Chapter 534 - What is Scarier Than a Ghost |
Bang!
The golem, having seized an additional enemy, singled out a specific target and doggedly accumulated damage by lashing and striking them with its scales. This method of physical striking, likewise, did not consume a great deal of mana.
[Uh...]
[Dear God.]
[Is this perhaps getting a bit dangerous for us?]
The exchange continued for a few more seconds. Just what kind of brain did that mammal have to be able to operate its main body and a golem at the same time? Does he use two brains alone? As the battle persisted, the New Generation Alphaurns gradually formed similar questions.
"Hmm."
Conversely, however, the Archmage's side was instead resolving long-standing suspicions as time went on.
"Today was one of the rare Earth invasion attempts, so why didn't they construct the space they were going to use on a super-massive scale in advance?"
"A genius who surpassed me ultimately failed to be born..."
In a way, this wasn't solely due to the simple talent he possessed at birth. Someone had their entire brain and heart stolen and worked an entire lifetime for others. But in exchange for his past life, he gained pain that was excessive for one creature to bear... and immense knowledge. Truly vast knowledge concerning a civilization to the extent that he could roll an entire planet on his own.
—Squeeze.
So, he could crush complacent descendants who had passed the pain onto others and lived in luxury at least once like this. The name Lemming rightfully held that much power.
[To engage in melee this terrifyingly, what kind of me—...]
—Bang!
Another invader touched the tip of the staff and was fragmented, and along with that, melted away like water. The New Generation Alphaurns could hardly advance and repeatedly suffered localized damage.
—"As expected, is this... "that"?"
—"Those who learned a fair bit of history used to spread ghost stories as a joke, saying that if the Engineer survived, that man's reincarnation might one day appear too..."
But even amidst this damage, they had gained something in their own way.
[This b*stard, isn't he the Magic Master?]
The Archmage had cast his techniques with full power from the start. This meant he had revealed the speed and clean structure of his magic, so Kim Giryeo's identity was specified. However, there was just one problem: even if the New Generation Alphaurns knew this information, there wasn't really anything they could do.
[Uh.]
[Umm.]
When some mammal swung a staff once, the steel bodies they had prepared so much for melted away. Moreover, the giant golem side, as if it had a separate brain running it, ground the mages to death with tremendously delicate movements. Truly, if those scales touched them, their mana barriers were shaved away by the second, leaving them with no way to endure.
[By the way, how did our ancestors manage such a monster again?]
[Anyway, with some despicable method!]
Therefore, most of the Alphaurn entities realized the atmosphere was turning bad and stepped back. But at this time when the intensity of the battle was semi-forcibly reduced... one alien creature, thoroughly hiding its magic, quietly looked for a magic circle buried in the dungeon floor.
—"If this mission went well, I was planning to plant my stakes in an Earth dungeon and catch my breath, but this won't do."
Sneak.
The minority of one who had received elite education decided to punch a new hole in this otherworld. However, it was not an entrance heading straight to their hometown. Because the Gate system was tightly gripped by the leadership of the binary star system, whose selfishness had reached extremes, it was a structure where a single citizen returning without authorization was impossible in the first place.
—"They said Earth was an incredibly easy planet. I was completely fooled. Our vanguard that came before didn't die simply because of the side effects of body exchange."
So, the nameless invader decided to widen the distance as much as possible first.
—"But if only time is given to me, a mage!"
Earth's modern society. It was somewhat dangerous because the source of mana was literally glaring ominously there, but whatever, it would be fine to strut around the streets for a moment before hiding in another dungeon... This body, to put it into perspective, was like a gas mask in front of hazardous gas. A scholar imitating the pure white Beta-star body carefully moved their fingertips.
—Tap.
But strangely, the magic suddenly didn't activate. The fact that a genius of the old era was already dead and gone had returned alive was absurd enough. Moreover, that ancestor genius suddenly attacked the people of the binary star system while in the body of an inferior species. It was already a frantic situation...
[Huh?]
Why isn't this escape working?
"Ahem."
It was around the time when the Beta-star skin, which had no sweat glands, momentarily felt a chill down its spine. At this moment, the Archmage's gaze was fiercely fixed on the elite entity.
"Hmm."
Furthermore, what was he hesitating so much to say?
"The war of attrition shouldn't drag on. There might be other kidnap victims in this dungeon, so it's better to settle this quickly for now."
What followed was a bit of a desperate measure. Kim Giryeo, while appropriately pushing and pulling with the enemy forces, suddenly realized something. Ah, this fight could be ended unilaterally and quickly if he used the status of [Guardian]. But if he randomly activated wide-range magic, he wouldn't be able to analyze the rarely appeared Alphaurn key figure. So, right before using his status, the Archmage attempted this negotiation.
[Honestly, I hate taking lives!]
If an elite entity was mixed in here, unless they were crazy, they wouldn't have charged dangerously first. And this was also a statement he threw out thinking that scholars from 3,000 years later would naturally be able to judge truth from falsehood.
[So let's make a deal.]
[Is there anyone among you whose rank is different from the rest?]
[If there is, please report that superior.]
[I won't kill the person who speaks the truth as a reward.]
Truth. Truth. Truth. If there was just one slightly dishonest point, it was that Kim Giryeo planned to turn the selected individual into a mana cripple in this process...
[At least I'm not killing them with my own hands. This promise doesn't mean I'm responsible for them dying of natural causes.]
The words he just threw out to filter out a high-ranking corpse with a lot of information created an unexpectedly huge ripple.
—Swish.
—Swish.
—Thud.
—
Swoosh.
Rumble, rumble.
The Archmage's statement fell. Exactly three seconds later, the arms of the gnat-like monsters present in this space suddenly pointed to one place all at once...
[No, what—]
This was the reason why the blond man had appeared carrying the corpse in his arms. He didn't expect them to be this consistently petty. Anyway, since Kim Giryeo had received active help from his descendants, he conversely managed to quickly select the entity he needed to kidnap. With just that, the purpose of this sortie was fully achieved.
For reference. Afterward, Kim Giryeo used his special status as a [Guardian] as planned. And he wiped out the enemies using Earth's unique mana spread throughout the dungeon, but there was no need to explain the simple events that led to this result in detail.
"Cough."
At any rate, Kim Giryeo successfully snatched the enemy commander's body and returned. The one S-class citizen he had swallowed and kept in the giant [Dragon] was, of course, safely rescued to Earth as previously explained. Although his respiratory organs were all tattered because he used quite a bit of mana, he tried not to show it and bravely moved to the upper floor of the dungeon.
"Hmm?"
But as soon as he joined up with the engineer, a situation that would make Kim Giryeo freak out unfolded.
"What is this?"
Because there was someone much more important than a stranger whose name he didn't even know in this place.
"Why is Seonwoo Yeon here?"
It was something he hadn't even imagined in his head. Kim Giryeo was quite flustered seeing that Seonwoo Yeon had been captured, but thinking deeply about it, there was no possibility that this was an intentional act by the enemy forces. If their technology was great enough to pick out and kidnap exactly the one person they wanted, some alien engineer would have already been dragged into the otherworld first.
"Does a person's destiny follow their name?"
It was easy to notice that this situation was a coincidence. But even if there was no deep reason, his heart still sank as soon as he saw his acquaintance's face.
"Member of Assem—"
"My friend. Why don't you resign?"
Kim Giryeo almost started speaking with this bizarre sentence the moment he saw Seonwoo Yeon's face.
—
Pause.
But thinking about it, telling someone to quit their job wasn't something a third party should speak of carelessly.
"Come to think of it, if I do this, I'll suddenly be scolding a person who was just doing her job as usual."
In a way, this was equivalent to scolding a firefighter who had jumped into a blaze. In his heart, he wanted to tell the civil servant to quit right now, but then what was Seonwoo Yeon, who became forcibly unemployed, supposed to do for a living? Was this world really a society where one could live safely just by quitting the Association in the first place? Most of the people kidnapped today were probably just pedestrians who had nothing to do with public service anyway.
"If anything, it is my fault for sharing blood with those people. It is only those heartless beasts, the unilateral perpetrators, who are doing wrong."
Kim Giryeo, who also respected his acquaintance's freedom on the other hand, ultimately couldn't bring out proper words. He just groaned to himself like a sick dog and couldn't easily express a strong opinion in front of the mammal. At best, he just opened his mouth to say indirectly, "Please work more carefully in the future." Moreover, as time passed, just continuing the conversation itself became physically difficult for them.
"Oh, it's a baby Earthling."
To be precise, around the time he was explaining the corpse he brought out in response to Kang Changho's question.
Waaah, waaah.
At this time, the E-class Awakened that Seonwoo Yeon had rescued belatedly came to their senses and burst into tears. The scenery was unfamiliar, and nearby, two S-classes with massive mana were glaring fiercely; from the perspective of an immature mammal, it was hard not to shed tears.
"Everyone, first of all, it seems we must hand over this foreign Awakened to their family as soon as possible."
"Yes, yes! Let's do exactly that right now, just as Seonwoo Yeon said!"
"It's a world where the internet is so developed, surely it'll work out somehow..."
Well then, since another discussion had started anyway.
"By the way, regarding the victims who escaped earlier, could it be that they arrived somewhere else and not here?"
The civil servant present again prioritized the safety of the citizens. When Seonwoo Yeon asked about the whereabouts of the other Awakened, the engineer who had drilled the escape route answered as the representative.
"Don't worry, those people at least wouldn't have died."
"Mmm..."
"I made the exit lead to the outskirts of the city where the population density is low. It would be troublesome if a monster appeared."
Alphaurn
I followed us out when we were escaping."
"Is that so..."
"But since it's still barely near the city anyway, everyone is probably being discovered and helped by people around by now."
That was why the place where this group was currently standing was an ambiguous beach. Seonwoo Yeon looked out at the sea, not knowing if it was the East Sea or the West Sea, and fell into sentimentality. Of course, this was only for a moment. To return the barely earned E-class child, they would have to break up the gathering soon.
—
Click!
It was when the victim child stood quietly on the sidewalk blocks, and Kim Giryeo was contacting the South Korean police as a representative. A small anomaly occurred in the corner.
"Uhhh!"
It was a woman's scream. Accordingly, the two ancient alien creatures turned their heads, wondering what it was, and a strange picture caught their eyes.
—
Rattle.
They had only paused their conversation for a moment. Yet Seonwoo Yeon was suddenly startled all by herself while staring at something.
"What's the matter all of a sudden?"
"Did you see a ghost by yourself or something?"
Moreover, the place where the Earthling's gaze was directed was somewhat unexpected. A bit larger than a mobile phone. A machine whose exterior was decorated entirely in black to make it easy to manage. In other words, the civil servant was showing a heterogeneous reaction while looking at the screen of the "analyzer" for hunter activities, of all things. But since it was Seonwoo Yeon who showed peculiar behavior, of all things, there was naturally a reason for this.
"No, actually... Hunter Kim Giryeo."
"Yes, yes."
"Actually, I thought it might be helpful in some way. So I... was just trying to take a quick scan of that thing you're holding, Hunter. You said to use the camera if I see a strange creature."
"Ah, so that's why you had the machine in your hand!"
"But my hand must have slipped, or I accidentally took a picture of you instead, Hunter. And then, this text suddenly appeared on the screen, so I was a bit flustered....."
Sneak.
The black-haired civil servant remembered the role of this machine and had tried to film the alien life form. A technique that the two Alphaurns, who didn't rely heavily on machines because they could perform miracles themselves, surprisingly hadn't thought of. But as soon as the Earthling extracted information within the scope of what she could do, the analyzer's display continuously spat out this unfamiliar Korean.
[Awakening Value: ■■■■■]
[Name: Blue]
[Rank: Star's]
[Description: Guardian]