The midday sun warmly heated their backs. Their calves were cold, and their heads were hot.

Yoon Tae-ha, who had been enthusiastically peering into the clear lake bottom, raised her head when a shadow fell over her. Cheon Geon-young suddenly held out his palm.

“Something like this?”

A stone with a pearly blue shimmer on a greyish background appeared. It looked more like a raw gem that had undergone simple processing than a pebble. Her eyes widened.

“Where did you find that? I didn’t see anything similar.”

“Over there. Look here. It even makes a rainbow when it touches the sunlight.”

“Wow... I want to go too.”

She took a step forward. Then Cheon Geon-young grumbled briefly.

“I looked so hard. Are you going to go look for something else?”

Why would he say that?

Her cheeks slowly turned red. Was it because of the sunlight? Or because of the man in front of her, who seemed to be sulking because she hadn’t accepted the pretty stone he had found after all his effort? It was hard to tell.

“You went to all the trouble of finding it. You wandered around for ages. Can I have it?”

Contrary to her worried words, Yoon Tae-ha held out her palm wide open. Put that stone here right now. Offer it to me. There was a discrepancy in her expression. Cheon Geon-young pointed it out with a cool face.

“That’s different from what you said?”

Receiving his partner’s shy smile as a gift, he handed over the stone. She clutched the stone preciously.

As if it were a sign to finish playing in the water, the sun disappeared behind the cumulus clouds.

They had spent the past three days traversing rough mountainous terrain. Thanks to that, today they had a simple task: just look at the lake and return.

They spread a thin cloth under the shade of a tree to dry off and sat down. Yoon Tae-ha, who was drying her whitened feet in the sunlight, slowly lay down. When she nudged him, Cheon Geon-young lay down too.

It was cool in the shade of the tree. It was a peace that even felt guilty. While they lay there, the shadow of the tree slowly moved according to the sun’s movement.

At the rustling sound of leaves, Yoon Tae-ha slowly lifted her eyelids. Not much time had passed. She first looked to her side. Cheon Geon-young was sleeping peacefully with his eyes comfortably closed.

“Gun-young-ah?”

She spoke in the smallest voice she could muster. He didn’t wake up. He was really asleep. From the moment she realized this, her heart began to pound.

“Cheon?”

She called his surname in a playful voice, but he showed no signs of waking up.

“Gun-young?”

She called his surname and then his given name, flustered. Still no response.

Her feet were already completely dry. Yoon Tae-ha immediately put on her shoes, went to the motorcycle, and brought back her jacket. Then she covered him with the jacket. The Ark logo was conspicuous, so she folded it so it wouldn’t be visible. However, after some time, sunlight poured onto his face. Cheon Geon-young slightly frowned.

‘He’s waking up!’

She hurriedly made a sunshade with her palm to block the sunlight. Surprisingly. Really surprisingly, as soon as a shadow was cast, the area around his eyes softened again.

Maintaining the shade, she timidly moved her hand to the side. Sunlight streamed in again. His eyelids twitched as if dazzled. She made a shadow again. His face slowly became peaceful. She felt like she would burst into uncontrollable laughter.

Yoon Tae-ha shielded his nap without even noticing her arm aching. But as the area the sunlight penetrated grew wider, it became impossible to protect him with just her palm.

I wish he would sleep a little longer.

She knew how sweet this kind of sleep was. Looking around, she telekinetically lifted several clean, large leaves. She carefully chose the clean ones and floated them upwards. Soon, the green leaves gathered together and made a large shadow.

Cheon Geon-young, who had thus obtained a personal sunshade that he couldn’t have even imagined in his dreams, woke up exactly 30 minutes later.

Normally, he should have seen dense branches and leaves. But what entered his eyes were leaves. Leaves. And more leaves. What’s more, they were spinning around like a carousel.

Am I still dreaming?

Cheon Geon-young blinked, trying to shake off his sleepiness. The leaves were still slowly rotating clockwise. It was a sight that could hypnotize you if you kept watching.

“Did you wake up?”

The woman sitting next to him noticed his movement and asked. His voice was slightly hoarse.

“Is this some kind of exorcism?”

As he got up, the leaves hit his chest and fell in a rustling cascade. The woman who had made something unidentifiable out of leaves by his head made a look of disbelief.

“Exorcism? It’s a sunshade.”

Cheon Geon-young still looked bewildered. He picked up a fallen leaf. Then he looked up to check the direction of the light. He belatedly realized why she had carefully floated the leaves by his head.

His lips formed a round ‘O’.

“Ah.”

“...Ah? I used my ability for 30 minutes, worrying that even a speck of sunlight might get on your face, and you say exorcism? Ah?”

Yoon Tae-ha, who had pressed her lips tightly together, gestured for him to get up without a word. It was time to return to the camp. She telekinetically tidied up the leaves and the mat in an instant. Before Cheon Geon-young could even offer to help.

The woman who had prepared the shade for his nap seemed disheartened and started the engine without waiting.

One, two, three, three and a half. Half of three and a half...

However, her face, which had started the engine, didn’t look like she intended to leave. A slightly upturned corner of her lips. Something she hadn’t fully hidden. Something only I can see. A subtle heat seemed to rise in his body.

“Let’s go together.”

At the voice filled with laughter, Yoon Tae-ha urged him to hurry up.

•

What greeted them upon their return to the camp was a new task. Kim So-bae, one of the Korean supervisors at the camp, pushed bags containing guns into the arms of the returning pair.

“We Koreans have to help each other.”

It seemed she intended to finish all the tasks that had been postponed while Team Alpha was staying. Kim So-bae explained that the other team members had also been assigned tasks such as patrolling the fortress walls and looking after the monster eggs.

“Flying boars have appeared again. If we lose the chili peppers and garlic we planted in the fields, we’re finished.”

Kim So-bae warned them not to underestimate them. A deep resentment was etched in her eyes.

“Their tastes are different too. Some only devastate the spicy crops, while others selectively eat potatoes and sweet potatoes.”

They got into the back of a truck that was going to the fields, hugging the bags containing guns.

“There was a time when boars ate all the potatoes I had waited six months for, so I had to wait another six months. They’re harmful animals, so don’t worry and just shoot them.”

“Come to think of it, Leader Baek Sang-ho also said the potatoes here are delicious.”

Kim So-bae proudly put her hands on her hips.

“The best french fries in the world are the french fries from our camp. So, please take care of them perfectly.”

She knocked on the cargo bed, and the truck started. While moving, the two finished preparing to use their guns.

As they got closer to the farmland, the sound of an animal’s neck twisting began to be heard. Their gazes turned to the sky. Black dots were sparsely scattered in the sky.

“So those are the flying boars.”

“Smaller than I thought. And agile.”

Cheon Geon-young observed the monster’s appearance through the scope. Two thin pairs of wings were attached to the back of a boar the size of an adult’s forearm. Dozens of them formed a swarm in the sky near the farmland, blocking human access.

“Please contact us again after you’re done dealing with them. We’ll come pick you up.”

The employee driving the truck said that and left. The truck quickly exited the wide farmland. Cheon Geon-young first identified the numbers.

“There are quite a few on the ground too.”

There were many of them among the crops as well. They were voraciously eating even the tender grass like caterpillars gnawing on cabbage leaves. When they sensed human presence, they all raised their heads.

They approached, revealing tusks as tough as rhino horns. Before fully engaging, Yoon Tae-ha proposed a shooting bet.

“The loser makes breakfast tomorrow morning.”

Cheon Geon-young, taking a shooting stance, muttered lightly.

“I’m going to lose.”

“We’ll see.”

She left those words and disappeared behind a hill. As the number of enemies decreased to one, the monster that had been biding its time rushed at Cheon Geon-young.

His posture, which had been slightly relaxed for conversation, straightened, the trigger moved, and the monster’s glabella was accurately pierced. The heavy body fell.

The monsters, which had been digging up the crops with their steel-like hooves, heard the sound and began to charge. Some even spread their wings.

His scope calmly aimed between their eyes without wavering. He didn’t panic even when the target suddenly dropped down or soared up.

The monsters that couldn’t avoid the bullets crashed to the ground. The cold, heavy gun demonstrated its full capability in the hands of a skilled soldier.

‘Yoon Tae-ha also likes potatoes. Especially french fries.’

He minimized damage to the crops by luring the targets to the path as much as possible before eliminating them. He felt he had to preserve the potatoes. Gunshots were heard from a distance. It seemed she was also busy fulfilling her assigned task.

Cheon Geon-young quickly moved, luring out the monsters that had hidden among the crops. At that moment, a strange sound came from among the monster carcasses. Cheon Geon-young turned around warily.

The eyes of the first boar he had killed rolled back. And a dark green earthworm wriggled out from the whites of its eyes. Despite the disgusting sight, he remained calm.

‘A variant?’

It dragged the surrounding carcasses towards itself. It even began to devour its living kin.

From a poorly molded clay figure back to a boar monster. The transformation was rapid. Its tusks were now sharp enough to easily pierce a person’s abdomen.

He moved agilely and activated the emergency shield nearby. Beyond the transparent shield, he saw a monster that had grown larger than before. About the size of the truck they had come in. It howled like a bad-tempered donkey. Soon after, it excitedly scratched the ground.

The large monster, with its aggression at its peak, charged at Cheon Geon-young without warning.

He secured his range and fired cautiously. But the problem was that the wounded areas regenerated instantly, even though he had clearly hit it.

A few steps away, the monster opened its mouth wide and roared again. At that moment, Cheon Geon-young saw it. A green stone embedded in its tongue. It was too close to use his gun.

He moved the shield to his right hand and quickly drew his military knife with his left, swinging it. A human hand went deep into the approaching monster’s tusks.

A terrible stench first enveloped him. And a few seconds later, an enormous impact was applied to the shield.

A pain as if his bones were shattering assailed him. But Cheon Geon-young didn’t budge, completely blocking the monster. The soft soil was haphazardly dug up by his combat boots and the monster’s hooves.

His left arm was still inside the monster’s mouth. The monster shook its tail frantically, as if it had been shocked. The earthworm in its eye also wriggled along.

While the enemy was flustered, he ran his left hand over the damp flesh and found the stone. Thwack. He confirmed its presence with the back of his knife and slashed without hesitation.

The monster resisted violently. Cracks appeared on the shield. Cheon Geon-young also staggered, and his palm was cut by the knife. He didn’t care and repeatedly carved around the target area.

Finally, a part of the sharp stone was caught in his hand.

‘The tissue is tough. It’s still connected.’

The more he pulled the stone, the more violently the monster thrashed. It even began to forcibly close its mouth, which wouldn’t close properly because of its tusks.

It was giving up its weapon, its own teeth. It was clear that the stone was its weakness.

The monster finally broke its tusks and closed its mouth as if it would bite off the man’s arm. At the same time, he succeeded in completely pulling out the stone. In that dizzying moment, Cheon Geon-young felt an enormous heat in his hand.

‘Fire?’

As he frowned at the pain of his body melting, the flames that had started in his left hand instantly engulfed the monster’s body.