The Unmasked MadSci
The syringe's crimson fluid emptied in a single push.
"Hahh..."
Baek Seoha let out a long, shaky breath.
I'm a hero...
She bit down on her lip and strained with everything she had to pull her embarrassingly spread legs back together.
Bring on whatever hardship you've got! If it's for justice, a little side effect is nothing!!
Ten seconds crawled by. Nothing happened.
What?
CLANG! CLANG!
Scissor-blade fangs snapped shut a hair's breadth from her nose.
Don't tell me the new drug failed...?
A chill raced down her spine — and then her heart slammed against her ribs, her breath tearing itself ragged.
"HAAAH!!"
Her back arched like a drawn bow. She convulsed.
MadSci's frantic voice burst from the monitor.
Mantis! Hold it! Baekho's biometric data is looking rather abnormal. This is...
Above her faintly luminous white hair, a pair of snow-white tiger ears sprang up and twitched.
Baek Seoha thrashed across the floor, rolling wildly.
"KYAAAAAAAAAAAH!"
A white tail banded with black stripes slithered out from the small of her back. Sprawled face-down, she flicked it this way and that. She flexed razor-sharp claws and raked them across the steel plating.
SKREEEEEEECH!
"Mad... Sci..."
The instant she lifted her head, a predator's eyes flashed — pupils slashed into vertical slits.
"MadSci!!"
Her hysterical scream thundered through the chamber.
BAM!
And just like that, Baek Seoha was gone.
"Hm?"
Mantis's antennae fluttered. He spun around in a panic.
CLANG!
He caught the descending boot on a foreleg. But Baek Seoha used the blade itself as a foothold, crossing her feet in a rapid one-two as though climbing a staircase, and stomped down at the speed of sound.
KRA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KA-KANG!!
Her boots blurred into dozens of afterimages. For the first time, Mantis gave ground.
"Not bad... for a greenhorn."
Steam erupted from every joint.
HSSSSSSSSSS!!
"But I am fighting for my life too!!"
Bladed forelegs and Heaven Kick boots collided dozens of times a second, the impacts smearing into a single shredded roar.
KRA-KA-KA-KANG!!
Defeat meant MadSci's wrath. Mantis blocked every kick as though his existence depended on it — because it did.
"Kh...!"
Even so, he was being driven back, inch by inch... until a clean hit finally landed on his shoulder. The boot heel punched in and the steel plating crumpled.
CLANG!
"Nngh... no... I can't! I will not lose!"
The armor over Mantis's shoulder overheated, glowing cherry-red. His slashes climbed even faster.
"I will survive this!"
KRA-KA-KA-KA-KANG!
This time it was Baek Seoha's thigh that split open.
"Nnh...!"
Mantis's eyes flared with light. Victory was his. He was sure of it.
Yes! I can win! I don't have to climb onto that hideous operating table!!
Only by earning recognition as a servant of the Super-science Dungeon could he live as a proper Main. Fail, and a fate worse than death waited — dissected for eternity, never even allowed to die.
Anything but that!!
Mantis spotted an opening and drove his blade home.
"Got you, you little—!"
The blade carved nothing but air. In that sliver of an instant, she had vanished again.
"What?"
The real problem was that even the artificial intelligence hadn't tracked her.
"Where are you?! Come out this instant! Face me in a fair fight!"
His antennae twitched — and he snapped his head back just in time.
"What?!"
Baek Seoha came crashing down from the ceiling she had just kicked off.
"If a head-on fight is what you want... then try and stop this!"
Her axe-kick carried the full weight of her fall plus gravitational acceleration. The heel of her boot split the air, burning as it came.
"Meteor Kick!!"
Mantis crossed his blades into a guard.
"Not a chance!!"
KRAAAAAANG!
Boot and blade collided.
"HRAAAAAAH!"
"UAAAAAAAAH!!"
Their battle cries tangled together — and then a sound that did not belong cut through them.
CRACK—
A fissure crawled across the blade. Mantis slowly shook his head.
"N-no! Nooooooo!!"
SHATTER!
The blade burst apart. Baek Seoha's boot punched straight through the shoulder armor.
CLANG!
SKREEEEECH!
The shockwave traveled clean through the lower chassis — and Mantis's body exploded.
BOOOOOOM!!
His upper half, split diagonally, tumbled across the floor. He watched Baek Seoha approach, her tail swaying lazily from side to side.
"Heh... that form... so you were a Main all along?"
Baek Seoha looked down at him, her gaze ice-cold.
"A Main? No. I am a hero. Unequivocally."
Mantis let out a hollow laugh.
"Heh heh heh... go ask the world what they see when they look at you. Who would ever call that a hero?"
The corner of Baek Seoha's eye twitched.
"I'm not a Main... I'm a hero. A hero."
Mantis's antennae drooped. A faint smile touched what was left of his face.
"...You said you'd save me, earlier."
"..."
"Heh... I'd rather die by a fellow Main's hand than suffer the disgrace of dying at a hero's. What do you say, my kin? Would you grant me that last courtesy...?"
In that instant, Baek Seoha's beast-eyes flashed.
She brought her boot down on Mantis's face without a shred of mercy.
WHAM!
"I!"
WHAM!
"Am not!"
CRUNCH!
"A Main!"
CRACK!
"I told you!!"
CRRRRRUNCH......
Mantis's head was completely pulverized — flattened like a frog under a truck tire.
Baek Seoha's breath came in ragged gasps. Then her eyes flew wide.
"Huh...? Wait... what did I just do?!"
She dropped to her knees and frantically scooped at the scattered fragments of brain matter.
"I-I'm so sorry! That wasn't what I meant to do! There's an incredibly talented doctor at the Association! If it's her, she can definitely..."
Her voice trailed off. Her head sank.
The brain was destroyed. Death was certain. No one knew that better than she did.
"I'm... really sorry... hhkk..."
Tears poured down her face as she raked her claws across the floor. She couldn't control her emotions. Rage had swallowed her whole, and for one terrible moment her consciousness had simply... gone.
"This is... the side effect the doctor warned me about..."
A hero had murdered a civilian. And that meant only one thing: disqualification.
"KYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!"
WHAM!
She drove her fist into the floor. Silence stretched out after it, long and heavy.
Then the playful little chibi avatar vanished from the monitor.
SSSKRRT—
Static flooded the screen — and MadSci appeared, gas mask firmly in place. He sat neatly in his chair, and yet something about him was different from usual. Off. Alien.
Slow, measured applause.
Clap. Clap. Clap. Clap.
Baek Seoha glared at the monitor, a jolt running through her.
"You... yeah, you!!"
She shot to her feet and jabbed an accusing finger at the screen.
"This is all your fault! You...!!"
"No."
MadSci cut her off without a shred of hesitation.
"The one who turned Mantis's cerebrum into hamburger was you, Baekho. You."
A split screen flickered to life, replaying the footage of Baekho mercilessly stomping Mantis's skull on an endless loop. Baek Seoha's pupils trembled. She stumbled backward, clutching her head, and screamed at the floor.
"That's not... I didn't... that's not me!!"
MadSci clenched a fist and crushed the split-screen feed out of existence.
"You're right. That wasn't you."
"...What?"
Baek Seoha's eyes went round. She lifted her head.
MadSci rose from his chair and strolled toward the camera at a leisurely pace.
"The Baekho I know was a noble hero of pure white conviction. But just now..."
He let the sentence hang. He had come so close to the lens that only his shirt and lab coat filled the frame. He hesitated for a long moment, then forced the words out as though holding something down.
"...Just one question. Who gave you that drug?"
Baek Seoha clenched her teeth and glared at the monitor.
"You really think I'd tell you?"
In that instant, MadSci seized the camera. The gas mask swallowed the entire screen.
The shouting detonated through the speakers.
"Tell me this instant! Now! Now!! Who dares play games with my precious, adorable Baekho?! KYAAAAAAH!! The only one allowed to experiment on Baekho is Me! This MadSci and no one else!!"
The deranged howl made Baek Seoha press her trembling lips shut.
He's... not sane...
A moment later, gas hissed from the filter canisters of the mask. And astonishingly, the voice that had been raving like a lunatic was suddenly dripping with laughter.
"Hiyohohohohot! But not to worry! And who am I? Throughout heaven and earth, I alone stand supreme! The Suuuuper Genius! Mad—Sci himself!"
His lab coat flared as he spun and dropped back into his chair.
"I shall perfectly Fix your error. So, No problem!"
WHIIIRRR—
The steel door directly ahead rumbled upward.
CLANG!
"Now then! Follow this path straight ahead and you will find your savior, Doctor MadSci! What are you waiting for? Come running into my arms already! Hiyohohohohot!"
MadSci bounced his shoulders and launched into a little song.
At last we meet! We meet!
We'll meet upon the operating table!
Hoit! Hoit!
Baek Seoha stared down the long corridor — then slowly turned her head. Off to the left, the hangar's steel door sat in her field of view.
"Hmph... I'm done dancing in the palm of your hand."
"Hmm...? What is that supposed to mean?"
Baek Seoha walked not toward the door ahead, but toward the hangar on the left. MadSci shot up from his chair.
"Wait! That is not the way!"
Baek Seoha grinned.
"What? Scared I found your hiding spot on the first try?"
"That isn't it! Inside the hangar, there's...!!"
He never finished the sentence.
That Wind Cleave the homeless guy used earlier... maybe I can do it too...
Baek Seoha spun her body at high speed and kicked the empty air with everything she had.
"Whirlwind Kick!!"
The air her boot struck rippled and launched outward.
WHOOOOOOSH!
The instant the blast of wind slammed into the monitor —
SHATTER!
The screen exploded.
BOOOOM!
"Incredible..."
Baek Seoha marveled at herself. She looked down at her boots with a bright, clear smile.
The Heaven Kick, a gift from the SS-Class Sinnyeo. The new drug, handed to her by the renowned physician Seo Aegyo.
"MadSci... I've inherited everyone's will. So I am never going to lose to you!"
She sprinted straight at the hangar door.
"HRAAAAAH!!"
She didn't slow down. She threw a spinning kick at full speed.
KRAAAAAANG!
The steel door caved in as though a cannon shell had hit it.
"One more!!"
She twisted at the waist, rotated, and drove her heel through.
KRAAAAAANG!!
A hole punched clean through the hangar door. Baek Seoha hopped over the wreckage and stepped into the pitch-dark interior.
"MadSci! Stop hiding and come out! I know you're in here!!"
She swept the surroundings, every sense on high alert. Astonishingly, she could see as clearly as if she were wearing night-vision goggles.
"There are side effects, sure..."
But she could feel it — her abilities had unmistakably improved.
"But where is this?"
She had been certain MadSci would be here. Instead, colossal glass cylinders, thick piping, and rows of experimental equipment stretched into the dark. She laid a hand on one of the cylinders.
"It's empty...?"
The inside was hollow — but the liquid pooled on the floor suggested something had been in there until moments ago.
SPLASH!
The sound of a puddle being disturbed. She whipped her head around.
"Eh...?"
A familiar man's voice brushed her ear.
"...Nuke Punch."
A massive fist filled her vision.
And that was where Baek Seoha's film ran out.
A hazy sensation, like drifting through the ocean floor. She forced her lead-heavy eyelids open, but a fierce glare of light kept her from seeing anything clearly.
"Kishishishit! The thoracic vertebrae are completely crushed! Looks just like a stomped soda can, doesn't it?!"
A scalpel swam in and out of focus in front of her eyes.
That voice... MadSci...
A raving mad scientist stood inches from her face, and her body would not obey a single command.
"Alpha! Initiate Reformer Protocol! Inject Neurogel liquid supplement into vertebra number three!"
Baek Seoha forced strength into eyelids that were sliding shut against her will.
No... if I fall asleep here... I have to defeat MadSci...
Black hair swept all the way back. It was the first time she had ever seen MadSci's bare face — no gas mask. But her vision was too blurred to make out any real detail.
The touch of a latex glove brushed her cheek. Bare-faced MadSci leaned in close to her ear.
"It is not yet time for you to fall, Baekho. You still have to save me... and beyond that, the world."
Baek Seoha's lashes trembled.
What... is that supposed to mean...?
A Main, worrying about the world?
Answer me! Come on... an... swer...
But it was no use.
Her consciousness sank beneath the surface of a deep, dark swamp, and was gone.