At Dongrang's words, I had to seriously revise my common sense.
Could it make sense for someone who had once been one of a Wing's top employees to suddenly join a terrorist organization?
At that level, he had to know better than anyone how pointless and time-wasting it was to oppose a Wing with half-baked force.
To put it bluntly, if K Corp hadn't been doing that incomprehensible thing of pinching pennies just to cover up the terrorism, they would've long since called in R Corp, an Association, or some famous Fixer office and had the whole place swept clean.
...Wait. Was it possible that being a top employee was exactly why he could do it?
What if K Corp had some crucial reason it couldn't afford to draw attention?
Someone in the position of a top employee would know that, no doubt. With only minimal support and no major backing from headquarters, he might have thought he could still pull something off...
No, maybe... terrorism actually benefited K Corp...?
"...Um, Saramago? We're almost there, I think. Um, hello?"
"...Ah, sorry. Were you calling me?"
"I've called you about three times now. What on earth were you thinking about so hard?"
At Ishmael's question, I was left speechless.
How was I supposed to explain this... that I'd been wondering why K Corp's top employee joined a terrorist organization, and ended up concluding that K Corp was actually letting the terrorism happen?
There was no way I could say that. It was half-baked nonsense, too...
After a moment of thought, what came out was, thankfully, a pretty decent dodge.
"...Just thinking about the old days for a bit..."
"..."
A little pity and some unreadable darkness settled into Ishmael's eyes. Geez... that made me feel guilty in its own way.
What I'd been thinking wasn't exactly the kind of thing you could casually bring up among K Corp researchers, even if...
"It wasn't anything that dark. I was just thinking about a workplace I used to work at a long time ago."
"A workplace... a hospital? Though if it was K Corp, then..."
"No. An even older workplace. It had nothing to do with medicine."
"Hm? Wait. Didn't Sara go straight into the medical field after graduating? You worked in a completely different field in between?"
"Oh, that's kind of interesting. I don't think I've ever heard the doctor's old stories in detail."
Well, um... I hadn't planned on telling anyone. But in this atmosphere...
"...I used to work at a Wing for a few years..."
"A Wing? You worked at a Wing? Which one? Which one? What Wing was it?"
Crap... was I really going to have to spill it?
"That..."
"Ah, just past this corridor. Then we'll reach the edge of the branch."
...! He cut me off from an unexpected place. Nice one, Dongrang!
"Once we get there safely and I collect the luggage I left behind, I'll hand over the ownership of the Golden Bough I mentioned."
"...But is this really all right? If you do this, the terrorist group will all run off and only the lab will be retaken. That seems a bit... unprofitable..."
"The terms of the contract were the retaking of the lab."
"That's why I kept telling you, Dongrang. When you draft a contract, you need to do it with a more meticulous, cold-blooded mindset so it works more in our favor."
Good, the topic had naturally shifted to work. Rodion was glaring at me with a dissatisfied look, though... hopefully that would work out somehow.
The killing machines were strangely out of sight, but there was no way they could keep pressing that question in this atmosphere...
As for the aftermath... well, that wasn't my problem right now. They'd sort it out later.
...What's that?
"Be careful, Manager! There's someone ahead."
""
"They may not be armed, but Manager, aren't you a frail civilian?"
""
"Can't you count? You're obviously outnumbered. What a fuss... Have you come? Worms."
The woman who appeared again, hurling the word "worms" like a curse, was one of the ringleaders who had instigated the terrorism at K Corp's research building earlier.
She was also the voice that had been mocking Gregor the whole time.
"That's the voice that was coming out of the machine. And... she's the person we saw earlier too."
Hm. Was there anyone who didn't know that, Sinclair?
Still, better than nothing...
"Where are the other members of your group? Senior Ran."
Senior Ran?
"...Looks like you dragged reinforcements in with you during all that chaos.
And how much have you even seen of us that you're calling me senior? Can't you tell at a glance?
They've all evacuated. And I'm... busy buying time."
"Interesting... I thought this was a surprise attack, but how did you know and get everyone out?"
"Because you're worms. Look at this. You got cocky after winning a single top employee award... and then you swaggered in here trying to catch us."
The woman speaking now, "Ran," was the person who had supposedly been K Corp's top employee?
Come to think of it, she had bragged earlier in the research building about how her paper on atoms at age eleven had turned out... She was more of a big shot than I'd thought.
"Your tongue's long. 'Dare' my ass.
Look at the numbers like you said. You know perfectly well it'd be better to surrender quietly, don't you?"
Heathcliff threatened the woman, swinging a metal bat menacingly.
Hmm... but someone who had once been a Wing's top employee couldn't possibly not know that. What was she hiding?
"...Say I surrender. Your plan is obvious without even looking.
You'd incapacitate me just enough so I wouldn't die... then 'treat' me with those fancy regeneration ampoules of yours. You'd repeat the same thing until you got the answer you wanted."
"Then wouldn't it be enough to just give us the answer we want in one shot? Wouldn't that work?"
"Of course not. Unlike you lot... we're not aiming to survive like cockroaches that live off whatever scraps are thrown at them."
"...You're really getting on my nerves."
...Ah, so that's what she'd been working so hard on earlier. I'd been watching closely, wondering what it was, and it was that?
She must have thought such a valuable asset was unlikely to do something insane, so it took her a while to find it.
"Ah~ I'm bored of playing with you now."
"What are you doing..."
Samjo seemed to notice something strange, but there was little he could do about it here.
Not that it mattered much, since I'd already started running.
"Yes, keep living your life while being endlessly curious only about what's happening right in front of your face. That's the proper attitude for a researcher."
"Senior..."
I can't believe she'd even leave me a full-blown last speech. Thanks to that, I bought enough time to grab her and shove my body into the passage inside.
Tch, so even an elite from K Corp hadn't seen this coming and prepared for it? Open your eyes that wide—
KRAAANG────!!!!
Before I could even finish the thought, my body was hurled hard in the opposite direction and slammed into the wall.
It hurt like hell, just as expected...
*
When I opened my eyes again, the corridor she had walked through was blackened with soot and leaking red metal.
What kind of lunatic straps that level of explosives to her own body...?
Hah... according to my prior observation, the only casualty was me.
Since I'd rushed out early, I'd been able to greatly reduce the direct blast damage on this side.
Which meant my corpse had probably been scattered so thoroughly that it was impossible to recognize any shape at all.
"..."
Ishmael silently supported my body.
Maybe because she'd watched a person die horribly right in front of her twice now, her expression looked grim.
To reassure her, I ran my hand through Ishmael's thick hair for a moment and looked around.
Everyone had taken some blast damage, but not to a serious degree. It matched the rough possibilities I'd skimmed through. No need to worry too much, apparently.
The atmosphere was unsettled because of the sudden suicide bombing, but... that shouldn't be a major issue.
"The fact that you could throw yourself in without hesitation probably came from believing you'd be revived at any time.
Not because of some feeling or attachment... right?"
"...I just did what had to be done."
"I see... so that's how it is. Convenient, isn't it? Being able to restore your body without regeneration ampoules."
""
Considering the amount of money you'd have to gather just to use one K Corp ampoule, this was obviously far more convenient.
Of course, it was a sad truth that would never be spoken aloud because one person had to bear all that pain.
"...So that's why you never kept taking regeneration ampoules. That clock had a special ability."
"That's right. They're people I brought here after thorough verification and investigation."
"Right... man... all those ampoules I brought... are useless now."
As she muttered that, Shurenne let out a hollow laugh and dropped the ampoules from her bag onto the floor.
...It was strange to just throw them away on the floor because they weren't needed here. The Fixers from the Rose Spanner Workshop could use ampoules just fine too.
Could it be... no, impossible. It couldn't be.
Suppressing the cold unease creeping up my spine, I voiced my opinion that we should move forward.
Nothing bad would happen. Right.
...There wouldn't be anything.