Ch.113The Children of Han Shinwoo

“Oppa! Oppa, wake up!”

Lia had been calling out to Shinwoo, whom she was carrying on her back as they crossed through downtown, for some time now.

But no matter how much she called to him, Shinwoo remained completely motionless, as if he’d been properly knocked out.

“Ugh… what did they hit him with to make him like this?”

“It wasn’t simply a hit. It was a precise technique to render him unconscious for an extended period.”

“…!”

As they were running, their path was suddenly blocked by Yurian, who descended from the sky.

Lia immediately tried to turn around and escape, but…

“I’m sorry, former Queen. I’m afraid I can’t let you escape.”

“Nngh…!”

“Please come with us, Queen Consort Lia.”

She was now blocked from both front and back by Shinwoo’s princesses.

“I-I’m not a princess! …Well, I might become one later, but anyway! You’re after Sister Sophia, aren’t you? Do you really think I’d do what you want?”

Lia, already aware of their objective, was trying her best to resist.

But it was a 2-against-1 situation.

And both of them were emitting an aura too powerful for her to handle.

“Sigh. Then I guess we have no choice but to fight.”

“?! S-Sister, are you really going to fight the Queen?”

“We don’t have a choice. Let’s just knock her out quickly and go.”

“O-Okay!”

They say a moment of carelessness creates opportunity, but with her limited options and someone to protect, Lia didn’t have many choices.

And none of the choices were good.

If escape was impossible, she’d at least take one of them down with her!

With that thought, Lia gently set down her unconscious brother and assumed the Sanchin-dachi stance of Kyokushin Karate.

“That stance…?”

“Your Majesty, were you trained in martial arts?”

“This is all I know how to do!”

Originally, Lia had rarely participated in combat after becoming a queen consort in the future.

Even her own children had barely seen their mother fight, so naturally Yurian and Shina, children of other queen consorts, knew nothing about Lia’s fighting style.

“It doesn’t change the outcome. Let’s go, Shina.”

“Y-Yes! Yurian!”

The two were about to close in on Lia from both sides when…

Swoosh.

“…! Shina, dodge!”

“W-What is this?!”

BOOM!

As if prepared for this situation, something fell from the sky…

Creak. Creeeak.

“Eek?! It’s grotesque!”

“…An automaton?”

A combat doll covered in armor plates that bent its joints in directions impossible for humans before assuming a battle stance.

The ultimate technique of a puppeteer – the Automaton.

“Automaton? What’s that, Sister?”

“From an era when humans had many different types. It’s equipment once used by Marionette Hunters.”

“By combining dead human and monster corpses with a bit of science, I succeeded in creating the ultimate automaton.”

Yurian followed the thin thread of magical energy connected to the automaton and looked upward.

There, on top of a utility pole, was the puppeteer presumed to be controlling the automaton.

Riverine of the Villain’s Troupe landed beside Lia, greeting the two with a smirk.

“Ah, so you’re the one from the department store…”

“I’m Riverine. We were together in Japan too, so it’s been a while, little monster.”

“Oh, yes! Did you come to help?”

“Of course. The Villain’s Troupe always assigns one observer to protect Shinwoo at all times.”

Quietly, of course, without the person in question knowing.

Though Shinwoo still didn’t know, members of the Villain’s Troupe had been assigned to secretly watch over him 24/7, 365 days a year.

“To attack Shinwoo during my shift, you two are quite unlucky.”

“The blue-haired puppeteer… Shina, be careful. It seems this person is Queen Consort Riverine, the Fourth Queen.”

“Queen Riverine?! Y-You were able to walk like this?”

“Yeah… honestly, I’m surprised too.”

In their world, Queen Consort Riverine had always appeared sickly, and approaching her was strictly forbidden.

The two princesses were bewildered to see Riverine, known as the Mad Queen, awkwardly preparing to fight them.

“Come on then!”

“…!”

“Sister, we’re going to fight anyway, right?!”

The situation had changed from 2-against-1 to 2-against-2.

Their original objective was to kidnap the First Queen Consort, Sophia.

But could they afford to waste time here like this?

This era was before humanity’s extinction, so human infrastructure was still at a considerable level.

If they caused even a small disturbance, “Hunters” might show up.

Therefore…

“Shina. Change of plans.”

“Sister?”

“I’ll stay behind alone. You go quickly and find Sophia to kidnap her.”

“O-Okay! Got it.”

Things might get rough, but if their identity was going to be exposed anyway, it didn’t matter.

With that thought, Yurian gestured to Shina over her shoulder to go, choosing to stay behind alone.

“Oh? She’s just leaving?”

“You’re going to face both of us alone?”

Frowning at what seemed like underestimation, Riverine watched as…

“Fourth Queen Consort, I apologize but…”

“Hm? Queen consort…?”

“I’ll have to get a bit rough.”

“…!!”

Yurian concentrated power throughout her body.

“KRAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!”

“?!”

“Huh? That’s Oppa’s…!”

Her body began to be consumed by dark energy.

Then, as if donning jet-black armor, Yurian appeared before the two shocked women with two black horns growing from her head.

“No need for discussion. I’ll end this quickly.”

***

“We’ve confirmed a monster appearance in downtown Seoul!”

“Based on its body volume, it appears to be a humanoid monster!”

“B-But the signature is very similar to… the monster that appeared in Jamsil before!”

“Hmm, I didn’t expect them to cross the 38th parallel so soon. I guess they just strolled through the minefield like it was nothing?”

Lee Jin-ah was listening to the situation room’s radio transmission in the branch director’s office.

Around her were Shinwoo’s extended family, who had been feeding their “starving” grandson before collectively becoming serious, along with two others who had been called in.

“W-What should we do? Should we deploy immediately?”

“Well… since we know their target is Sophia, I’d prefer if she remained at the Association.”

“I guess… there’s no other choice?”

“Yes. Even if we defeat all four from the future, we lose the moment Sophia is taken, right?”

“Excuse me, may I ask a question about that?”

At that moment, Barbatov Lorensky, sensing something odd in Jin-ah’s words, raised his hand.

“If this whole situation is happening because of this one woman, why not just hand Sophia over to the enemy?”

“What did you say?”

“How dare you speak to Mother like that!”

“Wait! Let me clarify—I don’t particularly care either way. Protect her or fight, that’s the way of a Russian warrior. I just don’t understand your actions, Miss Jin-ah.”

“……”

“Could you… explain exactly what you mean, Lorensky?”

Understanding Lorensky’s implication, Rolling quietly pulled Sophia closer into her embrace.

The three of them were fellow Hunters who had debuted in the same era.

They had encountered each other several times during past missions, and Rolling and Jin-ah had worked on the same team while in America.

So the source of Lorensky’s unease about Jin-ah…

“You’re a woman who naturally sacrifices the few for the many.”

“That’s right, so?”

“Between one woman named Sophia and the number of Hunters who will soon be sacrificed to Shinwoo’s children—from my third-party perspective, the latter is clearly fewer. So why are you trying to protect Sophia?”

Jin-ah had always calculated human lives on a scale.

It was unlikely she would protect Sophia to this extent just because she was a friend’s daughter.

And as expected…

“You’re right. If that were the case, I would have abandoned Sophia.”

“…!”

“Jin-ah, you…”

“Branch Director!”

“But having heard about the future, we absolutely cannot hand Sophia over to future Shinwoo.”

There was a compelling reason why Jin-ah was protecting Sophia with her life.

“Why? Would something happen if Sophia goes to the future?”

“Think of a fish tank. It’ll be easier to understand.”

“A fish tank? Like an aquarium?”

“Yes. If you add more water to a tank that already has water, the water might overflow, but the fish inside will remain fine.”

But in the opposite case…

“Conversely, if you remove water from the tank, what happens to the fish?”

“They all die, of course.”

“Exactly. The world operates on such principles. Now think about it. If someone who should naturally exist in their proper place completely disappears from this world…”

Just as a carefully set up computer program crashes when even one line of code disappears…

People who don’t exist in the past but exist in the future don’t naturally appear—they suddenly emerge one day.

The consequences of the broken universal laws would naturally fall on this world, the one being robbed.

“If Sophia is dragged to the future and dies in that world, an eternal void that can never be filled will be created in our past world.”

“That’s right. And from the moment she’s taken to the future, she falls into future Han Shinwoo’s grasp. Reclaiming her then would be much more difficult than protecting her now.”

“Hooo… So rather than trying to recover her after she’s taken, you want to protect her here and now?”

“Exactly. Fortunately, Korea currently has quite a few National Authority-Level individuals. I think we have a good chance.”

“Hah! This reminds me of Soviet times. This will be interesting!”

Lorensky, satisfied after hearing Jin-ah’s true intentions, began loosening up his body.

Sophia was also beginning to realize just how important her current existence was.

Meanwhile…

Outside the Korean Hunter Association, which had essentially declared a state of emergency…

“Hmm! Great. I can feel such strong energy!”

Since this was an era when humans were still plentiful.

Han Yujin, Shinwoo’s 16th child who had inherited the Han surname, had begun his individual activity to find strong humans.

“So this is the Hunter Association building where Mother used to stay.”

The prince shouted loudly toward the building.