episode_0063

Sword of Faith (4) – Gongseong High School Rooftop

I arrived at once and looked down at the student from the rooftop of Gongseong High School.

A school chair that looks like the guy was sitting on it while resting, and a bottle of water and food next to it.

And an aluminum baseball bat that appears to be used for self-defense.

“Are you looking for me?”

“… Heeek!”

The guy who was looking at the stadium with a telescope got so startled that he lost the telescope.

He used his telekinesis to catch the telescope as it quickly fell to the floor.

At that moment, he picked up the baseball bat that was on the floor and quickly increased the distance between him and me.

“Who, who are you?!”

His face, slightly stained black with grime, was full of tension.

I brought the telescope in front of him without any response.

His eyes sparkled as he watched the student slowly receive the telescope with a reluctant face.

This bastard is not at all surprised by ‘people flying’ and ‘telescopes floating’.

Just a wary feeling towards me who suddenly approached me.

His narrowed eyes scanned his entire room.

And I smiled at the very slight trace of mana.

“You are an awakened person.”

“… yes. Anyone can see that you are an awakened person.”

“Haha, uncle.”

Tuk-

He came down to the ground laughing loudly.

“I am not an uncle, but the leader of the One Mind Salvation Church.”

“… … I’ve never heard of such a religion?”

“Of course. Because it is a new truth created from the ashes.”

I smiled kindly at the guy who went into complete alert mode at my answer.

“What is your name?”

“… … It’s written here.”

He glanced at his name tag on his school uniform.

Kim Hae-il.

After checking the name written on the name tag, I smiled brightly and asked again.

“What is your name?”

“… … It’s Gimhae Il.”

“Yes, Haeil. What abilities have you awakened?”

As the conversation progressed strangely and naturally, Kim Hae-il was walking backwards, getting closer and closer to the door.

“… Isn’t it the rule of the country not to say things like that to strangers?”

A calm voice that seems to keep one’s cool and eyes that are not like that at all.

The guy’s eyes, which are rolling around and shaking with anxiety, are fixed on me in surprise.

“… Huh?”

I took a close look at the body of the guy whose entire body was fixed by telekinesis.

A clean baseball bat without any traces of blood or underdeveloped muscles.

I shook my head as I saw that I was too weak to deliver a blunt blow to the back of the zombies’ heads.

That guy is not the guy I was looking for.

“Yes. That’s your freedom.”

I lightly affirmed Kim Hae-il’s words and walked towards the entrance door.

I ignored Kim Hae-il, who was trembling at the sight of me getting closer, and opened the door and went inside.

Only then did Kim Hae-il, whose telekinesis was released, follow me with puzzled eyes.

A quiet hallway with only the sound of footsteps.

I spoke to Kim Hae-il as I looked at the hallway, which was very well organized except for the occasional blood stain.

“The physical system awakener organized it very neatly.”

“… Yes?”

“Where are your friends? Is that him?”

“… Yes?”

I gestured to the nearest classroom.

[3-10]

Class 10, 3rd grade, closest to the rooftop.

The slow breathing of several people could be heard inside.

In the midst of the incoherent conversation, I felt Kim Hae-il tighten his grip on the baseball bat and then straighten it out.

At a glance, an awakened person who could not do anything on his own was entering their home very naturally.

Regardless of the agony of Kim Hae-il, who could not do this or that, the door to class 10 was opened.

Drurrr

At the sound of the door opening, the eyes of everyone inside focused on me.

“… Who is it?”

A student sitting leaning against the wall asked me.

About 10 students who were hanging out helplessly slowly stood up.

A monkey wrench, a hammer, and a baseball bat in their hands.

It was believed to have been obtained from a gym warehouse and tool box.

“That… Guys. uh… I think it would be best to calm down first… .”

As the atmosphere became increasingly hostile, Kim Hae-il, who was behind him, hurried out.

When they saw Kim Hae-il, their eyes seemed to soften just a little.

“Tsunami. What is that person?”

“That… uh… , Pastor?”

“… … What?”

“Uh, so… … Oh, I’m going crazy.”

I looked around the classroom calmly, seeing Kim Hae-il gently explaining that we were crazy awakened people who could not do anything about it.

Dirty floors and trash rolling around as if they had never been cleaned up.

Desks and chairs stuck in the corner and food piled up next to them.

[Instant-to-eat beef red pepper paste bibimbap]

And he nodded at the familiar phrase written on the silver bag.

“… I think it would be better to follow that pastor’s request for now.”

“Wait a minute, wait a minute. … what? A whirlwind in the stadium? Flying? My body stops?”

Looking at Kim Hae-il who was frustrated and the students who did not understand at all, he raised his right hand.

The intention was to help Hae-il Kim with his explanation.

“… Huh?”

All the weapons they were holding tightly were gathered in the center of the classroom.

Grumble-

And it gradually came together to form a sphere.

An iron planet that flies gently through the air under my command.

I raised my left hand as I looked at the students who were staring at the scene blankly with their mouths open.

A baseball bat crashed into a planet orbiting the classroom.

Tuk-

With a faint crash sound, the planet disintegrated and flew back to its original owners.

Creak drudge-

The scattered weapons made a groaning sound and landed in the students’ hands.

The students raised their heads creakingly as they saw the weapons with clear crumples.

He slowly laughed at the fear that filled his eyes as he looked at me.

“Didn’t you take sulfur or hydrochloric acid from the science lab? That would be useful too, right?”

“Who says that? That kind of thing is really useless. of course… ”

After ending the meaningless confrontation, the students sat down in their seats and gestured with their weapons.

“This is just… It’s just a toy.”

Students who just lie down on the floor after finishing what they had to say.

It was too strange to react after a stranger entered their hideout.

Of course, they tried to discourage them with a little prank, but was that really what made them like this?

I looked around the classroom once again.

There is still plenty of food and the flesh is plump compared to the survivors I have seen so far.

Even though they were not hungry at all, the air was heavy.

A black face with a slightly open mouth and blank eyes.

It was a sight that gave me goosebumps more than dirt.

A strange silence returned to the classroom without any sound of conversation.

I asked Hae-il Kim, who was looking at the scene with an awkward expression.

“… There isn’t a single female student.”

“I don’t know why you’re asking that, but first of all, our school is not co-educational. Of course, women were also gathered together in the shelter… .”

I asked again, interrupting Kim Hae-il’s answer as he looked at me with strange eyes.

“You were in a shelter?”

“Uh… of course. There is no reason to be at school when the shelter is right in front of you. We were the first to be rescued by the soldiers.”

Those who were first rescued by the soldiers were confined to school again.

Although the situation was roughly sketched out, I smiled slightly and asked Hae-il Kim back.

“We stuck together, but?”

Kim Hae-il, who was trying to answer what I said, took a deep breath and looked toward the stadium.

He recalled the day the shelter collapsed.

Gunfire and the shouts of soldiers echoing through the stadium.

The group running out of breath and the howling of the zombies getting closer.

‘Keeek—!’

And the screams of the women who escaped the shelter together.

‘Kyaahhhh! Guys, please save me!’

They ran to school without looking back.

A small sense of relief spreads through the groaning of zombies moving further and further away.

Barely denying that sense of relief, they made up a reason.

The reason they had to die.

“All the slow runners were eaten, well.”

A voice that caught my eye and a bitter smile on Kim Hae-il’s face.

A flash of light flashed through my head as I encountered that smile.

I suppressed the laughter that threatened to burst out and looked through my inventory.

They were hungry.

A lot of that too.

I clicked my tongue as I looked at the weapons filled with inventory.

I remembered emptying all the food in my inventory and leaving the sanctuary.

I quickly searched the store windows and paid for all the food that caught my eye.

Pig’s feet, pork cutlet, chicken, black bean noodles, sweet and sour pork… .

The students slowly stood up as the delicious smell instantly spread throughout the classroom.

Then he looked at the food on the floor and at me.

“It’s okay if you don’t look at me so pitifully. Now, everyone, gather here.”

“… Wow, awesome.”

I sat down and continued to pay for all the food I saw in the store window.

The students’ eyes lit up as more food was added to the floor.

For the first time since coming here, their eyes came alive.

“Wow! Man, you really are such a mess.”

“Chicken! Jinheon said it would never be possible to do that for 70 points!”

A name dropped by a student who picked up a chicken leg with grime-covered hands.

I pointed to the food in the back.

“The friend who brought that food is Jinheon?”

“Uh… .”

The student was speechless, as if he had made a mistake, and the atmosphere was sinking.

He smiled brightly as he brought out a new chicken to the students who stopped moving their mouths and hands and just rolled their eyes.

“If I was going to do something to you, I think there would have been an easier way for me. Isn’t that right?”

“… Yes, that’s right!”

I offered a chicken leg to the student who first mentioned the name Jinheon.

The student who picked it up with his trembling black hands hurriedly opened his mouth.

“That’s right! Jinheon is an old man who is a bit of an awakened person. Of course, I don’t think it will work for you.”

“Well, shouldn’t that friend eat together too?”

“Uh… I’m not here right now.”

… does not exist?

“Where did you go?”

“I said I would go to Yeongjong Island because I was running low on food.”

… Yeongjongdo?

It was the most famous island in Incheon, where Incheon International Airport is located.

“Why there?”

“That’s the only place where gunfire still rings out.”

A gunshot rings out.

This means that armed groups are still active.

A student named Jinheon seemed intent on asking the group for help.

Or join the group and get food.

“How long has it been since you left?”

“Uh… Has it been a week?”

“You idiot, only 5 days have passed.”

“What can you say, you fucking sleepy bastard.”

I slowly gathered my thoughts while holding a chicken leg to two students whose words were getting heated.

First of all, you won’t be able to farm the awakened person named Jinheon, who was your primary target.

There was no promise as to when I would return here.

I liked it because every single action seemed smart.

Still, it wasn’t a loss at all since I still got the remaining food and 10 young male students in the classroom.

I don’t know what his abilities were, but there was also Kim Hae-il, an awakened person.

“Wow! It’s been a while since I had real black bean noodles.”

“Mister, don’t you have those chopsticks?”

“Crazy… Don’t give a damn, dude, our hands are already dirty. I should just eat it all myself~”

“Don’t put your dirty hands in the damn noodles!”

I smiled as I watched the students greedily devouring the food I gave them.

They were hungry.

A lot of that too.

I cast [Identify Deficiencies] on them.

A deficiency that is common to them.

A hunger that is not physical, but very mental.

“You were very hungry?”

“Ah, hehe― right?”

“Eating like that will not satisfy your hunger at all.”

Everyone dreams of being special when they are young.

I believe that only I will be different, and I am confident that I will take a different path from others.

Disaster struck them, and they had to flee.

Run away and run away again.

Hiding in a corner, embarrassingly relying on someone.

That would not be the me they dreamed of.

To overcome the feeling of self-destruction that continues to torment him, he bites his lip and fights against the zombie.

“… You couldn’t kill a zombie with a toy.”

Their weapons were clean, without a single trace of blood.

They were refugees who had already lost their will to fight.

A truly special person who is different from them.

You see it in cartoons and movies.

An awakened person with abilities that were only imagined.

The shame and envy I feel when I see them.

And jealousy.

“You must have been scared of the awakened people but also madly envious of them. I can see everything. Only I understand you.”

The common aspirations of fugitives who were defeated first at school, then at the shelter, and then again at school.

[Awakening]

“What they teach you in school is how to succeed in society, not how to survive destruction.”

Everything they had prepared to become adults went to waste.

What they need right now is not high grades, but real strength that will stop them from running away anymore.

This is their real deficiency that I need to fill.