Hiding a House in the Apocalypse - Chapter 424



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Episode 424 170. Reply (1)

Kugu palace!

The soft thunder echoed heavily.

As the weather rapidly worsened, the surrounding area was plunged into a gloomy darkness with thick clouds.

Our team was taking a short break, gathered inside and outside the armored vehicle, but that didn’t mean all the work had stopped.

The Chinese army was moving briskly.

They were doing groundwork to deal with the medium-sized species blocking the road.

The first of the century’s monsters to block the path is a large Vindicator type.

Although it is slightly larger than other medium-sized species, it is classified as a large species according to international classification standards because its weight is estimated to exceed that of medium-sized species.

The monster, which has an appearance reminiscent of a scorpion, is notorious for its defense rather than its attack power. The highly alkaline compounds it spits out can melt human bones the moment they come into contact, and it also creates toxic gases that can cause lung disease in the area.

If we have to categorize them in detail, they are broken armor – they are specialized in killing people.

He’s not a very pleasant opponent for a hunter.

In the first place, you wouldn’t use a hunter against someone like that.

But the players who will face that monster today are the Chinese army.

The Chinese military surprisingly responded that they could try out the Vindicator type.

“Rather, such a dull fellow is an easy enemy for us to deal with.”

If the opponent was not a general type and it was an ordinary mission, I would have found it interesting to watch the Chinese army’s work.

In the past, the Chinese always created new and interesting toys.

It’s still like that now.

What they’re making now is nothing less than a model rail.

Every time a button is pressed, the 1m rail extends to over 8m like a magic wand. The soldiers risk their lives installing the rails, even going so far as to expose themselves to monsters. The installed rails are then connected together like those on a toy train.

A train-shaped drone is placed on the rails created in this way.

The train drone, which was about the size of a medium-sized dog, was an odd-looking thing with two robotic arms attached, each holding an unmounted rail similar to the ones soldiers carried.

Clank!

After a while, the drone that had been moving along the rail stopped at the end, and with a delicate movement of its hands, it unfolded the rail it was carrying and extended the track itself.

It’s amazing.

The train is extending its own tracks.

The final destination of the slow but steady extension work is probably the Vindicator type front.

I thought the monster would naturally react as the drone flew back and forth in front, but strangely enough, the monster did not move at all even as the drone laid a rail right in front of it.

Ha Tae-hoon, who was watching, said something.

“Hmm. Is that the Takmasa?”

“A maid?”

“There’s an animation about a train character that kids watch. The friend Thomas in that animation is a Chinese phonetic transcription, and then read in Korean characters. It’s the same concept as English or Russian.”

“How does it work?”

“As you can see, the method is to lay a rail in front of the monster, and then crash a toy train filled with explosives into the monster through the rail. You could say that the rail itself acts as a guidance device.”

“It looks quite annoying.”

“That’s right. It may seem a bit shaky, but the Chinese say it’s a good method. Monsters ignore humans unless they explicitly show hostility.”

“Really? But isn’t that thing with the robot arm also a drone?”

At this question, Ha Tae-hoon scratched his chin and tilted his head.

He doesn’t seem to know either.

If you have any questions, the fastest way is to ask the person in charge.

I asked Jang Su-yeong about this strange tool.

“Oh? That thing? It’s not a drone. Look.”

She pointed to a soldier manipulating something at the end of the tracks.

“What is this?”

“Yes. It’s wired. So it’s not a drone, it’s just a normal work tool. And that type is also the insensitive type.”

As if on cue, the strange device laid another rail across the front of the monster.

“hmm.”

I understand why they made something like that, but I’m not sure.

At least when it comes to drones, the Chinese probably know a lot more about them than I do, so they probably brought that method to this dangerous battlefield because it has a higher chance of success.

The problem is time.

It takes too long to lay the rails.

When I asked Jang Su-yeong, she said it would take a whopping 30 minutes more.

He said that since manpower and effort have already been invested, he could not cancel the current plan, but asked that they try a different method next time.

Even at this moment, the hunter team centered around Na Hye-in is struggling in an area surrounded by enemies on all sides.

“By the way, I heard that a friend named Dongtan Mom arrived in Korea.”

As I was assisting the Chinese military in installing the rails, Gong Jingmin approached me while looking at his cell phone.

“Do you know Dongtan Mom?”

“Oh? That guy?”

Gong Kyung-min showed me the screen.

conceive.

But it is much smaller than the belly of the Dongtan mom I know.

I clearly remember that Dongtan Mom was riding a supertanker, but the boat in the photo was a small ferry about the size of a Han River cruise ship, and it was surrounded by small boats that seemed to be carrying Dongtan Mom’s friends.

Did they change ships in the middle of the journey?

Dongtan Mom posted a lot of articles, but when I saw that guy munching on articles, I felt like my energy was being sucked out, so I didn’t click on them. But it seems like there has been a change.

But its nature seems not to have changed at all.

dogntanmom : Yummy… It’s been years since I’ve been here and the air is still shit… This country is yummy…

As expected, you are writing a fast-paced article.

He quickly looked away from the writing and opened his mouth.

“This friend named Dongtan Mom. She’s from my school.”

“What? Really?”

“Baek Seung-hyun is my senior Ha Tae-hoon’s classmate over there.”

“Oh, that’s right. The way you moved around was unusual. I thought you were a real school graduate.”

Gong Kyung-min burst into laughter.

“······Wasn’t it quite difficult to enter school at the time?”

Yes, that’s right.

It was definitely difficult.

A scene from the past passed before my eyes as if I had inadvertently drawn it.

This is a scene from a school interview.

Now it is a faded memory with only fragmentary outlines left, but to me as a boy, that interview room was as wide as a soccer field, and yet there were only three interviewers and me in that space, and I can still clearly remember at this very moment that the click of my pen whenever I spoke would echo throughout the usually silent interview room.

The interviewer, whose name I didn’t know at the time but whose gaze and impression were more intense than anyone else’s, asked me:

“So, what exactly is your reason for applying to our school? Tell me the reason you are seriously considering it in your heart, not the reason you learned from school or the internet.”

As the battle that might be their last came to mind, memories of the dawn of time came to mind, making me feel a fateful double eyelid.

Well, the reason I became a hunter hasn’t changed at all, then or now.

I don’t remember exactly, but I think I said this to the interviewer, Jang Ki-young.

“I want to kill monsters.”

What else needs to be said?

“hey.”

The one who broke my momentary reverie was Ha Tae-hoon.

“Park Gyu.”

“what’s the matter?”

He never once called me in vain.

Ha Tae-hoon was looking at a small, palm-sized tablet.

It is a tool he uses to control various electronic devices, including drones.

“I see something on the motion detector.”

I checked.

Sure enough, something seemed to be moving behind us.

I looked back, but all I could see was a thick gray-white fog.

Gong Kyung-min stared at the motion detector screen and then looked behind him.

“That was the zombie earlier.”

We have no way of knowing what is reflected in those softly shining eyes.

Soon, Gong Kyung-min shook his head and said.

“It looks like a zombie on the verge of vaporization.”

“A zombie on the verge of vaporization?”

“Some people call it evaporation, some people call it extinction, but whatever you call it, it refers to the phenomenon where some zombies suddenly disappear for no reason.”

“Like Awaken?”

Gong Kyung-min looked slightly surprised at my words.

But instead of honestly admitting it, as befitting a person of such high status, he gives a sly and vague explanation.

“It’s a common phenomenon that things related to the rift suddenly disappear. There are stories of some suddenly turning into monsters, or being sucked into the rift, but nothing has been confirmed. In any case, the phenomenon of some zombie entities disappearing as if they were vaporized has actually been confirmed.”

Gong Kyung-min continued speaking, his shining eyes continuing to gaze beyond the fog.

“That kind of entity is hard to see even with our detection capabilities.”

“okay?”

“They are in fact things that have been assimilated into the cracks. A faintly remnant spirit? That’s what it feels like.”

“Is that what’s chasing us? How creepy.”

On the other side, the Chinese army beckoned.

Looks like everything is ready.

After the Chinese military recovered the arm-mounted train-shaped drone, they placed another train-shaped drone with a familiar propulsion system on the rails in its place.

The shape of the propulsion was similar to the one attached to the maul I had.

It looks like the same model.

The Chinese military launched the drone after confirming its location using surveillance cameras and other tools.

Kikrik kikrik-

The beginning was weak and crude.

It just moves slowly, swaying left and right like a clockwork on the rails laid by the Chinese army.

However, the rails were laid exactly 50 meters in front of the monster.

The maximum range of the Vindicator type reflective field blocking our path.

Only when the drone reached the end of the rail did the Chinese military turn on the drone.

The monster’s huge body, which had been motionless, trembled slightly.

The drone was detected.

but.

Cheeeeeeek-

The drone’s propulsion system caught fire.

At the same time, the drone zoomed past us like a bullet, zoomed along the rail, leaped up the curved edge like a ski jump, and shot straight towards the monster.

thud!

The monster tried to release a shockwave, but it was too late.

Kwakwakwang!

In a terrifying internal explosion, the monster was literally split in two and transformed into particles of light.

Jang Su-yeong approached with a smile amidst the fluttering particles.

“There’s one left?”

He nodded.

I thought for a moment.

The Chinese army also resisted while enduring many hardships.

Anyway, I spent a lot of time on the work below, but I was able to deal with one of the difficulties with ease.

The one standing guard at the next intersection is the Annihilator type that we faced before.

Like the Vindicator, he specializes in killing people.

Although they are not heavily armored, they are more wary of humans than other species and have quicker reactions, making them a nuisance in another sense.

Of course, this guy is not our hunter’s prey either.

“From here on out, I’ll do it the right way.”

The hatch of the armored car opened.

There were at least twenty combat drones stored there, stacked neatly.

Jang Su-yeong guided me into the armored vehicle.

Inside the fairly spacious armored vehicle, there were drone soldiers controlling their drones from their individual seats, and in the center, the screens sent by each drone were displayed in a grid pattern like a CCTV control room.

The drone unit commander shouted something in Chinese.

Twenty drones rose sequentially and flew towards the monster.

thud!

The shock wave echoed.

One by one, the signals on the screen go out as gunfire, rocket launches, and the sound of burning echo in confusion through the fog.

After a while.

thud!

With another shockwave, all screens went black.

Last I checked, the monster wasn’t defeated.

But all the drones were consumed.

I stared at Jang Su-yeong.

“Did it fail?”

She smiled broadly and shook her head.

As if to prove that statement,

Boom! Boom!

thud!

There was a series of loud noises and shock waves.

I saw the drone soldiers.

They were already shaking their hands and cleaning up the place.

“What happened?”

Jang Su-young answered.

“It’s a dual-manipulation method.”

“Double manipulation?”

“At first, you control it with a drone, but when a monster launches a radio attack and the connection is cut off, the built-in AI takes over the control.”

After the explosion and shockwave died down, they sent out a reconnaissance drone.

The reconnaissance drone sent back images of golden particles scattering through the fog.

A Chinese drone has defeated an annihilator type.

A Chinese officer who had been silent looked at me and spoke something in Chinese.

Jang Su-yeong translated those words.

“Black Whirlwind. That’s the name of this drone. He says that if this model had been mass-produced just one year earlier, there wouldn’t have been a war.”

“······.”

Well, that’s fine.

It might have been possible to do some good against monsters.

But the monsters adapted quickly.

The more threatening it was to them, the faster and more reliably they evolved.

The reason monsters can’t deal with these new toys is probably because they don’t have to.

Now, the scholars, factories, and workers who created those drones will no longer be around.

In a sense, this could be said to be the last fire arrow fired by China.

Now it’s our turn.

“You may go back first.”

“No. I’ll just watch from here.”

Jang Su-yeong and the Chinese army have made it clear that they will not advance any further, but will guard the middle route and observe the rest of our battle.

That’s what I said.

Even I can’t guarantee what will happen in the future.

There is one more left until the general type.

It’s a centurion type.

We also have something to say about this.

The guy is more specialized in heavy equipment such as tanks than humans.

If you can get close enough to the maximum range of the reflective field with proper maneuvering, it’s something that can be dealt with easily even with cheap weapons like the Monster Punch.

Together with Gong Kyung-min and Ha Tae-hoon, he advanced through the ruins and tried to secure an access route.

however.

“Get down.”

Gong Kyung-min muttered in a low voice.

The three of them fell to the ground, sliding almost simultaneously.

“People. Three, no, five.”

Those words were followed by a terrifying gunshot.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Three aimed shots were fired at us.

But this shooting.

It’s really annoying.

Three shots hit the shelters where Na, Ha Tae-hoon, and Gong Kyung-min were hiding.

That means.

“Even the enemy has a sense of smell.”

Could it be that you were waiting for us here on purpose?

The picture is drawn as if it were from a dream.

Even if I were a fanatic, I would have reacted similarly.

It would be obvious that they would send out hunters like us against the Centurion type, so the fanatics prepared for this by only blocking the paths that people could pass through.

It comes from a simple idea, but it is extremely difficult to destroy.

Especially in a situation like now where it is difficult to receive Kim Da-ram’s sniping support.

To make matters worse, the fanatic showed off another hand as a gesture of goodwill.

Doo doo doo doo doo–

It’s a machine gun.

In narrow and inaccessible terrain, the power of a machine gun is absolute.

Maybe they even laid barbed wire in front of their own camp.

In short, it is a story about not even dreaming.

As expected, the fanatics blocking our way were chattering in Chinese, not Korean.

It appears to be one of the sects that came from mainland China and destroyed China itself, rather than being a sect from North Korea or an indigenous sect that arose in South Korea.

It is said that he is a veteran among veterans even among fanatics.

“What should I do?”

“well.”

It’s not easy.

It’s really not easy.

The most difficult case on the battlefield is the area where monsters and fanatics are deployed at the same time, and this most difficult case is reproduced in its worst form right in front of the general type.

“Chinese Army.”

Should we borrow the strength of the Chinese army in the rear?

It was a time when I was struggling to find a solution that just wouldn’t come to mind while thinking about such things.

thud!

A shockwave erupted from the fanatics’ camp.

A shock wave of small class.

Was there one more?

As I was pondering those questions, gunshots and screams suddenly erupted.

“Ahhhhhhh!”

“Nizaiganshomaru?!”

Tata tata tang!

Amidst the ensuing gunfire, a familiar shout was suddenly heard.

“Park Gyu!”

At that moment, I recalled the scene in the interview room again.

“Now is the time!”

It can’t be helped.

The one screaming, creating shockwaves, and killing fanatics right now in front of me is none other than my mentor, Jang Gi-yeong.