Editor: Cherish
— Ah… ah… — Kang Dong Hong was breathing heavily in a dazed state.
His T-shirt was sticky with blood, and he could hardly move his legs.
'I must contact the squad leader…' He fixated all his energy on pressing the memory card inside his chest pocket.
He imagined the face of the commander looking for him.
The girl with shiny silver hair, Baek Hwa Yeon.
The commander of Hwaran's third squad, who had entrusted him with this task.
Struggling to breathe, he coughed up blood.
As he wiped the blood from his lips with his sleeve, he continued his journey, staggering in his steps.
'They must be caught as soon as possible.'
He bit his lip, trying to take his mind off of his throbbing wounds.
The creatures were catching up to him.
Just thinking of them slowed him down.
— Shit… — His consciousness grew dimmer and dimmer, and his movements became heavier.
He didn't care whether he died or survived.
But he couldn't die until he gave Baek Hwa Yeon the video that he was carrying.
What was recorded on this piece of plastic would be shocking to anyone.
He glanced down at the small memory card the size of his fingernail.
The memories of what he'd done to obtain this video footage flowed through his head like a kaleidoscope.
'Psychopaths.' His face twisted at the memory of what the Devil's Teachers were doing.
They sacrificed living people as if it were the natural thing to do.
Worse, such actions weren't just happening once or twice.
The Devil's teachers were not just founders of a pseudo-religion, like everyone had thought before. These monsters had much more power than they could have imagined.
Kang Dong Hong had slipped in with those fanatics, portraying himself as a madman to gather the necessary information.
And in the end, he achieved his goal by videotaping shocking footage.
'It's good to have at least this video.'
The Devil's Teachers, to avoid information leaks, carefully monitor all followers, and cut off any use of communication means.
Even if by some miracle someone managed to sneak something in, they would not be able to use it, because there are jammers all around the area.
This was exactly why he had to meet with someone from the squad in person to give away the memory card.
Blood spilled from his mouth as he fell to his knees.
To get the video out of this place, he'd disguised it as a fake video.
A decoder would need to be used at the squad office to see the real video hidden under the fake.
By disguising the original as an adult video, which would not be strange for an adult man to have, he was going to leave quietly and head for the meeting place.
But that was when the problem arose.
'Why was I caught at that very moment?'
The same day he was headed to the meeting, one of the Devil's Teachers found the hidden camera installed.
All his efforts to conceal the original went to waste.
Kang Dong Hong, realizing that it was only a matter of time before the video would be decrypted, took the SD card and ran for it.
He was quickly followed and had to fight against his pursuers.
With almost no strength left in his body, he finally managed to get out and request for reinforcement from the main office, but the fatal wounds he'd received were making the escape incredibly difficult.
— Oh… oh… — Kang Dong Hong continued to bleed profusely. His vision was growing dark and his breathing was becoming more and more ragged.
He realized that he was nearing his limits.
If he fainted now, the video would disappear forever in the hands of his pursuers.
— Commander… — Gathering the rest of his strength, he reached a dark alley to lay low for a while.
— It smells like blood.
At that moment, a pure-sounding girl's voice reached his ears.
Dong Hong's eyes glimmered with hope, and he stumbled towards the voice.
***
***
Heavy breathing could be heard from behind the deserted alley.
Kang Yu frowned and turned in the direction where the scent of blood and heavy breathing were coming from.
'What is that?'
They'd already walked quite far from the entrance of the gate.
That's why Kang Yu thought that it was unusual for there to be an injured person in the middle of nowhere.
He headed toward the sounds.
— Ah… oh…
Suddenly, a shivering, blood-soaked man who looked a little over twenty years old came into his sight.
When he saw Kang Yu, he slowly crawled in his direction.
— Pa… pass this on… — With shaky arms, he reached out to Kang Yu, grasping a memory card in his fist.
It was a card normally used in new phones.
— Hwar… — The guy had started saying something, but couldn't finish his sentence before falling to the ground and losing consciousness.
Kang Yu was confused.
— What's going on…?
A bloody guy comes out of nowhere, holds out his fist, and then falls and passes out.
Kang Yu looked around and cautiously approached the stranger.
'He's dead.'
Even before showing up in front of Kang Yu, this unknown guy seemed to have received life-threatening wounds, and only died now.
Kang Yu searched the guy's pockets for some kind of ID to find out who this person was.
— Hmm… — But after carefully checking all his pockets, he couldn't even find a phone.
A dead young man was lying in front of them with no ID.
'Maybe I should check with the Power of Observation?'
Remembering how he was able to view Si Hoon's status window, he used the Power of Observation.
Magi appeared from his body and slithered to the guy's body.
[Status Window]
Name: Kang Dong Hong
Level: 52
Rank: 6
'Rank six?'
This was a very high-level player. And his latest special ability was class A.
'He certainly didn't come out of the gate.'
Players were banned from entering the Level S Gate without a pass, which was only granted to Players at Level 60 and Rank 7.
'Besides, I didn't see him there.'
Kang Yu looked down at the SD card that Dong Hong had desperately struggled to pass on until his last breath.
— Is it all because of this card? — He inserted the memory card into his phone.
There was only one video on it.
Kang Yu clicked on it and began watching it.
— This is… — Kang Yu's eyes were bulged out at the sight of the video.
Squelchy sounds.
A woman moaning.
It was an obscene video.
The memory card received from the dying young man contained a single adult video.
'It's porn!' Kang Yu, stunned by the events that just occurred, couldn't understand the guy's motives.
Why did he use his dying breath to pass on porn?
'What happened anyway?' Kang Yu was distraught and rubbed his temples.
The situation was so unusual he couldn't even smile.
'Why was he so eager to give this to someone before he died?'
And it was the only thing he had on him.
'Did I miss something?'
Kang Yu, not trusting his own eyes, watched the video again from beginning to end.
But nothing had changed — there was nothing in that five-minute video except obscene scenes.
Kang Yu bit down on his lip, looking down at his smartphone screen.
He wanted to know the true meaning behind this video.
He replayed the video from the beginning.
— Hmm…
One more time.
— Ahem…
One more time.
— Oh…
Over and over, he kept watching.
— As a matter of fact…
The corners of his lips rose involuntarily.
His eyes were peeled to the woman in the video.
— This is great.
It had been ten thousand years.
He hadn't watched a video like this in ten thousand years.
— This is just great.
Honor and dignity? None of that was important to Kang Yu now.
Kang Yu didn't notice anything around him, completely immersed in the videotape.
His eyes twinkled as he rewatched the slutty content of the video.
Kang Yu couldn't stop watching the video, and a feverish blush crept on his cheeks.
— Kang Yu, what is it? — Echidna pulled at his shirt and tilted her head in a questioning manner.
— It's a very important video, — Kang Yu murmured as quietly as possible.
— An important video?
— Yes. The mystery of human bodies, the magic of the birth of a new life… — Kang Yu was trying to explain to the innocent girl, when men began to surround them from all sides.
— Hey. — They were dressed in black robes and their eyes were burning with madness.
Kang Yu, studying the people around him, slipped the phone into his pocket.
There was growing animosity among the people around him.
'Who the hell are these people?' Kang Yu frowned.
One of the hostile people clothed in black robes moved towards Kang Yu.
Averting his gaze from Kang Dong Hong's body to Kang Yu's, he spoke in a low voice:
— So you saw this video.
— What…? — The guy, bewildered, looked at the people around him.
One by one, the people dressed in black began to smile ominously.
— You don't have to pretend. We know you watched that video.
— I watched it, but…
— You're dead now.
— What the hell are you talking about?
Kang Yu, who had no idea what was going on, heard them laugh amongst themselves.
— Even though he admitted that he looked, he keeps pretending that he doesn't understand anything.
— What?
— Hah, are you stupid or are you just retarded?
— What…?
— One way or another, you're not going to live.
'Why are they so attached to porn?' Kang Yu, completely unaware of the situation, shook his head in disbelief.
Each one of them pointed a gun at Kang Yu.
Kang Yu was still wondering why they wanted this videotape.
But he had become their target.
His eyes turned cold.
Making sure his smartphone wouldn't fall out, he said:
— You pseudo-religion, I can't give you this video.
— You finally showed your true nature.
The crowd that was watching him stepped closer and closer.
Kang Yu looked at them with flaming eyes.
'Whatever happens, I must protect this video…'
'Even at the cost of my life!'