What It Means to Be Police in This World(4)

…With Sai’s sudden appearance, tension began to envelop the street.

The Special Task Force personnel, who had been instantly incapacitated by the mummy-like mutant, hadn’t regained their senses yet and didn’t even know what had appeared.

From people lying on the ground vomiting or sobbing to those trembling like newly hatched birds—even though they were holding guns, there was no one who could fight.

Damn it. Justice definitely said that Sai wouldn’t kill us yet, so why is that woman here?

My teeth gritted, but I realized this was purely due to my own carelessness.

From the moment we confirmed that such mutants were with the Chosen Ones, our visit to Dokkaebi had been in the palm of Sai’s hand.

Was she planning to kill us all here from the beginning? As I swallowed dry saliva in anxiety and glared at Sai.

There was something strange about Sai’s appearance. She seems angry, as if she’s lost her reason.

Sai had always been leisurely and smiling, except for the day she recovered her memories and revealed her true identity.

Similarly in the original work, the only time Sai lost her composure and revealed her emotions was near the end, when she saw that Mina had overcome all the trials she created and remained unchanged.

Then, why is Sai making such a face now?

As I was pondering, biting my lip to the point of bleeding out of anxiety, Sai was glaring at Mina, baring her fangs like a snarling beast.

I couldn’t fully understand what that crazy woman was thinking. But my will to survive was trying to somehow comprehend Sai’s current state.

Think. No matter how monstrous her power and incomprehensible her mindset, she hasn’t completely abandoned the characteristics of criminals.

Like how she deliberately infiltrated the Special Investigation Team to mock and toy with the police chasing her.

And opposite to her meticulous planning when orchestrating incidents, she also has impulsive aspects.

I think the idea of bringing down the Special Task Force and Mina from the highest point has similarities to the confidence display typical of serial killers—the “I’m better than you” attitude.

Now that I think about it, the novel describes her as insensitive to and unable to understand people’s emotions, as if the author wants to convey that Sai is a monster beyond human framework.

But from a police perspective, I think Sai’s behavioral patterns also share similarities with psychopaths.

Of course, being a character in a novel, Sai is completely different from ordinary psychopaths—she’s more mentally unhinged in various ways and harder to understand.

What I need to focus on now is what might have made someone with such a mindset as angry as Sai is now.

First, what were we dealing with? Answer: A mutant [presumably with an ability] created by Sai that makes people see dead people and despair.

For some reason, that ability didn’t work on me, but considering Sai’s confession-like statements, there’s a high probability she deliberately made it not work on me.

Then, what would make Sai so angry—

“Ah.”

Only after seeing Sai’s gaze continuously fixed on Mina did I vaguely understand the situation.

Sai didn’t think Mina would overcome the hallucination shown by that mutant and regain her senses. It’s clear.

Is this the same situation as in the original work?

What suddenly came to mind was the final content of the original work.

Sai is angry, just as she was angered in the original when she saw Mina refusing to give up on being good despite being chased by the police, betrayed by the people she saved, and wounded to her limit.

In the novel, it’s nicely expressed as her being angered by the denial of her human panorama, but frankly speaking, isn’t she just throwing a temper tantrum because things aren’t going her way?

Right. Having her ideas denied and her plans disrupted would be unbearable for a criminal of Sai’s type.

I recalled the words Sai uttered as she appeared here, and they seemed to prove that my prediction was correct.

But. So. How do I stop that?

I feel as if a blade is touching the nape of my neck.

What I’m holding in my hand is a gun, a lethal weapon, but in front of Sai, it’s no more than a simple stick.

The Special Task Force, Dokkaebi, and the vigilantes with him still haven’t regained their senses.

The only ones who can pretend to fight here right now are Mina and I, but honestly, what can I do?

We’re truly fucked.

I didn’t think Sai would appear so soon, and I hadn’t found a way to bring her down, yet here she is already.

Cold air rushes in. I glared at Sai, barely able to breathe properly.

But Mina’s face was strangely calm, to the point of seeming detached. Sai looked at Mina and said:

“I would have been different if I were in your place.”

“You already know better than anyone that such things don’t matter anymore… Nothing will change like this.”

“- No. I’ll make it change.”

The two exchanging peculiar questions and answers as if reading each other’s emotions without speaking.

In the original work too, during the final battle, there was a description of Mina and Sai feeling an inexplicable sense of kinship, understanding what kind of lives they had lived and what thoughts they had—

Watching them, I wonder what the hell they’re doing. What are they really doing?

As I was pondering whether to shoot or what to do, suddenly, the fools on the Chosen Ones’ side, who seemed unable to grasp the situation, began to shout:

“You! You must be that Sai! The prophet told us! You will resurrect our bishop! And lead us to a bright future!”

“Lead us! To paradise!”

“Defeat those villains right now!!”

Good heavens. What the hell are those bastards doing to Sai right now?

“These, idiots—”

I exclaimed in shock and tried to shout to stop them. But Sai’s movement was faster.

With just a simple flick of her finger, the heads of the shouting guys burst like balloons, and the mutants standing idly by their side began to rampage.

“Damn it!”

A situation where screams and blood began to spray instantly. I gritted my teeth at the sight and raised my gun to stop the rampaging mutants, but Mina rushed in before that.

Or rather, “would have rushed in” might be the more accurate expression.

When I came to my senses, I felt a heavy pain in my body along with a changed field of vision.

I realized a beat late that I had been pushed to a place far from where we originally were, along with the Special Task Force people.

The mutants that were slaughtering the Chosen Ones were also embedded in the concrete floor, reduced to pitiful lumps of meat.

Mina, who had pushed away the Chosen Ones and us at a speed my eyes could barely follow, deserved to be called a superhero, but I couldn’t see where Mina herself was.

Swallowing dry saliva and rolling my eyes, I could see Mina and Sai colliding in the distance.

Mina and Sai exchanged kicks and punches as if intersecting each other. Immediately after, with a boom that was unbelievable for human flesh colliding, dust was scattered all over the street.

Following was a bloody battle with blood spraying. But it became invisible as the two disappeared far away, knocking down buildings.

I rose, using the rifle in my hand as a cane.

I should help Mina somehow, but how? As I was trying to think if there was a way—

“Ugh……”

A Special Task Force colleague lying face down beside me let out a pain-filled moan.

Damn it. I cursed and supported my colleague, fleeing in the direction opposite to where the noise was coming from.

I only came to my senses after seeing those two collide.

The fight between a superhero and a supervillain is beyond what eyes can follow. It’s commonly described as a battle between gods, isn’t it? I’ve never felt that expression so apt as now.

Alright. The most I can do right now is evacuate people from areas affected by the aftermath of their fight.

I must have thought that I was somewhat important since things were going well in the Special Task Force. What nonsense! When superpower users fight like this, the only thing to do is run away!

Behind me, buildings collapse like dominoes and screams echo.

In the face of that overwhelming battle of power, I nervously wiped away my sweat. People are still everywhere, and there’s so little I can do.

Is there hope, seeing that Mina hasn’t been pushed back immediately like before? Can Mina defeat Sai now?

I muttered words, unclear whether I was speaking to that person or to myself.

“Just hang in there a bit. It’ll be okay.”

Mina will overcome this. She’s a hero, after all. She’ll somehow manage. I silently repeated this to myself while shouting with the radio in hand.

Sai has appeared here. Engaged in combat. Need support. Anyone, come.

But the radio was dead. There was no reception sound. It was truly a situation where I didn’t know what to do.

As I stood dumbly in place, feeling suffocated, suddenly, with a boom, the noise stopped.

Like an audio player stopping, the world became quiet. Has the fight ended? Who won?

As the city is enveloped in a stillness as if it suddenly held its breath, anxiety only grows rougher.

“Wh-what is happening… here?”

“Now we have to find out, damn it.”

The person I was supporting regained consciousness and looked around in shock.

I told him to run away on his own if he’d regained consciousness, and headed towards the place where the noise was last heard.

And what I saw was Sai standing on the ruins of a collapsed building and Mina, who was caught in Sai’s hand, not moving as if unconscious.

“Da-mmit.”

A sigh automatically escaped my mouth.

We lost. Indeed, we lost. Has the rail that deviated from the original work returned to this? What should I do? What can I do?

Sai raises her leg as if to finish off Mina. At that sight, my mind goes blank, and thinking I should do something, I raise my gun.

But as if mocking me, the wall beside me collapses, and chunks of concrete fall.

Perhaps because I witnessed a shocking scene right before my eyes? The concrete chunks that I would normally have avoided hit my head.

With a thud, my body collapses. Blood comes out and my vision shakes, but there’s no time. I need to get up and—

“Oh my goodness. Deputy Director.”

Suddenly, Sai abandoned the idea of finishing off Mina and rushed towards me. Looking at Sai’s face, I felt like cursing.

What’s with that face? She’s looking at the blood flowing from my head with a face as if she’s lost the world.

Seeing Sai, who doesn’t even glance at all this devastation and the injured people caught up in it, I was about to say something scornful but instead gritted my teeth and aimed my gun, but.

She easily bent the barrel of the rifle I was holding, making it round and damaged, then began to compress and destroy the gun with one hand.

In the process, there was an explosion due to the bullets inside the gun, but all that explosion was blocked by Sai’s small palm, causing no harm.

In a movie I saw in my previous life, a hero wearing triangular underwear showed something similar to this. But when a supervillain does it, I’m speechless.

Looking at the gun that had hopelessly turned into scrap metal and the unconscious Mina, a plan flashed through my mind involving the neutralization drug I had and how to inject it into this woman.

But there were too many deficiencies to successfully execute such a far-fetched plan. Since there’s only one chance, I couldn’t just recklessly rush in.

• • I’m dizzy. As I staggered from dizziness, Sai carefully stroked my cheek as if handling a sugar figurine that could easily break, and with eyes dripping with concern, she said:

“I’m sorry. I made a mistake because that child suddenly got stronger. But this is truly the last mistake. I promise you. After all this is over, I’ll proudly confess to you again, Detective.”

“There’s nothing left to believe in now, right? It’s just one step away from when the law and justice of people can no longer touch me.”

“Ah, I know… I’m lacking. It’s a mess. But what can I do? This is my first love…”

“I’ll try my best instead. After everything is over. I’ll prepare a house for us to live together.”

“I’ll formally confess to the Deputy Director, and I’ll prepare everything needed. I won’t do bad things anymore! So please, can you accept my heart?”

Sai must have had a tough fight with the grown Mina, as she smiled while bleeding from her head and nose, and without treating her own wounds, she sprayed her blood on my wounds to heal them.

I shuddered at the vivid sensation of my wounds healing. The flowing blood looked like the boiling emotions inside Sai being ejected in the form of bright red blood.

My impression upon seeing that face and hearing those words was the same as before. What a disgusting woman.

Faced with something so overwhelming, rather than feeling scared, I felt exhausted, and it seemed like even the last bit of sanity would completely fall away.

Everything about this woman was unspeakably disgusting, to the point where I was too tired to speak after hearing a person’s words—something I’d never experienced in my two lifetimes.

I thought that perhaps if I just blurted out that I loved her first, everything would end, but.

Looking at Sai’s clear eyes, I gave up. This woman has no intention of giving up no matter what I say until she achieves everything she wants.

Is that love? Is that kind of thing love? It seemed closer to madness than love, but I didn’t have the energy to point that out.

But with the irritation boiling inside me rising, I moved my dry lips and said mockingly:

“First love doesn’t come true.”

At my words, Sai blankly looked at my face, then soon, as if recalling something, she curved her eyes like a crescent moon and, humming a tune, grabbed the collar of the fallen Mina.

“I love you.”

Despite being able to kill Mina right away, Sai didn’t. She just dragged the unconscious Mina like a slaughtered piece of meat.

What is that woman thinking? I couldn’t even raise myself due to my head still feeling dizzy despite the healed wound, and I just watched that scene.

“I love you.”

Amidst the confession accompanied by a hummed tune, rain falls. Snow falls. In this winter, rain and snow begin to fall together.

Sai, laughing in the rain, smiled innocently like a child with her first love, but the surrounding ruins and the blood buried created an intensely stark contrast.

“This is my first love and last love. So, it will definitely come true.”

Leaving behind a sentence filled with certainty, Sai looked at the fallen Mina, then, as if recalling something, said while dragging Mina away:

“You won’t give up even in this situation, right? You probably already have a plan to take me down.”

“I know everything. I know this is all my selfishness. But—I really want to be chosen by you, Deputy Director. So I’ll give you one last chance. Please, choose me.”

Sai left those incomprehensible words and disappeared into the rain with her hummed tune.

And in the mixture of rain and snow where Sai had disappeared, I muttered dejectedly:

“Plan, my ass……”

Yes, you damn woman. There is a plan. Starting from Yuna-ri to Dokkaebi. I gathered these superpower users in the Special Task Force.

This was something I had vaguely thought of, like a passing idle thought, as I stayed up through that long night when Sai approached me with her memories erased and clung to my back.

My head unfortunately cracking against the concrete, and the face Sai showed indicate a high probability that the plan I conceived as a passing thought during that long night might work.

But now that bitch has gone and kidnapped Mina.

I’ll say it again. Sai kidnapped Mina. She didn’t kill her but kidnapped her. As if to signal that her plan isn’t over yet.

An idea is just an idea, and at the same time, shitty things are shitty, and fucking things are fucking.

What scheme is she plotting? I cursed, drenched in the rain and snow mixed with worries about the future, feelings of helplessness towards myself, and various other emotions, before losing consciousness.