Prologue
February 24th, 2018
Seoul, South Korea
The night sky was choked with dust, and filthy streaks of light obscured the stars from view. This was nothing unusual for Seoul, but Arthur Kim did not appreciate the fact after having moved from rural Australia. Even at the demilitarized zone border post where he had served, the amount of light pollution had been too much for his liking.
It was snowing heavily, but it was too warm for snow to pile up and all it did was make the streets run with greasy, muddy water. Growing up in the Outback, he had expected snow to be more magical.
Shoving his hands into his pockets, Kim looked down and sighed. He could see the house up ahead. The Senior's house was a small shack in the Gangnam slums, one of the last dilapidated areas remaining in the district, overshadowed by the skyscrapers looming nearby. He approached the door, and raised his hands to knock, but someone yanked it open from the inside. The man nodded for him to enter.
Kim walked inside and closed the door.
The Regional Senior for Korea, Seokmin Han, was a harried looking man, perhaps in his mid-thirties, of short stature, with balding hair and a beer gut. He smelled slightly of liquor, and his eyes looked like that of a chronically tired man, drooping and bloodshot. Kim did not blame him, for being in charge of approximately three hundred thousand wizards across the peninsula would be a terrible job, especially given the recent political circumstances. All of the furniture was old and breaking apart. Kim did not see anyone else in the tiny house.
"Arthur, huh? Dai," said Han, speaking in English. He had a gravelly voice scarred by chain smoking – there was a large ashtray on his table, almost full. "You got a Korean name?"
"Yes, sir," said Kim. "Seungho. But I don't use it often. I grew up in Australia, mostly."
"How's your Korean?" asked Han.
"Passable. Not really that good, to be honest," said Kim.
"Doesn't matter, cousin. This isn't a local assignment. Take a seat. You want some soju? You might need it," said Han.
Kim did a double take at the man. "No thank you, sir. I'm not sure if that would be appropriate."
It had occurred to him when he was told to turn up to the regional senior advisory that he might be in trouble, for this man was two steps up the chain of command from the highest-ranking people he usually saw. He had dismissed that possibility as unlikely, as he hadn't done anything of note in the past six months.
Han raised his eyebrows and looked at Kim, and then laughed. "You're right, man. You're right. Think I'll pass too. Have you had dinner yet?"
"Yes, thank you."
"If so, let's get down to business," said Han, typing on his laptop, an ancient Samsung that looked to be about eleven years old. He stared at the screen for a few seconds, then looked at Kim in the eye. He had an deep stare – Koreans are usually not very good at eye contact and Kim was unnerved.
"Seokmin Kim, twenty-five, moved from Bumfuck, Australia in the April of 2015 to here to do your time in the military as a Korean citizen…help your mother with her business. She runs a restaurant in Suwon. Is that right?"
"Yes. Family finances are strained right now, and I guess I had to chip in," said Kim. He didn't really want to talk about it. He shifted in his seat, looking sideways. "Finishing college can wait."
"Mechanical engineering, I saw. Uhm, you were involved in the 2015 Australian Crisis as a fireteam leader. You got a medic killed," said Han, still looking at Kim. "How did that happen?"
Kim winced. Han was a very direct man. "While retreating in absence of fire support, our vehicle took a railgun round to the rear, which overwhelmed our shields and led to significant fragmentation damage to the medical module. Despite our best efforts to escort Audrey Delvigne to the rear, the trauma wound proved too complicated for us to properly treat in a combat environment."
"That must have been hard for you," said Han in a disinterested tone.
"Yes."
"Combat sucks, man. Those alien motherfuckers – they got some big guns, yeah?"
Kim looked up. "We were very underpowered. They didn't have any wizards with them, but they definitely had great technology, and there was a limit to what we could do with our combined energy budget."
"Yeah, the loss isn't your fault. The intervention, was in the end, considered to be a success, if a pyrrhic victory," said Han. "Your bravery and quick thinking in combat was well noted by your rater. You could have all died, but your coordination of fire support, maintenance, and what some may see as recklessly aggressive behavior saved the day."
Kim looked at Han, and shrugged. "I guess I was angry. I usually don't get angry, but I could see that Delvigne was gone, so."
Han tapped on his keyboard a few times. "Hmm, next slide, next slide, next slide. You spent most of the last twenty-one months serving as a conscript infantryman at the border with the Army. Why is that? Guy with your talents could have applied to the Air Force or something. I was an airman myself. Spent most of my time at a desk doing paperwork. I did shovel a lot of snow, though. That was awful, but definitely better than whatever you get up to in the ground forces. You've got some fucked up people over there in the Army."
Kim smiled sardonically. Being a wizard hadn't really helped much with being a conscript, although the other men and women in his platoon had experienced mysteriously low injury rates and good intel when training. They had even given the medic a medal.
"Professional growth."
"What do you mean?" said Han.
"I have no idea how I ended up this way," said Kim slowly, "but somehow, ever since I had my Ordeal, someone saw fit to dump me into a warzone all the time on all of my interventions and assignments. I specialize in applied destruction wizardry. Embedding with a primitive nonwizardly combat force did provide a lot of perspective."
"Have you ever wanted to give up on that and specialize in other areas of wizardry?"
"Don't think I had much of a choice. I'm good at it and it's what people make me do," said Kim. "You've been in combat, sir?"
"A few times," said Han. "The adrenaline rush. I'll never forget running into that fucking Rirhaiti mercenary band on Chuvash III. That was back in 2001."
"Oh, yeah, those guys are pretty good," said Kim, nodding. "And yes. The adrenaline. Nothing like it."
"You had worked with Delvigne before?"
Kim nodded. They had met when he was sixteen, at a field medical wizardry competition held in Annecy, France. They had worked together a few times.
"You over it?" asked Han.
"Not really," said Kim.
Han sighed. "I can understand that."
They looked at each other for about half a minute before Han spoke up.
"I will fight to preserve what grows and lives well in its own way; and I will change no object or creature unless its growth and life, or that of the system of which it is part, are threatened."
"To these ends, in the practice of my Art, I will put aside fear for courage, and death for life, when it is right to do so, till Universe's end," answered Kim.
The Wizard's Oath. Kim had found after much thought, that all philosophical musings aside, a lot of the time, it meant blowing people up if it meant stopping them from blowing more people up. Most of the time, it wasn't that simple, but sometimes it was.
"The organization that I have recommended you to, Arthur," said Han, very slowly. "Focuses on the first part. I will fight, and not much else. They change creatures. That is to say, blow them up. It's a very exclusive job, full-time. You'll be working almost directly for the Planetary."
Kim considered, then shook his head. "Full time? I told you, sir. Family finances. If I have a choice in this matter, and I honestly wouldn't be surprised if I don't, I feel like there's a very urgent personal situation of mine that would distract me from my job to the point of being a burden to my coworkers."
Han laughed without much mirth. "I know, man. These jobs usually don't pay, we don't do wizardry for the money, so I can see why you would be skeptical. But this is special. Very special. Direct pay from our little planetary reserve fund. Laundered to your liking, of course."
Kim was expressionless. "How much?"
Han looked at his screen and raised his eyebrows. "They'll be paying you in dollars. Three hundred thousand a year, base pay. Deployment bonuses will be generous. Four-year contract. There will also be subsidies in…Rirhaiti credits. Wow, what the fuck, man. I wish someone paid me with Rirhaiti. Shopping at the Crossings would be a blast."
Kim breathed sharply. "That…would do. Yes. Where will I be working? What does this organization exactly do? What is its name? You said I'll be working for the Planetary?"
"You'll be stationed on Charon. They have a small base there. But I reckon most of the time, you'll be somewhere else in the galaxy. Or who knows, other galaxies. Or other universes. How the fuck would I know, these people are very secretive. I was just told to dig up a suitable candidate," said Han, starting to laugh, then coughing up what sounded like a lot of phlegm. Han spat into a garbage can.
"Anyway, what was I saying. What you'll be doing is conducting direct action against malevolent entities working directly or indirectly for the Lone Power for the purpose of defending the status quo for the Sol system. Essentially, you'll be identifying and tracking threats before they get to us, and then take the fight to them before it comes to us like it did in Australia. As for its name, I don't know, but I think its leadership answers directly to the Planetary. The rest of the intervention structure isn't involved as far as I can tell. I mean, I'm fairly high level and they won't tell me much. In fact, I'm authorized to do a selective memory wipe on all this if you decline," said Han cheerily.
Kim blanched. He didn't like the idea of anyone messing with his brain, Regional Senior or not. "I assume the job is dangerous?"
"No shit," said Han. "If you die, your immediate family is supposed to get two million dollars. You in? I can't give you much more information about this, because I don't have any. Choose now."
"Yes," said Kim without hesitation. Three hundred thousand dollars a year would save his family from bankruptcy, and combat wizardry was a small field – it sounded like he could make some very high-level connections on this assignment. "I need the money."
"Great. Congratulations. There's an armored cyborg shark waiting to interview you off the coast of Incheon. Let's not keep him waiting, he seemed like the grumpy type," said Han.
"Armored cyborg shark. So I guess it's a joint planetary project, not just a human thing. What's its name?" asked Kim.
"His name is Vorgak. He's Great White," said Han, smiling and flashing his yellow teeth.