53. Ant Hell
"Hold on... you're just suddenly letting us go?"
"What? Letting us go?"
The man asked, dumbfounded.
It had been an entirely reasonable response—arresting and detaining two large men trying to cross the border with forged identities and documents.
But over the radio, the voices only grew more insistent, pressuring him further, and after a moment of hesitation, they unlocked the cuffs.
"Damn it, I really don't know if this is the right call."
Click!
"Oh."
Freed from the restraints, Oh Hyeon-seong flexed his arms once and rose from his seat.
They hadn't been ordinary handcuffs but specialized anti-awakened equipment with mana-suppressing properties, and the whole ordeal had felt rather suffocating—so the last thing he'd expected was to be released like this.
Meanwhile, Lieutenant Colonel Choi, who had come sprinting from inside the building, stood huffing and panting before him.
"I-I sincerely apologize. It seems there was some... misunderstanding on our part."
"No, a misunderstanding? What kind of—"
"You two, stand down!"
He clicked his tongue sharply.
"So we're cleared to pass through?"
"Of course. We'll send you through right away. Hey! Raise the barrier!"
Lieutenant Colonel Choi pounded on the barrier in front of the vehicle and shouted.
The hunters, bewildered, had no choice but to comply, and the path through the gate on the other side swung open.
"Is there anything else you need? If there's anything we can provide from our end, we'll give you whatever you require."
"Well then, could I trouble you for a sturdy vehicle?"
"Ah, yes! We'll have one ready immediately. Take as many as you like."
Lieutenant Colonel Choi bustled about and, in the end, even handed over a military vehicle.
For pushing through an environment as hostile as the one beyond the border, it was far better suited than any civilian sedan—more power, more durability.
"...?"
Lee Gil-sang, who had been watching the entire spectacle unfold, could only stare blankly at Oh Hyeon-seong.
Wh-what on earth just happened?
Only moments ago, the atmosphere had been lethal.
He had his own crimes to answer for, and being deeply embedded in a criminal organization, he'd been certain it was all over.
But not only had they quietly let a forgery slide, they'd even handed over a vehicle.
Don't tell me... his reach extends all the way into the military?
The Special Operations Command was famous for being completely impervious to outside influence.
A military organization composed of high-tier awakened.
Its equipment, its rank structure, its internal culture—everything set it apart from the regular army.
Even a superior officer several ranks above, coming from the regular forces, would have been laughed out of the room.
And yet an executive of that organization had come groveling at their feet like this.
It was nothing short of a terrifying display of influence.
No wonder he was so calm the whole time... he'd seen this coming from the start.
"What are you doing? Get in."
"Ah... y-yes, sir!"
They climbed into the camouflaged military vehicle.
As the hunters cleared the way, they were able to pass through the checkpoint with leisurely ease.
They traveled down the long road lined with fences.
"That was lucky."
"Y-you think so?"
"The road ahead won't be easy. Think you can find the way?"
"Of course. I won't disappoint you this time."
Lee Gil-sang spoke with a deliberately grave expression.
He had memorized the coordinates of their destination, of course, and had even drawn up a detailed route plan for getting there.
All of North Korea had been transformed into an uninhabitable wasteland overrun by monsters, but even within it, some regions were more dangerous than others.
Planning the route properly meant a far higher chance of actually reaching the destination.
Grrrrl!
"Did you see that? There's a monster prowling over there."
"At this distance, it won't spot us. Let's pass quietly."
Their military vehicle wasn't just camouflaged—it had also been modified for low noise.
All to avoid drawing the attention of the monsters beyond the border as much as possible.
It wasn't as though a little hunting would put a dent in their numbers, so they too steered clear of the monsters wherever they could.
The roads are starting to deteriorate. It's worse than it was five years ago.
The farther north they went, the worse the roads became.
Sections of road that had been completely destroyed forced them to take long detours, and they crossed paths with monsters head-on a few times, forcing brief fights.
But all of it was within calculated bounds—nothing that posed a real problem.
"Whew. Then we'll set off again."
"Good work."
Without Oh Hyeon-seong ever needing to step in, Lee Gil-sang handled the monsters that blocked their path.
A Grade 8 hunter was a capable veteran deployed even to A-Rank gates.
Monsters from B-Rank gates and below were little more than light exercise to him, so they hadn't yet run into any force that posed a genuine threat.
How many more hours had they been driving?
They finally arrived in the vicinity of the marked coordinates, climbed out of the vehicle, and began combing the forest.
"It should definitely be around here somewhere..."
Lee Gil-sang searched through the underbrush as he moved about.
He was looking for the facility or any trace of it that had shown up in the satellite photos.
But since the coordinates weren't exactly precise, it was never going to be easy to find.
Damn it, if luck's against me, I could be stuck out here in the woods for days.
After coming all this way, giving up was simply not an option.
Lee Gil-sang searched for traces desperately, practically scraping the ground with his face.
Then, a step behind him, Oh Hyeon-seong—who had been surveying their surroundings with keen attention—summoned Merz.
"Think you can find it?"
Woof!
"Huh...? Where'd this puppy come from all of a sudden?"
Lee Gil-sang froze at the sight of the creature.
It looked, unmistakably, like a country mutt—sweet-faced and a little dopey.
Adorable, sure, but the kind of thing that wouldn't last a day in a place like this.
In Oh Hyeon-seong's eyes, however, that creature was worth more than a hundred hunters in their current situation.
"He's going to guide us there."
"I'm sorry, what on earth—"
"Just keep quiet and follow."
"It... it's real."
Lee Gil-sang stood rooted to the spot, staring.
An exhaust vent opening, revealed through the brush.
It matched the one captured in the satellite photos exactly.
"Seems we're in the right area after all."
"H-how on earth did you find this?"
"I told you—he'd guide us."
The rear view of a dog trotting along, tail swaying back and forth.
The two men began following the creature.
Merz could read the traces of the earth.
And more than that, when it came to what lay beneath the ground, his detection range was vastly broader still.
Having already located the exhaust vent that connected to the facility, finding the entrance somewhere nearby was a trivially simple task.
"Found it."
They had discovered the entrance to the underground facility.
Astonished at how they'd managed to find the place, Lee Gil-sang turned to look at the dog—but Merz had already vanished.
While he stood dumbfounded at how the creature had disappeared without so much as a whisper of movement, Oh Hyeon-seong tore the tightly sealed door off the facility.
CRUNCH!
"Let's go in."
They stepped inside and found themselves facing a pitch-dark facility.
Oh Hyeon-seong floated up a spirit's light and led the way.
"This does seem to be the facility from the photos, and it does seem to be a seed storage depot. But..."
The facility's scale fell absurdly short of the rumors.
And more than anything, the interior was in poor condition.
He hadn't expected a spotless facility given how long it had been abandoned, but this was something else entirely.
"It's—it's completely empty."
"... As I suspected."
Entering the storage vault, they were met with a hollow, emptied space.
Not a single seed remained.
And it wasn't merely that they were gone.
The cases had vanished wholesale, and the facility's equipment lay scattered about, dead and nonfunctional.
There were signs that intruders had breached the place from outside.
"This place was picked clean a long time ago."
"I... see..."
"What a waste."
Oh Hyeon-seong let out a short sigh and looked around.
It didn't appear to have been a complete fabrication, but the information was so meaningless it might as well have been.
Still, like the rice seed he had obtained recently, the question remained: where had those recently leaked seeds actually come from?
Collectors in this field did occasionally put rare seeds on the market, that much was true—but multiple species of Original Seeds were not the sort of thing a private individual should have been holding.
"To think this was all for nothing..."
"Wait."
Zap!
Oh Hyeon-seong drew the spirit's light back into himself.
In an instant, the space went dark.
At his glance, Lee Gil-sang swiftly slipped into stealth.
Something's here.
Oh Hyeon-seong likewise melted into the darkness, fixing his gaze on the entrance to the storage vault.
Then a man came in, killing his presence to the barest minimum, a sword gripped in one hand.
At the faint hint of bloodlust that reached him, Oh Hyeon-seong slipped in behind the man as he cautiously began to search the interior.
Crack!
The man's neck twisted all the way around, and he crumpled to the floor.
He fell without even a grunt of pain.
"Wh-what the hell is this guy? Don't tell me he's a soldier?"
"No, the military doesn't push this deep. Maybe near the border, but not here. Besides, look—he's a foreigner."
Whoosh.
Oh Hyeon-seong peeled off the man's balaclava.
Underneath was the face of an exotic-looking foreign man.
"South American, by the looks of him. Dressed like a mercenary, though they've stripped off all the patches."
"Why would a South American hunter suddenly be all the way out here?"
"No idea. But running into him here was no coincidence."
Vmmm.
Oh Hyeon-seong picked up the sword the man had dropped.
When he swung it around, it cut the air with a reasonably sharp whine.
It didn't quite meet his usual standards for weapons, but it was far from shabby equipment.
Haven't had a sword since the last one broke, so it'll do fine as a temporary stand-in. I can sell it off when I get home.
Equipment of this grade would fetch at least tens of millions of won.
The farm was doing well enough that he wasn't strapped for cash at the moment, but finding a new owner for a good blade was good for the environment, wasn't it?
Having secured his spoils neatly, he turned his gaze elsewhere.
"Surely... they didn't come all this way, to this remote land, and wander around alone."
Thud.
Oh Hyeon-seong knelt on one knee and pressed his palm flat against the ground.
His mana flowed out along the earth.
Eyes closed in concentration, he extended his senses outward.
With the help of Merz, the spirit of the earth, he swept the surrounding area.
He'd worried that being out of practice would dull the technique, but almost immediately, movements squirming just beneath the surface came into focus.
Just as I thought—there are more of them inside the facility. Looks like they came in just now. Did they catch sight of us entering?
Hunters, combing through the facility.
Not one or two, but several dozen of them.
Moreover, every one of them seemed to be a hunter of decent rank, hiding their presence properly—well enough that even Oh Hyeon-seong couldn't have sensed them through ordinary means.
But against Merz's ability, skills for masking one's presence were simply meaningless.
Was this a trap designed to lure us here from the start? Or did they come chasing bad intel of their own?
Either way, one thing seemed certain: they were aware of his presence.
The enemy had posted guards at the facility's entrances, sealing off every route out.
It was, unmistakably, the shape of an ambush.
Well, whichever it is, I can just ask them directly.
By now, the enemy was probably convinced they had their quarry cornered.
But in fact, it was quite the opposite.
After all, they'd crawled right in here on their own.
GRUUUUMBLE!
The earth surrounding the entire underground facility began to writhe and heave.