Chapter 73
Chapter 73
Cold, damp air seeped deep into the lungs.
The musty smell unique to underground spaces mixed with the metallic stench of rusted iron, stabbing at the nose.
Groaning from the pounding headache caused by a powerful anesthetic, Squad Three Leader Choi Taeho slowly opened his eyes.
“Ugh…”
His body felt unbearably heavy.
Out of habit he tried to move his arms, but they refused to budge.
Clank—
Only a dull metallic sound echoed in the empty space.
“What… what is this?”
Only then did the situation come into focus.
A massive underground bunker surrounded by dark concrete walls.
He wasn’t alone.
The sixteen squads deployed for the waste hill search operation—
all sixty-four soldiers—were trapped here.
Like slabs of meat hanging from a slaughterhouse ceiling, their limbs were bound to special alloy restraints fixed into the walls.
“Squad leader! Are you awake?”
“Sergeant Kim! What happened? Report the situation!”
Choi Taeho shouted, veins bulging in his neck.
But only despairing silence returned.
No one knew.
They didn’t know how they had been attacked, when they had lost consciousness, or even what the enemy looked like.
They were veterans who had survived countless battles.
Men who kept firing even while mutants tore their arms apart.
Yet now their eyes trembled with uncertainty.
“This damned thing…”
Choi Taeho shook violently in an attempt to break the restraints.
The large soldier tied beside him, Corporal Park, gritted his teeth.
“Squad leader. It’s useless. We can’t use any strength.”
He was an F-Rank physical enhancement Awakened.
Under normal circumstances he could tear through steel chains.
But now he was as powerless as a newborn.
Only then did Choi Taeho understand.
“…My mana is blocked.”
It wasn’t that the restraints were too strong.
The very air itself suppressed the mana flowing through their bodies.
Mana Suppression Field.
They had no way of knowing it, but this bunker had been specially constructed by Kang Sinhyeok using accumulated mana pattern data.
Ten F-Rank cores had been poured into it.
A prison where anyone below C-Rank Awakened could not even use their power.
“Damn it… does anyone know how we were captured?”
“….”
No answer came.
Choi Taeho felt a deep dread.
If sixty-four soldiers had been subdued simultaneously, their enemy was a monster beyond common sense.
At that moment—
Whiiing. Clank.
The heavy steel door of the bunker opened.
From the darkness, someone stepped inside.
A massive silhouette accompanied by mechanical sounds.
A figure wearing a strange leather suit and a grotesque mask.
The worst and most feared killer in Mapo District—
The Bomber.
Step. Step.
Each step made the floor tremble slightly.
Red light from the mask’s lenses swept across the soldiers.
Bzzzt—
The lenses contracted and expanded like a mechanical iris.
Every soldier froze under that gaze.
It was like livestock being inspected in a slaughterhouse.
There was not the slightest trace of emotion.
The inhuman stare overwhelmed them.
No one dared speak.
This couldn’t continue.
If they surrendered to fear, everything would end.
Choi Taeho bit his tongue to regain his composure and shouted.
“You coward! What are you planning to do with us?!”
His voice echoed through the bunker.
“If you’re going to kill us, do it now! We belong to the Machine Society! Things won’t go the way you want!”
It was a cry from someone prepared to die.
The Bomber turned his head slowly toward him.
Bzzzt—
The red lens stopped directly before Choi Taeho’s face.
The focus ring rotated slightly.
“….”
No answer.
No mockery.
No anger.
He simply observed.
Like a scientist examining a frog in a laboratory.
That silence tightened around Choi Taeho’s throat.
This was an opponent beyond human understanding.
The kind of terror one felt facing an aberration.
Without realizing it, he closed his mouth and lowered his gaze.
Meanwhile
Hmm. The structure is fairly complicated.
Kang Sinhyeok had no interest in Choi Taeho’s shouting.
Inside the mask, his HUD displayed the intricate mana circuit diagrams flowing through the soldiers’ bodies.
The world seen through the Mana Resonance Lens was fascinating.
Especially the bodies of these Machine Society soldiers.
They were practically treasure vaults.
“So this is neural integration…”
Mana strands extended like nerve fibers.
Their mechanical arms and legs were not mere equipment.
They were cyborg technology, where biological nerves and machines were fused together through mana.
Kang Sinhyeok’s eyes sparkled.
He hadn’t come to interrogate prisoners.
He came out of pure academic curiosity—
or more accurately, technological plunder.
“Picker, I’ve sent the data. Take a look.”
He transmitted the status window to Picker, who was commanding the drone army above Dohwa-dong.
Picker’s lively voice immediately sounded through the earpiece.
“Hahaha! Confirmed, Boss! Those guys look tough, but their guts are tiny!”
Picker snickered.
“Bladder scan complete! Their numbers are critical! If we scare them a little more, they’ll start wetting themselves! The guy who shouted earlier is already at peak fear level! His legs are shaking!”
I suppressed a laugh.
Well, they had been captured without even knowing how.
Anyone would be terrified.
But that wasn’t my concern.
“Enough nonsense. Focus on analysis. That neural integration—can I just remove it?”
My interest was purely mechanical.
“If we analyze that technology, we could apply it to the exoskeleton. Right now there’s a slight delay between arm movement and the exoskeleton response. If the interface improves, we could throw grenades without needing the sling. We might even mount ergonomic grenade launchers directly.”
“As expected of Boss! Excellent idea!”
Picker projected analysis data.
“Analysis complete! No problem, Boss. The nerves themselves aren’t directly connected. Mana strands extend like nerve fibers and wrap around the machinery. If we cut the mana pattern at the connection point, the components can be separated cleanly without biological damage.”
“Oh?”
That settled it.
Kang Sinhyeok turned toward the bunker exit.
The rusty hinges creaked as he stepped outside.
Inside the bunker, a heavy silence fell.
The soldiers exchanged uneasy glances.
“Wh-what did he leave for?”
“He’s probably getting torture tools…”
Ignoring their whispers, Kang Sinhyeok stood before Porter’s Storage compartment outside.
“Porter, give me one F-Rank core and some titanium scrap.”
“Understood. I regret the reduction in weight, but if it is Boss’s will.”
Materials spilled from Porter’s storage.
Kang Sinhyeok raised his hand.
“Manufacture.”
Blue particles gathered and formed into a sharp dagger.
But it wasn’t a normal blade.
The edge vibrated with faint blue energy.
Ding.
[Mana Cutting Dagger]
[Grade: F]
[Uses high-frequency mana vibration to precisely sever mana patterns.]
“Perfect. Success.”
He sheathed the dagger and manufactured a large metal cart.
The wheels were noisy since it had been assembled hastily.
Clatter… clatter…
When he returned to the bunker pulling the cart, the soldiers’ faces turned pale.
To them, it looked like a corpse cart.
So it begins…
Choi Taeho shut his eyes tightly.
Fear filled the bunker.
Kang Sinhyeok approached a soldier tied to the right wall.
The man’s right leg had been replaced with a mechanical prosthetic below the knee.
A crude but sturdy hydraulic frame.
Quite appealing.
When Kang Sinhyeok reached toward the leg, the soldier shouted.
“You bastard! Don’t touch it! Just kill me!”
What was wrong with him?
The soldier struggled, but the restraints held firm.
Fear filled his eyes.
Machine Society soldiers knew well the agony of forcibly tearing off a neural-linked limb.
One comrade had died instantly from shock when a mutant tore off his arm.
Because destroying a neural-linked limb sent a direct shock to the brain.
He trembled, imagining pain worse than death.
The glowing blade approached the connection point.
“N-no! Stop!”
The soldier screamed.
Kang Sinhyeok’s hand did not hesitate.
Slice.
The blade passed smoothly through the junction.
Bzzzt—
A faint vibration.
Then—
Clang.
The heavy mechanical leg dropped to the floor.
The mana circuits connecting it had been severed.
“Aaaagh!”
The soldier screamed, twisting in anticipation of unbearable pain.
But…
“…Huh?”
One second.
Two seconds.
Three seconds.
No pain came.
He opened his eyes cautiously.
There was no blood.
The cut surface was perfectly clean.
“What… is this?”
Watching the confused soldier, Kang Sinhyeok tilted his head.
“That scream almost blew out my ears.”
His mechanical voice spoke through the mask.
“You must’ve had a good breakfast.”
It was meant as a joke.
But the bunker’s atmosphere froze even colder.
To the soldiers, it sounded like madness.
A monster calmly joking after cutting off a man’s leg.
Picker sighed through the comm.
“Boss… those guys have muscles where their brains should be. They think you’re planning something terrible with their limbs.”
“….”
Better not talk anymore.
Kang Sinhyeok picked up the severed leg and tossed it onto the cart.
Then he moved to the next soldier.
“W-wait! Don’t come closer!”
“Aaaah!”
The bunker filled with screams.
Kang Sinhyeok simply continued his work.
Approach.
Slice.
Collect.
Clang. Thud.
Clang. Thud.
The cart gradually filled with mechanical arms and legs.
A bizarre disassembly process with not a drop of blood.
Soon the cart was full.
Sixty-four elite soldiers’ prosthetic limbs lay piled like scrap metal.
That should be enough research samples.
Satisfied, Kang Sinhyeok grabbed the cart handle and walked toward the exit.
He didn’t even look back.
His business was finished.
Creak. Slam.
The heavy door closed.
Sixty-four soldiers remained behind, still bound—now missing their mechanical limbs.
Silence.
Heavy silence.
Finally someone spoke.
“…Why didn’t he kill us?”
If he had tortured them or executed them, it would have made sense.
That’s what raiders did.
But the Bomber had ignored their lives completely.
He had taken only the mechanical parts.
“Wait…”
Choi Taeho stared at the closed door with terrified eyes.
“…Is he using us as test subjects?”
The soldiers misunderstood.
They believed they had been spared because they were valuable experimental material.
“That insane… bastard…”
None of them could guess the Bomber’s true intention.
An unknown terror slowly began devouring the soldiers’ minds.