Chapter 236
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The Transplanter I
I’ve had many jobs in my lifetime.
In the last episode, I found work as a DJ Producer, and over my various cycles, I’ve taken on roles like convenience store owner, Oh Dokseo’s editor, Dang Seo-rin’s personal secretary, academy teacher, and even a café barista.
Making ends meet was never easy on a single job, so juggling two, three, or even more jobs at once was common—whether in the past or in this apocalyptic world. Even I, a regressor, could not avoid the flow of this reality. Yet despite all that, my main occupation never changed.
I was, and always would be, an Undertaker—the one who buries the dead.
Today, let’s talk about my primary job for the first time in a while.
[Mr. Undertaker, there’s an Anomaly detected.]One day, the Saintess told me this.
True to her nature, she always sensed strange phenomena faster than the likes of a certain “eternally young detective” or a “youth with infinite grandfatherly wisdom.”
“What is it?”
[Please head to the National Road Management Corps headquarters. Someone there will explain the details.]
So I went.
In front of the Corps’ headquarters lay a wide open square known as Babel Tower Plaza. The nickname for the headquarters was “Babel Tower.”
As soon as I arrived, I spotted the Anomaly.
“...A green village bus?”
There, parked right in the middle of the square, was a village bus that had never been there before. It was mostly intact except for a slight dent on one side. Otherwise, it was the exact image of an ordinary village bus, green color and all.[1]
“Oh! Your Excellency, Sir Undertaker—you’ve arrived.”
A crowd of Corps members had already gathered around the bus. Ji-won was the first to spot me and salute.
“So, what’s going on?”
“We’re not entirely sure. One of the Corps members found it early this morning on their way to work.”
“It wasn’t there last night?”
“No, sir. The last person to leave headquarters was out at 4 AM, and they said the plaza was empty. The bus must have appeared sometime between 4 AM and 6 AM.”
I looked up into the air.
[Ji-won is correct.]
That meant the bus had suddenly appeared out of nowhere.
To move a vehicle of that size, you’d either need fuel or the strength of an Awakener. If it was fuel-powered, someone would have noticed the noise, and if an Awakener had carried it, the Saintess’s Clairvoyance would have detected it since she shared her sight with the Corps 24/7.
The conclusion was simple.
“It’s definitely an Anomaly.”
“Yes, sir. We tried applying external force to it, and it took damage.”
So, you were the ones who dented the bus.
“What about the inside? Have you checked it out?” I asked.
“No, sir. No one has entered it yet. I only just received the report myself.”
“Well, that’s fortunate. It might be a trap that looks intact on the outside.”
“A wise and prudent judgment, as always. If you give the order, I’ll destroy it immediately.”
I stroked my chin and pondered for a moment. “No, I’m not comfortable with destroying it outright. Bring me a death row inmate.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll have one brought at once.”
Soon enough, a groggy prisoner, who had been fast asleep, was dragged in. At first, the prisoner wore a face that screamed, “Just five more minutes, Mom...” but as soon as he saw me and Ji-won, his drowsiness disappeared.
“Aaaaaah! Please! Spare me! Spare me!”
“Toss him into the bus.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Please! I beg you! I was wrong! I know I messed up! Please, just spare my life— Aaaaaah!”
With a clean three-pointer from Ji-won, the inmate, a convicted murderer who had targeted elderly patients, was tossed into the bus.
Pssshhhh...
As soon as the inmate boarded, the automatic doors closed. The prisoner desperately banged on the glass, pounding with both fists.
“Please! Let me out! Please, let me...!”
But his pleading didn’t last long.
Splurt!
The convict’s body exploded, splattering blood all over the bus's glass doors and windows, painting them a deep crimson. It happened so fast that most of the onlookers probably didn’t even register what had occurred.
“Whoa. What just happened? Did you see that?”
“No, not at all.”
The Corps members around the bus were just as shocked.
I shrugged. “It’s definitely a trap.”
“As expected, Your Excellency. Thanks to your insightful command, we’ve managed to preserve our manpower efficiently.”
“Spread the word. Make it clear that no one is to enter anything resembling a village bus. Post the warning on SG Net too.”
“Your concern for the public and commitment to post-incident management will surely be praised for generations to come...”
“If you don’t want to get hit in front of the men, stop it.”
“Did I go too far?”
“Yes.”
“Understood. I’ll keep it simpler next time.”
I left the Anomaly, now dubbed Village Bus No. 44, to the Corps and headed off to handle other matters.
The next day, I was leisurely browsing SG Net at my hideout café when I came across a heartwarming post.
[iJoinedToday]: My father has recovered and is healthy now haha
He’s been suffering from heart problems, but today, he’s feeling better than ever. He hasn’t been this healthy since the Saintess of the North treated him a while back.
He mentioned how grateful he was for the support and encouragement he received from SG Net members. I just signed up today to share my thanks with everyone!
Life’s tough right now, but let’s get through it together. Thanks, everyone! We can do it!
I hummed, nodding. What a nice story.
By the way, the user iJoinedToday was Lee Ju-ho. He was the young man who had accompanied me when I first dealt with OldManGoryeo. It seemed he was doing well, taking good care of his father, which was comforting to know.
Just as I was feeling all warm and fuzzy, the Saintess spoke to me through Constellation Telepathy.
[Mr. Undertaker, I hate to interrupt your rest.]
“Not at all. What’s going on?”
[Village Bus No. 44 has disappeared.]
“What?” I frowned. “It disappeared? I told them to park it near the National Road Management Corps headquarters. Did they mess up?”
[No, they followed your instructions. The bus was parked where you told them, and Corps members kept a close watch, taking turns to guard it.]
[But it vanished.]
I furrowed my brow. “Did it disappear while they were changing shifts? Was it a momentary lapse?”
[No, it was even shorter than that.]
[The guard looked away for a brief moment when he heard children laughing in the distance. When he turned back, the bus had vanished.]
“......”
In other words, it had “vanished into thin air.”
The guard was a diligent Corps member, strict about following procedure. Even though the Anomaly had been neutralized, he had stayed vigilant in front of it. He never left his seat in front of the bus, only glancing away when the sound of children’s laughter briefly distracted him. When he turned back, the bus was gone.
[And no one saw it disappear. No Awakeners or civilians.]
“That’s strange.” I rubbed my chin. “Anything unusual besides its disappearance? Any casualties?”
[No, no incidents have been reported so far.]
“Well... It’s unsettling, but it should be safe to leave it be for now.”
[Really?]
“Yes. The bus is essentially a stationary trap. Traps are most dangerous when they haven’t been sprung.
Once people are aware of them, they pose less of a threat. Just make sure to warn everyone to stay away from any village buses they see.”
[Got it.]
And with that, the case seemed to be closed.
However, from then on, Village Bus No. 44 kept reappearing in various locations across the country.
It would show up in places like the small community in Yeongwol or at a bus stop in Incheon, even making another appearance in Busan.
Each time it showed up, we couldn’t always prevent the casualties.
If it was Awakeners, we could at least warn them in the name of their Constellations, but when civilians encountered the bus first, they were often helpless. Curious bystanders, hoping to salvage some scrap or supplies from the bus, would open the doors only to be crushed or mutilated in seconds.
The bus would vanish again within a day, leaving few clues that anyone had died.
Why did this Anomaly take the form of a village bus? I wondered.
At first, hearing “bus” made me think of the Knight Bus from Harry Potter.[2] But there wasn’t much similarity between that and Village Bus No. 44. It didn’t fit.
Then I considered the word itself. In Korean, the word “bus” sounds like “verse,” which could connect to terms like universe, multiverse, or metaverse. But once again, there seemed to be no direct relation to the nature of this particular Anomaly.
Could it be that passengers who boarded Village Bus No. 44 were transported to another world?
It was just a guess, and I couldn’t be sure.
I set that idea aside for now.
Another thought came to mind—an old, tragic incident in which a bus plunged from the Seongsu Bridge when it collapsed. Many passengers, including the driver, died in the accident. If this Anomaly was related to such a tragedy, it should have appeared near a bridge, not randomly in various places.
Again, I dismissed the theory as it seemed unrelated.
‘How frustrating. I really can’t figure it out.’
No matter how much I wracked my brain, I couldn’t pinpoint the origin of the Village Bus No. 44 Anomaly.
If I wanted to solve the mystery by firsthand experience, I could board the bus myself, ready to face whatever came next. But truth be told, it didn’t seem worth risking my life for.
At most, the Anomaly only claimed one or two victims each time it appeared. It was a minor nuisance compared to the many other high-risk Anomalies I still had to deal with.
Thus, for the time being, I decided to set aside my unease and leave the bus be.
‘Looks like I’ll just have to watch and wait.’
With a sigh, I cleared my head and opened SG Net to relax.
Before writing a new educational post about The Three Kingdoms, I browsed the site to check out the day’s top recommended posts.
- Anonymous: A miracle happened to my family! My younger sibling was diagnosed with an incurable disease, and we thought there was no hope. But yesterday, they woke up and said they felt fine.
- Anonymous: Bro, you won’t believe this. My mom, who went blind five years ago because of some Anomaly, suddenly says she can see again. The first thing she did was ask why I look so thin. She cried right after seeing my face, lol. But hey, I have a question... When my dog died, I secretly replaced it with a similar one. If Mom notices, am I screwed?
- [iJoinedToday]: Update on my father! We went for a walk and jogged together today. He’s in perfect health!!!
“Hm.”
As I scrolled through the recommended posts, I noticed an unusually high number of heartwarming stories on SG Net. People were sharing tales of miraculous recoveries and restored health.
‘This didn’t happen in previous cycles. Maybe some new Anomaly is affecting people?’
I was about to move on, but then—
“Wait.”
A strange thought struck me.
Quickly, I grabbed a red shirt from my wardrobe and waved it in the air—my signal for emergency contact with the Saintess.
[What is it, Mr. Undertaker?]
“Saintess, could you tell me how many people have died due to Village Bus No. 44?”
[I don’t have exact numbers, but so far, we’ve confirmed five deaths. If we assume the bus has appeared every three days, we can estimate there are between two to four more victims.]
“Thank you.”
So, roughly seven to eleven victims in total.
I then searched SG Net for any posts I might have missed.
Sure enough, I found four additional posts describing miraculous recoveries of people who had been suffering from life-threatening conditions. The illnesses ranged from heart problems to lung disease, corneal blindness, and pancreatic failure.
All of the posters were Awakeners, but I realized that if civilians had also experienced similar recoveries, they might not have even posted about it.
[Why do you ask all of a sudden?]
“...Saintess, I think I might have figured out what Village Bus No. 44 really is.”
The Anomaly wasn’t just causing deaths.
It was harvesting organs.
More specifically...
“It is extracting organs from its victims and transplanting them into others, healing their conditions in the process.”
Footnotes:
[1] Village buses are short auxiliary routes that feed local subway stations and other larger lines around major South Korean cities.
[2] A form of public transportation that allows underage wizards, who can’t use magic in the human world, to travel discreetly.
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