Chapter 74
Chapter 74
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 74
Chapter Title: Into the Deep Sea (2)
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BOOM!
Without hesitation, Kanghyeok fired the shotgun.
SPLAT!
Blood splattered from the man next to Lento as if a water balloon had burst, and a pale-faced Lento hastily covered his head.
Even so, he stared at Kanghyeok, his eyes wide with disbelief.
'How is he...'
He thought the man was surely dead; it was a situation no one could have survived.
Yet that very man was alive and standing before him.
"Lower the boat, now!"
"Hurry, move it!"
Led by his frantic men, Lento boarded a lifeboat as Kanghyeok advanced, firing the shotgun.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
With each pull of the trigger, blood and flesh flew from the men around Lento.
"Lower the boat, you sons of bitches!"
A man in the lifeboat with Lento screamed, and the pulleys began to lower the boat to the sea.
Rat-a-tat-tat!
A man unleashed a hail of bullets at Kanghyeok.
Rat-a-tat-tat!
And Gabriel and Amos desperately pulled their triggers to protect him.
And in the midst of it all.
BOOM! BOOM!
Kanghyeok slowly closed in on Lento.
KABOOM!
Just then, a massive explosion erupted on the side of the cruise ship, causing the ropes connected to the lifeboat to swing violently.
"Aaaaargh!"
The scream of a man falling from the lifeboat echoed across the night sea. Lento, who had managed to endure the vibrations by clinging to the lifeboat's ropes, looked down with trembling eyes.
The pitch-black sea of unknown depth looked like the eye of a demon.
The flames dancing between the sea and the lifeboat resembled a demon's tongue, and when he looked up, Kanghyeok seemed like the devil himself.
Click.
Kanghyeok took aim at Lento with the reloaded shotgun.
"N-no!"
Another man shielded Lento with his body, but Kanghyeok placed his finger on the trigger.
'The lifeboat first.'
BOOM!
The wide spray of shotgun pellets rained down on the lifeboat.
P-p-pop! Hiss!
The man shielding Lento was torn apart, and air hissed out of the lifeboat.
Lento panicked on the rapidly deflating lifeboat, while Kanghyeok looked down at him and switched to a rifle.
Seeing Kanghyeok aiming squarely at his head against the dark night sky, Lento moved instinctively.
He was trying to escape the lifeboat.
It was a feeling similar to jumping from the roof of a burning building to survive.
Splash.
He hit the water in a panicked flail, the impact feeling as jarring as landing in thick mud.
The cold seawater rushed in.
Blub, blub.
From beneath the water, Lento looked up at the fiercely burning cruise ship.
KABOOM!
Another massive explosion erupted, perhaps because the fire had reached the auxiliary fuel tanks.
Groooan!
Simultaneously, the cruise ship began to sink much faster.
The ship tilted as if it were about to fall on top of him, but Lento could do nothing.
Blub, blub.
All he could do was sink.
Sink beneath the dark waters, not knowing where the bottom was.
He had no choice but to silently accept his slowly approaching death.
Splash! Splash!
Men falling from the tilting cruise ship and lifeboats being thrown overboard hit the surface of the sea.
"Run, run!"
On the chaotic deck, where no one could even aim their guns at each other, Amos and Gabriel approached Kanghyeok, who was standing by the railing.
"We have to go too."
If they waited too long and the cruise ship sank faster, their chance of escape would be gone forever.
They would be caught in the current of the sinking ship and dragged into the sea.
Grip!
Gabriel grabbed Kanghyeok's wrist and spoke firmly.
"Let's go together."
Her voice carried the resolve that they would not be separated this time.
There were many lifeboats already in the water, and many still on the ship.
If they decided to escape, they could find a way.
But Kanghyeok pulled his hand away from Gabriel's and said softly.
"I still have something to do."
As Gabriel's expression hardened, Kanghyeok looked down at the dark sea where Lento had jumped.
He didn't seem like much of a man.
His chances of survival were slim, and even if he did, he didn't seem like he would be a major threat.
But his instincts and premonitions screamed of unease, and he couldn't take his eyes off Lento.
Click.
Kanghyeok drew a pistol.
"I'll see you in a bit."
He said, as if to reassure Gabriel and Amos, and then leaped toward the sea.
"You...!"
Gabriel's voice followed him from above.
Splash! Gurgle.
The cold water rushed in as if it had been waiting.
In the chilling sea, so cold it strained his heart, Kanghyeok looked around.
The water wasn't as dark as it had looked from above.
The burning cruise ship right beside him was illuminating the depths.
What could he see around him?
Corpses floating on the surface with their arms and legs dangling, and fragments of the sinking cruise ship.
And embers raining down onto the surface.
Gurgle.
Every time he moved, the air trapped in his suit escaped as tiny bubbles.
Kanghyeok searched for Lento through his bubble-obscured vision.
There had to be someone alive.
He would kill him.
With a pistol in one hand and a knife in the other, Kanghyeok scanned his surroundings, and finally, he spotted someone.
'That's him.'
Kanghyeok swam toward him. When he got closer, Lento spotted him too.
Blub.
Exhaling white bubbles, Lento turned his body.
Kanghyeok immediately extended his pistol toward Lento.
THUMP!
The gunshot was muffled underwater.
The bullet, enveloped by seawater, barely traveled a meter before losing its spin and falling uselessly into the depths.
Thump, thump, thump.
Kanghyeok fired a few more shots, but the bullets fell harmlessly each time.
So Kanghyeok moved closer to Lento.
KABOOM!
The light from the explosion pierced the surface and illuminated the sea.
And just then,
Crash, boom! Whoosh!
The wreckage of the cruise ship rained down onto the sea.
Small pieces made sounds like raindrops hitting the surface. Large pieces sounded like bombs exploding, and his vision was blurred by debris and bubbles.
And Kanghyeok saw it.
Gurgle.
Lento, caught on a steel rebar, sinking into the sea.
He looked like someone being dragged into a deep, dark abyss by a demon's hand.
Thump, thump, thump.
Kanghyeok pulled the trigger at Lento.
But the bullets lost their force before they could reach him, and debris rained down where Kanghyeok was as well.
'Damn it!'
Kanghyeok swam away, looking back in Lento's direction.
He had already been dragged down to where the light couldn't reach and was no longer visible.
Blub.
After swimming for a bit, Kanghyeok pushed a small amount of air from his lips and headed in the direction the bubbles rose.
Whoosh.
When he broke the surface, he saw the cruise ship tilted even more.
It felt like watching a dying giant or a collapsing empire.
Flash!
A light from the side flashed, stabbing at Kanghyeok's eyes.
Kanghyeok raised his pistol toward the light, then lowered it.
'These guys are fast.'
Gabriel and Amos were on the water, having apparently lowered a lifeboat as soon as Kanghyeok jumped in.
"Wait! We're coming!"
As Amos shouted frantically, Kanghyeok chuckled.
Coming where?
Out here on the sea.
Swish, swish.
Amos and Gabriel used their guns as oars to approach Kanghyeok, who took Gabriel's hand and climbed into the lifeboat.
Fwoosh! BOOM! KABOOM!
The cruise ship beside them continued to burn.
It was a majestic sight, yet strangely, it brought a sense of peace.
"Is it all over now?"
To the question from Amos, whose face and torso were dyed red by the cruise ship's flames, Kanghyeok answered, "For now."
"For now?"
"To be precise, for the time being."
Kanghyeok took a cigarette from his pocket, but upon seeing the seawater dripping from the pack, he tossed it far away.
Splash, splash!
"Ugh! Gurgle! H-help me!"
Just then, a man swam toward their lifeboat.
Then, realizing the people in the boat were not his allies, his face turned white. Kanghyeok shook the water from his pistol in front of the man.
"N-no."
BANG!
Amos, who shifted his gaze from the man sinking into the sea without even closing his eyes to Kanghyeok, spoke in a tone of disbelief.
"Can you just do that?"
"Yeah."
There's no information to be gained from them.
He'd experienced time and again that they weren't the type to answer questions.
And he had already thwarted all the plans that grunts like these would know about.
So, he had truly done everything he could here.
The development of the drug that had destroyed the world?
It would certainly be delayed.
His tension easing, Kanghyeok slumped down in the boat.
Amos and Gabriel silently used their guns to paddle away from the cruise ship. Just then, an LED blinked from inside Kanghyeok's coat.
Kanghyeok took out his phone.
Gabriel and Amos's gazes naturally fell on him as Kanghyeok, with a faint smile, tapped the phone's keypad.
"Who is it?"
In response to Gabriel's question, Kanghyeok shook his head and asked if it was okay for him to take a call.
"Of course."
"Excuse me for a moment."
Beep.
Kanghyeok pressed the call button and brought the phone to his ear.
(Hello?)
Yohan.
Yohan's voice, who had texted first as Kanghyeok had told him not to call directly, came through the phone.
"Speak."
(You're not busy, are you?)
"No, I'm done."
(And you're not hurt?)
"I'm fine."
(I'm sorry, but I've used up all the bullets.)
"All of them?"
(Yes...)
"You didn't do anything wrong. No need to say it like that."
(When are you coming back?)
Kanghyeok looked to the east.
Perhaps because it was just before sunrise.
A profound darkness had settled.
"I'll be back sometime today. Don't practice, just rest."
(Really?)
His tone was more pleased about him returning today than about being told not to practice.
So Kanghyeok smiled silently.
"Yeah. See you later."
(Yes!)
Beep.
As Kanghyeok ended the call, two pairs of incredulous eyes were fixed on him.
They had never imagined that Kanghyeok could talk to someone so kindly and normally.
"Who was that? Your son?"
Kanghyeok furrowed his brow at Gabriel.
"Then who?"
Kanghyeok opened his mouth, thinking the answer would be simple.
But describing Yohan in a single word was harder than he thought.
Someone who's been through something similar.
A son who lost his mother.
And one who shares the same goal.
Therefore, a boy he was looking after and training.
Kanghyeok gathered his thoughts and spoke.
"He's like a younger brother to me. His name is Yohan."
"Not your actual brother, then."
"No."
"If I get the chance, introduce me sometime."
"...I will."
Kanghyeok tucked his phone back into his coat.
When they were far enough away not to be caught by the sinking cruise ship, Amos clicked his tongue.
"Sorry to say, but I don't think we'll make it to shore today."
They were paddling hard in the direction of the harbor, but it felt more likely they'd be adrift forever than arrive on time.
"You don't have to worry about that."
"What?"
Th-th-th-th!
Beyond the point where the sky met the sea.
A helicopter could be seen, making a loud noise as it flew in a straight line toward Kanghyeok's position.
Amos and Gabriel looked at Kanghyeok in bewilderment.
But he looked perfectly calm, and the two of them relaxed as well.
They didn't know what was going on, but that helicopter seemed to be related to Kanghyeok.