Threat Level: 5
Why hadn't Sunghyun bothered to move?
Simple.
He could see exactly what had been put into the man.
◈ A BMS treatment produced through multiple processes by a liquid vending machine. Capable of curing BMS-related illnesses or parasitic BMS infections.
◈ Side effect: the treatment process is extremely painful. If this treatment is administered, it is advisable to place something in the patient's mouth so they do not bite through their tongue.
"Gyaaaaaaaaaaah!!"
The agony hit Changsik so hard his vision went pure white. Even from where Sunghyun stood, he could see every capillary in the man's eyes burst, leaving them looking for all the world like a pair of Sharingan.
Just how much does that hurt?
Sunghyun made a quiet resolution then and there: if he ever got infected with anything, he was going straight to the Coin Shop system.
About ten minutes passed. Pale smoke began to rise from Changsik's body, and at the same time his convulsions finally stopped.
"You okay?"
"Uuurgh—"
When Changsik opened his mouth, blood pattered down in thick drops. He'd bitten through his tongue. He did not look okay.
Lee Hanshin pulled a green liquid from inside his coat and splashed it into Changsik's mouth. Whatever trust Changsik had left for the man had clearly hit rock bottom; he twisted his head away with everything he had. Lee Hanshin's grip, however, was far stronger. He forced the man's jaws open and poured the green liquid down his throat.
"Hold still. You'll choke."
The green liquid must have tasted better than expected, because Changsik settled down almost at once. He swallowed, then stuck out his tongue.
"Bleh."
"Oh. Cleaned right up."
That one hadn't been a BMS product.
"This is just a treatment developed by our Control Bureau. One of the purest distillations of science to come out of BMS research."
Changsik opened his mouth to unload a double helping of profanity on the casually speaking Lee Hanshin.
"You son of a—!"
Sunghyun shut that attempt down before it could go anywhere.
"Hey. You think you're me? You're the one who has to keep living in this world. Go back to your ordinary life."
Changsik seemed to understand. He swallowed the rest of whatever he'd been about to say and gave a small nod.
"Good choice. Lee Hanshin, get this guy out of here."
Lee Hanshin looked faintly disappointed.
Don't tell me he was hoping the kid would pick a fight?
"Understood. The captain of Alpha Team 1 will escort him back to his residence. Please return safely."
Changsik bowed his head toward Sunghyun.
"Sir. I owe you more than I can say for today. Kim Changsik of the CH Group. I will never forget you. Thank you."
With that, he walked out through the same door as before.
There was nothing left to hold back now.
"We've got a lot to say to each other, don't we, Lee Hanshin?"
Lee Hanshin flinched.
"You're a little different from earlier."
Sunghyun spoke while still looking in the direction Changsik had gone.
"The situation changed. Which brings me to this—I'd like to cash in that favor from earlier. Right now."
"Haha. That's a little terrifying."
"Nothing major. Are there any Threat Level 5 or higher entities in Korea?"
Truth be told, ever since acquiring his new weapon, Sunghyun's body had been itching for a fight.
I can't just sit on this. Might as well test the weapon and drive a stake through the Control Bureau's skull while I'm at it.
I am not something you people can control.
He could already guess how the Bureau would respond. They would keep throwing him into death traps. And that was exactly what he wanted.
Lee Hanshin thought for a moment.
What the hell is this man even saying?
They had made a deal related to this earlier, yes. But Lee Hanshin's plan had been to put him through a battery of tests first and only introduce him to a Level 5 after at least a month. He had never imagined the man would spend that "favor" on something like this.
A mistake. A very large one.
He had thought he could keep this man under control. He had not expected him to be this far gone.
"Yes. I'll take you there."
Lee Hanshin let out a long breath.
"In exchange, promise me one thing."
"What?"
"Don't die. You are an extremely valuable research asset to the Control Bureau."
"Hahaha! Not even bothering to pretend anymore?"
"There doesn't seem to be any point in lying to you."
"Then lead the way."
A transaction. That was as far as the relationship between Lee Hanshin and Sunghyun needed to go. Sunghyun had no intention of getting attached to the man—not yet. And Lee Hanshin felt exactly the same way.
"Let's go. Follow me."
There was a heaviness in Lee Hanshin's steps as he led the way. Perhaps because he had already gotten a taste of Sunghyun's power.
Sure, if I went berserk down here it would be a disaster—but why would I do something that costs more than it gains?
Same elevator as before. The only things that had changed were the people riding it and the buttons being pressed.
Lee Hanshin hammered the buttons like someone in the middle of a keyboard battle. But Sunghyun could see it—the pattern underneath.
Those aren't symbols. They're characters.
In other words, Lee Hanshin was assembling letters into a sentence. The entire cipher was laid bare to Sunghyun. It wasn't intuition or some superhuman intellect at work.
I just… see it.
The Book of Thoth decoded every last bit of it and displayed the result for him.
To the fifth floor.
Whoever designed that cipher had made it deliberately difficult. Without the Book of Thoth, he never would have cracked it.
Lee Hanshin pressed a red button, and the elevator began to move.
Wiiiiing—.
This was nothing like before. The elevator simply kept descending, endlessly, into the earth.
"Just how many meters down does this thing go?"
"We're at five thousand six hundred meters underground right now. Another four thousand still to go."
What the hell was waiting at Threat Level 5 and above…?
Lee Hanshin, who had been glancing at him sideways for a while, finally asked.
"I've been curious about something. That thing in your hand. What is it, exactly?"
He meant the Vajra. Sunghyun floated it into the air between them.
"This?"
"Yes. This elevator is fitted with a BMS forced-expulsion system. You, and that weapon—what are you? How do you display that kind of power without being a BMS?"
Haha. Still thinking like a human, then.
"Is there some law that says anything that isn't a BMS has to be weak? From where I'm standing, BMS and all the rest of it are the strange ones."
Things that rewrote the laws of the world to suit themselves with nothing but some mysterious force, no mana involved. The reason Sunghyun had been teleported out of that bizarre mart without any warning was the same. An act with no causality whatsoever.
"What exactly are BMS?"
"Hmm… Even the Control Bureau doesn't have much to offer you on that. Let's try an analogy. What is the Earth? What is an animal? What is a human?"
Unanswerable. Or rather, there were far too many answers.
"That's what they are. BMS have existed alongside humanity since the beginning. Why? We don't know. Our job at the Bureau is simply to figure out how to use them and how to contain them. We don't even have the luxury of finding out more than that."
Sunghyun had his own theory. Chaos unleashed by the master of this dimension.
The original owner of this dimension had never intended to use it to farm coins. He had only wanted to amuse himself. When he later looked upon the highly advanced civilization that had grown inside his own dimension, he must have been stunned.
What is this? I never made anything like this.
Dimensional goods registered automatically. A person could register them deliberately, the way Hermes did—but for the most part, registration was automatic. Anything without an owner got logged. Coins would have kept pouring in. He would have grown arrogant. He would have believed he could become one of those lofty gods in the sky.
And he could have. The world had enough potential for it. But his own capacity had fallen short.
The dimension outgrew its master. Signs of runaway growth appeared. The dimension's customers turned their backs. Shareholders scrambled to dump their holdings.
And then what? The man who had poured coins into growing the place beyond his means became trash. He would have been reduced to a Lower God, back to playing games on some garbage planet the way he used to.
So he forced it. He entered the planet deliberately—and vanished.
The laws of the universe applied even to a creator. The moment he entered the dimension, his power would have been reduced to something close to Sunghyun's own level. Still a god, so stronger than Sunghyun—and yet he had died.
How did Sunghyun know he was dead? Because every last share of his holdings had hit the market at once. Instantly. The only phenomenon that produced that result was death.
Naturally, the BMS Dimension had been in freefall ever since.
Sunghyun knew that background. He had only asked because he was curious how much the humans here actually understood about BMS.
And because he knew, he needed to push his growth even harder. This was no time to be trading stares with some research director.
It was only a Level 5. He could not afford to get stuck at Level 5.
According to common talk, that god had likely been killed by something of Level 8 or higher. And the destruction of this world would come at the hands of a Level 9 existence—the conclusion reached by countless gods who governed prophecy.
So he had to get stronger.
Ding—.
The doors opened.
"Whoa."
The research director rummaged around inside the elevator and pulled something out. A pure white hazmat suit. He took out a second one and held it toward Sunghyun.
"Do you need one?"
"I'm fine. That kind of thing just gets in the way."
The place reeked of something overwhelming. Killing intent, fighting spirit, raw terror, and something else that defied understanding. For a mere Level 5 to radiate this much atmosphere…
Just how had the humans here managed to capture these things?
"Haha… A lot of people died locking these up. Anything above this, we couldn't even contain."
"Couldn't contain them? Then what?"
"Sealing. Full regional lockdowns. Release into the wild. Plenty of options. The Earth as it stands could go under at any moment and it wouldn't be strange. One spark and—boom."
There was a strange detachment in Lee Hanshin's tone. Maybe that was why. He always chose the option that saved people—and yet something about him always felt twisted on a human level. It was because he had already given up on himself. That was how it came across.
"That's enough sightseeing. Let's go. What you want is a fight, right?"
"Yeah."
"I've got a suitable one."
He looked thoroughly tense. What kind of creature was this?
"You'll know when you see it. We burned through more people capturing this one than any other. No special conditions—it earned its Level 5 ranking on pure combat power alone."
Gulp—.
Sunghyun swallowed.
Out of fear? No.
"This is going to be fun."
At that, Lee Hanshin's body gave a small shudder.
If it's this man… maybe he could change something about this world. The way that person they once called a hero did…