Codename Vestia

Chapter 2: Joonie

“It doesn’t matter if you don’t say anything.”

Rahel brushed her fingers lightly across the back of Doyeong’s neck as she turned away.

“Did you know that vampires have different tastes? It’s not just about gender. Some prefer pretty women, while others prefer handsome men. There are even vampires who prefer fat humans because they have more blood. As for me….”

Warm breath grazed his ear.

“I really like strong men.”

Rahel buried her nose in Doyeong’s neck, sliding it up along his throat as she whispered.

“There’s nothing quite like overpowering men who are packed with muscles, draining their blood, and watching as their confidence in their own strength shatters, seeing them completely helpless, unable to move even a single finger, their mental state collapsing. It’s indescribably satisfying.”

Even the thug-like men who had followed them in were all wearing bandages around their necks. They looked like they carried lunch boxes wherever they went.

With Rahel’s nose pressed against the back of his ear, causing him to lower his head slightly, Doyeong looked up and spoke.

“Sorry, but my neck’s a bit sensitive. Could you take it easy with the breathing?”

Rahel lifted her head.

“It’s been a while since I’ve had someone so lively. It’d be a waste to just drink you up.”

She stepped back.

“Well then, shall we begin?”

At her words, a white man, built like someone who could make Fedor Emelianenko cry, stepped forward. Without hesitation, he swung his fist and hit Doyeong square in the face with a loud thud. Had the chair not been bolted to the floor, he would have been knocked to the side and rolled away.

Doyeong slowly brought his head back to its original position with great effort.

“Maybe you should’ve signaled before barging in.”

“Don’t worry. He is human, after all.”

Rahel spoke calmly as she sat leisurely in the chair another man had brought over for her.

“You can tell just by those soft punches.”

As Doyeong spoke, the man shifted into a proper boxing stance and punched him in the stomach. Although Doyeong had read the movement and tightened his abs, if someone unprepared had taken that punch, it would have ruptured their organs. He suddenly felt grateful for the instructor who had once made the team members stand in a line and take hits from the Luas squad member to toughen them up.

Doyeong coughed and barely managed to catch his breath. Rahel chuckled softly.

“Still, he was in Spetsnaz, the Russian special forces. You might not want to make him angry.”

“Wow, a Russian brother. Scary stuff. Spasibo.”

When Doyeong responded with a laugh, Rahel looked at him with an intrigued expression.

“Did they teach you to provoke the enemy when captured at MCTC?”

“No way. They just gave up on teaching me.”

Rahel laughed, leaning her body slightly to the left, resting against the armrest.

“It’s a shame. If we had met on Tinder, we could’ve had a fun evening.”

“Sorry, but I prefer more natural encounters.”

Suddenly, the Spetsnaz man grabbed Doyeong’s face with his massive hands, as if he were about to crush his skull, and shouted something. Doyeong knew a bit of Russian, but the man yelled so roughly that he couldn’t make out a single word.

Doyeong stared blankly at the Spetsnaz soldier and asked, “You brushed your teeth, right?”

In response, the Spetsnaz kicked Doyeong. Once wasn’t enough, so he kicked him again, and eventually, the chair, with Doyeong still seated, tipped over and rolled across the floor. The loud noise echoed through the spacious room.

“Don’t kill him.”

Rahel spoke calmly and walked over, her demeanor unhurried.

“Now, Major, think carefully. Who do you think we are?”

Doyeong tilted his head back until the back of his skull touched the floor.

“You’re remnants of SN, I guess.”

“Remnants? I’d prefer if you called us the second generation. Look, the thing about a phoenix is, at some point, it sets itself on fire, burning itself to death. And then, when it rises from the ashes, it’s stronger.”

As Rahel spoke, the sound of her high heels approaching echoed.

“More complete.”

Click… click…

“It becomes an entity beyond reach.”

Standing beside him now, Rahel looked down at Doyeong and smiled. From this angle, lying on the floor, she seemed even taller, with the light behind her making her appear as an untouchable figure. Doyeong couldn’t help but laugh.

Rahel kept her smile, but a cold expression settled over her face.

“What’s so funny?”

“You sound exactly like someone from SN. Do they teach you to talk like that over there?”

Rahel chuckled softly. It seemed like she might kick him, but she refrained, clearly unwilling to dirty herself with such inelegant actions.

“The more spirited you are, the more fun it is for me. Humans are just too weak. I can rarely find a man who’s up to my standards, and even when I do, they never last. But I can’t stand men of my own kind—they’re too stiff. Their bodies, and their minds.”

Rahel gazed down at Doyeong, slowly licking her lips with her crimson tongue.

“Human men, on the other hand, are so wonderfully tender.”

Doyeong didn’t want to admit that her words gave him chills. Rahel was notorious for keeping human men as her personal slaves. Once they fell into her grasp, no one ever returned.

Fortunately, just then, a phone rang. Rahel looked at the wristband on her arm, pressed it, and answered the call.

“Yes, sir.”

She listened briefly to the person on the other end, then replied, “Understood. I’ll handle it right away.”

After hanging up, she turned back to Doyeong.

“The boss says he wants to see you personally.”

It seemed that here, they referred to the head of the group as “The Boss.”

Rahel nodded towards Doyeong.

“Take him.”

Two Russian men, who looked capable of wrestling a bear, lifted Doyeong up. As they did, Rahel raised Doyeong’s chin with just one finger, looking at him with her snake-like eyes as she spoke.

“When this is over, you’re mine.”

The two men dragged Doyeong out. They passed through the door and walked down a hallway. The white, spotless corridor was so featureless that it was hard to tell where they were.

One thing was certain: the building was too large and well-maintained to belong to an underground terrorist organization that had lost its command tower and had to go into hiding.

Boom.

At the end of the hallway, a door opened, revealing a hangar. In the middle of it stood a military transport plane, already prepped for takeoff.

Once again, a military transport plane. Though it bore no insignia to indicate its affiliation….

Doyeong was speechless. How could they have equipment and facilities that rivaled a proper military force?

The two men hauled Doyeong up the ramp door and slammed him into a seat. Moments later, Rahel boarded the plane, walking elegantly like a queen inspecting her guard. She passed by, flaunting her legs through the deep slit in her skirt.

“Take off.”

The ramp door closed with a heavy thud, as if marking the end of Doyeong’s fate.

***

Doyeong glanced out the rear window. They were flying over the ocean.

Once he met this so-called “Boss,” security would be even tighter. His only chance to escape was now. But how, in the middle of the sky?

“Look forward.”

One of the Luas soldiers sitting on either side of him growled.

They were not the kind of people you could warm up to.

Doyeong had no choice but to turn his head back. Rahel watched him with an amused expression.

Women often took an interest in Doyeong, and he didn’t particularly mind, but this was one of the rare times he wished they wouldn’t.

At that moment, a crew member approached Rahel and spoke.

“There’s a military aircraft ahead. They’re requesting our identification.”

Rahel glanced briefly at Doyeong before asking, “MCTC?”

Doyeong doubted it, and so did the crew member, who responded, “I don’t think so.”

“We’re deliberately flying over international waters, so why are they tailing us?”

“I’ll look into it.”

Doyeong remained silent.

Beep.

Suddenly, there was a sound. There was no way the vampires next to him hadn’t heard it too. The man on his left frowned and asked, “What was that noise?”
“What was that sound?”

The vampire glanced at Doyeong, whose hands were still bound behind his back. In that instant, an elbow slammed into his jaw from the side.

“It’s the sound of your jaw flying off!”

Compared to humans, vampires were built like tanks—extremely tough. But a jaw was still a vulnerable spot. If hit correctly, even a vampire could take considerable damage.

“How did you get out of the cuffs?!”

The man on Doyeong’s right shouted in surprise.

Doyeong found it amusing that the vampire was wasting time being shocked instead of reacting. It was a trait of vampires—sometimes, because of their superior physical abilities, they underestimated situations. In this case, it worked in Doyeong’s favor. They probably couldn’t fathom how a mere human could do anything while being flanked by two vampires.

But they had no idea. After all, his job involved spending most of his waking hours studying and training on how to deal with vampires.

Doyeong slammed his fist into the right vampire’s face. Normally, his punch wouldn’t have done much damage, but using the cuffs as makeshift brass knuckles amplified the impact. The vampire screamed, clutching his now bloodied face.

Doyeong didn’t waste a second. As he threw the punch, he’d already freed his belt and tossed it aside, charging forward.

Boom.

Suddenly, the plane shook violently, as if it had been hit by a missile.

Doyeong instinctively grabbed onto the safety net of a nearby seat.

“What the hell!” Rahel screamed, her voice almost hysterical.

It seemed the pressure system on the plane had malfunctioned after taking a hit. The aircraft’s pressurization, crucial at high altitudes, had failed.

That could mean only one thing….

Doyeong’s eyes darted to the ramp door control panel on the side of the transport plane’s wall—it wasn’t too far away.

The Legion members were too busy assessing the situation to notice what he was about to do. They likely assumed they could overpower him easily at any moment.

As soon as the plane steadied, Doyeong sprinted toward the panel. Grabbing onto a nearby cargo strap for stability, he slammed his palm onto the ramp door open button.

Boom.

Whirrrrr.

The ramp door began to open, and a blinding rush of light flooded into the cabin. His guess had been correct—the door could only be locked during flight when the pressurization system was functioning properly.

“What the…!”

Finally, the Legion soldiers turned their attention to Doyeong. But with the ramp door wide open, exposing them to the dizzying drop into the sky, they were forced to grab hold of something to avoid being sucked out. None of them dared to approach him.

Amid the fierce winds, which would have surely made the hairstylist who had prepped Rahel’s hair that morning weep, Rahel’s hair whipped wildly around her. Despite the chaos, she managed a mocking smile.

“Do you think a human could survive jumping from this height?”

Doyeong laughed.

“Isn’t my chance of survival higher than if I let myself get dragged along?”

But the truth was, if he jumped from this altitude, even landing in the water wouldn’t save him. The impact with the surface would crush him like a mosquito caught between a hand and a wall. And without a parachute, he didn’t stand a chance.

In short, he was stuck—having opened the door, but unable to do anything with it.

The Luas soldiers realized that Doyeong was bluffing and began inching toward him. They had the instincts of beasts, and their awareness matched that of animals.

Boom.

Suddenly, the plane lurched, and Doyeong felt his body drop sharply downward. More accurately, the plane was descending rapidly. It seemed the aircraft had sharply lowered its altitude to avoid enemy fire. Whoever was piloting that enemy craft had just become Doyeong’s lifesaver.

“Hey, watch out…!”

One of the Legion soldiers shouted, but there was no way the pilot could hear him.

Everyone, being vampires, clung desperately to something to keep themselves stable. Rahel, in particular, gripped the seat netting with one hand, showing surprising strength. It seemed she was more powerful than the average vampire, probably one of noble blood.

Doyeong felt like his arms were going to be torn off. The veins in his arms swelled as he strained to hold on with every ounce of strength.

The plane dropped so low it felt as if it might crash into the sea. The sensation was like riding a rollercoaster at breakneck speed.

The fierce wind battered his skin, almost as if trying to strip it away. Doyeong realized this was his only chance. If he didn’t jump now, he wouldn’t survive at all.

There was no guarantee he would live even if he did jump.

In that instant, Doyeong let go of the strap and spun his body, leaping out of the plane. The vampires’ eyes widened in shock—none of them had expected a human to actually jump.

“That crazy…!”

At that moment, the transport plane shot upward again, regaining its balance.

One of the men glanced down, staring at the now empty space below, before turning to Rahel.

“There’s no way a human could survive jumping from this height. Even if he did, this area is surrounded by uninhabited islands.”

Rahel continued to gaze downward, like a snake that had just lost its prey, prompting the man to add, “Without a GPS, MCTC won’t be able to find him either. Even if he miraculously survived, he’d die on one of those deserted islands.”

Rahel lifted her head and scoffed.

“What a pity. He could’ve been such a fun toy.”