Blood-Soaked Dawn
Throughout the night, the world beyond the walls had been filled with tremendous explosions, the thunderous roar of things collapsing, and between them all, screams so raw and desperate they scarcely seemed human.
The people crouched behind Sim Geum-a's fortress walls had no choice but to endure those sounds with eyes wide open in terror, waiting out the night.
And then, just as the morning sun began to rise—
Thud! Thud! Thud!
A heavy knocking sounded against the massive iron gate.
"After everything that happened, you didn't even check the situation outside? What the hell were you doing?!"
Dima forced himself upright on the cot and bellowed at the subordinate who had come to find him.
"The second anyone steps out, sniper fire or grenades come flying from somewhere! So we've been keeping external observation to a minimum…!"
A bloodstained bandage was wrapped around Dima's neck. He staggered, dizzy, but still lurched toward the gate. Then he called up to the sentry who was carefully peering over the wall from cover.
"Well? Report!"
"Sir… all night I figured those bastards had turned on each other—some kind of internal shootout…"
"You figured what? Spit it out properly, you little shit!"
At Dima's snarl, the subordinate rose from cover and pointed down the wall.
"It might be faster if you see it yourself, Captain. It's nothing like what we saw yesterday… I can't even tell if they're friend or foe."
"What the fuck are you talking about? What's the situation outside?!"
Dima spat a curse and climbed onto the wall, looking down. And there he froze.
The place where the vast scavenger horde had stood was now nothing but corpses. Fragments still trailing smoke lay scattered in every direction. And before the gate stood the "monster" from last night's chaos.
In particular, the gun-metal suit wrapped in iron chains was hideously plastered between those links with scraps of what looked like human flesh and bone. The entire suit was soaked through with blood, as if it had been dunked in red paint, radiating a grotesque and bone-chilling presence.
Then, from that blood-drenched suit, came a familiar voice—one that felt impossibly out of place in this moment.
"(Dima, it's me. Open the gate.)"
Hearing that voice spill from the steel giant caked in blood and flesh, Dima muttered under his breath.
"…Fuck… Bozhe moi…"
The massive iron gate closed again behind me. As I stepped inside the walls, I took in the faces of Dima and the others waiting to receive me.
Where there had once been friendliness, their eyes now held a deep fear and suspicion.
To clear up that misunderstanding, I began unwinding the chains that had wrapped my body through the night, one by one.
Clank. Shrrrk—
But the more chains I shed, the more scraps of human flesh, bone fragments, and clots of blood came tumbling down with them—and that only seemed to turn their stomachs further. People averted their eyes or clamped hands over their mouths, fighting back the urge to retch.
Thud!
I dropped the last of the chains to the ground and disengaged the suit.
After chasing those bastards all night long, even wearing the suit, my whole body felt heavy and exhausted.
I approached Dima first—he still couldn't bring himself to come near, even after confirming I had stepped free of the suit in my bare body—and asked him.
"Where's Sim Geum-a? Is she all right?"
Dima studied me for a long moment, then finally nodded.
"…She's hurt, but not badly. She's in the boss's room right now. Follow me."
"Good. Thanks. I want to see her."
I smiled with relief.
The expressions on Dima's face and those of the people around us twisted strangely for a moment at that smile, but I forced myself to ignore it and followed him inside.
The place Dima led me to was Sim Geum-a's bedroom—the same one I had visited before. When I opened the door and stepped in, the familiar smell of cigarette smoke met me, along with the sight of Sim Geum-a lying on the bed, her head wrapped thickly in bandages.
She was staring blankly out the window, unaware that we had entered.
"Boss. Seo Yeong-chan's here."
At Dima's words, she slowly turned her head. Curious about the situation outside, she first asked Dima in a hazy, unfocused gaze, as if her thoughts weren't quite connecting.
"Outside… what's the situation? All those noises I heard all night—what was that? Why did those bastards suddenly go quiet?"
Only when I heard her voice did the relief that she was truly safe loosen something in my chest, and the words slipped out before I could stop them.
"I'm glad you're okay."
At the sound of my voice, Sim Geum-a finally registered my presence. She startled, cried out, "Seobang?!" and tried to sit up.
But the sudden movement must have been too much—she clutched her head with a groan of "Ugh!" and collapsed back onto the bed.
Seeing her like that, I sank into the chair beside the bed.
"Don't worry. Those bastards—I cleaned them all up. Every last one."
With those words, the tension holding my entire body together finally gave way all at once.
It felt as if every drop of adrenaline that had carried me through the night was draining out of me. An unbearable exhaustion crashed over me in a sudden wave.
I couldn't hold on any longer. I toppled forward and collapsed face-down onto Sim Geum-a's bed.
"…Sorry. Just for a bit… just let me sleep a little…"
Those were the last words I managed. My consciousness sank completely into a deep, dark ocean of sleep.
When I opened my eyes, the first thing I saw was a view looking up at Sim Geum-a's full chest.
I made a sound—"Huh?"—and Sim Geum-a, an unlit cigarette between her lips, looked down at me.
"Sleep well, Seobang?"
I nodded, and she smiled.
"Then how about scooting over a bit? My leg's killing me—I've got a cramp."
Apparently she had been sitting on the bed with my head resting on her lap the whole time.
I scrambled out of the way, and she let out an "Augh…" as she pounded her numb leg with her fist, working the feeling back into it.
Once the cramp had eased a little, she looked at me and asked,
"Dima told me some of it, but even he didn't really know the details. What the hell happened last night?"
She fixed me with a piercing stare and asked again.
"Those bastards… did you really take them all out by yourself, Seobang?"
I began explaining the long battle of the previous night to her, piece by piece.
"Yeah. I was alone."
I told her how I had wrapped myself in chains and become a giant of steel to withstand their firepower, how I had torn through their lines. And how, in the middle of that chaos, I had cut their lifelines one by one.
"From what I heard, the ones leading the attack were soldiers with a grudge against you…"
Lastly, I laid out every step of crushing their final resistance and making my way here, telling it all in a calm, even voice.
When my story ended, Sim Geum-a simply stared at me for a long while without a word. In her eyes, awe and fear and some unreadable, complicated emotion were all tangled together.
"It must have been… Seo Guk."
She murmured the name under her breath.
"The ones who used to guard that supply depot we hit together—the 50th Division. Their commander's name was Seo Guk. So that old grudge followed us all the way here…"
She gave a bitter smile, as if briefly revisiting the past. Then she looked at me with worried eyes.
"Even so… Seobang, you didn't have to do something that dangerous. I was against you fighting in the first place…"
"I tried to do it that way too."
I cut her off.
"I thought my role was to stay back as much as possible and support everyone. That's what I believed. But what was the result?"
I looked straight into her eyes.
"Yeong-ju nearly died to a missile. And you—you nearly died too, surrounded by those bastards' attack right here in your own base."
I stood and stepped in front of her. Then I took her hand—gently, but firmly.
"From now on, I'll decide where I stand. And on that point, neither you nor Yeong-ju get to tell me to hang back anymore."
At my firm declaration, she said nothing. She only looked down at the hand holding hers and nodded.
A moment later, Sim Geum-a lifted her head and looked up at me. Her face had gone faintly red.
"…This feeling of being protected—why does it feel so good? I think I'm falling for you even harder. Seriously."
She said it while gazing at me with heated eyes.
"If I weren't banged up right now—if I were in perfect shape—I'd jump you on the spot, Seobang. You know that?"
Her mischievous joke pulled a laugh out of me before I could stop it.
Right then, a soft knock sounded, and Choi Eun-ji limped into the room with bandages wrapped around her hand and calf.
I was just thinking how relieved I was that she, too, had survived without any major injuries when she looked at me carefully and said,
"Mr. Seo Yeong-chan… I can see the mood is nice, and I'm truly sorry, but…"
She asked me cautiously.
"We… have too many wounded. It's beyond what we can handle. Would it be possible for us to use the Shelter's medical facilities as well?"
I fell silent for a moment, thinking. Then I made my decision.
"…Once Yeong-ju wakes up safely."
I looked at both of them as I spoke.
"Your people—all the wounded. You can bring every last one of them to our Shelter."
At my answer, a complicated light of relief and gratitude rose in Sim Geum-a's and Choi Eun-ji's eyes.
Meeting their gazes, I opened the system window. And there, under the Shelter Management tab, I could finally read clearly the new message that had changed since last night.
Eliminate or dismantle a hostile force of sufficient scale
(258 / 200) — COMPLETE
"……"
I read the text again.
The number of scavenger alliance members I had wiped out last night: 258. The number the system had required: 200.
By dealing with that trash, I had already fulfilled the condition for the Shelter's next level-up.
With a trembling hand, I looked down at the newly generated button glowing red on the screen—
Perhaps the new era this power called the Shelter was aiming for… was not so different from a game after all.