KEG 28
While Guides, who regularly took the basic purification potions provided as part of civil servant benefits, could barely withstand this kind of direct inhalation, it was fatal for ordinary people.
“What on earth is going on…?”
“I have to make dinner for the kids.”
“Young man, I’m too short to see. So can you tell me what’s happening?”
I mingled with the crowd inside the subway station, watching the situation unfold.
I thought everything would be cleared up by the time people were heading home, but it was still gridlocked.
“There are giant pigeons flying around outside right now.”
When I replied to the elderly woman who had spoken to me, she let out an exclamation of horror and clutched her shopping bag, filled with knitting supplies, tightly to her chest.
“Citizens! We’re handing out disposable anti-contamination masks! Please take one each!”
Although disposable anti-contamination masks (easily available at convenience stores, pharmacies, and online) were of much lower quality than those used in hospitals or specialized institutions, they were better than nothing.
Above all, ever since the culture of wearing them took hold, people began to report that they hadn’t caught a single cold during the seasonal changes. It had been a positive development in many ways.
“Don’t just give us one! Give us a few!”
“One per person, please! Everyone needs to get one!”
Some people probably already had spares in their bags, and government officials had likely handed them out before people even entered the station.
But there were never enough. As the saying goes, “Generosity comes from a full granary,” but in this extreme disaster situation, human nature had shriveled up, and people were becoming increasingly ruthless just to get their hands on even this small thing.
Thud! Bang!
“Aaaargh!”
“Eek!”
Just then, an ominous cloud of dust swept in from the entrance.
“Huff… Is there… a Guide here?”
An Esper in military uniform limped inside. It seemed the military had been mobilized, and a battle was raging right outside.
Judging by his nosebleed and the bloodshot veins in his eyes, the situation appeared dire.
“Come this way.”
“Ah, Assistant Manager Kim…!”
“Yujin-ssi, please take care of the civilians.”
The Guide from the local government, addressed as Assistant Manager Kim, quickly took the soldier under his wing and led him to a corner. Next, the Guide called Yujin tried to calm the citizens as Assistant Manager Kim had instructed, but the appearance of a soldier with severe injuries had caused great panic among the people inside the subway station.
“What are we going to do? Is it going to collapse?”
“I’m scared…”
“Why is the data connection so slow! We can’t get in touch with anyone!”
Although they had gathered here to be cut off from the outside world, paradoxically, the fact that they couldn’t see what was happening outside was suffocating them.
The fear in people’s imaginations knew no bounds and continued to grow.
“Stop pushing! Who the hell do you think you are?!”
“Hey, do you know who I am?!”
“If we paid taxes, shouldn’t we get masks? Give me a mask!”
Fear turned to anger, and anger quickly turned to violence. People shoved and fought each other, or pointed fingers and hurled insults at the civil servants trying to control the crowd.
Crash!
“You son of a bitch! You’ve been doing this since earlier, damn it!!”
“Why is this guy acting like this?!”
Then, two men in the crowd got tangled up, fell to the ground, and started fighting.
They grabbed each other by the hair, tore at each other’s shirts as if to rip them apart, clawed, shoved; it was absolute chaos.
“Calm down! Calm…”
Thud!
“Ugh.”
The civil servant who had tried to break it up ended up getting struck in the right eye with an elbow.
“Are you okay?”
“Ugh, yeah…”
The civil servant took off his glasses and wiped the tears streaming from his injured eye, but soon his face contorted, and tears began to flow from his uninjured eye as well. It felt like he was crying from more from sorrow and exhaustion than pain.
I took a cotton handkerchief out of my bag and handed it to him.
“People are watching. Go cry somewhere out of sight.”
“But I haven’t stopped the fight yet…”
I turned around. I saw two masses of flesh rolling around on the floor, stripped down to the point of looking almost like a porn scene.
“You! You fucking bastard!!”
“Let go! Let go of me!”
Splash
I poured water over the heads of the two beasts, who were so worked up they couldn’t tell heaven from earth.
“What, what the…?!?”
“Damn it…!”
“Gentlemen.”
Clang!
I threw the empty water bottle, the source of the water, onto the floor. At the sound, the two men, whose vision had narrowed as they fought, suddenly became aware of their surroundings.
“Act your age.”
With my remark as the starting point, the crowd that had been just watching also found the courage to chime in.
“Hey, you guys! Put some clothes on! This is disgusting!”
“That’s right! Do you think you’re the only ones here?!”
“Is this your living room or something?!”
After finally realizing how embarrassing they looked, the two men blushed. They came to their senses and began grumbling as they picked up their clothes and put them back on.
It wasn’t that I hadn’t wanted to stop them (I just hadn’t had a chance) but in a chaotic situation like this, I doubt many people would be happy to see a fight.
“Let’s go.”
I helped the Guide, who had been sprawled on the floor, to his feet and headed toward the corner where the soldier and the guide named Assistant Manager Kim had disappeared earlier.
“Thank you. I’m sorry for the spectacle.”
“Not at all. There’s no need to be embarrassed. I’m a former soldier myself.”
“Oh, so you’re an Awakener?”
“Yes, I’m an E-class guide.”
As we made our way to the corner, we exchanged brief introductions.
The man, who introduced himself as Oh Yujin, a C-class Guide, seemed pleased to meet another Guide.
“I was E-class when I was a student, but my class gradually rose as I worked after becoming an adult.”
Cases like this were becoming increasingly common these days.
Cases of Awakeners who started at a low class but saw their class rise as they used their abilities more. However, it wasn’t as dramatic a change as a second awakening.
“If you work hard, Seongho-ssi, you’ll rise quickly too!”
“I’m just going to live as a civilian.”
Cases like mine were common too. Low-class Awakeners who lived day-to-day without any particular desire for achievement.
Even among high-class Awakeners, the story of an A-class Esper who was too afraid of combat to leave the house recently garnered a lot of attention.
“Once you’re an Awakener, it’s not easy to live as a civilian. Take me, for example, I used to have a job I really wanted to do. It’s all gone to hell now, though.”
The local government Guide muttered gloomily.
While many new jobs emerged after the Dungeon Break, just as many disappeared.
Now, the structure of industry had been completely overturned.
People who lost their jobs overnight had become so common that they didn’t even make the news anymore.
“Ugh… Anyway~ But where did the assistant manager go? Is he out guiding someone…?”
Squelch, slurp-
Just as the soldier and the local government Guide were about to round a corner in a secluded spot, a slurping, suggestive sound reached our ears. Sensing something ominous in that sound, we fell silent and stopped in our tracks.
An Esper and a Guide were conducting an emergency guiding.
In that case, the most efficient and fastest way…
“Haa… are you… feeling better…?”
“Just a little more….”
Slurp–
Startled by the sight of the two of them greedily breathing each other in the damp, chilly blind spot of the subway corner, Oh Yujin turned his head toward me with a nervous giggle.
I too stood there blankly, unable to react, before fumbling in my pocket for a cigarette.
“Um, what’s your… name…?”
“Ah–wait, any more than this…”
The heated, charged air warmed the two of them with a thrilling intensity, but to the onlookers, it felt like the spine-chilling thrill of witnessing a traffic accident. They were caught up in the moment, but we were left feeling somber.
“They say babies are conceived even in the midst of war….”
Eventually, I put the cigarette in my mouth and lit it.
The sound of the ventilation fans in the distance felt far away. That’s how captivated the two of them were by the sensation of their lips exploring each other.
It had clearly begun as a medical procedure. But at some point, they became consumed with personal desire.
Suck, slurp.
Their heads tilted from moment to moment, digging deeper into each other, and the friction of their mucous membranes intertwining lost its secrecy.
They demanded of each other without reservation, honestly, more, and more explicitly, and shame had no chance to rear its head during the act.
“Ah….”
Every time their lips parted briefly, a sigh of longing escaped them, as if they had always been one body.
Even when conversation became necessary, they spoke with their upper lips pressed together, their eyes filled only with each other.
“Should… we stop?”
“…We probably should….”
Their lips, glistening with saliva, shone even under the subway’s characteristic gloomy, artificial lighting. Their ragged breathing and physical contact numbed their reason while simultaneously heightening their senses.
I couldn’t bear to watch these young lovers surrendering themselves to such pleasure any longer.
“You… look like you’re enjoying yourselves.”
“Gah…!”
“…Ah.”
We’re all about to get in deep trouble here, so please, snap out of it.
I mustered up the patience of a single cigarette, waited a moment, and then spoke up.
“Do you need more time?”
“Ah, no! I mean, this is…!”
“…I’m sorry. I was on the verge of going berserk…”
The two, who had been going at it full throttle, blushed like a newlywed couple caught in the act. Maybe I should’ve sprayed the water at them instead of those guys from earlier.
I should’ve just beaten the shit out of those guys.
“What’s the situation outside?”
I saluted the soldier and asked about the current situation.
“Sergeant Lee Seungmin, Esper Reconnaissance Platoon, 11th Infantry Division. The monsters themselves aren’t that strong. However, there are just too many of them. We’re short on manpower.”
The soldier shared the situation without hesitation. Even though he was just a standard-issue soldier, he grasped the situation quickly, which made communication easy.
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