The Regressor Only Protects Me [EN]: Chapter 37

#37. Edict (2)

The chief of police is undoubtedly the highest authority within the police station.

Most organizations maintained their existing hierarchical systems even after the cataclysm.

Kim Dong-gil did, and so does the police chief here.

However, the existing hierarchy alone is not enough to survive in this world.

It was hard to imagine how the existing leader could exert influence in this changed world.

“Are you sure? Should I come with you?”

Jin Jae-hee, who was beside me, asked Si-on.

Si-on didn’t think Jin Jae-hee needed to follow him for this.

Si-on turned to her and replied.

“No. You can go ahead.”

“Are you really okay?”

Jin Jae-hee asked again, looking worried.

Si-on looked at her, then turned his head and nodded.

“Yeah.”

Leaving her worries behind, Si-on followed Lee Cheong-chun up the stairs.

Jin Jae-hee stared blankly at his retreating figure.

* * *

Manaan Police Station, 5F.

“This way.”

Lee Cheong-chun led the way.

I followed him.

Every time we walked, the surrounding police officers glanced at us.

They were looking at Officer Lee Cheong-chun, not me.

Following Lee Cheong-chun, we headed to the internal conference room on the 5th floor.

At the end of the long corridor was a conference room.

A police officer was guarding the door.

The officer was startled when he found Lee Cheong-chun and quickly approached.

“Sergeant. You’re alive. I’m so glad.”

“Yeah. Is the chief inside?”

“Yes. He’s in a meeting right now.”

Lee Cheong-chun straightened his clothes in front of the chief’s office.

It seemed to be a habit of his.

Then, he looked back at me and opened the door to the chief’s office.

Creak.

It was a conference room.

The chairs filling the room were occupied by police station executives.

The whiteboard was filled with names, and the desk was covered with documents containing personal information.

Not only the Manaan Police Station staff but also the chiefs of nearby police boxes [small local police stations] and citizen representatives were present.

There were some familiar faces among them.

Anyang City Councilor, Gil In-ho.

Gil In-ho was sitting next to the chief, staring blankly at the scene.

Most of the dignitaries belonging to Anyang City seemed to be here.

Lee Cheong-chun saluted the chief.

“Salute.”

“Oh, Cheong-chun. You… you’re safe! I’m so glad!”

The chief, who was sitting in the center, jumped up and rushed over.

The chief hugged Officer Lee Cheong-chun tightly, then looked at him again and patted him on the shoulder.

“Do you know how worried I was? I’m so glad. Are you hurt anywhere?”

“I’m fine.”

“Good. Sit down. I’d like to offer you something warm, but I’m sorry. The situation isn’t so good right now.”

“It’s okay.”

“Okay, thank you. …But who is this?”

The chief finally showed interest in me.

Officer Lee Cheong-chun introduced me to the chief.

“He’s one of the reconnaissance team members. He was a great help on this reconnaissance expedition.”

“Ah. Thank you. Thank you so much for protecting my subordinate. What’s your name?”

The chief extended his hand to me, and I shook it.

It was cold.

Thinking that he was someone I would have to eliminate someday, the hand I was holding felt awkward.

Of course, that was just my feeling.

“Kang Si-on.”

“Si-on. Come in. I’ll have to make a seat for you.”

The chief ran and pulled his chair, then sat me at the table near the entrance.

Then, the chief brought a folding plastic chair and sat on the opposite side.

A somewhat chaotic atmosphere continued, and soon the chief spoke to me.

“But Si-on, what brings you here?”

The chief asked as he sat down.

Before I could say anything, Lee Cheong-chun spoke to the chief first.

“I was wondering if we could appoint Kang Si-on as an internal manager. That’s why I brought him to you, Chief.”

“Manager?”

I listened quietly to the two police officers.

“Si-on?”

The chief asked back, looking doubtful, but Lee Cheong-chun was firm.

“Yes. I’m sure of it. He’ll do a great job. Calmness, problem-solving skills, and even leadership. Didn’t you say you were going to select a manager from the citizens last time?”

“Ah, of course, I did. If you say so, I trust you unconditionally, but…”

The chief looked at me as if something was still bothering him.

And the chief’s eyes kept glancing at the councilor.

Frankly, I realized it the moment that man sat in that seat.

Councilor Gil In-ho.

I remembered the councilor’s face, always smiling brightly whenever he greeted citizens on the streets during Liberation Day [Korean Independence Day, August 15th] or New Year’s Day.

As someone belonging to the government, he would believe that the government would solve the current situation.

Politicians like him are the type who can’t accept the situation we’re in as a game of God and will simply dismiss it as a disaster until the moment they die.

The power of a politician, especially an Anyang City councilor, seemed to hold great sway here.

“Well. What do you think?”

Squeak.

The hinges of the chair creaked loudly as Councilor Gil In-ho adjusted his posture.

Gil In-ho asked me.

“How old are you this year, Mr. Kang Si-on?”

“Twenty.”

“College?”

“I dropped out of high school.”

As soon as he heard about dropping out, Gil In-ho started talking to me informally.

So, I answered him informally as well.

“Job?”

“Day laborer.”

“Do your parents do anything?”

“They’re dead.”

“Can someone who has no experience controlling people take on the position of manager? Accounting, operations, other computer-related tasks. Ah… I guess you can’t do that. What can a high school dropout do… Hmm. Then, can you do math? Addition? Subtraction? You might be helpful at the food supply depot. Or, water supply? Just scoop up the snow with a shovel and melt it. Day laborers are good at shoveling.”

“…”

I was silent at Gil In-ho’s last words.

Orphan, high school dropout, day laborer.

Those words that modify me.

They were things that would make the older generation in front of me frown.

Most of them were former police executives.

The person sitting on the left was wearing a doctor’s gown, so he must be a doctor.

Not to mention the city councilor.

Even just the clothes and watch that the citizen representative was wearing showed what position he had held before.

I was an incompatible combination with those established generations of society.

I came to talk to them, but they didn’t seem to want to listen to me.

Well, it doesn’t matter.

Even if they don’t listen to me, I’ll get what I want.

But there was one person here who was protecting me.

“Councilor. Kang Si-on has excellent crisis management skills and quick thinking. I can guarantee that to everyone because I just experienced it myself. With the artifact opening just a few hours away, I’m confident that there’s no one as capable as Kang Si-on to solve this internal situation neatly.”

“…”

Councilor Gil In-ho raised his head slightly and looked at Lee Cheong-chun arrogantly.

Then, he tapped his fingers on the desk.

He seemed to be contemplating something, then took out a cigarette from his suit pocket and put it in his mouth.

Gil In-ho lit the end of the cigarette and asked.

“What authority do you want?”

Gil In-ho spoke directly to me again, using polite language.

He wanted me to prove my qualifications myself, instead of having Lee Cheong-chun speak for me.

That’s what I wanted.

“Who is currently in charge of internal management?”

“It’s being handled in this conference room.”

I asked Gil In-ho, and he answered immediately.

“There are no assigned personnel?”

“Superficially, the chief is in charge, but all the police officers have individual tasks. According to principles.”

Before I knew it, the conference room was filled with cigarette smoke from Gil In-ho.

Only my voice and Gil In-ho’s voice were heard here.

“What is the police’s code of conduct in the event of a disaster?”

I turned to the chief and asked.

The chief glanced at Gil In-ho, then said to me.

“The disaster manual? First of all, it’s control. The police must ensure the order and safety of citizens from riots or crimes in a disaster situation. In the current situation, we are prioritizing the safety of citizens. On the other hand, we are continuing to try to communicate with headquarters.”

“Then, is there a reason why you are not using citizens as labor and leaving them unattended?”

I immediately asked back, and the chief coughed a few times and avoided my gaze.

I think I knew.

If an accident occurs while using citizens as labor in this situation, the chief or the councilor will be held responsible.

That’s not a measure that a police officer can take in a disaster situation.

Because it’s against the law.

In a democratic country, the police cannot order ordinary citizens.

Also, citizens have the right to refuse police orders.

The same goes for disaster situations.

The police can only advise citizens, not force them.

If they forcibly extract labor or punish citizens who ignore their advice, they will be punished by law.

The police are a group that moves according to the law. In other words, they cannot think and act freely.

The police chief and the councilor opened their mouths side by side.

“…So, we also have principles to follow.”

“I wonder what you know to be talking like that…”

The police chief and the Anyang City councilor.

Both of them were thinking about the aftermath of this situation.

After everything returns to normal, they didn’t want to be responsible for what happened here.

These two still thought that the government was functioning and the law would be upheld.

I put my hands together and clasped them.

Through a few conversations, I was able to read their thoughts.

It seemed like things would work out easier than I thought.

“You don’t want to take responsibility, do you?”

At those words, both men looked at me in surprise.

I also looked at the two men alternately.

“You know very well that we’re all going to die if we continue like this. The days are getting colder, and we don’t know when the unidentified monsters will attack. Above all, food. How long can we last with the food left in the city? A year? No, I don’t think we can last even a month.”

Squeak.

The chair creaked every time I fidgeted a little.

“Waiting for the rescue team and government guidelines is good. That’s because it’s a principle in the disaster manual, so the police should naturally follow it. I agree with that. But if you can’t be flexible in this situation, this group will be annihilated.”

Of course, I didn’t think that the ‘rescue team’ or ‘government’ would still exist.

I was just reminding them that their thoughts were not wrong by bringing up these words.

To use their power, I had to pretend to agree with their methods to some extent.

“You can’t treat citizens carelessly. After the rescue, the government will look for those responsible for this situation, and you will want to avoid responsibility in the process.”

The people who had been looking at me until now coughed and avoided my gaze.

It seemed like I had hit the nail on the head.

People who have power but don’t know how to use it and are only busy running away.

It was a word that scratched their pride.

The city councilor put out his cigarette in the ashtray and said.

“What do you want? What are you trying to say? You must have a trick up your sleeve to be saying all that?”

His words were somewhat irritable.

It would be a blow to the pride of a man who became a city councilor to hear these words from a day laborer.

But more than that petty pride, he would be greedy for the power he has as a city councilor right now.

I will use that desire for power.

“I’ll take responsibility. So, give me all internal authority from now on.”

I naturally released my neatly folded hands and said.

Gil In-ho looked at me blankly, then smiled a little.

“What are you, Mr. Si-on? Are you saying that you’ll take responsibility for everything that happens in the future?”

“That’s right.”

“Okay, well. Then listen to me carefully, Mr. Si-on. I don’t mean to belittle you, but…”

Saying ‘I don’t mean to belittle you’ already has the purpose of belittling.

“Mr. Si-on, you’re a high school dropout, young, a day laborer, and you don’t have parents, so how can we trust you? How much influence have you had in society until now? How can someone who has been nothing from the beginning take responsibility here now? Will the media and citizens believe you? If we say that you are responsible for everything that happened here, will they believe it? Tell me. Mr. Kang Si-on. Convince us.”

Everyone in the conference room turned to look at me.

I was looking at a small wound on the tip of my finger.

A wound that I didn’t even know when I got it.

It was cut by something, and it wasn’t bleeding.

I looked at it and muttered quietly.

“Convince.”

He was saying something interesting.

From the moment I came to this conference room until the situation where they have only been holding meetings for days.

Did they think I wouldn’t know?

It wasn’t a situation where I had to convince them.

The list of survivors lined up on the desk.

And they had written a few names on the whiteboard along with that list.

They were already selecting a person in charge.

Hundreds of people have died so far.

Even if the police don’t know what happened internally during the first round, at least from their perspective, they broke the law.

Superficially, they are gathering and protecting people, but in fact, this is just insurance.

The police leadership was afraid.

About what they had done and the sins they couldn’t take responsibility for.

Among the names of the citizens written on the whiteboard was the name of Officer Lee Cheong-chun, who brought me here.

“Isn’t it you who should be asking me for a favor?”

At that moment, the expressions of the people in the conference room all brightened up as if they were lying.

It was as if they were asking how I knew that.

It was simple.

The names of the citizens written on the whiteboard.

The meeting.

The list of survivors.

The way they were inducing conversation.

Gil In-ho is in a position to take responsibility, but he induced others to take responsibility.

No one here wanted to take responsibility.

But if they were to pick a complete stranger, there was a possibility that they would abuse the given rights.

In the meantime, Officer Lee Cheong-chun, a person they could trust to some extent, recommended someone.

That was me.

From their point of view, I was.

A godsend.

An unexpected windfall.

A cocky brat.

It would be nothing more or less than that.

“It’s a disaster situation right now. It doesn’t matter what I did before or what position I was in. There are monsters wandering outside, and the monsters kill people regardless of whether they have power or not, whether they are strong or weak. In this situation, someone like me can be the center. The ability needed now is not a high education or a noble status, but the ability to go out and get food right now. You just need to acknowledge my ability. If someone like you, who has received higher education and risen to a high position, acknowledges my ability, everyone will be convinced. And from then on, I will have the authority, and I will be able to take responsibility for everything I do.”

I deliberately praised him subtly.

What someone in a high position can’t stand the most is being ignored in a place full of subordinates.

I pretended to acknowledge him to some extent.

In order to create the ending I wanted.

I finally faced Gil In-ho.

Gil In-ho was already holding a cigarette in his mouth.

He kept sucking on the cigarette without even knowing that the end of the cigarette was curling up.

I looked at him and carefully concluded.

“Let’s be honest. You just need a puppet, right? A puppet to take all the responsibility. I’ll be that puppet.”

Everyone was silent.

They probably have nothing to say.

I waited for Gil In-ho’s answer.