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Beacon of Light in the Dark Sea-Chapter 168
Chapter 168
“The Engineer Team N bastards did this? Those cowards?”
All the Slavic people looked at Carlos. Especially under Vladimir’s gaze, Carlos hurriedly pointed at me and said,
“This person said it! He said those guys sabotaged the escape pods!”
…I’m not used to people looking at me like this. Everyone was looking at me, but only Nikita was still looking down at Dmitri’s face. Shin Haeryang turned his head towards me for a moment, then looked at Dmitri’s chest. I simply stated the facts I knew.
“In North District, there are Japanese people walking around with guns, in East District, there are Chinese people with guns, and an armed cult called Infinity Church has taken control of the Second Underwater Base.”
“How do you know that?”
Sophia, who was gathering Irina’s fallen arms and hands on the floor, asked with bloodshot eyes.
“…I found out by chance. To be precise, I don’t really know either.”
“He doesn’t know anything. He’s a newbie who just got here.”
Tumanako, who was standing next to me, stepped in to defend me, but it seemed to sound different to Nikolai.
“More precisely, this happened shortly after he was hired.”
Hmm. …That’s true, but. Wouldn’t it be a coincidence? It seems like the situation in this underwater base was already a mess before I arrived. I don’t think adding just one more person like me would have made things dramatically worse.
I can only do dental work. Even if someone visited Deep Blue, there might be several people who could eat less painfully or uncomfortably, but I don’t have the ability to mass-produce gun-wielding psychopaths. And there must be a few more people who were hired around the same time as me. It’s not like only one or two people live here.
“Is that all you know?”
Vladimir was asking me.
“If you use the central building elevator to go up, you will definitely encounter Infinity Church people at the Second Underwater Base. And there are armed people on Daehan Island as well.”
“How many people are there? What weapons do they use?”
“The Infinity Church people number between 20 and 60, and their weapons are guns.”
Vladimir frowned. Nikolai, who was listening from the side, asked me,
“So what kind of guns?”
“Long… guns?”
“Are you trying to be funny?”
Is my explanation about the guns lacking? How should I explain it?
“They’re black and you insert the magazine from bottom to top. They have strong recoil and are heavy to carry around, so they’re slung over the shoulder with a strap.”
“Most rifles have magazines inserted from bottom to top, have strong recoil, and are heavy. So would you tie them to your head with a strap?”
Judging by his tone and content, he seems to be mocking me. I understand what Nikolai wants to say. Seo Jihyuk taught me how to hold, aim, and shoot instead of teaching me gun names. And also that I should crouch as much as possible and hide well.
I’ve never even changed a magazine. I barely know from watching action movies and seeing Baek Ae-young change magazines. Nikolai said to me, almost like a sigh,
“Suka. All Asians are useless in life.”
“Watch your mouth if you don’t want to get beaten up by an unarmed Asian.”
Seo Jihyuk, who had retreated to a corner, growled. Jeong Sanghyun, who was next to Seo Jihyuk, was startled, looked around nervously, and then quietly slipped over to Jae-hee’s side. Hearing this, Nikolai stood up from the chair he was sitting on and said,
“You think I’ll be scared? Let’s see your team members found as corpses too!”
“Are you done talking?!”
As Nikita, who had been standing still like a statue, started shedding tears, Vladimir wrapped an arm around his shoulders and patted him. He didn’t try to stop his team member at all, even though he was about to get into a fistfight with a member of another team. Shin Haeryang, who had been carefully examining Irina’s gunshot wound to the skull, expressed his irritation towards those behind him.
“If you’re going to fight, fight to the death! We have plenty of chairs.”
That silenced them for a moment, but instead, Nikolai pulled out a knife from his wet, old pants, saying he was going to kill that bastard. Seo Jihyuk was about to rush out, saying he’d lay him next to those guys.
No. Did these people hear that as permission? Am I the only one who understood it as don’t fight? …Or not? Did Shin Haeryang give permission to fight?
Fortunately, the rest of the team members, except for those two, seemed to have understood it normally. Viktor grabbed Nikolai’s waist with one arm and dragged him backwards, and Nikolai’s legs were almost off the ground as he was moved away from the Engineer Team A people. Only Russian curses and demands to be put down could be heard, and Engineer Team A was similar.
Kim Jae-hee suddenly jumped onto Seo Jihyuk’s back, just as he was about to rush out. Like a frog leaping, he clung to Seo Jihyuk’s back, suddenly shifting his center of gravity backward. As Seo Jihyuk staggered greatly, Baek Ae-young lightly tapped the back of Seo Jihyuk’s knee with her toes, as if pressing a button. Seo Jihyuk, who had been trying to regain his balance as he was about to fall backward, rolled on the floor sideways with Kim Jae-hee. Baek Ae-young spoke to the groaning pair as if they were pathetic.
“You impatient fool! Have some patience!”
“When in your life have you ever been patient to lecture me!”
Seo Jihyuk, raising his upper body, shouted at Baek Ae-young like that. Fire lit up in Baek Ae-young’s eyes too. Kim Jae-hee, afraid that Seo Jihyuk might rush at Nikolai again, wrapped his arms around Seo Jihyuk’s neck from behind and tried to pacify him.
“Do you want to throw punches at a team that’s just lost two members in this situation? Let’s be patient, okay? People can talk nonsense when they’re struggling!”
“What? Fine! I won’t be patient! Do you want to die by my hands first?!”
“Jihyuk hyung! Now’s the time! Teach Ae-young a lesson! And that Nikolai bastard too! I never liked him!”
When all three glared fiercely at Jeong Sanghyun, he closed his mouth, saying, “No, I was just saying.”
Come to think of it, I can understand that Nikolai’s tone is trash-like. And that Seo Jihyuk was trying to take my side. I extended my hand to the two people rolling on the floor.
Kim Jae-hee grabbed my right hand that came towards him and grunted as he got up. Seeing him stand straight on both legs, I extended my hand to Seo Jihyuk, the next batter, and said,
“Those people are all drunk. They’re not in their right minds. Let’s not get hurt by the words of a drunkard who can barely walk.”
Seo Jihyuk nodded lightly as he took my hand and stood up. As Shin Haeryang, his hands wet with blood, approached the team members rolling on the floor, Seo Jihyuk asked the team leader without even dusting off the dirt on his body.
“What about Jihyun?”
“I’ve said it many times, but she wasn’t there.”
“You said corpses were hidden. Did you really search all of Central Building?”
“You think we could search all of Central Building in 15 minutes round trip while carrying a corpse? No.”
Realizing his words didn’t make sense even to himself, Seo Jihyuk closed his mouth. And he anxiously shook one leg. Seeing this, Kim Jae-hee whispered to Seo Jihyuk.
“Hyung. Shaking your leg makes your luck run out.”
“Is there any more luck to run out in this situation?”
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“Are you bragging to me that you can shake your leg right now?”
Seo Jihyuk’s leg-shaking stopped immediately. A slight look of apology flashed across Seo Jihyuk’s face, and then he started grinding his teeth.
I was about to say a few words about the enormous absurdity happening right next to a dentist. However, seeing the anxious side profile, I gave up on pointing it out and closed my mouth. Shin Haeryang looked at Seo Jihyuk’s swelling eyes and Baek Ae-young’s hand, then said to Baek Ae-young.
“I told you to stay still for just 10 minutes.”
The answer came immediately from Seo Jihyuk.
“It’s my fault. Ae-young did nothing wrong.”
“It’s not my fault.”
At Baek Ae-young’s words, Shin Haeryang looked at her face once, but didn’t say anything more. Kim Jae-hee, rubbing one of his ear piercings with his fingertip, asked,
“Team leader. What are you going to do now?”
“First, we need to get everyone here out.”
“What about finding the other missing team members?”
“We’ll do that later.”
At this, Seo Jihyuk looked like he wanted to say something but swallowed his words. It seemed like he wanted to form a search party right away and search the entire underwater base for the two missing people, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud. Instead, Seo Jihyuk asked Shin Haeryang something else.
“Are they going to take the bodies? You carried them here on your backs, right?”
“We couldn’t take pictures because we don’t have electronic devices. My pad is in my room, and Vladimir said he doesn’t know where his is. …Deputy Team Leader Nikita said she wouldn’t believe it until she saw the bodies herself.”
Nikita, even while crying, still couldn’t take her eyes off her dead younger brother’s face. She was looking at the face as if trying to engrave it in her memory, but it seemed she still couldn’t believe it no matter how much she looked. Seo Jihyuk scratched the back of his head, looked towards the chairs where Irina and Dmitri were laid, then looked back at Nikolai and asked,
“So. Did you agree on any deal? Like helping or something?”
“What could we possibly get in return for carrying a female corpse that’s not even half my body weight to a wake? Well, I did mention asking for help finding our people, but it probably won’t be much help.”
“Team leader. Can’t we escape while they’re fighting with the Japanese?”
Shin Haeryang thought for a moment at Jeong Sanghyun’s question, then shook his head.
“If Vladimir is in his right mind, he’ll probably think about evacuating his team members before seeking revenge.”
Baek Ae-young looked towards Irina and asked,
“Did they know how their team members disappeared? We suddenly disappeared while walking, right? Did they say theirs disappeared suddenly too?”
Shin Haeryang answered as if he had no expectations,
“As drunk as they are, they wouldn’t have noticed if their team members disappeared next to them, or even if a bear had torn them apart alive.”
Then Shin Haeryang extended his hand towards me. Now I know. This isn’t a request for a handshake or anything like that. I quickly tried to hand over the pad I had been holding at my side to Shin Haeryang.
However, Tumanako, seeing Shin Haeryang’s sudden gesture and my action, seemed to misunderstand that I was having the pad taken away by Shin Haeryang. She grabbed my hand that was about to hand over the pad, startled.
“Ah. This pad belongs to Team Leader Shin Haeryang. My pad is in the water.”
Then Tumanako sheepishly said, “Ah, is that so?” and removed her hand. Shin Haeryang, receiving his pad back, answered dryly,
“Thank you.”
“I used it well.”
“…Two members of our team have disappeared. Do you know where they are?”
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