The facility smelled like blood and disinfectant.
It always did. You'd think I'd be used to it by now. Six months of living in a military compound, fighting Devourers, watching people die—should have been enough time to adjust.
It wasn't.
"Kang. Briefing room. Now."
I looked up from my bunk. Commander Park stood in the doorway, her expression unreadable. She was in her forties, covered in scars, with eyes that had gone cold somewhere between the Fracture and now.
"What's the mission?" I asked, already pulling on my gear.
"You'll find out with everyone else."
Never a good sign.
The briefing room was packed. Thirty Augmented—what was left of our unit after last week's disaster. We'd gone into Sector 17 with fifty. Twenty came back.
Nobody talked about the ones who didn't.
"Listen up." Commander Park activated the holo-display. A map materialized—Sector 19, northeast quadrant. "Intel suggests a Nest. Class-S threat. Estimated Devourer count: three hundred minimum."
Someone whistled low. Class-S meant suicide mission.
"Civilian survivors?" someone asked.
"Approximately two thousand. Trapped in a bunker beneath the old subway system. They have food for maybe three more days." Park's jaw tightened. "After that, they start dying. Or worse—they get desperate and try to leave."
Which meant they'd get eaten.
"Our objective is simple. Breach the Nest, eliminate all Devourers, extract the civilians. Standard search and destroy."
"With thirty people?" The voice belonged to Lee Yuna, one of the few Augmented who'd survived longer than a year. "Against three hundred Devourers? You're sending us to die."
"I'm sending you to do your job," Park snapped. "Two thousand lives, Lieutenant. Or do they not matter anymore?"
Yuna's fists clenched, but she said nothing.
"Insertion is at 0600 hours. Full combat load. Questions?"
I raised my hand. "Extraction plan?"
"Helicopters. Assuming we can clear a landing zone."
"And if we can't?"
Park met my eyes. "Then you'd better learn to run fast."
0545 Hours - Sector 19 Perimeter
The city was dead.
Seoul used to have ten million people. Now? Maybe two million, scattered across fortified zones and bunkers. The rest were either corpses or Devourers.
Sometimes both.
Our convoy stopped two kilometers from the Nest entrance. Any closer and we'd trigger their detection.
"Check your gear," Sergeant Kim barked. "Augments, confirm your status."
I closed my eyes, focusing inward. The augmentation sat in my chest like a second heart. Pulsing. Alien. Wrong.
But powerful.
I flexed my fingers. Black tendrils—what the scientists called "reactive tissue"—writhed beneath my skin. My augmentation allowed me to manipulate biomass. Shape it. Weaponize it.
Every Augmented was different. Yuna could phase through solid matter. Kim had enhanced strength and regeneration. Private Choi controlled electricity.
And we were all slowly dying.
Augmentation didn't last forever. The foreign tissue gradually consumed its host. Some people lasted years. Others lasted only months. There was no pattern. No way to predict who'd burn out first.
"Minjae." Yuna appeared beside me. "You good?"
"Define good."
"Functional. Not having a breakdown. Take your pick."
I managed a smile. "Functional. Probably."
She studied me for a moment. "This is your first Nest raid."
"That obvious?"
"You're not vomiting yet. Give it time." She checked her rifle. "Stay close to me. Don't try to be a hero. Heroes die fast."
"What about the survivors?"
"We save who we can. That's all we can do."
The signal came through our comms. Green light. Time to move.
We advanced through the ruins in tactical formation. Buildings that used to scrape the sky now lay shattered. Cars rusted in the streets. Bodies—old ones, just bones now—littered the ground.
Then I saw it.
The Nest.
Devourers built them from whatever material was available. This one had been constructed from concrete, steel, bone, and what looked disturbingly like human tissue. It pulsed. Actually pulsed, like a living thing.
Because it was.
"Contact," someone whispered.
Movement in the shadows. Then more. Dozens of shapes emerging from the Nest's entrance.
Devourers.
They'd been human once. You could still see traces—a hand here, a face there. But the essence had warped them. Twisted them into something else. Some had extra limbs. Others had mouths where mouths shouldn't be. All of them were hungry.
"Hold," Kim commanded. "Let them come to us."
The Devourers moved as a pack. Silent. Coordinated.
Then they charged.
"FIRE!"
Gunfire erupted. Bullets tore through Devourer flesh. Some went down. Most kept coming.
"Augments, engage!"
I didn't think. Just acted.
The tendrils burst from my arms, extending ten feet in an instant. I lashed out, piercing through three Devourers before they could reach our line. Their bodies convulsed, then went still.
But more were coming.
Always more.
Yuna phased through a Devourer's attack, reappeared behind it, and put a bullet through its skull. Choi sent lightning arcing through a cluster of them. Kim was a blur of motion, his enhanced strength turning his fists into lethal weapons.
And still they came.
"Fall back to secondary position!" Park ordered.
We retreated in stages. Professional. Controlled. Exactly like we'd trained.
Training didn't account for the sheer number of them.
"Nest is spawning!" someone screamed. "They're multiplying!"
I looked back. The Nest's entrance was disgorging Devourers faster than we could kill them. Dozens. Hundreds.
This is wrong. Intel said three hundred total. There are already more than that.
"We need to collapse the Nest!" I shouted. "Destroy the core!"
"Negative!" Park responded. "Civilians are directly below. Collapsing it will kill them!"
So we were trapped. Caught between saving civilians and saving ourselves.
A Devourer broke through our line. It grabbed Private Choi. He screamed—then his screams turned wet as it started feeding.
"CHOI!"
I launched my tendrils and pulled the Devourer off him. Too late. Choi's chest was gone. Just gone.
His eyes found mine. Confused. Fading.
Then nothing.
"MOVE!" Yuna grabbed my arm, yanking me back. "Don't freeze! Keep moving!"
My hands were shaking. Covered in blood—Choi's blood, Devourer blood, maybe my own.
People are dying. We're all going to die here.
"Minjae, FOCUS!"
Yuna's voice cut through the panic. I looked at her.
"We're not dead yet," she said. "And those civilians are counting on us. So either pull yourself together, or get out of my way."
She was right.
I forced down the fear. The horror. Let the augmentation's cold logic take over.
We can't win by firepower. We need to be smarter.
I activated my comm. "Commander! I have an idea, but it's insane."
"Try me."
"The Nest is organic. It's connected to every Devourer in the area. If I can access its core and inject my augmentation directly—I might be able to kill it from the inside."
Silence. Then: "That would require direct contact with the core. You'd have to go into the Nest."
"I know."
"You'd be alone. No backup. And we don't know if your augmentation is compatible. It might reject you. Consume you."
"I know that too."
More silence. Then: "Do it. Yuna, escort him to the entrance. Everyone else, hold the line. Buy them time."
Yuna grabbed my shoulder. "You're actually doing this?"
"Unless you have a better idea."
"I really don't." She smiled grimly. "Try not to die. I hate breaking in new partners."
We ran.
Through the chaos. Through the battlefield. Toward the pulsing, living nightmare that was the Nest.
And I tried very hard not to think about the fact that I was probably about to die.
But if I could save two thousand people?
Maybe that would be enough.