episode_0571

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Rattle rattle

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Right now I’m hiding in the gangway of a train running across India. A gangway is a small passage that connects the railcars.

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When riding a train, there is an uncomfortable feeling in spaces other than the cabin that somehow gets on people’s nerves.

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Among them, this space was the place where the vibration and noise of the train were felt the most.

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‘It’s quite noisy.’

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In addition to the rattling axle noise, there was also a dusty wind blowing through the gap. In addition, a strangely unpleasant smell, something I couldn’t explain, was thickly permeating the train and stinging my nose.

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Maria can erase any traces left on electronic devices, but she hides them like this to avoid being noticed by people…

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The thought that I had made a mistake came to me.

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‘… Did you try to steal it while it was being transported for no reason?’

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Maria said that the Starlight in India would be transported soon, so we moved quickly, but I should have just sneaked in and stolen it once we got to our destination.

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I didn’t know I would feel this inconvenience since Namhira is set in modern times, but India’s train system doesn’t seem to be as well-maintained as Korea’s.

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Eventually, I changed my original plan of not being noticed by the passengers and got out of the gangway and went into the cabin.

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Clank-

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“… … .”

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As I entered the room, people quickly looked me over.

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There was no air conditioning, so everyone’s faces were shaking and they looked sharp as if they were going to commit murder at any moment.

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But in reality, they are just ordinary people who are tired of the heat.

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I also changed the shape of my face with reverse magic and darkened my skin color with nanobots, so on the outside I look like a mixed-race Indian.

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Sure enough, the passengers who had glanced at me for a moment turned their gazes away and resumed what they were doing…

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“There. Are you kind of my type?”

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… before I could even finish, a woman threw me a side glance.

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‘Why are you doing that?’

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As I was wondering, I soon realized the reason.

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I forgot about it for a moment.

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That this world is a world where the roles of men and women are reversed.

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Of course, in this world, it was unlikely that an Indian woman would sit idly by and watch a man with an exotic appearance who appeared to be mixed race.

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Even though her face was said to be worse than the original due to the plastic surgery, her solid body still remained.

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If the Lee sisters’ tastes were not minor, their current appearance, with its moderate height and good proportions, was exactly what women liked.

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The reason why people go crazy whenever Ignis appears on the Hero Live site or in the news is partly because of my body that can be seen under the suit.

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“Where are you going? Talk to me for a minute… ”

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Pubberbuck…!

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Before he could attract attention, he blew a gust of wind and subdued the blood vessels.

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The woman who tried to get up from her seat fell backwards like a stiff log.

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Since I only put in a little internal energy, I will be able to move my body after about 30 minutes.

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Swish-

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‘Is it really true that someone with Starlight is on this train?’

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I walked down the hallway as if nothing had happened and asked Maria.

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The governments of the world of Namhira are also gradually discovering the uses of Starlight. If they make the right equipment for superpowered people, their abilities can be greatly amplified.

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As such, Starlight was becoming more and more valuable than gold.

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Gold can be mined over and over again, but starlight is a metal that cannot be found on Earth unless it falls as a meteorite.

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However, the train was too poorly equipped to be thought to have carried people transporting such items.

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-That’s right. If you go three spaces forward, you’ll find the cabin the porter has reserved. That cabin has air conditioning, so it’ll be more comfortable than this one.

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‘Yes. Maria can’t be wrong, so India’s handling of affairs must be unusual.’

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As I was convinced, Maria gave an additional explanation.

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-Starlight’s transporter is an ordinary professor. He is transporting an item at the request of the government, which realized its importance while conducting research at the university. Retrieving the target shouldn’t be too difficult. However, there aren’t as many devices connected to the network as there are in Korea or the US, so there could be unexpected variables. There’s also no real-life Enigma chat.

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‘That’s true. But I still wonder if it would have been better to stop by other countries first.’

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As I walked towards the forward compartment, I thought about how I ended up on this train.

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“Sister! Where did the most Starlight meteorites fall?”

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In reality, everyone in my group is younger than me or the same age as me, but in the Lee sisters’ household in this world, I was the youngest.

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Although that was a little awkward, it was true that I felt quite comfortable being the youngest when I saw how the Lee sisters were considerate of me.

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“Where did the most meteorites fall?”

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As soon as she heard my voice, my younger sister, Yuri, stuck her head out of the room.

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As always, she is in the style of Kongsoon, wearing denim overalls, with dark blue bob cut and green eyes that go well with her.

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Yuri answered my question with a look that seemed to be looking into the distance, her finger to her lips.

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“Except for our Korea…I guess it would be China and India?”

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“Really?”

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“The government hasn’t announced the exact amount, but according to the announcements from observatories around the world, yes. It looks like a lot of meteorites fell there.”

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“Not Russia, Canada, or the United States?”

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It was surprising that these countries were ranked 1st, 2nd, and 3rd in terms of territorial area.

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Yuri shook her head repeatedly.

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“They fell there too. But meteorites aren’t evenly distributed across the entire Earth. Just because the land is large doesn’t mean that many meteorites fell there. Even in our country, quite a few meteorites fell there, right?”

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“That’s true.”

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The reason why so many meteorites fell in our country is because Namhira is a Korean work.

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However, I recovered all of the ones that fell in Korea and Japan, except for a very small number.

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‘Then shall we start from India?’

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-Why is China closer?

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‘Anyway, if I have the key to wherever I go, the distance doesn’t matter. And since I’m going there anyway, I want to see some sights. I’ve seen a lot about China in the Tosunhyeophangnok, so I’m going to go to India this time.’

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-So, if we just go to India and stop by China, is our schedule finished?

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‘No. Since I’m here, I should just take it all out.’

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Since I came here to retrieve the Starlight, I planned to travel around the world. It would be a hassle to steal as much as I needed later, and if I took too long, people might split it up and divide it.

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Now was the time for the government to collect starlight in large quantities for research.

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Aditya Rao, a professor of geology at the University of Mumbai in India, sat back in his seat and wiped the sweat from his face.

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The seat he was in was an expensive seat with air conditioning, but perhaps because of psychological factors, his palms quickly became damp even though he had just wiped the sweat with a handkerchief.

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He consciously tried to focus his gaze on the plains outside the window, but ended up glancing at the trunk placed in the overhead compartment.

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The scenery passing by outside the car window looked peaceful, but Professor Lao’s nerves were on edge.

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As the train rattled absentmindedly, he played out countless scenarios in his mind.

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‘… We’ll reach our destination in just three more hours. They said they’d send soldiers to the station to guide us, so all you have to do is stay there until then.’

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A starlight meteorite being analyzed in a university laboratory.

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Professor Rao was deeply interested in the tectonic activity of the Indian subcontinent and the origin of celestial material. This meteorite, which could possibly provide new insights into the origins of humanity in the universe, was a great opportunity for him.

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However, the research that could be conducted as desired in a university laboratory did not last long.

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When the government officially ordered the recall of all meteorites, Professor Lao, who had the largest number of meteorites, was also forced to vomit out the results of his experiments and the meteorites.

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However, I was transporting it myself out of pride in my position as a professor and because I wanted to continue researching it for as long as possible before handing it over to a government facility…

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‘These days, the whole world is in chaos because of villains… You must have come out of the lab for a reason, right?’

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Now, I keep thinking that I should have just obediently followed the government’s offer to transport it.

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I heard that South America is in a state of total chaos, with villains overthrowing the country and heroes subduing those villains.

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The recent news of the destruction of a huge villain organization in Japan was the only positive news.

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‘We in India are not in a situation where we can feel at ease either… Let’s just stay alert for the next three hours.’

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At that moment, Professor Lao made that pledge.

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Brrr

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The peaceful scenery outside the window was suddenly filled with a group of motorcycles and trucks following the train.

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It was a train robbery.

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‘… … !’

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