Gate Of Seoul - Chapter 1

Six years after the outbreak in Seoul.

‘Imperial’, a five-star hotel that became the provisional government building in Daejeon, the temporary capital of South Korea.

The banquet hall was turned into a conference room, with all lights turned off and only the PPT screen lit up brightly.

It was to get the approval of a very important plan.

Due to the nature of the operation, it was not something that could only be done by the military or the intelligence organization itself, and it required permission from the highest echelons.

“This better be worthwhile. Is this it? Are these all the trained elite special forces?”

asked the person at the top of the table.

“That’s right.”

The woman in navy uniform, who was conducting the presentation, replied. She had an insignia symbolizing her rank, the woman being a captain, and she appeared to be roughly in her mid-twenties.

Although she was quite young for the captain’s rank, anyone who knew anything about the military could easily accept that fact after seeing she had two ribbons on her chest and three medals for military service.

“However, from the records you have shown, this man has never received any special training. Military service is also in the third-degree military police. Isn’t the military police for technical administration? Did he have any special training? Was he a secret agent for the NIS (National Intelligence Service)? Maybe UDU (Underwater Demolition Unit)?”

He said in a cheerful and expecting tone, but the woman shook her head.

“He wasn’t, Mr. President.”

“Then what?”

“He’s a simple civilian who is now working as a PMC (Private Military Company). To be precise, he works alone like the UDU mentioned by the President. In that world, he’s one of the most famous people.”

Some people sneered or burst out laughing at those words.

“He is in a secret and illegal business and is famous in his industry? Does that make any sense? Who are you kidding?”

“Heh, a mercenary who works alone is better than our elite crew members?”

The general in the army uniform spoke loudly to himself as if he had nothing else to listen to, but no one criticized him because they were thinking the same thing.

The president interlaced his fingers for a moment, staring at the woman, then opened his mouth again.

“Captain, then, what is the basis for convincing us?”

“I thought it would be better to show it in person rather than tell you, so I prepared a video. If you watch the video, you’ll be able to accept it right away.”

The woman turned her ppt to the next screen and played the video that appeared.

“This was filmed by our military reconnaissance drone on August 23rd, a week ago. The place is a lake park in Suwon, a controlled area.”

***

On a slight slope in the lake park, a man was lying on his back, smoking a pipe, pressing the hood of his hooded jacket to cover his eyes.

In recent years, it has become common to smoke pipe cigarettes, which are relatively cheap at the beginning of the year, in the wake of high tobacco-related taxes.

It has been a long time since the lake water dried up and showed the bottom, and the plants were also full of yellow leaves.

If you have a normal mindset, you wouldn’t want to lie down and smoke a cigarette on a gloomy, overcast day.

The man’s appearance was a little peculiar.

He was wearing a khaki hooded jacket over a black thermostatic sweater, dark blue jeans, and ankle-length hiking boots. It was probably because it was cold there, even though the notorious heat of August began.

He was also wearing an army uniform, which was made in Russia, not the military uniform used by the Armed Forces, and was wearing leather half-gloves on his hands.

Next to him was a shotgun equipped with a bayonet, a shotgun called a trench gun, which was challenging to obtain.

The smoke from the pipe rose from his mouth, and as it slowly rose, the man pulled back the hood that was covering his face.

The skin on his face was slightly sagging as if a fat man had lost weight abruptly in the past. Even his countenance was as pale as a man who had never seen the light. But apart from those points, he had a decent face, and his age was roughly in his late 20s to early 30s.

The man took the pipe out of his mouth, flicked the ashes out, and cleaned it with cleaning tools. He was pretty meticulous about it.

After cleaning, he got up and shoved pipes and tools roughly into the sundry bag hanging behind the armament. He even turned his head a few times and let out a sigh and burp.

Even during these actions, his gaze was fixed on a certain building to the north all the time. In the past, it was a government office, but now it is a hideout for the ‘target’ he must find.

He put his trench gun on his back and walked a bit, looking around. At present, there was no living creature in his sight. He stopped walking when he arrived at a bench.

There was an elongated bag and a backpack for students to use. He opened the bag and took out the long bag a sniper rifle called a VSS or “Vintorez.” The Vintorez was a Russian-made sniper rifle that fired a subsonic bullet with a silencer as standard, and the Vintorez he was holding also had a Russian-made 4x scope.

The man checked the gun and opened the backpack next to him.

There was something like a motorcycle helmet made of titanium. The visor was also used by the Russian military, consisting of titanium and bulletproof glass.

He wore a balaclava mask with only eye holes and put the helmet on his head. The visor remained up. After loading the magazine into the silencer, pulling the bolt to reload, and turning the steering wheel toward safety, he headed for the government building.

The area was overgrown with grass because it had not been maintained since the abandoned government incident, and the parking lot of a nearby government office was filled with dusty, rusty, and old cars that looked like they would no longer move.

—-

Translation in collaboration with YFT.