Chapter 135
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 135
Chapter Title: Rift in the Bond (2)
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"Is my choice really that important? Can't you just force it on me?"
"Sorry, but we don't need soldiers who follow the hive against their will."
In truth, her mind was already leaning that way, but Arie forced out one more retort.
And Seira responded without hesitation, decisively.
What Seira—and by extension, Asmodra—wanted was a special individual capable of thinking and acting voluntarily.
Just like how Seira herself had stepped up for the hive, planning and executing all sorts of things to make them happen.
A being that couldn't exercise creativity and only followed orders by force held no value whatsoever to the current ant hive.
Loyal hive soldiers who devoted everything to the colony were already pouring out by the second. There was no reason to drag around a bloated ego like dead weight.
That was why Seira had persuaded Arie, guiding her to change her heart on her own.
'Demons... They're definitely a group worthy of being called demons.'
Arie lowered her thoughtful gaze to the floor.
In her eyes, the ant hive was undoubtedly a horde of horrific monsters.
Even the reason they were persuading her was ultimately to use her as a tool for the hive's growth and victory in war.
'But are the others any different?'
The problem was that the entire Edellion continent had already become a battlefield for the deities.
To those who accepted that power and interference as providence, it was divine grace. But to those who rejected it, it was nothing more than wicked violence.
A thirst for revenge boiled up in her heart.
Anything else she might accept, but she didn't want to die unjustly alone.
The traitor elves who had betrayed her, endangered their kin, and forced sacrifices upon her.
Arie burned with an intense desire for vengeance against them.
"If joining hands with demons is what it takes to stand against evil gods... fine."
In the end, Arie solidified her resolve.
It was a volatile emotion, but revenge was undoubtedly one of the most powerful driving desires.
"Prepare for modification."
The moment she signaled her acceptance of becoming Seira, Asmodra—who had been watching everything from the Primordial Nest—mobilized the prepared nest forces and began Arie's remodeling.
"What on earth are they going to do?"
Jin-hyuk muttered in fascination, enlarging the screen and focusing his gaze.
He had already scoured the Divine Community and such for information.
What he learned was that forcibly stealing a subordinate from an enemy deity required 'technology' on par with opening dimensional gates or space travel in higher civilizations—something far from easy.
The ants, centered on Asmodra, aimed to achieve it with their unique methods.
They had calculated it as possible, which was why they were using Arie as a test subject to try it themselves.
"Eek..."
First, the ants securely restrained Arie's body.
They bound her entire form with tough spider silk to prevent any movement, then injected paralyzing venom to ensure not even a finger could twitch.
"The pain will be fleeting, but if you endure it, you'll feel like you've been reborn."
Seira whispered beside the terrified Arie, who was gripped by fear of the modification, to calm her mind.
"What exactly are you planning to do?"
"The goal is to remove the evil god's power embedded in your body and replace it with Kair. That way, your bond with the evil god will be severed, and you'll become one with us."
Seira stroked Arie's cheek and showed her a wriggling parasitic worm that had climbed up her leg to her arm.
Arie, horrified, didn't even have time to scream at the grotesque creature dripping slime.
'I went through this too.'
As the mutant parasitic ant-thorn burrowed into Arie's body, Seira gazed lovingly at her convulsing new comrade, unconsciously smiling.
"Guhk..."
The ant-thorn didn't just parasitize the body.
It dominated the host's body and controlled it at will.
But that alone wasn't enough.
Stripping away a deity's blessing embedded in the flesh couldn't be done with mere physical control.
So the ant-thorn began rapidly dividing inside Arie's body.
Its massive form, the size of a human arm, split into tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of much smaller parasites.
Like nanobots, they moved in perfect unison, with one goal: to precisely locate and devour the cells infused with divine power within her body, replacing them with themselves.
The fairy wings detaching one by one from her back seemed to symbolize the fading power of the holy knight.
"..."
It was a sight that left even the watching Jin-hyuk speechless in astonishment.
The technology of countless minuscule parasites moving as one, the ability to detect power embedded in cells.
This was something that would leave even veteran deities in awe—achievable only by the current level of the ant hive.
"Ugh, guhk..."
"If it's too painful, it might be best to take a brief trip elsewhere."
As Arie writhed in agony, foaming at the mouth, Seira activated a new spell.
This spell, which was part of the necessary process anyway, was the very one Seira had once researched and used unknowingly: the magic that allowed temporary access to the ants' hive consciousness.
"This place...!"
The moment Seira's spell activated and her consciousness detached, Arie escaped the pain. Gritting her teeth, she barely held onto her sanity within the vast consciousness, like being tossed into a raging storm.
Maintaining her wits here was impressive in itself.
Most humans would collapse, their egos shattering instantly.
It was only because she was a long-lived elf who had lived over 200 years, a brilliant talent trusted by the elders.
And there, Arie confronted something enormous.
Sounds of rustling came from all directions without up or down—sounds that might have seemed like mere insects rubbing together in the past, but now whispered beyond her perception as if speaking.
And it approached.
At first, it looked like a massive mountain range rising from the distant horizon.
But as it drew nearer, Arie realized it wasn't just a metaphor.
Thousands of eyes, writhing sharp mandibles and mouths, legs devouring each other, scale-like antennae, and a chillingly beautiful human woman's face.
All tangled together: Asmodra.
This form, deliberately taken by Asmodra within the hive consciousness to overwhelm opponents, was the queen's visage composed of heterogeneous sensations—a highly compressed symbol and image of the ant hive.
"What... what are you?"
Overwhelmed as never before, Arie opened her mouth at the queen's first appearance in her life, but spoken words here didn't become sound; they scattered like fragments.
And simultaneously, a massive will crashed in like a wave.
Frozen in an instant, Arie felt herself being dismantled.
Just before, the ants had severed the deity's connection to Arie's flesh through physical means.
Now, they were detecting and removing even the remnants lingering in her consciousness.
"Vain hopes, proper servitude."
There was no voice from Asmodra, clearly.
Yet the entire hive consciousness became a nightmare, whispering to Arie.
She tried to resist, but felt something embedded in her unconscious snapping one by one.
That was the connection to the deity watching over her, and indeed, the enemy deity's view of Arie was flickering out piece by piece.
This was no trivial matter.
The bond between deity and subordinate involved the Divine Net system itself and couldn't be severed lightly.
The fact that the matured hive consciousness could crack that bond meant the hive itself posed a massive threat to the deities.
"You too... are us."
With the connection to the deity fully severed, leaving her alone, Asmodra mocked Arie.
Arie's consciousness assimilated into the hive at that very moment.
"Guardian, the coastline will be in sight soon."
"Finally... we're going to completely eradicate those horrific nests entrenched on our land."
While the ants focused on Arie...
The elf imperial unit led by Belpein, with Elderspine at the forefront, had already eliminated most of the ant nests that had been encroaching on the old Vanest Kingdom.
Small-scale nests remained here and there, but the fortress-like nests fused with entire cities were down to just one coastal city.
Destroy that, and the elf empire would finally succeed in excising the irritating cancer from their rear.
"It will be a great victory. Fire Elderspine!"
Seeing it as the final hurdle before triumph, Belpein and his subordinate commanders were exhilarated.
No need to bother detouring; they prepared to smash and trample it in one go, immediately readying Elderspine.
The troops from Vanest Kingdom barely gave it a thought anymore.
Their homeland was already devastated beyond decades of repair, and they were slated to be dragged to the northern frontlines anyway.
"What is that?"
But as they confidently prepared the Elderspine barrage, something caught their eye.
A small, black silhouette flying swiftly through the sky.
"Aaaagh!"
"I-it's the enemy!"
It hurtled toward the ground at tremendous speed, folding a pair of black feathered wings on its back and drawing dual swords from its forearms.
Unlike ordinary ants, its entire body was covered in black exoskeleton etched with bizarre tattoos.
The tattoos converged at the center of its chest, where a mana heart glowed, drawing up immense power as it swung the swords in one fluid motion.
"What the hell is that thing...? N-no way?!"
Belpein gaped in horror as the defense squad was sliced apart in a single stroke.
Its face was masked like an ant, but golden hair spilling from beneath gleamed in the sunlight.
'Kill the traitors!'
"Kill the traitors."
Along with the enraged deity's command, Queen Asmodra's order echoed in the reborn hive member's—Arie's—mind.
"Traitors."
The flustered elf knight order, and beyond them, Belpein in plain view.
Seeing them, Arie's eyes flashed crimson beneath the mask as she charged, swinging her dual swords.
"Protect the Guardian!"
The elf royal guard gathered to block the lone charger, aiming bows and muzzles in resistance.
"Fire spirit rounds. That should stop it!"
Shells and arrows infused with spirit power maximized destructive force.
No matter how strong the foe, they figured overwhelming firepower would crush it.
And it wasn't baseless; shells and arrows launched immediately, raining down on Arie.
"No, how...?"
Yet the spirit-infused shells and arrows failed to deliver full power against Arie.
The spirits, bound closely to elves, instinctively hesitated to harm her, who still retained elven essence.
Those unaware that the charging figure was their discarded kin stared in shock, only to have their throats slit by her sword strikes.
The spirit barriers were the same.
Ants would need significant force to breach them, but Arie, still holding her elven identity, pierced through far more easily, appearing before Belpein inside.
"You, you traitor bitch...!"
Belpein raged at Arie, whose mask had been grazed and cracked by his arrow.
"The traitors are you. Not me."
Easily batting away his second arrow with her sword, Arie replied coldly and lunged, crossing her blades in an instant to quarter Belpein's body in one stroke.