-Omen
After ending the call with Yantu, I called Cheon Danbi again. This time as well, she didn’t pick up even after the phone rang several times.
Just as I was thinking I should head straight to the herb shop, Cheon Danbi finally answered.
[Oh, Mage. What’s up?]
She sounded perfectly carefree, but there was a faint trace of unease in her voice over the phone.
“You’re only picking up now. I was worried.”
[Huh? Did you call several times? Oh? You did? It’s noisy around here, so I didn’t hear it.]
Hearing that it was noisy around her made me even more worried.
When I listened closely, I thought I could hear sirens in the distance.
“Where are you? I hear sirens. Are you near Bolba Restaurant?”
[You saw the news, right? They’re saying a swarm of monster rats appeared because of the dwarves. I’m honestly speechless… And natural mutation? That’s absurd too. I have no idea what they’re trying to pull.]
Cheon Danbi’s voice rose. It felt as if heat were pouring out of it.
“I’m asking where you are. Are you in the dwarf village?”
[I went there, and I’m on my way out now. Heading back to the shop. The dwarf village is in complete chaos right now. Everyone’s confused and doesn’t know what to do. But when I was leaving, I saw the police already swarming in.]
“Are they starting the search already? They’re moving fast.”
[Why on earth are they searching the dwarf village? What would even be there? This is just a witch hunt. They’re pinning it on the dwarves. As if they had no idea the dwarf village existed until now, making such a fuss about an underground base and whatnot. It’s so ridiculous I can’t even…]
There was one thing in Cheon Danbi’s heated rambling that I hadn’t known.
I asked about that first. I had to know the facts accurately to properly grasp what was happening now.
“Wait. Then are you saying the government knew about the dwarf village beneath Bolba Restaurant from before?”
[Of course they knew. Even if that village is illegal, how could the government not know when it had grown into that much of a settlement? They just turned a blind eye because it wasn’t particularly harmful.]
Cheon Danbi then told me the background behind how the dwarf village had formed under Bolba Restaurant.
From the very beginning of immigration, the government had only allowed dwarves to live in designated areas.
The dwarf zones in the metropolitan area were only created in places far from Seoul, such as Wolmido, Paju, and Dongducheon. They never gave up the city center.
But many dwarves worked inside Seoul.
The dwarves took on the dirty, hard, and dangerous jobs that humans didn’t want to do.
There were construction sites even in the middle of Seoul, and someone had to clean the streets. Most work at auto repair shops and in facilities maintenance was also left to dwarves.
Dwarves who were exhausted from commuting long distances between Seoul and Gyeonggi-do or Incheon secretly began renting places in Seoul. Then, one by one, they started living together.
That was how the underground dwarf village in the middle of Seoul had come into being.
[They let them live there because they needed them. And now they’re trying to blame the rat swarm on the dwarves? Honestly, when you watch them, humans really are the worst.]
After finishing her story, Cheon Danbi let out a deep sigh.
Only now did I understand.
Why the government had let zombies live on the streets as homeless people.
Why they had pretended not to see an underground dwarf village forming in the middle of Seoul.
It was all because it was necessary.
And not only because they were needed as members of society. They were also needed as a group to take the blame when problems occurred.
‘On top of that, racial conflict is the kind of controversy the public likes.’
It was a scheme to divert the attention of citizens anxious over a society thrown into chaos by the black mages’ terrorism.
[Ah! I just got to the herb shop, and when I look toward the main road, the police are spread out all over here too. Just how large-scale of a search are they planning?]
“Really? Got it. I’ll come to the herb shop now. Wait for me.”
[You’re coming here?]
“I was on my way home after going to Vanaheim, but I should stop by there and check the situation before I go. I brought the car, so I’ll be there soon.”
[Okay. I’ll wait, then.]
After hanging up, I immediately headed for Namsan.
Yantu seemed to be preparing well enough on the Wolmido side, so for now, I could watch and see.
The underground dwarf village beneath Bolba Restaurant wasn’t directly related to me, but I wanted to go and take a look at the situation.
I needed to find out what the government and the mages were scheming.
‘It’s clearly not because of the monster rats. Those rats must have been manipulated by black mages or someone else to trigger a mutation.’
The thought also occurred to me that searching the underground dwarf village in Namsan was nothing more than an excuse, and that their true target was Wolmido.
Vanaheim must have bribed the government and the mages into action.
For them, recovering Ren by any means necessary was important. Ren, who possessed the polymorph trait, was that valuable.
‘They must have wanted to barge into Wolmido and search every last corner. They’re using the monster rat swarm that appeared at just the right time as an excuse.’
No, perhaps Vanaheim had even more reason than that.
Maybe it was to hide Yasin, who had worked with Vanaheim…
For some reason, traffic wasn’t bad today. Once I crossed the Hangang River, I reached Neo Forest quickly.
Perhaps because of the news about the search of the dwarf underground base, the area near Neo Forest felt even more deserted.
I didn’t see the police Cheon Danbi had mentioned on the main road leading to the herb shop either.
‘That’s strange. Why is it so quiet?’
I had expected a commotion, but the quiet somehow made me feel even more ominous.
Then, when I had almost reached the herb shop, I noticed police cars passing one after another in the opposite lane.
Their sirens weren’t on, and they passed by quietly without any sense of urgency.
“Did they already finish the search? This quickly?”
It was strange.
I looked around. There were only police cars. Nothing else stood out. I couldn’t sense any major movement of mana either.
‘Did the mages not come?’
When I arrived at the herb shop, I pulled over by the roadside and hurriedly opened the shop door.
Jingle.
The surroundings were so silent that I could hear the bell on the shop door jingle. Even the sound of the police car engines seemed to be holding its breath.
“Ah! Welcome.”
Cheon Danbi, who had been sitting on a chair, sprang to her feet and greeted me.
“The police cars are already leaving.”
I skipped the greeting and spoke right away.
“I know. I was just thinking it was strange too. It’s odd enough that they’re leaving already, but when they came, they were blaring their sirens so loudly. Now they’re leaving so quietly, like they’re running away.”
Cheon Danbi seemed to have gotten the same impression as me.
Without even stepping fully inside the shop, I held on to the door and said,
“Let’s hurry to Bolba Restaurant.”
“Yeah. If we go, we’ll find out what happened.”
Cheon Danbi didn’t waste words and readily followed me out. She closed the shop door and activated the lock.
“But is it okay to not do business?”
“Oh, it’s fine. Is business the issue right now? And our customers usually come in the evening anyway. Mages are surprisingly lazy when you get to know them.”
We headed for Bolba Restaurant.
This time, instead of the back alley, Cheon Danbi guided us along the main road in front of Neo Forest.
“The police cars were coming from that direction. That’s why I’m deliberately taking the main road. I’m trying to trace their route backward.”
“Yeah. Good idea.”
As I walked, I checked whether there were any mages nearby. I activated mana detection and swept along the street.
But for some reason, my gaze kept going toward Neo Forest.
Of course, since mana flowed out from the forest, it was only natural that it drew my attention, but it wasn’t only that.
Today, the greenery of the forest looked unusually dense, and even though there was no wind, I had the sense that the forest was stirring.
Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who felt that way.
“Hmm? Neo Forest is really stirring. I wonder what’s going on.”
Cheon Danbi said, tilting her head.
“When does the forest stir like that?”
“Well. There are probably all kinds of cases. In any case, the forest stirring is a kind of emotion, and what I’m feeling right now is something like anxiety.”
“The forest is anxious? Is something about to happen?”
“Seems that way, doesn’t it? Let’s be careful.”
We walked while examining our surroundings even more carefully. But everywhere was simply quiet. There wasn’t even a single passerby.
It was when we left the main road and entered an alley. Suddenly, a phone rang. It was Cheon Danbi’s phone.
“You scared me!”
Cheon Danbi flinched, took out her phone, checked the caller, and said,
“It’s the lady from Bolba Restaurant.”
Then she spoke on the phone for a short while. Cheon Danbi mostly listened, answering with yes, yes.
Before long, Cheon Danbi hung up, opened her eyes wide, and spoke to me with a strange expression.
“She says the police came into the village, took a quick look around, and just left? They didn’t really conduct any search.”
“What? The mages didn’t come?”
“No. Only the police came. What is this? They made such a huge fuss on the news, saying they were going to conduct a large-scale search.”
“It’s strange to begin with that only the police came without any mages. If they were planning to search the residence of another race, it would be natural to bring mages along.”
Especially when it was an underground dwarf village. No matter how much they were police, ordinary people were bound to feel afraid of stepping inside.
Just thinking of the Wolmido dwarf zone, since no one knew what kind of devices the dwarves, who excelled in equipment, might have installed, the search would only be possible if mages capable of mana detection took the lead.
It was suspicious in more ways than one.
They had gone so far as to put it on the news, only to go there and put on a show?
Of course, it might be because they knew no evidence they wanted would turn up even if they searched.
But even so, not searching at all was far too perfunctory.
It felt like they had some other scheme.
“Let’s go for now. We’ll have to hear what happened once we get there.”
“Yeah. We’re almost there anyway, so let’s go in and ask.”
Once we turned that corner, we would be at Bolba Restaurant.
I had been to the restaurant, but never inside the underground dwarf village, so I was secretly curious about what it looked like inside.
It was just as we were about to turn the corner.
Kwakakwang!
In that instant, a heavy roar exploded out, and the ground beneath our feet rumbled and shook. It was as if the earth’s axis itself were trembling.
My body lurched backward.
“Ah! What’s happening?”
Cheon Danbi staggered and screamed.
I immediately regained my balance and spread detection magic in every direction.
A fierce mana wave was pouring out from the direction we were headed. The vicinity of Bolba Restaurant was the epicenter.
‘An explosion?’
But I didn’t see fire or smoke. There was only the roar and the vibration.
It was similar to an earthquake, but this was something artificial caused by mana.
And this vibration was a portent.
Something greater was coming.