Park Hana of the Combat Department (2)
Thanks to Park Hana taking the initiative and pinpointing Bang Hwa-cheol's location, all of us now had a legitimate reason to head for the amusement park's West Area together.
After all, everyone had relied on her help in dealing with Kang Kal-jin, so it was only fair that this time we returned the favor by helping her family.
Park Hana sprinted ahead, with me and Han Sora trailing right on her heels, while Kim Isabel and Cha Eunju ran a little further behind, both showing visible signs of exhaustion.
"So where is that bomb terrorist?!"
"I don't know the details either, but he's got to be somewhere in the West Area!"
"The West? Then we shouldn't be going this way — we need the Sky Bridge on the opposite side!"
"The Sky Bridge is out! He blew it up with a bomb earlier, so it's unusable!"
"What?! It didn't end with the Ferris wheel?!"
Under normal circumstances, carrying something as dangerous as a bomb into an amusement park would be impossible in the first place — but Bang Hwa-cheol's awakened ability was the creation of bombs through mana itself.
Given sufficient mana, he could produce as many bombs as he pleased. Of course, a more powerful bomb consumed that much more mana, and his own body wasn't immune to explosions, so it wasn't exactly a stellar ability, all things considered.
It's less an ability for raiding dungeons or hunting villains, and more an ability for becoming a villain yourself, honestly.
His personality was warped from the very start — the kind of man who'd openly say he wanted to watch people get blown apart by the bombs he made.
Villain organizations being what they were, the rank and file rarely contained anyone in their right mind.
"Then what do we do?! Without the Sky Bridge, our only option is to leave the park entirely and come in through the back gate!"
"No! There's a lift that goes to the West Area too! That's the way you're heading, right, Park Hana?"
"Yeah, that's right! That bomb terrorist blew up the Sky Bridge, so my twin brother Park Cheonho ended up on the opposite side all by himself. And the only reason I ran into you guys in the first place was that I was sprinting over to take the aerial lift myself. Anyway, we have no idea what's happened to Park Cheonho right now, so every second counts—"
...Talkative when she gets worked up. Just like her brother. Nobody would ever guess she's Park Cheonho's sister — oh wait, they absolutely would.
Since whatever she was babbling now didn't really need close attention, I filed away the important part first.
By the time we arrive, the situation between Bang Hwa-cheol and Park Cheonho will already be over.
Park Cheonho's Body Protective Aura was powerful enough to neutralize almost any physical attack coming from the outside.
On top of that, he exercised his ability unconsciously, barely burning any mana in the process — the ultimate natural tank. To Bang Hwa-cheol, whose only means of attack was physical explosions, he was the worst possible natural enemy.
Park Hana, who could punch clean through that body of his from the inside out, was impressive in her own right, but between the two of them, the more absurdly overpowered awakened ability probably belonged to Park Cheonho.
Which was why following her into the West Area wasn't really about Bang Hwa-cheol at all. My true target wasn't him — it was their final boss, Jo Jin-hyun.
Meet Jeong Byeok-hyeon, collect his weapons, and manufacture a justification for the heroines to fight the villains. Join up with Park Hana at Kang Kal-jin. Then, under the pretext of going to subdue Bang Hwa-cheol, slip away mid-mission and engineer a one-on-one showdown with Jo Jin-hyun.
That much follows the original story, anyway.
If I could somehow face Jo Jin-hyun alone during this opportunity, even this Lee Seonho's body might take a step forward.
At the very least, I'd no longer have to paper over my inadequate physical stats with brute improvisation the way I had until now.
-Kwa-ak.
I clutched a rifle with only a few rounds remaining tight against my chest.
It was time to go claim the final reward of the 'Amusement Park Attack Incident' I had risked so much to orchestrate.
"Hah, hah, hah..."
"Stop right there! I will never, ever forgive you!!"
"GWAAAH!! Ack!! AAAAH!!"
An hour had already slipped by since Park Cheonho began his eternal game of tag with him.
His existence had long since become the stuff of nightmares for Bang Hwa-cheol.
No matter how many bombs he threw, no matter how many traps he laid to manufacture a dangerous situation, the man kept reviving, over and over, coming for his life like some grim reaper that refused to stay dead itself.
Where in the hell did that impossible bastard crawl out from?!
Even most Physical Enhancement Type hunters couldn't escape his bombs unscathed.
The ones who could endure an explosion or two inevitably slowed afterward, hampered by their injuries — that was how it was supposed to work.
And yet this man had been caught in at least five or six blasts and emerged without a single wound. His clothes had been reduced to tatters and his hair was lightly singed, but that was the extent of it.
At first, it had merely bruised Bang Hwa-cheol's pride that someone could shrug off the ability he took such pride in. But by now, a genuine fear of this unknown entity had taken root in his heart.
"Hah! Hah! Hah!"
Somehow.
He had to find a way, somehow.
The most powerful bomb he could muster. He needed to gather every last drop of his remaining mana and create a bomb that would kill that man beyond all doubt.
The problem was that a careless detonation might catch him in the blast too — so somehow, he had to make sure the man took it alone. The trouble was that no matter how he racked his brain, he couldn't conceive of a way to shake off the man relentlessly dogging his back.
Well, the fellow did seem a little slow in the head. If he could exploit that to slip away, so much the better...
Maze Park — 10m ahead →
There—!
As if a lifeline had descended from the heavens, Bang Hwa-cheol spotted the perfectly suited attraction materializing before him.
The terror he and his comrades had unleashed had long since driven every employee into flight, so he plunged into the Maze Park entrance without a moment's hesitation.
"Stop right there, you bomb terrorist!!"
Good — if it's here, then...!
He'd only glanced at the map in passing when entering the park, but that much was enough. What mattered wasn't clearing the maze properly — it was hiding the bomb out of his pursuer's sight and escaping on his own.
All he had to do was flee as deep as possible, shake off the chase, then retrace his path straight back to the entrance. A bomb released with his full strength could level an area the size of this Maze Park in one go, after all.
While the man wandered the maze hunting for his hiding place, he would slip away at his leisure — and once the man was left alone, the bomb would end him.
And if that failed, then at the very least he'd buy himself time to escape. That was Bang Hwa-cheol's plan.
"Damn it! Where did that terrorist go?!"
-Click.
"Heh. Let's see if you walk away unscathed this time, too."
A one-minute timer began its countdown with the whir of turning clockwork.
Tight, but more than enough time to escape. He had already memorized perfectly every path he'd taken to get here.
Stretching the timer any further would only gift his pursuer a window to notice something off and escape outside — or so he reasoned as he retreated to the very first fork at the Maze Park entrance.
-Ta-ak!
"GWAH?!"
"Gotcha, you terrorist!!"
As if the man had known all along he would emerge here, Park Cheonho lunged out of nowhere, and Bang Hwa-cheol could not hide his bewilderment.
-Kwa-ak!
"H-how?! How did you know?!"
"Know what?!"
"That I would come back to the entrance! How could you possibly—"
"What are you even talking about?! I was just standing at the first fork wondering which way to go!"
"......Oh."
The realization that the man was even dumber than anything Bang Hwa-cheol had imagined made his head spin. And the fact that he'd been caught for such an absurd reason, by such an idiot, made it spin all the more.
But something mattered far more than that: the detonation timer on the bomb he'd planted had almost run out.
"You have the right to remain silent! And, and you could, um, choose something—"
"Ah, I know! I know, so let's get out of here, fast! Any second now the bomb is going to swallow this entire Maze Park—"
"Shut it! You think I don't know you're trying to escape with that talk?! Wh-when I exercise that thing, whatever you say, uh, anyway, it works! A-and also—"
"GWAAAAH!! Let go! Let go of me!! There's no time for this playground nonsense—!!"
Bang Hwa-cheol writhed and struggled for his life, but against Park Cheonho — blessed with prodigious natural strength and a full Physical Enhancement Type ability on top of it — resistance was never a possibility.
The instant the minute ran out, his 'final bomb' went off with a single thunderous roar.
-KWAAAAAAAAANG!!!
"Wha—?!"
"GYAAAAAH...!!"
The hedge walls of Maze Park collapsed inward, and the true explosion that followed swept over the two of them.
With a detonation thunderous enough to be heard from every corner of Neverland, all that remained at the blast site was—
"Hahk, cough, cough...! You really did plant a bomb?! Just how many crimes do you intend to commit before you're satisfied?!"
"......"
"But no matter what tricks you pull, you will never, ever escape my, Park Cheonho's, grip! Submit quietly to the judgment of the law and... huh, huh?!"
After the blast. Park Cheonho remained at the spot, injured only by light burns across half his body.
...And what remained in his hands was no longer Bang Hwa-cheol — only the two wrists of the man he'd been holding.
-KWAAAAAAAAANG!!!
"KYAAAAAH?!"
A thunderous boom split the air, and the ground shuddered beneath us as we rode the aerial lift toward the West Area following Park Hana.
The noise was loud enough that Cha Eunju, seated beside me in the lift, screamed in fright.
"Wh-what was that?! What just happened?!"
"Is that... an earthquake?"
I glanced back at the other girls — every one of them wearing the same flustered expression.
But unlike the others, who merely puzzled over the sudden roar, Park Hana seemed to have guessed exactly what had happened, her face growing even more frantic with worry.
"Th-that bastard! I know it was him! Ugh, what do I do?! That idiot Park Cheonho had better still be alive! Haah, seriously..."
"Calm down. From what I heard earlier, he took a bomb head-on and nearly fell off a bridge, and he still came back alive. He'll be fine."
"Haah, yeah, I guess you're probably right... Argh, why is this cursed lift SO slow?!"
Slow lift aside, one would think she'd be grateful the thing was running at all in the middle of a crisis.
She couldn't see the situation for herself, so her fretting was understandable. As for me, I already knew the original story, so the outcome was plain as day.
Bang Hwa-cheol is probably dead from that explosion just now. And Park Cheonho will be standing there dumbfounded, holding nothing but the man's wrists in his hands.
Surviving an explosion like that should be an impossibility — but for Park Cheonho, it was possible.
That was precisely why I was one of the rare men I bothered to build a friendship with. He had far too many uses to write off for the simple crime of being male.
Besides, unlike Seo Woojin, he wasn't the type to slink around coveting my women. Tolerate a little bit of meatheadedness, and he made a perfectly decent friend.
In a sense, the meatheadedness was a feature. At least unlike that bastard Seo Woojin, he'd never try to crawl up over my head.
"Let's head for the blast site first. If we examine the traces over there, we can figure out where Bang Hwa-cheol went. We need to check whether your family is safe, too, Park Hana."
"R-right! The sound came from over there, so let's head that way..."
Worry for her own flesh and blood had Park Hana marching off in a rush, heedless of her surroundings.
The moment she stepped off the lift and scrambled forward, a circle of blue light bloomed into existence right at her feet — a teleportation array.
-Pwat!
"Huh? What's this?"
Thank god. This was the one thing I had no clue how to find on my own, and just like in the original story, Park Hana stumbled right onto it.
One of the 'escape teleportation arrays' Jo Jin-hyun had prepared for his personal use was moments from activating — a gate of shimmering light throwing itself open.
"Look out, Park Hana!"
-Tuk!
"Huh?! Wha— hey, hey!"
I didn't miss the 'opportunity' that had landed right in front of me. The instant I shoved her aside and threw myself into the array in her place—
-Pwak!
"Hey, Lee Seon—!"
A brilliant bloom of light wrapped around my body once, and the world carried me away to somewhere else entirely.