Chapter 5
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5. Transport Train (1)
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Following the transport guard down the long corridor of the train car, they reached the section where the detention cells were located.
The structure consisted of two rows of iron chairs bolted to the walls, facing each other with a narrow aisle in between. Beneath each chair, a thick steel ring was embedded into the floor.
‘What is that…?’
Jae-hak’s question was answered quickly. As all the prisoners entered the detention area, the guards secured the prisoners’ handcuffs to the steel rings on the floor with thick chains. It seemed to be a safety measure to prevent any escape.
Once all five prisoners, including Jae-hak, were seated and chained in their respective spots, a bald guard who appeared to be of higher rank entered. He locked the cell door, clasped his hands behind his back, and spoke in a deliberately authoritative voice.
“Ahem. My apologies for the late introduction. I am Section Chief Im Gyeong-pil, in charge of this transport. I am with the Republic of Korea Railway Special Judicial Police.”
*Clink.* A prisoner with a long scar across his face fiddled with the chain connected to his wrist. He was a massive man, easily standing over two meters tall.
“My mission is to deliver you all to the Pyeongtaek Special Detention Center in the exact same condition you are in now—without a single scratch. However!”
Im Gyeong-pil emphasized the syllables.
“If! You show even the slightest sign of unrest! Or disobey orders in any way! I, as the officer in charge, have the right to take all necessary measures, including lethal force!”
Was it just his imagination, or did Im Gyeong-pil never once look at Jae-hak while speaking? Was it intentional? Or perhaps…
“……Therefore, I hope we can finish this without any unpleasantness. That is all!”
Im Gyeong-pil finished his speech and turned away. As he and the police force exited the transport car, two officers with their faces obscured by black tactical helmets stood guard in front of the iron bars.
*Hiss—*
The train let out a sound of escaping air. Then, slowly, it began to move forward.
“…….”
Inside the rattling train, Jae-hak stared blankly at the ceiling. What would happen once he arrived in Pyeongtaek? It didn’t seem likely he would be acquitted.
Since the Gates had opened, almost the entire budget had been allocated to the military, leaving judicial organizations, including the police, rapidly impoverished. Poverty was the seed of corruption, and the aftermath was severe enough that even a low-ranking officer like Jae-hak could feel it.
‘……?’
Just then, Jae-hak noticed something strange and narrowed his eyes. He surreptitiously touched the iron frame of the chair he was sitting on.
It was cold.
It wasn’t his imagination. The temperature inside the train was clearly chilly. It was definitely cold.
And yet… the police officer beyond the iron bars was sweating at the nape of his neck.
As if he were nervous, knowing something was about to happen.
‘……What is this?’
Jae-hak slowly scanned his surroundings. *Clink.* The massive prisoner was fiddling with his chains again.
Jae-hak had no way of knowing, but at that moment, the transport train was entering the Second Yulhyeon Tunnel, the longest tunnel in South Korea. Because it was a tunnel for trains, there were no CCTV cameras and no chance of outside witnesses—a ten-minute blind spot.
Therefore, it was perhaps natural that this was the place they had chosen to execute their plan.
*Clack-clack, clack-clack…* The train was sucked into the tunnel.
Darkness descended upon the world.
Faint orange lights dotted the tunnel walls. Emergency lights inside the train illuminated the floor at ankle height.
Vision stuttered like a stop-motion film.
The sound of metal scraping.
*Thud.* The sound of something heavy and metallic hitting the floor.
And then… an encroaching bloodlust.
A terrible chill ran down his spine. The moment Jae-hak felt an instinctive sense of dread and rose from his seat—
*Stab.*
A sharp blade plunged into Jae-hak’s abdomen.
“Ugh….”
Pain that made his mind go hazy. Amidst the flickering orange light, Jae-hak saw the one who had stabbed him. A prisoner in a transport uniform. A face he didn’t recognize.
The prisoner pulled the blade out. Before Jae-hak could even react, he stabbed him again, and then again. Enduring the pain that threatened to make him lose consciousness, Jae-hak forced strength into his legs, which were threatening to give way. He grabbed the next incoming blade with his bound hands.
*Drip, drip.* The sound of blood hitting the floor. It would heal anyway. It would heal anyway… Jae-hak gritted his teeth, desperately ignoring the burning agony.
Then, he kicked the prisoner holding the knife with all his might.
*Crack.*
As the prisoner, kicked in the groin, fell away, Jae-hak saw other prisoners gathering with gleaming weapons. Three of them, including the one who had fallen…
Three?
Jae-hak reflexively threw his body to the side. *Clang!* An axe embedded itself where he had been standing. A crude axe made by wrapping cloth around a long piece of scrap metal. It was the prisoner who had approached from behind.
The giant with the long scar on his face. The prisoner who had caught his eye earlier….
“Ugh….”
Using the balance he had developed from gymnastics, Jae-hak barely managed to recover his posture and land on his feet, but the terrible pain surging from his abdomen forced him to drop to one knee.
“…….”
Dizzying vertigo. His shredded lower abdomen had barely begun to knit together before it burst open again, blood gushing out. Perhaps because he hadn’t eaten properly, his regeneration wasn’t working well.
“Seong Jae-hak. Right?”
In the darkness, the massive prisoner who had retrieved the axe asked quietly. The three prisoners in transport uniforms, armed with weapons, slowly closed the distance.
How did they get their handcuffs off? Jae-hak thought, pressing hard against his bleeding abdomen.
Ah, they probably weren’t properly locked from the start.
Jae-hak glanced at the police officers beyond the bars. As expected, they were just watching the inside of the cell calmly, their submachine guns held at an angle.
They were in on it too.
“……Why, do you want an autograph?”
Jae-hak tried to bluff, enduring the pain. *Pfft.* Someone let out a sneer.
“The bastard who killed his own mother.”
Then, the prisoners lunged.
Jae-hak dodged the axe of the first prisoner to rush him and slammed his elbow into the man’s face with all his strength. He didn’t know anything about footwork or shifting his weight. It was a blow driven by pure upper-body strength.
But the superhuman strength of an Awakened turns even such clumsy attacks into a lethal weapon.
“Aaaargh!”
The prisoner collapsed, clutching his face. Jae-hak barely dodged another knife thrusting toward him, then grabbed the man’s hair with his handcuffed hands.
*Crack.*
He brought his knee up, smashing it into the man’s face with all his might.
*Clatter.* The dazed prisoner dropped his knife onto the train floor. Jae-hak hurried to grab it, but his arm was suddenly yanked backward. One of the prisoners had pulled on the chain attached to his handcuffs.
“……!!”
The prisoner raised his axe high and brought it down on the restrained Jae-hak.
*Thwack!*
A deep, piercing pain in his shoulder. If he hadn’t been a regeneration-type Awakened, he would have passed out from the blood loss long ago. As Jae-hak staggered, another prisoner kicked him deep in the gut.
*Gah.* Jae-hak couldn’t even scream as he tumbled onto the train floor. As soon as he hit the cold metal floor, a kick flew into his face.
*Thud!*
His mind went hazy. His mouth felt cold, as if he’d lost a couple of teeth. But the moment he was struck, Jae-hak grabbed the prisoner’s ankle with both arms. And then, he stood up.
“Uh…?”
The off-balance prisoner let out a death cry as he fell backward. Jae-hak saw a fleeting moment of terror pass through his eyes.
An incredibly human emotion.
Why did this person want to kill him? Was there some reason?
But the thought was momentary. Hesitation was a luxury Jae-hak couldn’t afford right now.
*Crunch!*
Jae-hak stomped on the face of the fallen prisoner with all his might. The sickening sensation of a face being crushed and bursting traveled up his leg.
“Uh… ugh….”
Jae-hak let go of the twitching prisoner’s leg and stood up. Three prisoners lay on the train floor.
And the massive prisoner glared at him from the other side of the detention area.
Jae-hak wiped the blood flowing from his broken nose and said,
“……Who are you people? Why are you trying to kill me?”
The scarred prisoner naturally didn’t answer. He bent down and picked up the chains the prisoners had discarded.
*Hum… hum….*
As he swung the chain like a whip, the air began to wail.
“…….”
This wasn’t right. Jae-hak thought.
*Bang!*
The scarred prisoner slammed the chain down with a deafening roar. Jae-hak barely managed to dodge it. Or rather, he thought he had.
“……?!”
With a searing pain, red blood dripped from his calf. His pants were shredded, as if mauled by a giant beast.
‘What did I get hit with…?’
*Clatter.* The scarred prisoner yanked the chain back. At the end of the chain, five sets of special handcuffs were hanging open like hideous claws. Red droplets of blood flowed down the tips….
*Whoosh!*
Without time to observe closely, the chain tore through the air again.
Jae-hak instinctively picked up the axe the prisoner had dropped. He tried to block the weapon at the end of the chain with the flat side of the axe.
But that was a mistake for someone like Jae-hak, who had never experienced a whip as a weapon in his life.
“!!”
He blocked the sharp edge, but the chain, carrying its momentum, wrapped around his body. In an instant, his hands were rendered useless. The prisoner didn’t miss the opening and yanked the chain. With unbelievable strength.
And then, the prisoner drove a massive fist into Jae-hak’s solar plexus as he was helplessly pulled forward.
*Crack.*
The wound on his abdomen, which had barely begun to heal, burst open again, spraying fresh blood everywhere. Jae-hak couldn’t even scream as he was flipped over and thrown to the ground.
“Gah….”
Pain that felt like it would tear his mind apart. It was a miracle he hadn’t gone into shock and died already. Lying on the dark metal floor with his consciousness fading in and out, Jae-hak watched the approaching footsteps of the prisoner.
*Clatter.* The massive prisoner began to pull on the chain wrapped around Jae-hak’s body again.
“Again….”
Jae-hak staggered to his feet and grabbed the chain wrapped around him. He pulled back with all his might as he rose.
*Clang!* The taut chain vibrated as if it might snap. But Jae-hak felt his body being pulled toward the prisoner. It wasn’t a matter of strength.
It was the fundamental difference in weight….
Think, think.
Jae-hak repeated to himself, forcing strength into his failing limbs. His regeneration speed couldn’t keep up with the blood loss. His consciousness kept drifting away.
Just then, a steel ring bolted to the train floor caught Jae-hak’s eye. Something flashed through his mind.
A moment to gamble.
Jae-hak suddenly released the tension he had been putting on the chains. With a sharp jerk, his body was pulled toward the giant prisoner as if by a vacuum. Jae-hak did not resist. Instead, he used that momentum to kick off the ground and launch himself forward.
“!”
Jae-hak’s body shot forward like a bullet. A leap that exploited the prisoner’s own strength. The flickering orange lights. A speed that made his vision swim. Pouring every ounce of his momentum into the motion, Jae-hak drove his knee toward the prisoner’s face.
Or rather, he intended to.
“…….”
A sickening sound of bone splintering echoed. But it wasn’t the prisoner’s face. At the last second, the prisoner had raised an arm to block the blow.
“You little bastard…….”
The prisoner let out a roar. But that hadn’t been Jae-hak’s true aim. It would have been better if the knee had connected, but the core of his plan was the kinetic energy delivered by his entire body.
From the very beginning, Jae-hak had intended to knock the prisoner backward.
“!!”
Because the prisoner had been leaning back to pull the chains, his center of gravity was already compromised, and his reaction was too slow. By the time he realized what was happening, his body was already toppling backward…….
*Thud.*
Jae-hak reached out in mid-air and grabbed the prisoner by the collar. Using a maneuver he had practiced countless times during his days as an athlete, he inverted his body. He channeled all his weight into the prisoner’s head. Straight down, to ensure he fell straight.
And there, on the train floor beneath him…… a thick steel ring was protruding.
*Crunch.*
A horrific sound rang out through the train car.
The prisoner’s limbs twitched once in a spasm. Then, they fell limp against the floor and moved no more.
“Ugh…….”
Jae-hak rolled away, landing on the train floor slick with blood and brain matter. In the now-quiet car, only the faint, ragged groans of the prisoner whose face had been crushed could be heard.
*I survived,* Jae-hak thought as he lay there.
But.
“D-District transport car. Reporting a bloodbath among the prisoners. Code Red. Code Red.”
His heart sank. Jae-hak had completely forgotten about the two corrupt police officers behind the iron bars.
“Attempted escape in progress. We are…… authorized to execute.”
Perhaps they hadn’t expected Jae-hak to take down all the prisoners; the officers looked visibly panicked.
This must have been their role all along. If the murder by the prisoners’ hands failed, they were to use the chaos as a pretext for summary execution.
A safety measure for when things went wrong…….
*Click.*
The two officers hurriedly pulled the charging handles of their submachine guns. Jae-hak desperately scanned his surroundings. Cover. An exit. A weapon. Anything.
But there was nothing. Nothing that could resolve the situation in a few seconds. Jae-hak was trapped behind bars, his body was already a wreck, and his wrists were still shackled.
The brief moment as the officers leveled their barrels felt like an eternity. The events of the past few days flashed through his mind like a revolving lantern. When he finally sensed the end, what came to him was not tears, but a bitter laugh.
*I’m going to die,* Jae-hak thought.
*Rat-tat-tat-tat!*
But the moment the triggers were pulled, the officer on the right suddenly knocked the other officer’s gun aside. *Clang, clang, clang!* The stray bullets peppered the train floor in a line. Jae-hak instinctively curled into a ball, shielding his head.
*Thwack!*
Another dull, heavy impact echoed. The officer on the left, caught by the surprise attack, buckled at the knees and collapsed.
“What the…….”
The officer on the right removed her protective helmet. She was a woman he had never seen before; as she brushed away her sweat-drenched hair, her pale forehead was revealed.
“Get up, Mr. Seong Jae-hak.”
The woman held out her hand.
“I am someone who believes in your innocence.”
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