eyes once again. Nothing in this world could be more rewarding than that.
Naram noona’s drone was going to become our eyes. Our means of transportation—a jeep and an off-road motorcycle—were parked in the special containment garage outside the institute, but without a license I couldn’t drive them. I planned to learn from Naram noona later, but for now, scouting with the drone was the most effective option. The latest-model camouflage drone, powered by a hydrogen fuel cell capable of 187 hours of continuous operation at a top speed of 70 km/h, was nearly invisible even to the naked eye.
“So what exactly was that man, anyway?”
I finished my shooting practice and sat with my back against the grotesque door. As usual, the head spoke up.
“Who knows. From what you described, it had to be a Hwanjong, but you insisted it wasn’t.”
“It didn’t feel like a Hwanjong. It didn’t even feel human.”
“Maybe some new mutant entity with abilities similar to a Hwanjong appeared……”
“Earth’s done for.”
“Watch your words. It’s not Earth that’s done for—it’s humanity.”
“Fair.”
Hwanjong were the new predators that had appeared. Countless predators had ruled this blue planet since its birth, and the baton had eventually passed to humanity. Many believed no species would ever surpass us, neither in the past nor the future. That belief shattered for me the moment those unidentified monsters appeared.
Supernatural disasters that violated the laws of physics. Beings that defied common sense. Humans had arrogantly believed they could contain them in special facilities like the Supernatural Research Institute through proper procedures. I had seen the result of that arrogance—with my own eyes, through the deaths of those who once despised me as a monster.
Now that the contained Hwanjong had been released, Earth was in chaos no matter how you looked at it. That was my conclusion.
“Eeeeh……”
Naram noona’s dazed voice. Had she seen something ridiculous through the drone?
“What the heck is that? A colosseum? Pointed arches? Stained glass? There’s even some weird temple. There’s no way buildings like that exist in Paju……”
“What’s going on?”
“I found a place where people are living. But our institute was in Paju, South Korea, right? Yet every building I’m seeing looks like something straight out of medieval Europe……”
Noona sent me photos. They were scenes captured by the drone camera. Beyond the mountains visible from the institute lay a city nestled beside a large river. Just as she said, the city had a distinctly medieval appearance. There were no modern buildings made of concrete or cement. Structures and roads built from white stone carried an old-world nostalgia.
“Hmm.”
No way. It couldn’t be. This was the curse of subculture. The only reason I was thinking of the most cliché isekai reincarnation trope right now was because I’d been watching Japanese anime with Naram noona whenever we had free time.
“Suho-ya.”
“Yes.”
“It’s because I’m such a hardcore otaku that I just had that thought, right?”
Naram noona seemed to be thinking the same thing. Strangely, her voice sounded excited.
“Aaah, you don’t get it……”
“Noona?”
“This is a camouflage drone powered by a hydrogen fuel cell…… fihihi.”
Naram noona began to burn with excitement. She started fantasizing about lecturing the technologically inferior people of this otherworld on the law of conservation of energy and showing off……
“In reality I’m just a low-level researcher, but in another world I’d be Einstein……?”
“Noona……”
“I’ve become a plagiarizing scientist in another world…… A medieval fantasy scientist…… A researcher in the Middle Ages…… That crazy medieval woman is me!!”
“Calm down……”
Suppressing Naram noona’s ignition was no easy task. Her otaku passion burned like an endless supply of firewood. Once it caught fire, it never stopped.
“I have to start the Industrial Revolution in this world right now. Don’t stop me, Suho-ya. Starting today, noona’s going to become a great historical figure! I’m going to have a statue of myself erected in that city!!”
The hour-long ignition phenomenon was finally extinguished by my secret ultimate technique: the collection of Naram noona’s sleeping photos. Apparently, seeing herself drooling all over the desk had been quite shocking. After that, she went completely silent. I hoped she didn’t think I was a pervert. All of this had been for the greater good……
“Delete the photos……”
Naram noona’s voice crawled with embarrassment. I had no choice but to erase my treasures from the gallery. Not that it mattered—I had backups in another folder anyway.
We came up with three hypotheses. The first was that we were experiencing a near-realistic illusion created by the Wormhole. The second was that we had gone insane from some unknown event and were hallucinating. The last was the isekai theory. Naram noona strongly supported the final hypothesis. How could someone who never even finished school argue against the logic of a researcher who had completed her master’s degree in record time? I simply nodded.
The moment that would prove Naram noona’s hypothesis true arrived relatively quickly. A human shadow was captured on the outer surveillance camera. All security systems except the main gate had gone dead, but thanks to Naram noona’s engineering knowledge combined with my handiwork, we somehow managed to restore the surveillance cameras. Permissions had also been granted. Now, accessing the cameras via Veritas was no longer Naram noona’s exclusive privilege.
I contacted noona.
“It’s an intruder.”
“Yeah, I’m watching.”
“What should we do?”
“My opinion hasn’t changed. I still think the best move is to pretend we don’t know anything until we have a complete grasp of the situation……”
Noona seemed to have read my true thoughts.
“You disagree, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
Time was limited. Sometimes you had to take risks to get what you wanted. Following Naram noona’s suggestion and carefully assessing the situation with the drone before moving wasn’t wrong in itself. But it wasn’t the best option either.
After the anomaly occurred, all the Class 4 personnel had disappeared. Director Jeong Yongjin and Eighteen had vanished, and every contained Hwanjong had escaped. I had even encountered that strange man with incomprehensible power. It was an endless chain of inexplicable events. And right now, the most important thing was that Naram noona was trapped inside the unknown Hwanjong’s camouflage. Even if there was no immediate problem, you never knew what could happen. It was better to solve problems while you still could. Otherwise, uncontrollable variables might come crashing down on us in the future.
“Got it.”
Naram noona sighed. She didn’t seem thrilled, but she understood. Once I dealt with the intruder, I’d have to reward her with a space battleship launch.
“Then.”
I’m coming to meet you now.