***
“Huk!”
When I opened my eyes, I was on the bedding inside that debtor’s chaotic house.
Seeing that the windows and walls were still smashed and the mantis monster’s corpse was drooping and dangling limply, it didn’t seem to be a dream.
“…What the hell…?”
I felt around my neck to check for wounds, but there wasn’t even a scratch, let alone an injury.
However, the white dress shirt of the suit I was wearing was stiffening as it was dyed a dark wine-red color. The fact that my throat had been slashed and I’d suffered a fatal wound wasn’t just a simple dream, but…
“Are you awake?”
“…Yes.”
I answered calmly, trying not to appear startled by the debtor’s wife who suddenly spoke to me.
She had a large backpack on her back and was holding the child’s hand, looking exactly as if she were about to flee in the night.
“Thank you.”
Without any particular explanation, she bowed in greeting and left the house with the child.
This day was the first day of the Dungeon Break that turned the world upside down.
***
One day the sky tore open and monsters poured out, and the world fell into chaos.
“…That sounds like the introduction to some heroic saga.”
I muttered to myself as I entered the training camp entrance. It was because there was no better phrase to summarize the Dungeon Break and the state of the world.
“All able-bodied men, please finish saying goodbye to your families and gather at the field.”
A businesslike announcement flowed through the training camp loudspeaker.
“Guide conscripts, move to the tent on the left from the headquarters platform, and Esper conscripts, move toward the parking lot on the right.”
Some of humanity awakened unknown powers and were divided into Espers and Guides. Among them, Espers were the only adversaries against monsters that could never be dealt with by human military power and technology.
And Guides were the only beings who could calm the special energy called “wavelength” of those Espers.
The government swiftly declared a national state of emergency upon their appearance, engraved biometric imprints on the Awakened’s bodies, and developed magic detection satellites to control and manage them.
They established the Special Warfare Command under the Ministry of National Defense while simultaneously enacting laws regarding the management and support of special ability users, leading to the current forced conscription of Espers and Guides.
“When did they say orphans shouldn’t come, and now they drag me in because they need me.”
Although I was only E-rank, I was a Guide, so I became subject to forced conscription and was dragged into the military.
“Should I just desert?”
Desertion.
It was a thought I had after receiving the enlistment notice.
However, I hadn’t been living with such grand ambitions in society. Thinking of it as an opportunity to settle my loan shark life that was getting boring anyway, I didn’t feel that wronged. So I obediently came here following the draft notice.
“You are the nation’s last shield.”
On the first day of enlistment, the Minister of National Defense spouted a speech packaged in impressive-sounding words as if to instill pride in the Espers and Guides who had their heads shaved clean and were standing there dumbfounded.
“Sniff, hnngh…”
“Sob… Mom…”
The speech was roughly about guaranteeing sufficient honor and compensation, and there were some guys who looked like they had their own stories, crying their eyes out listening to it.
“Yawn…”
I yawned widely and half-listened. I didn’t see why I needed to concentrate when I wasn’t going to memorize it anyway.
“-Each and every person is a hero of this era.”
The Minister of National Defense’s impressive-sounding comment marked the end of the lengthy speech, and my full-fledged military life began.
Generally, Guides were precious tactical resources protected in the rear.
However, Guides with poor abilities or low ranks couldn’t even dream of such privileges and were assigned to a special unit called “Guide Infantry.” Even low-ranked Espers could at least handle weak monsters, but low-ranked Guides had combat power inferior to even ordinary people.
Ultimately, “Guide Infantry” was the government’s scheme to fill insufficient numbers with useless forces and save budget.
“The recycling trash disposal unit is passing through.”
Those noble Esper-nims and high-ranked Guide-nims called us “recycling trash disposal,” “meat shield unit,” “broken blade,” and other such names while mocking us.
Even though we were all dragged here together, there were still class divisions and ridicule and contempt could exist. Perhaps the monsters weren’t pouring out of gates but had already existed on earth all along.
“Move quickly! Hey, be careful not to break the magic stone!”
The Guides belonging to the “Guide Infantry” unit were mainly assigned all sorts of dirty and dangerous work at the frontlines, such as collecting soldiers’ corpses and dissecting monster carcasses to extract magic stones, rather than doing Guiding.
“Kugh, ahhh…!”
Non-Espers would have their mental contamination level rise if they were near monsters for a long time or near gates, going mad while spouting dark red blood from every orifice in their bodies—and our unit was no exception.
Smack!
“Fuck, newbie, get it together. You want me to dismantle all this by myself?”
While collecting the corpse of a monster shaped like a giant deer, I grabbed the collar of a guy who collapsed screaming and slapped him across the face.
“Ugh, Private Ha Seongho-nim… Just how much of a steel mentality do you have…!”
I barely held onto the mental thread of the guy who was about to die, and instead he got angry at me.
I was about to retort, but I’d already tried to explain many times before and was only treated like a lunatic, so I decided to just keep my mouth shut.
Because.
[Offering has been completed.]
[That Person’s blessing descends.]
[Mental contamination immunity increases.]
For some unknown reason, my mental contamination level decreased just by offering money.
The money was automatically withdrawn from my account in a system that robbed my wealth very colorfully, from a few hundred to a few thousand at a time. The “hazard duty pay” and “special duty allowance” I received as the price for my life on a battlefield where I didn’t know when I’d die melted away without a trace as soon as it came in, bringing me to bloody tears.
But thanks to that, I hadn’t gone mad or died even after a year had passed, surpassing the typical infantry lifespan of six months.
I felt the irony of having to go die in order not to die.
Ptui!
“If you can’t do it, go hold hands with that C-rank Esper over there. It’s better than nothing, isn’t it?”
I spat bloody phlegm on the ground and helped up the newbie, dragging him to the barracks.
I was human too, so it wasn’t like I took no damage at all. Sometimes bloody fluid would fill up inside, or I’d hear tinnitus as if my ears were tearing, and my whole body would tremble as if having a seizure. But compared to Espers on the verge of rampage because they couldn’t receive Guiding, or Guides going mad from mental contamination and self-harming, I was an angel.
“You’re a Guide too? Try doing some Guiding.”
“Sit on oppa’s lap~ Hehe.”
This body was also sexually harassed by Espers in the unit for being a Guide, which was a bit fascinating. To think that people I couldn’t even make eye contact with in society would immediately look down on me just because their position changed and they gained abilities.
“Your tattoo’s flashy, huh? Did you sell your body or something out there?”
Perhaps they’d seen it in the shower, because they pointed out and sneered at my yaksha tattoo that I’d been semi-forcibly made to get on my back to threaten people during my loan shark days, throwing vulgar remarks.
“Yes, I was selling my body.”
I reacted indifferently to the Espers’ low-grade mockery.
Having been involved with an organization since I was a kid, I was sick and tired of this kind of putting-people-down behavior because I was so used to it.
“Esper-nim doesn’t drink or smoke and exercises regularly, so you’ll get at least three million for your kidney.”
At my response, the harassing Espers all opened their mouths in unison.
That’s how I made a name for myself as the lunatic of the recycling trash disposal unit.
Later, when I found out that Esper kidneys were especially valuable and went for hundreds of millions, I drooled while staring at them, and I even evolved from just a lunatic to a crazy psycho lunatic.
And so, in my second year of military service.
“Ha, those fucking bastards, really…”
After making a name for myself as a lunatic and living my military life like a mess, I ended up falling for the tricks of some nasty Espers.
“Did everyone really retreat?”
I was abandoned alone in the valley of Geonbongsan Mountain in Goseong, Gangwon-do.
What a disaster—everyone retreating except for me.
This place was even one of the biggest battlegrounds during the actual Korean War and had many landmines buried, so even without monsters, one could easily lose their life if they weren’t careful.
“Black Panther One, this is Black Panther Three. Current location unknown. Unable to secure visibility due to fog. Request confirmation of rally point. Over.”
I calmly sent a radio transmission, but being human myself, I could feel my heart pounding as if it were broken.
The rifle I was carrying had been malfunctioning since before departure, and I’d submitted a replacement request to the ordnance department, but it was rejected on the grounds that I was just going to collect corpses anyway.
Right now, the rifle wasn’t a weapon but just a lump of baggage. In other words, it meant I was essentially bare-handed.
Thump-thump, thump-thump.
Fear crept over me—what if no one found me and I died like this? I’d thought that one lives alone in this world anyway, but now that I was actually left alone, a terrible sense of helplessness crushed my entire body.
