Han-eol rested for a while and recovered his stamina. Then he sealed the demon beast's corpse in a space-contraction vacuum pack and buried it in the ground.
Han-eol also contracted the disc the demon beast had ridden into a small bundle with a vacuum pack and buried it alongside the demon beast's corpse.
Lastly, Han-eol buried the demon spirit stone, the size of two fists put together, together with the demon beast's corpse as well.
Han-eol intended to take back to Mid-Land Seoul only the one small demon spirit stone he had removed from the demon beast's neck and the sharp, hard needle the demon beast had fired.
In fact, with spoils of this much, even the 1st Assault Corps Leader would not be able to reproach Han-eol.
'Now I have to leave a marker.'
Han-eol drew a metal bundle, sealed in several layers, from inside his backpack and separated it into two.
Of these, the round mother metal served the purpose of acting as the N pole when guide-transferring an ability-holder to the Highland.
Which meant that if Han-eol buried the mother metal here, the odds of his being transferred near this spot the next time he entered the Highland were bound to shoot up.
'I will come back later and recover the demon beast's corpse and the disc.'
Han-eol resolved to make good on it in the future.
Han-eol's grumbling about never coming to the Highland again had vanished somewhere along the way.
Afterward Han-eol carefully opened the front glass of his watch and removed the watch hand.
This watch hand was the child metal for guide-transferring the Shinseong Group's ability-holders to 'Base Camp No. 1 on the Eighth Continent.'
This watch hand interacted with the mother metal buried at Base Camp No. 1 on the Eighth Continent to pull ability-holders to its vicinity.
'Hmph. This child metal did not even manage to send me to Base Camp No. 1 on the Eighth Continent anyway. So I have no need for this thing.'
Han-eol pulled out and discarded the hand of the watch issued by the 1st Assault Corps and, in its place, fitted a new child metal.
The child metal Han-eol newly fitted was one of a pair with the mother metal he had set down on the wasteland floor a moment ago.
When Han-eol reassembled the watch and strapped it to his wrist, the watch hand pointed exactly at the mother metal.
'Oooh. Good. It works smoothly.'
Han-eol nodded, then pressed three fingers into the three grooves of the round mother metal.
Click!
Immediately a drill sprang out from the underside of the mother metal. That drill began boring through the wasteland with a grinding whir and digging underground.
In the blink of an eye, the mother metal settled into the bedrock a hundred meters below.
When Han-eol rubbed the hole bored into the wasteland with his palm, the trace of the mother metal's entry vanished without a trace.
'There, that is done. Then next in line......'
Han-eol tore open the lower part of his backpack with the ultra-vibration blade. Then he scattered some unimportant consumables here and there across the wasteland.
'This way I can make an excuse for the mother metal disappearing.'
After meticulously making everything fit together, Han-eol returned to the spot where he had first been transferred and settled down beside the rolling blue mist.
'If I go back too early I could draw suspicion. Let us pass a little time here and then return.'
Han-eol took a one-touch tent from his backpack.
When Han-eol tapped it with a finger, the single-person tent deployed on its own. This was a flat tent just large enough for one adult to barely crawl inside and lie down.
Moreover, this tent came equipped with an automatic concealment function, so it not only changed by itself to a color similar to the surrounding wasteland but also blocked the smell peculiar to humans.
'It blocks the dust too, so all the better.'
Han-eol crawled into the tent and lay down for a while.
A fair amount of time passed.
Han-eol folded the one-touch tent up small, stuffed it into his backpack, and then began his manipulation.
When he took out the sharp needle the demon beast had fired, Han-eol's pupils trembled.
'I absolutely hate pain.'
Han-eol was on the fearful side. For Han-eol, who could not even watch blood being drawn with a needle, it was no easy thing to wound his own body.
'Still, this is better than putting myself in danger.'
Han-eol drew the demon beast's needle across his left forearm.
'Krgh.'
Han-eol's skin split open in a long line and blood poured out in a stream.
Han-eol stabbed his thigh hard with the demon beast's needle as well.
'Gyaah. Damn it all.'
It hurts truly, maddeningly.
Han-eol wiped away the tears that had welled up with his palm, then took out the antidote injection kit and jabbed it deep into his flank.
This was to prevent viral penetration and poisoning from the demon beast's needle.
'Hah, hah. This much should do it.'
Having wounded himself, Han-eol hoisted the half-torn backpack onto his shoulders and leapt into the blue mist.
The nausea that arrived without fail whenever he crossed between Mid-Land and the Highland was the same as ever.
'Urrgh.'
The dizzying vertigo that came without fail swallowed Han-eol up.
"Emergency. Emergency."
"What the hell is with this bastard? Where did he get injuries this severe?"
"Assault Corps Leader, look at this instead."
"What is that?"
"It is a triangular demon spirit stone. This is the first time I have seen this shape. And this sharp needle is made of a material I have never seen in my life either."
The noise of loud chatter shook Han-eol's brain.
Almost none of it concerned worry for Han-eol.
'Sons of bitches.'
Han-eol lay on the floor and squeezed both eyes shut.
Inside the Highland he had been able to hold up thanks to the tension, but the moment he returned to Mid-Land Seoul every kind of fatigue suddenly rushed in and reduced his whole body to the state of water-soaked cotton.
A short while later, paramedics under the Shinseong Group came running to the secret platform beneath the Han River. They transported Han-eol to a hospital emergency room.
'Now I am saved.'
Listening to the ambulance's wail, wee-woo, wee-woo, wee-woo, Han-eol sank into a deep sleep.
***
It was the middle of the night on May 22 when Han-eol woke.
'That hospital again.'
A private room at Gangbuk Shinseong General Hospital.
Han-eol looked at the needle stuck in his forearm and the nutrient packs dangling in a row beside the sickbed and snickered.
Perhaps thanks to his high Vitality, the self-inflicted wounds seemed to have mostly healed. The place stabbed by the demon beast's needle no longer hurt either.
Even so, Han-eol's heart was pounding and racing.
'Damn it. I nearly died again this time.'
That already made twice.
'This will not do. I have to come up with some countermeasure.'
Han-eol was a self-preservation-first sort of man. He could not go into the Highland again defenseless without setting up a proper safeguard here.
'What is the problem?'
Han-eol first considered the risk factors.
The answer was obvious.
Guided transfer failure.
Strangely, Han-eol had a tendency to fail the guided transfer and be sent to a dangerous region.
It was still only two failures, but for Han-eol, having attempted twice and failed the guided transfer both times was no ordinary matter.
The worse fact was that he did not know the cause of the guided transfer failure.
In truth, humanity had still not dug out the precise principle of guided transfer. Since the principle was unknown, analyzing the causes of failure was impossible as well.
'Then is there any safety measure prepared for when the guided transfer fails?'
Han-eol fixed on precisely this point.
Here too the answer was obvious.
Han-eol possessed an ability that could kill even a powerful demon beast instantly in a single blow. This was truly Han-eol's lethal weapon.
'The problem is my defense.'
Did he have the defensive power and vitality to hold out until he could catch and pull out a demon beast's soul? To survive, would he not have to withstand the enemy's attack at least once?
But since this was not easy for the present Han-eol, he thought he must reinforce his Defense Power and Vitality right away.
'How can I raise those figures?'
The first solution.
First, there was the method of Han-eol continuing to go in and out of the Highland and growing stronger.
An ability-holder's stats are not fixed by the single act of awakening. Even after awakening, one can develop by continuing to kill demon beasts.
'But relying only on this is too dangerous. I could end up croaking while trying to kill demon beasts in order to survive.'
In that case, the method of receiving outside help was also possible.
This was precisely the second solution Han-eol thought of.
Take the A-grade vest and the recovery potion, for instance.
Thanks to those things, Han-eol had saved his life twice.
'I have to obtain better armor and potions. But there is no way the Shinseong Group is going to hand out high-quality support like that to a fledgling like me, is there? Then is there no other way?'
At times like these, Han-eol envied the owner family and the families of the board of directors, who received lavish group-level support. And at the same time, Han-eol would harbor the fantasy: 'Could it be that I have a secret to my birth too? Might wealthy, splendid parents suddenly appear?'
But the fantasy soon vanished.
'Tch. Who would do that for an orphan bastard like me? I have to prepare my own way to survive somehow.'
Han-eol pressed and rubbed his considerably heavier eyelids with his palms.
In the middle of the night when Han-eol had just woken in the hospital, the Shinseong Group's Head of Human Resources Lee Jae-in visited the 1st Assault Corps building located at Gangnam Station.
In the Assault Corps Leader's office, which looked down over Gangnam's brilliant night streets at a glance, Lee Jae-in habitually spread his fingers and pushed his horn-rimmed glasses up.
The 1st Assault Corps Leader looked at Lee Jae-in with an expression that said the sight of him was bad luck.
"Well, it is truly an honor that a busy gentleman from headquarters would personally visit our humble 1st Assault Corps at this late hour, but what in the world is this about?"
The 1st Assault Corps Leader's tone had thorns in it.
Lee Jae-in belonged to Lee Myeong-u's faction, as those in the know within the Shinseong Group were aware.
The 1st Assault Corps Leader, by contrast, was a trusted subordinate of Pioneer Corps Commander Lee Seong-u.
Since Lee Myeong-u and Lee Seong-u were subtle rivals, relations between their trusted men were not smooth either.
However, Lee Jae-in did not show his displeasure openly as the 1st Assault Corps Leader did.
"The Assault Corps Leader seems busy, so I will state only my business, briefly. About Employee 330895, Han-eol......"
"330895? Hem hem. What about him?"
For an instant, a guilty look flitted across the 1st Assault Corps Leader's face.
The 1st Assault Corps Leader quickly managed his expression, but Lee Jae-in did not miss that brief instant.
"No matter that he is an employee assigned to the 1st Assault Corps, it is a problem to violate regulations and work him however you please."
"Violate regulations? Hah. This is absurd. What regulations has our 1st Assault Corps violated? Listen. Head of Human Resources. Do you know this is overreaching your authority, or not?"
The 1st Assault Corps Leader stepped right up and pushed at Lee Jae-in's chest with his index finger.
Lee Jae-in showed both palms to signal that he had no wish to fight, then spoke calmly.
"You will know if you look at the regulations. New employees are to be sent into the Highland after completing sufficient training. That is how it is written."
"What?"
The 1st Assault Corps Leader was dumbfounded.
He had no idea whether such a clause existed in the regulations.
But there had never been a case so lacking in common sense as to shove such a stuffy old manual in the face of the field.
"Hey! Head of Human Resources. This is clearly overreach. I am a man who has only rolled around in the field with no education, so I may not know the regulations well, but I do know that overreach is a serious violation of company rules. Shall I take this matter to the Pioneer Corps Commander and see? Huh?"
The 1st Assault Corps Leader brought up Pioneer Corps Commander Lee Seong-u.
Lee Jae-in fired off a counter at once.
"Since you are dragging in the Pioneer Corps Commander, I should say a word myself. I do not know whether you are aware, but Employee Han-eol is an employee of interest on whom a report has been submitted to the Head of the Strategy Division as well."
"Wh, what?"
When Lee Myeong-u's name was mentioned, the 1st Assault Corps Leader's pupils wavered.
Lee Myeong-u vs. Lee Seong-u.
They were said to be rivals, but there was no one who did not know that Lee Myeong-u was closer to the next chairman's seat.
Even setting that aside, the weight of Lee Myeong-u's name pressed down heavily on the 1st Assault Corps Leader.
"330895, that fledgling is receiving the Head of the Strategy Division's attention?"
The 1st Assault Corps Leader asked back as if wringing the words out.
Lee Jae-in corrected the misunderstanding.
"That is not the case. The Head of the Division is not so idle as to concern himself with a mere new employee."
"Hey. You, just now you said......"
"I never said the Head of the Division was casting his eye on Employee Han-eol. I said that because our Human Resources Team came to take an interest in that recruit, we submitted a report to the Head of the Strategy Division as well, recommending he watch that recruit with interest in the future."
"Th, that is...... Well, let us grant that much. But anyway, what groundless slander is this that I work that fledgling however I please? Why would I handle my own kid roughly once he has come into my arms? It seems the Head of Human Resources has not seen the hospital chart yet, but the boy is fine. He could be discharged tomorrow. Uh-heh-hem."
The 1st Assault Corps Leader changed the subject.
Lee Jae-in slid his glasses up.
"I already checked the hospital chart before coming here. For injuries of that degree even after he drank down an A-grade recovery potion, he was not merely worked hard."
"That cannot be. An A-grade recovery potion? No, how would a fledgling recruit have something that precious!"
The 1st Assault Corps Leader was genuinely startled.