Chapter 26 – Memory (3)

He chuckled seeing Sun-woo frown.

“It seems you can’t remember yet. Well, it doesn’t matter. You won’t need to remember now anyway.”

His sword blazed red. Standardized sword energy. He was completely at the peak level.

But the moment the opponent drew his sword energy, Sun-woo immediately jumped over the railing.

He was quite confused by the opponent’s words from his dream, but it was clearly an opponent he couldn’t handle. There was no reason to stubbornly stay.

“You definitely have good instincts.”

The man chuckled and jumped over the railing following Sun-woo.

But when he reached the factory’s first floor, he had lost Sun-woo.

Only the corpses of two security guards lay where he had landed.

“He killed both of them and disappeared in the meantime? Does he have abilities other than martial arts?”

The man looked around with narrowed eyes, but there was nothing to see besides gunfire sounds.

“Tsk tsk, I lost him again. What a rat-like bastard.”

He shook his head repeatedly and put his hand into his chest. Shortly after, his emerging hand held three grenades.

“Left clear.”

“Right clear.”

“Advancing.”

The gunfire stopped and summons’ voices could be heard from beyond the machinery. It seemed all the security guards had been eliminated.

“Tsk, half-wits are all like that.”

He roughly gauged the voices he heard, then pulled the grenade pins and counted.

“One, two, three, fire in the hole!”

Unlike his playful call, the grenades flew accurately toward where the voices came from.

“Take cover! Grenades!”

Since they were summons, they seemed to notice immediately. Warnings came out seeing the falling grenades, and sounds of people scattering in all directions could be heard.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

With explosive sounds, the factory interior was destroyed. Boxes burst and dust rose.

“There’s a living enemy!”

“Damn, I’m hurt!”

“What’s so special about this factory! Can’t we just blow it up with explosives?”

The summons were very confused by the sudden grenade attack. This was understandable since they hadn’t expected the opponent to have more than personal firearms.

Moreover, they were even more frustrated because explosives and grenades were prohibited to understand the factory’s secrets.

“Wonder if there’s time to rampage a bit more?”

The man grinned while raising his sword. He seemed itchy from not properly tasting blood yet.

“No. There’s no time.”

But he became gloomy at the voice heard from behind.

“You came quickly.”

“I came immediately after seeing the explosion signal.”

The woman who appeared behind him at some point was a Latin beauty with red bobbed hair. She looked ordinary in jeans and a knit top, but her tall stature made her look like a model.

“Let’s leave quickly. Staying until now was already against orders.”

“Anyway, really troublesome. If you’re going to be this troublesome, what’s the difference from being with those summoner bastards?”

“If you don’t like it, go back to those guys.”

At the woman’s words, he sighed, and the woman, who looked at him pathetically, waved her hand toward the back.

Wooooom!

At her gesture, a black circle was created in the air.

“Ugh, I get motion sick just from taking gates.”

“Just hurry up and get in. They’ll be here soon.”

“I know. I know. And the half-wits are more useless than expected. Some of them gathered in one place and died in one shot.”

The man complained about the two security guards collapsed on the floor before walking toward the gate.

“They’re disposable stones anyway. The experiment is almost finished, so it doesn’t matter much.”

With her words ending, the two entered the black circle, and the moment she entered, the black circle disappeared from the air along with them.

When they disappeared, the factory became quiet for a moment. The summons also couldn’t move to assess the situation.

Then, one of the security guards collapsed on the floor moved slightly.

The blood-covered security guard carefully stood up, and during his rising, his uniform gradually changed into a suit form.

At the same time, his facial features changed and eventually transformed into Sun-woo’s appearance.

“Phew, that was close.”

Sun-woo looked toward where the two had disappeared and sighed.

The moment Sun-woo jumped down, he realized he couldn’t escape from his opponent like this. The difference in martial arts was too severe.

Looking for a method, he killed a security guard below while jumping down, covered himself in that blood, then used <Illusion Art> with the blood as a medium to disguise himself as the dead security guard.

With the two people disappearing into the black hole, the battle ended. What remained were only summons groaning from injuries and an empty factory. The operation seemed to have failed.

Despite the grenade attack, fortunately no summons died thanks to their strong protective gear and sturdy bodies.

Still, several people were injured, but fortunately a summon with healing arts was on standby, so all the injured would be completely healed soon.

The problem was that they seemed to have gained very little from this.

No contamination spread agents were visible, and the remaining facilities looked like ordinary pharmaceutical manufacturing facilities.

The branch manager was pressuring people with a stern expression to find any remaining traces, but Sun-woo and Caroline sat to one side as outsiders watching.

Caroline wasn’t affiliated with Korea, and Sun-woo seemed to be treated as grouped with Caroline for some reason.

After the operation ended, Sun-woo reported to the branch manager and Caroline about the man he faced and the woman who appeared afterward.

He omitted the story about seeing the man in his dream. He still couldn’t completely trust the summoner association.

Hearing Sun-woo’s story, both the branch manager and Caroline became serious, but their concerns were different.

The branch manager seemed troubled that the opponent had noticed the operation in advance, but Caroline seemed worried about the woman who appeared later.

“You said a woman using black gates?”

But it didn’t seem like something to discuss in the branch manager’s presence. When only the two remained, Caroline asked Sun-woo again.

“That’s what they called it too. That technology’s name seems to be ‘gate’ originally. Anyway, after creating a black hole in the air, the two people entered it.”

“Could she still be alive?”

Caroline muttered quietly at Sun-woo’s answer.

“Do you know that woman?”

At Sun-woo’s question, Caroline, who had been lost in her own thoughts, flinched and came to her senses.

“Oh, no. Someone I don’t know…”

She reflexively started to speak then looked at Sun-woo. It didn’t seem like lies would work on him.

“Sigh, I’m still not sure. I definitely thought she was dead.”

She definitely seemed to know the person.

“It seems there are more things I need to know.”

He had thought he’d just need to deal with contamination sources and contaminated creatures, but now perfectly fine humans with abilities were the enemy. This would change everything.

“Where should I start explaining?”

She who had been lost in thought finally spoke.

According to her, some summoners had somehow cut their connection with the Summoners and gone into hiding.

“The method to cut connection with Summoners isn’t known. The Summoners issued missions to pursue the escaped summoners and remove their memories and abilities, and they naturally resisted.”

In the process, the escaped summoners seemed to have become a kind of resistance force.

“But they were busy hiding. They never did things like spreading contamination sources like this.”

Caroline muttered quietly at the end.

“Moreover, there’s no way she would participate in such things.”

With that muttering, her explanation ended.

And simultaneously, a voice was heard in Sun-woo’s head.

[The mission was not properly carried out. However, recognizing your efforts, 50 points will be awarded.]

The voice was also saying the mission had failed.

“At least they don’t give nothing.”

“The association’s compensation should be fairly decent.”

She seemed to have heard the voice too. She who had regained her spirits stood up briskly.

“Check your bank account tomorrow. It will be transferred. Now that the mission is over, there’s no reason to stay longer. Should I drive you?”

His address was already exposed anyway. The transportation was already cut off, so there was no choice.

Sun-woo was able to get home quickly thanks to Caroline. But Sun-woo had to resolve to buy even a used car rather than ride in her car in the future.

Caroline’s midnight speeding made even summoner Sun-woo terrified.

Sun-woo decided to bury the meeting with the man from his dream and the man’s words suggesting he knew him in his heart for now.

He had a strong premonition that he would meet him again.

The next day, Sun-woo whistled quietly after checking the amount in his bank account. Over 10 million won had come in.

***

Two days later, the place he was summoned to was Dimension Beta.

The dimension where Hayden lived.

“Huh? What’s with those clothes? Why did you appear all dressed up?”

Michael, whom he met after a long time, commented on Sun-woo’s clothes. Others also looked at Sun-woo with curious expressions.

Well, since he had always been summoned in sportswear, it was natural for them to look at him that way.

“Oh, right. You have that phone number I gave you before? I contacted them and went to check it out. It was totally like a mercenary company atmosphere. Full of tough-looking guys.”

The Korean combat summoners Sun-woo saw at the factory had also looked like mercenaries like Michael.

“But the pay was decent, so I decided to work with them. The operation a few days ago was also a failed mission, but they paid quite well.”

It was said to be operations happening simultaneously worldwide, so Michael seemed to have participated in the operation Sun-woo joined too.

“An association where summons gather together – your world won’t be lonely.”

Daniel sighed at Sun-woo and Michael’s conversation. As someone who had to keep secrets alone, he couldn’t help but envy Sun-woo and Michael who could gather with other summons.

“Maybe if you look more, there might be something similar in your world too. It seems Nan-seol’s world has something similar.”

At Sun-woo’s words, Nan-seol nodded. She thought of Hwangbo Ja-gyeom and Wang Mun-pung.

It seemed part of the Righteous Alliance organization served as a gathering of summoners.

“That aside, what’s the mission this time? The atmosphere feels really unpleasant.”

Michael had to say that.

The place they were standing was the entrance to a large sewer. The stench from the sewer pipes coming out of the large city visible in the distance was very severe.

“That city looks like Stuttgart no matter how I see it. The Empire’s second largest city.”

Looking at the city, Hayden spoke.

“No, the city name isn’t important – the question is why we’re in front of this stinking sewer.”

Michael’s worry soon became reality.

[A Level 2 contamination source has been discovered. It continues moving inside the city’s sewers. Please eliminate the contamination source quickly.]

“Oh, shit!”

Profanity burst from Michael’s mouth.