Chapter 8 – Security Robot
The lower area is incomparably larger than the other two. Of course, it is impossible to avoid the infected and move.
[One body each at 9 meters on the left side and 17 meters on the right side. The cross-vision of the two entities is blocked by a truck. From the left.]
The dark streets hid me, and stopped cars provided good cover.
An army knife was already digging into the back of the neck when the first infected felt something strange. As I pierced his neck and tore his spinal cord, his knees gave out and he sat down.
Pug.
After grabbing the back of the head and pinning it to the ground, the knife was held in reverse and the torn spinal cord was stabbed once more to stop the movement.
His head moved vigorously to and fro, but he did not move the slightest motion below his neck. I just hit my face on the ground.
They surpassed ordinary people in terms of resistance to pain and strength, but their senses were dull. If so, it is effective to directly attack the nervous system that controls body movement. In fact, this is a valid and often used method against humans.
He puts his knife in, picks up the fire axe, and approaches the second infected. The guy and I, standing parallel to each other with the front of a large truck in between.
Whoo~♪
I blew a low whistle and wandered back toward me.
[Kee-]
The moment he found me, the ax blade met his face in one beat.
Kwajik.
Luckily, he tore out his eyes and dug into his brain, killing him instantly. The crushed eye juice and brain water mixed together.
[Hurry up and enter the building. It’s easy to target from the outside, and it’s impossible to locate it through sensors.]
Follow the marker on the PDA and run down the road to enter the building.
[The lobby is safe.]
This is the administrative office. It is also a place to assign personnel recruited from outside and respond to various civil complaints. There were no infestations in the lobby, but the PDA was showing movement in passageways and rooms not far from it.
[This is an emergency. Evacuate in an orderly manner according to the instructions of the guards. According to Article 23, Paragraph 2 of the contract, we do not compensate for acts of violence caused by non-compliance.]
Unmanned issuing machines that issue various documents were playing emergency broadcasts. Among the job postings and advertisements hanging on the walls and the numerous papers on the floor, none of them were stained with blood.
[Six bodies in front.]
After passing through the lobby, there was a canteen with glass walls, and through the glass you could see the infected. The shelves obscured my view quite a bit, so I was able to avoid their gaze by crawling on the floor.
The problem is when you pass a doorway without a shelf. I slipped over the door so that only the head cam could be seen.
[Wait a minute.]
“Keeeeek-!”
“Grrrrrr-!”
Through the glass next to me, I could see the staggering feet and bloodstains on the floor. Some had intestines spilling out of their stomachs, and they rocked to and fro with his movements.
[Now!]
After being blown away, it rolled on two wheels to absorb the sound.
“What is their reaction?”
[It’s the same, I didn’t notice we passed.]
“…?”
[What’s the matter?]
“No, nothing.”
I was a little surprised that Artemis referred to ‘we’.
[From here on, it’s hard to get help from the fire detector. Keep your eyes and ears sharp.]
The place we are heading to now is a kind of subway. The residential area operates its own railway. It’s just for self-sufficiency, not something grandiose like entering a big city. In a limited space, no one can ride a car, and there is a limit to what a bus can handle, so streetcars are operated both on the ground and underground.
[If you ride from here, you can go to the power facility by the shortest route.]
All escalators were stopped. Overall, it looks like a subway station, but on a much smaller scale.
“Anyone with claustrophobia would be terrifying.”
In the narrow hallway, in the narrow waiting room, and on the wall, several bundles of wires with a thickness of an armful extend like arteries. The dim lighting here heightened the gloomy atmosphere.
When I finally reached the platform, a group of infestations greeted me. The number was quite large.
“Kieh!”
Not a few of the infected screaming at me had rubber bullets stuck all over their bodies. No matter how non-lethal bullets are, if they are hit properly, they can get stuck in the body like that and are dangerous. Of course, this is when the opponent is human.
Two civilian sentry guns were installed on the ceiling. Hundreds of shell casings fell below, but what use were rubber bullets?
[It seems that there were people who believed in the Sentry Gun and evacuated.]
Several shredded corpses were visible beyond the infected, most likely female, judging by the size of the corpse and the torn clothing.
“Keeeeek-!”
Now, most of the infected screamed as if they recognized me. It was a bit comical to see him approaching with colorful orange and blue rubber bullets all over his body.
Clap.
“Keeeee-!
Even though it was a non-lethal bullet, their movements were generally slow, probably because their joints and muscles were damaged by the rubber bullets hit dozens of times. Thanks to this, I was able to approach it at close range and hit it with maximum power.
Bang!
The iron beads flew and turned his face into porridge. Against the especially slow ones, I put the gun in front of my eyes and pulled the trigger.
Bang!
As it was, the eyes evaporated and at the same time the back of the head was smashed, and the face of the infectious agent behind it became covered with brains. As if it got into his eyes, he struggled, waving his arms in the air.
Pug.
Looking for a gap, I hit the face of the infected from the side with the butt, and blew the heads of the two approaching side by side with one shot. And shooting, and shooting again. Turned the approaching guys into corpses without heads.
Clap.
After emptying all the magazines, there are only 3 left. Even that was in a very bad condition because I was in the line of fire and was hit with bullets little by little. No need to waste ammo against these guys.
Sereung.
I put my shotgun in and pulled out my fire axe.
“Keeeeek-!”
Fuck! Puck!
It didn’t take long to finish them all.
[Pay attention to the back. There’s a group of people approaching you, probably attracted by the sound of gunfire. The number is four.]
“I expected this much.”
Soon after, a handful of infected came down the escalator with awkward steps. They spotted me right away and glared at me. The moment he quickly draws out his shotgun and loads ammo.
Kwajik!
The infected’s chest burst out like an explosion. I didn’t shoot.
“Kieh!”
With a large hole in her chest, the Infected struggled to find a metallic hand protruding from her chest. Blood and saliva flowed from his mouth, and he tried to tear off his hand, but to no avail. Rather, only their own nails fall off.
“Kurrrrr.”
Only then did the nearby infected look back.
Keying.
Along with the sound of the machine, the infectious object that had been pierced through the chest was lifted up, and as a result, the feet fluttered as if dancing in the air.
Swish
The metallic hand slightly tilted to the right and then swung to the left, flying nearly 5 meters and rolling around. And the owner of the hand that was hidden by him reveals himself.
“It’s a security robot. Why is it here?”
He is about 180 cm tall. The mercury-colored alloy steel frame was overlaid with engineering plastics painted black in major parts. It doesn’t have the feeling of a thick rice cake like the T-800 in the movie, but it has a much sleeker design.
[So far, not a single one has been found along the action route. It seems that he was in a separate place from the guards at the direction of the commanding authority.]
The commanding authority here refers to the worker supervisor.
The shelter guards, composed of human security guards, provide services in case of residents’ crimes, disputes, and various security-related incidents. We often perform tasks that come to mind when we hear the word ‘maintaining public order’.
On the other hand, those security robots exist solely for the purpose of monitoring and responding to workers. A detailed explanation of the reason for this dichotomization will be omitted. According to the expression of high-ranking people, it is called ‘more efficient division of work’.
“Kieh!”
In the meantime, a fight was taking place between the guard robots and the infected. It was more like one-sided violence than a fight, no, dissolution.
Chewy.
When the robot tore off the throat of one of the infected, dark red blood gushed out. However, the infected did not budge and rushed. Even three thick tentacles protruded from the torn neck and wrapped around the guard robot’s neck.
Ugh.
But what’s the point of being strangled by a machine? I grabbed the tentacles wrapped around my neck and threw them away, and the tentacles ripped off.
“Keeeeek-!”
The infectious body, which was emitting blood and glowing from both sides of its torn neck and severed tentacles, collapsed with half of its face falling off in the hands of a security robot that flew shortly thereafter.
The aftermath of the battle was similar. The infectious bodies attacked while ignoring their own bodies, but none of them dealt any significant damage, and they burst out at the guard robots, who silently counterattacked with one-hit murderous power.
“Isn’t it great power? I saw it test drive it when it was delivered, but I didn’t expect it to be like that.”
[It appears that the suppression power limit has been lifted. If it’s for workers, it’s locked, so I can’t use that much power. That’s a power level that is only allowed in some situations, such as prison riots.]
“Is this the work of the Workers’ Inspector?”
We had a few conversations over coffee, but he was very human. If it was him, there would be nothing strange about operating it with the limit lifted even during normal times.
[That is unlikely. For this operation, you must have an authorization code from a government-affiliated technician.]
After tearing all the infected to shreds, he looked around and found me.
As he walked towards me and came out under the lights, his full face was revealed. What is more impressive than the blood-covered metal body is the face.
“It looks bloody every time I see it.”
If a person is injured in the process of suppressing workers, the company also uses fear to suppress it during annoying times, and that operating philosophy is also reflected in the appearance of the security robots.
Exaggerated four hundred eyes in sunken eyelids. A wide slit mouth and teeth attached to it. Even though it is a security robot that does not eat and plays voice recordings when talking, the reason why it is unnecessarily equipped with such things is to bring out the fear of the viewer to the extreme.
“There was a popular YouTube series that showed people reacting to surprises after they suddenly appeared at night.”
In the video, not only humans, but also monkeys and cats have stiffened hairs. I heard that the face was made with a design that gives animals an instinctive repulsion.
“Anyway, good luck. Working with that will make things easier.”
Instead of a dog tag, he took out his employee ID that he had tucked away in his pocket.
“System administrator, Jinsu Seo. Report the current situation.”
Since my authority is higher than that of the Workers Supervisor, I can override whatever he orders.
“Gi-i profit?”
However, the security robot tilted its head once with a bizarre mechanical sound and did not stop. Something is strange.
“System administrator, Jinsu Seo. Wait there.”
[Co… Comam… Command confirmed.]
He stuttered a few times with the heavy, low-pitched sound typical of a security robot, then stopped in an awkward posture.
While waiting, I tried to take the default posture of ‘attention’, but sometimes my body convulsed, but that was the end. The head sunk into the ground.
[Be careful. It seems to be dysfunctional. The CPU driving sound is not a normal pattern.]
“It looks like that even if you pretend.”
I took out a hacking tool and pointed it at him.
“You have to step in here.”
When I pulled the trigger, the blue light was directed at the head of the security robot, and at that moment it reacted.
“Geeeee!”
He lifted his head and looked at me, his mouth wide open like a woman with a torn mouth, sprouting steel teeth flashing in the light.
[Harm! Attack!]
At the same time as Artemis warned, it charged towards me.