I stood as still as a statue in front of the central elevator, gazing at the surrounding scenery. The damp wind blowing from the seaside and the scorching midday sunlight burned the top of my head. Normally, I would have felt nothing while looking at Daehando's bleak scenery, gray buildings, seagulls flying here and there, and artificially created hills and trees.
I had wanted to live my whole life like a plant rooted in the soil of the land, receiving only sunlight and wind like this. The sense of relief and happiness at being alive filled my entire body and flowed downward endlessly toward the ground.
Trying to remain standing, the strength drained from my legs and I gradually sank to the floor. It seemed like it had truly been a long time since I felt such happiness. I've finally escaped the deep sea! I've finally gotten out of that repetitive underwater world! I was grinning with satisfaction at having arrived at Daehando when Baek Aeyeong shouted.
“Get down!”
I threw myself to the floor just as Baek Aeyeong said. Only then did I see two Muhangyo believers collapsed beside me. They seemed to be people Baek Aeyeong had shot dead the moment the elevator doors opened. Perhaps Haoran had been standing at the very front among them and had fallen toward the elevator ceiling where I had been.
I used my right hand to wipe away the tears streaming down my face. Baek Aeyeong, who had been firing wildly in a certain direction with her gun, checked my condition and seemed slightly surprised. As I wiped my tears and snot with just my right hand, Baek Aeyeong asked in a low voice.
“Does it hurt a lot?”
“No. It's just that I'm so happy to have gotten out of the elevator. I'm so happy to have come to Daehando.”
Baek Aeyeong asked me back in an apologetic voice.
“Did you wait long?”
“No. I didn't wait very long.”
I had thought I would go crazy waiting. I swallowed words like ‘I thought you might not come’ down my throat. Baek Aeyeong must have been incredibly busy too. An ambulance that had been slowly descending with a yellow hose trailing like a tail was now hurtling down at an enormous speed. Shocked that the ambulance had completely left its designated path and was rolling wherever it pleased, I cried out.
“Who is driving the ambulance?”
“Nobody.”
“Then how is a vehicle with no one in it moving?”
“The key was in the car, and I wedged a tool of some sort into the accelerator.”
There was no axe at Baek Aeyeong's waist as she said that. The ambulance, which had been rolling along on its own, overturned as if collapsing below the hill. It was impossible to know whether Baek Aeyeong had hit or missed the person firing at the driver's seat from afar.
After signaling me to get down, Baek Aeyeong carefully surveyed the surroundings. Fortunately, it seemed true that there was no one inside the ambulance. I blankly stared at the Rod of Asclepius engraved on the ambulance window, then returned to reality at Baek Aeyeong's words telling me to come to my senses. I couldn't take my eyes off the wrecked vehicle.
“Have you been to the hospital, by any chance?”
If I had the time, I wanted to go to Daehando Hospital and get my fingers reattached. Even if I didn't have time, I wanted to get my fingers reattached. Baek Aeyeong said, frowning as she looked at my left hand.
“The hospital is filled with critical patients right now. They won't pay any attention to injuries at your level, Muhyeon. And fingers aren't what's important! We have to get out of here right now! There's no cover here!”
What the hell is going on. Hearing Baek Aeyeong's urgent voice, I escaped from the happiness of having broken out of the undersea base and returned to reality.
At the helipad located beyond the hill, enormous black smoke was rising as if they were having a campfire with helicopters. The rooftop of Daehando Hospital was the same. Black smoke kept rising from the hospital rooftop helipad as if the hospital itself were on fire.
Around the shore, flames and smoke were billowing wildly from boats and yachts as if they were burning. Along with the salty smell from the sea breeze, there was a pungent scorched odor. On the distant sea, escape boats could be seen floating with people waving their hands aboard them.
Baek Aeyeong ordered me to run until my legs burst and get into the building below the hill. Contrary to Baek Aeyeong's order, I wanted to go to Daehando Hospital located atop the hill.
It was much closer from the central elevator than the main building, and the moment I saw the large letter H written there, I could think of nothing but going inside. My body desperately craved that green cross symbol. I wanted to dash into the hospital right away and start by checking into the ER. However, from Baek Aeyeong's perspective, it seemed she judged that even if I went to the emergency room now, it would be impossible for me to receive treatment.
I let out a sigh and then ran until I was out of breath toward the main building following Baek Aeyeong's orders. And I collapsed with a thud inside the building. There was no one at the left entrance of the main building. It was a building I had never visited since entering to write my employment contract. Baek Aeyeong, who had run up behind me, surveyed the building with a stiff face as she moved around. I carefully asked her tense back.
“Why is the hospital... so busy?”
“At first, I thought about going to the hospital to ask for help too. But listening to the patients there, they said the terrorists gathered the medical staff together and shot them.”
I had thought Daehando Hospital would have been left to operate normally.
“The medical staff at Daehando General Hospital numbers about 120, and the Muhangyo bastards shot about half of them with guns and then gave the remaining people time to treat them on their own. And then they came back three hours later and shot the uninjured people with guns, then gave them time to treat them before leaving, or so I heard.”
Did that number include all medical staff—general practitioners, interns, residents, specialists, and nurses? ...It seemed the hospital was more of a mess than the leaking undersea base. If my dental clinic had been inside Daehando Hospital, I would have been one of the people shot.
“Do you happen to know why they did that?”
“One Muhangyo believer who was there said they wanted to make the hospital so busy there wouldn't even be a moment to spare, but I don't know if that's true. The person who explained the situation to me was a nurse lying in bed with a gunshot wound to the side. The hospitalized cancer patients looked healthier than the medical staff.”
As we walked through the main building, there was no one. Just in case, I cautiously opened an office door, but there wasn't even a single mouse inside. All I could see were spilled cups and chairs shoved into corners.
“Have you met anyone who escaped on an escape boat?”
At my question, Baek Aeyeong shook her head.
“Quite a few escape boats came up from the sea. But in a situation where gunshots keep ringing out on Daehando, would anyone swim here? It's much better to stay floating on the sea in the escape boats. Even I wouldn't swim here.”
Baek Aeyeong entered a warehouse tucked away in the farthest corner where it seemed no one would come. The warehouse was a place without a single window, and Baek Aeyeong, surveying the inside, pushed me into the warehouse.
“What is this place?”
“From what I can see, this seems to be the safest place in the main building. The terrorists probably won't come all the way here when they don't even have time.”
Baek Aeyeong told me to rest here for a while, eating whatever was inside the warehouse. And then she naturally tried to close the warehouse door with me inside. After nodding away at Baek Aeyeong's words, I came to my senses only to find myself trapped inside a warehouse filled with snacks and office supplies. I turned the doorknob with my right hand, but the door wouldn't open. Panicked, I shouted toward Baek Aeyeong who must be outside.
“Take me with you too!”
“Stay here. Daehando is a mess too. The undersea base is also a mess. They say everyone who was in the main building has been gathered in the auditorium, and I'm going there. Daehando is too dangerous for you to wander around freely, Muhyeon. Hide here safely. Understand? You have to stay quiet like before.”
“No! I don't understand at all! Aeyeong! Please take me with you! I hate being alone!”
It seemed Baek Aeyeong thought that rather than taking me around and ending up with a bullet hole somewhere in my body, it was far better to be locked up in a safe place.
“I don't have the luxury to run around shooting at terrorists with a civilian in tow. I'll come get you when the situation improves. You trust me, right?”
Then I heard Baek Aeyeong's footsteps fading away. Ah. Of course I trust Aeyeong. But I don't want to be trapped here!
I felt that rather than being trapped alone in a warehouse waiting for someone, it would be better to be in the general hospital where chaos broke out every five minutes. Perhaps Baek Aeyeong had judged that a warehouse with no one in it was better than being in a hospital of utter pandemonium.
Wondering if there were no windows in the warehouse, I examined it closely and found nothing connecting to the outside. Moreover, the doorknob seemed to lock from the outside, because no matter how much I tried to open it from within, it wouldn't budge. The only small comfort was that the lights inside the warehouse turned on from the inside. It's bright. At least it's better than the elevator ceiling. There are no corpses here.
I tore open one of the water bottles in the warehouse and drank. The moment I drank the water, I keenly realized how dehydrated I was. Taking care not to drink too much given that I had been bleeding, I looked around the warehouse.
After quenching my thirst, I tore open chocolate and snacks with my teeth and pushed them into my mouth. These snacks were probably ones the main building people often ate. I didn't really want to eat them, but if I ate nothing, I didn't think I'd be able to move. Perhaps because they were foreign snacks, they were incredibly sweet. They were so sweet that I wanted to spit them out the moment they touched my tongue. It felt like I had gone a day without a proper meal in that undersea base.
Baek Aeyeong probably hasn't eaten or drunk anything properly either; how is she moving like that? Is it willpower? Can willpower let you move without eating?
I soaked a towel in water and wiped my face. Then I tore off the T-shirt from my left hand and examined the wound under the bright fluorescent light. It was the first time I had looked at the wound in a place with light. I could only sigh. Slowly exhaling, I wrapped it carefully with the towel, making sure not to touch the cut surface. And now I mustered the courage to check the fingers I had placed inside a plastic bag.
They were less gruesome than I thought. Fortunately, they were indeed my fingers. When picking things up in the dark, I might have mistakenly picked up other things instead of fingers, but thankfully Baek Aeyeong had handled them well.
I opened my backpack and emptied the items onto the floor. Perhaps because it was the largest, the Noeul doll caught my eye first. I had expected Daehando to be heaven because the undersea base was hell. I let out a depressed sigh and stroked the doll with my intact right hand.