Chapter 219
Chapter 219
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: crow
Chapter Title: EP. 49 – The World's Most Dangerous Creature...(5)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Standing guard duty in the army meant you ended up watching a ton of movies.
It wasn't like you were slacking off. There was just nothing else to do in the dead of night when everyone else was asleep.
Well, for Lee Han, anyway.
- You're still on wuxia novels and internet comics?
- Dokgo bro, it's webcomics, not internet comics.
His tastes had always been consistent, so he only watched movies once in a blue moon.
- Same difference, right?
- ...Dokgo bro, you sure you're really in your mid-twenties?
- What're you getting at?
- Uh, just that you seem really mature.
- Tsk, that feels off somehow....
- Ah, there's a movie playing. Movie time.
- ......
In contrast to Lee Han's unwavering preferences, his superior enjoyed SF films just as much as wuxia, devouring anything with sci-fi elements—hero flicks, thrillers, you name it. A true omnivore.
Because of that, Lee Han occasionally had to join in, and that's how he got hooked on one genre in particular.
- Dokgo bro loves those alien parasite movies, huh?
- Blame all the American comics I read as a kid.
- Early education gone wrong...
- What'd you say, punk!
He'd watched so many movies about aliens parasitizing hosts, and every time, Dokgo bro would toss out some childish question.
- What if those parasite aliens were real?
- You wanna talk about that at your age? ...But if I had to answer, you'd probably start by blasting 'em with high-explosive rounds, right?
But Lee Han was just as immature, and they'd spend four hours debating how to kill parasitic aliens.
...And now.
'Dokgo bro, you seeing this?'
[KEEEEE!!!]
'Looks like we weren't immature. We were visionaries.'
Gulp... gulp...!
It was a black-red liquid so filthy and horrific that even touching it seemed unthinkable.
It looked like a lump of unrefined oil, or at first glance, like scorching lava harboring flames.
-But one thing was certain.
You could say it with absolute confidence.
"...I know without you telling me."
Even without the one-eyed guy's advice, Lee Han, Lark, and Maximus backed away from the black-red liquid without laying a finger on it, fleeing like it was the plague.
They had a gut feeling that touching it would end in disaster.
It was their survival instincts screaming bloody murder, and those instincts never lied.
Squirm, squirm....
The black-red liquid monster melted down the half-demon's corpse.
Or was it eating it?
Either way, it was a gruesome sight.
"......Never thought I'd see one of those again."
"You've seen it before?"
"Mm, remember half a year ago when monsters were summoned to the Academy?"
"How could I forget."
Just thinking about the hell they went through made him bolt upright in his sleep.
"Well, then you know there was a mastermind behind that incident? And that Galahad and Lionel stepped in to take them down?"
"...First I'm hearing of it."
"Then listen up now. I fought one of those masterminds—a priest named Andrea Loran. He used his own body as a sacrifice to summon that thing."
"......"
"For reference, it took me over a fortnight to recover after fighting it. It's tricky... no, insanely tough and strong."
"...Figures."
Lee Han had no intention of ignoring the liquid abomination, even without Maximus's warning.
Its very appearance was nightmare fuel, but...
Rooooar-!
The sheer aura it exuded was dizzying.
As Lee Han and the other two knights hardened their expressions and ramped up their own presence, an absurd chuckle echoed from elsewhere.
"Heh heh, that prophet bastard... Who'd have thought he'd pull something like this on us..."
"He rigged it so if we die, the [spell] activates automatically. Sneaky son of a bitch."
The survivors—excluding No. 5 and No. 6, who were either dead or beyond saving—muttered as they watched their comrades get swallowed, their eyes hollow. Then they burst into laughter.
"Eh, dying like this ain't so bad."
"Better than running, if it means taking them out."
They offered no resistance.
With the gloomy gaze of the walking dead, they abandoned all will to live.
As if they'd always known this day would come...
And Lee Han, spotting the two precisely,
"-You shit-stinking losers are putting on one hell of a show."
"!?!!"
"Since you're all set on dying anyway, mind telling me if Auntie Lime's still alive? I've gotta kill that hag myself."
"You...!"
That "you" carried a world of meaning.
The man and woman glared at him in disbelief, but Lee Han pressed on regardless.
"Right, now that I think about it, you guys said you ditched the assassin guild to open a bakery, didn't you? ...Well, seeing you like this, guess assassination was your true calling after all?"
"...!!"
"Who the hell are you?"
"You still don't get it?"
It was a question of how he knew their little secret. Lee Han shrugged and uttered his old "nickname" from back then.
"It's me, 'Cutie'."
"????"
"...What the hell's your problem!"
The thug and the brute stared at him like he'd lost his mind, and Lee Han snapped back without thinking.
......To hide his embarrassment.
'...Damn it.'
It wasn't even a nickname he'd given himself...
[KEEEE!!]
The writhing liquid monster—no, the abomination that had absorbed all the corpses and taken full form—roared toward the world.
It was like something hatching from an egg, a grotesque mashup of mollusk and demon.
Some thing draped in black-red hide.
The deathly miasma pouring from its ill-defined body was thick enough to suffocate any ordinary citizen on the spot.
Its aura was that intense and vicious.
And the monster charged without hesitation—
Fwoooosh!
[?]
...Only for flames to erupt suddenly from its body.
"Y-You're really No. 8!? The No. 8!? How is this possible... Even if you went through some drastic change, your species can't just switch like that? ...No, even injecting monster factors couldn't turn you into that...?!?!"
The bomb maniac muttered nonstop in confusion while unleashing flames and explosions without pause.
The monster quietly endured the heat enveloping it, and a thought crossed its mind.
...It itched.
[KEEE!!!]
The monster rampaged.
It hadn't fully formed yet, but it was still powerful.
KABOOOM!
Every swing of its eight newly sprouted arms unleashed shockwaves that turned the surroundings to rubble.
If this weren't the holy precinct protected by countless wards, the entire city center would've collapsed long ago.
"Power rivaling a giant."
Thud!
The northerner—who was the only one with experience clashing against a giant—muttered as he withstood the rampage. But that didn't mean he had any leeway.
Fwaaah!
The monster wasn't just brute force; it spewed a powerful [curse], lethal poison to knightly kinds.
"Of all things, a curse..."
The spearman showed rare distress.
Curses and sorcery had always been knights' natural predators.
Knights beat mages, sorcerers beat knights, mages beat sorcerers—
Every world had its rock-paper-scissors. So the spearman's unease was natural.
A curse left permanent damage.
Thus.
"No. 8, that 'Cutie,' turning into that... Time is a cruel mistress."
The 'sorcerer's' presence played a huge role here.
"[Om]."
No. 11—the sorcerer Yan—uttered a curse word.
Shatter!
The monster's deathly miasma and curse cracked like glass.
Yan’s sorcery wasn't stronger than the monster's curse, but neutralizing it wasn't hard.
The giant was impressed.
"Impressive!"
"Haha, not quite praise-worthy from you. We're not like mages hoarding mana; it's all about precise puzzle-solving."
"...Better than my family's sorcerer."
Sorcerers were rarer than mages, their talents even more restricted.
Even in Pendragon Kingdom, they numbered only a handful.
The southern temples had nearly wiped them out through persecution.
Only a few clung to life thanks to Galahad and Lionel's support.
And as if proving why those great houses backed them, the sorcerer asserted his presence fiercely.
Showing exactly why sorcerers were knights' counters.
"Haha, now I see—you're the most dangerous one among the enemies. We might've lost otherwise."
"I appreciate the praise. But let's focus on what's ahead. It hasn't finished growing yet."
"Mm!"
The giant nodded vigorously at the sorcerer's words.
Indeed...
Krunch!
Its form was growing even more menacing by the second.
Watching this, the giant—no, Maximus—felt relieved to have allied with these former foes.
"Good thing my brother convinced you lot. Even if it's just a 'temporary alliance.'"
"...She's as stunned as I am."
Yan’s gaze turned to the man who had persuaded them.
He was their benefactor from the past, who had indeed saved them as described.
BOOM!
...And now, their former comrade canceling the monster's punch with his own fist in a mad display.
'He's grown into a truly strong human—no, a dangerous [creature], No. 8...'
"...Ha."
The sorcerer couldn't help a wry chuckle at this scene of knights entranced like ghosts.
A sorcerer, of all people, seemingly bewitched by a knight. It felt just like that.