The Operation Begins

The moment I woke, my whole body ached. Days of sleeping muscle pain had apparently decided to wake with me, and I lay there blinking for more than ten minutes before I could make myself move.

Still, it was a clear morning. I hadn't dreamed.

"Elder Heo."

"You come around?"

Elder Heo knew me. So he could still hold a person in his head for about a day.

"That thing you left……. Let's have a look."

Behind him, baskets of Cores stood in a row. A slip of paper was stuck to each one, notes set down with whatever he cared to remember about the person who'd left them. Other appraisers ran a scanner when they needed to confirm who a client was. Elder Heo had kept to this way of doing it. The feel of the work in the hands, or something like it.

"Strange, this……."

He flared his nostrils and looked from me to the basket and back again.

"This the right one? You leave three?"

He drew the basket in close. I'd turned it so the slip faced away from me, but I was already too late. Those hawk's eyes had read the thing long before.

I had nothing to say to that.

"What're you standing there gawking for? Did you leave three or didn't you!"

"I did."

Maybe I should have showered when Jo Yong-han told me to. It was probably the Feeder, the meeting I'd had just before I came. The reek of rotten zombie meat must have soaked into me.

Notes were stuck to two of the Cores as well. The last one had a black sticker in place of a slip.

"Elder Heo, is this by any chance—"

A no-entry sticker. It might explode, and that meant it was not to be carried inside Headquarters.

"Failure rate's sky-high. Banned from entry."

The yellow Core I'd taken after the airstrike wiped out the raider band those two bosses had led. The very Core Postman Kim-ssi had been robbed of.

"How high?"

"Ninety-five percent."

An Ability Core, then. Kim-ssi had been telling the truth. He'd have had it appraised at Headquarters while he was still alive, which meant a no-entry sticker had already been stuck to it once before.

He'd have peeled it off at once.

Force one of those stickers and it left a mark. There were technicians, though, who specialized in taking them off. Easy enough to find if you went to the black market. A no-entry sticker was as good as a sign reading Ability Core, so the usual thing was to strip it away before anyone else got a look.

"Don't you peel that. You'll catch hell."

"Yes."

Elder Heo set the stickered Core on my palm.

"You're gonna peel it, aren't you."

"Yes."

"Tsk, tsk."

Min Yeo-jin had said there was someone who'd used an Ability Core three times and lived. Only a rumor, she'd told me, but it wasn't a story I could wave off. Two uses were possible. Why not a third?

That was the whole of the rumor. I couldn't say what further change there might be beyond an ability's evolution, but the important part was that the ability evolved once more.

Only a rumor.

Either way, I'd do better to carry this Ability Core with me. Just in case.

Next was the green Core from Cradle Clinic. More than a few people had bled over that one. I'd seen a ripple pattern inside it. A good sign.

"One percent, you lucky bastard."

As expected. A one-percent failure rate. That would be serious money.

"Where'd you get it?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Why do I ask, he says?"

"I asked fir—"

"Respect your elders!"

I could hit the man and he wouldn't remember it anyway.

"I picked it up along the way."

"Hmph. Open your mouth and a lie falls out!"

Elder Heo started writing something new on the slip fixed to the basket.

"This Core, now—if your eye's any good, you can tell it's a precious thing without a lick of appraisal ability. That's what this is."

He was right. The ripple pattern. It was likely either a communications Core or an Ability Core, and at one percent it had to be communications. An Ability Core never showed a failure rate under ninety-five.

"What I'm telling you is, no one comes by a thing like this easy. You hear me?"

"Yes."

"Hmph!"

He clicked his tongue and brought out the last Core.

"This one's junk! Sixty-one percent!"

Not even an Ability Core, and the failure rate was pointlessly high. Nobody used a thing like that unless they were about to starve. The side effects of a failed use grew in step with the rate, too. Sixty-one percent was enough to leave you badly hurt. The one-percent Core I'd just had checked—even if my luck turned rotten and it failed—would amount to a day of body aches and then be done with me.

I'd had some hopes for it, green Core that it was. Then again, a Core betraying you was hardly a novelty. At any rate, I'd collected every Core I'd left to be appraised.

"Elder Heo, I'd like to ask one more favor."

"Eh?"

The green Core Boss had paid me for the blueprint.

"Why's this one so sticky? And what's this mold stink!"

"It sat under the floor mats a long time."

"Tsk, tsk!"

He started scribbling on the basket slip again.

"Come fetch this one tomorrow too! Work's piled high!"

"I have a great deal of work myself, so I can't say whether I'll be able to come tomorrow."

"Hmph! Playing at busy."

The foul-smelling Core went into a basket and was set down behind him. The slip on it was packed edge to edge with writing, so fine I couldn't make it out. Well. Maybe not knowing was better.

"I'll hold it a month, so come get it before then!"

He threw out what he had to say and turned his back. It probably wouldn't be a full month before I came again, but by then he'd have forgotten me down to the bone.

Say goodbye and he'd only find it a nuisance.

Leaving without a word was the considerate thing, where Elder Heo was concerned. I turned my back as well, and once more I felt the weight of the radio at my waist.

Elder Heo…….

No need to put his name on the candidate list. Never mind that you couldn't hold a conversation with him—he was the sort who wouldn't take the thing even if you put it in his hand. What I wondered, more than that, was whether he was in line to be driven out of Headquarters himself. A man with dementia only went on living in one piece because he held an indoor post. Throw him out and he wouldn't last a day.

Surely they wouldn't chase out an old man like that.

He was skilled labor, and Core appraisers were still too few. The ones being driven out, I told myself, would be the people who could be replaced.

The place I'd called Min Yeo-jin out to was the plaza inside Headquarters.

"Teeeacher~"

She looked as cheerful as ever. She probably had no idea how grim the mood at Headquarters had turned.

"You missed me, right?"

"No."

"Honestly, you're hopeless! It's written all over your face."

She'd misread me badly. All the same, I really did need to go around with my face properly washed.

A Hunter held a fairly high station, and yet their grasp of things lagged well behind that station. More precisely, the information was being kept from them. They were the manpower that supplied Core abilities, so they were treated well enough—while a wariness of Hunters lived right alongside the courtesy. If a rebellion ever broke out inside Headquarters, the organization that would be the real problem was the Hunters. That was why a Hunter outfit was not permitted an intelligence department of its own. There was an operations room, but every scrap of information came down from Headquarters, and most of what Headquarters provided originated with the Future Technology Department. The Future Technology Department, for its part, had no combat troops of its own. They were being kept in check in their own fashion.

The only organization that held both an intelligence arm and fighting men was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the military. Set beside the Future Technology Department, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠though, the military's intelligence was a pittance, and in a fight the Hunters chewed them up. And the post office had nothing at all.

"Teeeacher~ How about a drink together this time, for real?"

"It's broad daylight."

"Oh! You're being forward today."

"What?"

"You mean we should meet at night, right? Heh."

I was starting to think Elder Heo was the easier conversation.

"Enough. I've got a favor to ask."

"Oh? I know a quiet place where there's nobody around. How about it?"

"That too. You gave Clock-out Man a job, didn't you?"

The work he'd been doing out in the world. Watching for a monster horde on the approach—that had been Min Yeo-jin's errand.

A Hunter instructor—a survival instructor especially—had all kinds of work come in. I'd held the post myself, so I knew it well. It wasn't easy work, and as a rule they sent the trainees out to deal with it under the name of field practice. Now and then something too miscellaneous came down, and that ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠got farmed out to a mercenary. The job Clock-out Man had taken was that sort.

"Oh? You met Senior out there?"

"He was working hard at the job you gave him."

"You mean watching for the monster horde? It was exactly the kind of work Senior's good at, so I asked him right away."

Min Yeo-jin was a year older than Clock-out Man, but he was several classes her senior. He'd become a Hunter early. She was a late starter—not because she'd fallen out during training, only because she'd used a Core later than most. Her starting line had simply been farther back. To become a Hunter you had to handle a Core ability with some skill by around twenty at the latest. There was an unspoken age limit of sorts; past a certain point, they wouldn't take you as a trainee. Min Yeo-jin had only just made the cut.

"Senior told me not to talk about him to you, so I haven't said a word all this time."

"Seemed that way."

"You're not hurt, are youuu?"

Clock-out Man had asked me to find him work. Put him in touch with Min Yeo-jin and the thing solved itself. So why hadn't he asked her for more of it long before now? There was a reason.

"If anyone's hurt, it's you."

"What? Me? I'm not hurt at all."

"Not with me. With Clock-out Man."

"Ah……. Come on, that's all in the past."

After I quit the Hunter life, the only person Min Yeo-jin had to lean on was Clock-out Man. Nobody else would keep her company, and the cause was another talent of hers, as remarkable ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠as her Core.

A talent for earning hatred with words and actions that meant no harm.

In any case, she'd been on edge for fear Clock-out Man would quit the way I had. She'd tried everything, by the sound of it, to keep him from leaving. And when he finally said he was done, she'd clung to him with everything she had. Neither of them had ever told me the details, but I could guess well enough. In the end he left, and she didn't even say goodbye.

"I'm really not hurt at all anymore! I mean it!"

"You ought to wash your face, too."

"Ehk? Is something on it? Where? Where is it?"

She was a proper superior now, an instructor in her own right, so failing to get along with the other Hunters probably wouldn't matter much. Maybe that was why she'd wanted the post so quickly.

"This favor—it has something to do with Senior, doesn't it?"

"Got any jobs that would suit Clock-out Man?"

"Huh? He'll take Headquarters commissions too?"

"Give him one and he'll swallow it whole."

"You think? He didn't look happy at all about checking on the monster horde."

Min Yeo-jin had no sense for a room. A great deal of none. That was why she earned people's hatred without ever meaning to.

"Even if he doesn't look happy, he'll take every bit of it."

"I don't really follow……."

If he'd truly been unhappy about it, he wouldn't have agreed to the job she'd asked of him just before. Accepting meant he was that hard up for work. And the reason he'd pretended otherwise was almost certainly that the person asking was Min Yeo-jin. When she'd begged him to stay a Hunter, he'd refused. Coming back now and snapping the work up because he was desperate would have sat wrong with him. Unlike her, Clock-out Man had a sense for these things. Even now, if he'd told her he needed work instead of telling me, it would have been settled without any trouble.

"If you can, I'd like you to keep giving him jobs on a regular basis."

"Oh! I'd love that. A mercenary you can actually trust isn't easy to come by. Though I wonder if Senior will keep taking them."

Her own hurt probably hadn't faded altogether, but it was a favor I was asking, so she granted it readily enough. In the end the rift between the two of them wasn't going to close unless I was the one to close it.

Still, Min Yeo-jin was a little more of an adult.

At least she'd been the first to make a gesture toward mending it.

He couldn't have failed to understand what she meant. I wondered what he'd made of it.

"If you give him the work, he'll probably keep taking it."

"You've already settled it with Senior?"

"Not in the slightest."

"Eh?"

"You can start now. Work it out between you—how often, and how you'll pass the jobs along from here on."

I'd done this much. The rest they could manage themselves.

"Ah. Senior can't come inside Headquarters, can he?"

"Clock-out Man will come by in front of Headquarters on a regular basis. All you have to do is hand him the job then."

That way I'd know when he turned up in Yeouido. Useful, if I ever needed a mercenary myself.

"Is Teacher's business finished now?"

"So it seems."

"Then…… how about we move on to our business?"

"No."

"I haven't even said what it is yet."

Of everyone I might give the radio to, Min Yeo-jin was the one it would help most. There was a problem, though.

Take the radio, and she'd have to stand with Boss. And with Kkamagwi.

Min Yeo-jin loathed anything illegal. She was born to eat the state's grain. There was no world in which a woman like that kept company with the black-market people living illegally off Headquarters. Boss and Kkamagwi both meant to leave the market before long, but there was a limit to how well you could hide where you'd come from.

The moment I decided I had to give it to someone, it stopped being easy.

Nobody felt like the one. It wasn't urgent yet. I could watch a little longer.

"Teeeacher~ Come on, if we go over that way there's a quiet place—"

Wheeeeng!

An alarm cut the moment clean in two. For a split second I was even grateful.

"Hm? I've never heard this alarm before. What is it? Did they change the air-raid siren?"

Something was wrong. I'd never heard it either.