Chapter 252: Poring Situation 1

Elise showed him footage of a man touching a woman’s shoulder. It looked like a simple touch, but the woman walked away with the man right after it.

Junhyuk frowned while watching.

“One simple can infect other people.”

“The infection spreads even when someone’s clothes are covering them.”

He thought it over for a moment and asked, “Maybe the rate of infection isn’t as fast as I thought it would be?”

Eunseo asked, “There are already thousands of people infected. How is it slow?”

He answered calmly, “The infection spreads only through touch, but there is no way to escape it.”

After listening to him, Elise added, “That a.s.sessment is correct. It’s a simple mode of infection, but the numbers are still low. The first five were only able to infect twenty people each. It’s a slow process.”

“That also means the infection rate is twenty per day.”

Elise agreed.

“Five will infect a hundred. A hundred will infect two thousand. Two thousand will infect forty thousand,” she said and continued, “But the number of infected did not increase on the first and second day. On Sat.u.r.day, a hundred were infected, and two thousand on Sunday. Today, forty thousand will be infected.”

“There’ll be forty thousand infected just in Seoul?”

“If we are a day late, Seoul will have eighty thousand people infected,” Junhyuk said.

Eunseo looked at other employees and asked, “Did you not get any replies?”

“Not yet.”

“Call chief of police,” she told Elise without any hesitation.

“Right.”

Zaira connected to the police chief, and Eunseo spoke quickly, “Chief, people infected by a monster are appearing in downtown Seoul. If we don’t do anything, the number of infected will grow to forty thousand.”

“What are you talking about all of a sudden?”

“It started in Yeouido, and the infection is spreading. We have to establish a joint military/police command center to deal with the situation. If we don’t do it today, there’ll be forty thousand infected by the end of the day, and tomorrow, we’ll see eighty thousand people infected.

“Where should I go?”

“We have a temporary command center here at the company. Come here, and have your officers get ready. Make sure they can respond to anything right away.”

“I’ll get there as soon as possible once I get the basics set up. Do you have a landing pad?”

“On the roof.”

“I’ll be there.”

Eunseo hung up and looked at Elise.

“Call the Army Chief.”

She told the Chief the same story and hung up.

“We have to find out where those two thousand people are, and when they started infecting other people.”

“We found the whereabouts of 1,552,” Elise said.

Eunseo didn’t hesitate.

“Did you find the origin of it all?”

“We’ve spotted the first five, but we only found the location of one of them.”

“Get me that person’s ident.i.ty,” Eunseo said.

Elise stared at her, and Eunseo said, “Deploy the iron soldier.”

“That’s good. We’ll certainly catch the person.”

Elise operated something and the whole building shook. The iron soldier was deployed. While it flew, it transmitted footage of its path.

“What’s the incubation period for the infection before people can start infecting others?” Junhyuk murmured.

“It takes about twenty hours, but I’m not so sure.”

He asked Zaira, “From when is the last footage you have of infection?”

[Sixteen hours ago.]

Junhyuk sighed and said, “We have to do ID checks on all of the infected people and we have four hours to do it.”

Eunseo nodded and looked at Elise.

“Carry out the plans. Run a check on all of the people infected. How long would it take?”

“Wait a second.” Elise operated her tablet and said, “It takes time to run ID checks with facial recognition only.”

The screen was running through the faces one by one.

“They are spreading through downtown Seoul. Are they moving anywhere else?”

“Yeouido was at the center of it all, but it hasn’t spread outside of Seoul yet.”

Eunseo looked at the group after talking to the Army chief and said, “We have to move quickly before a curfew is announced. A joint police/army task force will deal with the situation.”

They might impose a curfew. If eighty thousand people were infected, they would have to block off the entire city of Seoul.

“The infected have to wait until they can infect others. If it wasn’t for that, Seoul would’ve been overrun already.”

Everyone frowned at his statement. If eighty thousand people were infected, a million six hundred thousand would be the next step.

Eunseo made another call and said, “The Chief of Police will be here soon. Let’s go meet him.”

Dohee, Eunseo and Junhyuk went to the roof, and he took the chance to make Eunseo a question, “What will the police do?”

“Right now, their SWAT teams have taken five helicopters around the city in search of people whose ident.i.ties have been confirmed.”

They soon saw a helicopter arriving. The rotor was loud, and it was blowing a lot of wind, but men walked out of the helicopter. The Chief of Police Taewoo Jeon, his a.s.sisted, and a man with a rough exterior stepped onto the roof.

Eunseo offered her hand, and Taewoo shook it.

“I’ve dispatched SWAT, but I want to hear more from you.”

“Let’s go down. I’ll explain everything.”

On the elevator, Taewoo asked, “Who is coming from the army?”

“The Army Chief will be here.”

“He is?!”

“Yes.”

Taewoo laughed intensely.

“Of course… The situation might spread beyond Seoul.”

They arrived at the command center, and Taewoo took a seat with the others. Elise turned on a big screen and showed them the CCTV footage.

Eunseo introduced her.

“She is our chief researcher, Doctor Elise. She will explain the monster infection to you.”

Elise bowed.

“Nice to meet you all. I’m Dr. Elise.” She continued, “This video shows a person, who is infected, infecting another. It’s the only video we have of it.”

Taewoo frowned.

“The contact happened over the clothes. Is infection still possible that way?”

“Yes. All you have to do is touch someone. Under or over clothing doesn’t matter. It takes about two for the infection to spread, but only one second of constant touch is required.”

She continued, “The people infected act as one group, and that seems to be because the source is controlling the others.”

“Then we have quarantine people who are infected. Do they display any other symptoms?”

Elise pointed to the screen showing the footage of the poring in Yeouido. “This is the cause of the infection. During the fight in Yeouido, some people got infected. At least, that’s what we think,” she explained.

She looked at Eunseo and asked, “Can I show the footage from the iron soldier?”

“Do it.”

The images on the screen changed.

“One of the first five infected people has been identified. The iron soldier is out to arrest that person.”

The monitor showed an apartment complex getting closer. The iron soldier broke one of the windows of the apartment and went inside. There, it saw a man. The man’s eyes were completely green, and it attacked the iron soldier without hesitation.

The iron soldier grabbed the man’s wrist, but the man, who didn’t seem to feel any pain, grabbed the iron soldier’s head. The iron soldier slammed him against the ground, but the man moved quickly and in an inhuman way.

The iron soldier slammed him against the wall, destroying it. The man punched at kicked at the soldier, but the iron soldier broke all of his limbs and stuffed the mans mouth with a cloth.

[I caught him alive. Returning now.]

The iron soldier was on its way back, and Elise explained, “We have to research the man further, but I can guess at what is happening. The man doesn’t feel pain, and his movements are superhuman.”

While frowning, Taewoo asked, “Is it possible to bring them back alive?”

“That won’t be easy. We’ll use tranquilizer guns, but if that doesn’t work, we should be prepared to kill.”

“We have to kill them?”

Elise nodded heavily.

“We have to do further research, but they will infect others within four hours. If that happens, forty thousand people will be like that.”

“You are saying we have to capture or kill them within four hours?”

She nodded, and Taewoo couldn’t hide his displeasure. If he had to give the order to kill them, his public life would be over.

The man with the rough exterior said, “I am sorry, but the lives of our policemen are important.”

The man got on the phone with someone and said coldly, “I am giving you new orders. You may shoot to kill those resisting arrest. Keep yourselves safe.”

Taewoo didn’t speak. The man had spoken instead, and Junhyuk agreed with him.

He looked at the man and said, “The order to kill is justified, but you should use silencers so ordinary citizens won’t know what is taking place.”

The man looked at him.

“What is your name?”

“My name is Junhyuk Lee.”

“I’m Moonki Song.”

Moonki made another call, and Eunseo got a call of her own.

“The army chief is here.”

Taewoo got up and said, “Let’s all go.”

Eunseo looked at Junhyuk.

“You go. I’ll stay here,” he said.

He looked at Moonki, and Moonki nodded. Taewoo and Eunseo went out, and Elise added, “The iron soldier is here. I have to go now.”

Elise gave Junhyuk the tablet and explained, “You have unlimited power to deal with the situation. Use Zaira to help you.”

“If you find anything else, let me know.”