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Click…
An emergency exit for VIPs opened.
Baek Ho stepped out and scanned the rooftop. Neon bled across his eyes; ad videos throbbed in his ears. This was the roof of a building two blocks from the Venus Club.
“Hooh…”
He scrubbed at the lipstick mark on his cheek and shot a look to the side. Frank grinned sheepishly… his face and neck plastered with kiss marks, digital business cards stuck all over his shirt.
“Like it?”
“Frank’s popular… hehe…”
Deiven stumbled out last, dazed. Unlike the other two, he looked the same as when he went in… but not in his heart. Shock rattled him; his pulse wouldn’t calm.
Baek Ho leaned over the railing. A megabuilding rose directly in front, strangling the view. The sides were open, but stacked with neon signs and giant hologram projectors. This was literally ‘under the lamp’… a perfect VIP evac point and a good place to hide.
He checked the clock flickering at the edge of his vision. There was still a little time before the meeting. Better to lie low here than rush headlong.
“Let’s rest a bit.”
“Yes…”
Deiven slumped down, back to the wall. He blew out a long breath and looked up at Baek Ho.
“Um… Sir Necromancer…”
“Why.”
“Thank you… for going to such lengths for me…”
“No need for thanks. Stop the nonsense and rest.”
“Yes…”
Deiven took a photo from his breast pocket… his daughter. He sniffled and stroked the worn edges. Her birthday was coming soon…
As sorrow swelled, Baek Ho’s flat voice cut in. “You will meet them. I’ll make it so.”
“Really… thank you…”
Baek Ho flicked his hand, cutting off the moist gaze. Deiven’s tension ebbed; his head drooped, and he began to doze.
“Hehe… Frank’s popular…”
Baek Ho glanced over. Frank was peeling business cards off his shirt and studying them like a man choosing a weekend dinner menu.
“What are you doing?”
“Picking the number one. I’m going to eat pizza with the first place.”
“Recharge your mana first. You’ll drain the Necroshell like that.”
“Got it. I’m tired anyway.”
Frank sprawled out, limbs akimbo, and shut his eyes.
“Do it.”
A Reaper needed time to recover mana… like sleep for the living. An Undead entered a coma state, during which mana restored itself.
“By the way, Baek Ho.”
“Why.”
“What’s Sophia’s identity? She was terrifyingly strong.”
“…”
Baek Ho’s brow ticked. An Oni who cleaved space. A Witch who caught it with bare hands. The memory replayed, souring his mood.
“If it hadn’t been Sophia… I might be dead.”
Weakness. A helplessness etched between folds of his brain.
“I’m sorry,” Frank said, deflated. A familiar’s duty was to protect his master… worse still, he hadn’t protected him as a friend.
“Bullshit. If it weren’t for you, I would’ve died at the Superhuman Academy.”
“I’ll give you that.”
Frank raised a massive fist. Baek Ho snorted and bumped it.
“Let’s get stronger,” Baek Ho said, leaning back to the wall.
Frank kept his eyes closed. “Alright. For that, we need a lot of money. Necroshells are expensive.”
“Do that then. Anyway, let’s rest. Just thirty minutes.”
Baek Ho worked his Smartbone and toggled Frank into coma mode. Frank didn’t refuse.
Everything except life support went quiet.
“Phew…”
Baek Ho rubbed the back of his neck. How many hours had he been awake? In night-city Underheaven, regular sleep mattered… but today had gone to hell. The day’s events left him more wrung out than usual.
Slowly, he closed his eyes.
Tap…
How long had it been?
Tap…
Something hard prodded his forehead. He opened his eyes… to a pig.
No… someone in a pig mask, tapping his brow with a gun muzzle.
“…”
Baek Ho didn’t flinch. He rolled his eyes calmly. Pig, cow, chicken… three animal masks, guns trained on the unconscious Deiven and the comatose Frank.
Tap…
The Pig Mask nudged him again.
“What are you gonna do about it?”
The Pig Mask drew an electric prod from his coat. Baek Ho’s brow knotted hard.
“Got anything gentler? Don’t make me make you regret it later…”
Crackle…
“No!”
Deiven jerked upright, hands flying to the nape of his neck. The image of the ox-head mask knocking him out sent shivers along his spine.
‘…Where is this?’
He looked around… a dark, cramped room. One door, a blanket on the floor. No windows, no furniture.
“Ah…”
‘So we were captured by the Central Authority after all! Our human life is over now!’
“Hng…”
Emotion surged… sadness and anger tangling into pain. Never mind life… what boiled him alive was the fear of forgetting his wife’s and daughter’s faces.
Then the room tilted and moved. Deiven lost his balance and slammed into the wall. Not a building, then… this was the inside of something moving.
‘What happens now…? Should I beg to see them one last time? If I promise to work like a dog forever, will they grant it?’
Voices drifted through the door… two men.
— This is going to get serious…
— I know… they should’ve given a heads-up or something…
They drew closer.
Deiven clenched his fist and slid back from the door. He wanted at least one last desperate act. He didn’t know how to wield mana yet, but he’d rush them anyway.
The door opened.
Deiven hurled himself forward. “Aaaah!”
He swung wildly. The masked man tilted his head and let the punch sail by. Deiven crumpled to the floor, but he didn’t give up.
“Please!”
On his knees, he grabbed the man’s pant leg, bowing low as he wailed.
“Please let me see my family! I’ll do anything you ask!”
“Ahhh…”
The man patted his back and helped him up. “Calm down.”
“Sniff… sob…”
“You must’ve been very frightened.”
They led him out. A narrow passage, old machines and wires lining the way. By the time Deiven realized they were inside a transport hovercar, a window opened along the right wall.
He stopped… and stared.
Light.
Warm and cozy.
Something soft and fluffy flowed through the window and grazed his skin. Spellbound, he stood there and cupped his palm into the glow. The warmth seemed to sink through skin to bone.
He looked up.
A round, blazing body. Dazzling… pain pushed his eyes down, and below it unfurled a world nothing like neon.
A sky of unbroken blue.
A green field carpeted with nameless plants.
Here and there, shattered shapes of grey concrete ruins.
A place he’d only ever seen in pictures and paintings.
The outside.
“Ah…”
“Deiven, it’s your first time outside the city, isn’t it?”
It was nothing like Underheaven. Nothing like the artificial eco-parks that cost two months’ wages to enter. Not fake nature.
And for the first time, he understood… why necromancers and Reapers risked their lives to reclaim the outside. Why they wanted to make it humanity’s again.
“Sob… sob…”
“Oh dear, why are you crying like this?”
This landscape. This spectacle. He wanted his wife and daughter to see it.
“Now, this way.”
Supported by the two men, Deiven walked on. At the end of the corridor, an iron door dropped open. A fresh breeze spilled in. Cool air swept his cheeks and neck.
Squinting into the brilliance, he looked ahead.
A lot of people waited beyond the door.
‘…Necromancer? Reapers?’
He couldn’t tell. Not the kind he knew… no drab black coats, no gleaming Necroshells. Most looked ordinary; without the weapons slung across their bodies, they could’ve passed for Underheaven workers.
“Hello!”
A woman stepped forward… brightly dyed hair, tight tights, loose jacket. Strikingly beautiful, with a white fox mask strapped to her forearm.
“Really glad to meet you!”
She seized Deiven’s hand and pumped it. “I’m Elise of the Liberation Army. I’m in charge of this shelter.”
“Liberation Army…? What’s that?”
“You haven’t been briefed yet?”
Elise tilted her head and glanced past him. At her look, the man who’d brought Deiven flinched and shoved the pig mask peeking from his pocket deeper.
“Hoho, he must’ve been out of it. Maybe he made an irreparable mistake?”
Elise beamed back at Deiven. “Formal intro, then. We’re Awakened who’ve united to liberate Awakened people. We call ourselves the Liberation Army. We used to be the Hunter Association.”
“…Huh?”
“Simply put… an armed group. Well… a rebel army.”
Deiven’s pupils quivered. Rebel army… he’d seen the phrase in news reels about terrorist incidents.
“Rebels… I mean, the Liberation Army… why did they… me…?”
A hovercar engine growled overhead.
Vroooom…
He looked up. Under the sun lighting the world, an older hovercar descended. It landed; the door hissed open. Two people stepped out… a woman crying, and a child clutching a white stuffed dog.
His wife and daughter.
“…Ah, aa!”
Deiven’s pupils dilated. He screamed and ran… tripped on a stone, fell, scrambled up, and ran again.
“Honey!”
“Dad!”
They ran, all three, like this was their last sprint in life. On a bright day, in a warm place, they collided and clung, wiping faces and shoulders, sharing the hoarse joy of reunion. On green, soft ground… not dark, damp concrete… they confirmed each other’s existence.
“Thank you! Really, thank you!”
Deiven sobbed and shouted… at the Liberation Army who had dragged him and his family back from the edge.
Elise brushed tears from her cheek and answered, “Not us! Give thanks to Baek… D!”
Baek Ho lay on the rooftop, eyes on the night sky. A moon made by illusion magic. Stars engineered by magitech. Astronomers and artists stitched the heavens tonight too… beautiful enough to feel like day.
A translucent window popped into view. A message… from Elise.
“Good grief.” Childish. He snorted and shut his eyes.
Come to think of it, this whole thing had been his request to Elise. He’d told her there was a runaway Awakened… go, take them. He’d offered to help. But then the ambush blindsided them, the plan twisted, and somehow he’d ended up getting zapped by the Liberation Army’s prod.
Vrrrr- vrrrr…
Vibration buzzed along the back of his hand. He opened his eyes… multiple overlapping message windows.
He typed quick.
As expected… no way they’d hand over a top-grade criminal.
Maybe ease off.
He ignored her and went to close the window… then noticed a missed message. From Sophia, sent while he was unconscious.
‘Who do they think they’re fooling.’ Better to say outright they’d attacked him to shake his father… and that she’d stayed close to cover the fallout.
“…”
Had she been watching from afar?
He understood Sophia’s anger. As a Reaper who hunted demonic beings on the frontlines, she wouldn’t look kindly on Awakened who refused to become Reapers and ran.
The messages kept going… useless chatter. Eat and exercise. Refrain from the technique. How about becoming a commander. On and on.
What he needed was at the very end:
He sent a short reply to the long note.
It didn’t send. Looked like Smartbone comms were blocked.
“How much will they pay…?”
He rose, buoyed by the thought, and woke Frank from his coma.
“No!”
Frank shot upright at the command, shouting… still trapped in half a dream.
“No way! I’m not dating second place!”
“…You madman.”
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