The Police Do a Better Job than Heroes - Chapter 11

WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

◈ The Police Do a Better Job Than Heroes

Chapter 11

──────

Get Famous First. (5)

Patrol was one of the standard duties on a police officer's schedule. Patrol usually split into two kinds, vehicle patrol and foot patrol.

"Alright! Jin-ho, let's go!"

"Yes, ma'am!"

Officers in Light City generally preferred foot patrol.

There were several reasons for that. First, Light City was a massive metropolis with a population pushing a hundred million, so the streets were packed, and the roads jammed up constantly during commute hours. Physically speaking, there just wasn't enough room for a car to squeeze through half the time.

"Excuse me, ma'am. Are you alright?"

"Yeah... I drank way too much yesterday... ugh..."

"Want me to pat your back?"

The city's population density was so high that narrow alleys and long staircases were everywhere too, another reason cars often couldn't get through.

Anyway, all sorts of things happened in Light City, the kind of things you wouldn't believe. An officer on patrol needed to handle whatever came their way, flexibly and fast.

"Sir, the one floating over there. You still haven't sobered up, have you?"

"Uh? I did go pretty hard last night... why?"

"You know you're not supposed to fly while drunk, right?"

"I was only like three centimeters off the ground... cut me some slack..."

Guys who partied until dawn and flew home still half drunk.

"Excuse me, my son's gone missing... could you help me find him?"

"Alright, I understand. Could you tell me what he was wearing?"

"A white shirt and ivory shorts... but there's a problem."

"A problem?"

"He has an invisibility ability... so you can't see him."

"..."

Missing kids who'd gotten lost while completely invisible.

"Hey, you two, officers!"

"Yes, ma'am."

"My Meow-ong climbed up that tree and won't come down... could you help me out?"

"...Is Meow-ong a cat, by any chance?"

"Nope? A pet tiger. He's pretty gentle though."

Getting an elderly grandmother's tiger down out of a tree, among other things.

Outside of Light City, things like this would've seemed impossible, but here they happened calmly, routinely, like nothing at all. This enormous city drew in all the world's capital, science, and superpowers, the single largest city on Earth. Naturally, even its everyday reality was nothing like anywhere else.

Well, if you came to Light City, you followed Light City's rules. Kang Jin-ho threw everything he had into helping people, using every bit of knowledge available to him.

After he'd finished helping every citizen who'd asked, Park Eun-yeong turned to him with a sudden question.

"By the way, Jin-ho. Most rookies lose their minds the first time they come to Light City. But you seem more used to it than I'd expect. Are you originally from here?"

"Ah, no, that's not it... I just figure, well, it's Light City, so stuff like this happens, and that seems to settle it for me."

"Ahh."

Park Eun-yeong nodded, apparently satisfied. In truth, Kang Jin-ho had already learned Light City's ecosystem inside out from the game, which was why he stayed so calm, but he had no intention of admitting that outright.

"You really are strange, Jin-ho, you know? You just glance at a case and nail it, just like that. Sometimes you don't even see it, you just hear about it and still get it right. You sure you don't have a superpower?"

"No, really, I don't."

"Yeah? They'll find out when you get tested eventually, you know. If it turns out you're lying, you're dead."

"...I-I really don't have one. Probably."

"Okay, okay. I just thought it was interesting, that's all. But you said it before, right? That you get a strong hunch the moment you hear about a case."

"Yes, that's right."

Everything Kang Jin-ho had shown so far didn't add up logically, so naturally people around him kept pestering him with "how'd you do that?" Every time, he'd dodged with vague answers like "I just got a feeling" or "it hit me instinctively," steering clear of any concrete explanation.

He had no intention of telling the truth, and honestly couldn't have even if he wanted to, so he'd kept deflecting. But judging from the way Eun-yeong's eyes were sparkling now, that word "instinct" seemed to have really caught her attention.

"So this instinct you're talking about. Does it just go off whenever, no rhyme or reason? Or can you trigger it on purpose?"

"Um... it's not something I control. It just comes to me sometimes, regardless of what I want."

"Yeah? Should we test it?"

"Huh?"

Kang Jin-ho had said "regardless of what I want" specifically because there could be cases he had no clue about, but he hadn't expected Eun-yeong to suddenly suggest running an experiment, and it threw him badly.

"Okay, so what should I ask? Hold on a second."

Whatever his reaction, Eun-yeong's crimson eyes gleamed as she scanned the area with real enthusiasm.

Kids kicking a ball around. A housewife on the phone, walking back from the mart. A middle-aged man sitting on a park bench, sipping coffee...

"How about this?"

She seemed to have found a proper target. She tapped Kang Jin-ho's shoulder and pointed at something.

"Those three pigeons up on that streetlamp. Which one's the oldest, out of the three?"

"...Huh?"

Kang Jin-ho went completely blank at a question he never could've anticipated. Hold on, I just walked into this game, how am I supposed to know a pigeon's age?

"..."

"Come on. Which one looks the oldest to you?"

But when it came down to actually saying "I don't know," the strange smile on Park Eun-yeong's face, and those eyes, were far too terrifying. If he said he didn't know, she'd be disappointed, right? And if disappointment kept piling up, one after another, he might suddenly find himself "let go" from the job, right?

Kang Jin-ho racked his brain desperately. He needed to come up with something plausible, but absolutely nothing came to him. The pigeons all looked identical, the only thing he could even point to was that the one on the right had some kind of blue bump growing on its head...

"Ah?"

A blue bump? Wait, isn't that a robot?

A screen he'd seen back in HiCiSi flashed through his mind. There'd definitely been an event where Blue Net, one of the telecom companies, released a swarm of bio-mimetic drone pigeons across the city to gather intelligence.

When that event triggered, the city's public order dropped by a full 5 points, and an illustration of a pigeon with a blue bump sprouting from its head would fill the entire screen. It was one of the game's classic, universally hated events, which was exactly why he remembered it.

Lucky break.

Kang Jin-ho felt a wave of relief inside at recognizing something he actually knew, but on the outside, he forced himself to look casual as he opened his mouth.

"Sorry, but I think the question itself is a little off."

"What do you mean?"

"The pigeon on the right doesn't have an age, I don't think. Pretty sure it's a robot."

"A robot? Seriously?"

Eun-yeong grinned, then immediately bent down and scooped up a small pebble lying on the street.

And then.

-BOOM!

"Huh?"

Up at the top of the streetlamp, at a height of nearly ten meters, the robotic pigeon perched there burst apart with a loud pop. Sparks and mechanical parts scattered to the ground instead of blood and feathers, and a chill crawled up Kang Jin-ho's spine.

She'd just thrown a rock and hit a robot pigeon that far away? Hard enough to make it explode in one shot?

"Actually, I already knew the one on the right was a robot, you know? Heard about it from somewhere. But I didn't expect you to figure it out just from looking! That's genuinely amazing!"

Whatever his own reaction was, Park Eun-yeong clapped her hands, delighted with herself. She didn't seem ready to stop there, scanning the area fiercely for something else to ask about.

"Hmm, so then~ ah, this one."

Partway through her search, Eun-yeong's body went suddenly still, a mischievous smile spreading across her lips. She'd apparently found a suitable target.

"I've decided what to ask. Those two guys over there, how about them? Does your hunch kick in for this one too?"

Following Eun-yeong's gaze, Kang Jin-ho turned his head and spotted two figures at the mouth of an alley.

Deep inside the dim alley, two men were exchanging something.

The shorter of the two pulled cash out from inside his jacket, while the taller man in a hoodie nodded and took the money.

Given how little money was changing hands, it could've easily passed for some ordinary secondhand trade.

"Hm."

For some reason, the taller man's face looked familiar to Kang Jin-ho. He'd definitely seen that face while playing the game... who was it, though? Since it hadn't stuck clearly in his memory, the man probably wasn't a powerful villain or hero. But he was almost certain he'd seen him somewhere.

He stood there in silence, staring at the man for a good while.

"What's wrong, Jin-ho?"

Park Eun-yeong asked, her expression carrying a strange note of anticipation.

Too focused to notice her tone, Kang Jin-ho spoke without thinking.

"It's... that guy over there. The tall one. He looks kind of... suspicious."

"Hmm... really? Interesting."

Eun-yeong smiled brightly at that.

"Now that I look closer, I think I might know him. Want to go talk to him?"

At that very moment.

"Here, fifty thousand won. Thanks for your trouble."

"Sure~ if you ever need anything again... huh?"

"What's wrong?"