Chapter 99
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 99
Chapter Title: The Price of Choice (3)
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If the plan succeeded, the enemy would suffer a fatal blow. Before the elves could push northward, they might even eliminate the obstructive barriers and the enemy deity's subordinates.
Calian's decision and Seira's negotiations were events that created massive variables for everyone, even in Jin-hyuk's judgment as he quietly observed the proceedings.
Arcaina Zero was the empire's most critical facility, essentially the distilled essence of all civilization, built by Astragon in the safest location.
If it was destroyed, they would lose all the technology, manpower, and resources accumulated thus far.
Rebuilding it would be impossible. The ants wouldn't allow it.
The northern legions left at the barrier would then be cut off from supplies, forced to abandon it and retreat.
'But there's nowhere to retreat to.'
He was certain the barrier would become their grave.
Surrounded by ants both above and below the latitude, they would be defeated and pay the price.
"Your Majesty, are you truly going to do as that witch demanded?"
"The deed is already done. Besides, didn't that witch do something strange to my body?!"
In the screen Jin-hyuk was watching, Calian hurriedly returned to his lodgings with his butler, Raum.
There were no scouts watching them now.
But Jin-hyuk could observe them because the parasite now infesting Calian's body was part of his subordinate ant horde.
Naturally, everything Jin-hyuk saw and heard was also being relayed to Asmodra, the queen of the horde.
"All I know is that it's somewhere around Rinoa. To pinpoint the exact location, I'll have to go there myself."
"B-but if you get caught..."
To obtain a more precise location, Calian had requested to visit Arcaina Zero personally from Shuber.
Raum was aghast at the bold decision, but Calian, having already adventured to secretly negotiate with Seira, had nothing left to fear.
"That greenhorn is stirring up needless trouble."
Shuber, already nursing a headache, scoffed when he received word from Calian—who had left the palace to check on the refugees—that he wished to visit Arcaina Zero.
"What should we do? Even if he is the emperor, shouldn't we refuse? Do you know how busy it is there right now? Work would grind to a halt just to receive him."
"...No, grant him permission. Seeing that overwhelming grandeur might humble him and quiet his insolent attitude for a while."
His close aide, the foreign minister standing nearby, suggested refusal, but Shuber shook his head.
A powerless whelp like him couldn't accomplish anything anyway.
"We're planning to deal with him soon enough. He's imperial blood and an emperor now, so we'll give him that much as a final courtesy."
A dash of human mercy to boot.
Shuber dismissed thoughts of Calian from his mind.
With the ants pressing fiercely from the north, he had no time to dwell on anything else.
"So this is the place..."
Having shed his shabby disguise for stealth and donned proper imperial attire to receive a full ceremony as emperor, Calian finally arrived.
Arcaina Zero, the empire's secret magitech research lab—boasting enhanced security and facilities in the wake of Seira's terrorist act—was located underground in Rinoa, a small city near the imperial capital.
The city itself was an unremarkable little place, but the massive facility beneath it had been built by reinforcing ancient military installations into something enormous.
"This is the place where the greatest magic in the world is researched for the empire's magnificent magitech civilization, Your Majesty."
The lab director strutted proudly before the emperor, boasting of the facility and its achievements.
Calian feigned pure awe and wonder, but he glanced sideways at the reaction and bit his lip.
'It's not for the imperial family or the empire—it's to serve that wicked deity.'
Calian already knew the truth.
All the advanced knowledge and inventions being developed here, and the brilliant talents working and praising magic...
In the end, they served not him, the emperor, but some unknown will.
"Seeing it in person makes it seem even more impressive. Thanks to you all, the imperial family and empire can endure this raging crisis and grow even greater."
"Of course, Your Majesty."
Forcing a smile, Calian looked down with feigned innocence and admiration. The lab director nodded with a meaningful smile.
Asmodra has acquired all necessary information.
But the lab director, inwardly mocking Calian's true feelings, had no idea.
That within Calian's green eyes, another will watching him was already mobilizing its grand army.
"What? Monsters are swarming in massive numbers from the south?!"
The ants moved simultaneously from the north and south.
Just as the northern ants battered the barrier as usual.
The infiltration horde led by Seira halted further expansion, assembled en masse, and began their advance.
"No. The forces in the south are scattered, focused on blocking nest expansions!"
"We've been had. Why weren't we informed while they gathered in such huge numbers?!"
Marquis Hermann, dispatched south to halt the ants' expansion, burn nests, and manage refugees as best he could, paled and sighed.
While the ants—previously scattered, eroding territory and building nests—gathered in perfect order at one point, they had failed to notice.
"They've breached the defensive line...!"
"No... The central region will fall to them!"
The result was the charging ants breaking through the overstretched, thinned defenses, sweeping into the untouched central region in one fell swoop.
If the ants repeated their southern tactics—raiding villages, destroying farmlands, and attempting erosion nests—massive casualties were inevitable once more.
"H-how in the world...!"
But the ants' actions defied expectations.
Instead of scattering to build nests, they pressed straight ahead toward Rinoa near Arcaina Zero, charging almost in a beeline.
Astragon, witnessing this, was more shocked than his subordinates.
A secret the ants neither should know nor could know had leaked out.
"Activate the spells at once. Hold out until reinforcements arrive!"
"This is the heart of our great magitech civilization. We can't let those monsters destroy it...!"
The mages threw everything they had to block the ants, deploying pre-prepared spells and weaponry to endure until reinforcements came.
This was the empire's most vital site.
They couldn't possibly abandon it—not even for the palace.
In fact, even now in the north, amid battles with the ants to defend Arcaina Zero, they were preparing to divert troops and equipment southward.
'So that's the multi-layered composite resonance barrier.'
Seira, arriving with tens of thousands of ants, marveled at the massive barrier enveloping the entire city.
This grand barrier maximized defense by layering multiple rigid shields and resonating them, completely isolating interior from exterior—an advanced spell.
Transcending mere shields, it drew from the superior knowledge of Astragon's advanced civilization.
It required immense resources as a large-scale magic, but there was no reason not to invest in protecting their most crucial facility.
Asmodra moves her forces.
But the ants already knew how to dismantle that magic.
Based on what the lab director had blabbed in front of Calian, Seira had obtained the info and stated that if the ants provided the necessary details, they could shatter the barrier.
"We can't give them time."
Jin-hyuk muttered softly at the sight of the enormous spherical barrier crackling with sparks over the city.
Astragon, enraged by the dire crisis, was bombarding him with furious message slips one after another.
Whether Jin-hyuk replied or not, the slips—pure self-venting—bragged that all this was futile and he could rebuild his foundation anytime.
But bluster aside, he couldn't let his guard down.
The key was to finish it swiftly and precisely, without giving the enemy room to scheme.
"What the hell are those things doing?"
The mages inside the barrier watched the incoming ants with tense expressions.
By their common sense, the ants couldn't possibly breach the barrier they'd constructed.
Internal attacks were impossible too, but they were waiting for reinforcements anyway.
Smashing it with impacts was the best bet, but even if the ants hammered away, the barrier's strength and output could hold for a week easily.
"Don't let your guard down. Stay prepared."
"But, squad leader, you know as well as I do. It's mana-intensive and slow to set up, but once it's active, it never breaks."
One mage involved in the setup chuckled, trying to ease the stiff atmosphere and tension.
If brute force wouldn't work, structural reverse-engineering was the only option.
But that demanded vast magical knowledge and information-processing capacity beyond human brains.
"Ugh... So gross..."
A female mage recoiled at the ants slowly crawling up the barrier.
Not just those climbing from the ground—even winged ants took to the skies and settled atop it.
Countless legs and writhing bodies gradually blanketed the barrier, blocking out the sunlight.
'What are they doing?'
Tense mages and city residents alike gaped skyward.
Expecting violent pounding, they were surprised as the ants delicately covered the dome-like barrier with their bodies—almost cautiously.
It was a grotesquely horrific sight, yet also a mystical scene they'd never witness again.
Before long, most of Arcaina Zero's mages had come outside, staring dumbly at the sky and the ants' actions.
Even these scholars, proud of being the empire's—or world's—finest, couldn't comprehend it within their knowledge or common sense.
"They're using a higher level of magic, combining biological abilities with magical knowledge to dismantle it."
Few could understand the ants' actions.
Jin-hyuk, their master, clicked his tongue as the swarming ants fully enveloped the barrier.
The mages didn't know, but the moment the ants blanketed it completely was their defeat.
Asmodra shares all collected information.
"Receiving. Commence reverse-engineering."
Masked Seira aimed her staff at the barrier blanketed in a writhing black wave.
Since awakening as a subordinate, her ability to sense mana and other energies had sharpened remarkably. The ants clinging to the barrier shared its every mana pattern via the hive mind using all their sensory organs.
Asmodra had reassembled the myriad fragments collected from tens of thousands of ants into a complete structural formula within the hive consciousness, and Seira pinpointed the reversal method within it.
A method beyond the mages' wildest imagination, transcending knowledge limits.
"Crumble."
Seira's eyes flashed as a bolt of lightning shot from her staff tip. Simultaneously, hornet ants and Tyrants positioned precisely vibrated their wings furiously, drawing power from their mana cores to assault the barrier.
"Wha—what!?"
"The barrier's collapsing! They've exposed the structure!!!"
Seira's lightning amplified along the Tyrants' resonance, disintegrating the tightly bound barrier segments all at once.
"A-aaargh!!!"
As the barrier vanished, the countless ants atop it plummeted earthward en masse.
Everyone on the ground screamed in horror at the onslaught of massive ants raining from the sky.