Second Adventure Begins (1)
“Long time no see.”
Seon Yul greeted Cha Seong Hyeon with a pleased expression when they met.
“But it’s only been about two months, right? Team Leader Cha, you’ve been very busy lately, haven’t you?”
“Haa… busy, yes. I’m completely swamped.”
After the Second Great Cataclysm, the world had been pushed to the brink of collapse, so the amount of work for the Management Bureau had increased exponentially.
Naturally, Cha Seong Hyeon, the second-in-command of the Republic of Korea Gate Management Bureau, had an enormous amount of work to handle.
He had to oversee the post-management of those who had crossed the Main Gate to Earth-001, prepare for their eventual return, and also deal with numerous large and small incidents occurring everywhere.
“But AbsoluteSafetyFirst… do you have no interest in the Main Gate at all?”
Cha Seong Hyeon asked Seon Yul very cautiously.
From his perspective, it would obviously be good if Seon Yul took an interest in the Main Gate, but he couldn’t openly ask him to.
“It’s not that I’m not interested…”
Seon Yul paused briefly and thought.
‘Since I need Team Leader Cha’s help with the satellite anyway… how much should I tell him?’
Seon Yul believed that if it were Cha Seong Hyeon, he could trust him to some extent.
They had built trust over time, and Cha Seong Hyeon had often proven himself reliable. Because of that, Seon Yul thought it would be acceptable to reveal part of his secret to him.
“Team Leader Cha, do you happen to know anything about aerospace technology… specifically satellite technology?”
Cha Seong Hyeon was the chief of the research team at the Korean Gate Management Bureau and a chair professor in the Department of Magitech Engineering at Korea University.
Knowing that, Seon Yul wondered if Cha Seong Hyeon might also understand aerospace technology to some extent, so he asked directly.
“If it’s satellite technology… I don’t just know a little… I know it well. My main field is magitech engineering, but my secondary major is aerospace engineering.”
Cha Seong Hyeon was a mana user with an Intelligence Enhancement ability.
Not just any, it was S-rank Intelligence Enhancement. In other words, he was a genuine genius, and naturally, his talent extended beyond magitech into numerous fields.
And after magitech, the field where he had shown the most brilliance was aerospace engineering.
“Oh!”
Hearing that, Seon Yul nodded in admiration.
‘Alright… I’ll just share some of the secret with Team Leader Cha.’
“Team Leader Cha.”
Seon Yul spoke while looking at him with a serious expression.
Cha Seong Hyeon also saw Seon Yul’s expression and responded seriously.
“Yes.”
“What I’m about to tell you… I would prefer it if you absolutely did not tell anyone else. Even the Director of the Korean Gate Management Bureau… I’d rather you didn’t tell him either. Would that be possible?”
“Hmm.”
Looking at the extremely serious Seon Yul, Cha Seong Hyeon showed a slightly troubled expression. Until now, no matter what it was, he had always shared and reported everything to Director Jeong Yeon Woo, so he couldn’t answer immediately.
“If enough time passes and things naturally become known later, then it’s fine to tell him. But for now, I’d rather you didn’t.”
After Seon Yul’s repeated request, Cha Seong Hyeon reluctantly nodded.
“Understood.”
Once Cha Seong Hyeon agreed, Seon Yul began explaining his secret naturally.
“First of all… I’ve already been to Earth-001.”
Right from the beginning, Seon Yul revealed a powerful secret.
As a result, Cha Seong Hyeon looked at him with an extremely shocked expression.
Seon Yul deliberately left out Cheon Li Yu during this explanation.
Even if he was sharing a secret, there was no reason to reveal everything.
“Y-you really… went there?”
“Yes.”
“What kind of place is it? And how did you obtain Return Stones? Is it easy to obtain Soul Stones?”
Naturally, Cha Seong Hyeon had many questions.
But instead of answering them, Seon Yul shook his head and spoke.
“I’ll answer those questions at the end, so please be patient for a moment. For now, please listen to what I have to say.”
“Ah… yes. I’m sorry.”
Cha Seong Hyeon realized he had gotten excited and apologized while nodding.
“And regarding the things I’m about to show you… Please don’t ask how I obtained them or how I plan to carry them out. Just think of it as one of my abilities and only answer the final question. Can you do that?”
“I’m not sure what it is, but I’ll do as you ask.”
To be honest, Cha Seong Hyeon had absolutely no idea what kind of question AbsoluteSafetyFirst was about to ask.
So all he could do was agree to the request.
“This is the appearance of Earth-001, which you’ve all been so curious about.”
Seon Yul began showing the photos of the massive Earth-001 that he had taken with his smartphone from space.
He had taken around 50 photos from various angles, so just looking at them made it possible to roughly understand the size and appearance of Earth-001.
“W-what in the world is this…?”
Of course, Cha Seong Hyeon looked at the photos with a completely disbelieving expression.
It was already hard to believe that Seon Yul had gone to Earth-001, but suddenly seeing photos of it taken from space made it even more absurd.
“These photos were all taken from exactly 400 km above the surface. You can tell it’s much larger than the Earth-104 we live on, right? You can probably calculate the size yourself, Team Leader Cha… but what I’m really curious about is this: for a planet this large, at what altitude and with what settings should a reconnaissance satellite be placed into orbit?”
Seon Yul showed photos of the Korean reconnaissance satellite he possessed and asked the question he truly wanted answered.
“…A satellite…”
Cha Seong Hyeon still looked at the photos with disbelief.
In fact, Cha Seong Hyeon himself had participated in the creation of the Korean reconnaissance satellites Seon Yul currently possessed, so he knew them better than anyone.
But that wasn’t the problem right now.
Who in the world would think it was possible to launch a satellite on Earth-001 instead of Earth-104?
Cha Seong Hyeon knew that AbsoluteSafetyFirst was an extremely unconventional mana user, but even so, he still couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“And after launching the satellite, could you also adjust the control program settings used to operate it?”
Seon Yul continued asking questions without caring whether Cha Seong Hyeon was shocked.
He had already expected this level of shock.
But what mattered most right now was obtaining the answer that could solve the problem.
That was why he had taken the risk of revealing his secret.
“…Ahem. My apologies.”
About ten minutes passed.
After being stunned for a while, Cha Seong Hyeon finally regained his composure and focused on Seon Yul’s question.
“First… I think calculating the size of Earth-001 will be possible. But what about the environment? Are the environmental conditions similar to Earth-104?”
“Yes, they’re very similar.”
“If the size difference is this large, the gravity must definitely be stronger. How was it?”
“I could clearly feel the difference.”
When Seon Yul first arrived on Earth-001, he had definitely felt the difference in gravity.
However, mana users already possessed physical abilities completely different from ordinary people, so he had quickly adapted.
Seon Yul also thought the differences in strength and size of the monsters between Earth-104 and Earth-001 might be partly due to gravity.
Of course, the density of mana in the atmosphere probably had a greater influence, but in any case, to survive under stronger gravity, creatures likely grew larger and accumulated more mana, which naturally made monsters stronger.
For the same reason, Seon Yul also suspected that the basic physical abilities of humans living in that world would differ from those of humans on Earth-104.
After observing the lives of the people there for quite some time, his conclusion hadn’t changed much.
“Good. Then I’ll calculate the optimal reconnaissance satellite orbit while taking all those variables into account. Of course, no matter how precisely I try to calculate, I won’t be able to apply every variable perfectly, so I might not find the exact answer you want. But if I calculate about five to ten possible results, there’s a high chance one of them will be correct.”
Cha Seong Hyeon spoke calmly.
He was truly an aerospace expert. The only reason he mainly researched magitech was because technological capability in that field was still lacking.
If he had instead focused his research on aerospace engineering, he likely would have raised the global aerospace technological level by several stages.
“And regarding the control system, I’ll personally write the program for you. That part really isn’t difficult.”
“Thank you.”
Thanks to Cha Seong Hyeon’s help, everything began to progress smoothly.
Of course, they hadn’t actually succeeded in launching the satellite yet, so the final judgment would have to wait for the results.
But at least, if he continued receiving Cha Seong Hyeon’s help, it seemed likely that one day they would be able to launch a satellite on Earth-001.
After discussing satellites a bit more, Seon Yul answered the questions Cha Seong Hyeon had been curious about.
Since no one in the entire world had ever returned from Earth-001, there were naturally many questions.
Seon Yul explained the basic information honestly without omission.
However, he did not talk about the other humans living on Earth-001.
Instead, he told him everything about the vast forest with enormous trees (the Forest of Darkness) and the seemingly ordinary yet powerful monsters living there.
In particular, he carefully explained the key elements necessary for surviving in that forest, which would be most helpful if the government knew about them.
This was purely Seon Yul’s compensation for Cha Seong Hyeon helping him with the satellite.
***
“Oh, these turned out well.”
After several days of deep discussions with Cha Seong Hyeon and finishing the basic preparations for launching a satellite on Earth-001, Seon Yul finally met Cheon Li Yu again after a long time.
While Seon Yul had been solving the satellite problem, she had been traveling around Earth-104 to solve the clothing issue they would face in Earth-001.
“I had that leather-crafting player you mentioned make them, and they did a really good job.”
The clothes she had prepared looked almost identical to the clothes worn by the humans they had seen in the Earth-001 fortress.
Considering that those clothes also varied in style anyway, they could easily pass as clothing from that world.
“What about you? Do you think we can launch the satellite?”
“I’m not certain yet, but if we try several times and fix the problems as they come up, we should eventually succeed.”
“Oh, that’s good.”
“Oh, and I sold 1 kg of the 2.7 kg of Soul Stones we collected to the Korean Gate Management Bureau.”
Because of Cha Seong Hyeon’s earnest request, Seon Yul sold 1 kg of Soul Stones to the Bureau for experimental use.
As payment, he arranged to receive all satellite-related equipment currently stored by the Bureau.
“Then Korea will probably be the first country to create an anti-force-field generator.”
“That’s exactly why I sold it to them.”
Seon Yul had already secured some level of safety for his aunt Lee Hyun-a and cousin Jang Jun Hyeok with the help of the Bureau.
Even after returning to Earth-104 this time, the first thing he did was check on their safety.
Given that situation, it was naturally good if South Korea became the first to develop the anti-force-field generator.
“So now… we just go back there again?”
“Yeah, we should. This time, the Bureau said they’ll clear the schedule for us, so let’s go through comfortably.”
Since he had already shared some secrets with them, Seon Yul planned to receive the Bureau’s assistance and pass through the Main Gate comfortably this time.
The two are prepared to head back to Earth-001.
This adventure seemed like it would last longer than the first one.
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