Accomplice II
Everything proceeded smoothly as planned, except for the discovery that Noh Do-hwa's secret kink was choking play.
SG Net became a bit noisy.
-Anonymous: I heard there's no leader at the National Road Management Corps right now? Is that true?
-[NRMC] Officer: It's true. Our leader is on a long vacation.
└Anonymous: ?
└Anonymous: ?
└LiteraryGirl: That machine has a concept of vacation??
-[NRMC] Officer: Yeah. So all the management officers were shocked. Since the establishment of the National Road Management Corps, there hasn't been a vacation or even a holiday. But this time, she took a bold 21-day long vacation and disappeared without a word.
└Anonymous: That person is really unpredictable from head to toe. Really seems like a nutcase.
-OldManGoryeo: ? lol
└[NRMC]Officer: What? Why?
└OldManGoryeo: She left silently with exactly a 21-day vacation notice? Did she disappear without a trace? lolol
└[NRMC] Officer: Exactly. Why?
└OldManGoryeo: lolololololololol
└[NRMC] Officer: ?
-[Samcheon] WitchJudge: Hmmm…….
“Hmmm…….”
As I read the comments up to that point, Noh Do-hwa sighed next to me.
I closed my smartphone and returned from the virtual world to the real world.
“What’s wrong?”
“…It’s nothing. This mineral is fascinating. It’s light and strong. Truly, this is something not found on Earth. You called it ada-something…?”
“Adamantium. Be careful not to mistakenly call it mithril even by accident, it could cause a big problem.”
“……? The two words don't sound similar at all……”
Noh Do-hwa took out and put on her monocle. Her left eye had particularly poor vision, but it was also part of her routine to get serious about work. Like soccer players who touch the grass or pray to the gods as they step onto the field.
“Hmmm……”
Noh Do-hwa wandered around the mining village for a long time, observing the dwarves making weapons through her monocle.
Clang, clang!
The dwarves mechanically hammered their weapons, and as soon as they finished, they started the same process again. But the finished products didn’t remain; they melted into the air and disappeared.
Noh Do-hwa raised her hand and touched the remnants in the air.
“Hmmm……. A village where objects disappear right after being created. But I can learn the blacksmithing skills just by watching.”
“How’s it going? Learning anything?”
“I don’t know. You call me a blacksmith, but I’m just a prosthetist, a maker of assistive devices. Even if you suddenly ask me to make a weapon, it’s problematic…….”
Mumbling, Noh Do-hwa extended her right arm toward me while keeping her eyes fixed on the dwarf. I took a hammer and tongs from another dwarf’s grasp and handed them to her. Her white fingers silently gripped the tools.
“Do you think I'm Doraemon? Making prosthetic limbs is tough enough, but now you want roads built, the National Road Management Corps organized, and balancing the guilds’ power struggles, for fuck’s sake. Do you think I'm a vending machine that spits out anything when poked……?”
Clang.
Noh Do-hwa mimicked the dwarf with a sidelong glance. Clang, her hammer slightly missed the mark due to unfamiliarity with the material.
“Hmmm……”
Her lips twitched. She closed her mouth tightly and continued to imitate the dwarf for hours.
By nightfall, a sword was in her hands. Its shape was crude, and its balance was off. But the silhouette it cast in the moonlight was unmistakably that of a sword. Noh Do-hwa’s slender eyes, resembling moonlight, traced the sword’s curve. Her gaze was so sharp that if the two overlapped, the sword seemed like it would get shaved down.
“Hmmm. I don’t quite get it. I should start with something simpler, like a hoe……”
From that day on, Noh Do-hwa almost stopped eating, imitating each dwarf one by one.
Clang, clang—
I followed her like an assistant, carrying tools and supporting her. We were a perfect match.
“…….”
The shadows of dwarves that remained in place of humans who had fled from the anomalies.
The decayed mining town’s mines.
In a village where there were only the two of us, the clang of metal echoed eternally.
This naturally brought to mind memories from hundreds of years ago.
When Noh Do-hwa called me something other than ‘Regressor Undertaker’.
“I want to apply as an apprentice in your workshop. Please hire me.”
“Hmmm……”
It was the 53rd run.
Up until then, the National Road Management Corps had never been established in my regressor life. It only existed as a paper plan in the palace of my memories.
At this time, I was searching for the right person to become the head of a quasi-governmental organization. In other words, the future leader of the most powerful entity in Korea.
Dang Seo-rin came to mind first, but that was a last resort. My preference was to avoid burdening her further.
I could have done it myself, but I had to run around the front lines fighting anomalies. It was impossible for one person to be both Xiang Yu and Xiao He.
The conditions were fourfold:
-Someone not corrupted by a desire for power. In other words, mental strength or character.
-Someone who knew how to wield power. In other words, competence or instinct.
-Someone who pursued practical benefits as a system rather than individual gains. In other words, beliefs or philosophy.
-Someone willing to tread an untrodden path. In other words, courage or bravery.
Practically impossible conditions.
But ‘practically impossible’ doesn’t mean ‘absolutely impossible’, and countless hours made me bridge the gap between ‘impossible’ and ‘almost impossible’.
Test commenced.
-Hey, Undertaker! Aren’t we the top family in Korea now? Let’s show those Incheon bastards……
-What? Connect the road to Seoul? Why would we do that? If we waste our energy laying roads, we’re just benefiting other guilds……
-Doc, can you take a break? You’re too good, and it’s making it hard for me to speak. Just take a short vacation and when you come back……
Eliminated. Deferred. Eliminated.
Countless candidates were considered and discarded. I spent at least 5 years, sometimes 10, being their acquaintance, colleague, friend, or partner.
I gave them power and took it away. I bestowed honor and trampled on it. If necessary, I observed their character across different runs.
The position of the head of the National Road Management Corps, as I envisioned it, required that level of scrutiny.
Like a massive wave, I swept through the people of Korea one by one, raising the stakes each time, until I ended up at a remote alley.
“An apprentice. It’s true our workshop is always short-handed……. But why? From your appearance, it seems you could join any guild and live well……”
Noh Do-hwa.
She was like an island.
If not for being a regressor, I would never have met her in my lifetime.
She was already famous for custom-making prosthetics for those who had lost limbs. I had relied on her in other runs a few times.
But it was my first time trying to establish a close relationship beyond that of customer and shopkeeper.
I bowed my head.
“My father had difficulty walking all his life. I want to do something to help those who struggle with mobility.”
“Oh. Your father?”
“He passed away.”
A lie.
“By an anomaly.”
“Hmmm……”
Noh Do-hwa’s sigh had the same resonance then as it did now. It was like a tremor that gently touched and outlined a person.
Like a bat mapping objects with ultrasonic waves.
“Well, wouldn’t it be better to seek revenge on anomalies rather than helping others?”
“…….”
“Well, urging someone to give up revenge is as presumptuous as pushing them to pursue it. Alright. If you don’t mind being a temporary apprentice, give it a try……”
If the world were not an island, she would make an island to live on.
The net Noh Do-hwa cast over her world wasn’t wide, but it was tightly knit.
She would pull in and examine everything before deciding what to keep and what to let go.
That was evident in how she treated the other apprentices in her workshop, aside from me.
“Don’t come in tomorrow……”
“Pardon?”
“It means you’re fired. Do you have a metal rod in your ear, making me repeat the same thing? Should I pull it out for you?”
“No, master! Wait a moment!”
The fired employee had grumbled about a young customer who had lost a leg, muttering during lunch, ‘How can a young kid act like the world ended just because he lost a limb? It’s rare to find a healthy person in this messed-up world.’
The fired employee cried, but no one helped. Worker protection? Labor laws? Such Western concepts didn’t exist in this land of propriety.
“Oh dear, sir! You came all this way despite the snow and bad roads. Here, have a warm cup of coffee.”
“Oh, this is precious. Thank you……”
Moreover, I had earned the nickname ‘Little Brother’ even from the crazy Sword Marquess of Korea. Naturally, I had no issues serving the main customers of the workshop, the elderly.
Noh Do-hwa, who probably had ‘Respect for the Elderly’ etched in her skull, must have seen me as an ideal apprentice.
“Apprentice Undertaker .”
“Employee Undertaker.”
“Employee Doc.”
“Assistant Doc.”
Each time my title changed, the staff at Noh Do-hwa's workshop were also reshuffled.
Realizing she no longer needed to lower her standards, Noh Do-hwa awakened as a true bourgeois. She offloaded tedious tasks like managing personnel, customer relations, internal factions, and profit improvement onto me.
“Assistant.”
Eight years.
It took eight years for the title ‘Apprentice Undertaker’ to shorten to ‘Assistant.’
At the rate of dropping one syllable every two years, her personality was indeed hard to get close to.
“Yes, master.”
“Aren’t you evacuating? The northern cities are getting eaten by anomalies and moving south……”
“Master, where else would I evacuate from Busan?”
“To Japan, China, or even Southeast Asia. There are always places to run to……”
“Do you think those places are safe? I’m fine.”
I wasn’t the only peculiar one.
Every time the world ended, I found that many people didn’t run until the end, regardless of the run.
Noh Do-hwa was no exception.
“Did you hear? Samcheon World is forming a last-ditch resistance team to counterattack.”
“Hmmm. Do you think they’ll succeed?”
“It’ll be tough. The problem is even if they succeed, it’s uncertain. The anomalies already won when they formed a ‘monster wave’.”
“Hoh?”
“Anomalies aren’t particularly close to each other. Their types and personalities vary. But if they’ve formed a legion, it means they’ve excluded incompatible types and fused into one organism. Or rather, calling it an organism is misleading. It’s just… a mass of cancer cells. Bugs of the world. Even if we defend Busan, anomalies will continue, without purpose, to spread bugs everywhere.”
“Hmmm……”
Noh Do-hwa smiled.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Sometimes…. I think you know a lot, Assistant.”
“…….”
“Well. It doesn’t matter much……”
The next day, the last resistance team of Korea was swallowed by the tsunami of anomalies.
“Assistant.”
“Yes.”
“What are you doing? It’s 8 o’clock, and you haven’t opened the shop. Do you think you’re exempt because you’re the senior now? Should I help you write your resignation?”
“No, no. Master.”
Click.
I flipped the sign on the glass door from [Closed] to [Opened].
On the day the last city in Korea fell.
Noh Do-hwa's workshop opened for business.
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