LIGHTNOVELONLINE Chapter 6 - The Angel's Monster
Chapter 6: The Angel’s Monster
“Darling…!”
“Huh?”
“Are you crazy?!”
Thunk!
“Ouch!”
Of course, what came flying at me after calling our adopted son a monster was a stinging flick to the forehead.
“How could you call Shin-woo a monster?!”
“Well, I didn’t mean it like that…”
“Then what did you mean?”
“Like I told you before… Us Beast Hunters, we always feel an inexplicable and intense aversion when dealing with humans, right?”
Even to the parents who gave birth to us.
Even to the comrades with whom we roamed life and death.
Even to my beloved partner and daughter.
The intensity varies greatly depending on the person.
But as long as they’re ‘human’, Beast Hunters feel aversion towards anyone.
However…
“But with that kid, Shin-woo, I felt a sense of comfort for the first time.”
“Comfort?”
Sitting back at the table, having calmed down, Rolling listened as Lee Seok-gyu explained.
“Yeah. It was an incredibly comforting feeling, as if facing a monster. Of course, if it were really a monster, I would’ve attacked immediately. Haha!”
“…So, that’s why Sophia likes Shin-woo too, right?”
“Yeah. Probably. It’s a completely new experience for our daughter.”
“That aversion you feel even towards the parents who gave birth to you…”
“Shin-woo doesn’t have any of that.”
What could be the true nature of this kid?
What could it be?
Ordinary people might have tried to uncover that first.
“So let’s lovingly care for our benefactor’s adopted son.”
“…And don’t call the kid a monster.”
“O-Of course! A soldier always keeps his word!”
They simply laughed together, happy that their daughter, who they thought would always live as a loner, finally found someone she could open up to.
***
Three days had already passed since I was adopted into Mrs. Rolling’s house.
How should I describe life here?
“Now that we have two children, it’s like juggling kids!”
“Oh!”
“Hahaha.”
“Darling-!!”
Maybe it’s because I had never felt such harmonious joy in my life.
Three days flew by in what felt like an hour, enjoying every moment.
But I was both a transmigrator and a rare returnee from ten years ago.
I had things to do.
“Shin-woo, what are you doing?”
“Just thinking for a moment.”
“Thinking…?”
“Anyway, it’s something like that. Kids might get hurt if they know.”
“…! Hmph!”
In Sophia’s pink room, decorated like a princess’s chamber, I had already finished all the kindergarten workbooks. Meanwhile, Sophia was still struggling with the problem 1245 + 634.
Taking advantage of my solitary and relaxed study time, I tried to scribble in the corner of the workbook, thinking about what important events might happen in the future.
“It’s still ten years ago in the game setting… So this was only mentioned in character flashbacks, right?”
Ten years later in South Korea.
In other words, the main heroines of this world that you would encounter as soon as you start playing *Hunter’s Blood*.
At the same time, the common event these mostly psychotic characters would mention when mocking me for being so spiteful was just one.
“The so-called ‘Laughing Monster Incident’ that wiped out the entire city of Busan.”
It was an event that left a massive trauma on most of the heroines and caused the worst human casualties and territorial loss in South Korea within this world.
The year it occurred was also exactly ten years ago, just like now, in the original story.
On a snowy day, the first ‘national disaster-level monster’ in Korea, named ‘Angel,’ appeared at Busan Port.
To subdue it, most of the military units and hunters went down to Busan, but the result was a total defeat.
Korea lost almost all of its forces capable of countering monsters and regressed from a developed country back to a less developed state, not even a developing country, but back to the backwardness of the 1900s.
And though it’s said that the monster ‘Angel’ was eventually incinerated by a nuclear missile launched by the United States,
“Because of that, Busan was entirely annihilated, and the adjacent Ulsan and Daegu were irradiated, turning them into uninhabitable wastelands.”
Childhood is the most significant period for personality formation and character development.
Just as the saying goes, that incident plummeted the life values of the heroines, who should have grown up normally, into the abyss.
I intended to prevent the Laughing Monster Incident, which was bound to happen in the first half of this year.
And to do that, I needed a reason for an elementary school student to go to Busan, where the monster would appear…
“Sigh…”
“Huh?”
“I can’t think of anything.”
“Hmph! Acting all smart, but it looks like Shin-woo doesn’t know something! But I won’t show you my work!”
“……”
“Uh, um… If it’s really hard, I could show you a little…”
Should I just run away from home for a while then?
But just imagining how my new family would react when I return filled me with guilt and tore at my heart.
“Sigh…”
“Sniff… sniff… Sh-Shin-woo, don’t sigh… It’s my fault… Sniff…”
“?! Sophia, why are you crying all of a sudden?”
“You’re sighing because of me, right?”
“Of course not! I just have something on my mind.”
“On your mind.”
I wondered if there was a good way.
Just as I was consoling the suddenly dejected Sophia, continuing to think, it happened.
“Huh?”
“Wow!”
I looked up at the window, hoping to clear my head.
“Shin-woo, look! It’s snowing! Snow!”
“…Snow?”
It was early June.
The middle of summer.
How could it suddenly be snowing during a season where you’d be drenched in sweat without the air conditioner?
Come to think of it, the heroines who mentioned the Laughing Monster Incident always frowned when they talked about ‘snow.’
“Yes, that day… it was particularly snowy…”
“It snowed so heavily, it was unusual. It was so cold…”
“I hate snow. Whenever it snows, it reminds me of that day’s incident.”
At first, I thought these lines meant that it snowed because it was the middle of winter.
But now, I understood the true meaning of those lines.
It snowed in the middle of summer, which made the heroines particularly fixated on it.
That means right now, in Busan…!
Thud!
The door swung open roughly, and Mr. Lee Seok-gyu and Mrs. Rolling came looking for us with smiling faces.
“Mom? Dad?”
“……”
“Hey, kids…”
They were smiling brightly as usual, but I could tell instantly from the cold sweat running down the side of their faces and their trembling lips.
“Something happened in Busan!”
“Um… how about we all go on a trip to Busan?”
“Busan?”
“Yes! Right. Sophia, you said you wanted to see the sea before. Today, both Mom and Dad have some free time, so we decided to go on a trip.”
“Wow! Sounds great!”
How could people dressed in well-organized military uniforms and formal attire possibly be going on a casual trip?
But I decided to play along.
“Okay. I want to go to Busan too!”
“…! Great! Our son Shin-woo will come with us too.”
“Yes!”
So, our whole family got into the foreign car and headed straight to Gimpo Airport.
A free pass without any checks.
It took us less than an hour to fly and arrive in Busan.
Nearly three times faster than the KTX.
Even leaving the airport, it was a free pass.
The first sight of Busan, where we arrived in just a few hours, was…
“Aaahhh!”
“Run! It’s a monster!”
It was utter chaos.
***
“Salute! I am Major General Lee Chun-kyung, the division commander currently defending Busan!”
“Yes, salute. I’m General Lee Seok-gyu, the Army Chief of Staff. And this is…”
“Hello. I am Rolling, Deputy Director of the Korean branch of the Hunter Association.”
“Ah, yes! Nice to meet you, Mrs. Rolling.”
As soon as we got off at Gimhae Airport in Busan, a military vehicle that seemed to be waiting for us was parked right in front of the entrance.
The driver was none other than the division commander responsible for defending Busan.
Mr. Lee Seok-gyu sat in the front passenger seat, while I, Mrs. Rolling, and Sophia sat in the back.
“But, General. The children in the back are…?”
“They are my children. My daughter is a Beast Hunter, so there was no one to look after them. I had no choice but to bring them along.”
“Is that so…”
As a Beast Hunter, Sophia felt aversion and clung tightly to me, avoiding the division commander’s gaze.
On the other hand, Mr. Lee Seok-gyu, who should also be a Beast Hunter, seemed impressive as he conversed easily with the division commander.
“So, what’s the current situation?”
“Well, to be honest, it’s not good.”
“How much of our forces have we lost?”
“We haven’t had any direct confrontations yet, so our forces and equipment are all intact. However…”
“However?”
“We’ll soon reach the naval base where we are allied with the army, so we can give you a proper briefing there.”
“Understood.”
It didn’t sound like a good situation.
Sophia, who thought we were just on a trip, hated being in such an unfamiliar vehicle. Clinging tightly to her mom’s arm, she asked,
“Mom, can’t we just go home?”
“Hmm… If we do, we won’t be able to eat the king crab you like. Are you okay with that?”
“King crab?!”
As expected, my mother was amazing.
“Daddy will finish his work quickly, and then we’ll go have a king crab party together. Of course, Sophia will come too, right?”
“Yes! I love king crab!”
Sophia, who had been gloomy, quickly regained her energy.
But I could see a worried smile forming on Mrs. Rolling’s face as she looked at her daughter.
“The first ‘national disaster-level monster’ to appear since the founding of Korea…”
If things went south, I would step in, but could I transform into a monster without being noticed?
The military vehicle, shrouded in a strange silence, soon arrived at the naval base.
“Victory! I’m Admiral Yoo Jun-young, Chief of Naval Operations.”
“Salute. Alright, enough with the greetings, Jun-young. Start the briefing right away.”
“Ah, yes. Understood, sir.”
Even though they were from the army and navy, they seemed to know each other.
Inside the headquarters, equipped with a huge state-of-the-art monitor and various radar devices, Mr. Lee Seok-gyu received salutes from numerous soldiers.
Taking a seat with Mrs. Rolling at the long table with built-in hologram functionality, he began to listen to the briefing from the Chief of Naval Operations.
“First, at around 04:21 this morning, there was a disturbance caused by a gate at Busan Port.”
“Does that mean a monster appeared? How big is it? If you called me, the Army Chief of Staff, it must be at least a B-rank threat, right?”
“Well, the thing is…”
“…?”
The Chief of Naval Operations stuttered momentarily during the briefing.
With a cough, he continued, leaving both Mr. Lee Seok-gyu and Mrs. Rolling looking shocked.
“The entity’s size is roughly under 2 meters…”
“What?!”
“It is presumed to be a humanoid monster with a minimum threat level starting at B-rank… And, unfortunately, it appears to have human-level intelligence, which only exists in A-rank threats or higher…”
“Proof. Is there any proof that it possesses intelligence equivalent to humans?”
Gulp.
“Yes… The entity has currently seized control of a US military aircraft carrier stationed at Busan Port.”
“W-what?!”
“A monster stole a human weapon? That’s ridiculous…!”
“And this is an image of the entity captured by a long-range camera early this morning.”
As the Chief of Naval Operations finished speaking, he showed the image of the monster through the hologram.
It resembled an angel, but the only commonality was the halo of light floating above its head.
With two pairs of wings, even lacking arms, it stood gracefully in the night sky. This being, having descended upon Busan Port, was the very essence of a cursed arbiter, bringing only the judgment of death to humans.