Chapter 69 Monster or Human
[Right now, the streets of Hongdae are a scene of utter chaos!!]
“What, what is this…?”
A safety alert text that appeared on my phone.
With the ominous sound of beeping, I quickly turned on the news on my phone.
And then I saw the current catastrophe in Hongdae, which wasn’t in the original work, leaving me speechless.
“Yes. This is reporter Gidae Park from the scene. Currently, the entrance to the streets of Hongdae is completely blocked. It is presumed that there are still many survivors inside the street, and the military and the Hunter Association are working hard to rescue them.”
“Oppa, this…!”
“What, what? What’s happening?”
Ria and Eve had already crouched down on either side of me, watching the news outside together.
The two monsters looked at the hellish scene in Hongdae with expressions that left them at a loss for words.
‘What on earth happened?’
Currently, Lee Hee-jeong was in the United States, so there was no scenario where the streets of Hongdae would be engulfed in flames.
In other words, this was a butterfly effect that deviated from the original work.
But I had no time to figure out where and how things had gone wrong for the scenario to change like this.
“Oppa! I’ll go back to my sister right now!”
“Yeah. Then I should ‘depart’ soon too.”
If you can’t use your head, use your body!
To stop this disaster, I stood up almost simultaneously with Ria, ready to rush to the scene.
But then.
“Hmm…”
“?! Wh, what! What are you staring at!”
Ria, who was about to run the fastest, turned back and looked quietly at Eve standing still.
“Oppa, aren’t you taking her?”
“Uh, huh?”
“Darn it… Why should I go?! This is my home!”
“My little sister… I mean Eve. Can’t we just raise her at our house?”
“Hey! This is my home! I’m staying here!!”
Perhaps Ria didn’t want to leave her newly found sister behind.
Ignoring Eve’s will, Ria wanted to take her by force if necessary.
“Oppa, let’s just kidnap her and take her!”
“Ki, kidnap?!”
…What a thing to say.
Seeing Eve trembling at the serious suggestion of kidnapping the Korean branch chief’s subordinate monster, I firmly shook my head.
“Ria… If we take her, Sophia will have a hard time.”
“Sister will…?”
“Yeah, so we can’t take her to our house.”
“…! Y, yeah! Just try to take me! My mom won’t let you off easily!”
Eve was trembling all over, but thanks to Jin-ah Lee, she only had the guts to back me up.
Seeing Ria sigh deeply in regret and finally giving up, she asked.
“…Why do you talk like that?”
“Huh?”
“…Butt?”
“Eek?!”
Seeing the sister trying to assert dominance over her younger sibling, I could only give a bitter smile.
***
The actions of the cyborg monster were truly bizarre.
No matter how focused a monster was on eradicating traces of humanity, after turning an entire city into a sea of fire, it should logically move to a region with more living humans.
“…How many laps has it been already?”
The monster had been moving around the streets of Hongdae for a continuous hour since it first appeared there.
As if it were a human shopping.
“Does it not know where to go? Or does it have another purpose…?”
Hongdae, a famous spot in Korea.
A tourist attraction that foreigners and locals alike wanted to visit at least once if they were in Korea.
But that was for humans, not monsters.
“Why is it doing this?”
On the rooftop of a collapsed building.
A hunter with blue hair was secretly monitoring the monster from a high vantage point to avoid being seen.
Korea’s A-rank hunter, Kim Yoon-ji.
She was tracking the cyborg monster, sending real-time information to the headquarters.
“The monster is on the move again. First, it passed by a clothing store, then a café, and now… tanghulu? Anyway, it’s entering another food store…”
Who would have thought that a national disaster-level monster would go to eat tanghulu.
Kim Yoon-ji was just bewildered.
But thanks to her, the Korean Hunter Association’s branch could keep track of the monster’s movements.
Even if the monster kept acting strangely…
“Hey, Korean woman…!”
“?!”
“Why, so, pretty?”
She was thinking about never letting her guard down and stealthily tracking it.
‘Was I being followed?! Since when?’
She hadn’t noticed at all.
The monster had clearly entered the tanghulu shop, but before she knew it, it was standing behind her.
A shadow nearly five meters tall covered Kim Yoon-ji’s body.
At the same time, a chilling, heavy aura emanated from behind her.
“Muay Thai – Spinning Kick!!”
Smack.
Kim Yoon-ji instantly jumped up, spinning her body to deliver a kick that could demolish a five-story building in one blow.
But.
Slash.
“What?”
…She was sure she had attacked first.
With a blink of an eye, Kim Yoon-ji saw sharp wounds appearing all over her toes.
The sight of blood splattering in the air caught her eye.
And that wasn’t all.
Thud!
“Urgh?!”
Before she could land, the cyborg monster’s fist struck her, driving her solar plexus back to her spine, causing her to vomit blood with only the whites of her eyes showing.
“Hmm!”
“…Huh?”
She would have been slammed to the ground and died if not for—
“…Fortunately, you’re still breathing.”
“Wh-who?”
The person who quickly ran to her and held her in his arms, rescuing her.
The monitoring room of the Korean branch, which captured him through a drone, was now filled with shock and relief, regaining hope.
“It’s Don Joe Michaelida…”
“Don Joe Michaelida! A national power-level hunter from the United States has come to assist us!”
“We’re saved! We survived!”
Don Joe Michaelida.
Currently, he felt responsible for the unavoidable sacrifices that had occurred, contrary to their party’s plans, and had rushed over.
“I don’t know how you can still move, but given the situation, I’ll have to terminate you.”
With that, Don Joe began to take off his clothes.
However, the cyborg monster wasn’t going to miss this chance.
“Keek!”
Thud!
A powerful punch hit his face hard enough to collapse the building behind him.
Gathering himself.
“?!”
“…Tch! Please wait… This suit is a gift from my wife, and I cherish it, so I can’t fight wearing this.”
Only with a bit of a bloody nose, Don Joe neatly folded all his clothes except for his underwear, right in front of the bewildered cyborg monster.
He placed the well-folded suit next to the fallen Kim Yoon-ji.
And then.
“Hup!”
Clang!
He landed a punch on the monster’s face, just like he had been hit.
The sound of metal clashing resonated.
However, instead of being surprised, the cyborg monster mirrored him, a drop of blood at the corner of its mouth, and Don Joe just smiled.
“Why are you so surprised? Is it that fascinating that my fist isn’t cut?”
“…!”
“HAHAHAHA!”
Showing his fist, which was as big as an average person’s head, to the monster, Don Joe spoke.
“I’ve known for a long time that your ability allows you to turn your entire body into sharp ‘blades.’ And my ability is the exact counter to that. I’m a shielder hunter who can harden all the structures of my body.”
“Am-er-ic-an… man!”
“A shield can never be cut by a blade. In fact, it’s the blade that gets damaged while fighting against the shield.”
The cyborg monster spread its palms wide.
Sharp blades appeared inside every finger joint, and it intended to crush and tear apart Don Joe’s head.
But Don Joe Michaelida hardened his entire face in response.
Clang!
“Stop! I’m your perfect nemesis!”
“…!!”
Seeing Don Joe Michaelida standing dominant.
“It’s done! We’ve won!”
“The monster in Hongdae, classified as a national disaster level, is expected to be subdued soon!”
“Oh, thank God…!”
Up until that moment, the monitoring room of the Korean Hunter branch was filled with hope.
Wriggle.
Inside the cyborg monster.
Wriggle wriggle.
Another monster was about to emerge, something they couldn’t even imagine.
***
This place is hell.
I realized this fact at a young age, as an elementary school student.
“Tada! Isn’t this pouch pretty?”
“Wow…”
“Mom bought it for me! Hehe. You guys live in a poor neighborhood apartment, so you can’t afford something like this, right?”
It was a pouch I wanted so much.
But I couldn’t buy it.
Because I wasn’t born into a family that could afford it.
‘Why can she buy it and I can’t?’
We’re both human.
We’re both from the same country.
Then we should all use nice things equally. Why does the discrimination start from here?
When I’m eating discounted beef at home, someone else might be cutting into a luxurious steak at a restaurant.
When I’m filling my bathroom with water to feel good with a bath bomb, someone else might be traveling to a real hot spring to relieve their fatigue.
The legend of the dragon rising from a small stream.
Every time I saw the famous American CEO who started as a pauper but succeeded by founding a huge company with sheer effort, I realized.
Without even such opportunities from birth!
Without any chance of rising in status!
In this country where I have to keep living just because I’m alive, it really is a rotten place.
And I needed to escape from this place as soon as possible.
When the Ministry of Defense sent me a draft notice, even though they had never done anything for a woman like me, my resolve became even firmer.
So…
So!
“I can’t die yet.”
I have to rise to the top.
In America, the land of opportunity, if you work hard, you are rewarded accordingly.
To live a life where I don’t use bath bombs, don’t buy discounted beef, don’t tremble at delivery fees, and don’t feel guilty about buying luxury goods.
“Kraaaaaaa!!”
“Wh, what?!”
A woman’s fierce determination began to tear at the monster’s instincts and burst outward.
And as a result.
Riiip.
Just to absorb nutrients, she had been put inside, but now she tore through the cyborg monster’s abdomen, absorbing all its strength and emerging outside as a human…
No, more accurately, a humanoid monster.
“I… must… succeed!!”
“…A woman? No, that hair color! Could it be…?!”
“I can’t go back to being a miserable lower-class person who eats… pork!”
A scenario completely twisted from the original.
It was the moment when the monster Lee Hee-jeong, who devoured a national disaster-level monster with sheer determination, first appeared in this world.