Chapter 184
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 184
Chapter Title: Second Clash - Part 2
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“...What in the world just happened?”
Another terrorist attack targeting Steelain had just occurred, right in front of everyone.
But once again, Steelain displayed an uncanny ability to respond, turning the tables and subduing the assassin—Conor O'Neil.
“Wow— I thought he was a goner for sure, but he caught the guy instead...”
"But doesn't this mean the Lord of the Sandcastle was a member of that evil organization?"
"Gasp, you're right! Crazy, what the hell are those guys?"
The players who had witnessed the scene up close stared, dumbfounded, at Steelain floating in the sky.
*Fwoooosh—*
However, the sand that Conor O'Neil had filled the area with was now scattering with the wind, pouring down like rain and obscuring their vision.
Thus, they failed to notice the strange phenomenon occurring around them...
*Gurgle— Gurgle—*
It was...
“—Huh? Everyone, get back!”
"What?"
"Get off the ground you're standing on, right now! Something's happening there!"
A mage player, sensing a shift in mana, screamed at the top of their lungs. The other players looked around, their faces asking what he was talking about.
*Gurgle— Gurgle—*
The ground around the Giant’s Citadel, where the players had gathered, had transformed into an unidentified 'black mire'.
"Huh? What is this?"
A nauseating stench of rotting corpses began to rise from it, its surface bubbling and writhing with a dynamic yet threatening movement, as if it could explode at any moment.
*Gurgle— Gurgle—*
And its area was steadily expanding.
"Ugh— It reeks of decay! What's happening now?"
"Come to think of it, didn't a system message pop up earlier?"
"It did. The... Land of Impending Death? I think I've heard that somewhere before..."
They hurriedly switched to a combat stance and surveyed their surroundings.
And then...
"Huh? W-wait a minute! Is that thing... alive?"
A titan's corpse seemed to twitch.
The creature was kneeling with its head bowed, but the veins on the back of its neck were moving.
"No way... we confirmed all the kills. It's probably just, you know, rigor mortis or something, right?"
That statement was immediately proven wrong.
“—Hah!”
The titan's neck muscles tensed, and it snapped its head up, reaching out a hand.
*Groooaaan...*
Letting out a strange moan, it began to crawl on the ground with vacant eyes, trying to grab the players.
"Gasp— A z-zombie?"
Yes, a 15-meter-tall zombie. That was exactly what it felt like.
And it wasn't the only one.
Before they knew it, the titan corpses lying around them were twitching and rising. The players, who had been scattered to loot the bodies, were instantly surrounded by a ghastly green light.
"Oh, my god..."
"W-we have to get out of here!"
They dashed away, dodging the massive hands reaching down from above.
As the players scrambled frantically, they soon realized they were once again treading on the mire.
And from within it—
"Ugh— W-what is this!"
Black hands shot up like bamboo shoots, grabbing their ankles, as denizens of hell crawled out and swarmed the players.
*Crunch—*
"Aaargh— My leg—!"
That was only the beginning. Hordes of Orc Skeletons and Troll Skeletons crawled out, surrounding them from all sides.
A few of them carried enormous jars on their backs. When they opened the lids...
*Pshhhh—!*
Black smoke, the Breath of the Abyss, burst forth and spread rapidly.
Inhaling it would inflict all sorts of curses, inevitably slowing them down.
“—Gack!”
"M-my body..."
When that happened, their ability to evade was drastically reduced.
"Aaargh— N-no!"
Like small dolls being snatched up by the claw of a crane game machine, players' bodies were seized by giant hands and lifted into the sky...
*Crunch! Crunch!*
A series of horrifying sounds echoed from beyond their line of sight, which was blocked by the sand dust and black smoke.
"Dammit, that way! We have to get up on the fortress walls!"
They ran toward the walls—the Giant's Citadel—dodging the hands of the zombie titans and the undead crawling from all directions.
The stairs there were not made for humans, each step as tall as a wall, but it wasn't impossible to climb.
However, with hundreds of terrified people converging on one spot, a bottleneck formed, and scuffles inevitably broke out.
"Ugh! E-everyone, calm down! Let's go up slowly, one by one!"
"Ughh— I-I think I'm going to lose my mind..."
Even these elite players were intoxicated by the Breath of the Abyss, making it impossible to maintain control.
The leaders of each group rushed over and attempted to direct them, which helped to some extent, but as the sound of the titan zombies' footsteps grew closer from behind, more voices lost their reason.
*Thud— Thud—*
The creatures were obscured by the 'Breath of the Abyss,' which only amplified the terror.
"Q-quickly, we have to get out of here!"
"Damn it, open a large-scale teleport, now—!"
*BOOM—!*
Just then, something leaped over the Giant's Citadel and landed squarely beside the players.
「—Everyone, move calmly!」
It was Steelain's metal giant, Talos.
It held a handful of shafts in both hands—all of them were the massive spears of the Titan Hoplites.
「I'll hold this position, so hurry and escape!」
As it spoke, it threw a spear, precisely piercing the chest of a titan zombie, right where its heart would be.
*THUD—!*
The creature fell backward but immediately pushed itself up from the ground.
*Grrrrr...*
It was literally 'undead'; it couldn't be killed.
Or more accurately, since it was already dead, targeting its vitals to destroy organs essential for life was not enough to retire it.
'And as a subordinate of the Necromancer, it will reassemble itself no matter how many pieces I break it into.'
Lee Hyun-wook clicked his tongue as he looked down at the scene.
'As I thought... it's a ridiculously overpowered ability.'
Hyun-wook's own metal control ability could be called overpowered, but it was nothing compared to the Necromancer's control over death.
That man's ability was, for all intents and purposes, the strongest.
'That's why I have to finish him before he gets any stronger.'
Hyun-wook had anticipated and prepared for a second encounter with the Necromancer during this <Titanomachy>.
The only problem was not knowing exactly when it would happen. Hyun-wook had narrowed down the possible moments the Necromancer might strike, predicting one 'essential condition'.
'It would be the moment the maximum number of titan corpses has accumulated.'
That would be when the Necromancer's power of death could be exerted to its fullest.
Therefore, he predicted that the most likely time for him to appear would be right after the conquest of each Giant's Citadel.
And just as he'd thought, the man didn't wait long, appearing right now, immediately after the first conquest.
This was the most unexpected timing.
'I thought he'd wait until the Allied Human Forces and I were more exhausted... Does striking now mean he wants to prevent us from joining up with Lee Sung-yoon's group? Or is there some other scheme at play?'
Regardless, he couldn't avoid a fight that had been brought to him.
If he didn't stop them here and now, the titan zombies would form ranks, making them even more difficult to deal with.
'Alright, let's end this.'
*Click—*
He took out his mana messenger.
"This is Lee Hyun-wook. A message for all group leaders. Please evacuate all forces to the top of the Giant's Citadel as quickly as possible. Then, use transport aircraft to get out of here."
- *Click*— Are we retreating?
The voice belonged to Brian Teal, leader of the Omega Team and an A-rank Analyst.
Hyun-wook's gaze found him.
He was already atop the Giant's Citadel, looking down at the scene unfolding on the ground.
"No."
- Then you intend to fight them? Those things... they look like the ones from Ganghwa Island... but they seem much stronger than before.
As an Analyst-class player, he would have spent a long time studying the events of the Ganghwa Island incident.
That's likely why he judged that even for Hyun-wook, facing this power of death would be difficult.
He offered his advice in a cautious tone.
- Steelain, back then, that unidentified death power used Black Orcs as its army, but this time, it's titans. I may be overstepping my bounds, but the situation looks very bad right now.
His analysis was accurate.
'He's right. The difference between Black Orcs and titans is night and day.'
If all the titan corpses strewn about that place were to reanimate, they would be impossible to stop.
"I have a plan..."
But just then—
*Whoosh—*
"Hm?"
A zombie titan was flying through the air.
A wingless behemoth like that couldn't fly on its own, meaning someone must have thrown it.
It was heading toward Talos, and Hyun-wook cursed.
'Damn it...'
He tried to send Mjölnir to knock it away, but it was too late.
*BOOOOM—!*
As if a multi-ton high-explosive bomb had detonated, a massive fireball erupted, blasting Talos hundreds of meters away and shattering part of the Giant's Citadel.
Players within the blast radius were swept up in the thermal storm, killed or injured.
- N-no...
- O-our team was wiped out!
- Do something, please!
Through the mana messenger, the desperate voices of the group leaders poured in.
That last attack had been a 'Corpse Explosion' using a zombie titan.
There was no more time to waste. If the Giant's Citadel crumbled any further, Hyun-wook's plan could be ruined.
"Everyone, do as I say. Use every means at your disposal to rescue the players and get them onto the Giant's Citadel. Then, call the transports and escape. As for what comes next... leave it to me."
Hyun-wook said in a cold voice.
'If this continues, the players will end up being sacrificed for my plan.'
At that moment, Maru's voice echoed in his ear.
「Job's done. Blocked it all off. Even took care of the spot that got blown up by that weird explosion.」
Hyun-wook switched to Hugin's perspective, and the Giant's Citadel came into full view.
Maru had just completely sealed the holes and cracks in the fortress that had been damaged during the battle.
With this, the Necromancer's undead army was now trapped inside the Giant's Citadel.
Of course, destroying the walls wouldn't be a difficult task for them, but that wasn't what Hyun-wook intended.
'...Inside there, I'll send them all to their final rest.'
He raised the mana messenger.
*Click—*
"...Now, let's begin."
***
"To think they'd get back up after we went through all the trouble of killing them..."
The commander of the ROK A.M.T, Lieutenant General Choi Jeong-cheol, clicked his tongue as he stood atop the Giant's Citadel.
Just as he said, they had paid a tremendous price to hunt down over a hundred titans, only for them to rise again.
And what's more, as enhanced undead that were difficult to kill.
From here, he had a clear view of the advancing giant zombie titans and the massive number of various undead soldiers squirming at their feet.
The scene was truly more horrifying than any monster horde he had ever witnessed.
“—That's all the players rescued!”
Finally, following Lee Hyun-wook's instructions, all the players had successfully made it onto the Giant's Citadel.
But their numbers looked significantly smaller.
"Hmm... Are we sure this is everyone?"
"Yes, sir. The rest have... become undead."
Though it had been a brief moment, a considerable number of casualties had occurred.
And now, they were the enemy.
"Hah... So this is what they mean by 'one mountain after another'."
At that moment, a light burst in the sky, and a white ring began to form.
It was an all-too-famous sight, and cheers erupted from all around.
"Yes, it's a Wight Hole, just as I thought!"
Everyone here knew that during the Ganghwa Island incident, the tide had turned when a Wight Hole opened and the Saintess appeared.
And common sense dictated that holy power was supposed to crush dark-aligned powers like death.
In other words, they believed that if the Saintess came, she could melt away this undead army.
"Alright, we have to believe in the Steelain and Saintess combo—!"
"Please, crush those bastards!"
However, Brian Teal still felt a sense of unease.
'The master of this death power I'm seeing has grown several times stronger than before.'
As an Analyst, he possessed a special kind of vision that allowed him to glean various pieces of information about skills just by looking.
'This is on a completely different level from Ganghwa Island...'
He didn't know how much the Saintess, Emilia Müller, had increased her holy power in the meantime, but even if she appeared, it would be a much tougher fight than before.
He looked up at Lee Hyun-wook, who was floating in the air near the forming Wight Hole.
'Steelain... you must have anticipated a situation like this. Your plan to evacuate all the players and face this alone must be because you have something in mind...'
He was both expectant and worried about what it could be.
'...No matter how much I think about it, I can't come up with a way to handle that massive undead army.'
Just then, the Wight Hole was complete.
- Warning! A super-wide-area teleport, 'Wight Hole', is opening in this area.
"...Huh?"
But he noticed something strange.
Usually, a Wight Hole would show a glimpse of the other side. If it was summoning the Saintess, the scenery of Yggdrasil should have been visible... but this time, all he saw was a deep blue background...
*RUUUUUMBLE—!*
"Hey, that's... water, isn't it?"
Yes, the deep blue background was entirely water. An truly overwhelming volume of it. It began to pour out of the hole like a waterfall.
'Don't tell me, they opened the Wight Hole underwater? ...Why?'
And then he noticed one more peculiar thing.
He could feel an incredibly powerful holy energy emanating from the water.
In other words—
"...No way, is all of that holy water?"
He had never once imagined that such an overwhelming amount of holy water could exist.
Then, the torrent of water stopped in mid-air, twisting and beginning to swirl.
'What in the world is that...'
Dozens of waterspouts formed high in the sky, and like diving dragons, they plunged down upon the undead army.
*CRASH—CRASH—CRASH—CRASH—CRASH—!*
- Warning! The Water Spirit's Fury, 'The Great Flood', has begun in this area!
"...Steelain, what in the world did you prepare?"
And so, a great flood imbued with holy power began, washing away all the unclean forces.