A week after the incident, NEST.
A middle aged man with short black, slicked to the side. Adorned on his face are two blue eyes and a grey bar moustache accompanied by a short goatee.
This was Dohyeon Ma, professor of understanding NEST protection and head lab researcher at NEST.
He was sitting at his desk, on his computer, seemingly looking at the footage of the fire at the facility a week ago. When he spotted something out of the ordinary.
The footage was slightly off, corrupted, so it wasn't extremely clear as to what he looked like, however, he saw a man, around 20 years old, Ran out the building at a rather impressive speed. Despite this, it didn't seem like the speed he ran at was intentional, as he stumbled and fell almost right after getting out of the building and trying to slow down.
'Fast… a complex that enhances speed maybe? Nevertheless… judging by the clothes he's wearing he was definitely a pet shop victim. Luckily he doesn't seem to have been feed trained yet…'
Professor Ma was a little surprised as he watched the footage. After the fire died down, the figure went back inside. About an hour later he came out wearing a security guard's uniform.
'Smart…'
After watching the direction he walked off to, and estimating the unique character's rough location he made a call.
"Hello? Professor yu? I wanted to ask… is student Dohwa Cheon finished with her help in the research department for the day?"
"Professor Ma? Yes, she's complied and we finished our tests rather quickly today, why do you ask?"
"I'll need to send her out for a certain insect-human enrollment process. This one looks like he fights back. She's also the only active student on campus at the moment."
"...I see. I'll send her to your office now."
"Thank you professor Yu"
Professor Ma hung up. He was rather curious about what would happen in the near future…
—
A month after the incident, somewhere in Gangwon province.
Do-Hyeok was pissed. Not only could he find nothing about the guys he wanted to track down, but now he's homeless.
The only good thing about this situation is that those loan sharks think he's dead. Guess that was a good thing.
Anyway, living on the streets was hard. He had to change locations almost everyday to make sure he wasn't tailed by 'those guys'.
And food was an even worse issue. He barely scraped by with the wallet that the security guard had on him but now he was out.
Now, he's slowly waiting to die of starvation in a dirty alley.
'it all comes full circle' so thought Do-Hyeok dejectedly
It was true, he ended up back at square one. What now? He wasn't stupid enough to run himself ragged trying to find those bastards. It simply isn't worth it.
"...and here I thought I'd have some cool vigilante story."
Wallowing in his misery, Do-Hyeok couldn't help but be a little regretful. Though he was a super human, he didn't even get a chance to use any of his cool new insect powers.
And he certainly wouldn't rob a bank or anything. He may be a super soldier made in an evil lab, but he himself has never once committed a crime.
'Well if i'm lucky… things will work out for me.'
Even now his mind went back to games of chance…
Sigh… truly an addict.
"Oi, Antboy."
While in deep thought, Do-Hyeok heard a voice. While the tone seemed a little aggressive the voice he heard it from was actually quite pleasing to the ear.
"...Huh?"
Do-Hyeok looked up. It was a girl, one about his age, standing at around 5'3, rather slender and eye catchingly silver hair mixed in with cyan highlights braided from one ear to the other like a headband. She also had bright blue eyes.
She wore a plain black shirt that exposed her midriff with a silver and cyan college jersey. matching her hair and eyes with the addition of black. From the waist down, she had blue jean shorts with a black belt as well as fishnets and heeled black boots with silver bands.
She was smirking rather fiercely at Do-Hyeok. She seemed like the type that brute forces every problem.
"...do you piss acid?"
'What the hell does that mean?'
She said this without a hint of shame, not a care in the world about those around her.
"The heck do you want with me?"
Now he was just utterly confused. A girl he doesn't know walks up to him, calls him Antboy, and asks if he pisses acid. How do you react to something like this?
"Listen, I'll make this easy for ya. You come with me, and you don't die, simple."
'...'
'The fuck do i do now?'
"Where are you gonna take me?"
He couldn't help but be a little intrigued, 'where could this girl possibly want to take me?' He thought.
"Somewhere you can learn more about what happened to you."
"Lead the way."
Do-Hyeok didn't hesitate in the slightest. If he could learn more about that jungle juice stuff and what happened to him, the quicker he could make that white haired bastard cough up his teeth.
—
Soon enough, the two ended up on a green bus with the word 'NEST' printed on it, it looked like any other coach.
"So can you actually tell me where we're going now or…"
"Hah? Don't wanna, I said enough earlier didn't i?"
"...could you at least tell me what kind of place it is? A lab? A hospital?"
Do-Hyeok was excited to learn more but at the same time he was equally cautious, he didn't want to be experimented on again…
"Tch! Fine. We're going to my university campus. Happy now?"
This Dohwa girl didn't seem like the type to care about details and spurted out the bare minimum.
'Wait… University…?'
Do-Hyeok's perspective on the matter did a complete 180.
He finally got to go to university…!
An excited, almost childish smile appeared on his face.
'What's up with him?'
Dohwa, looking at this smiling idiot, began to smirk a little without realising it.
'...cute.'
—
After a long drive the bus stopped at a tunnel.
Confused at this, Do-Hyeok looked to Dohwa and asked,
"Why'd we stop in the middle of a tunnel?"
"Cuz we're here, duh."
"???"
Dohwa hopped off the bus and Do-Hyeok scrambled to his feet and followed her.
Dohwa walked up to the wall and raised her student ID.
"These tunnels were built through mountains, so what do you suppose happened to all that extra space?"
As she spoke, the wall suddenly opened up, it was a hidden door.
"...!"
"We made it our safe haven."
Dohwa continued to speak as she walked through the tunnel-like secret entrance.
"A place where insect-humans, like you and me…"
Suddenly something appeared from her back.
It was a scorpion tail!
"...can peacefully live out our days, as well as not bother people. It'd be bad if our existence was known clearly…"
As they continued walking through the tunnel light began to pour through, a bright blinding light came through and soon, once his eyes adjusted, Do-Hyeok saw it.
It looked as if he'd stepped into a different world.
People of all shapes and sizes were everywhere. Not only that, every single one of them had a feature unique to insects. Mothers, children, elderly. People of all sortd of backgrounds.
Somehow sunlight spilled in, coating this enormous mass of land in it.
Towns, districts, schools, markets. It was an entire insect human society!
Dohwa turned to him, an amused grin plastered on her face,
"...welcome to NEST, Antboy. Let me introduce myself again. My name is Dohwa Cheon, a student at Nest, a freshman studying in the practical entomology department."
"What's with the Antboy thing…?"
"Well one, it's funny. Two, you never told me your name."
'True enough.'
And in reply Do-Hyeok introduced himself,
"...Kim Do-Hyeok, Future student of Nest."
"Alright then Do-Hyeok, i gotta go to the department office, you're one of our only transfer students this semester so feel free to walk around a bit…see ya! I'll come by to grab you later. Maybe."
After saying her piece, Dohwa was off and Do-Hyeok was left alone in this bustling college-town called NEST.
—
After wandering for a while Do-Hyeok found himself in a forest and he overheard a conversation.
"Those are a good, sturdy pair of wings. So why do you keep them hidden?"
The first voice sounded old, but toned, a voice that sounded like it demanded respect. One that was confident yet grounded.
Do-Hyeok turned through the trees to get a better look and saw a man standing at a staggering height over six feet. He looked like Santa worked out all year round.
"...I'm only here to get rid of these useless things."
The second voice sounded more youthful but the tone of his voice sounded sadder.
The young man, standing around 5'9, had short black hair with dark green and blue highlights and green eyes that somehow reminded Do-Hyeok of his own, stormed off clearly, seeming to be thinking of a bad memory.
As he walked away it was brief but Do-Hyeok caught a glimpse of a pair of wings from under the jacket the man was wearing.
"...stupid kid."
The old man, who for some reason was topless turned to Do-Hyeok.
"And what insect might you be?"
"...huh? Sorry, do you mean me sir?"
"Kid, who else do you see around here?"
What he said was true, although while walking through here he saw plenty of people in the forest, there was almost no one but him and this old man in the area.
"Right, sorry. I'm pretty sure I got an ant. At least that's what I'm aware of, no idea which type though…"
Almost as soon as he said that, this old man was already in front of Do-Hyeok, looking very closely at his eyes.
"Hmm… those are pretty highly defined compound eyes, maybe a bulldog ant?"
"Sorry sir but I have no clue…"
'Gotta get away from this weird old man asap.'
"Now… if you'll excuse me…"
And just like that, Do-Hyeok managed to slip away from the old man.
"...How interesting. To run into both of the semesters only transfer students already… Am I lucky or what?"
The man mumbled something under his breath but by the time he started, Do-Hyeok was already gone.
—
"Alright i've taken you to where you need to be, i gotta go do some other stuff, i'll probably see you at class registrations at the latest, see ya antboy."
Do-Hyeok, after going back out of the forest, ran into Dohwa who said he needed to go to professor Dohyeon Ma's office.
"See ya Dohwa, and don't call me that, please."
"Hehehe~"
Dohwa did not respond, she simply walked away with a maniacal giggle while waving behind her
Currently, he was in front of the door to professor Ma's office and to his right was…
"Oh, hey! You're the other transfer student right? I'm Huijin Park. Freshman here at Nest in the practical entomology department and this is the other transfer student, Jang Suchan."
"You're a transfer too? Nice to meet you."
The two to his right were the guy with wings he saw earlier and a new girl he hasn't met yet.
She had long dark brown hair highlighted bright pink and two barely noticeable hair-thin incredibly long antennae that bend downwards blending with her hair. She also had brown eyes and seemed about the same height as dohwa.
"Do-Hyeok, nice to meet you as well."
After introducing himself, Do-Hyeok and the other two walked into the office.
And once he entered the room he came face to face with Dohyeon Ma.
"Ah, Mr. Jang and Mr. Kim. It's nice to meet you. Im Dohyeon Ma, a professor at Nest."
—
END OF CHAPTER