The man we had captured readily agreed to have his limbs tied with the laces of his sneakers. Shin Haeryang had grabbed him and skillfully threatened him with words like, “Below here is the hell of an abyss. There’s no coming back up. Even the god you believe in won’t be able to find you. If you scream, I’ll throw you down there. If you want to live, nod quietly.” There was a hint of sincerity in his tone.
The man, who had been dragged through the wall into an unknown space and beaten, stared at the pitch-black stairs barely visible as a single ray of light shone through the darkness, all while the wind let out strange wailing sounds. Then he nodded frantically. He seemed to think that if he screamed and people came running, he would already have been thrown into that pitch-black darkness.
The man instinctively looked toward the wall where light was coming through, as though he wanted to escape, but Shin Haeryang anticipated his actions and said,
“Your companion says we shouldn’t kill you. But I hope you’ll be uncooperative. That way, I can throw you down right away.”
After that, the man, stripped of his clothes, was obediently tied up without resisting. At one point, he sniffled and cried, making noises like “Please, spare me,” and my conscience was stabbed again and again. I really wasn’t cut out to be a terrorist, but Shin Haeryang acted as though it were his calling.
After tying the man up so he couldn’t move, Shin Haeryang forcibly put on the black top we had stolen. The sleeves, shoulders, and chest looked as though they would burst, but none of the three of us paid it any mind. Once he pulled the hat low over his head, he at least looked like a believer of the Infinite Church.
Shin Haeryang inspected the stolen gun and slung it over his back. I didn’t have a gun, and I felt relieved about that. I had barely managed to crawl out through the hole beneath the wall on my own, but we needed to do more hammering to get Shin Haeryang through.
When we emerged outside, we discovered that the place connected to the stairs was a fairly large warehouse. Beside it were stacks upon stacks of beer cans. Dozens of cans of nonalcoholic beer had been piled up like a tower, and behind them was another large stash of alcoholic beer that seemed to have been hidden away. Seeing the many cans already emptied and discarded on the floor, it seemed that the man we had caught had quietly slipped away from his patrol to drink beer alone, only to suffer this misfortune.
Shin Haeryang crawled out as though he intended to break down the entire wall, then brushed the dust clinging to his hat and looked around before speaking.
“This appears to be a warehouse located beside the farm at Undersea Base One.”
Only after hearing Shin Haeryang’s words did I notice all the farming tools and agricultural machinery scattered around. Strange. All I could see was beer. I picked up a can of nonalcoholic beer and handed it to Shin Haeryang, then opened one for myself and drank. As carbonated foam poured out, moistening my parched throat, I felt a little happier.
I desperately wanted to drink alcoholic beer, but the fiftieth floor was 1,200 steps if you counted only the stairs. If I drank alcohol after climbing 1,200 steps, I felt like I would collapse from exhaustion on the spot, so I abandoned the idea altogether.
Shin Haeryang quietly gulped down a can of nonalcoholic beer in three swallows, then opened another. As he drank the second can a little more leisurely, I asked while holding my own can of beer,
“Have you ever been to the farm at Undersea Base One?”
“Yes.”
“What do they grow at an undersea base?”
Since they had seawater to spare, did they grow things like mangroves? I had once seen a TV program introducing mangroves, saying that there were plants capable of growing in seawater. They were, quite literally, plants that formed forests and lived along coasts with extremely high salinity. Not only were they excellent at storing carbon dioxide, but mangrove forests also served as a first line of defense against disasters such as tidal waves, typhoons, and tsunamis. Korea had mangroves as well, but they had all been cleared away for development profits. Contrary to my expectations, however, Shin Haeryang listed sweet potatoes, potatoes, onions, eggplants, and beans. Apparently, just because it was underwater didn’t mean they grew only halophytes.
When we left the warehouse and entered the farm directly connected to it, there really were full-fledged fields and rice paddies inside. There was even rice. The ones over there, growing more than three meters tall, looked like corn.
I had heard that they grew crops on the farm for research, so I’d assumed they cultivated only small quantities, like the plant factories commonly found at space stations. I had never imagined they would build and operate such a proper farm. Moreover, even fifty meters beneath the sea’s surface, sunlight was literally shooting down from the ceiling.
I took off the pitch-black Infinite Church believer’s hat and exposed my face to the sunlight. My face grew hot beneath the intense rays. When I closed my eyes for a moment, red afterimages appeared, and even my eyelids seemed to be burning from the light.
I wanted to become a sunflower among the crops, doing nothing but basking in the sunlight. I stood there motionless, like a vampire granted light for the last time just before death. Even knowing that special glass and special lenses were being used to forcibly draw the sunlight shining down on the surface into the sea, and that all the remaining insufficient light was fake light produced through optical fibers, the sunlight I encountered under the sea was overwhelming simply by virtue of existing.
As I stood dazed by the sunlight, staring blankly at the farm built beneath the sea, Shin Haeryang walked quickly ahead and said,
“They grow crops commonly found outside. Apparently, they’re experimenting to see whether crops can be cultivated even on the seafloor, where no light enters at all.”
According to Shin Haeryang’s explanation, the undersea base conducted two major types of experiments involving crops: one on methods of cultivating crops below the water’s surface, and another on methods of cultivating them above the water’s surface. Undersea Base One, apparently, was conducting experiments on successfully growing crops below sea level.
…I understood why they conducted such experiments. The farmland available for planting crops was shrinking because of desertification and all kinds of development. On top of that, climate change had grown so severe that droughts and floods suddenly struck. Crops that had been growing well were withering and dying within a day or two, so it seemed people had begun considering beneath the sea as a refuge where crops could grow properly. Just as people had fled into undersea bases because it was becoming difficult to live on land.
Besides, agricultural water was in critically short supply across the world, whereas an undersea base could draw as much seawater as it wanted. The greatest advantage seemed to be that, by using desalination equipment to turn seawater into agricultural water, they would not have to worry about droughts for the time being.
My delight at seeing sunlight lasted only a moment. As I looked at the artificial farms established beneath the sea, indescribable emotions swept over me. Instead of spending such enormous sums of money and effort building massive farms beneath the sea, wouldn’t it be better to work, even now, to restore the polluted land above?
“Are there any advantages to growing crops under the sea?”
“Ayeong said the lack of pests was a good thing.”
That made sense. It was an environment where insects couldn’t enter in the first place. Fifty meters beneath the sea, after all. Unless they were carried in through soil or some other external factor, there shouldn’t be any insects on the crops grown inside the undersea base.
There were also areas where certain crops were grown separately, sealed off or enclosed entirely in glass because they required their own temperature and humidity controls. As I watched small green tomatoes hanging from their vines, I noticed that cameras and temperature-humidity meters had been installed separately in several places. When I asked about them, I was told that they were crops being grown by researchers from other countries.
Shin Haeryang, who had been crossing the farm as quickly as possible along the most efficient route, glanced toward a corner and spoke.
“Over there are the engineers’ fields.”
“……Engineers farm as well?”
Would I have to farm too if I joined this place? Or were they desperately short of labor? I thought I’d be rather flustered if someone gave me a field and told me to grow crops. Though, of course, I would grow crops that required less tending.
“At first, the engineers and the members of the mining team roasted the corn and potatoes they were growing for research and ate them. The researchers complained, so that’s why.”
“Uh……”
I was at a loss for words for a moment. Right. Nothing surprised me anymore. I felt sorry for the researchers whose identities I didn’t even know. What happened to a researcher if the specific subject of their paper suddenly disappeared?
“I see. They were crops being grown for research. Were they allowed to eat them?”
Wasn’t it frightening when they didn’t even know what kind of research was being done? What if they had mixed corn and rat DNA? Then it would be no different from eating a rat.
“According to our team members who ate some, they said they salted it and grilled it in butter, and that it tasted much better than anything bought at a store. Since they’re all in perfect health, there doesn’t seem to have been anything wrong with the crops.”
Shin Haeryang spoke as he entered the area where hydroponic cultivation was being conducted.
“Apparently, people continued to steal and eat the researchers’ sweet potatoes, peanuts, corn, potatoes, pumpkins, and so on from time to time. After the researchers complained, they gave people fields of a certain size and asked them not to touch anyone else’s.”
Thinking of the roasted sunflower seeds Wang Wei from the neighboring room had given me, and the handful of roasted peanuts I’d received while going around greeting people after joining, I asked Shin Haeryang. Had I eaten some too?
“Did people actually follow that rule?”
Shin Haeryang pointed with his chin toward a distant fenced-off area.
“Of course not. That’s why they put up an electric fence like that. After two fellows ended up hospitalized, people stole food less often.”
I had wondered why they had built such a fence when there weren’t even any wild boars or water deer around. I’d thought it was meant to keep the crops separate so they wouldn’t get mixed up with those belonging to others, but it was actually to keep humans out. I let out a troubled sigh and asked Shin Haeryang,
“What is Team A of the engineers growing in their field?”
“At first, they grew potatoes and sweet potatoes, but other teams dug them up and took them as soon as they matured. Now Ayeong is growing Cheongyang chili peppers.”
Apparently, no one was very interested in stealing spicy things.
Shin Haeryang gestured urgently for me to follow, so I limped toward the place he indicated. We hid behind a tall crop and held our breaths. Judging by the sign, it seemed to be a field where Chinese yams had been planted. The crops were more than two meters tall, so we crouched as low as possible and waited. Two men then passed through the yam field, grumbling as they went.
“Is that bastard Levi off getting beer, or did he eat it all and come back? Or did he eat it all and fall asleep?”
The two men, dressed in Infinite Church believers’ clothing, were heading toward the warehouse in the distance, cursing about how the person who had lost rock-paper-scissors and been sent to fetch beer still hadn’t returned. Shin Haeryang waited, then quietly signaled that we should let the two pass before moving on. I merely nodded in silence. That was when it happened.
A snake was crawling around by my feet.