WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: Arsène
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ How an A-Rank Hunter Lives ◈
Chapter 89: Soldiers - [3]
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My Hunter Rifle weighed seventy-eight kilograms, so its barrel was absurdly long.
The Deathclaw corpse skewered on that barrel exploded some distance away, but the blast was far more spectacular than it needed to be. Its blood and chunks of flesh reached all the way over here.
Red bits were plastered all over me and the soldier I had shielded.
As I looked at the soldier, now sticky with blood and flesh, it took a few beats for the soldier to finally understand what had happened. The soldier opened their mouth hesitantly.
“Thank you so-”
Wanting to play it cool, I cut them off.
“Ah, sorry.”
“...Excuse me?”
“I've got a force field, so I can just shake myself off, but you'll have to do laundry as soon as you get back. What a pain, right?”
After brushing off the soldier, who could only stammer, “Uh, yeah,” I led the way down the mountain.
At the same time, I listened closely to the conversation behind me while pretending not to.
“No wonder he's number one in the business... Kim Geuk is Korea's strongest Hunter after Kang Jun-chi, right?”
One of the soldiers asked, and Seong Munyeong answered.
“Of course. No one's better than Geuk, whether it's skill or achievements.”
“That was incredible. He just did that and stayed totally calm? And not just Kim Geuk, the other Hunters too... We were all scared out of our minds, but you Hunters weren't as surprised as I expected. Has something like that happened often before?”
“Pretty often. One time, Geuk even used Spatial Teleportation to take a bullet for someone... I was a little disappointed that one wasn't broadcast. Did they get this one properly?”
Then the cameraman spoke.
“Yeah, I got it! Got it!”
“How's the chat reacting?”
“There are too many chat messages for me to explain, but check it yourself when you get home. The vicarious thrill will be amazing.”
When we returned to the guard post with the soldiers, the colonel was waiting for us.
After I roughly explained what had happened that day, the colonel visibly brightened.
“You let every one of them experience killing a Monster?”
“Yes. Did I do well?”
“Did you do well? If one of my men had done this, I'd give them everything I could, reward leave and whatever else! It's a shame there's nothing I can give you!”
The colonel made a huge fuss for a while, then asked me in a cautious voice.
“Anyway, thank you very much. You said you'd continue working here for a while, correct? Could you keep taking the soldiers you brought today with you in the future?”
“If they want to.”
When I asked them directly, the soldiers said they wanted to accompany us for the rest of our schedule too. Maybe it was because of all the food we had given them that day, or because hiking was better than their usual military routine. Either way.
After getting home, I washed up and turned on my computer.
I went to Naito's YouTube channel and clicked on that day's broadcast.
Even I thought my performance deserved praise. I wanted to enjoy it.
Sure enough, the video had captured everything I did.
- What was that? Kim Geuk didn't even look back before using Spatial Teleportation to save someone. How did he even react that fast? Does Kim Geuk have an acceleration ability too?
- Awakened people can only have three abilities at most, so Kim Geuk probably doesn't have an acceleration ability. What the hell was that?
After replaying my performance and everyone's praise several times, I moved on to the YouTube comments and noticed a few interesting ones.
- Kim Geuk saving that person was amazing, but Naito's reaction speed is seriously insane too. Did everyone see Naito aim the shotgun the instant the Deathclaw jumped out?
- Anyway, both of them have completely crazy reaction speed...
- Is this really something you can dismiss as just having good reaction speed? Could Naito have Neural Acceleration too?
- Neural Acceleration is a great ability, so why hide it? Is Naito an idiot? Naito could work as an A-rank Hunter.
- You can't make a living as an A-rank Hunter with Neural Acceleration alone, can you? A-rank Hunters aren't recognized just because awakened people fight well. They're recognized when they can kill tough Monsters like Force-Field Creatures.
- And while Neural Acceleration would let someone fight better than ordinary people, it isn't an ability with superior firepower. It'd be hard to get rated A-rank with Neural Acceleration alone. Naito would just be treated like an exceptionally skilled non-awakened Hunter, and might not even get paid much because people would decide it was better to hire several non-awakened Hunters instead.
- Maybe Naito is hiding the fact of being awakened so people will say, “A non-awakened person who fights at an awakened person's level.”
I read through those comments and thought about it. Naito could be an awakened person hiding an identity?
That wasn't a new idea. I'd thought about it more than once myself.
Still, I had already concluded there was no way that was true.
What a bunch of stupid bastards. They should say something that makes sense.
If Naito had really been an awakened person pretending to be non-awakened, and benefiting from that fact, Baek Dambi would never have kept quiet.
She disliked Naito nearly as much as I did, and she could personally check whether someone was awakened. My petty and underhanded ring girl would have exposed Naito through a Huntweb account if she had to.
I'd also seen Naito's soul several times inside Gates.
Honestly, I had been unsure when I looked at that soul. It was ambiguous in many ways.
Naito's soul shone brighter than ordinary people's, but only within the margin of error.
When observed inside a Gate, an awakened person's soul usually shines brighter than a non-awakened person's or in a different color, but there were occasional exceptions.
That happened when the awakened person's power was so weak that it was barely any different from that of a non-awakened person.
Deathclaws always awakened regardless of their poor spiritual aptitude, yet even though every one of them had awakened the force-field blades ability, many of their souls were not especially remarkable, if I remembered correctly.
Naito's soul was not particularly remarkable either. Even Jeong Jinyeong's soul beside it shone brighter than Naito's.
So it was difficult to tell based on that soul alone inside a Gate. Neural Acceleration itself was such a rare ability that it was hard to judge from a quick look anyway...
Still, there was decisive proof in the middle of all this. The fact that I disliked Naito.
If Naito were truly awakened, there was no way I would hate Naito, yet I found Naito disgusting. That proved it.
The revulsion I felt toward Naito was proof that Naito was nothing but non-awakened trash. Wasn't it?
* * *
We continued hunting at Manisan after that.
During the process, we became fairly close with the soldiers. We had reached the point where we could exchange somewhat sensitive remarks.
“I heard awakened people who get special recruitment into the military are all made noncommissioned officers or higher. This is my first time seeing awakened people serve as regular soldiers... So how is it? Do they make unreasonable demands because you're awakened or anything?”
When I asked, one soldier readily answered.
“It isn't as different as you'd think. We're treated just like the other soldiers.”
“Just like them?”
“Yes. Our routine is almost identical to everyone else's. We grow rice and cabbages, attend political education together... We're a lot stronger than other soldiers, so we're treated like aces, but besides that... Ah, all our specialties are related to portable heavy weapons. Other than that, though, there's nothing.”
“So they haven't really mobilized you to hunt Monsters just because you're awakened?”
“No. Not so far... We've fired at Monsters trying to get over barricades, but that's about it.”
Jeong Jinyeong muttered after hearing that.
“That's unexpected. I thought the military wouldn't pass up the chance to work expensive awakened people to the bone without even paying minimum wage. They're treated like ordinary soldiers...?”
I found it surprising too, but thinking about it, it wasn't completely shocking.
The military would hesitate to treat awakened soldiers too harshly. In other countries, many awakened-person rebellions had been started by awakened people serving in the military.
Awakened people in the military naturally banded together by unit, and they often became dissatisfied after comparing their treatment to that of awakened Hunters. If awakened people tried to overthrow their unit from within, it would also be difficult for a military unit to stop them...
I was about to conclude that the military and government were simply trying to avoid trouble, teach them how to use Hunter Rifles, then send them back into civilian life.
Then a soldier spoke.
“Ah, but there are bad rumors about awakened soldiers.”
“What rumors?”
“They say the military avoids sending awakened soldiers on dangerous missions because it would be troublesome if they became dissatisfied with their treatment... but when an awakened soldier doesn't have much time left in service, they stop holding back and work them hard.”
“Work them hard how?”
As I asked that, I instructed the cameraman to put away the camera. Only after confirming that did the soldier explain.
“Apparently, they gather awakened soldiers near the end of their service and send them on dangerous missions, like suppressing Gate incidents or exterminating wild Monsters. They give them about three hundred thousand won more as hazard pay...
“They figure that even if those soldiers become unhappy after being sent into such work, it won't matter if they die. And if they come back alive and resent the military, they'll be discharged soon anyway, so there won't be a problem.”
My expression hardened as the soldier continued.
“Even here on Ganghwa Island... there are an unusual number of awakened people with similar discharge dates gathered in one regiment. They say they're being collected in preparation for a large-scale operation on Ganghwa Island.
“The plan is supposedly to gather awakened people who could work as Hunters after returning to society, keep training them, then deploy them all at once in the Ganghwa Island operation near the end of their service... an operation where even awakened people face a high risk of death.”
I asked in a voice that sounded serious even to me.
“Come to think of it, Manisan has plenty of formidable Monsters, if I remember correctly? The ones that ate huge numbers of people early in the Gate crisis and grew tremendously strong...”
The soldier nodded.
“Do you know Tungtung?”
“Tungtung? No.”
“It's a four-meter Ogre that awakened the force-field exoskeleton ability. It can take a tank shell without a scratch. It got that nickname because it roars so often and so loudly that everyone can hear it inside the barracks. Even that thing shows how serious the Monsters at Manisan really are...”
It happened when I met the soldier's eyes after hearing the name Tungtung.
Ah? Ah...
Startled, I was once again seized by the sensation of being pulled somewhere.
It looked like I was about to see another vision of the future, but why?
It hadn't been that long since I saw a vision related to Kim Hyeongman. Why again already...?
* * *
In the vision, I looked at the soldier in front of me.
In the vision, I felt both pity and contempt for the soldier's situation.
They were awakened, yet they had to absolutely obey the orders of mere non-awakened commanders? Pitiful, but pathetic too.
The awakened soldier before me had come to find me as a representative of the awakened people in their unit. They were asking me to help them escape from that military base.
They said they wanted me to get them out of their unit on Ganghwa Island... to use Spatial Teleportation to send them as far away as possible.
The awakened soldier pleaded.
‘If we stay in that unit, we're all going to die! An administrative clerk was organizing an operations officer's drawer, saw some documents, and told us... The regiment is planning to send us into some insane operation.
‘We're all sergeants near the end of our service, so they're planning to deploy us in a dangerous operation where we might die before we're discharged. They're trying to profit from us that way...’
Any awakened person serving on Ganghwa Island would have reason to worry about that.
Manisan, the foremost sacred mountain in the Laniakea Supercluster, was where Korea's first Gate had opened.
That sacred mountain had been stained with the blood of Ganghwa Island residents, tourists visiting at the time, and soldiers sent into later operations.
The results of Operation Eagle, carried out by the previous administration, were serious enough.
It was an operation that mobilized ten thousand reservists to exterminate the Monsters believed to be holed up in Manisan.
After that grand operation left several people dead or injured, all it had achieved was killing a single Deathclaw. There were even suspicions that the commander had been so embarrassed that they obtained a corpse elsewhere and claimed it had been killed during the operation.
To be fair, at the time, nobody knew anything about Gates or the ecology of the Monsters inside them.
People did not know that Monsters normally hid inside Gates, or that wild Monsters usually dug burrows or hid in caves. They didn't know that bombing places where Monsters might be, or sending up a few helicopters equipped with autocannons, would not accomplish much.
They also didn't know that if they started fires to drive out hiding Monsters, some Deathclaws could awaken into Flame Elementals and become an even bigger problem. Nor did they realize that Monsters already strong from eating people would grow even more powerful and become even greater threats.
Manisan was a hell created by all that ignorance piling disaster upon disaster.
And the soldier said they were scheduled to be sent into that Manisan.
They were going to be driven into that deathtrap because they were awakened. Before that happened, they wanted me to help them flee Korea and seek asylum.
After hearing everything, my vision-self finally spoke.
‘I can help you seek asylum. But not in another country. Moving you that far would be difficult too.’
I was surprised by the coldness in that voice.
Of the two emotions I had felt earlier, pity and contempt, the voice carried more contempt.
‘Then... where can you send us?’
The soldier asked, and my vision-self answered.
‘I can send you to Soweol.’
‘Sword World?’
‘Yes, Sword World. The paradise of awakened people. I'll send you there, so go live there.’
It must have been such an unexpected answer that the soldier could not react immediately. After hesitating for a long time, they finally spoke.
‘But I heard Sword World is worse than North Korea...’
‘It's fine. Doesn't the Kim family live well in North Korea? The powerful awakened people are like that in Sword World. Of course, if you go by yourselves, you'll have a hell of a time... so I'll send slaves to suffer in your place.’
‘Slaves?’
‘Yes, slaves. I'll catch them and send them there.’
The soldier stared blankly at my vision-self. Their expression seemed to ask what I meant by saying I would catch slaves for them, so my vision-self explained by asking a question.
‘Ganghwa Island has military apartments too, right? I'll send all the noncommissioned officers and officers in your unit... along with every member of their families, to Sword World.’
‘Why them...?’
‘Take that non-awakened trash to Sword World and make them work as slaves. They'll resist at first, but once you show them the difference in strength, they'll eventually submit. The process of taming them will be even more fun. Why, isn't it enjoyable just to imagine?’
A question came in response to mine.
‘Are you crazy?’
It was full of disbelief. My vision-self only snorted instead of trying to explain properly.
‘The world is what's crazy. Does it make sense for non-awakened trash to give orders to awakened people? Does it make sense for them not to pay minimum wage?’
‘Even so, how could you...?’
‘Wasn't non-awakened trash born to serve as slaves for awakened people in the first place? The world is in this state because things born as slaves call themselves officers and lawmakers, giving instructions and orders. That's why Earth is worse than Sword World... Have you ever been to Sword World? Do you know much about it?’
‘No...’
Then I smiled.
It was not a good smile. Not at all.
‘I went there long ago. Sword World is a good place. Much better than Earth.’
That smile was full of mockery for weak fellow awakened people, and pride that I alone behaved more like an awakened person than anyone else.
Still smiling, I continued.
‘I'm saying I'll send you to that good place. What a wonderful offer. I'm even sending slaves along with you, so I don't understand why you're hesitating...’
The awakened soldier left without agreeing to it on the spot.
I, on the other hand, waited for the fellow awakened person who had left to accept my offer one day.
It was such a radical offer that they could not have answered immediately, but if they thought it over, it would be quite appealing.
They would not only get to leave for somewhere far away, but also have the chance to make slaves of the people who had ordered them around and their families.
I was full of desire to personally make that near-delusional reversal of power a reality.
A few days later, an awakened soldier came to find me again. Since they were using leave to visit me, it might have been difficult for the same person to come repeatedly. This time, it was a different awakened soldier.
With a stiff expression, they told me.
‘We'll go. To Sword World.’
‘The slaves too?’
‘Yes. The slaves too.’
Then I smiled.
‘Good, my fellow awakened people. At last, you'll become genuine awakened people. Right?’
* * *
Footnotes:
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