I once saw an angry mob in Seoul dragging a man and woman through the streets while pointing fingers at them.
At the ti, I was on my way to beg Kim Daram for help—back then, she still held her committee title and lived comfortably—so I didn’t have the luxury of finding out what it was all about. But from what I caught in passing, people were furious because they were Chinese.
The disappearance of the many ethnic Koreans from China who had once lived in South Korea wasn’t solely due to China’s nuclear strikes and chemical attacks.
Even though four years had passed since the war began, people still harbored hatred toward China, and so channeled that emotion into scorn and mockery.
“What do Chinese people know? They refused to use the Awakened and ended up destroyed for their stubbornness.”
Cheon Young-jae’s opinion didn’t represent everyone, but it was true that many people looked down on China.
Their war had devastated our lives, but the way they crumbled afterward—shockingly fast and hollow—was no different from one of their own four-character idioms: all bluff and no substance.
Theories about China’s swift collapse include brutal Arican nuclear retaliation, mass starvation due to disrupted food chains, infighting among local warlords and party factions, early monster incursions, and the rise of fanatics—so of whom still plague us.
But even so, few have conducted serious, in-depth research on China’s downfall.
It’s not because researchers lacked interest.
The kind of people who would run to the edge of the Mariana Trench or camp before an erupting volcano out of pure academic curiosity weren’t able to study China simply because reality got in the way.
So European scholars tried to fly into China after it had effectively collapsed, only to be struck by surface-to-air missiles and forced to change their research topics to the afterlife—a story still talked about on community forums.
I’m not a scholar. I’ve never pursued any topic to the point of academic achievent.
But humans are creatures of need.
I’d felt this vaguely for a while, but now it seed like sothing I had to understand.
Why did they fall so fast, and so aninglessly?
Large, abstract reasons like internal strife, fanatic uprisings, or mass monster offensives didn’t satisfy my curiosity.
Most of all, my experience at the Lighthouse turned that curiosity into urgency.
It began when I showed the K-WalkieTalkie retrieved from the Lighthouse to one of Woo Min-hee’s researchers.
“Well... I’ve never heard of monsters using pseudo-EMPs. EMPs are, by definition, byproducts of terrifyingly powerful energy bursts. You’ve heard of the Dellinger effect, right? Monster pulses may release massive energy, but could they really compare to nuclear fission?”
Woo Min-hee’s researchers outright rejected my hypothesis that monsters could destroy electronic devices over a wide area.
And frankly, I knew my theory was shaky.
A few radios were destroyed, sure, but the control room equipnt had functioned just fine.
“Even the monsters’ abilities to counter drones don’t actually damage the circuits. At one ti, a European scientist’s circuit disruption theory gained traction, but no one believes that anymore.”
“Is that so?”
Since arriving in New Seoul, I never once felt like I’d caught up.
What’s hardest to follow is the evolving information and theories about monsters.
The theories I once trusted had been revised, refuted, discarded.
The drone perspective was one of them.
I used to believe that monsters destroyed drones by emitting powerful, radar-like waves that fried their circuitry from afar.
That turned out to be completely wrong.
“These days, the dominant view—originating from China, actually—is that monsters interfere with drone signals to disable them.”
Why didn’t I know that?
Maybe because I hardly used drones, or maybe because I had directly encountered the kind of ability that destroys gunpowder-based weapons.
Humans are prone to assu that similar things are the sa.
Anyway, researchers see much more than I do, even when looking at the sa thing.
“But this fried circuit board is kind of unusual. The capacitor is relatively intact, but the inductor is lted beyond recognition. Even I, with no background in electronics, can tell that’s strange.”
“What’s the problem?”
“They’re both components for storing electricity, but capacitors store charge, and inductors store electricity in the form of magnetic fields. I don’t know the specifics, but when one part is that badly damaged, it usually ans the cause is linked to that component.”
Whatever the cause, we’d observed an anomaly.
Before the Rifts opened, humanity would’ve written such things off as acts of God.
After the Rifts, everything weird beca the monsters’ fault.
And to be fair, most strange things really are the monsters’ fault—and they’re a lot closer than God.
The most detailed and comprehensive monster data is held by North Arica and Europe.
They’ve beco living hells too, but unlike Korea, their governnts still exist and continue leading the research.
But with South Korea practically obliterated and sea routes now severed, I doubted the U.S. would entertain any of our requests for intel.
As far as I could tell, they didn’t have a functioning “representative” either.
Apart from the West, the next largest body of data cos from China.
Since arriving in New Seoul, I learned that so of the monsters we thought were new had already appeared during the final days of China’s collapse.
It makes sense—given the scale of the monster war they endured, it’d be stranger if they didn’t have data.
Among those undocunted “new types,” one of them might hold the key to the mystery of this burned-out circuit board.
There were Chinese remnants nearby.
Not just scattered survivors, but a group that still seed to retain so organizational structure.
I’d fought them once, risking my life.
“Oh, those Chinese bastards?”
Kim Byeong-cheol had so connection with the Chinese remnants.
In his heyday, he’d even signed a flashy ceasefire agreent with them.
“I have a channel. Haven’t used it in a while, but if I reach out, they’ll probably respond.”
Back when I first allied with Kim Byeong-cheol, I hadn’t been fond of him.
He was an ex-warlord, and nothing good ever ca from getting noticed by a man like that.
But life is long and unpredictable.
We’ve both changed, and in this place called New Seoul, we’ve beco assets to one another in many ways.
“Damn.”
Kim Byeong-cheol let out a sigh.
There was only one reason he sighed.
I didn’t ask.
No need to invite more work.
For so reason, the higher-ups thought I had it easy these days.
While others were buried in docunts and struggling to build defensive lines, I just sat in my office all day and occasionally strolled the periter.
I’m not the type to make excuses, but for what it’s worth, I am doing important future-oriented work. It’s just that in Korea, research is treated like slacking off.
Still, from Kim Byeong-cheol’s perspective, I probably looked like a loafer with too much free ti.
“My damn daughter... she’s seeing so strange guy lately.”
The general started ranting.
“Hm...”
“Obvious gigolo, just from the look of him. Who knows how a guy like that even survived until now. Daughters, huh. That’s why they say daughters leave the family once they’re married. I should’ve had a son, no matter what.”
“Leaves the family...?”
“First ti hearing that expression?”
“Are you saying when they leave ho, they beco Japanese?”
“...What the hell are you talking about?”
Maybe the reason Kim Byeong-cheol failed in life was because he had no sense of humor.
After a full thirty minutes of his ranting, he finally agreed to reach out to the Chinese.
About two hours later, while I was briefly online in my office, one of Kim Byeong-cheol’s n ca to find .
Contact had been made.
And apparently, things were going well.
“Guess the Chinese are hitting their limit too. Four years is long enough for anything to run out.”
With an uneasy smile, Kim Byeong-cheol explained the terms of the negotiation.
“They’re asking for a few supplies. Seems they’re running a submarine or sothing—they want ship parts and fuel. Hunter Park, you’ll have to talk to Director Woo yourself. I handle the warehouses, but I need her authorization to release that much material.”
“That shouldn’t be too difficult.”
“Oh, and they’re sending soone over.”
“Soone?”
“Yeah. A negotiator fluent in Korean.”
That negotiator showed up in Seoul the very next day.
And they had so nerve.
They rolled in with an armored vehicle—and mounted a Chinese flag, the Five-Star Red Flag, on it.
“What the hell is that?”
“Are they insane?”
“What are the soldiers doing? Why haven’t they blown it up?”
“Didn’t we sign a ceasefire? Didn’t Kim Byeong-cheol pull so stunt about reclaiming Manchuria?”
“Still, to bring that disgusting flag into South Korea...”
Even I had to admit—it was nuts.
Either extrely patriotic or ntally unhinged.
Then I t the negotiator.
Four people had arrived, but only one was doing the talking.
And I knew her face.
“It’s that woman.”
Kim Byeong-cheol whispered as we watched a young woman greet governnt officials.
The Chinese remnants used to sell goods openly.
They’d stopped now—likely out of stock—but I’d done business with them before, so I rembered her well.
That woman.
She was a Chinese Hunter who’d been present back then.
Her eyes had a faint glow to them.
“Jiang Shuying.”
Kim Byeong-cheol introduced her to .
“This is Park Gyu, our lead Hunter.”
She looked at with those glowing eyes and spoke.
“Hello.”
Flawless Korean.
Elegant features, balanced posture—even from afar, she radiated intelligence. The kind of woman who would stand out in any profession.
And in this day and age, offering a well-made business card was... oddly refreshing.
Her na was printed in simplified Chinese, traditional Chinese, and English. In traditional script, it read “Jiang Shuying”—a na that would sound completely familiar to a Korean.
Almost like my old ntor, Jang Ki-young.
“Pleasure to et you.”
Naturally, I kept my identity as “Professor” hidden.
Kim Byeong-cheol might be arrogant and reckless, but when it ca to important matters, he didn’t rise to the rank of general for nothing—he was ticulous.
We moved to a private eting room.
The negotiation focused on balancing the value of China’s data with the materials we’d be providing in return.
Since Woo Min-hee hadn’t authorized much, the evaluation had to be strict.
I didn’t know Chinese, and I’d even killed a few Chinese remnants in the past, but I was present because I had requested the data, and I had to select what I needed.
The main thing I asked for was information on the undocunted new monster types that appeared just before China’s collapse.
Of course, trying to deal honestly with a shrewd Chinese negotiator would be suicide, so I added a few decoy demands:
Health records of people who survived long-term in erosion zones, specs on Chinese anti-monster weaponry, data on China’s ten secret Rift nuclear detonations, and so on.
Instead of a tablet, Jiang Shuying pulled out a large school notebook and began scribbling rapidly in incomprehensible handwriting.
She was left-handed, and though I didn’t know Chinese, her handwriting looked atrocious.
“I’m terribly sorry, Mr. Park. Could you repeat what you just said?”
Apparently, even she couldn’t read her own notes.
Just as Kim Byeong-cheol predicted, the Chinese remnants seed to be in a rough state.
Though Woo Min-hee had allocated few supplies, and Kim ~Nоvеl𝕚ght~ Byeong-cheol had slashed that in half, Jiang Shuying accepted it without protest.
“...If your side is also struggling, then it can’t be helped. Let’s proceed that way.”
Still, a Chinese negotiator is a Chinese negotiator.
They act like they’ll give you everything, but at the crucial mont, they deliver a blow.
“However, our materials cannot be transmitted or copied. They are only accessible via approved terminals for viewing purposes.”
The Chinese data was sealed—view-only, no transfers, no copies, and any attempt to extract it would trigger a self-destruct protocol.
No surprise, considering how notorious their hackers used to be.
After North Korea’s fall, so elite hackers abroad had sold hacked Chinese intel to the U.S. and Europe.
To sum up: they’d sell it cheap—but you had to go in person to read it.
And naturally, that person... would have to be .
But then, a new problem arose.
Just as the Chinese were preparing to leave, Jiang Shuying approached with a aningful smile.
After glancing around, she leaned in and whispered in my ear.
“You’ll be coming, right?”
I glared at her in protest—how dare she act so familiar?
But then her smile deepened, and she added another na.
“Professor.”
I looked at her carefully.
I didn’t know this woman.
I’d never seen her before those supply deals.
But she clearly knew .
“I was there when you received the Golden Fleece.”
“...”
Then it made sense.
Despite strict security and a no-photography policy, over fifty people from all walks of life had witnessed that faded ceremony.
“I’ll be waiting.”
As she left, Cheon Young-jae erged from the corner.
“...Senior Park.”
I knew exactly what he was going to say.
He’d tell not to go.
And realistically, staying here would be the wiser choice.
But that woman had driven into enemy territory, waving the Five-Star Red Flag, alone.
Not to show off her courage.
If I had to pass on a saying I’ve learned from my long career as a Hunter, it would be this:
If you don’t know, you die.
So there’s nothing to fear.
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