Chapter 127
For a moment, my mind went blank.
I immediately sprinted toward Sector X.
As I ran like a madman, CEO Cha caught up to me and snatched me away without a word.
"I’m-!"
"Sector X."
He tossed the words out before I could say anything and accelerated.
Just like last time, I was carried along, tucked under CEO Cha’s arm.
As the warden, CEO Cha had the ability to control every sector of the prison.
He didn’t need to go through the tedious process of stopping to scan an ID badge whenever he passed through a checkpoint.
Every door opened automatically before him, allowing CEO Cha to move without a single obstruction.
The scenery blurred past so quickly it felt like a blink of an eye.
Thanks to that, we arrived at Sector X in an instant.
CEO Cha dropped me off in front of Room 6.
Two guards, huffing and puffing while holding stun batons, looked back at me.
One of them was leaking neon green liquid from a shredded arm.
"Fuck. I barely hit him a few times... Oh, Medic! You’re here. Do something about this bastard," the guard grumbled, mixing in curses as he explained the situation.
Apparently, Room 6 had bitten the guard’s arm, so they immediately fired a creature-killing gun, and the moment the bullet hit, he went into Code Blue.
I practically dove into Room 6.
Since the guards didn’t know much, they often called Code Blue indiscriminately.
Hoping that was the case this time, I checked Orca’s condition.
No pulse. No breath.
"Get me an AED!"
Since creatures often went into shock, Sector X was equipped with AEDs.
When I shouted, the guards hesitated for a moment before bringing over a red box.
It was only because my affinity level with them was high that they actually listened.
I opened the box and powered on the machine. Then, I attached the pads to Orca’s chest.
My hands were shaking violently, but fortunately, I managed to attach the pads without missing.
The AED for creatures was set to a much higher electrical output than those for humans.
Since it took a few seconds to charge, I had to wait while performing chest compressions.
Those few seconds felt like an eternity.
"Charging complete. Press the button to deliver a shock."
The moment the mechanical voice spoke, I pressed the button.
As I did, Orca’s body jolted upward.
A powerful current surged through his entire body, piercing every nerve and muscle fiber.
His heavy chest muscles twisted violently in a spasm, and then his body slumped back onto the floor.
A faint smell of burning accompanied a thin wisp of steam rising from around the pads.
The AED didn’t wait and immediately barked the next command.
"Begin chest compressions."
I interlaced my fingers over Orca’s chest again. Just as I was about to put all my weight into pressing down on the thick sternum-
Orca took a sharp breath and snapped his eyes open.
"Mr. Orca!!"
I urgently called his name.
Focus quickly returned to Orca’s eyes.
And then, I saw it.
The flash of disappointment that crossed his eyes for a split second.
Orca was not happy to have returned from the threshold of death.
To him, death had always been something to desire.
Orca called me in a cracked voice.
"Teacher Roasted Chestnut.."
He spoke to me with a faint smile.
"It would have been a disaster if you weren’t here."
I didn’t respond to the words that lacked sincerity. Instead, I glared at Orca.
"Do you still think this is a game?"
I had never thought of it as a game.
Rather, because it wasn’t a game-because it was reality—I wanted to do my absolute best.
Even if it was difficult and grueling...
No, regardless of the means or methods, I wanted to bring this to a happy ending.
’Should I just modify him?’
What if I changed his mind and body entirely so he could never think of dying again?
If I poured in the psychotropic drugs from the infirmary, even a creature’s mind would have no choice but to break.
Since he’s an orca hybrid, there wouldn’t be many side effects if I transplanted deep-sea creature parts into his body.
If he wanted, I could find something in the same family as an orca and attach it.
If I crushed everything that was diseased and replaced it with something strong and new...
[System Window]
...I felt like the letters had gotten larger. There was some spacing, too.
Coming back to my senses thanks to the system window, I swallowed a sigh.
I had a strange thought because of the brainwashing, but a tiny bit of sincerity was mixed in.
It wasn’t that I actually wanted to modify him, but rather that I wanted to save Orca by any means necessary.
However, I still didn’t know the method.
To create a happy ending for Orca, I had to make it so he could swim freely in the vast ocean.
But his legs were something that even Neo couldn’t cure.
In the original game, I had tried every possible method...
’Wait.’
There was still one method I hadn’t tried.
That was Moon-dari.
He was the god of this place. He likely possessed energy far more powerful than Neo’s.
Even a tiny fraction of that might restore Orca’s legs.
’Since they’re both sea creatures, at least. I couldn’t guarantee the effect, but it seemed worth a try.’
"Teacher Roasted Chestnut."
Lost in my new thoughts, I looked at Orca.
He smiled, revealing his jagged teeth.
"Do not be angry."
I didn’t answer and scanned the surroundings.
The guards who had caused the Code Blue were standing far off as if it were someone else’s problem. CEO Cha was standing in front of the iron bars, watching me.
I quietly replied while pulling a first-aid kit from my inventory.
"I’m not angry."
"But your eyes look angry."
Wearing surgical gloves, I pushed tweezers, sterilized with alcohol swabs, into the wound.
Orca mentioned it hurt, but I pretended not to hear.
Creatures were resistant to pain and healed quickly. Once the bullet was removed, the wound would heal on its own.
At the end of the tweezers, digging between raw flesh and bone, I felt a hard, foreign sensation.
I gripped it firmly with the tweezers and pulled.
With a sickening friction sound, a bullet drenched in blood emerged.
Clink.
The bloody bullet fell onto the tray I had placed on the floor, making a cold sound.
I immediately poured hydrogen peroxide over it, and white foam covered the wound with a sizzling sound.
True to a creature’s regenerative power, the bleeding was already stopping.
I covered it with gauze soaked in antibiotic ointment and wrapped it in a bandage as I asked.
"Why did you attack the guards?"
Orca looked up at me and curled his lips into a smirk.
"Teacher Roasted Chestnut. When you’re locked in such a small space for so long, your head occasionally goes strange."
Until now, I lacked the energy for it to show even if I wasn’t in my right mind. Today, it happened without even realizing.
Orca laughed as if telling a funny joke, then doubled over with a groan from the pain of the gunshot.
Pretending to check the bandage, I leaned closer to Orca.
"There is a creature execution ceremony in two days."
Orca’s eyes widened.
I continued in a low, rapid voice.
"The Security Chief will start a coup that day. I’ve lied to him, saying I can control the creatures. Please, attack the warden when the time comes."
Truthfully, if I had a better excuse, I would have said something else.
But that was the only thing that came to mind at the moment.
I was sick and tired of failure and running away.
If there was something I could do, I wanted to try. If I was going to regret it, it was better to do it and then regret it.
I didn’t care if I got hurt a little in the process.
I already...
A faint pain flared in my left wrist.
A tingling sensation lingered to my fingertips, so I slowly clenched and unclenched my fist.
A sharp voice rang out.
"Trembling in fear by the thought of a single NPC dying, and you claim you’re doing it because you don’t want to."
I had shown too much intimacy with Orca in front of CEO Cha.
From his perspective, my actions would be incomprehensible.
But that didn’t matter. I answered bluntly.
"Yes."
CEO Cha was not someone I needed to make understand.
I liked CEO Cha, but separately from that, I had no confidence in being understood by him.
The idea that he should understand me just because I liked him was a contradiction.
"I will make sure the clear and the dispatch contract proceeds without issue."
He might not know why I was doing this right now, but CEO Cha was a utilitarian.
In the end, as long as the contract was fulfilled, it wouldn’t matter.
CEO Cha let out a sharp, short laugh.
"Han Goyo."
He tilted his face toward me. Then, he spoke as if chewing the words.
"I don’t need a True Ending."
Then, he vanished from my sight. He had raised his cognitive degradation to 100%.
Not knowing if he was right in front of me or had gone far away, I let out a small breath.
Was he saying he wouldn’t support me anymore?
Given CEO Cha’s temperament, the fact that he had accommodated me this much was already a miracle.
Actually, since the plan was to start a coup to bring him down, it was natural that he wouldn’t like it.
With a complicated heart, I finished my remaining duties as a medic and trudged back to my quarters.
[Lieutenant Colonel Je, I would like you to capture the remnants of the underground maze alive.]
I sent the message to Je Hyun-oh and opened the door to my quarters.
....
As I was about to send the next message, I froze in place with the door open, utterly shocked.
Je Hyun-oh, leaning against the window, and Kwak Han-mook, sitting crookedly in a chair he had dragged over, both looked at me simultaneously.
The medic’s quarters, which weren’t that large, felt cramped with two tall men occupying the space.
Kwak Han-mook spoke expressionlessly.
"You’re late, Goyo."
He called me by my name, not the ’Nut’ series.
Won Tae-beom’s words flashed through my mind.
"I will also share Recruit Han’s current state with Captain Kwak."
I had agreed to that back then without much thought believing that I hadn’t been brainwashed
I intended to use only messages until tomorrow and avoid both of them as much as possible.
I didn’t expect Kwak Han-mook to find Je Hyun-oh and come to the medie’s quarters together.
I slowly swallowed a dry lump in my throat.
’Act like a normal person no matter what.’
I had to show them that the brainwashed state was no big deal.
With a grim determination, I approached my superiors.
"Lieutenant Colonel Je, Captain Kwak."
While I hesitated slightly on whether to salute, Kwak Han-mook stared at me and spoke.
"Were you brainwashed?"
I stood in a straight posture and answered.
"Yes. It will wear off in two days. And the degree of brainwashing is weak, so there are no major abnormalities."
"Is that so..?"
Kwak Han-mook looked back at Je Hyun-oh.
Je Hyun-oh moved his metallic hand with a rhythmic click, click while keeping his gaze on me.
I quickly added one more thing.
"I haven’t lost my mind."
But the sound of the metallic hand continued. Kwak Han-mook said indifferently.
"Octopus looked delicious lately."
"Octopus is great. It’s nutrient-rich. Is it in season now?"
Phew... I thought I was doing okay.
It was just as I was apologizing to the Great Octopus Leg in my head.
Hearing a tap sound, I turned to see Je Hyun-oh touching the octopus leg statue I had placed on the table with his metallic hand.
Before leaving today, I had found the dusty statue in a corner of the medic’s quarters, scrubbed off the profane filth, and set it up.
I watched anxiously, fearing Je Hyun-oh might crush it.
"Goyo-ya."
At the sound of my name called languidly, I answered with a nervous heart.
"Yes...?"
"Do you like things like this?"
I was suddenly at a loss for words.
As the silence stretched, Kwak Han-mook rose from his chair.
"Hey, Lieutenant Colonel Je. Why are you intimidating him? He seems fine."
Strolling toward the table, he looked down at the statue and said,
"Now that I see it up close, it’s cool. Maybe I’ll get a baptism from Lieutenant Won tomorrow?"
The moment I heard those words, I felt a strangely strong sense of rejection.
Without thinking, my mouth opened on its own.
"Um, Captain Kwak! While that person is great and magnificent, I still think-"
Ah.
Realizing my slip of the tongue while trying to stop him, I stopped talking.
The lights on Je Hyun-oh’s goggles flickered on.
^^
Kwak Han-mook arched one eyebrow.
"This... lying to your superior is quite a habit, isn’t it?"
"Trainee Han Goyo."
"Yes.."
Kwak Han-mook looked down at me and spoke.
"Looks like you need some discipline today, huh?"