WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ The Police Do a Better Job Than Heroes

Chapter 29

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Staying Still Gets You Halfway There (3)

"This way, please~"

"Number 137. Number 137, where are you?"

Inside the Light City Eastern Awakened Screening Center, Kang Jin-ho let the cool blast of air conditioning wash over him and looked around with real curiosity.

Late evening as it was, staff in lab coats hurried past, a small kid who'd apparently just awakened was whining at their mom, and a huge holographic panel on the wall displayed a scrolling list of names waiting to be called.

'Interesting.'

Of course, Kang Jin-ho had built this exact "Awakened Screening Center" building type more times than he could count while playing HiCiSi. So the place looked familiar in its own way, but that familiarity had only ever extended to the glossy exterior model. Standing inside the real thing felt new in some ways and oddly familiar in others.

If he had to reach for a comparison, maybe a university hospital lobby, except with way too much money poured into it.

Citizens waiting around blankly to kill time, researchers calling out names in that clipped, businesslike tone, the whole scene felt uncannily close to a real hospital.

The differences were small. Cushioned chairs instead of hard waiting benches. Biometric number tags instead of paper ones. Oh, and the interior was a lot cleaner and more upscale. Still, for a "superpower testing facility," the place had a surprisingly grounded, dry sort of atmosphere.

"Interesting, huh?"

Beside him, Park Eun-yeong asked quietly.

"First time at a private testing center? You've been looking around like crazy since we got here."

"Yes, that's right. First time at a place like this. It feels different."

"Different from the police academy's testing center, right? That place always felt kind of run-down."

"...Yes, it does."

He had no memory of any such thing, of course, but Kang Jin-ho just went along with it and nodded in agreement.

"Still, the academy had a certain cozy charm to it. This place feels a little cold."

Eun-yeong sank into the sofa and grumbled, and just then a researcher approached and spoke to her.

"Excuse me, are you Kang Jin-ho-nim's guardian?"

"Yes, that's me."

"I see. You're registered as an ability user, so I just need to check your license once."

"Here you go."

Eun-yeong pulled her registered ability license out of her wallet and showed it to the researcher. It bore her photo alongside the words 'Light Intensity Manipulation.'

"Yes, confirmed."

"Thank you~"

The researcher walked off, and Eun-yeong turned her head to look at Kang Jin-ho, smiling in a strange, knowing way.

"You saw that, right?"

"...Sorry?"

"The license. You saw it. I never told you my ability before, did I? I'm a light manipulator."

"Ah."

It was a lie that wouldn't fool a soul, but here, Kang Jin-ho had to pretend not to know the truth.

So he nodded as convincingly as he could in an "oh, is that so?" tone, but Eun-yeong seemed to read something in it anyway, watching him with an odd look.

"What's wrong?"

"What? No, nothing's wrong. I'm fine. I just thought it was interesting. Light manipulation, huh."

"What's so strange about it? Something bothering you about my license? Is that 'gut feeling' of yours kicking in again?"

"No, no. Really, I'm fine."

"Right?"

Just as this genuinely loaded small talk was winding down.

Ding dong.

"Kang Jin-ho. Kang Jin-ho-nim. We'll be conducting the first-stage basic physical exam now, please proceed to Examination Room 3."

The voice rang out over the speaker.

"I'll, I'll be right back!"

Kang Jin-ho shot up from his seat and headed straight for Room 3.

"Room 3, where's Room 3..."

Even as he walked, part of his mind kept circling back.

Wasn't that light manipulation cover story just a bit too flimsy?

**

"Alright~ take a deep breath. Hold still, please~"

Kang Jin-ho followed the staff's instructions through a string of exam rooms.

It started with basic physical measurements. Vision, hearing, reflexes, and then a precision scanner that supposedly measured "ether."

'My body really has gotten better.'

Kang Jin-ho thought as he ran on the treadmill. If this had been the old him, he'd have collapsed ages ago, but now, despite running for a long stretch, his breath never caught. A direct result of the massive karma he'd gained recently.

He'd actually considered faking his test results on purpose beforehand.

"Hey now, you need to keep pushing to your full limit. You've still got plenty left, right? It shows up on the graph."

"...Yes, sir."

Advanced technology couldn't be fooled. In the end, Kang Jin-ho had no choice but to take the tests seriously.

Two hours of testing later.

"Everything go alright?"

Back in the waiting room, Eun-yeong, snacking on nuts, greeted him warmly. Seeing her like this, she really did look like a pretty, gentle senior. And yet she was secretly a horrifying villain.

Kang Jin-ho sat down beside her, his feelings a tangled mess, and she tossed him an almond she'd been eating.

"Good work. Anything hurt or feel off?"

"No, I'm fine. Just a little tired."

Kang Jin-ho answered as casually as he could manage, crunching down on the almond.

"Well, they said the results come out fast, so just wait a little more and..."

"Kang Jin-ho-nim. And guardian, correct? This way, please."

"...that really was fast."

Before Eun-yeong could even finish her sentence, a staff member holding a tablet approached and guided the two of them. They walked down a maze of corridors and into a room labeled 'Results.'

"Kang Jin-ho-ssi? Correct?"

A man who looked like he hadn't been home in days greeted them.

"Ahh. Have a seat here."

The man, hair greasy and lab coat rumpled, seated Kang Jin-ho and Park Eun-yeong before moving to stand against the opposite wall.

"The test results turned out pretty interesting, so I called you in right away. Take a look."

The researcher pushed his glasses up as he spoke. He tapped the wall twice with a finger, and a series of holographic graphs bloomed to life above it.

"Alright, this is Jin-ho-ssi's result graph. As you can see, your physical stats are excellent, even for a regular civilian. Look at the muscle mass and skeletal muscle structure, this isn't the body of someone who just trains hard, the muscle quality itself is superior. That's a trait typical of ability users."

The researcher pulled up a series of technical x-ray images, unreadable to the untrained eye, and kept talking.

"Honestly, based on your physical condition alone, I'd have sworn you were an ability user. But here, look at the ether test results."

He tapped the wall twice more, and the display shifted again.

"Your current ether level in the body is close to zero. Which means, legally speaking, Kang Jin-ho-nim is unpowered."

When the researcher finished speaking, a strange, heavy silence settled over the room.

Eun-yeong stared fixedly at the test results, as if trying to work out what they meant.

Kang Jin-ho hung his head low, fidgeting his hands anxiously.

'I'm screwed.'

He'd been caught. Caught without a shred of superpower.

Just as expected, the status window wasn't a power at all, and Kang Jin-ho had turned out to be nothing more than a "young man with a really good body," no ability to speak of.

What excuse should he give? He'd come prepared with about four different cover stories, but which one would land the most convincingly?

Right as he was locked in a fierce internal debate over which scenario to run with.

"So I gave it some thought. Turns out you're kind of famous, Jin-ho-ssi?"

The researcher tapped the wall again, and a string of news articles about cases Kang Jin-ho had solved scrolled up.

"The articles say you've got a sharp head on you, and you solve problems with some kind of unique gut feeling. Is that true?"

"Yes, well..."

"Hm. That gives me a rough picture. In that case, it's most likely..."

"Most likely?"

"A pre-awakening state."

The researcher let out a big yawn and continued explaining, easy and natural.

"You know how a superpower manifests once ether fully settles into a person's body, right? Well, there are quite a few cases where the moment the ether fully settles and the moment the power actually manifests don't line up. Think of it as a kind of preparation stage before the body can fully accept it."

Tap, tap. The wall shifted again, pulling up a series of reference materials on the 'pre-awakening' stage.

"When the ether hasn't fully settled, a person can use their ability, but not properly, not at full strength. We call that the pre-awakening state. For most ability users, this period lasts anywhere from a few hours to a day or two at most. But you, Jin-ho-ssi, seem to have been using that 'gut feeling' of yours for at least several months now?"

"Yes, that's right."

"It's an unusual case, but not unheard of. Generally, the stronger the ability, the longer the pre-awakening period tends to run."

"I see..."

Kang Jin-ho nodded along, but inside he was thoroughly rattled. Of course he'd known about the concept of a pre-awakening state. But could it really drag on for months at a time?

He liked to think of himself as a veteran player, but that expertise really only extended to things that interested him, villain-caused incidents, combat, that kind of thing.

Minor, detailed settings like this had never held much appeal, so he'd never really studied them in depth.

"Since you're not fully awakened yet, it's hard to pin down what ability category you'd fall under. Legally, your classification right now is actually just civilian. So let me ask, do you use the ability intentionally? Or does it trigger without you meaning to?"

"Well... it's not intentional. When I come across information related to a case, certain details just naturally come to me. Sometimes it's about the culprit's method. Sometimes it's about a clue."

Kang Jin-ho recited the cover story he'd prepared ahead of time.

"Hmm. Just from what you're describing, this sounds less like an information-type ability and more like a prophecy-type one. Though something feels a little off about that too..."

The researcher stroked his chin, thinking it over, then went pale and let out a loud exclamation.

"Wait, are you actually feeling alright?"

"What?"

"Huh?"

Kang Jin-ho and the researcher stared at each other, both sensing something had gone sideways.

"No, wait. Now that I think about it, your test numbers were all normal earlier? Huh? What?"

The researcher suddenly bolted over to his computer and started typing so fast his nose nearly touched the monitor.

"What's wrong?"

"This doesn't add up. If it were a prophecy-type ability, your organs should be half wrecked by now."

"...Sorry, what?"

"You've heard the term 'heaven's secrets leaking,' right? Prophecy-type abilities burn through life force the more you use them. Muscle wasting, loss of strength, organ damage, that's the normal progression. And since the power triggers regardless of the user's will, most of them don't live very long."

Clack, clack!

The researcher typed something in, and Kang Jin-ho's x-ray images popped up on the wall.

"But look at this. You're way too healthy. This is just a normal, healthy adult male."

The researcher kept flipping back through the images, muttering, clearly unable to make sense of it.

"Learning certain information regardless of your own will, that's a defining trait of prophecy-type abilities... but with a body this healthy, maybe I should be looking at information-type instead... There was a paper on this somewhere..."

While the researcher sank deeper into his own private world.

"Hmm."

Beside him, Eun-yeong propped her chin on one hand and let out a strange little hum.

Her eyes. Her crimson eyes, glinting with an eerie light.

"This is fun."

She smiled.

Her eyes curved into crescent moons.

"..."

And Kang Jin-ho found that look absolutely terrifying!

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