Total Chaos (2)
Total Chaos (2)
The superhumans most welcome on a battlefield are, naturally, those specializing in anti-army combat.
The prime examples are war mages who specialize in spell workshops and mass-destruction magic, necromancers who command undead armies, and spirit casters.
Lee Ha-yul counted as all three.
So Lee Ha-yul set up a spell workshop, summoned golems, undead, and spirits, and then entered the Reverse Side.
'Shit, shit...'
Sprawled helplessly after tumbling across the ground, Lee Ha-yul realized his mistake.
His plan had gone wrong. He had accounted for injury, but he never imagined he would end up a cripple who couldn't even move properly.
To make matters worse, his heart power had bottomed out, and his body was barely clinging to life.
So here he was, sprawled on the ground, unable to escape the battlefield.
Lee Ha-yul, unable to even hold himself upright, was nothing more than an easy-to-swallow, extremely high-quality piece of prey.
The monsters, eyes rolling in frenzy, swarmed in from all directions, and the hastily summoned undead moved to intercept them.
The disadvantage was clearly on the undead's side.
The Reverse Side monsters were high-rank to begin with, and they were also receiving the Reverse Side's correction.
In contrast, the undead were receiving Taesan's correction, but they were still being suppressed by the Reverse Side.
On top of that, the formation was surrounded on all sides and the master's consciousness was half-faded, so his commands lacked organization.
- Krurgaaaggghh!!
A monster seized that opening.
The monster, having turned its body into a fluid to penetrate the formation, raised a scythe-like claw and brought it crashing down.
Crunch! Just as the cruel claw was about to strike Lee Ha-yul's neck, Aerus burst up through the ground, bit the claw, and shattered it.
- Grrrrr...!
After tearing out the monster's throat in return, Aerus let out a howl and spread his Blood Cloud.
Beyond that, the undead who hadn't been dismissed clustered desperately around Lee Ha-yul to protect him.
But the fact of their disadvantage didn't change.
On a battlefield already being encroached upon by the Reverse Side, where it was nearly impossible to detect presences, locating Lee Ha-yul sprawled on the ground in such a short time should have been impossible.
'Taesan?'
Yet Lee Ji-yeon, through the chaos, could pick up the presence.
Lee Ji-yeon, who had been steadily raising undead atop the castle wall to serve as meat shields, suddenly snapped her head up.
Within the chaotic battlefield, she felt a presence of Taesan that resembled hers, yet was different.
It was the presence she had felt in China, from the enormous pit Lee Ha-yul had created.
- G-grrrr...!?
- Ppeep!? Ppeepip...!
"W-what? Why are the spirits suddenly...!"
That wasn't the only anomaly.
The spirits, who had easily been holding a whole axis of the front line, began to rampage, foaming at the mouth.
They were the spirits Lee Ha-yul had summoned in advance and left behind at the spell workshop.
The aftershock did not end with Lee Ha-yul's spirits alone.
As if contagious, every spirit in the area went into a frenzy, unleashing fierce attacks and surging forward.
The accumulating data pointed Lee Ji-yeon's mind toward a particular judgment.
But it wasn't a certainty.
Action carries responsibility. Success brings gain; failure brings loss.
Her own inadequacy made her hesitate to act.
She would put the losses and responsibilities of failure on the scales first, before the gains of success, and waver.
Lee Ji-yeon was an inadequate person.
She could not guarantee success. Especially when the values of others were at stake in the costs and responsibilities.
That was also her weakness.
Prudent judgment is a virtue of a leader, but on a battlefield, life and victory hinge on split-second decisions.
"...All Dark Evil Unit members! We're breaking through the front line at once!"
After only a moment's hesitation, Lee Ji-yeon issued a loud command.
A command given before the reasoning. Common on a battlefield, but it was natural for those receiving it to be puzzled.
Why deliberately push into that army corps when the front line is being maintained stably?
And how far are they breaking through?
There is not a lot to be gleaned from a frantic command. The resulting hesitation breeds hesitancy in action.
"I'll take point and deploy a wedge formation! We reach the objective swiftly!"
"""Yes!"""
But without any resistance, the Dark Evil Unit followed behind Lee Ji-yeon as she leapt from the castle wall down into the battlefield.
Was it because the one giving orders was Lee Ji-yeon? Because she was the family's legitimate successor?
That would also be correct. The reason they followed her this far in the first place was that their commander was Lee Ji-yeon.
'What was that just now? What's with our lady's spirit?'
'That was a shock. I thought she was the clan head.'
'If I had objected, I think my head would have been taken off right then.'
But the bigger reason was simply that they dared not even entertain the thought of refusing Lee Ji-yeon's command.
The Dark Evil Unit members, after automatically following Lee Ji-yeon and reflexively opening a path, belatedly widened their eyes.
The overwhelming spirit, akin to Taesan himself, did not permit any dissent.
It wasn't just that. They also felt a sense of stability, that following her without objection would be problem-free.
It was the sense of stability they always felt while conducting operations with the current clan head, Lee Ji-ah.
- Kwaaaaaang!
At the head of the charge, Lee Ji-yeon manifested Mountain-Breaking, her expansion ability, and it detonated.
Monsters blocking the path were torn to shreds. Through the chunks of flesh, Lee Ji-yeon and the Dark Evil Unit carved a path.
"Ah...! Purification Unit! We're breaking through too!"
"Aaagh! Kids! The young master is in danger! Deploy assault formation!"
Having sensed the presence just a fraction later, Hong Yeon-hwa also kicked off the ground.
At the news that Lee Ha-yul was in danger, the Jeonghwaju (Stop Fire Master), who had rushed over panting, and the Purification Unit joined her in pushing back against the monster tide.
"Now, Ten-Thousand Mirrors Unit! Changpa Unit! We're going too!"
"Oh dear, straight into hardship the moment work ends... Push in between Calamity Flame and Taesan!"
Following Baek A-rin's command, people grimaced but still lifted their armaments.
The Changhae family's Ten-Thousand Mirrors Unit and Changpa Unit, who had been dragged to the battlefield before fully resolving the territory's matters, also entered the fray.
In a short staggered sequence, the forces of the Three Great Families advanced.
Whenever flames erupted, monsters tumbled to the ground in a roaring mass of shrieks.
The surface of the earth heaved, swallowing and crushing monsters; the dead monsters rose as undead and swarmed the living.
Chunks of solid ice crashed and shattered, and waves surging everywhere quelled the excessively blazing Calamity Flame and invigorated the earth's energies.
- Ppeepit, ppeepipip...!
"Ah, ah? Kids? Kids! How far are you going...!"
On top of that.
The spirits, suspiciously frantic, finally disobeyed their contractors' orders and pushed back the monsters with all their might.
Liana, as if responding in turn, scraped together her mana and released most of her spirits, and a newly appeared monster that was 4th Rank or above was instantly pulverized, limbs scattering as a brilliant light flashed.
After receiving the observation data, the Association's subjugation forces also spurred themselves off the front line and joined the battlefield.
The wave of monsters that had been crashing in with such momentum first faltered, and then reached a point where it was being pushed back outright.
"...Huh?"
"Whoa...?"
Then it happened.
Questions gradually surfaced on the faces of the Dark Evil Unit members who were drawing closest to the objective area at the vanguard.
An energy growing clearer. It isn't an unfamiliar sensation. In fact, it's more than familiar—it's intimate.
- Boom!
As Mountain-Breaking burst forward, monsters were sent flying in chunks, clearing the view. At the head, Lee Ji-yeon's eyes flew open wide.
"Junior...!"
She couldn't help but scream.
A small number of undead were holding off monsters from all sides in a circular formation.
At the center of that circle, something lay helplessly sprawled on the ground.
She couldn't be certain with her naked eye. The state was so dire it called survival itself into question.
"You... you mere monster bastards—!"
The enraged Lee Ji-yeon slammed one foot onto the ground. Boom! With raw, brutal force, she seized total dominion over the earth.
- Kwa-ga-ga-gak!
Every monster in the area was pierced and torn a thousand, ten thousand ways by surging spikes, then buried and compressed by the earth until their forms were unidentifiable.
Without even checking the carnage she had wrought, Lee Ji-yeon dashed breathlessly to Lee Ha-yul.
- Grrrr...
Even Aerus, who had been holding off the monsters, had enough sense not to block Lee Ji-yeon.
"F-fuck...! What is this. What did this to you..."
Close up, his condition was even more unbearably horrific.
Before she could find a single uninjured spot, it was hard to locate even a less-injured area on his entire body.
His right arm was burned over every inch, covered in hideous scars; his left arm, replaced by an artifact, was gone, leaving an empty void.
She placed her palm on Lee Ha-yul's back.
There wasn't a shred of warmth, and her eyes quivered at the cold touch of his skin.
- ...Thump...
"He's... he's alive..."
Still alive. The barely perceptible pulse and the faintly felt vitality attested to it.
Lee Ji-yeon drew up whatever faint vitality she could sense and carefully poured it into Lee Ha-yul.
"...Hey, what is that?"
"I don't know either. Just keep them blocked for now."
Right now, Lee Ha-yul's injuries were too severe to move him from the spot.
While the members of the Dark Evil Unit skilled in healing added their strength to the emergency aid, the other members, who had formed a temporary defensive formation as if shielding Lee Ha-yul, couldn't hide their dazed expressions.
The Special Admission Cadet of Siyoram looked practically no different from a corpse.
Why is he here? How did this happen? Why does he look like that?
Before they could even entertain such questions, Lee Ha-yul's right hand, which had dug into the earth, drew their focus. More than the horrific burns, the innate talent blooming from that hand was overwhelmingly familiar.
"That's Taesan..."
"I said I don't fuckin' know...! First, just protect..."
Taesan.
At the word that instantly came to mind, their eyelids fluttered.
Soon, troops including Calamity Flame and Azure Sea forces arrived one after another.
"Ah, ah..."
Hong Yeon-hwa couldn't spare any attention for something like Taesan. She was too busy desperately holding onto her consciousness, which threatened to give way at the sight of Lee Ha-yul sprawled out like a corpse.
"What... this is insane..."
"......"
Baek A-rin swore and rushed over to Lee Ha-yul, and Ellia knelt down wordlessly and poured out Healing Melody.
Among the numerous healing-type superhumans who clustered around Lee Ha-yul was Baek A-rin.
Azure Sea water energy has restorative properties, and Baek A-rin herself had a talent for healing arts and had put in the effort for it.
She could sufficiently help even with these near-fatal wounds, which went beyond mere emergency aid.
So, as she tried to manifest Azure Sea and pour out water energy—that was when it happened.
Lee Ha-yul's body flinched.
- Kwarrrrrr...!
"Huh?"
A water current cascaded forth. Water energy imbued with healing properties coiled around Lee Ha-yul's entire body and flowed, initiating recovery.
Ice Purity coated Lee Ha-yul's body. Parts that seemed about to fall off were frozen with cold energy and temporarily adhered.
"...?"
"...Huh, huh...?"
Baek A-rin's eyes widened. This wasn't Baek A-rin's Azure Sea. Nor was it the Azure Sea of another Changpa Unit member.
It was an Azure Sea that had originated from Lee Ha-yul.
Everyone froze for a moment at the sudden, unrealistic sight.
Essentially unconscious, Lee Ha-yul was unaware of the situation and moved instinctively for survival.
A small amount of power entered the fingers digging into the ground. Kuwoong! The ground rumbled. Soon, vitality from the earth was drawn into Lee Ha-yul's hand like a hungry ghost.
It was Taesan, openly manifested as if to confirm the kill.
For reference, Lee Ha-yul was publicly known to be a manifestor of Calamity Flame.
"......"
"......"
It was the middle of a battlefield.
Even though it was a place where they could never afford to relax their tension, for a moment, everyone lost their minds.
The members of Calamity Flame, Azure Sea, and Taesan couldn't find their voices and just stared back and forth at each other's stupefied faces.
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