Editor’s Survival Guide - Chapter 125

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Survival Rules for an Editor Chapter 125

ep18. Rescuer (9)

* * *

Tap-tap.
“Come in.”
The moment Kwon Mu-seop gave his permission, Cha Si-eon opened the manager’s office door and stepped inside.
He spotted me right away—I’d arrived just before him.
He didn’t show it, but there was a flicker of surprise that I was here.
“Sit.”
At the manager’s suggestion, Cha Si-eon sat down without understanding why.
Kwon Mu-seop got straight to the point.
“That Train Station suppression operation you mentioned before—explain it properly this time.”
“The Train Station suppression operation, sir?”
Cha Si-eon asked as though he’d misheard.
Until recently, he hadn’t even been allowed to bring it up.
Being told suddenly to explain it—he looked genuinely surprised.
Kwon Mu-seop nodded, and Cha Si-eon glanced sideways at me.
His look said: What did you do?
What did I do? I had a rational conversation, that’s all.
The fact that Kwon Mu-seop looked a little worn out was purely my imagination.
“Let me be clear—I’m just listening for now.”
Kwon Mu-seop threw in a warning not to get ahead of himself.
Cha Si-eon still seemed to be reading the room.
“The objective is to neutralize the Great Siren, the primary hazard in the Train Station, using eleven prisoners and drones.”
But sensing this was his chance, he launched into the explanation without hesitation.
“I’ll be included, making twelve personnel total. We’ll be split into four teams of three for siren evasion—three attack teams and one escape team. The attack teams will use drones to strike the Great Siren directly. The escape team secures train tickets in advance as a contingency for operation failure.”
The siren in the Train Station attacks one person at a time.
Its attack can be neutralized if you move outside its range.
So by forming three-person squads, whoever becomes the siren’s target gets rescued by their flanking teammates, and we nullify the attacks that way while executing the operation.
In theory, it sounded plausible.
But theory and practice are different beasts, and Kwon Mu-seop showed his skepticism immediately.
“You’re saying you’ll run this elaborate operation with prisoners…….”
“If you authorize it, I’ll get prisoner recommendations from Exploration Team 1’s team leader and train them for three weeks.”
He was saying he’d handpick the best of the prisoners and prepare them.
But would it really be that simple?
In the Train Station, the siren wails every twenty seconds, and anyone caught as its target experiences a crushing, suffocating terror.
Without exceptional mental fortitude, it’d be nearly impossible to endure.
Cha Si-eon knew that, which is why he’d accompany the prisoners himself rather than send them alone.
“You might be able to drill them into shape. But even granting that, it makes no sense for you alone to control eleven prisoners.”
“Their own lives are at stake, so they’ll follow orders. I’ll reinforce motivation with prize money and sentence reductions as incentives.”
“That only works when people are in their right minds. What if even one of them has a change of heart?”
Prisoners are fundamentally antisocial individuals.
And they’d have every reason to harbor strong resentment toward the Management Bureau.
If things went south, they could easily throw caution to the wind and mutiny against Cha Si-eon.
“I’ll set up a system in the command center to remotely control the prisoners. That way, I won’t have to manage them solo.”
Yet Cha Si-eon pressed on, unshaken, laying out contingencies.
In the end, it was Kwon Mu-seop who sighed.
Now I understood why Kwon Mu-seop had silenced him before.
“Is there solid reasoning behind neutralizing the Great Siren?”
“Research Department says there’s a high probability that the contaminated Lee Sol and the Great Siren are homologous.”
“…….”
“During the process of subduing Lee Sol, we identified a method to stop the siren’s sound. If they share the same structure, we should be able to stop the Great Siren the same way.”
“That’s just an estimate at best.”
“If it fails, the escape team will use the secured train tickets to evacuate.”
“What about the Great Siren’s outer durability? You ought to have some rough estimate, shouldn’t you?”
“We can measure that through Lee Sol. We can’t guarantee it’s identical, but we can narrow the estimated range.”
“…….”
“……?”
To Cha Si-eon’s measured response, Kwon Mu-seop nodded reluctantly, then stopped cold.
As I listened quietly, something struck me as off, and I looked at Cha Si-eon.
Was he really suggesting they beat Lee Sol to gauge the Great Siren’s durability?
Team Leader Cha, who wouldn’t balk at a yaksha negotiation with a fifteen-year-old if it meant keeping her alive.
Warm? Ice-cold, more like.
To Cha Si-eon’s rational coercion, Kwon Mu-seop exhaled a long sigh.
I was the one who’d convinced Kwon Mu-seop to hear what Team Leader Cha had to say.
These people need operation meetings as their most viable forum for communication, so why silence him? I thought.
But listening to him now, I understood why Kwon Mu-seop had gagged him in the first place.
This, no matter how I looked at it, was gambling with lives.
A gamble with success odds you couldn’t even begin to estimate—truly a gamble with no answer.

* * *

Kwon Mu-seop said he had something else to discuss with Cha Si-eon, so I stepped out first.
Morning work was already in ruins anyway, so I headed back to the residence.
Last night, Kwak Jae-gyeom had offered me something between an explanation and a non-explanation.

—Somehow it ended up looking like we were hiding it, but we didn’t expect Lee Sol to change this dramatically either.
—The reason I didn’t tell you was because there’d be nothing good in it even if you found out.

According to Jae-gyeom, Lee Sol’s transformation had been a shock to the Management Bureau staff as well.
Now I understood why Jae-gyeom had described Rescuer Association activities as an oxygen respirator.
These people needed ventilation in some form.
So what happens next?
If Lee Sol “dies humanely,” will they find some other hobby and muddle through alright?
I don’t know.
Will Manager Kwon authorize Team Leader Cha’s operation?
Is betting lives on that uncertain possibility actually the right call, or would wisdom lie in restraint?
I don’t know that either.
I’d sat down thinking I’d at least listen to smooth things over, frustrated at how things were spinning. But the situation hadn’t really changed.
What couldn’t be helped remained unhelpful.
“Hm?”
When I returned to my room, there was a message on my tablet.
It was from Tae-o.

—It’s Lee Sol’s quarantine records. Refer to them if you need to.

Refer to them for what?
I hesitated a moment, then opened the shared file.
It contained reams of documents, dozens of photos, and a few videos.
After deliberating, I opened a photo from around February.
Lee Sol, dressed in a medical gown, was eating pizza.
Hm, she had a pretty good life back then.
Scrolling further, I found photos of her playing with her phone, playing board games with a female researcher.
But once March came around, Lee Sol’s clothes changed to a restraint suit.
Her complexion had turned pale, and her eyes were different from before.
The restraint suit didn’t last long before reverting to a medical gown.
It looked like something growing from her back had shredded the restraint suit, rendering it useless.
After that, most photos were taken while she slept.
Many showed cuts and scratches on her face, and she was receiving IV drips almost daily.
Looking at those photos, I muttered under my breath.
Why are you here like this? All that compromise for nothing.
As I kept scrolling, a video naturally came up.
I played it.

—

Waaaaagh—!
The moment the video started, the siren wailed.
In that footage, Lee Sol was in agony.
Thump—!
An invisible pressure slammed down everywhere in the space.
Bang—! Bang—!
Someone rushed at the rampaging Lee Sol.
It was Cha Si-eon.
Cha Si-eon twisted and broke what had grown over Lee Sol’s shoulders.
Lee Sol screamed in agony, thrashing.
Cha Si-eon held her down regardless, suppressing even her convulsions.
He was cut and torn by her violent resistance, yet he kept subduing her, over and over.
And after Cha Si-eon held Lee Sol’s shoulders and endured for some time, the rampage stopped and the siren faded.
As silence fell, Lee Sol, having barely regained her senses, wept quietly.
—Uncle, I’m sorry…….
—It’s okay.
Cha Si-eon murmured as though it were nothing.
He simply murmured, holding the weeping Lee Sol tighter.
—It’s okay.

—

I pressed my forehead as the video ended.
A sigh spilled from my lips without my noticing.
“This crazy bastard…….”

* * *

Once work ended, Team Leader Cha appeared on the terrace.
I, waiting there already, asked him coolly.
“Did you convince the manager?”
“Not yet.”
If it’s not yet, then it’s failed, surely.
This guy still hasn’t given up.
I nodded, and in that moment, Cha Si-eon stood beside me.
“The manager said you…….”
“……?”
“……subjected him to personal attacks and gaslighting.”
Cha Si-eon looked at me with eyes that said: What on earth did you do?
No, but the way he’s putting it is weird…….
We had a rational conversation.
I simply pointed out that because of that experience, he nearly got innocent people killed in the Ant Hill. And because he kept taking refuge in responsibility, kept insisting on conservative caution, I asked whether he really was just a one-trick person.
Several similar exchanges happened after that, but still.
I waved off his skeptical gaze lightly.
Then I asked point-blank.
“You don’t intend to give up on Lee Sol, do you?”
Cha Si-eon didn’t answer.
It wasn’t surprising, so I just murmured casually.
“I’m not fond of letting actions do the talking. Actions are actions, words are words—why does action have to speak for you? Speak first, speak straight, then act. If you won’t speak, then other people have to read between the lines. And then people like you always say, ‘I never asked you to read me’—it’s infuriating. If you’re going to be like that, at least do things right on your own.”
“I…….”
“Anyway. You don’t intend to give up on Lee Sol, right?”
Cha Si-eon looked at me incredulously.
As if to say: Why am I being subjected to this?
So I met his gaze steadily.
To say: That’s why you’re being subjected to it—because you don’t understand.
Fortunately, he seemed to feel something. After a long pause, Cha Si-eon spoke.
“Yes.”
“Then make one promise with me.”
At the word “promise,” he looked at me again.
I met that nonverbal response calmly and spoke with precise words.
“Stake your life to protect hers. Then I’ll help you save Lee Sol.”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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