I’ll Retire After Saving the World - Chapter 18

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Chapter 18 – Basement Level 5 (1)

May 15, 2021.

11:10 PM.

Gyeonggi Province. An abandoned retreat center.

People dressed in black moved quickly in the darkness.

“…Where did you bring these people from?”

“Shh!”

“No, I mean….”

“Shhh!!!”

Can’t even get a word in.

I looked at Kim Chaemin, who was also dressed in black and holding a finger to her lips. She gestured for me to be quiet again and squinted at the darkened retreat building.

The building, unused for a long time, couldn’t be called attractive even in the most generous terms. The first floor walls and parking lot were wrecked, possibly from a dungeon opening nearby.

That wasn’t all.

The windows were shattered as if someone had broken them on purpose, and the doors were wrapped in rusty chains…. In horror movies, kids who unknowingly visit places like this end up cursed and dead.

Kim Chaemin shuddered.

“Ugh, I’m not good with places like this.”

Telling me to be quiet and then…

“Even in dungeons, I don’t enter places like this.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be an Archmage?”

“I am an Archmage, so I pick my jobs carefully.”

…Makes sense.

No. This isn’t the time for small talk.

I looked at Hong Seokyoung, standing a little distance away, talking on his phone.

I looked back at the retreat center.

Even dressed up in words, it’s still a ruin. No sign of life at all.

Hong Seokyoung, after hearing the location, had asked me several times to confirm.

But this is it.

This is the research lab I was in.

Well, to be precise, one of the labs I was in. But this was the place I stayed the longest, until the end. It was one of the biggest in the Ark.

“Preparation’s done.”

Hong Seokyoung ended his call and ambled over.

I looked at him suspiciously.

“Who are these people?”

“Employees of someone trustworthy.”

A bizarre choice of words.

“Sounds like someone not to be trusted.”

“No, they’re meticulous in this sort of thing. Trustworthy.”

“Who are they?”

It couldn’t be the police moving so covertly. These movements were definitely hunters. Trained ones.

Their coordinated movements weren’t for dungeon raiding. It was closer to a special forces operation just before breaching.

No management office involvement. Who on earth would use hunters like this at this time? It’s a waste of manpower.

Hong Seokyoung’s phone lit up. He checked it.

“In 20 minutes, we go in first.”

Kim Chaemin and I nodded.

“The goal is to confirm the kids. Block escape routes if possible. If we can get important information before they destroy it, great. Capturing someone who looks important would also be… well, good. After that, we signal to flip the lab upside down.”

“Aren’t you just telling us to do everything?”

“This is all about improvisation.”

Hong Seokyoung handed me back a sword. Yoo Jieun’s sword. It’s been a while.

Of course, the mana control device on my ankle remained. Hong Seokyoung warned me.

“I’m giving it back in case there’s combat. I’ll be by your side, so you won’t need to draw it.”

Kim Chaemin looked puzzled, glancing between me and Hong Seokyoung, but said nothing. I didn’t feel it appropriate to explain, and Hong Seokyoung pretended not to notice.

Once inside, she’d find out anyway. Or maybe she already guessed since she knew I provided the location.

Alright.

Focus.

From now on, I am Woo Hwijae, the whistleblower of the Ark.

Ha…. Have I fallen this far? How hard did I work to get that position?

I might as well have created the management office and taken the director’s position…. No, that would mean doing all the hard work the director did. If I’m going to wear a title, it should be something better.

One thing I learned working under the director was that being the principal of the Hunter Academy is a sweet job.

The principal is also a public official, so the pay is steady, and being the Academy principal gets you respect.

There are so many great hunters from the Academy! Just thinking about the gifts the director received every Teacher’s Day….

Yeah. I’ll become the principal.

I’ll create the management office, oust that old man, and become the Academy principal. I’m already teaching kids and even an Archmage; being the principal isn’t much different.

“Hm? Teacher Woo. Focus.”

“…I am focused.”

“I know you’re tense, but hang in there a bit more.”

Hong Seokyoung looked at me with pity for some reason. It gave me chills.

…What?

“Worrying about your sibling is natural. But we’ve come this far, haven’t we?”

“Oh my, a sibling?”

“A sibling?”

Kim Chaemin looked startled, and I was also surprised, staring at Hong Seokyoung with a blank face.

“Yes, a sibling.”

A sibling?

I don’t have any—no, maybe the nameless organization member whose identity I’m temporarily borrowing does.

Was it one of the pieces of information that Kim provided?

This isn’t good.

“Thank you for trusting me. We’ll be able to get your sibling out safely.”

I appreciated that Hong Seokyoung was misunderstanding on his own without me having to step in.

I quickly recalled what I had said before.

…Since I spoke in such vague terms, there wasn’t anything particularly suspicious.

But I added to Kim’s information about the insider.

Did he want to leave the organization to save his sibling?

I felt that answering clumsily would make things worse, so I just changed the subject.

“Is it time yet? Let’s go in.”

* * *

Sss….

Kim Chaemin’s vines crept along the ground.

Besides capturing monsters, Kim Chaemin’s vines had many functions. They could search within their extended range, for example.

Kim Chaemin opened his eyes, which had been closed.

“I don’t sense anything.”

“Nothing?”

“Yes. There are some bugs, but no other life forms. No surveillance cameras either…. Is this really the right place?”

“It is.”

Kim Chaemin cautiously watched my reaction. She had been like this ever since the sibling topic came up.

“Nothing sensed underground either?”

“No….”

I frowned. The Ark wasn’t foolish enough to let the research lab facilities be visible right upon entering.

The retreat center was an isolated place in the mountains and was private property, so they had secured space through illegal expansion. The children were in the deepest part.

I had never met Kim Chaemin in her lifetime. But, like other hunters, Archmages had abilities that were hard to consider human.

Even though Kim Chaemin didn’t have much experience as a hunter, an Archmage was still an Archmage.

The Ark’s preparations were thorough enough to escape Kim Chaemin’s detection?

“I’m going in.”

“What? Wait!”

Hong Seokyoung grabbed me. He didn’t channel any mana. I smoothly slipped out of his grasp.

Kim Chaemin’s vines, still crawling on the ground, twitched and moved aside. I stood in front of the retreat center’s main entrance. It was locked with thick chains and a padlock.

I gripped the sword.

The padlock was large but crude. There was no need to use mana. I wasn’t completely accustomed to using the sword yet, but I wasn’t entirely inept either. And I trusted Yoo Jieun’s sword.

To be precise, I trusted its performance.

Yoo Jieun often used her sword more like a club. Yet, its blade had never dulled. Yoo Jieun’s sword was always sharp.

If the weapon is good, half the battle is won.

Whip.

Crack.

Just one swing.

The chain was cut. I caught it before it hit the ground and quietly set it down. Hong Seokyoung and Kim Chaemin came up behind me.

I opened the door. Despite the dust thickly accumulated, it opened smoothly.

The inside was a mess too. Dust, trash, and rubble were everywhere. It looked like the retreat center was shouting in my ear that no one was here.

I wasn’t fooled.

I knew this place so well I could find my way with my eyes closed. Hong Seokyoung and Kim Chaemin followed me. I walked inside the retreat center. We needed to find the elevator.

The retreat center was a building with one basement floor and six above-ground floors. I heard it used to be a training center for a large corporation, used by many people at once, which was why it had three elevators.

The middle one. I forced it open with my sword, twisting it between the doors. Dust billowed out. I wasn’t fooled.

I entered the elevator. There were numbers. I pressed the button.

6.

6.

6. 5. 1. 2. 6. 6. 3. 4. B1.

“…….”

No reaction.

“Damn it.”

The elevator needed power to operate.

I ran out of the elevator. If this elevator didn’t work, I’d try another method. This was the outer entrance. If they knew we were coming, this would be the first place they’d block.

“Teacher Woo!”

“Mr. Woo!”

I found the stairs. Dust clouded around my feet as I moved. There were no traps on the central staircase, which people used often. I was looking for the emergency stairs, mostly used by staff.

Next to it, the freight elevator.

I forced the door open.

There were buttons here too. I raised my hand. If the elevator had power, the numbers would light up when I pressed them.

No reaction, just like before.

I pressed the buttons in reverse order of the ones at the entrance elevator.

Starting with B1. Then 4. 3. 6. 6. 2. 1. 5. 6. 6. 6.

“…….”

This had to be the Ark’s research lab.

It had to be the Ark’s research lab.

The very place where a much younger version of Hunter Hong rescued young Woo Hwijae and the other children.

It had to be that world.

There are many works that deal with time travel.

Movies where someone travels to the past to help their parents fall in love to avoid disappearing, or stories where changing the past leads to tragic consequences like being erased before ever being born…. Maybe not that one.

In any case, the protagonists of such works usually take one of two actions.

Preserve the past to protect the future.

Or change the past to dream of a different future.

However, another classic movie presents a different possibility for this situation.

A parallel world.

What if this isn’t my past?

What if this is another world?

A world where the information on my mana watch is useless, where all the future knowledge I have never existed in the first place?

No.

From the moment I woke up in Myeong-dong, I had already changed the past. So is this the world ten-year-old Woo Hwijae experienced? Or is it a new world?

…It’s impossible to know.

I’ll probably never know.

But I believe this is my past. For that to be true, this must be the Ark’s research lab. Because it was in my timeline.

Ding.

An incongruously clear bell sound rang out. The elevator button flickered and lit up.

The elevator spoke.

[Wel-come.]

I never imagined that damn voice would bring tears to my eyes.

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