Surviving in the 121st Century - Chapter 67



Only Noblemtl

“Ha, hijacker···!”

The expression on Rabito’s face, who had asked a question to Jincheol’s half-joking answer, changed. Not only that, but the armored soldiers there also had similar expressions. Embarrassment and fear. Jincheol, who was smiling, also felt puzzled. What the heck? Do these guys know me?

“You are the hijacker who… sentenced Donchava to death, stole the pig doctor from Siapo, and annihilated the 2nd Special Forces Armored Division in Solkain…?”

“···?”

A look of absurdity appeared on Jincheol’s face. If you think about it, what that Rabito said is true, but how are those incidents connected to the name ‘hijacker’? How do they know that? What made Jincheol the most absurd was the incident that came first.

“How do you know the end of Donchava?”

“···That day, the bridge of the Donchava and the main ship’s radio were connected. So, the name of the criminal who swept through the bridge of the Jasso battleship during the chaos of the battle that day···”

“aha.”

Come to think of it, Jincheol had introduced himself as a hijacker back then. It was the first time the name hijacker appeared. Of course, he didn’t think about it deeply. He just said that because he thought of himself trying to hijack the airship cockpit and the idea of ​​an air hijacker came to mind.

No, even so, how can this be so? Jincheol laughed in disbelief, and the Rabitos who saw that laugh felt that Jincheol had acknowledged their true identity. So they stepped back, heaving in shock. This was the attitude of people who faced a truly vicious international criminal.

Jincheol, who was looking at the sight with a look of absurdity, soon realized that if he did this well, he could easily overcome it, so he immediately pulled out his sword. The silver blade rose with a clear metallic sound.

“Are you scared? Then don’t block my path and get out of the way. I just need to raid the bridge and the general.”

“···”

The armored rabbis really looked at each other at those words, then slowly retreated from the direction that seemed to be the entrance and exit with Jincheol. Jincheol laughed. It’s fortunate that they are a timid species.

At that moment, Rabito, who had first opened his mouth, came to his senses and screamed.

“Nonsense-! We are the special armored unit of the Great Uratan Kingdom! Do you think we would be scared and run away from a mere criminal? All members! Prepare for battle! Anyone who runs away or does not fight actively will be executed by me immediately! You must fight for the grace and honor given by General Rahiman-”

Jincheol snatched the machine gun from the armored soldier next to him. Even though he was having his weapon taken away, the armored soldier was frozen in fear. Then Jincheol lifted the machine gun with one hand and aimed it at the loud-voiced Rabito and shot him.

The officer’s face was blown off with a loud bang and he fell backwards.

“···”

Jincheol, who was looking around the quiet armory, spoke briefly.

“Next complaint?”

The armored men retreated from between him and the entrance. Jincheol nodded at the sight and strode forward, holding a heavy machine gun in his left hand and a silver sword in his right. Even though he showed his back, the armored men in the armory all seemed to have no intention of attacking.

As I exited the doorway, a long corridor appeared. A thump-thump-thump sound echoed throughout the ship. The guns of the revolutionary forces, including the Comintern, were striking the battleship.

“Why does it seem like this happens every time I board the Rabito battleship?”

Jincheol muttered as he looked around to find a structure to climb up to. At that moment, several Rabito soldiers found Jincheol on the other side of the hallway and shouted.

“There! Who is that! Who is that over there-”

Jincheol fired his machine gun over their heads. With a “drrrrrr” sound, bullet holes were made in the ceiling and walls. The rabbis threw down the rifles they were holding and covered their heads, crouching face down. Jincheol, who had neutralized them, immediately ran down the opposite corridor.

Rabito, who had been lying face down watching Jincheol’s back disappear like that, slowly crept over to the nearby ship’s radio, grabbed it with his funnel, and shouted.

“Tch, intruder! Armed intruder that looks like Esai!”

Behind Jincheol, who was running, a long tail-like ammunition belt rang. Jincheol, looking at the ammunition belt and the heavy machine gun, felt like he was Rambo as he crossed the ship. Of course, not the first one, but the Rambo from around the third one.

Jincheol, who was running without stopping, saw a staircase. A staircase that could go up and down. Jincheol went in right away and climbed the stairs. He skipped eight steps at a time. He climbed four or five floors in an instant.

There were no more stairs to climb, so I kicked the door in front of me with my foot. I heard the doorknob shatter and the door opened wide.

And then there were the black armored men.

[You! Intruder!]

Jincheol quickly turned around and leaned against the wall after seeing those black armors. Drrrrrr- Bullets rained down, turning the place he was standing into a beehive. What the heck? Why are there so many of them?

The armored soldiers who had been shooting their guns immediately thought that Jincheol had gone down the stairs, so they stopped shooting and started running towards him.

The moment the gunfire stopped, Jincheol ran back to the exit without any hesitation. Of course, he shot the front with the machine gun he was holding in his left hand.

[Crash!]

[Shoot, shoot!]

Bullets poured out from the machine guns and struck the armor of the armored soldiers standing in the hallway. At that moment, some pulled the trigger without thinking, but since they didn’t aim properly, most of them missed Jincheol and just grazed him. In the first place, there was no time to shoot the bullets. Jincheol’s body dug into the armored soldiers without even taking a breath.

The blade of the sword flashed down onto the black iron armor. The thick iron plate split like a sheet of paper when it met the blade.

Three armored men fell in an instant. The one behind him must have been frightened by what he saw, because he aimed his machine gun at his comrades who were still alive. The moment the gun was about to shoot flames, Jincheol threw his sword.

[Ouch!]

The silver blade pierced the armored soldier’s helmet. Jincheol immediately clenched his empty right hand and hit the last armored soldier’s helmet with the back of his hand. With a loud thud, the helmet of the man crumpled as if it had been hit by a hammer and slammed into the wall of the ship. The body that had been trembling immediately fell flat.

“···”

The five armored soldiers who had been pouring bullets at Jincheol were thus defeated. Jincheol, confirming that there were no more enemies left, immediately drew his sword and ran again.

In this way, when Jincheol meets the enemy Rabito, he first threatens them by shooting over their heads, quickly passes over those who have no will to fight, but mercilessly swings his blade and fists at those who want to continue fighting, and crosses the battleship. Naturally, as the armored soldiers had already shown, Urata also sensed Jincheol’s intrusion and tried to block his movements.

It was at the Battlewing hangar that Jincheol encountered the stubborn defense line. Jincheol, who had kicked open the locked door and entered the hangar, had no choice but to stop abruptly. His body slid forward slightly due to the sudden braking.

[That’s it, hijacker!]

“···this.”

What Jincheol saw as he stopped like that was a phalanx with a wall of shields like the Roman army and machine guns placed behind it.

Jincheol instinctively tried to open the shield on his right arm, but when he saw that the armor was inoperable and only produced small sparks, he quickly flew away. He was headed towards the back of the materials piled up in one corner.

Immediately afterwards, ear-piercing gunshots echoed throughout the hangar. Of course, shrapnel from the shattered materials flew over Jincheol’s head as he lay prone. The men continued to fire bullets for a long time, as if they were going to use up all the bullets they had.

After thousands of bullets flew in vain, the gunfire stopped. Jin-cheol raised his head slightly and looked through the shattered materials to see what was happening, and he felt troubled. The men who had been shooting a moment ago had retreated, and the new armored soldiers behind them had taken their place. They seemed to be changing positions one after another, not giving Jin-cheol a chance to run.

Sigh. Jincheol felt himself sighing and slumped. Is this how it is without a single protective shield? Well, this was usually the case. Of course, he shouldn’t have stepped forward in front of a machine gun that wasn’t just a gun, but a chainsaw-like machine gun.

Of course, Jincheol could have just run forward, trusting his superhuman body. He would get hit a few times, but he wouldn’t die like last time, when all that was left was a scar on his chest. In the past, superhuman soldiers ran forward while getting hit by rifle bullets from the front. At that time, it couldn’t have been that terrifying or scary.

But even though he didn’t die, the fact that he was shot didn’t change. The pain and the shock. For Jincheol, who had already been shot several times before and almost died, that was a terrible plan. How crazy must those guys have been back then to be able to run into the hail of fire like that?

So what should he do? Should he break the floor and go down to find another way? Jincheol was thinking, and then he pricked up his ears. With his sharpened hearing, he could hear the radio transmissions coming from behind the armored soldiers ahead, rather than the noise reverberating outside the battleship.

[···Idiots! Don’t you know what’s more important right now? Send support immediately! The hijacker is here right now! What the hell are you talking about? Another intruder? What the hell is the battleship’s air defense system doing that keeps allowing intruders···]

At that moment, a steel door opened with a loud bang on the opposite side of the entrance through which Jincheol had entered. The armored soldiers who had been forming a defensive formation toward Jincheol turned their gazes back, and the gazes of the one who had broken open the door and entered met those of the armored soldier commander.

She was wearing an owl mask.

“···”

[···!]

The commander’s face became thoughtful as he looked at the cold-blooded face of the owl. He shouted urgently.

[T-Butcher!? Special Forces! Direction! Change the direction of the defense immediately-]

The next moment, her body soared like an owl leaping into the dark night sky. At the same time, the round iron balls she had scattered rolled into the feet of the special forces who had formed a phalanx. They were startled, but they were too tightly packed to react right away. Jincheol quickly buried his face in the ground and covered his ears.

Intense light and explosions. The screams of confused armored personnel carriers echoed throughout the hangar. Some were so frightened that they simply fired their guns without thinking, and the sound of gunfire, screams, and bullets mingled.

Jincheol raised his head again and looked at the sight, then laughed.

“This is a mess.”

A real dog appeared in the middle of the mess. Behind the owl mask, only the child with his staff and longsword ran out. Snow, who seemed to be descending from the sky, and the child who was running as if sliding on the ground. The spears and swords of the two people began to tear through the armored phalanx.

Jincheol also stood up and ran. He swung the machine gun, which was almost empty, to blow the guy away and started swinging his hands and feet.

What I realized as I came here was that there was no need to use a sword to cut through their armor. His strength was greater than he felt and thought.

Jincheol’s fist struck the armored soldier’s helmet. The part where the fist hit dented and the person fell down. Then, he kicked the one nearby, and the chest armor was crushed and flew backward.

There was no blood gushing out like when swinging a sword, but it was still the same as the armored soldiers who couldn’t withstand the shock transmitted to their insides being incapacitated. Jincheol liked this better.

“You’re so energetic!”

Only Ai shouted as he passed by Jincheol. Jincheol’s gaze turned to him and was fixed on him at the same time.

The screams and shouts of the armored men, the gunfire of the machine guns, the flash grenades exploding again from Snow, the armored men falling, the sound of iron plates being torn apart by the blades. Amongst all of this, only Ai was dancing with her sword.

Jincheol himself had not felt it since leaving the forest, but after waking up from a long sleep, his senses became increasingly keen. Hearing distant sounds, seeing with his eyes, and feeling with his skin, the combined senses gave Jincheol an unusual level of sensitivity.

And that sensitivity was now fixed on Aiman’s movements. The way the swordsman of that small race stepped, jumped, stretched out his hands, gathered them, spun around, and jumped up again. Those movements that seemed strangely slow to Jincheol were ultimately harvesting the lives of the armored soldiers at every moment. It was unbelievably beautiful that the movements were made by the body of that small race.

Snow’s movements, who was running wild beside him, were also surprising. She, too, had long been trained and mastered martial arts. However, it was not as clear to Jincheol as Aiman’s appearance was now.

After a while, after disabling all the armored soldiers in the hangar, Jincheol was able to realize the reason. Only Ai was looking at him with a strange smile.

“Yeah, what does it look like up close?”

“···Did you show it to me on purpose?”

He quickly swung his sword away and shrugged.

“Well, that’s not necessarily true. The eyes and body movements are really good, but strangely enough, the movements are so easy that even someone who doesn’t know martial arts can see them.”

“···”

When he saw that Jincheol had no answer, he smiled and spoke again.

“I realized when we met again that you are quite stubborn. You never asked me to teach you anything until the end. That’s good. A swordsman must have an unwavering spirit. You must have your own thoughts and stories. That’s why I gave up on teaching you. But, well…”

He turned his head slightly and continued speaking.

“···If someone learns by watching alone, it’s because I didn’t specifically teach them···”

“ha ha ha.”

Jincheol smiled blandly as he looked at that sight. It seemed that this puppy swordsman really liked Jincheol. If not, he would have forgotten that they had fought each other at first sight and would not have been this friendly. So, Jincheol also nodded.

“Yes, then I will learn it well on my own.”

“···Really? Are you feeling like doing that?”

“Yes. I feel like doing that a lot.”

“That’s fortunate.”

Aiman’s smile grew wider. Even his face, which was considered serious and cool among the camp members, looked like a gentle puppy when he smiled like that.

At that moment, Snow, wearing an owl mask, dragged an armored soldier towards them. The Rabito, whose helmet had been blown off and whose ears were hanging down, groaned and quietly muttered while looking at Jincheol and Aiman.

“A stray dog ​​and a hairless mutt. What a great combination···”

Only after hearing his voice did Jincheol realize that he was the commander who had been on the radio earlier. But before he could say anything, Snow kicked him in the face. Broken teeth and blood splattered on the floor. He could see the armored soldiers lying here and there, not dead, flinching at the sight.

“Ah! Don’t kill me yet!”

A bright voice. Jincheol’s gaze turned to the doorway where Aiman ​​and Snow had jumped out a moment ago. He saw Haita running towards him, her robes fluttering. Jincheol spoke to her, who smiled at him.

“He told me to go up first.”

“Hehe. Thanks to Jincheol infiltrating first, we were able to get in a little more easily.”

As she spoke, she held Commander Rabito’s bloody face and examined it. She asked.

“Tell me how to get up to the control room.”

“···That’s funny. Do you think I’ll tell you?”

That Rabito spoke with blood dripping down his face, but Haita shrugged his shoulders as if he hadn’t expected it and placed his palm on his face. And the next moment, Commander Rabito began to convulse and squirm.

“Ugh! What are you doing, ugh!”

Light sparkled from the magical tool called Chakra, the Circlet of Highta. Soon after, a small amount of silver liquid flowed out from Commander Rabito’s eyes, nose, and mouth and seeped into her palm. Rabito, whose consciousness had been blown away, fell down with his eyes wide open.

“···”

Haita closed her eyes and waved her hand soaked in silver liquid. After a while, she opened her eyes with a somewhat serious expression on her face.

“As expected. It’s the silver blood. And it’s not innate, it was injected by someone.”

“It’s not innate, it’s injected silver blood. It’s a very ancient technique.”

“I think my prediction was right. The assembly is not simply erasing technology, they are utilizing it.”

“Not good.”

Why are the two of them talking? Haita and Aiman ​​were talking with serious expressions, but Jincheol and Snow couldn’t understand. Of course, Jincheol could guess the content of the conversation. It seemed to be a story about the meditation meeting. It was probably a conversation about whether they were the ones who planted the silver blood in the bodies of those armored soldiers.

Jincheol said.

“Let’s talk about the Knights later. For now, we have work to do.”

“Oh, I see.”

Snow, who had been waiting quietly for those words, turned around and started to lead the way. Jincheol and Aiman ​​followed behind, with Haita at the very back.

Snow seemed to already know the layout of the Rabito battleship well, as she ran down the stairs and passageways without hesitation. Her footsteps were unstoppable, in part because there was no one to block her path, but then the vibrations of the ship’s hull grew louder.

“When we came in, the situation we saw was that the Revolutionary Army had the upper hand! They were winning the air battle except for the battleships! That’s probably why they’re so focused on the artillery battle that they don’t pay attention to us!”

Whether Haita’s interpretation was correct or not, the Rabitos who encountered Jincheol and his party while running were busy making a frightened sound like “Heek-” and quickly turning around and running away rather than thinking about fighting. Thanks to this, the party was able to encounter a large circular hatch after a while.

“Is this it?”

It looked similar to the door to the command room where he had met Donchava before. However, unlike back then when it was wide open, it was now tightly shut. Snow immediately pulled out a spear and stabbed it into what appeared to be a hook. However, the door was too big to open with just that spear.

“Just a moment.”

Then, Haita stepped forward. Her chakras glowed and her eyes sparkled with a brilliant light. Then, she pointed to a wall on one side of the hallway.

“Please tear this off.”

Jincheol immediately stretched out his hand. The iron plate broke open with a bang, and when he grabbed it and tore it open, he saw a complex array of pipes and vacuum tube-like organs shining brightly.

“With your bare hands? Are you okay with that?”

“Okay, just open the door.”

Haitha looked at Jincheol with worried eyes, but immediately reached out to the organs. She changed the positions of the vacuum tubes while her chakra glowed, and when she finally locked one of the pipes, there was a “push-” sound of steam escaping, and the locked door opened with a creaking sound.

Then a scream was heard from inside.

“What kind of guy are you! Have you forgotten the order that no one is allowed to enter the command center until this battle is over?”

Instead of answering, Jincheol just confidently went inside. And he could see a similar scenery to the battleship Jaso had seen before.

Steam engine-style control mechanisms, filled with pipes, mechanical dials, ticking clock hands, and instruments. Officers sitting in front of them, frantically adjusting dials or pulling levers, and a general sitting on a splendid throne and bellowing at the top of his voice.

“You··· you guys···”

As Jincheol looked at him, he also looked at Jincheol. General Rahiman, with a haggard expression, looked even worse when he saw Jincheol and his party entering.

“How to lock···”

“Does that matter?”

Jincheol strode inside. The other Rabito officers in the command center saw him and stood up in a rush, taking out their pistols and aiming at him.

However, Snow and Aiman ​​jumped up and rushed towards them, starting to cause chaos. Amidst the gunshots and screams, Jincheol approached General Rahiman with a stern face.

The general looked at his officers and Jin-cheol, who was getting bigger and bigger, with a half-blown expression. Then, looking at Jin-cheol, who was finally right in front of him, he said.

“You, you… you… hi, Jacker…”

“Yes. It’s me. And now this battleship is mine.”