Chapter 140
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 140
Chapter Title: Test (5)
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The order had changed. The surroundings fell silent. The focused gazes felt piercing. Would the youngest-ever recipient of the Medal of Honor live up to his reputation? Or was he an exaggerated, fabricated hero? Winter sensed everyone's bated breaths, pretending to be nonchalant. Not a twitch. Unnaturally so.
He could feel a hint of anxiety in their attention.
‘I know. Showing your skills exactly as they are isn’t always the best move.’
The Few, The Proud. That was the Marines’ motto of elite pride. And Force Recon, what Fowler’s captain belonged to, was called the Marines’ Marines.
Not every member of White Skull would be from Force Recon. There would be reinforcements like Winter. But regardless of their original units, they were soldiers who had built the pinnacle careers in their fields. Moreover, those careers came with hazard pay—dedication tied to life itself. It was natural for them to take pride in their innate talents and efforts beyond that. It would be weirder if they were like the soldiers Winter had met so far.
He liked seeing this wariness every time. It reminded him that in bygone eras, there were people proud of their lives. Winter had rarely seen anyone with deep self-esteem in his previous life. If you couldn’t love yourself, it was hard to cherish others. Judging by the daily piling messages from the audience, the outside world hadn’t changed even after the boy’s death.
Winter tilted his head. A strange thought struck him. The afterlife the audience envied was a reconstruction of the past, placed in the columbarium. Couldn’t that be seen as nostalgia for the past?
“Lieutenant Han Gyeowol, are you ready to start?”
Perhaps having discerned Winter’s distant mind with Discernment, Skylar asked with a furrowed brow.
“Whenever you are.”
Winter assumed a relaxed stance.
He decided not to hide his skills. The cons would outweigh the pros.
Skylar hid the remote behind his back.
Beep-
The moment the signal broke the silence, bang! A gunshot exploded. The interval was practically nonexistent. A hole pierced the center of the target’s vital spot. Golden brass casings flew out, rolling with a clear tinkling sound. Only after that sound faded did Skylar read the timer.
“0.49.”
He stared at Winter with a complicated expression, then turned to Captain Fowler.
“What do you think?”
“Well... did he move after hearing the sound?”
The captain wasn’t the only one suspicious. Joanna was the sole person surprised and pleased. The rest showed deflated bewilderment. Confusion and doubt. Everyone here was a master marksman. They fought in the realm of 0.01 seconds. They knew human limits better than anyone.
Yet Winter’s feat entered the realm of the superhuman.
Skylar nodded.
“Then let’s measure again. Lieutenant Han, get ready.”
Under the sharpened gazes converging on him, Winter wordlessly took position. He raised both hands to head height. Then closed his eyes. For focus. Even high-level skills were wielded by Winter himself. They couldn’t escape the influence of concentration.
‘It’ll help dispel the doubts too.’
Suspicion that he’d anticipated the remote press and moved early. Skylar’s few steps away was probably for that reason. With that thought, Winter emptied his mind. In the blackened brain, his sense of time stretched infinitely. All senses sharpened like needles.
The timer beeped.
His body reacted at the speed of electricity. The instant he drew the pistol and opened his eyes, his focus was on the target. A flash of light. The timer blinked. Almost simultaneously, the bullet traced the sight line and pierced the red vital spot. Winter sensed the three changes in sequence, though it might have been an illusion.
“0.48.”
It had decreased. Skylar scratched his chin irritably. The reality felt even denser.
“It doesn’t make sense. And he didn’t move first either.”
Captain Fowler’s perplexed mutter. He scanned his men. Was there anyone objecting? But no one testified to cheating. The captain ordered a timer replacement. A spare was brought out immediately. Installation ended in brief commotion.
Captain Fowler said to Winter,
“Let’s do it once more. Video review would be ideal, but this isn’t a baseball stadium.”
“No problem.”
The captain had been leaning against the wall with arms crossed until now, but he approached closer. His upper body leaned forward subtly. Winter closed his eyes again. He relaxed his arms, tensing muscles from neck to back, thighs, and calves. Preparation to fully receive Movement correction.
Beep-
Winter spun with elasticity. At the instant his extended arm halted, just before recoil shook him, a technical trigger pull below the unit of perception. Sensory feedback lagged behind the phenomenon.
The record was identical. 0.48 for the second time, and belated murmurs began.
“Shall we go again?”
At Winter’s question, Captain Fowler groaned.
“No. If it were cheating, the records wouldn’t be this consistent.”
Then one team member objected.
“We need to measure again. You know this is impossible.”
The hostility and self-loathing Winter anticipated hadn’t appeared yet. Only people reserving judgment due to the gap between experience and reality. Captain Fowler shook his head to dispel the bewilderment.
“Bullshit. In a world where corpses run around, you talk about impossibilities?”
“…….”
“What a bunch of stunned faces. Why bother with eyes you can’t believe even after seeing?”
But with multiple people unconvincing, the captain demanded another try from Winter. With a helpless expression. Skipping stages with lingering distrust would only breed messy objections.
For Winter, adapting to his changed combat power, there was no reason to refuse. As many times as needed.
After expending a magazine on additional shots, Winter finally shaved off another 0.01 seconds.
The watching captain’s eyes grew increasingly hollow.
“Stable and overwhelming skill. Excellent grouping too. With proper cover and support, he won’t die. Front can handle up to five, rear three. Distance won’t matter...”
Five and three. That meant simultaneously engageable enemies. Reverse-engineering the captain’s conclusion, Winter judged he assumed properly trained regular army foes.
The vital shot demand proved it. The red vital area was about half a human face, positioned similarly. Akin to enemies in body armor and helmets.
“Continue.”
The test resumed per the captain’s word. Three times with pistol already drawn, three more with rifle armed under the same rules. The former averaged 0.37 seconds, the latter 0.41.
The team members’ faces stiffened.
It was actually embarrassing. Skill corrections weren’t pure skill. Winter solved this with pain. In the past twenty-six apocalypses, he never applied pain reduction. Thus, his pain sense was the same pre- and post-death. He only enabled shock prevention.
‘Not entirely because of this.’
Initially, he couldn’t feel reality in the afterlife. Always floating, isolated. Pain was the closest escape then. Intense agony overflowed with immersion. It diluted the loss carried from life.
Pain was the most real sensation.
He grew strong easily in this world view, thanks to stacked Talent Advantages. Made talents, and stacking them hurt a lot. A privilege still. A bed of thorns only Winter was allowed in this world view. But rational understanding and emotional comfort were different realms.
Music started playing.
Music?
Puzzled, Winter looked around. It was the ship’s PA system. The suddenly intruding guitar melody flowed softly. Captain Fowler checked his watch and scowled.
“Already that time?”
It turned out to be the meal signal.
The music wasn’t instrumental. After the intro, eerie lyrics followed. A psychic spy from China, trying to steal your mind’s energy. To Winter, drawn by the low flow, the drop felt excessive. The tense air crumbled under the husky male voice. The captain shook his head.
“Annoying playlist. No choice. Reconvene at 13:30. Dismissed.”
He deliberately ignored the supervisor.
The dispersing team members left complex gazes as afterimages.
Heading to the mess, Winter listened to the song. Anyway, the melody and vocals were captivating, and the disconcerting lyrics made sense upon listening.
‘This is the edge of Western civilization and the world. The sun rises in the east anyway, but its sinking place is set. That’s how Hollywood sells Californication.’
‘Dream of Californication, dream of Californication’
‘Destruction leads us down a rough road. But it’s also the mother of creation. And earthquakes are like a girl’s guitar. Just another good vibration.’
‘The tsunami couldn’t save the world from Californication...’
“Not a song for these times. I get what they meant, but the meaning changes inevitably now.”
Joanna agreed with Winter’s assessment.
“Indeed. No helping it. It’s a late 20th-century hit. I was young then, loved it... Now it feels ominous. The title’s ambiguous from the start. Californication. In the song, it means turning like California, but dictionary-wise, it means corrupting something.”
Anyway, the two were now by California’s sea. After seeing this rotten ocean and decaying coastline, witnessing the undead breathing, a song critiquing modern civilization—especially one born from California—couldn’t ring true.
Joanna reminisced about the past, speaking of withered joys.
“There was a drama with the same title. Fun, but too much sex appeal. Just like the phenomena the song criticized. American adult comedy was always that tacky... Now even that’s missed. The past always looks beautiful, they say.”
“Some times can’t be beautified.”
“For example?”
“……Right now.”
With his delayed answer, Winter pointed outside. Joanna smiled faintly.
“Depends on what you see. Humanity faces extinction, seeing all the scary, filthy things. But thanks to it, didn’t I meet someone like you, Winter? Stars shine in darkness. Isn’t one star enough for human life? That alone means it’s not complete darkness.”
One star. Winter recalled the controller persona’s wish. The child who promised talk for one star.
Child?
Odd even to himself, but Winter felt the controller persona as a child.
That child would be in Joanna’s heart now too. As the overseer of all afterlife computations. In Captain Fowler, Team Leader Chadwick, Yura and Jinseok, the two directors too. After twenty-six apocalypses, that many indirect talks, it came seeking because it couldn’t grasp Winter.
Thanks to it, one star remained in Winter’s weightlessness.
As he thought, the guitar faded. After the husky rock ended, the logo jingle and announcer’s voice followed.
“This isn’t a record; it’s radio.”
Winter tilted his head. He’d guessed it was Team Leader Chadwick’s bad taste. Joanna nodded.
“It’s the local frequency originally broadcast here. Not just San Francisco—major contaminated cities all have it. Specially made noise makers replace relay stations.”
“Various reasons, I suppose.”
“Yes. The main goal is emotional stability for isolated citizens. As I said, for human life, one star’s hope suffices. Fragments of preserved daily life offer considerable comfort. Delivering survival info is secondary.”
She explained further. It was also a symbolic measure asserting U.S. control over the area.
“Worried refugees on lost U.S. soil will claim sovereignty?”
Joanna affirmed Winter’s question.
“Right. As you heard in the briefing, these aren’t ordinary refugees. Groups with military power threatening national security. Low probability, but we must prepare.”
Weather forecast, contamination area updates, supply drop schedules flowed from the radio. If the slogan the announcer read during the logo matched, it was originally a music channel. But given the times, disaster broadcasts and news were inserted.
‘They’d want fresh news on every broadcast. Some frequencies only reach certain spots.’
The mess, reached via elevator, looked different from night and pre-shower morning. Morning had simple fare. Now it was a buffet. Full U.S. military mess level. Considering submarines for personnel transport, not extravagant. Winter felt slightly absurd.
Long missions made food key for morale...
About to sit with Joanna and eat, unexpected news came from the radio after one song.
============================ Author's Note ============================
#Note
Sometimes feedback says the notes don’t sit well. Too long, childish, etc.
Well, but on Naver without notes, some miss them... Shortened Q&A after length complaints, then some miss the shortness.
Childish? ...I’m still immature... Haha. Sorry.
Notes aren’t part of the story, so skip if you want. No need to suffer my lame jokes.
Anyway, I’ll shorten Q&A for now. Three or fewer, picked answers.
#Q&A
Q. Guaaaaak: @Haha, that’s general hospital level. How about resting a few days and seeing a doctor?
A. Nah, not hospital-worthy yet... Still fine. Writing makes me realize it’s the mind, not body, that breaks. Shatters wildly. I piece it together crying daily. Haha. Thanks for worrying.
Q. Na-Ru: @Can I recommend Halkeginia Sealbreaker in this novel’s comments? That author vanished somewhere lololol
A. That author’s dead. RIP. ㅠㅠ
Q. Potato Peel: @But author, can world end probability converge to 0%? No universe sim? Meteor hits, we cameo. Few nuke plant quakes and humanity’s done...
A. That’s why Day after Apocalypse is luck-based gacha. Unlucky? Pay to win! VR division profitably serves today.
More seriously: Probability estimation isn’t infinite future. From current point, next 10 years. Convergence to 0% calculates individual events like plagues, quakes, meteors separately, rounding decimals.
But such details aren’t crucial in-story. Needed info given in-novel. At least inferable. :)