The Imperial Hunter Chapter 63 - Light and Shadow (5)

While recuperating and handling piled-up work, the day to leave the safe house was one day away. On the way back I planned to stop by America briefly to examine the Mycelium Empire and Forest of Giants. I would put off the relatively less important Sequoia Grove for another chance.

On the last afternoon in Mexico, I was on the long, deserted beach with the kids. Beneath the clear sky dotted with shreds of small cumulus clouds, white waves gathering broke again and again, the color of the clouds. The monochrome sea bereft of even a single common vessel was to me akin to a demoted equivalent, and I felt a nearness to daydreaming comfort, angled back on a sunbed beneath the parasol.

The peace of this port primarily perched on the buoyant, beautiful land, blown in by wind from the ocean. The farther from the beach, the thicker the unrest in the city, embracing the darkened, famished residents, the ugly burnt ruins, and the bandits, pillagers, violence, murders, and rapes between them. But that was none of my concern, nor the concern of FPDA+1 and the Mexican government. The latter two urgently needed visible results, while reporters who came to the beach enjoyed luxurious leisure, their cameras only containing images of the city with restored order. As the wind still blew only from the southwest, the stench the city held would not reach the beach one could safely assume. Unless the residents of back alleys came bearing torches.

This safe house beachside was a rental luxury villa away from the city interior. Originally owned by a corporation like any other upscale villa, it had come under government management when the company went bankrupt. The justification was the government would run it directly to attract tourists, but as with all the rotten government administration, proper management never took place in reality.

Currently, the villa we were staying at was officially vacant. The facilities manager had cooked the books. By omitting registry entries and arbitrarily providing the facilities, he skimmed off money that should have gone up top. He really could not be anything but a good man.

The smells of burning firewood and grilling meat wafted in on the same wind. Kyung-tae and the others gathered at the barbecue grill laughing raucously. Each bragging about grilling meat the best. Aside from them, some swam, some competed in diving, and some tried out waterskiing and racing yachts scattered at intervals.

Among them, the sound of typing came from Suyeon. The girl had placed a laptop on her thighs facing me from across a small wooden table, continuing messenger conversations with various parts of headquarters. When conversations halted she would also search for information related to work. News from the region played from one earphone dangling loose.

I turned my gaze back to the ocean and spoke.

“Whether before or now, you don’t know how to rest.”

The typing stopped.

“I’m most at ease when working.”

“I know.”

Even when I had insisted rest was an order too, this girl who always gave the same reply however much I looked never seemed the type to lie to me. Once the signs within became familiar, I could be certain of that fact. Rather than simply not knowing how to rest, she was someone who didn’t know how to live differently. To the extent of carrying arms and wearing suits even at this moment. Despite teams on duty too.

As I said no more, Suyeon returned to her work. The monotonous rhythm of the clacking keyboard. Doubtless matters to report to me were steadily stacking up in her head. It wasn’t an unpleasant sound to hear.

“Hyungnim.”

This time Kyung-tae.

“Could you try these in order and evaluate them?”

The plate he brought had slices of beef neatly arranged. Creations of the guys competing in grilling skills it seemed. Kyung-tae’s eyes were full of anticipation looking at me.

“The second from the left is the best.”

“Yes!”

Kyung-tae cheered and shouted back over his shoulder.

“I’m on cooking duty tonight again, you punks!”

The subordinates around the grill sent loud applause his way. I wonder if he alone knows he genuinely enjoys such chores? I know he must really know that, but watching his actions, thoughts like what if he doesn’t would cross my mind from time to time.

“Hyungnim and noonim eat up the rest!”

Kyung-tae placed the plate on the table and returned to his group. I vacantly looked at the plate. The taste was good. But it did not suit the serenity I was enjoying, the pleasure just flowing alongside time.

The meat’s giving off steam.

I brought out my tablet and pulled up a document I had read that morning. It was not internal material, but an article from a periodical thoroughly examining the ecology of Rasberry Crazy Ants.

「As revealed by the joint research of Edward G. LeBrun, Nathan T. Jones, and Lawrence E. Gilbert, and verified through numerous follow-up studies, Rasberry Crazy Ants (Nylanderia fulva) possess chemical neutralization capabilities against the toxins of the previously most destructive invasive species, the red imported fire ant (Solenopsis invicta). Building on this ability, the crazy ants are expanding their territory across the southern United States, and other sporadic spreading is taking place in various regions via human transport systems.」

「Additionally, not all colonies of crazy ants form the typical colony centered around a single queen ant. They form supercolonies with multiple queens coexisting simultaneously. Another reason the crazy ants continue to displace other ant species.」

「The proliferation rate of crazy ants has gradually increased annually, and it is not rare for a single colony to extend over 1 mile in a year if sufficient nutrients are available. This September, one colony near Austin, Texas in the Balcones Canyonlands was confirmed to have expanded approximately 12.7 miles (20.4 kilometers), more than triple the previous maximum observation. Although there is a need to verify it was not mistaken for a neighboring colony….」

Reaching the end of such contents, the concluding paragraph of the chapter dealing with the distribution and expansion rate of crazy ants, along with countermeasures, made the following determination:

「…therefore, currently no method exists to halt the spread of crazy ants.」

The reason these unstoppable ants were called a disaster in the southern US was the bizarre tendency to be attracted to electronics, as experienced firsthand in the Indian reservation. When they got electrocuted and died, they released alarm pheromones to notify allies an enemy was attacking, prompting comrades smelling it to swarm in and trigger a chain reaction short circuit.

The result was one of two. If lucky it ended with just a simple short circuit, if unlucky additional damage like fires followed.

How fearsome were they that US environmental authorities rated them one of the biggest biological disasters America faced, alongside rampant wild boar populations.

I was devising a plan to utilize these indefensible ants as messengers of plague.

‘First, real estate investment beginning from London’s most dilapidated residences….’

Places like Peckham, not far from Charing Cross at all, and Dewsbury further south would be prime investment destinations. Peckham had the lowest white population proportion in London, while Dewsbury had the cheapest housing in all of England combined with the worst public order.

The rough scheme was this:

First, secure dozens of buildings in these slums, then from tunnels dug underground horizontally from those spots, release queen ants to build colonies. At this time, by continually providing heat to spur explosive growth in numbers, by the time the ants reach the surface from underground, the colonies would be large enough that the spread origins would be difficult to locate.

Well, the authorities wouldn’t actively seek them out anyway.

I didn’t arbitrarily want to invest in poor neighborhoods first. The grievances of the poor were handled as lightly as their thin wallets outside of election season. The impoverished residents wouldn’t be able to call expensive private pest control either.

Moreover, Dewsbury was a residential district with an absolutely overwhelming Islamic population. Mohammad Sidique Khan and his supporters who perpetrated the 2005 London bombings also lived right here. Extremist inhabitants who disregarded the public rule of law and tried to arbitrarily create Sharia autonomous zones. Would the British authorities have any reason to seriously address their complaints?

No.

The England I knew would never be that kind of country. They wouldn’t even consider finding out what kind of ant was causing trouble. Amidst such negligence and composure of theirs, I would continue expanding real estate investment in lockstep with the ants’ territory expansion.

With time, a colossal colony that could not be removed by any means would be completed. The officials who belatedly recognized this biological disaster would be perplexed.

Wondering why the proliferation rate was so fast.

But they would never figure out the cause. By then, all I would have brought into London was sugar and more sugar, and even more sugar, which was not a hazardous substance at all.

From my research, in southern Brazil there was a white ant metropolis half the size of England, and in Europe an Argentine ant empire spanning 8 thousand kilometers from northern Italy to Spain’s Pyrenees. The latter’s territory alone was 8 thousand kilometers across. So the kingdom of crazy ants I fed would swallow all of London and have some left over.

What mattered was after that.

At the point of facing the London offensive, with real estate investment expanded across the entirety of London, I planned to provide the ants with disease-contaminated food through each foothold.

‘Beginning with the plague… Smallpox too, if possible.’

The plague for starters was an easily obtainable disease. With consistent annual infections and deaths in the US and Central Asia. So by sending personnel to regions with patients and capturing wild animals like marmots, it wouldn’t take long to secure live samples of the bacteria. Mixing that cultured sample into the ants’ food would be all it took.

Of course, ants were not intermediate hosts for plague bacteria. But it was possible for bacteria clinging to or ingested by them to contact true hosts before dying. Places ants got tangled up and died, technicians coming to repair broken electronics would also be exposed to the infection source.

The fact prevention was possible through early antibiotic use was a huge advantage here. Having living hosts captured or exposing your own troops to contagion during the Round Table offensive would be as foolish a self-inflicted wound as any.

Next, smallpox.

This disease officially eradicated long ago had acquisition difficulty on a different plane. Aside from the US and Russia, it would be a pathogen strictly controlled by the likes of China or North Korea. Moreover, securing vaccines to inoculate operatives was not easy either. As it was strategically stockpiled by national governments. Just attempting to mass purchase vaccines could land you on intelligence agencies’ bio-terror watchlists across the globe.

But if both virus and vaccine could be obtained by some means, smallpox would provide a tremendously forceful additional strike. First using the plague to quarantine the city and partitions, then cutting off roads physically, and only then finally unleashing the smallpox for a limited yet intense secondary blow. Like delicate surgery excising just London from the map. I couldn’t recklessly release a contagion that could potentially wipe out a fraction of the world’s population without any countermeasures. For the sake of the peace I dreamed of, as well.

In any case, the powerful cocktail regimen of two potent diseases would be sufficient assistance for attacking the Round Table, even considering the environment saturated with magical power was harmful to microbes. Perhaps even managing to easily kill off one or two Round Table masters.

It would not fall short as a prelude to the London conquest.

However, this plan had two problems. Internal issues on personal and organizational levels.