Chapter 40 : Where and What to Become

I drank the black tea on the glass table while hiding my still slightly trembling hands in my cloak since seeing the news yesterday.

The deep aroma of black tea spreading from my throat, along with the sweetness of sugar, helped calm my mood.

After receiving worried calls from friends first last night and comforting them one by one, I used the time I had until the next day to inform Sumire, the council representative, about the inside story I knew.

Sumire thought briefly, with her hands folded modestly, and then opened her mouth.

“A ritual where already bloomed 2-star magical girls evolve one step further through plunder…”

A small sigh escaped between her lips as she listened intently without a hint of disturbance in her posture.

“If this were to be known, it would cause unimaginable terrible chaos that I don’t even want to imagine.”

“…”

“Even the media, who were passive about reporting overseas news while watching out for Fujimoto, are paying attention to this simultaneous large-scale plunder.”

“No one will know yet why the terrorists are doing this.”

“Magical girls, including the council, don’t know more than the concept of blooming and dreams that you’ve told us.”

“…Are you upset that I hid it?”

I saw again the surprised expression I hadn’t seen during the month I secretly watched Sumire after establishing the Garden.

Sumire returned to her original expressionless face, but it was noticeably softer.

“There’s no need to tell subordinates everything, especially if it’s to avoid unnecessary misunderstandings.”

“Anyway, I apologize for not anticipating the current chaos.”

“Even in private, a monarch’s apology shouldn’t come out lightly in front of subordinates.”

Sumire put her hands in her kimono sleeves and said in a firm voice, narrowing her fine eyebrows.

“We are just those who help you make better decisions, not those you should bow your head to. How could we find fault when your intentions are in the great cause?”

No, I can’t say anything.

I think of Sumire more as a CEO leading the <Magical Girl Company Japan Branch> that I forcibly appointed rather than a friend or colleague like Sato Hana or Ichika.

‘I think of myself as in the position of a major shareholder.’

Fortunately, Sumire belonged to the type of diligent CEO who tries to understand and maintain the investor’s intentions within given rules, rather than an evil CEO obsessed with short-term performance or considering the company as their personal property.

As soon as she realized Fujimoto’s methods were wrong, she completely changed the direction of the council.

‘I came on a business trip to farm talent from abroad after setting it to auto mode, but she’s trying to treat me like a real king.’

The problem is that she seems to think of herself not just as a CEO but as a subject who has really come under me.

Even though it was that cruel and inhuman Fujimoto Eiji, I got goosebumps when she said she had cut ties even with her own father and left.

“Because there’s already a domain spread in Japan, I can’t create many more domains, but those who will belong to the Garden will gradually increase.”

“If there’s a great cause, people will naturally gather there.”

“If uninvited guests are entering the domain, I’ll rush to save the magical girls who called me king.”

“Then I and the other leaders will risk our lives to save those with ordinary dreams until the Faceless King arrives.”

“…”

Sumire stood up from the glass chair and slowly bowed her head with a perfectly angled posture.

I still had complicated feelings about whether just one teaching and opportunity could change a person this much.

‘Actually, Sumire’s inherent nature of wanting to protect something hasn’t changed.’

It’s just the difference between a wrong path due to ignorance and a right path someone taught her.

“Then I’ll be going out again.”

“I wish you good fortune.”

* * *

“Fucking hell! Fucking cowardly bastards!”

Bang

Kang Dorim kicked the trash can in the office with all her might.

Trash spilled out and a loud noise sounded, but Oh Sanghyuk just bowed his head with a gloomy face.

“Fuck!! Those crazy bitches could come anytime now!! And you’re talking about security? Secuuurityyy?”

For the few days Sanghyuk tried to arrange a meeting with the plan to seek protection from supernatural ability terrorism through [Beginning]’s domain declaration and [Beginning]’s pledge to respect the will of Korean magical girls, he only heard two things.

-For security reasons, it’s difficult to arrange a meeting or conference with VIPs right away with a supernatural ability user whose identity hasn’t been confirmed, especially one who has only been active abroad.

-The opinion that it should be resolved through a trustworthy route is dominant because the possibility that [Beginning] is the leader of the terrorists cannot be ruled out.

Sanghyuk’s head throbbed at the reality of having to go around a lot because of the old men’s suspicion disease that couldn’t grasp reality.

‘If we revealed that [Beginning] was staying in the country, they seemed ready to surround and detain her with the military.’

The detailed damage situations in China, the Middle East, and Europe were treated as confidential, but from what Dorim could find out with her ability, all that could be said was that it was a dangerous situation.

70% of the state-recognized magical girls of the European Union who participated in a joint event in France died or were seriously injured and had their stars stolen, and government facilities were paralyzed by bombs. And they failed to catch any clues about the suspects.

Some small countries in North Africa where a magical girl’s solo coup d’état was reported to have occurred were completely cut off from communication.

‘China has completely locked down its external communication network and is only carrying out missile bombings on its domestic cities one by one.’

The United States was officially dispatching an aircraft carrier fleet to Europe while strongly demanding that each country’s government fully disclose the current situation of supernatural ability users.

Some members of the National Assembly argued that White Wing unit members should be put on US fleets for protection.

‘They’ll probably try to detain supernatural ability users who have never been officially confirmed on the American continent under the pretext of protecting them in their homeland because it’s dangerous.’

Japan, despite being the country with the most supernatural ability users, was just silently watching the situation closely as it had completely lost control over its own supernatural ability users.

In the first place, they didn’t care because the person who held that control was in the same building.

Although it was an emergency situation involving supernatural ability users, even the Supernatural Ability Countermeasures Team was forbidden from entering the secret bunker under the pretext of security.

What on earth was the reason for checking Dorim, who had never committed any misconduct in her 13 years of life and had only done good deeds since becoming a magical girl, to this extent?

‘They’re probably wary of us rebelling after seeing the Japanese government become such fools.’

He already knew the answer, but Sanghyuk felt his chest bursting with frustration.

I understand why they refuse to give up the initiative in this situation at all costs, but it’s been a day since the situation occurred and they’re still using security as an excuse. Do those old men think we didn’t do it because we couldn’t?

“F…uck… I really can’t be a civil servant.”

“…Mister.”

Dorim, who had been shouting and getting angry in the corner, suddenly called Sanghyuk calmly.

“What.”

“Let’s do it.”

“…”

“If we don’t do it and even slap them, I don’t think we’ll ever be able to persuade those old men.”

Sanghyuk raised his head and looked at Dorim.

Dorim was quietly looking at the office wall with her fist tightly clenched.

“If we do it, we’ll probably get a lot of criticism, but there’s no other way.”

It was the first time he had seen Dorim’s small fist clenched tightly since they had gone hiking on a hot summer day. Dorim left the office and walked somewhere.

-…Seoul doesn’t look that shitty from afar.

-Right, Dorim? Life might look shitty up close, but when you look at the whole picture, it’s quite beautiful.

So let’s not hate people.

So let’s live liking people.

It didn’t seem like a coincidence that he suddenly remembered the promise they made that day.

Ring ring ring-

The phone number of the VIP’s security officer was on the suddenly ringing phone.

“Hello, this is Oh Sanghyuk, head of the Supernatural Ability Countermeasures Team.”

* * *

Glance

The path to the secret bunker where VIPs and ministerial-level personnel were having an emergency countermeasure meeting was known precisely only to a very small number of security officers working at the Blue House.

Therefore, the person in charge of escorting the Supernatural Ability Countermeasures Team was driving a special vehicle in which the outside couldn’t be seen except for the front seat, which was blocked by a partition.

“…”

“…”

On the CCTV screen that could monitor the back seat in real-time, Team Leader Oh Sanghyuk and the magical girl of [Cyberbrain] could be seen sitting awkwardly apart, with their mouths tightly shut.

“We’ve arrived.”

The vehicle stopped with just a fingernail’s width gap in front of the bunker entrance, and the only place that could be entered through the opened back door was the corridor inside the bunker.

As Sanghyuk walked through the bunker’s concrete corridor, he seemed to understand why they had told him to wait one more day.

‘They’ve blocked all radio waves and electronic devices, are they wary of Dorim’s ability even when meeting through video?’

They placed one security personnel at each square end of the corridor and confiscated all of Sanghyuk and Dorim’s phones. Then, they started moving after checking their entire bodies with metal detectors and other inspection devices.

Every time they passed through a corridor, they blurred their sense of direction by going back and forth several times under the guidance of a security officer with blindfolds. Then, they opened and closed doors several times to make the internal structure unknowable. This seemed intended to block escape routes if anything happened.

‘They’re going overboard, so this is why they never let Dorim enter inside the gates of the National Assembly and Blue House no matter what.’

They called Kang Dorim only after coming to the point of judging that the Supernatural Ability Countermeasures Team needed to be completely controlled before making a decision.

Finally, the interview preparations were completed with two female bodyguards holding Dorim’s arms on both sides and bodyguards standing behind her.

Sanghyuk felt like he wanted to cause a disturbance by shouting ‘Did you think we didn’t do it because we couldn’t?’ with his insides boiling, but he held back.

He couldn’t interfere when the person enduring the most humiliation was enduring to arrange this meeting.

‘If Dorim had really been treated like this, I would have almost said let’s cancel what we said on the mountain.’

Clank

The iron door opened, and the interview that would determine the future of magical girls began.