My body was engulfed by a dizzying sense of terror as I watched the escape pod port door draw nearer. Before I could stop Kim Jaehee or order the AI to halt, the mining machine slammed into the escape pod port door at full speed.
I thought I briefly heard Seo Jiheok shouting from behind me. With a heavy thud, the impact sent my hips lifting about a hand’s breadth from the driver’s seat, pitching my body forward. The mining robot barreled straight ahead before coming to a stop. I had squeezed my eyes shut without realizing it, and when I opened them and lifted my head, the first thing I saw was Kim Jaehee’s shoulder.
[Mister Rundle. Colliding with an external obstacle has increased the number of damaged parts to five, including the intake filter section. Shall I request assistance from Mining Team 2, our fellow team members?]
My heart rate was so extreme that I could feel my heart pounding in my ears and inside my skull. My vision swam as if I were dizzy, and there was no trace of an airbag anywhere. A chill ran down my spine. There were no airbags for the driver inside a machine like this? Then how did it reduce the impact when you crashed into something? Did this even count as a traffic accident?
Kim Jaehee seemed to have acted as an airbag between the front windshield and me in this narrow, sturdy operator’s compartment. Kim Jaehee was bleeding, probably from having smashed his forehead against the front glass. The mining robot called [Crocodile] was so solid that there didn’t appear to be a single internally broken part anywhere. Even the glass was perfectly intact.
“Mr. Muhyeon. Are you okay?”
“Your forehead. It’s… bleeding.”
At my pointing, Kim Jaehee picked up a small hand mirror that appeared to have been left in the corner of the compartment by a previous worker, checked his forehead, and spoke.
“Just grazed my skin on the window. Wasn’t that fun? …Are you crying?”
Kim Jaehee said this as if he had made some surprising discovery, so I turned my head. And I roughly scrubbed my face with my right arm. Damn it!
When Kim Jaehee tried to pull at my arm, which I had buried my face in, I shook him off and shouted.
“I’m not crying, so worry about your own bullet-riddled head, you dopamine junkie!”
I don’t even know what I was saying. Only after ramming my shoulder against the terribly heavy compartment door as if to break it and leaping outside did my heart rate finally return to normal. Panting for breath, I surveyed my surroundings, which were covered in dust.
It had been moving at less than thirty kilometers per hour. It was really no big deal. Amusement park rides went faster than that. I wasn’t hurt this time. I was fine.
I don’t know what those mining robots that roam around digging rock and dirt while withstanding three thousand meters of underwater pressure are made of, but ramming with it had crumpled the interior door of the underwater base like a piece of scrap paper. One of the door panels had been dragged across the floor and pushed underneath the [Crocodile].
By the time I jumped down from the two-meter-high driver compartment and my dazed mind registered my feet hitting the ground, the people inside the escape pod port were all staring this way with blank, soulless expressions. Dizziness washed over me and my body swayed, but after a few more steps, I finally managed to straighten my back.
Inside the escape pod port, the crowd had largely divided into two groups: on one side were the members of Engineer Team Na, and on the other side were staff from other national teams. Luckily, there was some distance between where the people had gathered and the entrance to the escape pod port; if fortune hadn’t been on our side, people could have been crushed beneath the mining robot. With everyone inside staring at me, a creeping fear entirely different from the terror of crashing through the port welled up inside me.
Wondering where Tamaki was, I scanned the crowd from left to right, but I couldn’t find him in my field of vision at first. He was sitting astride the passage through which the escape pods launched upward.
He was waiting at a height of about 2.5 meters with his gun aimed downward, and when people began to murmur because of the accident that had just happened, Tamaki fired two more warning shots at the floor. Next to where the shots landed, about three people lay collapsed. A pool of blood had formed, and the fallen people were motionless.
The [Worm], which Seo Jiheok had been driving, arrived late and tried to pass through the shattered door and entrance. With door panels strewn about and chunks of concrete fallen from the entrance, entry seemed impossible. The mining robot screeched horribly as it rocked back and forth, barely managed to squeeze through the entrance, and then stopped with a series of beeping warning sounds.
The engineers, who had just totaled two mining robots worth about one hundred million each, forcibly cut the power to the mining robot that was emitting the warning sounds. Seo Jiheok remained seated inside the driver compartment without getting out, but Kim Jaehee seemed to have jumped down from his seat, because I heard the sound of his prosthetic leg striking the floor behind me.
From a distance, a familiar voice asked Tamaki a question in Korean.
“Tamaki. I think our team member is hurt; may I go check on their condition?”
Apparently, Tamaki had given orders to the people inside the escape pod port forbidding them from moving about recklessly.
“Uh? Uh.”
Looking at the shattered entrance, the clouds of dust, and the havoc wreaked by the mining robot—which looked like it belonged crawling on the seafloor rather than here—Tamaki gave a reply that didn’t sound like permission. The people inside the escape pod port probably never imagined something like this would happen. Shin Haeryang called out to his team member in a low voice.
“Ayeong-ah.”
Baek Aeyeong immediately grabbed the back of Jeong Sanghyeon’s collar with one hand. Jeong Sanghyeon let out a choked gasp and was dragged by Baek Aeyeong’s strength for about three seconds before coming to his senses, then he shouted something like “Jaehee hyung!” and ran this way.
Shin Haeryang and Baek Aeyeong also slowly approached the side of the mining robot. Baek Aeyeong, walking toward me, spoke in a very quiet voice.
“Hurry up and collapse.”
“Huh?”
“Stagger and pretend to collapse.”
Though I wondered why at Baek Aeyeong’s hushed voice, I did as he said, took one more step forward, and toppled over with a thud. To anyone watching, it would look like I had jumped out of the driver compartment and collapsed after only a few steps.
I heard footsteps running toward me. I could feel Baek Aeyeong throwing a question at the back of my head in a loud voice, asking if I was all right. Shin Haeryang, who had been running behind him, flipped me over and scanned me from head to toe with his eyes before asking.
“Are you injured anywhere?”
His voice was unusually loud for that question. I answered honestly in a small voice.
“My mind is injured.”
“Then you are severely injured.”
Shin Haeryang nodded and said in a loud voice. Did he even hear my answer? He pretended to check my arms and legs as if they were broken, then shook his head vigorously. Anyone watching would think I was gravely wounded. Looking at my state, Shin Haeryang asked in a quiet voice.
“Where is your translator?”
“It broke because of water, so I took it out.”
Baek Aeyeong pulled something like a handkerchief from his pocket, pressed it to Kim Jaehee’s forehead, and ordered him to sit right there. Baek Aeyeong leaned in and whispered low to Kim Jaehee, who had obediently sat down on the floor.
“Pretend it hurts. Hurry.”
“Ayeong-ah. I’m really fine. …You had a handkerchief? I think this is the first time I’ve seen it. And it really doesn’t hurt.”
When Kim Jaehee muttered in a small voice, Baek Aeyeong looked at him with an expression on the verge of tears, fidgeting as he glanced around. However, contrary to that demeanor, he replied in an icy voice.
“Pretend it hurts quickly, before I make you hurt for real.”
By now, the crowd had divided into groups beside the [Crocodile], which had broken through the entrance and stopped in the middle: the Engineer Team Ga members, staff from other teams standing slightly apart, and the Engineer Team Na members.
“What is the condition of the escape pods?”
While lying down, I asked Shin Haeryang about what I was most curious about first. How many intact escape pods remained was the most important thing.
Honestly, that felt more important than the situation where Tamaki seemed to want to shoot every visible engineer one by one with his gun. If the escape pods were intact, we could send out the uninjured people. Shin Haeryang answered quickly.
“We were told there are seven intact escape pods remaining. They are escape pods that Engineer Team Na bastards prepared for themselves. As you can see, Tamaki is shooting and killing anyone who approaches. And it’s the same for anyone who moves without permission or tries to leave the escape pod port.”
Seeing that even the Engineer Team Na people couldn’t board the escape pods, it seemed Tamaki was shooting indiscriminately, including at his own team. While guessing at this situation, I asked Shin Haeryang.
“Does that mean even Engineer Team Na can’t board the escape pods?”
“Yes.”
Shin Haeryang gave me a concise answer. And that was the end of that explanation.
“Please explain in more detail.”
Shin Haeryang looked at me for a moment and then told me. Upon arriving at the escape pods, two people were already dead. According to what another team staff member, who had reached the escape pod port earliest, had witnessed, Tamaki had announced that he would shoot anyone who approached the escape pods and ordered them to get out of the Hyeonmudong escape pod port.
But Tamaki only had to step aside for them to board immediately, so people who had no intention of relocating to other underwater base quarters outside Hyeonmudong to board escape pods tried to persuade Tamaki or showered him with insults.
But even then, the moment Tamaki fired warning shots, people were terrified and tried to flee the Hyeonmudong escape pod port. It was then that an employee named Daniel approached using the Engineer Team Ma leader—who was trying to leave the escape pod port—as a human shield, locking his neck with his forearm, spewing racist insults at Asians and shouting for them to sort it out amongst themselves and get out of his way so he could board the escape pod.
Then Tamaki calmly shot and killed both Jennifer, who had been taken hostage, and Daniel. After that, Tamaki announced that he would kill anyone who tried to leave the escape pod port as well, and ordered everyone to wait quietly.
And finally, when the Engineer Team Na people arrived at the escape pod port, Ichita approached Tamaki asking if he had been guarding the escape pods well for him, and the moment he drew near, Tamaki shot him.
The corpse lying over there must be Ichita’s. Then is the woman lying face down next to him, her face invisible, Jennifer? Jennifer seems to have died unluckily after getting caught up in this. According to what I’ve heard, the current situation came about because Tamaki fired shots at the floor toward the mining team members and told everyone except the engineers to get out if they didn’t want to get shot.