Chapter 112: Butterfly Effect

“...”

All eyes in the security team turned to Kang Baekho.

Every one of them was a military veteran, at minimum discharged from reconnaissance units or something equivalent.

Which meant they understood the power and danger of real firearms better than anyone.

“They’ve even got suppressors mounted on all the rifles. If so, they’re probably using subsonic rounds too. Unless you’re military, those are almost impossible to get....”

“Manager Yoon. Are you saying those guys might actually be Chinese soldiers?”

At the security guard’s question, Yoon Seolhee shook her head.

“No. I don’t think so.”

“...?”

“For starters, the ones in the white padded jacket and the beanie are carrying QBZ-97 rifles. Those are export models. They’re mostly used in Southeast Asian countries like Myanmar or Cambodia. China’s front-line units don’t use them anymore.”

“Ah...”

“And the one in the old field jacket is carrying a QCW-05, a submachine gun that uses 9mm. It’s a bullpup design just like the Type 97, and it was built from the start as a suppressed SMG. It jams a lot and honestly it’s a piece of shit, but the rate of fire is good.”

At Yoon Seolhee’s explanation, everyone nodded and listened closely.

“The QCW-05 is Chinese-made too, but the export version is compatible with MP5 magazines. That’s what’s loaded in that bastard’s gun right now. But if they were actual Chinese military, why would they be using MP5 mags? They’d use the dedicated mags it originally came with.”

“Ah, yeah. That definitely makes sense.”

“So what you’re saying, Manager Seolhee, is that they’re Korean?”

“Most likely. The MP5 magazines are one clue, and so is the fact that they’re carrying export-model Type 97s—Chinese guns meant for Southeast Asia. I really don’t think they’re Chinese military.”

“They’re not Chinese military, but they’re carrying Chinese-made guns? Then...”

“Either Chinese or Joseonjok gangsters under a Heuksahoe organization that operates mainly out of Incheon. Or Korean criminals with close ties to them.”

“Hah. So they’re the guys bringing in the supplements?”

“Most likely.”

At Yoon Seolhee’s answer, Kang Baekho fell silent for a moment.

As the son of the Kangho Group family and someone who had long had a foot in the show-business side of things through sponsoring mixed martial arts, he knew the dark side of Korea’s chaebol families and so-called social elites better than most.

And he also had a rough idea who supplied those high-and-mighty people with their drugs.

“Those bastards... this might be Daeseong syndicate.”

“Daeseong syndicate...? What’s that, sir?”

“It exists. A nationwide gangster outfit that rose fast after the administration changed. The kind of exalted gangster bastards who get escorted by customs even after getting caught smuggling drugs.”

“Huh?”

Everyone’s eyes went wide at the unbelievable claim.

“Anyway, let’s watch what the hell they’re doing. Whether they’re Heuksahoe, Joseonjok, or Daeseong syndicate, I want to know why they crawled all the way out here.”

At Kang Baekho’s cold words, the security personnel stood behind him and stared intently at the laptop screen.

The ten or so men literally dragged someone out of the village hall.

They had a hood over the person’s face, the body trussed up in rope, and they dragged them across the ground by the legs before three or four of them hoisted the person up and threw them into the truck.

“They came all the way out here with guns... to kidnap somebody?”

It made no sense.

In a world crawling with zombies, in a village so remote it might as well have been the middle of nowhere even if it was technically in the greater Seoul area, the thing they had come to do was abduct someone?

That was when it happened.

“Ah, fuck!”

“What?”

“One of them spotted the drone!”

The security man operating the drone moved his hands frantically.

As the drone, flying in a straight-line distance of roughly three hundred meters overhead, maneuvered sharply, the laptop screen lurched wildly.

Kang Baekho hurriedly raised the binoculars toward the village.

One of the men pointed at the sky and shouted something, and the others all tilted their heads up at once.

A moment later, the armed men opened fire into the air.

But that was not the real problem.

“Goddamn it! The drone—the drone, not this way, the other—”

Kang Baekho shouted in alarm, but he was already too late.

The security man piloting the drone had done the most natural thing in the world and sent the expensive, precious drone straight back here.

Which, of course, meant the men firing at it had just been shown the direction of the drone’s operators.

“Everybody down! On the ground!”

Yoon Seolhee barked the instant she realized what was happening, and the guards all dropped reflexively.

“Shit. Too late. Those bastards saw the direction.”

Kang Baekho clicked his tongue.

Of course, they did not know this side’s exact location.

But by tracking the drone’s flight, they had already figured out the general direction.

Which meant they could now infer the existence of Kangho Resort.

“Let’s head back for now. Doesn’t look like they’re coming immediately. It’ll take them over two hours to climb all the way up here from there.”

“Yes. I think it’d be best to return to the resort and discuss countermeasures. Assistant Manager Choi Jinseok and Mr. Oh Changyong—you two erase all traces here, then circle back by way of Sang-ri before returning.”

Yoon Seolhee rapidly issued orders to the security personnel.

That way, even if those bastards did come all the way up here, they would not easily find any traces and would be confused about where this side had moved.

“I-I’m sorry, sir. I panicked and screwed up.”

The guard who had been piloting the drone bowed his head, visibly crushed.

But Kang Baekho shook his head.

“No. I probably would’ve done the same thing on instinct trying to save the drone. And besides...”

One last time, he checked the men at the village hall pointing in this direction through the binoculars, then turned away with a grin.

“You all know how my gut works, right? Funny thing is, I’m not getting much of anything from those bastards.”

That was not a lie meant to put his staff at ease.

It was real.

And though Kang Baekho had no idea of it, if things had gone the way they originally were supposed to, then today he and his staff would have entered the village directly without drone reconnaissance.

And as a result, they would have clashed with the Daeseong syndicate, and roughly a third of the people here—including Yoon Seolhee—would have been killed or severely wounded.

But thanks to the high-performance drone, that tragedy did not happen.

And that, in turn, was thanks to the butterfly effect created by a regressor’s prior intervention.

In other words, unlike his original fate, Kang Baekho was now about to face the Daeseong syndicate in a state of complete preparedness.

***

“Yuna, can you go to the cold storage and bring me a tray of eggs?”

“Yes, ma’am!”

At Choi Haneul’s words, Jo Yuna answered loudly and walked briskly into the cold storage room beside the kitchen.

Woom. Hiss!

Entering to the sound of the air curtain kicking on, Jo Yuna headed with practiced steps toward the sealed container holding the eggs.

Built in a two-level structure using stainless-steel panels, the cold storage room held all kinds of food in sealed containers in an environment kept at a constant five degrees Celsius.

“It really feels like this stuff could last forever....”

Even though the shelter members had been eating their fill three or four meals a day for the past six months, the food in the cold storage room did not seem to have diminished at all.

On top of that, she had heard there was another ultra-low-temperature freezer built separately in the back mountain, containing almost as much food as this place.

Just like the people who had been here from the beginning always said, it really did feel like they could live for thirty years doing absolutely nothing but eating what was already here.

And yet the shelter was even running greenhouses on top of that.

“I’m seriously so lucky. If we hadn’t met Mr. Junho back then....”

It was a past she did not even want to think about, but Jo Yuna did not shake the way she used to anymore.

She was simply grateful to Junho and to everyone here at our shelter.

“I brought them, ma’am.”

“Good girl. Thanks.”

“Hehe.”

At Choi Haneul’s bright smile, no different from any other day, Jo Yuna smiled too.

She liked everyone at our shelter, but Choi Haneul was her favorite.

Of course, Park Sunhee—the girl she had struggled alongside since their trainee days and eventually debuted in the same group with—was the one she liked most of all, but...

“Sunny? What’s wrong? What are you thinking about?”

“...Hm? Ah, yeah. N-nothing.”

Seeing Park Sunhee staring blankly into space while peeling garlic, Jo Yuna tilted her head.

Then Choi Haneul stepped in with a strangely sly smile.

“What do you mean, nothing? You were just looking at Mr. Junho, weren’t you?”

“What!? M-me? No, I wasn’t!”

When Park Sunhee jolted in alarm, Jo Yuna’s gaze naturally turned toward where her friend had been looking.

She could see the broad back of a heavily built man running quick laps around the exercise yard below the main building.

“I was watching Purdy and Kkamsoonie. They were just so adorable and cute today....”

Though it was still cold at the tail end of winter, Junho was out running in nothing but training pants and a short-sleeved T-shirt. Purdy and Kkamsoonie were racing happily alongside him.

“Well, our Mr. Junho may be built like a tank, but his face is kind of cute.”

Choi Haneul casually dangled the bait.

And then—

“Right? Even to you, he looks cu— ah! Ohhh...!”

Just as expected, Park Sunhee bit.

She was incredibly capable and tidy when it came to physical work, but every now and then she showed this innocent, spacey side of herself.

And Choi Haneul, who could read people like a book, had long since picked up on the hidden side of Park Sunhee after living with her for months.

“Honestly, that girl’s got eyes for men after all.”

When Choi Haneul shot her a look, Park Sunhee’s face instantly turned bright red.

“M-men? W-what do you mean, eyes for men? I d-don’t know anything about that. Aww, I don’t know anything about that. I don’t know any men except Ducky.”

“Sweetheart, Deokcheol is your brother. And a brother isn’t a man, he’s a lifelong enemy.”

“A-anyway, I don’t know. I finished peeling the garlic.”

Ears burning red, Park Sunhee shoved the basket of garlic toward Choi Haneul, sprang to her feet, and then—

“I still have stuff to organize in the basement gym. I-I’m going to go work.”

“Oh, that girl...”

Smiling as she watched Park Sunhee leave the kitchen with the stiff, jerky walk of a malfunctioning robot, Choi Haneul turned to Jo Yuna.

“You’re her friend, so you know, right? Since when’s she been like this?”

“Uh, well....”

Jo Yuna hesitated.

No matter what, it felt a little wrong to talk about her best friend’s private business to someone else.

More than anything—

“Sunny sees Mr. Junho as a man?”

Raised in Japan with a strict young-lady education, Jo Yuna—like Park Sunhee, who had essentially been raised by her stern grandfather—had never dated anyone in her life.

In fact, that was one of the reasons the two girls, despite coming from completely different backgrounds, had become close.

“Oh, good grief....”

At the sight of the real sheltered young lady tilting her head with utterly innocent eyes, Choi Haneul’s energy deflated on the spot.

“Forget it. Just beat the eggs.”

“Okaay. Oh, but ma’am.”

“Yeah?”

“Mr. Junho. He said he’s going somewhere before spring comes, right? Where is he going? Is it far?”

At Jo Yuna’s question, Choi Haneul’s expression stiffened slightly.

Unlike the others at the shelter, she had heard bits and pieces from Baek Hail and roughly knew what Junho was planning.

“Mr. Junho’s going to the National Agricultural Cooperative warehouse soon... and after that, he’s going a little farther away. But you don’t need to worry. Our Mr. Junho isn’t somebody we should be worrying about.”

“That’s true. Hehe.”

Choi Haneul smiled along with Jo Yuna’s bright grin, but her heart was not at ease.

She did not know exactly where Junho planned to go, but she knew this much.

'He might cross the Han River in weather this cold? Good grief, what am I supposed to do with that man...'

She would keep her mouth shut until Junho told the shelter members himself someday, but Choi Haneul could not help worrying about Junho, the master of the shelter and the one protecting them all.