Chapter 223: A Real Reaper
Park Gyumin hated the dark.
He had been extremely uncomfortable in pitch-black environments since a very young age, though he no longer remembered exactly when it started.
Because he was afraid of supernatural beings like ghosts and spirits.
Of course, as he grew older and matured, he stopped believing in such things.
Even so, the habit of preferring spaces with at least some lighting on regardless of day or night remained.
So the room where he spent time with the men and women who “served” him was no exception.
Nami Island’s electricity was somewhat lacking, but Park Gyumin always lived with bright LED lights turned on.
Even when he slept after indulging in depraved pleasures, he merely lowered the brightness a little rather than remaining in darkness.
Bzzzt.
“......!?”
Having lived over thirty years avoiding darkness, Park Gyumin woke instantly from his early-morning sleep the moment the room lights went out.
“What the...?”
Feeling around beside the bed, he found his phone and immediately turned on the flashlight.
In the current world it looked completely useless at first glance, but Park Gyumin filmed everything he did with his slaves on his phone.
Moreover, videos of the killings were all stored there too, and whenever he was bored he watched the horrifying snuff films he had personally recorded.
“Ugh, ah... too bright.”
“Mmm... what is it?”
“Shut your fucking mouths, trash.”
The people sleeping with him woke up grimacing at the bright light, but Park Gyumin paid them no attention and immediately climbed out of bed.
Outside, noisy voices were already echoing.
“What the hell? Why did all the lights go out?”
“I-I don’t know!”
“You think saying you don’t know solves it? Go find out!”
“Chief! It’s not just the lights! The entire power’s out!”
“What? Ah, fuck....”
Pricking up his ears, Park Gyumin hurriedly threw on his clothes.
Bang.
“What’s going on? What happened?”
“Ah! Director, well... the power suddenly went out.”
Hearing the employee holding a red flashlight like a security guard would use, Park Gyumin narrowed his eyes.
“Ha, seriously... what about the guys standing guard? There should be people at the CCTV room and power room, no? And at the hotel too.”
“Ah, about that....”
The employee continued awkwardly.
“We sent scouts to Namyangju too. And yesterday we sent a few more men to the garden to wait for the reconnaissance team, so we were short on manpower... so there’s only one guy in the CCTV room....”
“.......”
“.......”
Since he himself was the one who had given those orders, Park Gyumin could only scowl deeply.
“There are radios, aren’t there? Did you try contacting them?”
“Yes. But there’s no response. We thought maybe they were asleep, so we sent some guys over.”
“Ah... fine. Just fix it quickly.”
“Yes, Director.”
It was right then, as the employee turned around.
- C-Chief....
“Huh? Who is this? Jiwon?”
The employee brightened when a transmission came through from one of the men sent to the hotel where the power room was located.
But—
- Chief. Please save me... there’s someone here, no, a ghost... ugh....
“What? What are you talking about? Hey, Jiwon. What the hell are you saying right now?”
- I-I don’t know. I don’t know either. Everyone who came with me... I think they’re all dead. The fog, the fog is too... hhk, I-I hurt too, Chief. Huh? Ah, aaah? Hrrgh... a, a ghost...!?
Click.
The radio transmission of the employee, who had been rambling incomprehensible but horrifying words, abruptly cut off.
“......!?”
There were still more than thirty minutes left until sunrise.
The rain had almost stopped, but fierce wind continuously battered the corridor windows drowned in darkness, making them rattle.
With such an eerie atmosphere already hanging in the air, hearing something like this naturally made the employee feel his hair standing on end.
And that was even more true for Park Gyumin, who had been especially terrified of ghosts and spirits since childhood and always slept with the lights on at night.
In an instant, the hairs all over his body stood up, goosebumps spread across his skin, and his lower stomach felt cold and heavy.
Feeling as though he had suddenly returned to elementary school, Park Gyumin opened his lips, now completely dry before he even realized it.
“G-Go out. Everyone go out and find out what’s happening. Turn the lights back on first. No, give me that. Are there more flashlights? Where are the others?”
“Huh? Ah, there are a few more in the office. I’ll go get—”
“N-No. I’ll get them myself. You hurry up and take the guys out there and check the situation first.”
“Y-Yes!”
Snatching the flashlight from the flustered employee almost violently, Park Gyumin turned on both his phone light and the old-fashioned flashlight and headed toward the office.
“Fuck, fuck....”
Just like the constant stream of curses spilling from his mouth, his body was trembling like a leaf.
***
Wheeeeeeeeee...!
The cold dawn wind swept across the Bukhan River, soaked wet from the rain that had poured down all night, producing a chilling howl.
Kiiiiiiiiing...!
Mixed into that wind was the rotor noise of an A2 attack drone flying roughly twenty meters above the ground.
And not just one.
Two A2 attack drones, including the one Park Deokcheol was controlling, were simultaneously flying at low altitude.
As the sound of the rotors tearing through the wind mixed with the powerful gusts sweeping over the river, it created a bizarre noise like the cries of ghosts heard in horror movies.
Moreover, because Nami Island sat in the middle of the river to begin with, fog frequently formed there.
And tonight, because of the rain that had poured down nonstop, the fog was far thicker than usual.
Thus, with the fog, the predawn darkness, and the horrifying sounds all tangled together, Nami Island resembled the set of a horror film itself.
“.......”
Keeping his body low in the brush, Junho stared into the fog where human forms could barely be distinguished beyond twenty meters.
Several sources of light, presumably flashlights, were moving around and slowly drawing closer.
But through the wide-angle night-vision goggles Junho wore, the heat signatures of the humans holding those lights were clearly visible.
“Now.”
The moment Junho spoke quietly—
- Confirmed.
Paw... pawooong....
“Aaagh!”
“Khk!? What the hell? What’s happening— guh!”
The A2 drones flying low unleashed tungsten rounds upon the Nami Island looters.
They had been upgraded more than the A1s, but their accuracy was still lacking, and now there were fierce winds, unstable flight conditions, and thick fog on top of that.
But every one of the Nami Island looters was carrying a flashlight.
The drones controlled by Yoon Seolhee and Park Deokcheol merely had to fire at those lights, which had become perfect targets fully exposed in the darkness and fog.
Kiiiiiiiiing...! Pawoong... pawooong....
“Ugh, aaah...! Ghk!”
“What the fuck is this!? What the fuck!?”
Out of the six light sources the looters had been carrying, all but one either disappeared or fell motionless onto the ground.
“Cease fire.”
Papapapapak!
The moment the A2 drones stopped firing, Junho exploded forward like a beast while keeping his body low, slicing through the fog.
Kiiiiiiing...!
“Hhk!?”
The bastard who whipped his body around and raised his head at the sound of the A2 drone mixed into the howling wind failed to notice Junho charging at him like an arrow from barely twenty meters away.
Puhk!
The looter’s head split in half from the machete strike, and he collapsed without even managing a scream.
After finishing off several others writhing on the ground after being hit by tungsten rounds, Junho checked the screen attached to his forearm armor part and spoke again in a low voice.
“The guys who came to Namyangju as a reconnaissance team, the ones who took the boat to the dock, those bastards earlier, and these fuckers now. That makes twenty-six. There should only be a little over ten left now.”
- Shall we move in?
“Yeah. Manager, I’m counting on you.”
- Understood.
If it was Yoon Seolhee—a consummate professional whose abilities Junho had personally verified multiple times—then she would take good care of Choi Hyunwoo and Park Deokcheol.
That was why Junho could focus entirely on what he had to do without a single worry.
Step. Step. Step.
Holding the radio one of the dead looters had carried, Junho began walking toward the food court, his final destination.
***
“Fuck, what the hell happened? Why isn’t anyone contacting us!?”
“How the hell should I know? I’m going crazy too!”
At Park Gyumin’s furious nagging, Kim Geonwoo—the former corrupt police executive—answered irritably while holding something out.
“Just take this first.”
“Ha, fuck....”
Park Gyumin shoved the K5 pistol he owned into its holster and took the K2 rifle Kim Geonwoo thrust toward him.
“You know how to shoot, right? There are only two magazines, so—”
“How the fuck would I know?”
“What?”
“I was exempt.”
“Ha....”
Well, there was no way the child of a pro-Japanese collaborator family with assets worth hundreds of billions hidden away had properly served in the military.
Clack. Chak.
After checking the chamber and magazine and even pulling the charging handle for him, Kim Geonwoo pointed at the selector switch.
“Keep it on safe for now. When you need to fire, use your thumb to switch it to semi-auto. It’s stiff, so push hard. Okay?”
“Fuck, got it. I’ll figure it out.”
Feeling uneasy for some reason, Kim Geonwoo clicked his tongue quietly and turned around.
“Hey, we still don’t know what’s going on, but everybody hold your positions and—”
It was right then.
- I-Inspector, please save me... a ghost, a monster... KRAAAAH!
One of the men on the first floor of the food court let out a horrifying scream midway through his radio transmission.
“!!!!!”
The scream was so loud everyone heard it, and as though they had planned it beforehand, every single one of them froze.
Wheeeeeee... clatter, creak.
An eerie wind blew through the corridor windows that had shattered long ago but were never repaired, making the window frames and doors groan.
Then immediately afterward—
Aaaahhh... hraaagh....
An even more horrifying scream rose from the first floor of the food court and spread through the second-floor corridor carried by the wind.
And it was enough to plunge even these people—who had killed cannibal monsters and butchered fellow humans indiscriminately while looting—into fear.
Above all, every comrade who had sent a transmission after the power went out had mentioned one similar, no, identical word.
Ghost.
None of them, all adults and murderers, would normally believe in something like that.
But because of “zombies,” something they never believed could exist, the world had truly collapsed.
Frankly speaking, even if something beyond that appeared, it would not be strange anymore.
“Fuck....”
Feeling goosebumps rise across his skin, Kim Geonwoo muttered quietly.
“Everybody get into concealment and cover first. Shine the flashlights toward that side, toward the stairs. When I give the order— no. Fuck it. Anything we see besides ourselves, just shoot it.”
“Y-Yes, sir.”
“And Director, you should— huh?”
Kim Geonwoo narrowed one eye as he looked back at Park Gyumin.
Drenched in sweat to the point his whole face glistened, Park Gyumin was trembling violently with terror written all over his face.
“No, what the hell are you doing right—”
KIIIIIIIIIIING!
At that moment, an enormous and horrifying sound—truly like a ghost crying—swept past outside the second-floor food court windows.
And the instant everyone instinctively turned toward the sound—
“Huaaagh!”
BANG! BANGBANGBANG!
Park Gyumin, who had been unusually terrified of ghosts since childhood, fired the K2 on full auto toward the corridor window where the “ghost sound” had come from.
“Ack!?”
“Gah!”
As everyone covered their ears and shrank back from the deafening gunfire exploding in the narrow corridor—
A man clad in pitch-black ballistic gear, who would forever be remembered by the Nami Island looters as a real “ghost,” suddenly burst out from the stairway.
Fwoosh. Thunk, thunk-thunk.
Something flew through the air across more than twenty meters and rolled right up to the cover position nearest the stairs.
It was a K413 fragmentation grenade.
KWA-BOOOOM!!!
Sixty-two grams of composite high explosive detonated, scattering hundreds of tungsten fragments in every direction.
And immediately afterward—
Junho, not some supernatural ghost but a real reaper that truly existed, charged toward those who had piled up countless sins.