Chapter 1 – Mother and the Deserted Island (1)

“Ha~.”

Even though it was midsummer, the chilly early morning air from the forefront shattered his breath white.
As I stared blankly at the breath scattering in the air, the next soldier who was on duty with me started talking to me.

“Corporate Kang Chang-jae. What do you think?”
“Think of the family.”

The successor on duty together is Private First Class Han Seung-pil.
It’s cocky, but at least it’s not trashy.
I like it because it’s fun.

“Cut your eyes for a second. I’ll be watching.”
“Flaw. What do I believe in you?”
“No. I can see well.”
“It sucks.”

Silence came again.
For a while, only the sound of frogs could be heard.

“I thought of you when you said family. Corporal Kang Chang-jae’s mother, isn’t she very beautiful?”
“Oh~.”

Some time ago, my mother had visited her unit without warning.
I was able to visit her on the order of the company commander, but it is true that she came to visit me without saying anything and it was difficult. Of course, if she had told her beforehand that she would come, she would not have come.

The guys in the unit flocked to me like a herd of dogs, wondering what kind of sight they had.
Come to think of it, Han Seung-pil was also one of the onlookers who flocked to the scene.

Ha, this bastard is missing. I can’t really beat it.
When I was in first class——

“Envious. Because you have such a young mother.”
“You jealous bastard. What are you doing when you are young?”
“Still, I’m envious because you’ll live as long as you’re young. My mother is already dead.”
“Hey, you bastard. Are you doing this on purpose?”

Seung-pil is a funny guy, but he also makes the atmosphere fight like this out of the blue.
You can’t really beat this.

I kicked the floor with my military boots for no reason and spat out in passing.

“My mother-in-law also passed away. When I was 10.”
“Uh? Are you serious?”
“Yes ma’am. That young lady is my stepmother. Are you okay?”
“Wow! I’m even more envious of a young stepmom!”
“What is this bastard? Do you really want to go back?”

With a subtle pad lip, he pounded Seungpil’s bulletproof bullet with his palm.
Seungpil giggled and giggled even when he was right about what he liked.
Only my hand hurts, damn it.

“Ah~ I want to work with Corporal Kang Chang-jae every day.”
“It really turned, you bastard. Please don’t say anything horrible. Huh?”
“It’s true. Time goes by fast, isn’t it?”
“You bastard went fast. It hasn’t even been an hour yet.”

There were still 30 minutes left before the shift.
Besides, even if I shift, I can’t even rest. When you go in, it’s time to start working again.

OMG! I want to desert! Fuck!

“Corporate Kang Chang-jae is my role model in my military life.”
“What is it all of a sudden? Did you really eat something wrong? I’m going to break it, man.”
“I am serious. Subordinates follow and are acknowledged by seniors. My wish is to live just as much as Corporal Kang Chang-jae.”

My back was itching for no reason.

“Even if you only suck cancer, my mother won’t introduce me.”
“Haha, it’s not like that.”

Seungpil scratched the back of his head and said ‘Ah!’ As if he had just remembered.

“Don’t do that, Corporal Kang Chang-jae, don’t you intend to marry us at all?”
“What? This bastard is real——”
“No! No no! I don’t mean that!”

No matter how much the army goes backwards, which successor in the world will touch the senior mother?
Seung-pil shakes his hand in surprise when he raises his rifle at the drip that crosses the line.
Then he rummaged through the top pocket of his combat uniform and pulled out a photograph with tattered edges.

It’s a film picture. In today’s world, he’s a strangely analog-tic guy.

“Actually, I have a younger brother who looks just like me. Would you like to take a look at this picture?”
“If you look at your brother one more time, he is number 12. Seunghee Han. I even memorized your name, bastard.”
“Oh, are you serious? Corporal Kang Chang-jae, you seem to have been secretly interested in me?”
“Who wanted to memorize it? If I had heard that much, I would have memorized Yellowy on the transport.”

Seungpil smiles when his brother’s name is mentioned.

Han Seung-hee, the younger brother of that bastard who brings it out whenever he has a chance.
Just by looking at the pictures, there was nothing I couldn’t say was pretty.

An innocent beauty with a pretty smile. I heard that she was sick, so she felt like a sickly beautiful girl.
It might feel that way because it’s this fucking army. Having been in the military for a long time, even the female platoon commander in the melon navel of the next platoon looked pretty.

“Although he is my younger brother, he has a pretty face and a really nice personality. There are no kids like this these days.”
“Seungpil. Do you see me as a person who will live while tending to someone else’s disease?”
“When my friends go to college and spend their campus life, our Seunghee spends only in the hospital. Doesn’t Corporal Kang Chang-jae feel sorry for my younger brother?”
“It’s pitiful, but I feel more pitiful for my life stuck in the military while others are spending their campus lives.”

I don’t know how many times I’ve heard the story of the tragedy of Seung-pil’s sister Seung-hee.

Seung-hee, who has been weak since childhood, collapsed as soon as Seung-pil enlisted in the military. She barely survived a heart transplant, but she says she has been in the hospital ever since.

“Oh, stop doing that and think about it seriously.”
“Ha~. Seungpil, do you want to introduce such a pretty and kind little sister to a trash like me?”
“Corporate Kang Chang-jae. I’m not saying this to anyone. I am saying this because I can trust Corporal Kang Chang-jae.”

As a bonus, I’m going to expand my military life a bit.
Seung-pil added a pointless joke as if he was embarrassed to talk about it with his son.
I laughed out loud.

“Oh yeah. Don’t bullshit, I’m going to sleep, so wake me up when the shift comes.”
“No way.”
“No way?”
“Hmm. No.”

Thanks to my long military service, I even learned how to sleep standing up. Especially in the early stages of the fatigue soaked in fatigue like now, I was confident that I could just lean my head against the wall.

And in this case, the important thing is to wake up easily rather than fall asleep easily.
As someone who is especially sensitive to presence, I was confident that I would notice and wake up even if the officer on watch approached secretly with a low crawl.

“Whoa-.”

So I leaned against the corner of the post with Seungpil as a sentry.
Now, until the next shift comes, to dreamland–

“—Corporate Kang Chang-jae?”
“Ah! And why?”

I tried to close my eyes for a moment, but Seung-pil called again and said, “Fuck it.”
When I opened my eyes, I saw Seungpil pointing into the air.

“What.”
“Look at that.”
“What is that?”
“UFOs? I have the same thing.”
“What.”

I forced myself to swallow what was about to come out.

Our Seungpil has finally gone crazy. Even if you go to a mental hospital, you won’t have to say that I’m crazy because I’ve beaten you.

It’s nothing, just do it.
I grumbled and pulled myself away from the wall.

──And then, I saw it.

“… What is that?”

Not too high,
A sphere the size of a human face floated in the air that Seungpil pointed to.

That said… A burning volleyball?
It was a volleyball that glowed white like an electric light. With my limited vocabulary, I could only express it that way.

“Isn’t that a real UFO?”

Private First Class Han Seung-pil muttered with a stupid face.

Seung-pil, who can be carefree even after seeing such things, is surprisingly a big man.
My heart is beating like this

“Hey, send the radio quickly! No, I——”

I hurriedly reached for the radio, but my hand didn’t reach it.

-Keying——!

Intense light that burns your optic nerves.
An eardrum-shattering sound.

The world was swallowed up by the light emitted by the volleyball-shaped UFO.

“Kuh, ah… “

Round and round, the head turned.
Nothing was visible. Heard nothing.

Just before reaching the radio.
I fell down and passed out.

*

-Are you Changjae? Changjae, wake up.

Someone shakes me up

“Ugh…”

My throat was dry.
My mouth was dry, so my voice couldn’t come out properly.

I’m tired. My head hurt as if it would break.

“Turn off…”

I forcibly lifted my dizzy head and stood up.
When I finally opened my eyes, a dim light came into my field of vision.

It was a place like a stone cave.
Against the background of a landscape I had never seen before, there was a pair of round eyes looking down at me.
In my eyes, he was familiar, but he was someone who couldn’t be here.

“Mother… ? Coke!”

The voice cracked. As if talking for the first time in months.
I forced myself to speak for no reason and had to cough for a while.

“Changjae, are you okay?”

My stepmother rubbed my back anxiously.
A warm energy spread through his back and through his entire body.

Okay. This is my stepmother.
If my eyes weren’t broken, this person must have been my mother.

“… How is your mother here?”

He barely stopped his cough and raised his voice with difficulty.

Obviously I was in the army.
He must have been on duty at the ammo depot a while ago.
Mother couldn’t be with her, so why is she here?

Mother shook her head instead of answering. As if you don’t even know.
Its eyes were shaking with anxiety.

I couldn’t understand English. It was confusing.
But my mother seemed more confused than I was. I also had to come to my senses.

I decided to figure out the current situation first.

Rugged lime-colored floors and walls.
It is an environment untouched by human hands. It was a natural cave.

My current outfit is combat uniform and combat boots.
It was the same uniform he was wearing while on duty, but there were no bullets, rifles, or bullet belts that he was wearing.

… Could it be that you lost it?

An ominous feeling stabs in the chest.
He also lost his gun when he left his duty station while on duty at the guard post.
It was not strange even if he was taken to the military prison.

No… I don’t even know what’s going on right now, so there’s no need to get ahead. This isn’t trespassing, it’s more like kidnapping.
The priority now is to understand the situation and deal with it. Let’s put off our worries for later.

Unlike me, who was wearing a combat uniform, my mother was wearing skimpy nightgowns.
Did you call this a negligee? It is a grown-up white nightgown made of lightly see-through material.

Wouldn’t it be cold Too much exposure.

The moment I thought that, a strange alarm sounded from somewhere.

『Teeling♪』

My mother and I both hardened at the same time.
And the whole nerve was bristled at the message that followed.

『I succeeded in peeping at my partner’s bra. You have acquired 1 coin.』

“… What?”

-Papat!

With the momentum of such a sound, her mother quickly covered her own breast.
She and she looked at me with surprised eyes, taking a step away from the danger.

… What is this?