Although I had already been briefed by Defender, the height and strength of the barrier Yoo Yang-seo had built around the Rift exceeded anything I could have imagined.

“As you can see, we’ve fully utilized the existing facilities of the former military base and government agency that used to guard the Paju Rift. Even the most rabid scavengers don’t dare come near the Rift, so the infrastructure remained intact.”

Jeon Si-hoon already had many followers.

One of them was Lee Chan-ho, a member of the Jeju Committee.

He emerged when the veil surrounding the Jeju Committee began to lift as they lost their grip on power, revealing details about the committee’s size and member list little by little to the world.

Though it’s still not entirely clear, it appears the Jeju Committee had eighteen members in total. These were the people who had pulled the strings behind Korea from Seoul to Jeju and created the current state of things.

Everyone had probably suspected it, but the biggest factor that allowed them to seize power was the former president and the old leadership.

The initial intent was good.

Faced with the unprecedented possibility of nuclear war, the government established a wartime command hierarchy as tensions escalated.

This system, known as the Hydra Plan, divided the Republic of Korea’s command structure into multiple layers, ensuring that if the top tier was killed or went missing in a nuclear strike, the next tier would immediately inherit full authority to continue governing and waging war without a leadership vacuum.

This kind of concept was already outlined in the Constitution and related laws, but the previous president had refined it to allow more immediate and forceful enforcement.

However, no one had predicted that all those layers of upper leadership would collapse at once.

Ironically, the former president lived on long after the ministers and higher-ups evaporated in the heat of nuclear fission. But obsessed—almost pathologically—with his own safety, he chose isolation. And at the very moment he should’ve emerged, during the lull in the war, he was assassinated—presumably by Kang Han-min.

The ones who seized the power vacuum were the leadership of Gukwiwon, who had the ability to gather all information and maintain broad, smooth relationships with various departments.

Gukwiwon had to deal with many threats: the rampant mutations in the provinces, religious fanatics hiding among North Korean refugees, the Rifts, and the monsters. Thanks to that, they stayed connected with the military, police, local governments, and allies like the United States. When the upper echelon was wiped out, they alone remained in a position to collect and distribute information.

With America and the remaining elite class either tacitly approving or turning a blind eye, they quietly slithered in and stole the highest authority in the Republic of Korea—like a snake slinking over a wall.

No one can deny that these people, while despicable and secretive, were also cunning enough.

In particular, they were smart enough to completely hide themselves—ensuring no one knew who was actually leading the country.

“Then I’ll begin the briefing.”

At the center of it all stood Lee Chan-ho.

According to what’s been passed down, Lee Chan-ho had coaxed the other attention-seeking members of the committee into staying in the shadows, leaving the Jeju Committee as a faceless power.

On top of that, he was involved in major operations: coexistence with military factions, dealings with the Chinese remnants, maintaining Seoul up until the Jeju relocation, and orchestrating the mass migration to Incheon.

In short, he was the strategist of the committee.

Surprisingly, I had known Lee Chan-ho from before.

While our cohort—the 13th, often dubbed the “Golden Generation”—was famous in one way, Lee Chan-ho, a low-level Awakened, was seen as a golden figure in a different sense. He secured a spot on the Gukwiwon committee at a young age.

I recall, though, it wasn’t a particularly important position.

He used to hang out with Lee Sang-hoon.

My classmate Lee Sang-hoon had this weird quirk—he’d only associate with people he felt superior to, those he found easy to handle.

If he played screen golf with someone after work, that was enough for him to consider them close friends.

True to his clever nature, Lee Chan-ho, unlike other committee members, didn’t obsess over followers or supplies.

Instead, he clutched a currency now faded in value: information.

“This is the overview of the Paju defensive line. Yoo Yang-seo built a surveillance network along what she calls the 'Third Defensive Line'—a classified perimeter. As you already know, Captain Park Gyu, this line sits at the outermost edge of the Rift, designed more to block journalists and nosy civilians than monsters. Each observation post and accessible route is monitored by CCTV, thermal imaging devices, and motion sensors, all managed through an AI-based integrated security program.”

He was familiar with areas of Paju even I hadn’t known about when I was stationed there.

Where I only had vague guesses, Lee Chan-ho had concrete, verified data in hand.

The more of his data I saw, the more confident I felt in my decision to side with Jeon Si-hoon.

There were no gaps.

Even the forced breakthrough route I had designated as a last resort was caught in the net Yoo Yang-seo had laid out.

If I got lucky, maybe I would’ve escaped unharmed—but if not, I might have been captured or killed.

Lee Chan-ho also had a thorough understanding of Yoo Yang-seo, a person still unfamiliar to me.

“People call her Kang Han-min’s lover or some cult leader, but in reality, she’s extremely sharp. During her pre-Awakened evaluation, she scored 132 on the Wechsler Intelligence Scale—an exceptionally high score. Her intelligence alone is impressive, but she’s fundamentally cunning. Despite that dazed look on her face, she’s more calculating than most old men I know. Personally, I suspect it’s not that she’s following Kang Han-min, but that he’s being led around by her.”

Lee Chan-ho was the brain Jeon Si-hoon had assigned to help me enter the Rift.

Sure, Jeon Si-hoon could’ve asked Yoo Yang-seo directly, but that would only be a last resort.

If he went that far, Yoo Yang-seo would start looking into us with a magnifying glass—and she’d find me.

Lee Chan-ho was the perfect candidate to bridge that gap.

“There is a way. We exploit the cult-like structure of their group. Yoo Yang-seo personally enters the Rift once a month to meet with her ‘prophet.’ They say she receives Kang Han-min’s instructions through a type of communication only available to higher-level Awakened inside the Rift—though I personally think that’s nonsense. Still, that day is when their guard is weakest.”

As expected, he laid out a solid plan based on intel I didn’t have.

“Our side is in charge of transporting supplies requested by the Rift’s internal detachment. I suggest you slip into the convoy and, depending on the situation, find the right time to slip into the Rift.”

Lacking in imagination perhaps, but rational to the core—his plan seemed feasible enough to try.

“...Alright. Let’s review this part together.”

“Shall we take a short break?”

“Sure. Let’s.”

I headed to the break room with Lee Chan-ho.

The room reeked of old cigarette smoke, but the view from the tall, ruined building wasn’t too bad.

He offered me a cigarette, but I shook my head and waved my candy instead.

He chuckled quietly, lit one up, and gazed at the distant sky.

“Nice weather today. Not too muggy for summer.”

They say Lee Chan-ho was the first to align himself with Jeon Si-hoon.

Like the other Jeju committee members, he was young, quick-witted, and equipped with the basic manners society still demanded.

And like every other committee member I had dealt with, he had his own quirks.

His surfaced during our casual chat over the break.

“...I heard a fleet of Japanese refugees is headed for Incheon. Some folks say we should sink them at sea. Do you think that’s really necessary?”

“Excuse me?”

“Well, I mean, even if they’re Japanese, there must be kids and women among them, right? They’re people too. Is it really necessary to be that heartless?”

He was spouting words completely contrary to everything the Jeju Committee had done so far.

Whether he was genuinely kind or just posturing remained to be seen, but for now, he was blatantly showing a desire to be seen as a “good person.”

I gave a light jab.

“Didn’t our country have a 'Resettlement Corps' too?”

“Resettlement Corps?”

“Yes. The one that rounded up old folks and dumped them outside the city.”

“Really?”

“That was a government-backed program out of Seoul, wasn’t it?”

He was probably behind it.

His flustered expression made it 100% certain.

After all, he was one of Seoul’s anonymous powers.

Even if he hadn’t led it, he must’ve at least condoned it.

I still vividly remember the elderly left behind in those abandoned apartments.

“Oh, that thing?”

He stuck out his tongue—not like him.

“That was the work of some radicals... yeah. A knee-jerk reaction. I told them we shouldn’t do something like that, but who listens, right?”

He must really want to be seen as a good person.

We sat in silence for a moment before he cleared his throat and continued.

“Ultimately, the decision will be made by Committee Member Kim So-uk, but even he’ll be looking to Hero Jeon Si-hoon for direction. It all hinges on Hero Jeon’s opinion. I hope it’s resolved peacefully.”

The next time I saw him wasn’t in person—it was on TV.

People had gathered around an LED monitor with a coat hanger antenna and speakers jury-rigged into a makeshift TV.

The broadcast was about the Japanese refugee fleet that Lee Chan-ho had mentioned earlier.

It might’ve been his first official appearance, but Lee Chan-ho stood out among the huckster-like New Seoul lawmakers. His neat appearance, calm demeanor, and polished manners gave him a dignified presence. 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

With all eyes on him, he spoke with a gentle, refined voice.

“I have no intention of invoking old sentiments about the nation of Japan. That’s their burden to bear, passed down in their bloodline. But they are people, just like us. They fled a failed government, threw away their homeland to survive, to protect their families—they crossed the strait to get here. They may speak a different language, live a different culture, and even bear the shame of having sunk our refugee fleet in the past, but precisely because of that, we must show tolerance. We must demonstrate the depth of our character by surpassing the Yamato race.”

The crowd’s mood turned cold.

A man grumbled.

“Isn’t that the bastard who made the Resettlement Corps?”

Probably not based on any evidence.

Just a hunch.

But that single comment was enough to make people start cursing. Lee Chan-ho’s speech had stirred only resentment.

He wouldn’t know.

What it was like for those left behind in Seoul. The kind of life they were forced to live. The losses they suffered. The deaths they witnessed.

In an age where everything had collapsed, it wasn’t just material foundations that crumbled.

When the material falls, the façades of the spirit go with it.

“This has been Lee Chan-ho, Executive Committee Member of New Seoul.”

I won’t see him again.

He’s already given up his intel, and the plan based on it is ready to move forward.

But that smug look on his face—as if he had just performed some great act and was now basking in the crowd’s applause—gave me a new perspective.

That guy... has no clue.

The best proof of my thought was Jeon Si-hoon’s icy stare from behind the screen, locked firmly on him.

Jeon Si-hoon had also been left behind in Seoul.

He might’ve gone to Jeju later, but he’d seen and experienced all the worst this place had to offer. He wasn’t so different from the people still here.

*

News that they had decided to accept the Japanese refugees reached me two days before I was scheduled to infiltrate the Rift under the guise of a transport unit.

Contrary to their claims of fleeing the cruel and incompetent Japanese government in search of hope on the Korean Peninsula, the reality of their condition didn’t seem all that bright or hopeful.

Defender had used his connections to investigate the makeup of the Japanese refugee group and passed the information on to me.

“They’re your classic bunch of Japs, apparently. The supposed leader is some pretty girl, but she’s just a figurehead. The real one pulling the strings is a psychopath named Rōgai. He’s always draped in this cape, and that cape? Apparently it’s stitched together from the skinned faces of elderly people.”

Japan had maintained its system for quite a while even after the war, but their stability was nothing more than a lid forced onto a boiling pot—eventually, the government was overthrown.

The longer they held on, the harder the backlash struck the Japanese archipelago, turning the country into a living hell. I’d heard multiple times that young people were reportedly hunting and killing the elderly in groups.

They seemed like the same kind of people.

Let them handle their own mess, but the only mildly fortunate thing was that the Japanese refugees would be housed in a newly constructed residential zone rather than one of the existing housing areas.

There were already people living near that site, but they were powerless individuals or families who had gathered independently, not as part of any group or faction—voices too weak to ever reach the upper levels.

A day before the operation, I got a call from an unknown number.

Turned out it was one of Jeon Si-hoon’s subordinates.

“Captain, we sincerely apologize, but the operation’s been delayed.”

A delay in the operation was a variable I’d already accounted for.

The reason: an outburst.

Since Jeon Si-hoon had taken the lead, the Paju Rift had been spewing monsters at irregular intervals, and one just happened to appear on the very day I planned to enter.

Regardless, the people deep inside the Rift still needed water, food, and supplies, so from my perspective, all I had to do was wait a few days.

In fact, I considered it a good thing.

It had been a while since I’d hunted monsters, and the hunger was starting to gnaw at me.

If I lingered near Jeon Si-hoon’s hunting grounds, maybe I could at least pick up some scraps.

A good way to feed the hunger without taking on unnecessary risk.

I followed Jeon Si-hoon’s subjugation unit and watched the battle.

Boom! Boom!

Well—flashy.

Shockwave after shockwave.

Brilliant flares and blinding flashes.

Watching how they slaughtered mid-sized monsters in a way completely different from ours reminded me all over again why the term “old school” had come to be treated as such a derogatory prefix.

As I watched the scattering light particles in ❖ Nоvеl𝚒ght ❖ (Exclusive on Nоvеl𝚒ght) the distance, I unconsciously inhaled deeply through my nose.

It didn’t mean anything, but somehow the hunger seemed to settle a bit.

“......”

Yeah.

This should be enough.

At the very least, I wouldn’t have to risk my life hunting inside the Rift.

After the battle ended, Jeon Si-hoon walked past me.

Surrounded by Awakened, he passed by with a terrifyingly cold expression on his face.

He might’ve seen me. Or maybe not. Either way, it wasn’t something worth thinking too hard about.

But that disturbingly cold expression gave me a sense of déjà vu.

Right.

It was the exact same expression he wore right after Lee Chan-ho made his statement during the public debate on the Japanese refugee issue.

Whether it was fate’s mischief or just coincidence, right then, another figure from that memory reached out to me.

“Captain Park Gyu!”

It was Lee Chan-ho.

His voice was urgent.