The Regressor Only Protects Me Chapter 43

#Episode 43. Wintering (2)

“I, um, am really amazing, sir.”

Kim Soo-kyung, who was following me, spoke to me carefully in a trembling voice.

I was still flipping through the charts and didn’t respond to his words.

After planning the internal structure for building the boiler, I explained the overall schedule to Kim Soo-kyung.

Starting tomorrow, we will recruit additional general workers and begin boiler construction in earnest.

Kim Soo-kyung muttered, following one step behind.

“You can persuade people with just words… …. I, I mean. It may be a bit random, but I’ve attended special lectures at interview academies on persuading others. That is, before I prepared for the civil service exam. Do you think it would be okay for you to pursue that path? You kind of feel like an instructor.”

That was such a random comment.

I thought about the reason or purpose for which Kim Soo-kyung said such things to me, and then stopped.

I tucked the chart under my arm and checked my wristwatch.

5:30 p.m.

It was an awkward time to do anything additional.

And at 6 o’clock I had to report to the police station leadership about what happened that day.

I spoke to Kim Soo-kyung, who had stopped in front of the stairs.

“Ms. Kim Soo-kyung.”

“Yes, sir.”

Kim Soo-kyung answered right away as if she had been waiting.

“I have a task that I need your help with by tomorrow.”

“Go ahead.”

“Only physically fit people, regardless of age or gender. Please mark down all the people who can be used as manpower on the chart by tomorrow. The total number is 812, right?”

“Oh, that’s right.”

A total of 812 people.

There was no way to know how many additional people would come in today.

But compared to the inside of the shopping mall, it was a huge number.

In the shopping mall, it took a whole day to even set up a simple barricade.

Using a workforce of hundreds of people would be a different matter.

“Is that possible?”

To be honest, it was nearly impossible to handle this much work in one day.

Because they had to investigate, classify, and even mark every person inside the police station.

And he and I met for the first time today.

So it would have been a good thing if he had only investigated about 400 people.

Kim Soo-kyung looked at the chart I handed her in bewilderment.

Then he answered with a slightly trembling voice.

“Oh, yes. I will. Can I do it before roll call tomorrow?”

“Yes, please. I have to do it. I’m going to be really busy starting tomorrow.”

“Okay, sir. I’ll do my best.”

Kim Soo-kyung flipped through the chart a bit, bowed her head to me, and walked away.

It seemed like he was walking for a bit, but soon he started running.

It may be to save even a little time.

To survey 800 people in one day.

I waited for him to disappear from sight and then looked at my watch again.

Now it was time to report.

I started going up to the 5th floor.

* * *

On the fifth floor, many citizens were already lining up to receive the additional food that had arrived.

At the very front of the line was Officer Lee Cheong-chun.

I hadn’t seen him in a day, but he felt like someone I hadn’t seen in a long time.

Today was an unusually long day.

I walked through the rows and headed toward the executive conference room.

And without even thinking about it, I opened the conference room door and went in.

They were eating rice.

The leaders first took the freshest food that the reconnaissance team had brought today.

“Oh, you’re here. Our manager.”

City Councilman Gil In-ho responded first and spoke to me.

Then, the leaders who had been eating with their heads down also raised their heads one by one and looked at me.

I said to them while they were eating.

“Please open the underground detention center.”

Gil In-ho took the plan I had written and stuffed a frozen sausage into his mouth.

“Hehe, I never dreamed that you would ask for something in just one day. But whatever. It’s Kang Shi-on.”

And after chewing on it for a while, he said to me.

“But why the juvenile detention center?”

“We plan to draft the prisoners needed for the work.”

The police chief, who had been listening quietly from the side, intervened.

“Uh… … That’s not right. According to the Constitution, prisoners must remain in detention centers until their sentences are finalized or they are transferred to prison. It is in accordance with the laws of the Republic of Korea that the inmates are kept there.”

While the police chief spoke, city councilman Gil In-ho was eating his meal in silence.

It was an expected rebuttal.

However, considering the personality of the police chief, I thought of a countermeasure in advance.

“But, Chief, please think about what happens after we are rescued.”

“After being rescued?”

When he asked, I continued speaking calmly.

“I went to the detention center today. It was not a place fit for human habitation. I completely agree with the chief that the inmates deserve to be punished. But what if it turns out that even one of the inmates died after being rescued? They will be held accountable for the management of the inmates. Fortunately, no one has died so far.”

The police chief’s eyes widened.

He was a really easy-to-get-to know man.

And he was an incredibly stupid man.

I couldn’t understand how he rose to the position of chief.

Oh, wait. I think I got it.

He would have stuck with powerful figures like Assemblyman Gil In-ho and taken his share.

“But it’s not something that can be released just for the sake of it. There’s one reason we still have the prisoners there. It’s to maintain order and stability inside the police station. The police’s job is to maintain order rather than to be responsible for management, right?”

Gil In-ho said, wiping around his mouth with a tissue.

As expected, Gil In-ho was not a man to be taken lightly.

“We won’t release them all. Our investigators will sort them out. But we will provide them with basic treatment. We will allow them to use food, clothing, and restrooms like ordinary citizens. And we will clean them up a bit.”

It was not a bad performance.

Although limited, the prisoners were eventually granted freedom.

And all I needed was that thug.

I’m back on topic.

“We will make the 2nd and 3rd floors into residential spaces for citizens. However, in order to do this, we need to reduce the living space of the workers to one space. If we start construction on one floor, it will be impossible for them to live on that floor.”

“Are you asking for public authority?”

Gil In-ho, who asked that question, pushed the plan aside and ate the cold bean sprout soup with a plastic spoon.

“Yes, that’s right.”

“But even now, citizens are living in cramped environments. If they live in cramped environments any more, won’t dissatisfaction explode?”

Gil In-ho, who was eating the soup, glared at me.

“The biggest responsibility of a manager is to coordinate things in the middle so that riots don’t break out. You know that?”

“It was the same council member yesterday who told the manager to try to solve the cold.”

At those words, Gil In-ho became dumbfounded and kept his mouth shut.

Then he sniffed and swallowed the mucus twice.

There was a kerosene stove here, so it was a relatively warm temperature.

It was a fairly rare resource these days, but it was something the leaders here had in their possession.

Gil In-ho smacked his lips and then spoke while picking out the bean sprouts stuck between his teeth with a toothpick.

“Okay. Just give it a try. You only have one day. I think you have an idea, and you said you’ll take full responsibility, so just do it your way.”

I frowned at his words.

His responsibility, responsibility, responsibility.

Wasn’t that the place that originally took responsibility?

Why is it that those in high positions do not take responsibility even though they are in responsible positions?

I felt suffocated, but it was okay.

We got what we needed from this report.

“Then let’s go.”

“Good luck, Mr. Zion.”

Gil In-ho spoke to me as I held the doorknob.

I nodded slightly at his words and left the conference room.

Squeak, thud.

As soon as I left the conference room, the cold air gave me goosebumps all over my body.

I walked into the room, feeling the cold air.

A day has passed.

I’ve been tinkering with a lot of stuff all day.

Yet, looking at the many things that still remain, you can see how haphazardly the power has been run up to now.

The incompetence of the director and the assemblyman was keenly felt.

However, there will be no great difficulty in utilizing the labor force.

In the first place, citizens did not work.

It’ll get busier starting tomorrow.

* * *

Paaaaat-!

Light flickered again in Jin Jae-hee’s palm.

The light gradually took shape and took the shape of a sword.

9 full hours of continuous training.

While Zion was walking around the police station all day, Jin Jae-hee was busy with training to implement artifacts.

Her body was already covered in sweat.

The power to lead intelligence had to go through a simple yet difficult process.

Intelligence is ultimately a system.

The otherworldly abilities inherent in humans were not something that original humans could have displayed.

Meditation, concentration.

Humans can develop their intelligence through these two methods of training.

During this process, heat is generated in the human body based on the input values inherent within the system.

“after…….”

Jin Jae-hee let out a soft groan.

Then, before the sword took shape, I lost consciousness.

Swish- swoosh!

She fell to the side, her whole body losing strength, breathing heavily.

“Haa, haa.”

Jin Jae-hee couldn’t move a single finger like a hanging laundry.

As the cold weather continued, there were many people who tried to maintain their body temperature through meditation and concentration.

But that was foolish.

Because the side effects of the intellect were much more painful than the pain felt from the cold.

Just sitting still made me feel nauseous, sweat poured out of every pore on my body, and I couldn’t close my mouth, so I had to keep it open like a cripple.

That was the training of intelligence.

Squeak-.

At that moment, the door opened and Zion came in.

Zion looked at Jin Jae-hee, who was slumped down, and sat down on the opposite bed.

“What? Training?”

Zion could roughly tell what condition his opponent was in just by looking at him.

Jin Jae-hee spoke in a slurred tone, moving his jaw and tongue.

“No… … No. It’s just not enough.”

Jin Jae-hee raised his upper body with difficulty.

It was a resilience that was possible because of the regressor.

When an ordinary person begins to train his or her intellect, he or she will be unable to move for several days.

Zion looked at the chart quietly and said.

“It takes a tedious process to get results.”

“……huh.”

“So just bear with it for a little longer.”

Zion said it casually, but Zion had no idea how much strength those words gave her.

Jin Jae-hee took a sip of water.

It was melted snow water contained in a 2L PET bottle.

Zion put the chart aside and opened the quest window.

And I was looking at Jin Jae-hee beyond the quest window.

Knock knock, knock knock.

It was so hot that I didn’t even have my coat on.

Even though the weather was so cold, he was only wearing a black tank top and cargo pants for bottoms.

Jin Jae-hee was sitting on the bed with her legs stretched out, gulping down water from a bottle.

Sweat was dripping from my neck to my collarbone.

Judging by the fact that even his black hair down to his chest was soaked with sweat, he seemed to be quite hot.

“Are you looking at the quest window? Are you making any progress?”

Jin Jae-hee asked, wiping the water from his mouth with the back of his hand.

Only then did Zion take his gaze away from her and look at the quest window.

[Quest: Government Dog]

[Achievements:

●Achieve a comfort level of 30% or more for citizens (current level is 2%)

●Resolving the problem of continuous food supply (0/1)

●Achieved 100% of available manpower within the police force (current figure is 37%)

★ Reward: Achievement Points – 150 ]

‘The comfort level has gone down, and the available labor has gone up.’

Zion looked at the quest window and asked her.

“If the value becomes 0%, does that mean the quest has failed?”

“Yeah. There’s a few percent left.”

“2.”

“It’s a little dangerous.”

“There’s no other way.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

Jin Jae-hee asked him, closing his coat, if he had gotten cold again.

“Yes. But not yet.”

“What is it?”

Zion closed the quest window.

We had to get some meaningful results tomorrow to at least secure the remaining 2 percent.

And importantly, we had to let the remaining citizens know that their lives were definitely improving.

“I’m going hunting. I have one more person in mind besides you. Come down to the basement with me tomorrow morning. I’d like to hear your opinion as well.”

“hunt?”

“huh.”

Zion looked at Jin Jae-hee again.

Jin Jae-hee was putting his arms into the sleeves of his nightgown.

Zion looked at her and concluded his words.

“Monster hunting.”

(Continued in the next episode)