Chapter 13

Chapter 13
## Chapter 13

Ajantu

“This way! Step on it!” Commander Lee Chang-soo, a veteran officer with the Korean Returnee Association, barked orders to his squad as they sprinted after the escaping lawbreakers.

“Sir, are we sure this isn’t a wild goose chase? We breached the perimeter within five minutes of the alarm, but given the bizarre magic these dimensional travelers wield, they’ve likely vanished into thin air by now.”

“Then what do you propose we do? Give up without even picking up a scent? This marks the third incident this week!”

The criminal pair—a ferocious lycanthrope and an enigmatic figure donning a dark facial concealment—had become notorious recurring headaches for law enforcement.

The authorities had successfully tracked their movements in previous operations, only for the trail to completely evaporate without a trace, leaving investigators entirely empty-handed.

*Damn it all, their operational territory is far too wide for our current patrol routes. They must have an underground network arranging their extractions. This case is turning into an absolute nightmare.*

It was a universal truth of security work that protecting a perimeter demanded far greater numbers than breaching one, and the tactical ranks of the Guardians were perpetually understaffed.

Even so, the squad pressed forward through the gloom, desperate to uncover any scrap of forensic evidence.

*Thud!*

The heavy vibration of an impact reverberated from the skeletal frame of the unfinished building ahead.

“Commander… do you feel that ambient pressure…?”

“Damn, stay close! We’re moving in!”

While the initial sound might have seemed like falling debris, the unsettling aura radiating from the structure carried a distinct, spine-chilling malice.

Lee Chang-soo wasted no time and crossed the threshold into the construction site.

“What in the world happened here?”

Slumped across one corner of the dirt floor were several unconscious laborers. In the center of the clearing lay a masked operative and an seemingly commonplace civilian female, both completely blacked out.

And crumpled against a fractured concrete column, his monstrous features gradually shifting back into human anatomy, was the battered form of the werewolf.

Taking in the Carnage, Lee Chang-soo barked to his subordinates, “Secure the perimeter immediately! This skirmish concluded only moments ago; the perpetrator must still be in the immediate vicinity!”

The narrative of the scene was elementary.

An unknown combatant had engaged the rogue elements, neutralized them entirely, and departed.

Considering the villains were left alive but incapacitated, the mysterious fighter likely bore no malice toward the public, though that didn’t mean law enforcement could overlook such an anomaly.

The residual energy hovering in the air was potent enough to make the officers’ skin crawl, making it an absolute priority to identify this wildcard entity.

Yet, despite a thorough sweeping of the local blocks, the phantom vigilante had vanished like smoke.

“Sir, the targets have been securely restrained.”

A squad member materialized at his side, using telekinetic gravity to hover three individuals bound in specialized suppression cuffs engineered specifically for supernatural offenders.

The woman was a fresh face in their databases, but judging by her positioning, she was almost certainly the logistics expert providing their escape portals.

“Once we get them into the isolation chambers, the truth will come out.”

Psychic interrogation techniques left no room for deception or evasion.

As a standard precaution, the commander requested transport reinforcements and ordered the dazed laborers transferred to the secure medical wing of the regional hospital, which maintained a permanent Guardian detachment.

Even if the female accomplice attempted to feign the role of an innocent hostage, the psychic scans would tear through her facade.

“The immediate threat is neutralized, and a major crisis has been averted…,” Lee Chang-soo muttered, though a fresh anxiety gripped his mind.

The oppressive, foreign energy vibrating through the structural beams remained deeply unsettling.

“Our only hope is squeezing some intelligence out of these three captives.”

Since they had faced that terrifying power head-on, their memories would contain the answers the Association desperately needed.

—

I waited until I was safely clear of the area before re-summoning Hans, whom I had hastily dismissed earlier.

Bit by bit, I was growing accustomed to standing face-to-face with his monstrous presence, finding the mental fortitude to keep my own rising panic under control.

*My civilian identity, Hansung-hyun, possesses negligible combat value, but Hans is an entirely different story. Utilizing him allows me to influence events without ever exposing my true face.*

Given that the confrontation took place a substantial distance from my neighborhood, reducing the likelihood of personal blowback, there had been no logical reason to sit idly by.

*Though I must admit, those criminals possessed significantly more combat prowess than I anticipated.*

Disabling the woman—who clearly filled a non-combat utility role—and the masked mercenary had been straightforward, particularly since they had lowered their guard believing their spatial rift offered a guaranteed exit strategy.

However, the lycanthrope’s physical resilience and stubborn refusal to yield had pushed my summon harder than expected.

It was fortunate that I managed to shatter his defenses and perform a cancel summon to wipe my tracks before the Association’s vanguard breached the perimeter, but the margin for error had been razor-thin.

*To maintain a coherent defense while actively suffering from a supernatural terror status effect… those two must have survived brutal environments to earn their status as returnees. It makes perfect sense that they wouldn’t fold instantly.*

Naturally, the caliber of these individuals varied wildly across the spectrum.

Unlike the initial waves of historical pioneers who were pulled across dimensions with absolutely no preparation, modern returnees benefited from established institutional knowledge, allowing many to utilize standardized, safe methods for harvesting karma and securing their passage home.

Consequently, some gifted individuals were completing their dimensional cycles in as little as five years, a massive drop from the decade-long trials required during the pioneer era.

Of course, a select few intentionally prolonged their stays abroad to accumulate overwhelming cosmic power.

*Even with those advantages, a twenty percent survival and return rate across the population is a staggering statistic. And that’s a massive leap forward from the early casualty rates.*

Regardless, those macro-politics were no longer my concern.

The Guardians would undoubtedly recover the stolen precious commodities from the scene and see that the state judiciary handled the sentencing.

I had briefly weighed the option of completely liquidating the crew to ensure absolute anonymity, but…

*Their rap sheet didn’t indicate any homicides. If I start executing people indiscriminately, Hans will be branded an existential threat by the media for no valid reason. As long as the investigators remain oblivious to the fact that he’s a summoned entity rather than a human rogue, my position remains secure.*

Reflecting on the encounter, hunting down criminal syndicates wasn’t the worst way to spend an evening.

It provided an effective outlet for processing my lingering anxieties while bleeding off a significant amount of daily stress.

—

Over the course of the following week, Heinz systematically mapped the urban layout and gathered local intelligence, relying heavily on Diana’s assistance.

Diana was a sharp twelve-year-old child I had crossed paths with upon my initial entry through the city gates—a lifelong resident who knew every cobblestone and corner.

*You couldn’t ask for a better guide. Her extensive knowledge of the local underworld is a clear byproduct of an incredibly grueling childhood.*

In exchange for a daily wage of two silver pieces, she had agreed to serve as my personal navigator throughout the duration of my urban stay.

That simple transaction formed the foundation of the partnership between Heinz and Diana.

Recognizing the critical value of her localized expertise, I had fronted her a portion of the silver immediately.

It was a calculated gamble, but thus far, Diana had honored every term of our arrangement with absolute precision.

I had been thoroughly taken aback on our opening day when I discovered her waiting quietly outside the entrance of my rented quarters before the sun had even cleared the horizon.

From that moment on, we established a comfortable rhythm: meeting up for a midday meal, sharing a table, and traversing the commercial sectors to analyze the city’s infrastructure.

*Or at least, that was our established routine until yesterday.*

Yes, until everything went sideways yesterday morning.

I pushed myself away from the wooden table in the common room of the inn, keeping a watchful eye on the front door for any sign of Diana.

*She didn’t strike me as the type to casually abandon a paid contract. Her punctuality had been flawless up to this point. Did she run into some kind of trouble?*

Ultimately, the geographic and cultural intelligence she had provided over the past several days was worth far more than the silver I had spent.

Taking precautions, I left a brief update for the innkeeper regarding my destination and navigated toward the central marketplace on my own.

The municipal district bore the name ‘Ajantu,’ a modest provincial hub situated on the western fringes of the continental Talya Kingdom.

The tavern rumors described it as a conventional settlement reliant entirely on agricultural yields, game hunting, and foraging the surrounding dense timberlands.

*Though the local garrison clearly lacks the numbers to maintain proper public order.*

The thoroughfares were visibly sparse, and the residents I passed carried an overarching aura of defeat, their expressions weighed down by an unspoken dread.

While Diana had avoided going into specifics, she had given me strict instructions to avoid the labyrinth of back alleys entirely, keep my boots on the paved main avenues, and secure transit out of the region as fast as humanly possible.

*It’s probably wise to conclude my business here and move on. There’s a much larger trading hub located a week’s travel to the east…*

With my travel itinerary taking shape, I began prioritizing my errands, focusing on acquiring long-term rations and travel gear for the road ahead.

“Psst, over here, traveler. Might we have a quick word with you?”

A cluster of heavily built men, their necklines dominated by aggressive black ink tattoos, were gesturing toward me from the shadows of a narrow alleyway.

I cast a quick glance over my shoulder to check for alternate explanations, but the street behind me was entirely deserted.

*Why is it that trouble always seems to find me right when I’m planning an exit?*

Choosing the path of least resistance, I stepped into the alleyway to see what they wanted.

Since my departure from the city was imminent, my priority was resolving any potential altercations with minimal drama; if diplomacy failed, I could always pivot to a more aggressive resolution.

“…So, look at it this way, friend. Our association handles the security details for this specific block of the merchant quarter, and maintaining a crew of our size requires a significant amount of coin…”

Once the posturing was stripped away, the core of their proposition was entirely transparent.

It was a standard, run-of-the-mill protection racket.

“Ah, I completely comprehend the situation. Here, while this might only be a modest sum, I trust it will assist in keeping these streets safe for travelers. Consider it a token of my appreciation for your hard work.”

“Well, look at that. This young traveler possesses excellent manners and a sharp mind. We’ll make sure this is put to good use.”

Rather than escalating a minor inconvenience, I reached into my coat, slid a reasonable amount of coin into their palms, and brought the interaction to a peaceful conclusion.

In anticipation of such scenarios, I always carried a secondary, lightly funded coin purse specifically designed to satisfy local highwaymen.

*Regardless of how smoothly that went, the breakdown of civic authority here is glaringly obvious.*

“Hey boss, what’s the play with that little brat anyway…?”

“Don’t worry your head about it. The orders came directly down from the upper tier. Our job is to execute the mandate, not question it…”

The low murmuring of the enforcers faded as they retreated deeper into the slums, but my cognitive focus had already locked onto their words.

*Reaching the neighboring eastern hub on foot will require roughly seven days of steady marching. While that timeline applies to normal merchants, my physical conditioning should allow me to shave off a couple of days… Perhaps securing a mount or a space on a merchant caravan would be more practical?*

Since destiny had stranded me in a fantasy realm, experiencing a long-distance carriage ride felt like a mandatory item on the bucket list.

While weighing the logistics of my impending departure and scanning the storefronts for a dry-goods grocer to purchase salted meats, a familiar silhouette caught the corner of my eye.

“…Thank you for your time, ma’am. Please, if you notice him anywhere near the stalls, send word to the lodging house!”

“Don’t worry, child, I’ll keep my eyes open.”

Concluding her desperate conversation with the female shopkeep, Diana gave a frantic nod and began sprinting blindly down the pavement toward my position.

Completely oblivious to the crisis driving her, she nearly collided with me in her rush to pass, forcing me to reach out and firmly anchor her by the forearm.

“Let go of me! What do you think you’re doing? Help!”

To any casual observer on the street, the optics were terrible—I looked exactly like a predator targeting a child.

I immediately released my grip, raising my hands while wearing an exasperated expression.

“Diana, open your eyes, it’s Heinz! You completely stood me up for our daily appointment without a word. What is going on? I’ve been waiting at the common room for hours!”

“Oh… mister?”

Her focus finally snapped to my face, her pupils widening as recognition set in.

A profound terror seemed to have hijacked her senses, her eyes darting erratically as she struggled to anchor herself.

“Oh my goodness…! Please forgive me for breaking our contract! I should have run to the inn to explain the situation, but my head is completely spinning right now!”

“That much is obvious. Don’t worry about the contract, just tell me what happened to cause this panic.”

“It’s… it’s my little brother, Aaron… he’s gone…”

As Diana forced the words past her lips, heavy tears began spilling over her eyelids.

“I had prepared our morning meal… and instructed him to clean his face and hands before eating… but the basin was completely dry. So, I stepped out to the well for water… and when I returned…”

A wave of intense sobbing choked off the remainder of her sentence, her shoulders shaking violently.

*Great, this situation looks incredibly compromising to anyone passing by.*

A physically imposing young man standing over a weeping, terrified young girl in a public square.

And unfortunately, I was that imposing young man.

Terrified of attracting the local guards, I took a panicked step backward to create some distance.

Diana remained entirely consumed by her grief, tears tracking paths through the dust on her cheeks.

“Hey, hey, take it easy! I hear you! I understand there’s an emergency, so just take a deep breath and try to steady yourself, alright? Breathe in, breathe out. I’m right here, and I’m listening. Tell me the rest.”

The simple truth was, I had always possessed a massive soft spot for kids in distress.

—

It took a few minutes of patient reassurance to quiet Diana’s crying enough to piece together her narrative.

“I have a younger brother named Aaron. He’s only eight years old, and he’s been battling a terrible fever for weeks now…”

Though her explanation was fractured by occasional hitches in her breath, the overarching picture became painfully clear.

The two siblings were orphans, left entirely to their own devices to scratch out a survival by running small errands, carrying water, and performing menial labor for the neighborhood residents.

Then, disaster struck when Aaron’s health collapsed, leaving him entirely bedridden and helpless.

“The local apothecary demanded an exorbitant sum for the fever reduction herbs, forcing me to take a loan from some very dangerous people. I was completely trapped beneath that debt, but then you arrived in the city, mister.”

Our chance encounter had provided her with the financial windfall necessary to clear her outstanding accounts before the lenders came to collect.

“And with the extra food allowances you provided during our tours, I was able to properly feed him. His color was finally returning, and he was getting stronger every day…”

*Now that I think about it, whenever we dined at the taverns, she always meticulously wrapped the leftover bread and roasted meats in a clean linen cloth instead of eating her fill.*

I had observed the behavior daily, operating under the assumption that she was simply budgeting her meals for later in the evening.

Had she simply communicated the reality of her domestic situation, I would have gladly financed a separate basket of rations for her household.

But dwelling on past assumptions was useless in the face of the current crisis.

Aaron had vanished without a trace this morning.

“Is it possible he recovered enough strength to go play with the neighborhood children?”

“Absolutely not! Even when the fever was at its worst, Aaron constantly expressed guilt over me carrying the financial burden alone. He was always begging to help with the chores! He would never willingly wander away from the house knowing it would cause me this much agony!”

Diana rejected the theory with fierce conviction, before her posture slumped, her voice dropping to a fragile whisper.

“…Besides, because of our situation, none of the other children in this district will play with him…”

The underlying social dynamics required no explanation.

A pair of destitute, unprotected orphans living in the slums—the cruelty of human nature remained entirely consistent across different dimensions.

“In that case, let’s prioritize a sweep of your residence. It’s entirely possible our paths crossed while you were searching the market stalls, meaning he might be sitting on the doorstep right now. Let’s verify that first. If the house is empty, I’ll join the search effort.”

“You mean it, uncle…?”

Despite my repeated corrections that I was far too young to be labeled ‘uncle,’ the semantics were entirely irrelevant to a child experiencing the worst day of her life.

“Well, look at it this way: once a problem is brought directly to your attention, you can’t exactly walk away and pretend you never saw it.”

We had built a solid rapport over the past week, and my conscience wouldn’t allow me to turn my back on a frantic child whose sibling had been missing for hours.

Abandoning her in this state was a line my moral compass wouldn’t let me cross as an adult.

Diana’s eyes went wide, her jaw dropping slightly as she processed my declaration, before she lowered her face and let out a quiet, emotional sigh of relief.

“Alright, standing around here won’t find your brother! Lead the way to your house.”

“Right!”

Wasting no more precious minutes, we pivoted and accelerated toward the edge of the slum district.

The reality of their living conditions was horrifyingly substandard, perfectly matching the grim expectations I had formed during our walk.

Their home was nothing more than a fragile lean-to, constructed from salvaged timber and rotting canvas, huddled among a cluster of similar shanties in the deep alleys.

“Isn’t maintaining a residence in an isolated sector like this incredibly hazardous for two children?”

The question slipped out despite my awareness that they had no financial alternatives, largely driven by the sheer volume of predatory, dangerous-looking figures we had passed on our trek inward.

How had two defenseless minors managed to avoid being preyed upon in a lawless zone like this?

“We’re usually safe from the street thugs. We pay our protection dues regularly.”

Diana extended a small finger toward a crude charcoal illustration emblazoned on the weathered wood of the alley wall.

The primitive drawing depicted the silhouette of a shark’s head, its maw lined with jagged, exaggerated teeth.

It was clearly the territorial marking of the criminal syndicate running the local rackets.

*Wait a minute… where have my eyes crossed that exact design recently…?*

“Aaron! Aaron, are you inside?! Answer me!”

While I stood frozen, attempting to trigger the relevant memory, Diana breached the threshold of the shack to check the interior, but her cries were met with absolute silence.

“What do we do now? Aaron isn’t here. What if the slavers or the press-gangs actually caught him…”

As Diana’s fragile composure shattered for a second time and the tears began to flow anew, the puzzle pieces in my mind snapped violently into place.

*The black ink branding on the napes of those heavy-set extorters from the market street!*

Simultaneously, the tail end of the conversation I had eavesdropped on echoed clearly in my mind.

> “Don’t worry your head about it. The orders came directly down from the upper tier. Our job is to execute the mandate, not question it…”

Those low-level enforcers were the exact operatives who had abducted her brother.