A Dark Fantasy Spy

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Since the start of the war on terror, distinguishing friend from foe in the global arena has become quite the conundrum.

Especially with the rise of military concepts like fourth-generation warfare and cognitive warfare, the lines between conventional and unconventional warfare, as well as between wartime and peacetime, have blurred even further.

This shift has also influenced intelligence agencies.

However, in my view, despite the myriad changes brought about by the war on terror, it has certainly been revolutionary in the realm of information warfare, yet it hasn’t fundamentally altered its foundations.

Information warfare has always been a dirty and messy field.

Some say that “Call of Duty” is just a game and far from reality. The allure of the CIA and U.S. military was merely a subject that could ignite the rich imaginations of consumers, not a faithful representation of their actual reality.

But to dismiss the intelligence operations conducted by American agencies like the CIA and the military as mere entertainment would be misleading; they were certainly no less dramatic than any game script.

These guys could easily overthrow governments with coups or shove special forces into hostile environments to extract informants, a tactic they’ve honed since the Cold War era.

Britain? Canada? France? They were just as involved, if not more so. The Soviet and Chinese intelligence agencies, which led the Cold War hegemony from the Eastern Bloc, were no different.

Especially China. Those guys have been a headache since my dad’s time in the field.

Once, they collaborated with the U.S. to eavesdrop on Soviet troops in the Far East, and then they went and propped up Kim in North Korea, stirring up trouble. After the “Three Links” policy, they sent intelligence officers to Taiwan, and by the 2000s, they were spreading industrial spies around, attracting the world’s ire.

Of course, it was wrong, but I couldn’t really criticize them since I was cashing in on my own espionage under the South Korean government’s payroll. After all, South Korea had stealthily pilfered industrial technologies from advanced nations before; it wasn’t like I could speak freely when most of those technologies came from allies like the U.S., Britain, and France.

But what can you do? In this line of work, the victim usually gets treated like a fool.

The international community doesn’t wipe away the tears of its victims. It’s almost a victory if they don’t bash your head in for getting hit in the first place.

So when Israel bombed Syria’s nuclear facilities, no one was upset, not even the Syrian government that got bombed.

There were no grounds for frustration, nor any place to vent anger.

What truly ticked me off was that the sheer, astonishing capacity for information collection and meticulous analysis underlying such actions stood in stark contrast to the image of “Northeast Asia’s malevolent troublemaker and uncultured mainland Chinese” that often floats around on the internet. The internal report on the company that I smashed with a wrench was far more intricate and profound than any analysis I’d ever seen.

It wasn’t just a stroke of luck; it was a culmination of the capital invested over decades and the blood, sweat, and tears shed by Chinese intelligence agents, which only multiplied my annoyance. That feeling grew exponentially after a year when my senior, who had gone missing after a few months of uncontactable stint, returned home.

Even so, the most irritating part was that all these phenomena were “relatively less” than during the Cold War.

The intelligence officers who were dropping like flies, the special operations agents penetrating through coastlines to extract informants, all that was definitely reduced compared to the cold days, or so people constantly said.

I heard that at the funeral of my senior who came back home after being handled as missing for a year. By the way, that remark came from my dad’s junior, who visited me as a recruitment officer.

But one truth remains unchanged.

Ever since the Cold War, or even long before that, information warfare has been a battlefield where distinguishing friend from foe was traditionally tough.

It’s been that way and will continue to be.

So,

“It’s been a while, Sophia. How’s business going these days?”

“Pretty good. Really good, in fact.”

Sophia’s sudden appearance during my vacation wasn’t surprising. I expected she would show up right away in Patalia.

“How long have you been planning to meet? Since you got the visa from your embassy?”

Without the slightest hesitation, Sophia nodded in affirmation. That was her answer.

To obtain a visa, one has to undergo a certain level of background checks. They look into criminal records and whether this person might cause trouble upon entry.

By the way, the agency issuing certificates of criminal records predominantly falls under the jurisdiction of the police department in the Ministry of the Interior. Considering the nature of foreign affairs, there’s no need to spell out where that information ends up.

Furthermore, the primary job of intelligence agencies is to prevent spies from foreign countries from crossing over, so one would think that a silly person would never just apply for a visa to come over as a spy.

Naturally, my entry information would have reached the National Security Agency the moment I applied for a visa. And that information likely found its way to Sophia as well.

I sipped my pre-meal cocktail before speaking. My second question was absurdly predictable.

“That immigration officer, he was one of yours, right?”

“Yep, our team’s youngest. How did he come off when you met him? Not bad, I hope?”

Sophia said this with a bright smile.

“Everything’s fine except, well, his pitch was a bit lame. If you’re going to do a job, at least make it sound convincing. What kind of immigration officer asks personal questions like that?”

Sophia shook her head slowly with a manner that suggested she was slightly embarrassed, her expression revealing a trace of awkwardness.

“He’s just the rookie that joined this time. I’m fully aware that he’s lacking experience, and he knows that too.”

“Oh, he was a newbie? So was this a test then?”

“Sort of.”

The seniors who joined the intelligence agency before always say that fresh meat (a term deemed popular by one of my elementary school fellow intelligence officers) is always a pain in the neck.

It’s not that they’re disaster-prone or dimwitted; think of them more like children left at the edge of a river.

They’ve gone through basic training and education, but when it comes time to deploy them into the field, concern arises about whether things might go wrong. That’s why intelligence officers usually assign simple tasks to the fresh recruits straight out of school.

They’re generally not difficult.

“It reminds me of an assignment I had ages ago: my job was to keep some old man company at a fair.”

“Keep him company?”

“You know how it goes. The seniors would say, ‘Find out what you can about this guy,’ and then once I investigated, I’d come back with prepared information and get it thoroughly wrong.”

“Oh, I get it. I’ve done that a lot during my rookie days too.”

It seems the immigration officer’s antics followed a similar testing routine.

When Sophia first received information about my entry, she likely instructed her rookie to run a test.

Using the information she had and a few details that filtered through the embassy when I applied for my visa, she probably ordered him to collect data about me disguised as the immigration officer. And then, she must have ordered him to relay her personal number to me at the end.

The problem was,

“How was he?”

“Horrible.”

Honestly, if I were to critically evaluate, Sophia’s rookie was absolutely dreadful. His conversational skills seemed to be just passable, but he made a lot of mistakes in other areas.

“Tell him to manage his expression better. And did you give him my information in advance?”

“Yeah.”

“No wonder he kept steering the conversation in a weird direction, as if he was confirming what he knew.”

I sighed deeply and lit up a cigarette.

“Grab him and train him again. He’s gonna mess things up when he gets into the field.”

“Thanks for the advice, Merlo.”

Sophia signaled for the waiter with a glance. As the waiter hurried over, she almost ordered another cocktail to celebrate my arrival in Patalia only to say,

“How about I treat you to a drink?”

“Sounds good.”

She ordered my share as well and handed over a tip.

*

Regardless of nationality, there’s a strict rule for intelligence officers: no drinking while on overseas missions. This is to prevent breaching confidentiality by spilling secrets when inebriated, but it’s also a cautionary warning because you never know what might be mixed into your drink.

However, a moment exists when this principle can be broken—when drinking with intelligence officers from allied or friendly nations.

“Ah, coming to Patalia is the best.”

“Looks like the mission took a toll on you. You’ve already knocked back four shots?”

“Don’t even get me started. You know how those Imperial folks can be, right?”

“They’re still as uncouth as ever. Did you get marked on the first day?”

“Yep. And on that same day, I ended up causing a significant incident.”

Personally, I don’t fully trust the National Security Agency or Sophia. I’m a citizen of Abas and she’s from Patalia.

But regardless, Patalia remains Abas’s greatest ally and partner, and that’s proven by over a century of history between our two nations.

That means I could enjoy a pleasant drinking session.

“What kind of incident was it?”

“Some car was doing circles near my accommodation, and when I dashed out, it plowed right into me.”

“Really? What happened then?”

“What do you think happened? I kind of clung onto the car, and then we crashed; I got scraped all over.”

The phrase ‘scraped all over’ barely describes the extent of my injuries, but I decided to just brush it off. After all, causing a scene about being run over would only draw attention to my identity.

Officially, I’m just a military officer and a colleague of Camila, but unofficially, I’m an intelligence officer. The Military Intelligence Agency placed me in a military role for safety—their assurance doesn’t mean they’ve cleared me of any wrongdoings.

In this context, the Imperial Guard HQ would see me merely as a spy slipping into their midst, brazenly sticking my head in.

Unfortunately, that’s just the way it is.

Sofia from the National Security Agency spoke calmly.

“It can’t be helped. Your position is your position. But if you think about it in reverse, how do you think you would have reacted?”

“I’d probably have crashed my car right back.”

“Is that really something you’d say…?”

“Isn’t it true?”

“I know it’s true, but openly confessing to running someone over with your car? That’s a bit much….”

Regardless, this is the reality.

Even if I had a grasp of the wheel, I’m pretty sure I’d push the pedal down just the same, and the Intelligence Officer from the Imperial Guard HQ would have been tearing his hair out too. The reason is simple: the other side is a spy, and I’m the one meant to stop him.

In war or combat, fundamentally, both events are merely ridiculous antics aimed at beating a particularly nasty foe. The relationship between intelligence officers and investigators is quite similar. One side must gather secrets while the other has to prevent those secrets from being leaked, which inevitably means that someone will end up bleeding.

So, what can you do?

“Fight and win. If you’re a fool whether you win or lose, at least be the winning fool.”

“A fool is still a fool, isn’t it?”

“Not really. One side has still won.”

“…Are you drunk?”

“Uh…. Nope?”

As I answered while downing the remaining half of my cocktail, the slurred words got trapped between the ice and glass.

Seeing me in that state, Sophia shook her head.

“Even if it’s just an aperitif, it’s still alcohol. If you drink carelessly, you’ll end up getting hit hard?”

“Where? Heaven?”

“Well, I don’t know where you’ll end up after you die, but I doubt they’ll welcome someone who drank themselves to death into heaven.”

Is that so? Pondering, I took a final sip of the cocktail.

“When that time comes, I’ll just pay the saint for a one-way ticket to heaven. After all, I must be one of the most favored descendants, so they should turn a blind eye to a human drowning in alcohol, right?”

“Maybe.”

Seemingly tired of the jest, Sophia replied with a subdued voice. It was a truly pointless conversation.

*

After finishing four cocktails and two glasses of soda while enjoying the seaside view and having a smoke, our ordered appetizers finally arrived at the table.

Thinly sliced raw meat—drenched in lemon juice with a dressing. The taste of the meat was excellent, with a nice balance of slight sourness, tenderness, and the crunch of fresh vegetables that tantalized the palate.

“How’s it, Merlo?”

As Sophia, adorned with salmon and tomatoes on a cut bun, asked for my impression, I replied.

“This is my first time trying Patalian food, and it’s pretty good. Not bad at all.”

“Way better than the Francian grub. Same goes for Abas cuisine.”

As Sophia munched on the appetizer, she critiqued the disastrous food culture of neighboring countries. Honestly, not much of any cuisine ever clicked with my taste, but with a single misstep, the couple at the next table and the waiter might rush me to the nearest gas station to hang me upside-down, so I nodded diligently.

Dinner extended for quite a while.

We whetted our appetite with the aperitif and appetizers, and then came the pasta, meat, and fish—all sequenced accordingly, with the pasta served first, followed by meat and fish after the plates were cleared.

We ordered extra when needed, enjoying a leisurely meal with drinks. Putting work out of my mind, I truly felt much better, just as Clevenz had mentioned.

And not long after I finished up the ordered meat, fish, and sides, when I was finally about to order dessert.

I was finally met with a question from Sophia that felt like a proper inquiry.

As she lifted her wine glass, she casually dropped a line.

“How’s Ranieri doing these days?”

A question about Francesca Ranieri.

It was her first question at a table where dessert was yet to be served, and that was the reason Sophia had sought me out today.

I smiled and put down my drink, intertwining my fingers.

“Was that what you came here for? To ask about her?”

“Well… Not exactly, but it was part of it.”

That was an obvious untruth.

There’s a technique diplomatic officers use when engaging in a personal conversation with a foreign diplomat. You invite the diplomat for dinner under the pretext of filling them up, ensure they drink plenty of wine, and then at the onset of a slight drowsiness and tipsiness, casually drop a favor to the wine-imbibed diplomat.

Under normal circumstances, one would ponder over requests once or twice, skillfully declining. But in that moment, they often find themselves nodding and accepting without realizing it. It’s just human psychology.

“What could possibly concern you? What did your higher-ups order? Why are you bothering me the moment I arrive?”

Sophia feigned a look of guilt and smiled.

“I’m sorry, but this is my job. I wanted to avoid it as much as possible, and yet here we are.”

“Stop dragging it out and just spit it out. Is all you want to know about Francesca?”

“Yes, just Ranieri’s whereabouts. That’ll suffice.”

I nodded in agreement. Then I casually replied.

“Let’s hear the reason why.”

The National Security Agency’s sudden curiosity about Francesca’s whereabouts was exactly what I wanted to know.

During this dining session, Sophia had inquired about the northern situation several times before, and true to the nature of an intelligence officer, she questioned me about the overall conditions in the north, and I shared what I could (without breaching security regulations).

And those talks included information about Veronica, Lucia, and Camila, who had recently stirred the pot by leaving the country and causing a commotion for influential bureaucrats in both the cult and the empire.

But a query about Francesca was the first of its kind.

As I brushed crumbs off the tablecloth, I began to speak.

“There’s no intelligence network in the north, so it must have been tough for your agency to gather intel. But I bet you could indirectly monitor things through your imperial branch, huh? Surely, you have that capability?”

“Tracking movements through local intelligence networks ultimately means the information goes through several steps to be obtained.”

“Could the information have been compromised?”

“Exactly.”

The reason human intelligence collection has declined since the 21st century is partly due to technological intelligence, represented by signal and image data, replacing human intelligence in many areas, but the biggest reason is the flaws inherent in human intelligence itself.

What is human intelligence? It’s information collected through humans.

Intelligence officers directly infiltrate to gather intel, or hire assets in third countries to fetch intelligence, consolidating all that gathered intel into usable formats. That’s the essence of HUMINT.

The problem, however, is that it’s an incredibly vulnerable approach.

“If an informant fails to make contact with the target, it’s not a big deal. You can always find a substitute. But what if an informant inflates their results, or an intelligence officer intentionally manipulates information for promotion, or they get duped into receiving false intel from the start?”

The advantage of human intelligence is that it gathers info through humans, yet its downside is that it relies on humans for gathering data.

Therefore, a significant portion of intel collected through HUMINT often gets cut at the intelligence officer level or goes missing when passed through analysts. Stocks of intel obtained by taking risks often turn out nearly useless.

That’s precisely why many intelligence agencies invest heavily in launching satellites. At least, photographs taken directly and signals collected firsthand won’t lie.

It’s a sad reality, but that’s how things are.

“So to summarize, your agency is dying to know what’s happening with Francesca.”

“Yep.”

“But you’re worried about the information degrading if you go through the networks.”

“Exactly.”

“And now, it’s too late to send someone to the north or recruit nearby individuals, so you’re thinking of pumping me for information from the closest position, huh?”

“Yeah… it does sound like that.”

It turns out the essence of what she was saying was correct.

I calmly nodded and began.

“Then formally request information sharing. What’s the deal? Is your agency always this inconsiderate?”

“….”

“I’m here on vacation right now, and I’m not in a position to share anything with you. I mean, even if I wanted to let something slip, I can’t. Sharing information without authorization will get me reprimanded by my agency.”

Sophia stared at me blankly while I leaned back in my chair. Then I spoke firmly.

“Now, tell me the real reason. What’s going on?”

After a moment of silence fixating on me, Sophia reluctantly withdrew her gaze, letting out a sigh.

She lifted her head, gazed at the night ocean, and then returned her sharp eyes to me, weary from fatigue.

“If I tell you the reason, will you share?”

“Let’s hear the story first.”

“Alright.”

Sophia discreetly slid her wine glass aside.

After casting her eyes around the vicinity, leaning closer to whisper, she began softly.

“The agency wants to eliminate Ranieri.”