Marking (3)
Lee Hanshin sent only three agents to Sunghyun.
Behind that choice lay a quiet hope of keeping any potential chaos to a minimum.
Clack—.
The moment Sunghyun opened the door, the agents produced a laptop that had been waiting and ready. Its screen showed a room packed wall to wall with monitors.
“A pleasure to meet you. I’m Lee Hanshin, Research Director of the Control Bureau’s Korean branch.”
At the center of that room stood a man in a white lab coat, hands shoved into his pockets.
Sunghyun had wondered, just for a second, whether they might be impostors posing as the Bureau. Thoth’s Book, however, confirmed they were speaking nothing but the truth.
“Yes, I’m Kim Sunghyun. Nice to meet you. I actually wanted to see you myself, so this is quite the stroke of luck.”
They had come looking for him on their own. He had expected someone to notice the anomaly sooner or later—lightning that size didn’t fall out of a clear sky without drawing eyes—but he hadn’t expected them to move this quickly.
This is the kind of speed you need if you’re going to be the organization that props up an entire dimension.
Fast. And careful.
Lee Hanshin’s mouth curved upward.
“You wanted to meet me? That’s a relief. A genuine relief. If it’s all right with you, would you mind following the agents here to the Control Bureau?”
On the surface the tone was perfectly calm. The hand trembling inside the lab-coat pocket and the faint quiver in his pupils, however, were impossible to hide.
Looks like I’ve got the upper hand here.
In that case, he would simply use it.
“Sure. No trouble at all.”
At Sunghyun’s agreement Lee Hanshin quietly clenched a fist. Sunghyun’s lips twisted into a thin, knowing smile.
“But you’ll have to do me two favors first.”
“Favors…?”
“Nothing big. See this guy here?”
Sunghyun pulled Changsik forward.
“Ah… a victim of the strange mart. We’re truly sorry about that. It was our management negligence.”
Whatever the real list of reasons might have been, Lee Hanshin simply bundled them all under “management negligence.”
“Then you already know about the marking as well.”
“Marking… Don’t tell me this friend has been marked? Ah! So that’s why the BMS went completely berserk.”
Lee Hanshin pulled his hand from his pocket and pressed it hard against his face.
“I understand the first condition. We happen to have a treatment prepared for experimental use. We’ll provide it. Now for the second. What is it?”
The man was sharp. Sunghyun’s smile turned faintly predatory.
I wonder what face he’ll make when I say this.
“You’ve got those rank-five-and-above threats sitting at headquarters, don’t you? How about leaving them to me?”
Cold sweat beaded on Lee Hanshin’s forehead. He had planned to hand that work over eventually, but hearing the offer come from the other side first left him strangely uneasy. He couldn’t pin down the motive.
What was the real purpose?
“May I ask why you want to take on BMS of rank five and higher? I simply can’t understand it.”
Sunghyun curled his fingers into a circle—the universal sign for money.
“To make money. And while I’m at it, prevent a few disasters. Mutually beneficial deal, wouldn’t you say?”
The proposal was good for the Bureau and good for Sunghyun. So Lee Hanshin decided to let it slide. The man clearly had no intention of revealing his true goal.
If I keep him close, I might pick up a few clues.
Observe from the side for now. That was the plan.
“I’ll treat this as a transaction rather than a favor. If any actual favors come to mind later, just say the word. I’ll grant whatever falls within my authority.”
“Fine by me.”
“Then please follow these agents. We’ll escort you to the Bureau.”
The agents offered a crisp, formal greeting.
“A pleasure. We’re Alpha Team 1, assigned to escort Mr. Kim Sunghyun. I’m Team Leader Lee Jongseok. This way, please.”
Disciplined movements, manners polished to a shine—clear proof of just how seriously the Bureau was taking Kim Sunghyun right now.
“All right, let’s go. Changsik, you too.”
“Yes, sir!”
Changsik was convinced Sunghyun held some high post inside the Control Bureau. In his mind the entire exchange had been some kind of coded ritual, a carefully staged process designed solely to bring him in.
The Bureau really is incredible! All this complicated procedure just to pick up one guy like me…
He had almost fallen for the whole performance.
“Mr. Sunghyun really is amazing.”
Sunghyun wondered what fresh delusion the kid was spinning now.
Doesn’t matter.
Whatever fantasy Changsik cooked up was irrelevant. Once the marking was gone, their paths would no longer cross.
Though we might bump into each other now and then if fate feels like it.
Sunghyun climbed into the waiting black car and they set off. Roughly five more black vehicles fell into formation around them.
“Are those all Bureau cars too?”
Team Leader Lee Jongseok answered promptly.
“Yes. Because we have a marked individual with us, agents are concentrated along the entire route.”
That explained why they hadn’t seen a single civilian vehicle the whole way.
Full lockdown, then.
In most novels the authorities kept ordinary people completely in the dark about monsters. This world, apparently, operated differently.
“Is the control working well?”
The team leader’s reply was flat, almost clinical.
“As you’re no doubt aware, five years ago the Bureau decided that pouring resources into information control was less efficient than focusing everything on managing the BMS themselves.”
People, it turned out, could be surprisingly bold about threats they understood. It was the unknown that truly terrified them.
“Would you mind filling me in on what’s happened? I’ve been away a long time.”
In a world full of BMS, people vanished and reappeared all the time.
“Back when I was still around, the news didn’t even mention what a BMS was.”
The team leader calmly laid out the intervening years. The Bureau had understood the mechanics of human fear. As control grew harder, internal debate had raged until, finally, they chose to release BMS information to the public. The present world was the result—a place where BMS appearance alerts were issued as casually as fine-dust warnings, and frequency reports scrolled across every screen.
At first people had trembled. They simply hadn’t known. What a BMS was. What it could do. Once the Bureau opened the files and countermeasures became common knowledge, society began to adapt. Testimonies from survivors who had escaped using that public information had helped enormously.
“There are even private companies that jumped into BMS-related businesses,” Changsik added with a grin. Clearly talking about his own family.
The team leader’s eyes widened as he looked at him.
“I thought you looked familiar—you’re the heir of the CH Group.”
Sunghyun raised an eyebrow.
“What’s the CH Group?”
Samsung he knew. This one was new.
“The company that dove into the BMS industry the very second the information went public five years ago.”
“Impressive.”
Changsik’s shoulders seemed to lift a little. Sunghyun felt a sudden urge to smack him, but credit where it was due—jumping into a brand-new industry was never easy.
“So why were you living in an ordinary house like that?”
Changsik turned his head slightly; the tips of his ears went red.
“Well… I had a fight with my parents and was living on my allowance…”
Living in Gaepo-dong, Gangnam, on nothing but allowance. Definitely a chaebol kid.
The team leader swallowed hard, envy plain on his face.
Before long the convoy reached Yeouido. They rolled slowly past the National Assembly and finally stopped in an empty lot. The team leader stepped out. The car door slid open and he leaned in.
“We’ve arrived. This is the Control Bureau’s Korean branch.”
Sunghyun could already sense a great many lives moving beneath the ground.
“Interesting. Is this it?”
He climbed out and pressed the tip of his shoe into the grass. Instantly a massive tunnel rose smoothly from the earth in front of them.
The team leader yanked off his sunglasses and rubbed his eyes, the carefully maintained atmosphere of the entire trip shattering in an instant.
“How did you—? Did you come from headquarters?”
Sunghyun only smiled.
“I’ve got good instincts. Haha. Shall we go in?”
“As expected…”
He casually ignored Changsik’s muttered admiration from the side.
Sunghyun, Changsik, and the team leader stepped into the cavern.
“Anyway, this is the Control Bureau’s Korean branch building. Welcome.”
The team leader offered the greeting a little late. At the far end of the cavern stood a single elevator. He slotted in a card key and the doors opened, revealing a panel covered in countless numbers written in unknown symbols.
“What are these symbols?”
“They probably designate individual BMS. Even I don’t know the exact system.”
He pressed a soft, pudding-like button and inserted the card key again.
Clunk—.
The elevator began its descent, turning sideways several times before continuing downward. At last the doors slid open.
“Wow. I never imagined there was a space this huge underground. Without Mr. Sunghyun I wouldn’t have believed it.”
An enormous chamber stretched out before them, each section marked with a number. Inside those numbered zones sat objects, animals, and even humans—one specimen per cell.
“This is the containment area for danger-rank-1 BMS.”
A familiar voice spoke from the side.
“Research Director Lee Hanshin. A pleasure.”
Lee Hanshin stood beside the elevator, hand extended. Sunghyun, who had already met him on-screen, smiled and shook it.
“First time meeting face-to-face. Nice to meet you.”
Lee Hanshin smiled at Changsik.
“And this is the heir of the CH Group—and the one who received the marking—Mr. Kim Changsik.”
“You already knew.”
“Haha, well, the heir of a company that catches the eye tends to stand out. This way, please. The treatment is ready.”
Lee Hanshin led the way. He stopped before a massive steel door and swiped a purple card.
Different color.
The color of the card key apparently indicated rank. Iris scan, fingerprint, facial recognition—once all three cleared, the steel door slowly opened. By then the team leader had already retreated far down the corridor.
“I don’t have clearance beyond this point. You’ve worked hard.”
“Thank you for your efforts.”
Lee Hanshin guided Changsik into a pure-white room.
“This way.”
Inside waited a single syringe filled with blue liquid.
“BMS?”
Sunghyun’s question earned a nod.
“Correct. Another BMS created by using BMS.”
Cold sweat ran down Changsik’s back. Inject a BMS into his body? The panic was written all over his face. Sunghyun gave him a light smack between the shoulder blades.
“Hey, what are you fretting about? You’ve already got a BMS stuck to you.”
Come to think of it, that was true.
“Is that so…? Yeah, I guess it is…”
Once Changsik settled, Lee Hanshin steered him to a chair.
“Sit here and roll up your sleeve. It won’t take long.”
“Ah—yes. Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. Thank Mr. Sunghyun here. How lucky can one person be? Encountering that many rank-four-and-above BMS in a single day and still walking around alive…”
Even Changsik had to admit it. If he hadn’t run into Sunghyun inside that mart, he would already be nothing but bones.
“I’ll begin the injection. It stings a little. Just a little sting.”
The blue liquid slid through the needle and into Changsik’s vein.
It felt like molten lava pouring into his body. The lava raced along his blood vessels. Everything melted. His skull cooked from the inside. He was going to—he was dying!
“Kuaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!!!”
He couldn’t hold it in. The moment Changsik screamed and flung his arm forward, mechanical restraints shot out of the chair and locked him down.
Sunghyun looked at Lee Hanshin. The Research Director met his gaze and beamed with pure, sunny innocence.
“Oops. Forgot to mention the side effects. It hurts like hell.”
This guy’s a real piece of work.
For quite some time afterward, the laboratory rang with uninterrupted screams.