Chapter 49 – The Briefing

Yoo Sang-heun’s SH Company gradually grew.

Even though the president did not work hard, it began to expand its size on its own. This was because of Se-min’s name value.

Since a Black Mark Raider belonged to it, people expected that something would be different. And the fact that he belonged to it was already a special point of the company in itself.

“President.”

Se-min entered the office and looked for Yoo Sang-heun.

He was not seen.

The newly registered Raiders focused their eyes on Se-min’s appearance.

He was a Black Mark Raider whom they had not seen even though he belonged to the company. He was wearing a Sukajan as always. The cheeky face they had only seen on the screen looked even more ill-mannered in reality.

Feeling numerous eyes, Se-min glanced back.

There was no need for Raiders to be in the office. It was enough for them to be in the training hall and on-site.

“Hey.”

Se-min called the person familiar to his eyes first.

It was Bang Yu-bi’s younger sister, Bang Jin-yeong. She was preparing for the Raider qualification exam next year.

“Yes?”

“Aren’t you practicing?”

“What practice?”

“Aura, or swordsmanship, for example.”

“I’m going to do it after resting a bit.”

“Foolish fellow. Raiders do not rest. Your lifespan is extended as much as the sweat you shed in the training hall. You are currently in a state where your skin is so soft that the peach fuzz seems visible. To compare you to a living creature, a mayfly.”

“Uh…”

“Get lost to the training hall right now!”

Se-min shouted like a macho instructor in a movie.

At his artificial tone, Bang Jin-yeong widened her eyes.

“Raider, did you perhaps fight with my sister?”

“Huh?”

“No?”

“Why is your sister brought up?”

“It’s because you seem to be in a bad mood.”

“What does my being in a bad mood have to do with her?”

“Well…”

Bang Jin-yeong smiled strangely.

“Are you two… not?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Is it not…”

Bang Jin-yeong rested her chin on her hand and showed a strange expression. As if thinking about something, she looked at Se-min with a smiling gaze and nodded.

“Well, alright.”

Se-min said as he sat in Yoo Sang-heun’s seat.

“If you don’t train in advance, you will regret it later.”

It was not just empty talk.

Se-min had heard a new fact through the Director of the Raider Bureau. It was that the appearance of monsters would cease before long. Although it was unknown how long it would last, it could be expected that the work of Raiders would decrease.

When that time came, only the truly strong would survive. High-mark Raiders capable of subjugation battles, they would need to be at least Gold or Platinum or higher.

The era where one could live without worries just by having their aura aptitude recognized and passing the qualification exam, like now, was drawing to a close.

In that respect, prospective Raiders like Bang Jin-yeong were the most awkward.

Bang Jin-yeong, who seemed to be heading to the training hall, returned to Se-min.

“Raider.”

Se-min answered as he turned on the computer as if it were his own seat.

“Why.”

“Please teach me a bit.”

“Do it on your own.”

“Why. I don’t know much.”

A nasal sound was mixed in her voice. Se-min frowned as he looked at her.

“Did you eat something wrong?”

“Tsk.”

She clicked her tongue and retreated to the training hall.

He thought he should tell Bang Yu-bi to manage her sister. He also thought he had heard somewhere that they did not get along well. Was she in puberty after passing twenty?

Se-min wrote ‘Bang Jin-yeong—Mental and Fundamentals Management Required’ on the memo pad of Yoo Sang-heun’s computer and checked his internet access history.

Yoo Sang-heun returned.

“What are you doing?”

“Web surfing.”

“Why are you looking at that?”

“Because I’m bored…”

Yoo Sang-heun suddenly pulled the chair. Se-min performed a stunt of floating in that exact posture and drifting onto the sofa.

The Raiders who were glancing at them from the office clapped.

“Why are those guys in the office?”

“They probably came because they wanted to see you.”

Se-min had become a Black Mark Raider in name and reality, one of the six strongest in South Korea.

He had become like a celebrity to the Raiders.

Se-min said to the Raiders.

“Everyone, please train in the training hall. I will go and take a look for you later.”

“Is that true?”

“Yes.”

They headed toward the training hall.

Soon, only Yoo Sang-heun, Se-min, and two office workers remained in the office.

“Are you really going to take a look for them?”

“No.”

Yoo Sang-heun shook his head.

“The guy who previously told me that he had an allergy to lying…”

“White lies should be excluded. I saved them from getting hurt.”

“Saved them from getting hurt?”

“If they kept staring at me, I might have attacked them because it was annoying.”

“…”

Yoo Sang-heun shook his head and moved to Mango Net’s overseas soccer articles out of habit. Realizing his own subconscious action, Yoo Sang-heun closed the internet browser and coughed.

“Ahem, yes, what brought you here?”

“I’m going to a subjugation battle.”

“What?”

Se-min decided to participate in the subjugation battle he had heard about from the Director.

Seeing a unique mark and facing the monsters of the other world would both be good experiences.

As Se-min explained, Yoo Sang-heun crossed his arms.

“Since it is a decision you made, I cannot stop you, but will you be okay?”

“Are you worrying about me?”

“Yes. You cannot speak English.”

“Do not ignore me just because I’m a middle school dropout.”

“Were you a middle school dropout?”

Yoo Sang-heun showed a more contemplating expression.

“Did they say there is an interpreter?”

“Yes. Since it is a joint Korea-US subjugation battle, others are going besides me, so there will be friends who speak English well.”

“If the Raider Bureau is connecting it, then…”

Yoo Sang-heun nodded.

Se-min informed him of the rough schedule, and Yoo Sang-heun recorded it. Although he seemed careless, Yoo Sang-heun tended to adjust raid schedules meticulously.

Yoo Sang-heun, who wrote ‘subjugation force’ on a memo paper and drew a circle, sighed.

“Jonathan Sandberg…”

“Do you know him?”

“I heard he is a skilled fellow. He has a unique mark, after all.”

“Have you ever met a unique mark Raider?”

“Once. When I was young.”

“What is different?”

“Since the level is too different, he rather looked ordinary. There has to be something to feel.”

Yoo Sang-heun looked at Se-min and said.

“Actually, nothing is felt from you now either.”

Even when Se-min was Platinum, it was faint, but after facing the Black Castle, whether he had become stronger, no trace of aura was felt at all.

Yoo Sang-heun realized anew that this fellow, who was just joking around with him, was a Black Mark.

The unidentified man who came through Hyeon Jae-yeong’s introduction had now become the company’s flagship Raider.

Who would have known that he would become so close to a Black Mark Raider like this?

He was lucky.

“Kid.”

Yoo Sang-heun stroked Se-min’s head.

Se-min flinched with a goosebumps-inducing expression.

“Don’t get hurt, and travel safely.”

“…”

Se-min stepped back slightly.

“What is Jae-yeong doing these days?”

“Isn’t he doing raids?”

“He doesn’t do it much lately. I don’t see him at all. Is he hanging out with his girlfriend?”

“Considering that, his skills have improved, though.”

Although Se-min lived with Hyeon Jae-yeong, since Se-min only entered the house to sleep and came out, there were not many times they encountered each other recently.

Since the aura was greatly developed every time they met, Se-min thought that he was engrossed in training or focusing on raids.

“I will probably leave in a few days, so I am telling you in advance.”

“Can’t you take more of our kids?”

“They say the minimum application qualification is Platinum.”

“Then it won’t work.”

“An announcement has been posted on the Raider Bureau homepage, so look at it if you want.”

Se-min stood up from his seat.

Thinking of going to the other world again made his heart pound. It was half anticipation and half resistance. The other world was not such an easy place. There were many bad memories.

The scars he obtained there throbbed.

“Then I am heading to a raid.”

“Are you really not going to look after the kids?”

“You look after them, President. Aren’t you a Gold Mark?”

Se-min shrugged his shoulders and left the company.

***

Se-min arrived at a convention hall located in downtown Seoul.

A briefing session in preparation for joining the subjugation battle was scheduled to be held there.

When Se-min reached the entrance, the staff of the Raider Bureau rose from their seats and welcomed him. They handed him a name tag and offered a handshake.

“Thank you for attending.”

“Yes.”

“By all means, please take good care of the subjugation battle. Hahaha.”

“Pardon?”

He felt anxious.

The words asking to take good care of it somehow choked him.

Entering the interior, Se-min looked around. The attending Raiders were all looking at him. The voices of them whispering among themselves were all heard.

“We can just trust Lee Se-min and go, right?”

“I heard the representative of the subjugation battle is Lee Se-min?”

“Is he trustworthy? He just recently rose to Black Mark, didn’t he?”

“Just because one Black Mark came, won’t we get pushed around by the Americans?”

He had guessed it, but as expected, it was so.

Se-min opened the Black Mark group chatroom and asked if they were not participating in the subjugation battle by any chance.

Oh Jeong-hui: It’s bothersome. Go alone.

Ryu Gwan-cheol: I have decided to go on a pre-natal trip with my wife. A pity.

Jang Geon: I’m busy too TT (emoticon) Fighting, Se-min.

Ju Ho-san: Why go to a place like that. This hyung cannot sleep unless it is a soft bed.

Seol Mu-jin: No.

He was the only Black Mark.

In this flow, he clearly had to wear the title of leader or guide of the subjugation battle.

It was perplexing.

“Does the era require a hero…”

Se-min’s serious face gradually relaxed, and the corners of his mouth slowly rose.

He scanned the surrounding Raiders one by one with a sharp gaze. His face looked as if he had practically become an examiner.

Se-min filtered pass and fail in his mind. The standard was the expression. A look of respect was a pass, and a guy expressing competitiveness was immediately a fail.

“Se-min.”

It was Ju Won-ho, the leader of the Raider Bureau’s Support Team. He was in charge of Support Team 25 of the Raider Bureau and was someone who had done raids together since Se-min was a Blue Mark. Since he became a Black Mark, they followed him exclusively.

“I have decided to join this subjugation battle as the support team.”

“Weren’t only Raiders going?”

“It’s because the nature of this subjugation battle is special. You will know if you watch later.”

The two shook hands.

“Are you by chance still single?”

“Yes.”

“Then let’s tempt at least a blonde beauty in this subjugation battle.”

“Hahaha. I will try.”

After exchanging jokes, Se-min sat in his seat. The host announced five minutes before the start of the briefing, and all the Raiders sat down.

Since the application qualification was Platinum Mark or higher, it meant that all the people here were Platinum. Looking at the number, they seemed to have gathered from all over the country.

Considering their power, they were more than a decent army.

A young employee from the Raider Bureau explained about the subjugation battle.

[This subjugation battle aims to completely subjugate the corresponding area, in accordance with the plan of the US Raid Security Agency to construct a forward base in the other world.]

The rough terrain of the other world was explained, and the shape of the structure to be built there was displayed in a translucent form.

According to the explanation, the US planned to establish a base in the other world and make it a foothold for the subjugation battles that would continue in the future.

The plan to build a base in the other world had suffered difficulties so far. Stationing a Raider unit capable of defending the base was a waste of human resources in itself, and research on the climate was also insufficient, so it had been postponed until now.

But in the end, the US drew its sword.

They intended to further solidify their status as the world’s greatest Raider superpower.

The first plan for this was the current subjugation battle.

South Korea was granted the qualification to participate as a long-time ally.

[Of course, there is no need for you to be stationed there. South Korea is only supporting until the surrounding area is cleared, and we are thinking of the period to be about two weeks.]

Se-min recalled his own experience and assessed the success or failure of this subjugation battle.

While he was lost in thought with his arms crossed, the host suddenly pointed him out.

[Mr. Lee Se-min. As the representative of this subjugation battle, would you like to say a word?]

Se-min stood up awkwardly.

Was it goodwill?

Or was it a trick to force the representative position onto him?

As one cannot spit on a smiling face, the employee welcomed him with applause while smiling brightly. Se-min went up to the platform and raised the corners of his mouth.

And the Raiders watching him flinched at that moment.

Se-min’s mouth was smiling, but his eyes were not smiling at all.

The aura of the Black Mark Raider threatened them.

Only the Raider Bureau employee, knowing nothing, was adding remarks beside Se-min, asking them to welcome him with applause.

The Raiders sweated coldly and tried to clap politely.

Se-min said.

“Stop.”

With that single word, the auditorium became quiet.

It was a perfectly orderly command.

Only the employee, who was shrugging his shoulders beside him, clapped alone, then got startled by the suddenly changed atmosphere and slowly lowered his hands.

Silence continued for a while.

The employee tried to say something, but realizing the situation, he stealthily stepped back a few paces.

Se-min smiled broadly as he looked at the Raiders.

“As those who know would know, I returned from the other world.”

Standing on the platform, the facial expressions of the audience came into view one by one. There was a person focusing toward him, an expression of some dissatisfaction, and also someone fiddling with their cell phone anxiously.

Se-min closed his eyes.

As a Black Mark Raider, what should he say to these weak Platinum fellows?

He continued in a low voice.

“I endured cold and hungry days. I fought for my life every day against bizarre monsters not even registered in the Monster Encyclopedia. One day, while enduring the days by killing and eating, I looked at myself reflected on the water surface and found that I, too, had become a beast…”

His repertoire began.

There were types of people who could not listen to long speeches.

Se-min witnessed a Raider sitting in the middle stealthily bowing their head at the part ‘I looked at myself reflected on the water surface’.

Se-min shouted.

“That is the other world!”

She got startled and dropped her cell phone.

The others also flinched and looked at Se-min.

“A place where you die if you let your guard down. A place where the entire world drools to kill humans, that is precisely the other world.”

Se-min pointed to the man sitting in the front row.

“You.”

“Ye-yes!”

“What is the most desperate experience in your life?”

“Uh…”

Most of the Raiders here were older than Se-min. Since reaching the Platinum Mark required a long time and effort, most of them were in their thirties or older.

As such, something like a special experience might come out.

The man opened his mouth.

“Before becoming a Raider, I didn’t have living expenses, so I did a part-time job loading and unloading…”

Se-min smirked.

“For how long?”

“I did it for three months.”

“Th-three months…”

The entire auditorium was stirred. Se-min also nodded.

“It must have been very hard.”

“Yes…”

“You went through a lot.”

To the man of three months of loading and unloading, even Se-min had nothing to say. So he shifted his target.

“The person sitting next to him, what experience do you have?”

Whether he had prepared his answer, he replied immediately.

“I wanted to experience the world, so I recklessly left for a working holiday in Australia, and to get a job there…”

Se-min cut off his words.

“With just this kind of mindset!”

“While suffering a lot… Pardon?”

“I mean, can you survive in the other world!”

Se-min raised his aura and made eye contact with the Raiders one by one.

“You have been flowers in a greenhouse until now. Is it not so? Raids? The Raider Bureau forecasts them for you!”

Se-min pointed to the Raider Bureau employees standing at the back of the auditorium. The Raiders’ gazes turned. They grinned and nodded.

“Also, the combat support team prepares everything!”

Next, he pointed to Ju Won-ho. Ju Won-ho smiled and waved his hand.

“Then you gather in a group with all combat equipment equipped and gank the monsters! That’s all! You, who have only done such easy raids!”

Se-min pointed to the screen displayed behind him.

His voice lowered again.

“In that harsh other world, can you survive?”

People were being sucked into his push-and-pull pacing.

“To survive, I crawled while buried in drake excrement, and because I was hungry, I hunted and chewed up and swallowed gursauls. Unable to overcome thirst, I touched my tongue to black dirty water whose identity I did not even know.”

People’s faces contorted. Gursaul was a horribly looking monster, treated as absolute filth among Raiders due to its shape of a bloated lump of flesh and its foul odor.

“Are you prepared to survive even by tearing and eating monsters like me?”

Everyone was quiet. Se-min smiled and waved his hand.

“I am just asking. I am not pressuring you, I am just asking if you have the confidence to do so. How about it? Can you do that to survive?”

The Raiders looked at each other’s faces.

Just then, a booming voice was heard from the back.

“We can do it!”

It was a familiar person. He was a man belonging to CCC who had done a raid together in the past. He grinned and raised a thumb toward Se-min.

Se-min smiled and continued.

“Of course you would. I know that all of you are Raiders who can do so.”

Se-min looked at the Raiders one by one.

“Since I did, you can do it too.”

Se-min pulled out the microphone and continued his speech, pacing around like Steve Jobs.

“I am an ordinary guy. It is just that I became a Black Mark because I was lucky, and you are greater people than me. Loading and unloading? Working holiday? I was just a middle school dropout and unemployed.”

The people laughed. Se-min advanced toward the end of the speech.

“Since it is a subjugation battle thoroughly prepared by the Raider Bureau, things like what I mentioned earlier will probably not happen. But I am telling you to think about the worst case. Because the most important thing is your safety. If, by any chance, you lose your party and get left behind, you must survive alone until we find you. Imagine it. The future would look bleak, right?”

As his tone softened, people who answered began to appear one by one.

“Yes.”

“It seems like it would be bleak.”

Se-min smiled faintly.

“Of course. That is why I would like to teach you one training method.”

The auditorium stirred again.

Se-min tapped the chest of his Sukajan.

It was the position where the dragon embroidery was located.

Se-min said.

“Dragon Barbecue.”

“…!”

The Raiders’ eyes widened.

“Try eating monsters there. If so, getting left behind in the other world will not be so bleak. Because you will know the taste of monsters. That is all for my presentation.”

Se-min put down the microphone.

The Raiders were flustered. It seemed like some meaningful speech, but the conclusion ended with promotion for his shop. Was everything a setup for that?

It was a moment when people looked at each other on both sides, not knowing how to react.

“Applause.”

Se-min said in a low voice.

The thickly laid aura vibrated the auditorium.

“…!”

The Raiders began to clap one by one. It soon became applause and poured toward the stage.

Se-min smiled and bowed his head.

“Thank you.”

And he stepped down from the platform.

The Raider Bureau employee who had invited him up fell into confusion about what on earth he had just seen.

“Uh, that…”

He picked up the microphone, looked alternately at Se-min and the screen, and soon coughed.

“Yes. Thank you for the good words. As expected of a Black Mark Raider. Hahaha.”

The Raiders sitting on both sides of Se-min watched his reaction. Se-min sat with his arms crossed, nodding with satisfaction as if pleased with his speech.

***

After the briefing session ended, Se-min exchanged greetings with the Raider Bureau staff.

There was one Raider whose dispatch had already been decided along with him.

“I am Kim Ah-reum.”

She offered her hand to Se-min first. When Se-min accepted the handshake, Kim Ah-reum shook it up and down vigorously.

“Nice to meet you. I am a fan.”

She was a mixed-blood with American blood, and she was a Raider scouted for communication issues. They said that although she was a Platinum Mark, she was not well-known because she did not active much.

“Are you good at English?”

“Of course.”

She babbled something in English. Although he did not understand, the pronunciation was fluent. She seemed to be more proficient in English than Korean. Se-min also welcomed her in English.

“Good, good.”

They said that besides her, employees fluent in English would mediate between the US and them.

“If they are building a base in the other world, the US must have prepared quite a lot, right?”

“Yes. Securing the gate had been the problem so far, but they reportedly found a decent place this time.”

It was not that they created gates randomly to cross into the other world. They secured an already opened gate and forced the connection to be maintained through a switch.

For this, precise technology and an enormous amount of magic crystals were required.

The US seemed to have found the environment they wanted.

“Once the applications are finalized, we will gather the successful applicants and organize it for you again, so please feel at ease until then.”

“But what about meals when we go to the other world?”

“We substitute them with combat rations.”

Se-min knitted his brows.

He was a reservist who had eaten combat rations until he was sick of them.

“Once we cross over, we can just catch monsters…”

Se-min muttered. He was already making plans to procure food directly.

“Ah, and Jonathan Sandberg is looking forward to meeting you, Se-min.”

“Me?”

“Yes. We sent the materials about you, and they said it was very impressive.”

The Raider representing South Korea in this subjugation battle was Se-min. The Raider Bureau had already sent his combat videos and data to the US, and they said Jonathan Sandberg expressed interest in him.

“I should give him an autograph when we meet.”

Who else but Se-min would say they would give an autograph to a unique mark Raider?

The staff nodded and laughed.

“Give him a cool one.”

“Of course.”

When Se-min mimicked Kim Ah-reum’s pronunciation, everyone laughed once more.

After finishing the schedule, he went out to the parking lot. In the parking lot, supercars of various colors were assembled.

It was while Se-min was heading toward his scooter.

“What kind of trash is this?”

A Raider passing by saw Se-min’s old scooter and giggled. His companion joined in.

“Does that thing even roll?”

“Pitiful, pitiful. Buy them a car when the owner comes.”

“I’ll buy one for them.”

“Seriously?”

Se-min sat on the scooter without a word. Perhaps feeling a bit sorry as the owner suddenly appeared, they coughed and turned their heads.

Then, startled again, they looked toward the scooter.

The owner’s back looked familiar.

It was a Sukajan.

It was a dragon pattern.

It was not just some common product trending on the street, but the one Lee Se-min was wearing.

Se-min said.

“It rolls.”

The Raiders ran to Se-min and apologized.

“We are sorry. We just said it as a joke…”

“It’s not that we ignored it because it’s a scooter, but we just play like this among ourselves… We are sorry.”

“We did not know it was your property, Raider.”

Se-min twisted his eyebrows.

“You say it was a joke?”

“Pardon?”

“Are you saying you lied to me just now?”

“No…”

The men, unable to follow Se-min’s conversation, looked at each other.

Se-min said.

“Was it a lie that you would buy a car when the owner comes?”

“Pardon?”

They did say such words.

Of course, they were joking.

However, Se-min’s face was not joking.

Se-min said.

“Buy it.”

“Uh…”

“Buy me a car.”

The men yielded under Se-min’s burning gaze.

“Yes…”