If this had been a normal battle, there would have been no reason for White Fang to be pushed back. A wide-open tunnel with no curves and no cover. There was nowhere to hide from gunfire.
They also had numerical superiority. As long as they did not allow Snowfield to approach, this was an environment where firearms should have displayed an overwhelming advantage.
But what was reality like? Rather, it was White Fang that felt pressured.
“Is that a monster...!”
Squad leader Roben muttered as if groaning. Snowfield ran along the wall as if it were flat ground, escaping the hail of bullets. Those were not the movements of a human.
The only relief was that the enemy was on the defensive. The one bullet Chelsea had fired had at least opened a way out.
‘Snowfield is clearly wary.’
Kim Yi-hyeon carefully watched Snowfield’s movements. Even amid the confusion, he struggled to read the battle situation as objectively as possible.
In truth, Mary’s skill duration was very short. In its unraised initial state, it was only 3 seconds.
If it was 3 seconds, that had passed long ago. Snowfield’s Spell had already stabilized.
‘Still, it’s broken enough.’
It had been useful in the game, and reality was no different. The fact that Snowfield was no longer recklessly charging in while trusting that Spell like a moment ago was proof.
‘I’m glad she’s worth the money.’
At the current point in time, three shots were the limit of what Mary could imbue with her Spell. He had needed someone who could make good use of a weapon with limited uses.
‘......I didn’t expect it to become our lifeline, though.’
Kim Yi-hyeon checked the state of his body. It was not bad. Even though dull pain spread through his whole body as if he had muscle soreness, his arms and legs moved properly.
White Fang stood in front of him.
No one was panicking and running away. Some were fighting hard, while others... were frozen solid and showed not the slightest movement.
He decided not to think about that right now.
He had to survive, and send the others away alive.
Click!
Kim Yi-hyeon removed the pin from a smoke grenade and threw it between White Fang and Snowfield. It was equipment he had received from the platoon leader in advance. With a hiss, green smoke began pouring out.
“Fall back while firing!”
Bryce, who understood his intent, hurriedly gave the order. The members had already hastily poured out their bullets, so their magazines were just about to run dry.
But Snowfield would not quietly let them go. It was easy to imagine a future where the enemy pursued them and slaughtered them. Someone had to hold the enemy back.
“Bryce. Give me your shield.”
Even with his hearing dulled by gunfire, that voice was particularly clear. Kim Yi-hyeon threw away his crumpled shield and approached barehanded.
Kim Yi-hyeon was not looking at Bryce. He glared at Snowfield through the smoke. Unlike usual, his eyes were filled with venom.
There was no time to hesitate. Bryce nodded. He handed over the shield he was carrying and shouted.
“......Retreat! Dump all remaining ammo!”
White Fang members sprayed bullets into the smoke. Even as the distance gradually widened, Snowfield showed no sign of chasing.
One by one, the members’ ammunition ran out. The number of bullets raining down visibly decreased. Only then did Snowfield accelerate again.
Snowfield crossed the tunnel in an instant and emerged from the smoke, posture lowered as much as possible to reduce the area exposed to bullets.
Thoom!
The second shot also hit.
This time, it was the shoulder. Chelsea did not possess a Spell. However, with her outstanding shooting ability alone, she would later become one of the Lab’s elite operatives.
Frost vanished from the armor once more. The force of the charge died. As if he had been waiting, Kim Yi-hyeon threw himself forward and rammed into Snowfield.
THOOOM!
‘What the fuck, is this a truck or something...?!’
At the impact that exceeded his expectations, Kim Yi-hyeon gritted his teeth. It felt as if his whole body were breaking apart. What if it had been his bare body instead of the shield? Just imagining it made a chill run down his spine.
Absurdly enough, Snowfield recovered faster than Kim Yi-hyeon did. Snowfield ignored Kim Yi-hyeon sprawled on the floor and stretched a foot toward the fleeing members.
Clang!
At that moment, a hook caught on Snowfield’s leg. The pulling force was fairly strong. Snowfield braced against it and turned her gaze.
“Where do you think you’re going, bastard?”
Kim Yi-hyeon was lying flat on the floor, gripping a steel wire. [Tactical Hook]. A 2-star Special Armament.
Because it was classified as support equipment rather than a weapon, it had no attack power bonus at all. It was equipment with the simple special ability of pulling an enemy toward the user.
For a 2-star, it had plenty of uses, but in the end, it was still 2-star. One could not expect too much from it. Even in the game, its effect was reduced against bosses.
The hook froze, and the cold spread along the connected wire. Kim Yi-hyeon hurriedly let go. As expected, Snowfield was not an opponent tricks would work on.
And the third shot.
Thoom!
The last bullet struck Snowfield’s side. As soon as the Spell was suppressed, Kim Yi-hyeon drew out [Mubyeong Spear]. It might be more inconvenient than a firearm, but for the power of a single blow, there was no weapon like it.
Kim Yi-hyeon sprang up and thrust [Mubyeong Spear].
A blow launched from an unstable posture. Yet it was sharper and heavier than any before it. It may have been the monstrous strength that came out in a crisis.
That did not matter.
In the end, the spear tip failed to reach the armor. It was not even close enough for him to sigh in regret. Dumbfounded, Kim Yi-hyeon looked down at his own hand.
‘What the hell did Snowfield do?’
The spear, cut in two, fell while crossing diagonally. At some point, the shaft had been severed. Was it not supposed to be high quality, even if it was 1-star?
Even his final struggle ended in failure. Chelsea’s, no, Mary’s ammunition had also run out. Snowfield, who did not know that fact, would be cautious for now, but she would soon notice.
There really was no method left. The moment Kim Yi-hyeon thought that, Snowfield opened her mouth.
“......They survived thanks to you.”
It was a rather pleasant, beautiful voice. As one could tell from her physique, Snowfield was a woman. To add, a beautiful woman. That was the reason she was popular among users.
Snowfield seemed to want to talk. It was a desirable flow. There was only one thing Kim Yi-hyeon could do right now.
Run his mouth as hard as possible.
That had been his plan from the start when he stayed behind alone. He had no intention of sacrificing himself to save his comrades. It was not as if he were Ghost.
“Are you sure you don’t need to chase them?”
“The path ahead is complicated. It is structured so that several branching passages join into this tunnel. That is why I was waiting for you here.”
“Thanks for explaining so kindly.”
In other words, if they scattered, it would realistically be difficult to catch and kill them all. In fact, the White Fang members were scattering and fleeing.
“Whether one survives or six survive makes no difference. If I include the sniper, that makes seven. My information will reach the surface.”
“Then I’d appreciate it if you’d let me go too.”
“A joke.”
At least smile when saying something like that. Snowfield did not even chuckle.
“I do have reservations. Those who joined hands with us are criminals, after all. They are devilish people who kill for selfish desires, then brag about it in front of others as though proud of themselves.”
Her tone was full of contempt.
“At least you have the pretext of protecting the city. Even if you are the same kind of killers, I find people like you more pleasing.”
Snowfield looked down the tunnel. The route her enemies had fled through...... More than that fact, she took in the darkness spread over the underground itself.
“But to begin with, where is good or evil? Everyone merely pities their own body.”
The darkness seemed to writhe with its own will. What made him mistake it that way was the anguish and anger she carried.
“In the end, I believe everyone has their own role... and things flow according to that.”
“Sorry, but I have no idea what the hell you’re talking about.”
“I suppose not.”
It was not a belief clear enough for her to make someone else understand. Snowfield herself did not understand her own heart very well.
Protect Cilicia. Their objective was that simple and clear, while in contrast, her own heart was filled with nothing but dark clouds.
Meanwhile.
Since a moment ago, countless hypotheses had been raised and rejected repeatedly inside Kim Yi-hyeon’s head. The subject was “why Snowfield came here.”
First, he thought about why a development different from the original scenario had unfolded. The answer to that was already fixed.
‘Obviously, because of me.’
Other possibilities did exist. The possibility that there was another “foreign substance” besides Kim Yi-hyeon who had fallen into Polaris.
He decisively excluded it.
If he considered that, no inference would be possible. He judged it only as the butterfly effect caused by his own actions.
‘Then now the question is which event it’s connected to.’
Cilicia. Ulanz. Tulavia. As time went on, it would become harder to calculate backward like this, but Kim Yi-hyeon still had not done that many things.
If there was an incident among them that could influence Snowfield’s actions......
Only one came to mind.
Kim Yi-hyeon wet his dry lips with his tongue. His reasoning was done, so now it was time to move his tongue.
“You give a completely different impression from what I heard.”
Snowfield’s gaze touched Kim Yi-hyeon again. She had been wary of sniping the whole time, but from the situation, the sniper seemed to have withdrawn.
Should she use him as a hostage to lure the enemy underground? No, that was troublesome. Now was the time to press the attack. It would be better to deal with this man cleanly.
Just as she put strength into the hand holding her sword,
“Your name was, uh. Talixis. Was it?”
Snowfield flinched.
“Looks like I’m right. Well, you are pretty distinctive. They say you always dress like that when you go outside?”
“Do you know me?”
“I heard some things from a friend.”
“A friend?”
“A guy named Carib.”
Silence settled.
Because her face was hidden by the helmet, Kim Yi-hyeon could not read Snowfield’s expression. However, he could imagine it all he wanted.
The Snowfield in his imagination was extremely flustered. Her pale, light-blue eyes opened wide, and her lips opened and closed like a fish.
No, would she not make such a stupid expression? Even if she was rather warm-hearted deep down, her emotions basically did not show outside.
“They call him Shadower on your side, or something. How’s he been lately? Still hasn’t fixed that gloomy personality?”
His voice was soaked in sentiment. Kim Yi-hyeon spoke in a nostalgic attitude, as if he were an old close friend he had not met in a long time. The acting was not difficult.
Yu Seung-bae, Oh Seung-jun, Kim Sang-gu......
Kim Yi-hyeon had friends too.
‘Those bastards. They probably never dreamed I’d be rolling around here like this.’
He should have listened when they nagged him to stop spending so much money on that damn phone game. This was the price for passionately shielding it as his beloved game.
Snowfield, who had been frozen for a moment, lowered her head slightly. Then she answered.
“Carib is dead.”
“...What? Dead?”
“They say his corpse was found in a remote land in Cadillac. Other than that, I cannot say anything. Even if I knew something more, it would not be something I should reveal.”
“......Ha.”
Kim Yi-hyeon slowly dropped his gaze to the ground. He avoided an exaggerated reaction. There was no need to interrogate her about how Carib had died.
As naturally as possible.
In Snowfield’s eyes, “Kim Yi-hyeon” was someone who went in and out of the underground while armed. Someone used to the deaths of others.
He had already thrown out the information that he was Carib’s friend. This time, it was Snowfield’s turn to lead the conversation.
“Where did you meet him?”
“In the Shiran Empire. I am... as you can see, from a distant region, so I wandered from place to place. Carib helped me quite a bit. He told me to come to Legion too, but I just didn’t feel like it.”
“When did you realize we had come to Cilicia?”
“I wasn’t certain. It was just that he told me something. If I ever ended up staying in Cilicia, I should be careful. Haha, at the time, I wondered what he meant.”
Kim Yi-hyeon let out a dry laugh and raised his head again. Looking at the blade that had not a single drop of blood on it, he spoke.
“How long do you plan to talk?”
“Were you not trying to beg for your life?”
“By bringing up Carib? I was just curious whether he was doing well. I didn’t know he’d gone off and died already. What connections am I going to try to sell to you?”
“......”
“I know what you people, Legion, are trying to do, and I know why. I can’t sympathize with it for shit, but you probably don’t care what I think. I think of it as some huge current. Like you said, what can a bastard like me do except flow along with it?”
Naturally, it was a lie. He had not the slightest intention of obediently being swept along by the current.
Even if he had to deceive people at times, and kill at others. He would use every bit of his knowledge and ability to obstruct them.
Kim Yi-hyeon had already made many sacrifices.
It had become easier to speak lies with the tip of his tongue. Once he judged someone an enemy, he had become able to calmly shoot people. His guilt and discomfort had faded, and at times, it even felt like he was doing a job.
He sometimes thought about it. “I” had not been like this.
Twenty-six years old. An office worker. An ordinary person who was crushed by work and crushed by people. Who cursed Polaris as a trash game while enjoying it, and sometimes gathered with friends to talk about life.
There had been several times when he felt he had changed. Perhaps after one year, two years, even the original form of Kim Yi-hyeon would weather away and vanish.
It was something he had to endure.
So that he could live. So that a world already like a gutter could remain even a little intact.
He had decided when he saved Ghost and killed Carib. His resolve hardened even further when he dragged in Asterike and Rosco.
‘I can’t die like a dog in a place like this.’
Kim Yi-hyeon closed his eyes and counted seconds inside his mouth.
Even after 10 seconds passed, the blade did not fall. Snowfield looked down at Kim Yi-hyeon with quiet eyes.
In truth, Snowfield herself did not agree with Legion’s ideology either. She could not feel any interest in oppressing non-ability users.
She had simply wandered. While she was lost, Legion picked up Talixis. From that day on, Talixis became Snowfield.
She had lived with Carib like a friend. That was why. The reason she had stepped into the invasion of Cilicia, in which she had no interest.
Since Carib had died emptily in a foreign land, she had to shoulder his role in his place. Though no one had told her to, she had come to think that way.
Then what was this person’s role?
Snowfield ultimately lowered her sword.
“Leave the city. If you want to prolong your life by even one more day.”
“......You’re not killing me?”
“Cilicia is only the beginning. What can you do except be swept away by the waves? There should be no need for me to act.”
She did not completely believe the claim that he was Carib’s friend. She simply did not feel like killing someone who remembered him with her own hands.
“Snowfield” was that kind of person.
A Pecatum who had drifted by chance into Legion. She could have become mafia, a bounty hunter or a League competitor, or an operative of Selvlogics Lab.
If one called her pitiful, then she was pitiful. Because of that, some users had appealed for her to be released as a playable character.
It was a wish that would never come true.
Step.
As if there was nothing more to discuss, Snowfield turned around and began walking. Her shadow vanished into the green smoke, and the sound of her footsteps gradually grew distant.
Even after he could no longer feel her presence, Kim Yi-hyeon stubbornly watched the smoke. He feared a blade might fly at him the moment he turned his back in relief.
How many minutes passed like that?
“...Haaaa. Fuuuck.”
After becoming certain that Snowfield had left, Kim Yi-hyeon flopped down on the floor. A feeling of exhaustion ruled his whole body. His clothes were soaked with sweat.
“I really thought I was going to die this time.”
He realized anew how miserable the weak were in the world of Polaris. To think the only thing he could do to preserve his life was run his mouth.
It was an experience he never wanted to go through again. Even until now, he had never picked a fight where the odds of winning were low, but he felt he would have to be even more careful from now on.
‘If I say it’s unfair, then it is unfair.’
Snowfield got pissed because Shadower died and suddenly appeared in Cilicia? How could a human being predict that?
But there was no one anywhere who would listen to him complain about unfairness. He had no choice but to bear the damage caused by unforeseen abnormalities himself.
‘I was rushing. There are so many stages after LW-3, but I ignored them all and tried to get an easy win.’
He acknowledged what had to be acknowledged. From the moment he twisted the development, this place had become a world both similar to and different from the Polaris Kim Yi-hyeon had known.
‘I need to be more cautious.’
He had to become even more meticulous than he was now.
Kim Yi-hyeon forced his exhausted body up. In front of him was smoke that still showed no sign of settling. Below were bullet casings and equipment scattered across the floor.
And corpses.
Platoon leader Kiara. Rude Tony, Philip, who was big but cowardly, Iana, who gave him snacks whenever they met, Graves, who had been quiet.
Mary.
“......That goddamn bastard.”
Kim Yi-hyeon turned his steps. There was a concern that monsters might gather after hearing the commotion. Since he had wasted time, he had to hurry and leave.
Whether he cried like a child, or beat his chest in guilt, blaming himself for getting his comrades killed by mistake. Whatever he did, it was something to do after returning home and crawling under the blankets.
He would not do either, though.