Kang Hyeonjoo, whose gaze met Joo Seonghan’s, nodded his head. Probably.
* * *
Click. The lock on the thick iron door was released. The man who pushed open the heavy door effortlessly entered beyond the iron door carrying a large black bag. He, who turned on the interior lights brightly, opened each weapon storage unit made of plate glass one by one and threw the necessary equipment he checked into the bag.
“Team Leader Yeon! I’ll go with you too!”
A young-faced man rushed into the weapons storage waving an empty bag. The man who had been packing weapons, Yeon Dogyeong, looked at the man and grinned.
“Gyeongjae-ya, you have to guard this place.”
“Still, still, two of our team members were captured, so how can I be the only one staying here!”
“Just stay here. Be good.”
Yeon Dogyeong, who rubbed the man—Cha Gyeongjae’s—hair with a swoosh, put his arm around his shoulder and dragged him toward the door. Cha Gyeongjae shook his head vigorously.
“I’ll go with you! There’s even one civilian over there! You’ll need more hands!”
“The civilian will die soon anyway.”
Yeon Dogyeong pushed Cha Gyeongjae straight out the door. A woman who had been standing properly near the door—when did she arrive—was looking at them with an expressionless face.
“Team Leader Yeon. As I said earlier, there’s no guarantee I can open the Guimun.”
The woman said in a calm voice. There had been a meeting a few hours ago. Yeon Dogyeong said he would cross the Guimun to rescue the team members, and the Presidential Representative, the Semi-Human Department Head, and the Research Director recommended he not go, saying it was dangerous. The word was recommendation, but it was no different from saying they wouldn’t send him. They couldn’t carelessly push a team leader-level talent into a pit of death. Opposition was rampant. In that situation, the only one who raised her hand for Yeon Dogyeong was the woman, Chief Lee.
“I know. I’ll try for a few days and come back if it doesn’t open.”
Yeon Dogyeong, who spoke with a smile, shoved Cha Gyeongjae off to Chief Lee. She put Cha Gyeongjae in a headlock. The captured Cha Gyeongjae struggled, saying he didn’t want to.
“Chief Lee-nim! Please let me go! I’ll follow Team Leader Yeon!”
“No. Cha Gyeongjae-ssi, please stay and guard your assigned jurisdiction.”
“But!”
“It would be very troublesome without Cha Gyeongjae-ssi.”
“Still!”
“The Semi-Human Department Head says he’ll send one Team 2 member to Team 3’s jurisdiction. He’s waiting in the conference room, so please go up quickly.”
Chief Lee pushed Cha Gyeongjae toward the corridor. The pushed-out Cha Gyeongjae looked at Yeon Dogyeong with a tearful face. When he showed no sign of moving his feet, Yeon Dogyeong spread his arms with a smiling face. Cha Gyeongjae hugged him deeply.
“Team Leader-nim, please really return safely.”
“Yeah. I’ll come back holding hands with the kids.”
“…Definitely. If the civilian is alive, bring that person too. His parents cried a lot.”
“Okay.”
Cha Gyeongjae, who let out a big sigh, escaped from Yeon Dogyeong’s embrace and showed a brave face. And he turned around and walked briskly down the long corridor.
“He’s like a child.”
“I can hear everything!”
Cha Gyeongjae, who shouted loudly, glared at Chief Lee then widened his stride and moved away.
“Isn’t he cute?”
Yeon Dogyeong, who leaned against the door frame, said with a laugh. Chief Lee, who had been looking at Gyeongjae’s retreating figure, shook her head.
“What good does a cute face do? He slices semi-humans to death while smiling.”
Yeon Dogyeong made the smile he wore on his face even thicker and looked down at Chief Lee.
“Did you come to cheer me on?”
At the roundabout question of why she came, Chief Lee twitched her eyebrows and took out a small zipper bag from her lab coat pocket. Seven pills were inside.
“They’re stimulants. Make Han Jaejun-ssi take only one pill, and Team Leader Yeon and Kang Hyeonjoo-ssi can take them up to three times.”
“How many days per pill?”
Yeon Dogyeong, who took the zipper bag from Chief Lee’s hand, examined the pills. The purple pills had no markings on them at all.
“Han Jaejun-ssi will last four days. Team Leader-nim and Kang Hyeonjoo-ssi won’t even last two days before it ends. Having too good body performance is bad at times like this. Recovery is too fast.”
As she said, Yeon Dogyeong and Kang Hyeonjoo had poor cost-effectiveness. Still, they could take them up to three times in a row. Han Jaejun could fight for at least four days without rest, and Yeon Dogyeong and Kang Hyeonjoo for six days. Though there would be no occasion to take them anyway. Yeon Dogyeong, who thought to himself, put the pills in his inner pocket.
“The management team left combat suits, so change into those, and I’ll attach one person to you.”
“A person?”
“Yes. The person who studied the world inside the Guimun most diligently.”
“Mm… I don’t quite understand what you mean.”
Yeon Dogyeong smiled and tilted his head. Chief Lee, who looked around, pushed Yeon Dogyeong’s chest to send him into the weapons storage, then entered herself and closed the door behind her. The air in the corridor and inside the weapons storage was different. Chief Lee, who glanced up at Yeon Dogyeong, took out a stiffly folded paper from her lab coat pocket and handed it over.
“It’s a recently discovered map. As you know, it’s been over 100 years since semi-humans appeared. We didn’t know, but the ancestors at that time went beyond the Guimun to investigate semi-humans. Perhaps there weren’t many individuals, so they settled down there completely and researched this and that.”
Yeon Dogyeong unfolded the map while listening to Chief Lee’s words. It was only half. Whether she deliberately didn’t show Yeon Dogyeong or this was the best available was unknown, but anyway, what was drawn on the map was mostly forest. Rivers and lakes could be seen here and there, but the excessively vast area was mainly composed of forest. And there were X marks in various places. Chief Lee pointed her finger at the X mark near the largest lake.
“There’s a Guimun here. If you really succeed in going beyond the Guimun, find your team members and go here. If you activate the Guimun there, you’ll be able to cross back to this side. I’m attaching a guide for that.”
It was true that easy-to-understand symbols were drawn on the map. However, that didn’t mean you could tell at a glance where the Guimun was. Moreover, she said the ancestors crossed the Guimun and researched this and that. It had to be assumed that what was recently discovered wasn’t just the map. Yeon Dogyeong raised his gaze from looking at the map and looked at Chief Lee.
“There’s a map but you need a guide?”
“Yes.”
“I’m good at reading maps though.”
Yeon Dogyeong didn’t continue speaking and just grinned. As he just smiled while looking down at Chief Lee with no change in expression, Chief Lee sighed.
“Yes, well… Actually, guidance is one thing, but there’s something I need you to bring from inside the Guimun. There’s a fruit discovered in the body of a semi-human two months ago, and it was a fruit I’d never seen before. It’s probably beyond the Guimun. If we have that, it would help with research. Since it’s beyond the Guimun, we naturally gave up on it, but since Team Leader Yeon said you’d go, I’m trying to hope.”
She was obviously beating around the bush, but Yeon Dogyeong didn’t dig deeper. Rather, as if meeting her expectations, he appropriately changed the subject.
“Can that person fight?”
Yeon Dogyeong asked while fluttering the map. Chief Lee shook her head.
“No. That’s why I gave you stimulants, isn’t it? So you won’t sleep and will fight. Since this person is in charge of a rather important mission, please protect them well.”
I have to protect them, huh. Yeon Dogyeong, who playfully drew out the ending, folded the map and put it in his chest. Chief Lee tapped his forearm with a displeased face.
“This person is delicate. I’m asking you nicely.”
“My ability might not be enough to protect that person.”
Yeon Dogyeong, who smiled, made a subtle threat. It meant if they were a burden, he’d leave them behind. Yeon Dogyeong acted like an obedient dog but occasionally went off track. Chief Lee, who had watched Yeon Dogyeong for a long time, wasn’t intimidated by him like that.
“Even if you get there, Team Leader-nim can’t open the Guimun. There are conditions, you see. Of course, I won’t tell Team Leader Yeon those conditions.”
“Ah, that’s too much.”
Yeon Dogyeong, who spoke with a chuckle, turned around and finished packing the weapons he had been loading.
“Team Leader-nim is even more too much. To openly say you’ll kill my precious subordinate.”
“Hey, why are you saying it so scarily again? I didn’t say I’d kill them.”
That cunning snake. Chief Lee, who cursed Yeon Dogyeong inwardly, watched him packing various weapons and medicine, then opened her mouth.
“The guide is waiting at the main gate.”
“Yees.”
At the answer that flowed out like a joke, Chief Lee quietly sighed and turned around.
“Ah, Chief Lee-nim.”
Just as she was about to open the door and leave, Team Leader Yeon called her. Chief Lee turned around.
“Yes?”
“That condition for opening the Guimun doesn’t work on this side, but it seems to work over there.”
