The "Tang" in Tang Clan Means Sugar # 2
After the purple nymph fled in a flash, the Tang Clan was finally free.
I drove out all the centipedes writhing inside the people's bodies, and every time I did, Oinoi already had another batch of centipedes filling an entire glass jar.
“A nymph who can command this many Shadow Centipedes... Even Oinoi has never seen one before...! Shadow Centipedes live mainly on sugar and honey...! They're also extremely finicky by nature, so they're difficult to handle...!”
The nymphs could quickly befriend insects such as honeybees and ants, but the Shadow Centipedes were naturally so particular that they were difficult to tame.
“I heard that Poison Nymphs easily become friends with poisonous creatures like spiders, snakes, and bees, but it really seems to be true...! How fascinating...!”
“Mhehehe, none of that matters to this Illinoi...! Since this Illinoi has liberated the Tang Clan, you are to give a donation of 1.5 billion won every year to this Illinoi's Nymph Human Rights Foundation...! Give the donation...!”
Whoosh—!
Illinoi raised both hands, reveling in the joy of liberation.
The people of the Tang Clan were deeply astonished, yet they were also grateful to Illinoi.
“1.5 billion won a year? That's more expensive to maintain than that wicked witch! Isn't this a case of the fox leaving and the tiger coming in?”
“Shh! Keep your voice down! Rimbu have excellent hearing!”
“Who is the person who just said that...?”
“This Illinoi is not a tiger, but a Drug Nymph...! I shall teach you that freedom is not free...! Let's do it...!”
Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud—!
Illinoi pummeled the members of the Tang Clan with her fists.
“Aaaagh~!”
Anyway.
With that sort of thing going on, the Tang Clan's building was thoroughly cleaned up.
However, Mr. Tang Huru, whose hair had fallen out completely from all the stress he'd endured, was still worried.
“There's no way that woman will simply back down. She'll surely head to her villa in Rimbu Forest and try to get revenge! She'll definitely bring along her Rimbu Bandits from there!”
Apparently, the Poison Nymph had first appeared at the Tang Clan about ten years ago.
Back then, the nymph had simply declared, “You will pay me 1 billion won every year...!” before taking control of the Tang Clan.
With the money she collected, the Poison Nymph built herself a villa in Rimbu Forest in Sichuan and fortified it by hiring her own private army there.
She had also conducted countless experiments involving the opening and closing of rifts inside it.
“I should have been wary when Xiao Xiao brought Rimbu here ten years ago. What happened is entirely my fault.”
Sniff—.
Mr. Tang Huru shed tears.
In the end, the problem hadn't been solved simply because the Poison Nymph had fled.
“Where is Rimbu Forest in Sichuan?”
# # #
Huff, huff—!
The Poison Nymph fled with all her might.
Eventually, she arrived at the forest.
Rimbu Forest in Sichuan was a dark and gloomy place.
“Hieeeek...! I've ended up back in this forest again...! There is absolutely no way I can allow anyone to take away this Grandmaster's faucets, showerheads, water purifier, and refrigerator....”
The Poison Nymph remembered the distant past, when she had first fallen into this unfamiliar land.
Back then—
The memory of humans chasing after her with torches had made the nymph's body tremble.
How much suffering had she endured to obtain the peaceful life she had afterward?
To lose all of it overnight was a horror she simply couldn't bear.
“Now that things have come to this, I have to call Kore So So-hee...!”
Swipe—.
The purple nymph raised her phone.
So So-hee owed this purple nymph a great debt.
It was an enormous debt, a favor she would have to repay for the rest of her life.
“So So-hee...! Hurry and come to Rimbu Forest...!”
The purple nymph shouted into her phone.
After walking for a while, she eventually arrived at her villa in Rimbu Forest.
The villa should have been filled with sports cars and all kinds of home appliances purchased with the money the purple nymph had collected from the Tang Clan over the years.
But—
For some reason, the oriental-style villa was eerily quiet. There wasn't even a sign of anyone's presence.
“Where did all the employees and mercenaries I personally handpicked go...? This sort of prank isn't funny, so stop it at once... Come out here...! I'll call a lawyer for breach of contract...!”
The purple nymph looked around the villa, which had been thoroughly ransacked, and felt terribly sad.
Had everyone abandoned her and left?
But—
That feeling lasted only a moment.
She soon realized that something strange was crunch-crunch-crunching its way through a sack of sugar inside the villa's storage room.
Grrrrrrrr—.
It was a snake.
Ten eyes gleamed menacingly, and it had more than five heads.
The terrifying sight startled the purple nymph.
“A monster...!”
It was a monster.
But why was a monster—a creature that lived inside rifts—in this villa?
The purple nymph soon learned the reason.
In the center of the villa, in what could only be called a spacious garden, a round dimensional rift had appeared, and snakes were pouring out of it.
She could also vaguely guess why the rift had appeared in the garden.
“M-My hundreds of years of hard work have been reduced to nothing like this...? Unacceptable...! You lot, get out of here at once...! Katsu!”
The Poison Nymph shouted at the snakes.
But the snakes began destroying the villa as they pleased, and eventually they even lunged at the Poison Nymph.
━Shaaa! Shaaa!
“You lot...! You've gone completely mad...!”
Something was wrong with the snakes.
They seemed to have lost all reason, as if they had gone berserk.
“This rampage isn't normal....”
It seemed as though someone had deliberately made these Fire Snakes go berserk.
Who could possibly be doing such a thing, and for what purpose?
For an instant, the nymph thought of Ha Ildo and the nymphs accompanying him.
No. There's no way those people would do something like this...!
Ha Ildo, whom she had met personally, was truly nymph-friendly.
He didn't seem like the sort of person who would deliberately do something evil just to torment a nymph.
BOOM—!
Just then, a tremendous tremor shook the ground.
When she turned her head, she saw something enormous and terrifying tearing through the entrance of the rift and emerging into the villa's garden.
It had eighteen eyes.
Nine heads.
Its scales looked as hard as steel, and venom dripped from each of its nine mouths. The fluorescent-colored poison melted the ground and corroded everything it touched.
It was pure, concentrated venom.
The pinnacle of poison—a toxin capable of killing even a god.
The nymph immediately recognized the identity of the horrifying giant serpent.
The Hero-Killing Serpent.
A monster among monsters, also known as the Nine-Headed Dragon—Hydra.
“Hieeeek...! I have to run...!”
Swipe—.
The nymph chose to run without looking back.
But her feet wouldn't move easily.
“……”
If the monster known as the Nine-Headed Dragon escaped and rampaged through the world, something truly horrifying would happen.
And then the nymph wouldn't be able to eat her beloved tanghulu or Bashkir honey candies anymore.
# # #
“I heard that Rimbu Forest is supposed to be a nymph-friendly forest...! I never imagined it would be such a creepy forest...!”
Forests where nymphs lived were generally said to be bright and full of hope.
Forests where Dog-Squirrels frolicked and Honey Ants wandered here and there.
But Rimbu Forest in Sichuan was saturated with dampness. Unidentifiable mist clung thickly to the ground, the leaves had withered as though it were winter, and the vegetation was gradually drying out.
“Mhehehe, this is a forest where a banshee looks like it could live...! By the way, a banshee is a ghost of the fairies. When a fairy dies while holding a grudge, it becomes a ghost called a banshee...!”
Banshees were also called Bansheenois, and apparently they were ghostly fairies who loved screaming loudly in other people's houses.
Apparently, even after dying and becoming ghosts, nymphs still liked making a racket in other people's homes.
How strangely endearing.
“…Wait.”
Seo Yerim's pace gradually slowed before coming to a complete stop.
Calmly surveying the situation as though reading the air around her, Seo Yerim spoke.
“I can feel the energy of a rift nearby. It's a T-Rank rift.”
Seo Yerim was one of South Korea's S-Rankers, and among S-Rankers, she had an exceptionally extensive record of subjugating T-Rank rifts.
There was no reason to doubt what her senses had detected.
However, Dang So-hae spoke with a puzzled expression.
“There wasn't any alert today, though?”
In the modern world, it was only natural for residents in an affected area to receive an alert message before a T-Rank rift opened.
But if a rift had opened without any such warning, the possibilities were considerably narrower.
An Anomalous Rift.
A calamity that opened without warning.
“Even this Oinoi came out of an Anomalous Rift...! Looking back on it now, that was an extremely dangerous moment...!”
Oinoi was a friend who had emerged from an Anomalous Rift.
Dog-Squirrel Keongkeongi and Honey Ant Ang-ang-i had probably settled in the twenty-first century in much the same way.
However—
Most of the things that emerged from Anomalous Rifts were, in fact, terrifying monsters.
“If something came out of a T-Rank Anomalous Rift, then that alone is already a calamity....”
In Korea, the standard procedure was for S-Rankers to immediately subjugate T-Rank rifts before their dimensions became unstable.
If too much time passed and the monsters inside managed to break out, the resulting disaster would be so horrifying that even calling it a calamity wouldn't be enough.
Indeed, the LA Incident, which occurred when an A-Rank rift collapsed in the United States, was still remembered years later as an extremely dangerous event.
If the collapse of an A-Rank rift had caused so many injuries, what would happen if a T-Rank rift collapsed?
“Let's hurry!”
I urged the others forward.
If we dawdled around and a catastrophe occurred, the consequences would be horrifying in every possible way.
We had been heading toward the villa for quite some time when Dang So-hae suddenly covered her nose.
“Kugh. What is this? This overwhelming poisonous energy...!”
The ground was shrouded in a thick purple mist.
The oriental-style walls and eaves had been eaten away and corroded until they were melting, while the ground had become a muddy mess.
Even at a glance, the situation was horrifying.
Then Oinoi spoke.
“I can hear a nymph's song...! This is the Brooklet Song...!”
“This Illinoi can definitely listen to it too...! Someone is clearly singing the Brooklet Song somewhere inside that mist...!”
Could it be a trap set by the purple nymph who had fled earlier?
We had no time to consider such things as we entered the villa's garden.
There, we discovered the entrance to a rift crackling with intense lightning—and a nymph singing in front of it.
“Hey! Nymph! What are you doing?! Don't tell me you're the one who opened this rift?”
Seo Yerim shouted angrily.
But the nymphs quickly seemed to understand what was happening.
“Now that I look at it, that nymph sister is clearly using her song to hold the rift back...! She must be preventing something terrifying from escaping from inside...!”
“We have to help her immediately...!”
Flash—!
Oinoi and Illinoi joined the nymph's song.
Brooklet, brooklet, brooklet water—.
As the nymphs began to sing, the rift entrance started shrinking with a crackle—!
I stared at the sight in surprise.
“Nymphs' songs can actually close rifts?”
It was the first time I'd discovered such an effect.
After all, there had never been nymphs singing at the entrance of a rift before!
If this was true, then this was an incredible discovery!
But—
━Foolish nymphs. Do you really think you can stop me by doing that? I am the Emperor. I am flame, and my breath itself is power and authority...! I am immortal...!
Something began forcing its way out through the rift entrance while letting out a sinister, Hehehe...
It was a snake's head.
But it was enormous—each head was as large as a calf.
━Grrrr...!
Keongkeongi instantly puffed up its fur.
Even the usually gentle Honey Ant Ang-ang-i and Kwangkwang-i began to grow extremely wary.
“Keongkeongi, push it back in!”
━Woof...!
Flash—!
Keongkeongi leaped forward with all its strength and slammed into the snake's head.
BAAANG—!
━Hahaha...! That tickles...!
But the snake's head didn't seem to have suffered any damage at all.
Its scales were as hard as rock, making blunt-force attacks largely ineffective.
Then it was time to change tactics!
“Ang-ang-i, Zzuji Cutting!”
━Zzuji...!
Slash—.
Ang-ang-i's razor-sharp horn attack, capable of easily cutting through thick steel plates, surged toward the snake.
The snake's head was cleanly severed with a shashak—!
But there was one problem.
An identical head rapidly grew back from the snake's severed neck.
Hyper Regeneration.
As I tensed at the sight of that overwhelming ability, Seo Yerim scoffed.
“A talking snake? I've really seen everything in my life. I was told to stay quietly in China, but this is obviously an exception.”
Whoosh—.
Seo Yerim spread her hand toward the rift entrance.
“Flame Hell!”
WHOOOOOOSH—!
A scorching stream of fire erupted from Seo Yerim's hand, and the calf-sized snake head writhed in agony beneath the searing heat.
━GAAAGH...! What is this flame...?! I can't stand it...! What kind of woman are you?! I've never heard of a woman like you...! You horrible woman...!
Swipe—.
Unable to endure the pain, the snake withdrew its head back into the rift.
It was like a turtle retracting its head into its shell.
In a way, it was only natural.
The agony of being scorched was among the greatest forms of pain a living creature could experience.
And Seo Yerim's flames possessed enough firepower to work even against the Lava Giants of Muspelheim, a T-Rank rift.
They were flames hot enough to burn magma that itself burned with fire.
━This crazy woman...! May you be cursed...! You witch...!
“What did you just call me, you bastard?! Hey! You! Get back out here!”
Fwoooosh—.
Furious, Seo Yerim looked ready to charge into the rift and give the snake a beating.
But the rift gate closed completely.
Whoosh—!
Oinoi raised both hands high.
“We defeated Hydra...! No other nymphs could possibly have accomplished such a feat...! And we even obtained one of Hydra's heads...!”
Point—.
Oinoi pointed at the head Ang-ang-i had severed with Zzuji Cutting.
Thump. Thump—.
The severed head was still flopping around like a mackerel, which was astonishing in more ways than one.