Magic on the Dead Chapter 67

The lieutenant colonel stroked the stubble that had sprouted on his chin and put on airs.

“Actually, right after we imprisoned you, the plan was to ask for the location of the remaining rioters’ base. I was going to find out to the end, even if it meant torture.”

“…”

“But after capturing you and taking a slow look, what do you know, the things inside your bags were all just a bunch of bizarre stuff.”

Hajin roughly snatched the bag from the lieutenant colonel’s subordinate. When he opened the backpack’s zipper, the decks of cards, all mixed up in a mess, came into view. His gaze sank more heavily than ever before.

Lieutenant Colonel So walked past the two of them and leaned his heavy body against the bench.

“Hah, my goodness, it’s a big problem with the days getting hotter and hotter…! Phew. Anyway, where was I? Ah, right. It wouldn’t make sense for rioters to attack this place carrying luggage… and it also didn’t make sense that only a bunch of things like cards, balls of fur, and cubes came tumbling out of the bags. In many ways, the situation was turning out to be a bit ambiguous, you see.”

Lieutenant Colonel So, who had been precariously maintaining formal speech, eventually chose to speak informally out of habit.

“In the midst of that, a few of my subordinates said something out of the blue. They said it seemed there was a magician among the people we captured… Hey, you. I heard you’re a pretty famous magician?”

At the natural switch to informal speech, Hajin did not answer and stubbornly kept his lips sealed.

“That’s when I knew. Ah, there must have been some kind of major misunderstanding here. Besides… I picked up these weapons on the pasture, you see.”

The lieutenant colonel gestured with his chin toward somewhere. The chubby man standing in the very last row rushed over. In his hands were the stone axe and flail-like club that Eden had made.

“No matter how I look at it, these are not weapons that an ordinary person can make. Unless, of course, they are a person with considerable survival knowledge. I couldn’t find anyone with this kind of ability among the ignorant rioters, even with a fine-toothed comb. I remember it clearly.”

Hajin, who had been patiently enduring his oration, finally burst out in anger.

“What on earth are you trying to say?”

Lieutenant Colonel So paid him no mind and, with a flash of his eyes, raised his index finger.

“I’ll make a proposal. How about staying here for the time being? If you want, I can also help you find the real culprit who killed your colleague.”

🃏

At the end of Lieutenant Colonel So’s long speech, the two men went to the warehouse where Chunbeom was laid to rest. Chunbeom’s body, just as the lieutenant colonel had said, was laid out straight and neat in a corner of the supply warehouse.

Hajin, barely managing to move his weak legs and hands, worked with Eden to move Chunbeom outside.

Following Officer Kim’s guidance, they found a spot beyond the fence where the soil quality was not bad. Waving off the soldiers who offered to help with the digging, Eden and Hajin dug the pit themselves.

They could not entrust their colleague’s grave to the hands of murderers. At least, Hajin believed that the soldiers here were the ones who had killed Chunbeom.

The soldiers were watching the two from a distance as if monitoring them, following the lieutenant colonel’s orders.

Hajin, who had been digging silently without crying, smelled the damp earth and asked Eden.

“Do you believe what Lieutenant Colonel So is saying?”

He raised his head and met Hajin’s reddened eyes.

“I don’t.”

He had only listened quietly because he didn’t know when he might get shot if he was uncooperative, but he had long since realized that Lieutenant Colonel So was spouting bullshit.

“Do you believe him, Mr. Do Hajin?”

“Not at all.”

“And your reason for thinking that is?”

“It’s just a gut feeling.”

“Mine is a gut feeling as well. And fundamentally, his lies lack sincerity.”

Hajin discreetly glanced beyond the fence and leaned his head toward Eden.

“Sincerity?”

“The man who prattles on about clearing up a misunderstanding doesn’t bother to ask about the appearance or description of the culprit who killed Mr. Park Chunbeom. He just simply insists it wasn’t one of his people.”

“That’s right. And he talks way too much for no reason.”

Hajin slammed the ground hard with his shovel as if in frustration. His wrists, which had been tied all night, throbbed, and a slight fever rose in his cheeks. His physical condition was not good, but he had no choice but to clench his teeth and endure it.

Meanwhile, Eden observed Hajin’s badly swollen wrists and ankles, and the heat rash that had bloomed on his cheekbones.

“That’s enough. Come over here and sit down.”

Hajin, pretending not to have heard the instruction to rest, raised a question.

“Let’s say we set aside the culprit who killed Mr. Chunbeom. Isn’t there something strange about this shelter itself?”

“…”

“If I were a citizen who had stayed here, I think I would choose to be safely under the protection of the military in a disaster situation, not start a riot because of a food shortage. Especially not against people who have guns as weapons.”

Even Eden, a trained former special forces member, had quietly stayed cooped up in the warehouse all night simply because the enemy possessed firearms. No matter how he thought about it, it didn’t make sense for civilians to stand up against the military.

Eden nodded his head as if to say Hajin’s rational deduction was quite good. Wiping away the beads of sweat that had formed on the tip of his chin, he held up his right ring and pinky fingers in the air.

“In that case, there are two hypotheses. First.”

The ring finger folded.

“Lieutenant Colonel So did something so unreasonable and coercive that even powerless citizens started a reckless riot.”

This time, the pinky finger folded.

“Second. The riot never happened in the first place.”

“…Whatever the case, the fact that Lieutenant Colonel So is trash doesn’t change.”

Hajin shuddered and pulled out the shovel that was stuck deep in the dirt. As his exhausted body staggered, a scolding immediately flew his way.

“I told you to sit.”

Having his shovel taken away in the end, Hajin sat down as if he couldn’t win the argument. He deliberately turned his eyes away from Chunbeom’s body, which was laid under the shade of a tree.

Eden, who was digging silently, pulled up the hem of his shirt and roughly wiped the sweat beading on his face. Hajin stared blankly at his abs. He had lost a lot of weight from the prolonged hardship, but his hard-as-a-racehorse muscles were still there.

“Do you remember how, right after we left the rest stop, zombies kept swarming us at half-day intervals?”

Hajin, who had been stroking his own skinny forearm, answered Eden’s question a beat late.

“How could I forget? We really had a hard time back then. We got injured a lot before we reached the cave, too. If it hadn’t rained, we would have died right then and there…”

Suddenly stopping mid-sentence, he widened his eyes as if he had realized something.

“…Could it be that all those zombie hordes from back then came from here?”

Eden nodded and spoke in a confident voice.

“Considering the timing and the distance, it’s a very plausible story. It seems certain that there was a zombie cleanup operation at the ranch… but whether those zombies were the damn rioters, or innocent civilians, we’ll have to wait and see.”

“That makes sense.”

The face of Lieutenant Colonel So, who had been shamelessly wagging his tongue, and the faces of his subordinates standing close behind him, flashed through Hajin’s mind.

If Eden’s hypothesis was true, it meant that all those breathtaking moments where they almost died several times from the attacks of zombie hordes were also their doing.

If it hadn’t been for the zombie hordes that attacked periodically, they would have been able to pass through Nogwang City a little earlier, and they would never have had to climb the mountain and come all the way to the ranch.

Hajin was engulfed by the impulse to plunge a knife into Lieutenant Colonel So’s throat right that instant.

Meanwhile, Eden finished the work and climbed out of the pit. Hajin also got up from his spot to follow him. The two of them carefully moved Chunbeom’s body into the pit.

“Do you want revenge?”

While they were burying Chunbeom, Eden posed a tempting question. Hajin resisted the urge to agree like a madman and, gritting his teeth, shook his head from side to side.

“I think finding the others comes first. If it were up to me, I’d like to set the place on fire, but I’m sure Byeol, Miso, and Jeffrey are all waiting at the cave. The news that Mr. Park Chunbeom died… I have to tell them, too.”

He nodded coolly as if he had expected it.

“Understood, for now.”

Hajin picked up the shovel he had set on the ground and threw dirt into the pit. When he threw dirt over Chunbeom’s face, his heart stung so much that he ended up shedding a single tear.

Soon, Chunbeom sank into the deep darkness. Hajin, blinking his bloodshot eyes, recalled his conversation with him.

‘Mr. Jung Taegeon is the role model for most of the people working in the defense industry in Korea. …That’s why everyone was so envious when I became his temporary executive assistant after you came to Korea, sir.’

The excited voice saying it was an honor to serve Eden was still vivid. A wave of indignation, similar to indigestion, churned Hajin’s heart.

“Mr. Chunbeom respected you a lot, Mr. Jung Taegeon. I know because I heard it so often my ears were ringing.”

“I know. It’s not common for a subordinate to put up with me, but Assistant Manager Park held on for quite a long time.”

At the self-aware answer, Hajin let out a hollow laugh. Eden set down the shovel and patted the dirt with his own palms, tidying Chunbeom’s grave. In his meticulous touch, there was a hint of indifferent affection for his subordinate.

Hajin plucked a few wild briar roses from beside a large tree. The white flowers were placed directly on top of the grave. With a long moment of silence, the two finished their farewell to Chunbeom.

Rubbing away the moisture that had gathered at the corners of his eyes, Hajin called to Eden in a hoarse voice.

“But… if we say we’re leaving just like this, do you think Lieutenant Colonel So will let us go nicely? What will you do if he tries to keep us here?”

“Then we’ll have to let ourselves be caught.”

Hajin furrowed his straight eyebrows.

“Then what about the others? We need to go meet them as soon as possible…”

Eden picked up the shovel from the ground and checked his broken wristwatch.

“Actually, by now, they would have already left the cave.”

“What? They left?”

He explained to the confused Hajin the unspoken rule of the special forces unit that he and Jeffrey had joined.

It was a simple rule: if an ally leaves the operation zone and becomes incommunicado, the others wait for 12 hours at the designated location, and if they do not appear within that time, they immediately advance to the next point and await a future reunion.

“Jeffrey is also ruthless when it comes to rules like that, so the group is most likely on their way to the next point, the Yongun Tollgate.”