-Control
When I glared at him, perhaps remembering the time I had turned him into a block of ice, Hwangga began protesting again with renewed vigor.
“No, I mean, is hiding a crime? At first, we trusted the country too! Monsters showed up, killing people left and right and smashing everything, so we thought the mages would show up any minute and deal with them. So all we could do was hide and wait.”
“Got it. You did well.”
“But even after hours passed, we could still hear the monsters, and there wasn’t a mage in sight. At this rate, our neighborhood was going to be wrecked. That’s why we came rushing out. We came out ready to risk our lives and fight!”
“I said I got it. But why are you shouting and making such a fuss? Do you want to lure in even more chimeras?”
His squawking was so loud that I gave him a word of warning and casually raised my arm.
Hwangga flinched in alarm and quickly backed down.
“Ah, sorry. I’ve always had a pretty loud voice.”
“Anyway, don’t shoot. Chimeras don’t die even if you shoot them.”
I spoke while pointlessly running the hand I had raised through my hair.
Hwangga seemed to have clearly remembered what I could do when I stretched out my arm, because he no longer raised his voice.
Instead, he pressed close and spoke almost in a whisper.
“If guns won’t work, should we set off explosives? We’ve got quite a lot of C4 stored in our basement.”
“No. Don’t do anything. Chimeras react sensitively to loud noises. Guns or bombs will only provoke them for no reason, so do nothing and stay still. Leave the chimeras to the mages.”
When I cut him off firmly, Hwangga pouted and replied.
“If the mages had shown up earlier and dealt with the monsters, why would we have stepped forward? Mages, honestly. They enjoy all kinds of privileges in normal times so they can fight at times like this…”
“I’m here, aren’t I? I dealt with them, didn’t I? And didn’t you watch the news? It’s not only here that’s in chaos. Even I only got here now because I had to clear Guwol-dong first. Anyway, are you going to keep arguing with me? Should I have just left you to be eaten by the chimeras?”
“No, sir. I was wrong. From now on, we’ll leave it to you, Mage.”
As if Hwangga had suddenly come to his senses, he even bowed at the waist, then turned around and gestured to his companions.
“The mage is here, so let’s stop here and go.”
“Yeah. Let’s go. The mage says he’ll handle it.”
“Works for us. Saves bullets too.”
“Then we’ll be counting on you, Mage!”
The men who had been watching from behind each said something as well.
There seemed to be a faint trace of sarcasm mixed in, but I let it slide. This was not the time to be wrestling with thugs.
The men began moving sluggishly.
“Are you going to the basement? I heard they’re evacuating residents to the Chinese school. You’re not going there?”
When I asked, Hwangga turned back again and looked at me.
“No. We’ll go back to the basement. It’s safe there. But those monsters are completely dead, right? You didn’t just freeze them for a while, did you? Last time, I heard you froze the orcs that showed up at the restaurant and then revived them. What if they come back to life? Ah! Now that I think about it, aren’t the materials used to make those chimera-whatever monsters the same orcs from back then?”
Hwangga really talked a lot. He was curious about a lot of things too.
He was quick with profit and loss, and his wits worked fairly well.
“I said I’ll handle it. I’m busy, so stop talking to me and hurry up and go!”
“Ah, yes, yes. Then we’ll go back to the basement and hide quietly, so if you need anything, Mage, come find us anytime. Good luck!”
As Hwangga said, there might indeed be something I would need.
If I met Hwangga and the underground organization people again, I had meant to ask them about the Magic Tower and the information flowing out of the mainland organizations.
But right now did not seem to be the proper time.
For now, I had to focus on dealing with the chimeras.
The men from the underground organization all crowded into a Chinese restaurant behind them.
When I had seen it last time, I remembered that the basement had been quite spacious and connected to several places. That restaurant seemed to be one of the entrances.
Using kinetic magic again, I crossed over the chimera iceberg and went to the other side.
Gil and Cheon Danbi were waiting for me there, just as they had been.
“Are you done talking? Who were those people?”
“You were talking for quite a while. Were they people you knew?”
Both of them must have been curious, because they threw questions at me at the same time as soon as they saw me.
“They’re people from Chinatown’s underground organization.”
“Underground organization? There’s such a thing? And they even have guns?”
“I wouldn’t go so far as to call them gangsters, but they’re not exactly a good organization. Seems like some kind of merchant organization that smuggles weapons.”
“Weapons smuggling? So that’s why they had guns?”
“This is the first time I’ve learned there are people walking around with guns like that in South Korea. My god, a weapons smuggling organization.”
Both of them spoke in surprise.
Cheon Danbi shook her head, then went so far as to wave her arms about. The remaining medicinal herb smoke scattered.
“But how do you know people from an underground organization, Mage?”
Gil asked again.
“I got to know them by chance last time. While saving Ren from the orcs, I happened to enter those people’s hideout.”
“Ren? Ah, during the Incheon Port explosion incident?”
“Yeah. That was when.”
“What a strange connection. No, I mean Ren, not the underground organization people.”
Since he had come to mind, I looked up at the sky, but the crow was nowhere to be seen.
It was the same with Hugin and Munin; once crows flew off, there was no telling where they wandered.
I suppose that was the freedom of winged creatures.
“Let’s get out of here now.”
We walked out of the alley.
For the time being, I left the frozen chimeras as they were. I decided I would meet Yu Jaeseon, ask him, and then handle them.
They wouldn’t be able to move for several hours, so there was no problem.
At some point, the rain had stopped.
That did not mean the sun had come out, and the heavily sunken air remained the same, with humidity clinging stickily to everything.
Even though rain had poured down in torrents, the weather had not grown cool; instead, it was suffocatingly hot.
It was unpleasant weather where sweat poured down like rain just from walking.
“Ah, it’s hot. Is there a park or something around here? Right! If you go up the hill behind Chinatown, there’s a park.”
Cheon Danbi was looking for a place where she could obtain the energy of nature. It seemed she had consumed quite a lot of life force spreading the energy of purification.
Perhaps she was trying to recharge even a little life force while walking, because she extended her focus toward the direction of the park.
As always, Cheon Danbi walked with a large bag on her back. It looked heavy, so I had tried to carry it for her, but she absolutely refused to hand it over and carried it herself—a bag like a peddler’s bundle, packed with all sorts of things.
Gil and I walked while keeping our guard up and thoroughly scanning our surroundings.
On the way to the Chinese school, we did not encounter any more chimeras. However, gray energy lay spread broadly in every direction.
“The weather really feels oppressive. Could this be because of the gray energy too?”
“It could be. It feels like the black mage has taken control of this entire district.”
I wanted to look around all of Chinatown once, but I thought it would be better to meet Yu Jaeseon first, so we headed straight to the Chinese school.
When we arrived at the Chinese school, a sturdy barrier was wrapped around its perimeter.
Yu Jaeseon seemed to have prioritized evacuating and protecting the residents over fighting the chimeras.
Since he had said there were only two mages, they must have had no choice but to choose and concentrate.
The schoolyard was empty.
But as soon as we entered the grounds, Yu Jaeseon came out of the building.
It seemed he had set up a surveillance system on the barrier.
“Mage! You’re here. Please come inside.”
When we followed Yu Jaeseon into the school building, only then did we see the people.
People were staying divided among the classrooms here and there, and as I glanced over them while walking, they were all human.
There were no elves or dwarves, and not even the common zombies were visible at all.
‘Don’t tell me they only evacuated the humans?’
We were guided to the teachers’ office. They had set up a situation room there. However, there was no one inside. Only the occasional beeping of communication equipment could be heard.
When I looked around with a puzzled expression, Yu Jaeseon said,
“The other mage has gone out to the field. He is guarding the police while they transport the injured.”
“I see. On our way here after parking the car, we ran into a few chimeras and froze them for now. What should we do with them?”
“About where is the location? I’ll send a disposal team and have them handle the aftermath.”
When I told him the location, Yu Jaeseon immediately made a call and gave instructions.
From what I heard, it seemed the military was in charge of the cleanup.
“The Bureau’s mages still cannot be dispatched here. I’m told even the ones clearing the city center have all gone to Incheon Airport. The military is handling the cleanup.”
It seemed the situation at Incheon Airport still had not been resolved.
But since we were here, I asked about this side first.
“What is the overall situation in Chinatown right now?”
“It’s serious. The entire area has been completely taken over by the chimeras.”
“How many chimeras are there in all?”
“When we checked with a drone about an hour ago, there were around fifty. But it seems they’ve continued increasing since then. According to the police, they’re swarming in from the direction of Incheon Station.”
“Then how many chimeras have you dealt with so far?”
When I asked casually, Yu Jaeseon let out a sigh. Unlike his usual self, he looked anxious.
“Mage An Guktae and I have not properly disposed of any chimeras. We burned them completely with flames, but after a while they regenerated. Moreover, when we saw them spreading the energy of disease, we started avoiding close combat and focused first on evacuating the residents.”
It seemed the other Bureau mage was someone named An Guktae.
In any case, the chimeras the two of them had encountered must have been chimeras combined with zombies as the base. They were a type that was not easy to deal with because of their regenerative ability.
Yu Jaeseon continued.
“If I were skilled in ice magic like you, Mage Oudin, I would at least have frozen them, but I’m weak in ice magic. But when you freeze them, do they not immediately regenerate? Completely annihilating them must still be difficult, I suppose?”
Seeing this now, it seemed Yu Jaeseon thought I kept freezing the chimeras and asking others to deal with them because I had no way to kill them.
Well, I had not separately reported the one I had completely annihilated.
“It is possible to annihilate them. It consumes quite a lot of mana, though. You know there are two types of chimeras, don’t you? The ones made with zombies as the base have regenerative abilities, but the ones made with orcs as the base probably cannot regenerate.”
“Ah! Is that so? There are chimeras that don’t have zombies mixed in. The chimeras I personally faced all had zombies in them. With the drone, we only checked the numbers from a distance, so I didn’t get a proper look.”
I glanced once toward Gil, then began explaining to Yu Jaeseon how to deal with the chimeras.