It didn’t take very long until I was discharged. Just like last time.
I hadn’t been injured much to begin with, and although this body was weak, its recovery was at least fast.
Maybe it was because I had pushed my divine power to the limit, but my head felt stiff… and that was about it.
After throwing off the patient gown, I found some suitable clothes and changed.
‘These damned women’s clothes.’
Not even a month had passed yet, and I was already afraid of how I was getting used to women’s clothing.
…Sigh.
After changing into something appropriate and plugging my phone into the charger, I headed for the briefing room.
I didn’t see anyone around, so I asked nearby, and they said everyone except Captain Kim had gathered there.
Creeeak.
When I opened the thick soundproof door and stepped into the briefing room, familiar faces all turned toward me at once.
“Ah, you’re here! Are you feeling all right?”
The first to greet me was the Owlbear elder.
He waved with a slightly brighter expression than before.
It seemed that being able to save Captain Kim’s child had had a positive effect on him.
“I’m fine, as always. It’s not like I’m going to die just because I used some divine power.”
I shrugged as if it were nothing.
The Owlbear elder, the naga beastman Yu Inha, and Min Aji all let out sighs of relief as well, giving me slight bows.
‘…Hmm.’
Even if we had crossed the line of life and death together, I still couldn’t get used to receiving such blindly favorable and respectful gazes all at once.
To change the mood, I casually shifted the topic.
“So, why is everyone gathered here? I only heard you were here, not the reason.”
At my question, the warm atmosphere that had been lingering in the briefing room until moments ago sank heavily, as if it had been a lie.
The Owlbear elder quietly lowered his gaze, and Min Aji, standing beside him, swallowed dryly.
“Why does everyone look like that? Is there some kind of problem…?”
The Owlbear elder bitterly rubbed his face and jerked his chin toward the large screen at the front.
The screen had been black and turned off.
“Until just now… there was a briefing. About what’s been happening in the world while we were rolling around on the fourth floor.”
It seemed they had heard here the same information I had gotten from the military doctor.
Blackout Zones had formed overseas as well. And an uncontrollable number of mimic beasts had come out of them.
“I heard the gist of it, but… just how serious is the situation for everyone to be this gloomy?”
“They say contact has already been lost with five UN member states.”
“Contact has already been cut off? No matter how badly they failed to blockade them, you’d think the higher-ups would find a way to survive on their own.”
At those words, the orc man muttered as if to himself.
“To be precise, contact wasn’t cut off. We cut it off.”
“What does that mean…?”
“The lines themselves are still intact. They also sent us requests for rescue several times. However……”
The Owlbear elder picked up from there.
“The problem is that we cannot be certain they are still human.”
The Owlbear elder let out a deep sigh and operated the screen remote.
With a small beep, the screen lit up, and several photographs appeared.
“This is……”
“Satellite imagery. Dechencholing Palace in Bhutan, I believe.”
A place where the head of state had once resided, like the Blue House or the White House.
But that place was polluted, stained with numerous traces of blood.
These traces had not been left by humans.
Human weapons were optimized for efficient slaughter rather than for flaunting such brutality.
I could tell at a glance what kind of beings had done that.
“…Was it attacked by mimic beasts?”
“That appears to be the case.”
“…Even so, it shouldn’t have collapsed already, should it?”
“Bhutan’s military strength was likely the issue. It is considered one of the weakest in the world, after all. On top of that, the location where the Blackout Zone formed was also a problem. Because it appeared near an armored unit, the Land Leviathan destroyed all their armored forces, they said……”
In many ways, their bad luck had piled up.
In any case, because of those circumstances and that misfortune, Bhutan had suffered an attack on the place where its head of state resided.
It was a situation where their survival could not be clearly determined.
“Furthermore, they say mimic beasts were confirmed moving around as recently as yesterday.”
“So they’ve essentially been devoured.”
“That is why they have been treated as having lost contact. We cannot know whether they are truly all right.”
In truth, most countries were already occupied with defending their own territory.
The reason the lines were still being maintained was largely for the purpose of sharing information.
In such a situation, when beings that might or might not be human had mixed in, it was probably right to cut them off in advance.
‘Right. If countries start collapsing one by one like this… then the information being controlled is bound to leak out as well.’
I had a rough but clear picture of how things were going.
But after hearing this much, one question arose.
“…But why are they going out of their way to brief us on this?”
Why had they deliberately gathered us to explain this?
Until now, the government had hidden information if anything, not released it like this.
Even if it was something that would have to be explained someday, it wasn’t a story that needed to be told right now.
Even if it was a minor country, a nation had collapsed.
For the sake of maintaining morale, it would have been better to hide this from us as well……
The Owlbear elder frowned and answered that question.
“It seems the nation intends to change the direction it has maintained until now.”
Changing its direction. That was a rather shocking statement.
The Republic of Korea had controlled information as much as possible up to this point.
Its behavior had been almost pathological.
‘The information about mimic beasts is proof enough of that.’
The public still did not know of the existence of mimic beasts.
Only a minority who had encountered fragmented information from overseas harbored doubts; for the vast majority of citizens, even the path to accessing the truth had been blocked.
‘It may not be morally right, but from a practical standpoint, it was the best decision.’
Thanks to that thorough concealment, large-scale social chaos had been postponed, and the government and armed forces had been given precious time to blockade and explore the Blackout Zones.
Citizens’ dissatisfaction would build over controls with no clear explanation, but from the standpoint of the massive organization known as the state, it must have been a fairly profitable bargain.
‘Of course, that concealment wasn’t limited to civilians.’
The military was also controlling information internally.
Even Captain Kim himself hadn’t had access to that information until he entered the Blackout Zone.
Until now, the government and military had been obsessively fixated on controlling information.
That had been the nation’s direction.
“When you say they’re changing that direction……”
“Yes. It seems the higher-ups intend to release a bit more information.”
Information control had certainly been an effective policy.
Thanks to it, the military was still firmly holding the blockade lines, and society had not fallen into complete chaos.
But now, it was about time to discuss the breaking point.
Blockade lines had to be maintained by literally grinding people down. As time passed, someone’s sons were dying.
If they tried to gloss over that without an accurate explanation, dissatisfaction would naturally continue to accumulate.
On top of that, the rumors and information pouring in from overseas were also a problem.
Soldiers and the families trapped in Blackout Zones were unable to return, and ominous rumors were pouring in from abroad.
‘The dissatisfaction will probably explode completely in the not-too-distant future.’
What the government was trying to do now was simple.
“Since they can’t hide it anymore, they’d rather set it off first and pull it into a domain they can control.”
“They want to seize the initiative in propaganda… something like that.”
I let out a deep sigh and sat on a chair.
It was good that we could get more information, but it didn’t sound purely hopeful.
Because, well, I could feel society getting more and more fucked.
It wasn’t for no reason that I was starting to think it might collapse soon.
But that was something the high and mighty would handle on their own.
They had been doing a decent job so far, and they were people who also held some information about the future, weren’t they?
For now, I could put aside worries about families collapsing and society falling apart.
That wasn’t my role.
“So, they decided to change direction, but the only information that came down to us was that?”
“…For now, yes, but I heard there would be an additional briefing. They said they would discuss it once everyone was gathered……”
Creeeak.
Just then, the door opened and someone entered.
It was the agent in the suit from last time.
A rather welcome face. He was the person who had brought important information last time too.
“…Perfect timing. Everyone is gathered. Please wait a moment. There are a few measures I need to take.”
Fortunately, we did not have to wait long.
The agent moved around, checked several items, and then went up onto the platform.
“From this point on, I will explain the current status of survivors inside the Blackout Zones as identified by the government.”