Chapter 322
Chapter 322
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 322
Chapter Title: Can One Who Has Seen the End of the World Plant an Apple Tree? (27)
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“....Kaurladi. Form defensive lines in the third row and retreat.”
Clack.
“Nullak fleet. Forces including a large number of highly skilled pilots. The command structure of the Kaurladi forces under shamanic control meshes with the allied forces’ uncoordinated command system—equal numbers.”
Clack.
“Brother and Nigmi. Facing off against the Nullak flagship.... This is surprising, isn’t it, Buddy? A shaman named Nullak matching Brother evenly. The enemy’s unique defensive system played a part. Our allies who went along didn’t die off as expected, so Brother’s power isn’t fully manifesting as calculated.”
Bugrrrk—
“Hm? No.... No, that’s not it. Father must have foreseen this and left behind forces that could perfectly counter them without killing my brothers. You always portray him in such a negative light, Buddy.”
Clack, clack!
Clack-clack! Clack-clack-clack!
The small, fragile hand moved the pebbles as it spoke, while Buddy tapped the floor repeatedly in unease.
Buddy, the living outer shell specially created by the queen for Palkatus, who was born so frail he couldn’t withstand the northern cold.
The mute born from Palkatus’s afterbirth expressed his dissatisfaction with the place and his angry heart through clacking footsteps.
Buddy couldn’t understand. Why had he left? Why had he, with a body weaker than the queen’s and in constant danger just by staying in the north, abandoned the safety of the north to come to such a harsh wasteland? Why did he refuse to enter even Buddy, who was made to protect him, and continue on a path akin to self-harm?
“No matter how many times I explain, you don’t get it. Well, I suppose I’ve been chasing Father’s footsteps all this time because I didn’t understand it myself.”
Clack.
“I’ve always had leeway. The power Mother gave me. Thanks to borrowing the bodies and eyes of so many brothers to survey the field, I could focus purely on using my head. Even if I died, I’d still be safe in the northern nest. I could just scatter the sensation of death and enter another body.”
Clack.
“The day my true life nearly fell into the hands of that soul shaman, when I barely escaped from the handmaid’s bell tower, I realized it. Ah, there are things you can’t move with thought alone. I was so terrified I couldn’t think straight. It was the will to live, the instinct of a living being to survive, that moved my body and let me escape. So, my leeway was that much complacency. I’d neglected and unused the sensations Father always carried on his back while navigating perilous fields with his whole body.”
Clack. Clack. Clack. Clack.
As Palkatus’s fragile arm placed the pebbles in a row, the battlefield etched in his mind advanced step by step.
“Resolve. What Father always carried on his back in battle, what I lacked. Not knowing what such resolve truly is, this was the only way for me.”
....Clack, clack-clack!
“....Yes. I’m sorry to you, my protector.”
Boom— Boooom—
In the distance, the sounds of battle echoed like ripples. Sounds striking his eardrums directly, without passing through another brother’s ears. His body swelling and cracking in an ill-fitting environment.
As his dry, field-cracked skin cried out in pain, as his innate senses rang alarms at the approaching crisis.
And so, finally. As the pursuing sensation of life became vividly clear.
Clack. Clack.
Resolve ignited in his withering life. Conviction bloomed in his fingertips moving the pieces.
.
.
.
.
.
.
If he hadn’t known, it might have been different. But now that he knew, he absolutely could not lose.
He had to pour everything he could into it.
Desperately. Thrashing like a drowning man, earnestly.
Just as his father had.
Clack.
“....One more move ahead.”
Palkatus moved the pieces from his seated position amid his crumbling body and pooling blood.
A single piece separated from all the others, advancing forward. Palkatus gazed down at the only pebble carved into a human shape among the countless stones, his eyes sinking cold as an abyss.
****
Boom!
Kwarrrrrr!
“This is....!”
Crunch!
His left hand shattered the warriors’ formation, while his right snatched a spinning weapon like a swallow and jammed it into its owner’s torso.
Short-term breakthrough. With the enemy clearly intent on dragging out time, Professor spared no effort, and the aftermath manifested vividly in the shower of warship fragments and human debris.
But even the protagonist of this disaster-like advance, Professor, couldn’t hide his impatience.
‘That bastard Palkatus set up the board so I’m screwed no matter which way I choose!’
He fought like a warrior, but his mind held the cold calculations of a commander who had led special operations.
Breakthrough speed versus enemy solidity. And between them, Professor’s personal resources and regeneration depleting in an instant.
His throat burned dry as his regeneration drained like blood drying up.
Palkatus’s dilemma was a battlefield where every path was a landmine.
He’d simply poured every last mute ant into the Nullak flagship.
Thanks to that, I couldn’t utilize my sustained combat prowess, which was unbeatable on fields with mutes.
Go back to the Nullak lines overflowing with mutes? I could steer that front favorably and whittle down their mute hordes, but that would hand the time they so desperately wanted to enemies openly stalling with a ‘We’re dragging this out~’.
Going back meant the round trip gave time to the enemy.
Pushing through meant my combat power drained, turning me into a nobody alone on the field.
It was a battlefield crafted by someone who knew I recovered fatigue through mutes. Simple, but devastatingly effective, and simple enough to leave no room for disruption.
Crack—
Fwoooosh!
He yanked a mast from a half-sunken warship and rammed the side of another nearby, seizing a brief breather to glance at the Nullak lines, where his back still stung from the battle.
An oppressive presence felt without looking. Combat sounds like space forcibly twisted and split echoed ceaselessly from the Nullak flagship.
Amid two massive water pillars swirling fiercely, relentless red lightning—fragments of clashing Termakian power and Nullak shamanism—snapped masts and tore warriors apart.
The Nullak fleet was pinned in place; they held for now, but collapse seemed imminent.
Creeeeak!
“For Lord Kaurladi!”
“For the true desert kingdom that will return!”
Despite Professor’s urgency, his penetration slowed.
Kwaaaang!
Greeeeek— Halt!
“....Blocking?”
“No matter your prowess, you can’t shatter the warriors’ convictions entirely!”
From the fifth row of Kaurladi’s fleet onward, the famed slave warrior legion met Professor.
Warriors slathered in every body-enhancement shamanism, wielding iron shields the size of palace gates.
As they crumpled like bowling pins, their eyes gleamed, and their soul weapons—flying in flocks like migratory birds—screamed toward Professor’s back with horrific velocity.
Letting them hit would pare his spine, so blocking momentarily let the recovered warriors rise, reform their damn formation, and hurl more weapons. Excellent defense, plus sharp multi-angle strikes preventing focused offense.
Even the slashed shields spun through the air back to warriors’ hands—those shields too were soul weapons infused with personal spirits.
According to the ‘ancient desert warrior common knowledge’ forcibly implanted in his mind days ago during infiltration as Kaurladi’s slave, this was utterly impossible.
For warriors, soul weapons were lifelong companions surpassing spouses; infusing souls into two or more was akin to adultery against both. Doing so stripped a desert warrior of all abilities, reducing them to ordinary slave soldiers.
At least, by common sense.
“These.... rat-bastard sons of bitches....!”
Professor’s eyes locked on shields whizzing through the air and returning. Curved edges, massive sun reliefs. Unfamiliar yet eerily familiar.
‘That’s it from the memories, right?’
[Yeah. The one the manipulated ancient warrior carried on his back even while sleeping.]
The manipulated memories implanted to create warrior slaves. The cherished weapon in those memories was exactly that shield. Even seen only through unwashed memories scraped by Hide, the familiarity was tangible.
Identical replicas, down to the letter, felt intimate to the implanted warrior slaves too. In their memories, that was the cherished weapon from their past lives.
Handling that shield alongside their current-life weapons posed no issue. The mystery of desert warriors’ powers was unknown, but clearly tied to mental techniques.
Twaaaang—!
Splash!
Professor scowled at the warrior legion blocking his strike and recoiling.
Their infuriating defense aside, their very existence struck his mind savagely with displeasure.
The desert’s finest warriors scraped together. Loyalty implanted, plus shamanic brainwashing enabling warrior abilities with other soul weapons.
The result: a defensive army that could even halt a warship-shattering monster.
If Kaurladi prepared to unify the desert, better offensive forms were endless. Desert battles sank even elite warriors without ships, so position-holders excelled at stopping charges but struggled leading offensives.
Thus, they were crafted purely to block approaching powerhouses.
As if prepared for this exact moment.
‘Invasion wasn’t the goal from the start.’
Long-prepared. No mere brainwashing produced such warriors overnight.
Something was lacking; Kaurladi received it from mute forces.
Then, war preparations blared like rumors of grand conflict.
‘Massive fleet movement suited to total war.’
‘Forces unfit for carefully nurtured invasion. Not made to stop unheard-of Saladin, so slave warrior legion to bar approach to their core, whoever it is.’
.
.
.
.
.
.
‘....Bluffing? Using war as mere smokescreen?’
That was the only reason for such irrationality.
Some massive undertaking required moving hordes and elite shamans, impossible to hide from desert eyes and ears. The desert was constant battlegrounds; one’s scheme inevitably drew interference.
So, ignite a flashy war.
Leading every force they had.
Into the vast desert where approachers and fleers were visible at a glance.
Erecting an impenetrable human wall of poured resources, creating his sanctuary.
‘No interest in war’s victory or defeat.’
Abandoned 150 warships and crews. Elites dying by his hand now. War was mutual attrition; only total victory compensated the horrific cost by seizing all.
If not victory-bound, all expended was mere consumable.
The desert’s pinnacle pouring truly everything. What was the “true desert king” Kaurladi and his subordinates parroted?
By now, irritation turned to dread.
Vanished sun and moon. Dragons perishing with them from ancient dragon kingdoms.
Strange powers from desert sands.
Kaurladi withdrawing unharmed from taboo likenesses amid hordes, sinking half the Nullak fleet in one blow.
The desert’s emerging contours held too much.
Dread spurred Professor’s steps.
‘Hey, Hide. Regen left?’
[Used sparingly.... 60%? 70%?]
‘....High jump over the fleet.... I’d get shredded?’
[Don’t. Those hundreds of flying blades would blender you. Maybe cover 30%?]
‘Big auror blast?’
[Auror? That separate-shattering crap could plow through.... But backwards, right? Last time, auror-chewed flesh was leagues beyond normal damage. Goal’s approach and disrupt ‘super-suspicious something’. Abusing power to reach leaves you crawling at the hidden part.]
‘Then.... slowly grinding through is it.’
[One 4th, no 5th-grade mute and no fretting like this.]
‘Yeah. One mute, ration marrow-tight and....’
Cannibal talk, but genuine regret.
Palkatus’s web bound his feet stickily; two clashes crippled half the warrior legion ahead, but endless warriors and supporting shamans blocked beyond.
‘No choice. Breakthrough sans auror with flesh and blood....’
Crack, crrrack!
Professor swelled his thighs for another charge. Heavy whoosh behind signaled Nullak catapults or ballistae firing support.
Doubtful against main-fist blockers, but better than nothing—he timed his lunge for impact.
Thud!
Thump!
.
.
.
.
Drip.
Not hard sharp debris, but wriggling live thing tumbling confused. Professor’s eyes lit with question, admiration, then ecstasy.
Flew that distance, crashed—no external damage, just sensory flail.
Hard carapace, impressive bone structure, chitin-blend spear.
And matching its sturdy look, thick sweet-fetid blood scent unique to them.
Professor whipped around; two dragon-like waterspouts sucked mutes, flinging them from the peak.
Scattering everywhere, most arcing here to crash. Some rode flows to other ships.
Heavens. Ottoman, you genius!
Crack,
“Teamwork forever!”
Fwoosh!
Ecstatic Professor’s fist pulverized the fallen mute’s skull; headless corpse fountained blood over the deck.
Shield-wall blocked the blood rain perfectly, but froze at a warrior hoisting the headless corpse one-handed.
Blood pooled alive at his feet.
As it soaked in, vitality surged; audible heart thundered, veins bulged with spiking pressure.
Fsssh—
Corpse crumbled from warrior’s hand; blood-soaked warrior licked lips regretfully, demonic as mythic oni.
Professor seized their flinch.
—Kwaaaaaang!
“U-up top!”
“Intercept! That impure thing mustn’t reach the ritual!”
Stiffened warriors’ delayed strikes chased Professor leaping from deck, but ankle nicks were fine—regen resupplied.
Leaping layers of ships, shedding hook-wielders mid-jump several times.
“Visible!”
Finally, Kaurladi’s flagship emerged beyond warship walls.
Insufficient defenses shrouded deck in massive awning.
Sails and shades obscured, but Professor’s sharp eyes caught edges: ivory bone fragments of ancient beast.
Decaying heap of recent remains, unwound bandages.
Chanting from a hundred shamans. And center:
Kaurladi, ritual axis, intoning mantras, hands raised amid incense smoke—eyes alight with achiever’s rapture—as Professor vaulted mast toward hidden flagship.
『Our father and mother, great being who birthed the desert, hear us. Grant me greatest glory. Cast off your yoke to hang ’round my neck, lighten your burden upon my shoulders.』
At ritual’s climax, Kaurladi raised obsidian dagger skyward, shrieking like banshee.
『Thus, genesis power. Power to reforge your world collapsed upon this false one!』
Riiip!
Bone-leather awning tore; white-flame fist rocketed centerward.
Pffft!
No hesitation—obsidian dagger plunged Kaurladi’s heart, blood splattering deck.
Crack!
Professor’s follow-up fist smashed Kaurladi’s head; sweat-drenched shamans screamed.
But shattered head and body already crumbled to sand.
“Oooooh! Worship! The king is reborn as true desert king!”
“Worship! Worship!”
“The desert returns! The desert reclaims ancient glory!”
“We all return to our rightful forms!!!”
Sobbing shamans prostrated; belated warriors followed.
‘Too late.’
Desert quaked beneath. Tremor to shiver. Chill up spine. Like citizens eyeing distant mushroom cloud.
Signaling all present: something unfolded.
Swaaaaa—
Ship sank.
No—ship afloat on sand. All around sank below.
Before Professor’s eyes, the desert rose.
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