Codename Vestia - Chapter 3

Doyeong fell into the sea with a huge splash.

 

As soon as he fell, he realized had the plane not dipped at the last minute, he would have died.

 

Usually, once the free fall training session is done, he would be joking with his friends and doing backflips, however, at present, the impact of hitting the water with his bare body without a parachute hurt as much as getting punched.

 

The water was dark like an open mouth, where the bottom could not be seen.

 

Doyeong swam towards the surface. The handcuffs he discarded sank alone into the deep sea.

 

Splash.

 

He floated above the water.

 

“Putain!”

[meaning ‘bitch’ in French.]

 

As soon as he breathed air, swear words began to burst out.

 

“I almost died from fright!”

 

No matter how often he had trained to dive, the experience of jumping with his bare body off a plane that was flying abnormally was such a horror that it was deeply engraved on his chest.

 

After finally calming down, Doyeong wiped his face and looked around. It was just the vast sea. He hadn’t expected anything, but it seemed like he really did fall in the middle of the sea.

 

Doyeong looked around. He saw a blurry silhouette of an island in the distance.

 

‘It’s too far to swim with your bare body.’

 

But even so, he had to go.

 

Doyeong was confident in every aspect of his abilities, but he was the most confident in his swimming skills. Even during Hell Week (training period), he could survive it if the lesson was on swimming.

 

Doyeong began to swim towards the island.

 

***

 

Doyeong climbed to the beach with his hands.

 

He felt like his limbs were broken and his lungs would burst.

 

No matter how trained he was, the island was farther than it looked. He didn’t know how many times he stopped in the middle because he was lacking energy. Still, it wasn’t a waste to call him a special force member. Aside from him, only a few vampires were able to swim to the end of the most difficult track on the training ground.

 

“Putain de merde… .”

[meaning ‘fucking hell; holy shit; goddamn’ in French.]

 

Doyeong cursed and stretched out lying on the beach. He took his breath avidly as he watched the scorching sun.

 

Chwaaa. Shwaaa.

 

A gentle wave came and flowed under his body, then it pulled back and repeated. He wanted to fall asleep like this, but his throbbing body awakened him to reality.

 

Doyeong barely sat up with his upper body raised. The transparent azure sea quietly pushed the white sand.

 

The forest started at the end of the beach, and a huge stone mountain was seen overlapping in the distance, looking like a sleeping giant’s spine.

 

The island looked bigger than he thought.

 

‘It’s probably not an uninhabited island.’

 

Doyeong thought with anxiety about the unknown. Then he suddenly went through his pockets… .

 

He took out his wristband.

 

It appears that he had stolen it back from Legion.

 

He noticed that the brown bear-like Spetsnaz had taken it, so he secretly stole it back.

 

It was originally his, so the expression of stealing wasn’t accurate. In any case, Doyeong was once known as a legendary pickpocket, a skill he had learned from a member of MCTC just in case it might be helpful.

 

However, the wristband was jammed.

 

“Damn it.”

 

No matter how much he shook and hit it, it seemed that Legion had deliberately broken it down. Now it was as useful as a stone.

 

Doyeong looked at the sky.

 

After this happened, there was no way for MCTC to find his location. Besides, who would think of finding him, who disappeared from Tripoli, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean?

 

Doyeong looked at the shining sun and sighed.

 

“To live deep in the heart of the mountains.”

[It is said to be a Korean proverb, I cannot find the exact meaning anywhere, but probably has something to do with ‘living in a difficult situation’ or something like that, seeing the next paragraph is written that way.]

 

However, what the Korean proverb did not mention was that even if you were caught in a tiger’s den for no reason, there would be at least a hole in which you could survive if you put your mind to use properly. Therefore, he decided to tour the island first.

 

Doyeong got up and wore the jammed wristband on his wrist so that he would not lose it.

 

***

 

He didn’t want to admit it, but he still forced himself to admit the hard truth, as the sooner you admit the difficult situation, the easier it will be to come up with the next countermeasure.

 

‘It’s an uninhabited island.’

 

There were no traces of humans here.

 

If it were a normal person, it would have been difficult to get his act together starting from the time he got stranded here, but fortunately, Doyeong was familiar with this kind of circumstances.

 

His father, who was also a special force member, took him on a survival journey into the wild from an early age.

 

In addition, even though the MCTC recruitment education program seemed more convenient, the BUD/S (U.S Military Recruitment Training Course), which is said to have twice as many dropouts than the successful candidates, made him feel not too disturbed by these circumstances.

 

Besides, he regularly trained through the jungle with only a knife and a small amount of food.

 

However, he didn’t even have the minimum preparations currently.

 

Doyeong swept away a leaf that was as big as a person and went out. For a moment, he forgot his situation and admired the scenery that was revealed in front of him.

 

“Haaaa… .”

 

A waterfall was pouring down in the middle of a lake with a radius of about 100m.

 

A huge splash was formed as an enormous amount of falling water hit the water below. There were also thick moss-covered rocks in several places around it.

 

With collapsed huge wooden pillars buried in the mysteriously colored water that resembled melted emeralds, ‘majestic’ was the only word that could describe the scene. The smell of water, soul, and grass was everywhere.

 

Gush.

 

An unknown bird flew overhead. Doyeong looked up at the sky through the browned leaves.

 

He lowered his gaze to the ground again. The lakeside was full of all kinds of sounds of nature, even though it was still. The phrase “a virgin land that no one has ever visited” could be used no matter where one looked.

In fact, even the Amazon has been touched by a lot of people with the exception of the deeper part of the jungle, so much that sometimes it feels like a theme park instead of a natural rainforest.

 

“Father would like this.”

 

Feeling peaceful, Doyeong muttered while walking over to the water. Then he sat down on his knees and took off his t-shirt. He was so sweaty, it looked like salt would drip from his t-shirt.

 

He rinsed the t-shirt and folded it up, using it to carefully wipe the wounds on his face. It was so painful that he moaned without realizing it.

 

“How unsophisticated.”

 

Fortunately, there were no open wounds. It was a situation where you wouldn’t know when the rescue team would come, but if there’s an open wound anywhere, it’ll be more difficult to survive.

 

Doyeong stared at the waterfall for a moment. The strong splash of water from the waterfall crashing into the lake made it look like there was a white mist around it.

 

Suddenly, Doyeong got up and started to unbuckle his pants. Then he took off his pants and walked into the water. As he approached, he dived in headfirst into the middle of the waterfall.

 

Time passed. 1 minute. 2 minutes… .

 

Suddenly, a foot appeared where Doyeong had stood before.

 

The owner of the pale bare feet looked around in bewilderment. But no matter where they looked, Doyeong was nowhere to be seen.

 

They knew humans couldn’t dive this long.

 

The feet walked towards the waterfall.

 

Fshwaaa… .

 

The sound of falling water was loud. The waterfall that crashed into the lake moved the water to the shoreline which led to where the foot had walked, and fell back into the lake immediately below.

 

The feet made their way through the shallow water and approached the waterfall. The transparent water swirled around her ankles.

 

The water erased any kind of smell, and the sound of water erased any presence. Even their sensitive ears did not feel any signs.

 

It was then. From the middle of the waterfall, Doyeong appeared. He grabbed the t-shirt that was tightly held with both hands and tightened it around their neck.

 

“… !”

 

The woman reflexively grabbed the t-shirt that only grew tighter around her neck as seconds ticked by. She could barely stabilize her body.

 

“Who are you?”

 

Doyeong shouted. His voice was barely audible, drowned in the roar of the cascading waterfall, but his eyes flashed in anger, and his mouth looked like he was shouting.

 

Suddenly, the woman turned around and grabbed Doyeong. At the same time, she pushed Doyeong back.

 

It was an inhumanly powerful force. Doyeong was helplessly pushed into the shallow dug-out space beyond the waterfall. His back slammed against the wall so hard that his whole body shuddered.

 

Kung.

 

A sound rang out.

 

However, Doyeong did not feel any pain this time. He pushed himself against the wall and looked up. It was a woman, so beautiful that she didn’t look like a human from this earth.

 

The woman was so beautiful that he lost his mind for a moment.

 

Rather than just pale and smooth, she had unrealistically shiny skin, with long, wet black hair that clung to her body, and vivid red eyes that were staring at him.

 

For a moment, it seemed as if time had stopped.

 

But this kind of power only belonged to the vampires.

 

Doyeong kicked the woman with all his might. The woman staggered for a moment, loosened her grip, and fell into the water as her feet slipped.

 

There was no sound of the woman falling into the water because of the sound of the waterfall, so Doyeong immediately dived into the water. In the middle of the chaos, he could see that the woman was already swimming away in the distance.

 

As soon as the woman reached the shore, she got up and started running. Doyeong pursued the woman.

 

The physical ability of a vampire was far superior to that of a human being, and knowing the surrounding terrain well, she ran at an incredible speed. He knew he couldn’t close the distance like this.

 

After some time, the woman suddenly stopped and looked back because Doyeong was nowhere to be seen and she couldn’t sense his presence at all.

 

“… ?”

 

The woman hesitated and looked into the path she had already passed.

 

At that moment, Doyeong, who jumped out of the bush next to her, pounced on her with his body, making the two get tangled and rolled on the ground.

 

“So, who are you?”

 

Doyeong pressed a knife to the woman’s neck and shouted.

 

“What are you doing here? What is your purpose?”

 

He had realized at an earlier time that someone had been watching him.

 

The woman had been following Doyeong for quite some time. He didn’t know exactly when, but at some point, he just realized that someone had been following him quietly.

 

He only pretended not to know because he could get attacked right away if the other party noticed that he had realized.

 

The woman was wearing a very frayed t-shirt. A t-shirt with ‘‘I ♡ NY’ written on it. This may seem funny at first glance, but it meant that the woman came from outside, not here.

 

At that moment, the woman turned her arms to the ground, and simultaneously turned her body over using only the strength of her legs. She still had not said anything. As their position was reserved, Doyeong fell to the ground on his back. He groaned but immediately turned around.

 

Slam!

 

The sound of the woman’s feet hitting the place where Doyeong had been lying reverberated through the sky.

 

Doyeong quickly got up and broadened the distance.

 

A vampire was still a vampire.

No, he knew intuitively that this particular vampire was ‘strong’. The vampire hadn’t put on much strength until recently because she was aware that he was human.

 

On the other hand, the woman looked surprised.

 

「He avoided it?」

 

Her words were spoken in an unknown language that he had never heard of.