6The ‘Human’ I Can Trust3 weeks ago

Chapter 6: The ‘Human’ I Can Trust

Translator: ShutDoor

The community posts became a hot topic for a while, but the world went on as usual.

At least, that was how it looked on the surface.

Even if it was the country’s largest community, the claims were still nothing more than unsubstantiated rumors circulating on an unreliable site, and most people dismissed them as mere conspiracy theories.

I couldn’t rule out the possibility that the government or some shadowy force had manipulated public opinion to make people believe that, but I decided not to dig that far into it for now.

I already had my hands full taking care of myself. Looking into all that would only give me a headache.

Anyway, after realizing I could buy any item within a three-kilometer radius of the terminal, I first purchased a warm sleeping bag, drinking water, combat rations, hand warmers, and Starlink.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t buy the entire rocky mountain wholesale.

‘Why sell everything else but not the mountain?’

So I decided to pitch a military-green tent and live there temporarily.

Strictly speaking, pitching a tent in a national forest was illegal, but I decided to just pay the fine if I got caught. The world might end in twenty-eight days. Who cared about a fine?

For the record, I had moved the ‘terminal’ inside the blueprint using the Construction function, meaning into the screen. Apparently, it counted as a structure too, because it moved just as easily as the concrete had when I demolished it.

Anyway, from now on, I planned to build discreetly using only the laptop’s blueprint function.

That way, even if a government official found me, all they would see was some crazy twenty-something guy playing a game on a mountain in winter. They wouldn’t see the shelter.

Having more or less finished rationalizing my decision, I stared at the blueprint.

The power-generation facility was located 1,200 meters underground. Since the rocky mountain itself was 1,400 meters tall, that effectively put it 2,600 meters below ground.

‘That is ridiculously deep.’

It went without saying, but I couldn’t allow just anyone to wander in and out of the shelter’s most critical facility.

So taking the dedicated deep-level elevator all the way to the bottom would not bring anyone straight into the power-generation area. I had designed the route to pass through a long, straight, sealed corridor first.

At the end of that corridor, I had set aside space for a checkpoint and office that would control access to the power-generation facility.

Since this was a grade-one hazardous facility capable of blowing up the entire shelter if anything went wrong, I planned to force anyone entering it to pass through a special protective area adjoining the office and put on dedicated protective gear and decontamination equipment.

But now that I looked at it, something still seemed to be missing…

「Construction of a nuclear power control and management facility is recommended.」

…Right. That.

I hated to admit it, but the system’s offhand suggestions were surprisingly helpful.

But what did a nuclear power control facility need? Did I have to search through more research papers? I barely read any papers even when I was in college…

*****

The National Intelligence Service, commonly known as the NIS.

South Korea’s premier intelligence agency, and the first institution to intervene whenever a threat to national security arose.

But never once since its founding had it faced a security crisis of this magnitude.

“…Cross-validation has confirmed that the coordinates of every nation’s top-secret military facilities listed in the circulated data match our previously acquired top-secret intelligence with 99.8 percent accuracy. We have also confirmed that not only fixed installations, but the movements of all visually identifiable strategic assets, including the U.S. Pacific Fleet and the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force, are updated daily.”

“So, have you identified who distributed it?”

A weary-looking senior government official was firmly massaging their temples. Apparently, their head was throbbing.

“At present, we believe the probability that a hostile nation or neighboring great power is responsible is exceedingly low. They would have no reason whatsoever to expose the locations of their own strategic assets with such precision. Our current assessment is that an unidentified third party possessing transnational asymmetric capabilities, or possibly an extremist terrorist organization, is attempting to bring about the collapse of the global security system-”

“In other words, you don’t know?”

“…Correct.”

A satellite map with such freakish precision that even America’s most advanced reconnaissance satellites looked like toys had been distributed to civilians worldwide. As an added bonus, the locations of every military facility on Earth visible to the naked eye had been laid bare.

Military facilities that had been kept under the tightest secrecy, with information about them perhaps shared only among superpowers such as the United States, Russia, and China by tacit agreement, had been exposed for all the world to see.

Warship and nuclear-submarine ports of call, and even the concealed routes of tank battalions in countries at war, had all been made public. Apparently, the software was already being used for intelligence in the Russo-Ukrainian War.

How? A satellite map capable of picking out tank skid marks would have no trouble finding a single tank hidden in a forest.

It was a catastrophe. There was no other way to describe it.

They didn’t even know who had distributed it.

They had mobilized every available member of the Cybersecurity Center and Security Investigation Unit to comb through CCTV footage from every location mentioned on internet communities, including Jamsil, Myeongdong, Namdaemun, Hongdae, Suwon Station, Hwaseo Station, Haeundae, Daejeon, Daegu, Gwangju, and Jeju. Yet only the footage from the relevant times had been erased, as if someone had cut it out with scissors.

If this was the situation in South Korea, a country famous for its abundance of CCTV cameras, conditions in other countries were probably not much different.

“How is the analysis of that game software coming along? With all the manpower we’ve poured into it, surely you have at least a rough outline by now?”

“…We are doing everything we can to understand it.”

Knowing what that answer implied, the senior government official squeezed their eyes shut.

“Why the hell did something this fucked up have to happen at the beginning of this administration…?”

The sighing official’s gaze fell upon the report on the desk.

[ Top secret ]

Subject: Preliminary analysis report on anomalous software 「Shelter Builder」

Prepared by: Joint Investigation Team, National Intelligence Service Cybersecurity Center and Scientific Intelligence Headquarters

The physical properties of the disc’s surface are entirely consistent with existing polycarbonate materials. However, whenever physical data extraction is attempted using a laser optical reader, every connected forensic device burns out due to an overload of unknown origin.
Four isolated-network servers have physically burned out to date. Throughout this process, no scratches or thermal deformation have been observed on the disc’s surface.

(※ Analysts are strictly prohibited from subjecting the disc to destructive impacts or cutting experiments at their own discretion until authorization is granted by their superiors.)

All attempts at digital downloading through online platforms and source-code cracking have proven futile. The software has a security mechanism that defies logic and is written in an unknown underlying language. It operates only when the ‘purchaser who has acquired ownership’ consciously wills it and makes physical contact.
Based on the voluntary report of civilian software purchaser ‘Kim Ui-seong’ (hereafter referred to as the self-reporting user), Security Investigation Unit agents visited the subject’s residence and sought voluntary cooperation. The self-reporting user readily consented to inspection of the device, but it was confirmed that neither operation nor seizure was possible without the subject’s involvement.
Based on the self-reporting user’s statement, investigators retraced events to a street-vendor district in Songdo International City, Incheon, on December 24. The area’s telecommunications base-station records and all security and private CCTV records from that day were otherwise normal, but only the records from the street where the transaction occurred were blank.
An in-depth interview determined that the self-reporting user came into contact with an individual wearing a Santa mask who approached under the guise of conducting a street survey. The user answered a total of seven questions and then paid 7,000 won in cash.
The survey primarily concerned ‘survival behavior in a hypothetical large-scale disaster or apocalypse scenario.’ However, because the self-reporting user’s memories are unclear, investigative hypnosis and further corroboration are required.
The security risk posed by the self-reporting user’s operation of the software cannot currently be predicted. Measures to release self-reporting users from detention are postponed indefinitely.
The potential impact cannot be estimated if the software is shared with terrorist or other extremist organizations. Entry restrictions targeting specific countries should be considered. Large-scale movements of strategic assets have, in fact, been identified in the Middle East. In the worst-case scenario, civil war may occur.

Report immediately upon securing any additional self-reporting users.

*****

“Ugggh…!”

I had been hunched inside the tent staring at the screen for twelve hours, ever since morning, and my back felt ready to burst.

Hammering away at a laptop on a mountain in the dead of winter was pure misery. At least I was bundled up in a blanket and sleeping bag inside the tent. Without them, my hands and feet would have frozen solid long ago.

I had done my best with the nuclear power control room for now, but the limitations of being a layman were obvious, so I decided to refine it later.

Why didn’t I ask AI? Because it was an idiot. It confidently spouted answers even when it knew nothing, and without the background knowledge to verify whether those answers were true, I was better off quietly reading research papers.

Anyway, the next areas I needed to work on were the substation and battery room above the power-generation facility.

It seemed best to place them as close as possible to the three SMRs on the deepest level, so their high-voltage output could be transformed with minimal loss.

However, I planned to tuck the main battery room safely inside an independent area separated horizontally from the SMRs by at least fifty meters. A fire there could lead to a massive explosion.

「[TIP] Relying on a single main substation will leave the entire shelter without power if the main transmission line is damaged.」

Fine. Just like you said, I’ll build a few subsidiary substations on the middle and upper levels too.

Though I’ll have to check the research papers first and verify that you’re right.

Since it had come to this, I decided to just roll with it. Unless I brought in a professor of architectural engineering from Seoul National University, I had no choice but to rely on the tips the system displayed.

Drawing on domestic and international research papers, I selected the most advanced equipment available.

[ ■ Substation and power-storage equipment list ]

⦁Extra-high-voltage central substation equipment set

⦁ Description: A core substation installation consisting of extra-high-voltage gas-insulated switchgear (GIS) and large transformers. It performs the primary reduction of externally supplied extra-high-voltage power to a voltage suitable for the internal transmission system.

⦁ Unit price: 500 billion won