Gate Break!
The moment I gave the green light, my little brother rounded up seven of his buddies.
"Whoa…! I'm a huge NewTube fan!"
I've only been doing this a week…?
"I've rewatched Noona's videos at least ten times each."
I haven't even watched them that many times… Thanks, I guess.
"Seeing you in Yeongdeungpo? I was genuinely moved!"
Ah, crap. So they saw that footage.
…
Seven guys chirping one after another like baby birds left me with zero room to think. Still wearing a smile, I thanked each of them in turn and started signing the papers they'd brought.
"Whoa, Noona's got autographs now?"
A voice that was, by any measure, asking for it. Under Mom's watchful eye, I shot him a warning through voice transmission.
Keep yapping next to me and I will actually kill you.
Hearing it, he started glancing around.
I already told you. Stop looking around.
A second transmission made him stare at me, eyes wide. Whether he actually got the message or simply foresaw the nightmare waiting if he kept it up, his mouth finally shut.
Even after the autographs were done, though, his buddies just stood there staring blankly.
"What? You want something else?"
At that, they fidgeted and started naming their requests one by one.
Do they seriously think this is a fan meet?
I'd only asked because they weren't leaving. I hadn't expected them to actually make demands. Thanks to that, my first-ever fan meet—which I'd figured would happen at a gym—ended up taking place in a military visitation room.
Still, since I was feeling generous, I started granting the cuter, more modest requests one by one.
"You just want a handshake?"
"Yes, ma'am!"
A two-handed shake. One down, lightly handled.
"Would a hug also be possible?!"
This kid…
All right. Confidence earns points.
"Okay. Come here!"
I hugged him good and tight.
"Ghk—!"
Whether that was a sound of pure joy or pure asphyxiation, I couldn't tell. He collapsed into a chair with a noise I had no name for.
Two down.
Seeing that, the next two in line also asked for hugs. I obliged the same way, and they went down too.
That made four.
Watching it all, Dojun leaned in.
"Hyung, are these guys still alive?"
"Obviously."
Did he seriously think a hug from me would kill someone? I wasn't about to be that unreasonable over a simple request. Still, the suspicious side-eye he was giving me got under my skin, so I offered:
"What, want one too?"
He bolted like his life depended on it.
I asked the remaining three what they wanted. Turns out there was something they wanted to see.
"Huh?"
"Could we see the giant you showed off in Yeongdeungpo?"
The other two nodded, chiming in that they wanted to see it too. I hesitated a beat.
"Doing that in a visitation room is a little much…"
So I summoned the tiny mini Demon God I'd manifested back at the community center. Their faces lit up in shock.
"Whoa… is this Noona's summoned beast?"
"Not exactly. I just control it myself."
By way of demonstration, I put the mini Demon God through a dazzling action routine. They watched with sparkling eyes. And just like that, the last three requests were done.
Judging by the way they left, the impromptu fan meet must have hit the spot. They thanked me, looking thoroughly satisfied.
"Thank you so much!"
"I'm keeping this autograph as a family heirloom…!"
"That hug was absolutely lethal!!"
…
They filed out of the visitation room one after another. The whole thing felt like scrambling for cover from a sudden downpour.
"Whew… I'm wiped."
For fan service to only seven people, I was surprisingly drained. Still, Mom and Dad watched and praised me for handling it well. Dad, who'd somehow appeared without my noticing, was staring at the Demon God from a moment ago with pure fascination, clearly dying to know how it worked.
I was just about to take Dojun out for his overnight leave when—
"Hhk—!"
My senses picked up a massive surge of mana.
In the next instant, disaster alerts blared from every smartphone in the visitation room. A microphone crackled to life, and the soldiers started being called up.
Attention all personnel. Effective immediately, a Gate Break has occurred in the vicinity of Pocheon. Civilian evacuation orders have been issued.
A groan tore from Dojun's mouth.
"Ah, of all times—!"
Then, through another burst of crackling mic static, the protocol dropped.
Attention all visitors. Effective immediately, all leaves and overnight passes are cancelled. Visitors are to evacuate the base at once—
The volume was so loud it made my ears ring as it shook the visitation room.
All personnel, effective immediately: full individual combat gear and assemble on the parade ground. Repeating: all base personnel and visitors are to immediately…
"Sorry, Mom, Dad—I've gotta go…!"
Dojun shot to his feet and started heading back. While my parents sat stunned by the sudden chaos, officers poured into the visitation room, urging everyone to evacuate at once.
Escorting Mom and Dad out, I thought:
A mana wave this strong…
It was far more powerful than even an ogre's. As useless as my little brother could be, a flicker of worry still hit me. So before we got in the car to evacuate—
"Mom. Dad."
I asked their understanding so they wouldn't spiral.
"I'll clean this up and be right back."
I told them there was no one here more certain to stop that gate than me—but they still pushed back.
"Honey, you don't have to push yourself this time…!"
"Yeah, the military's already mobilizing. There's no reason for you to take this on!"
Even so, they opposed it. But given the reach of that mana wave, the military alone would never hold the line. At minimum, you'd need a mid-to-high-tier Climber—someone past the thirtieth floor—to even stand a chance of stopping it.
"Come on, you don't trust me enough?"
I met their anxious eyes and spoke with absolute confidence.
"It's me. One of the few S-Class Climbers in the country."
I talked them through it—how this was exactly why the nation supported people like me with grants and resources in the first place. Their gazes stayed heavy with worry all the same. Putting on a serious face, I gripped both their hands tightly and promised:
"I won't come back with so much as a single hair out of place."
They knew me well enough to know that once I'd decided, I saw it through.
"You mean it…? If it gets dangerous, you run. No questions."
"Yes. You come back safe. That's non-negotiable."
They both pulled me into a hug. Smiling, I told them I understood, pointed them toward a direction free of the mana wave, and then launched myself with everything I had.
"That way…!"
Even from a distance, the mana hit me all at once. Holding *Void Treading* at maximum speed, I tore toward the source. A stretch of thirty to forty kilometers—I covered it in five minutes flat.
What I found was a catastrophe.
Dozens of colossal golems were smashing through every storefront and building in sight. Between the rubble, the groans of the wounded and the bodies of the dead filled my view. Worse, every golem was plated head to toe in solid mithril. Mid- and low-tier Climbers who'd stepped up couldn't so much as scratch that durability, reduced to scrambling just to get civilians out of the way.
"You've got to be kidding me."
It had been less than ten minutes since the gate blew, and the scene was already this grim. Heat flooded my head.
Some righteous, justice-drunk hero complex? Honestly, I wasn't sure I had one of those. But watching a bunch of scrap-metal piles pull this kind of crap was more than I could stomach.
I let gravity take me and dropped from the sky.
KWA-AANG!
I didn't brake on the way down, so the impact thundered out in a massive boom.
"Hoo—"
Dozens of golems turned on me with uncanny mechanical noise, drawn by the sudden crash. To stop their rampage cold, I poured internal energy into a roar.
"GAL—!"
Even the Climbers mid-evacuation spun around, startled. The golems answered with flat, emotionless operating tones and unleashed killing intent in unison.
That should make me their target.
I hurled myself at them with everything I had. A strike loaded with the pinnacle of the Heavenly Demon Divine Art slammed into a golem's frame.
But the enemy was a machine armored in solid mithril.
TAAANG—!
"Tch—"
My Magi failed to penetrate. It skated along the surface and evaporated. At best, the impact dented the plating. Mithril's mana conductivity had neutralized my demonic arts entirely.
On top of that, the metal's light weight meant those enormous bodies moved with absurd speed. Iron maces closing in at near-supersonic velocity came crashing down from every direction.
KWAKWAKWAKWANG—!
In that frantic instant, I answered with the Form Displacement I'd unlocked in the training yard. But the barrage was so savage it crushed even the afterimages. Dodging while bleeding off the force wasn't an option—too many civilians still hadn't made it out.
Damn it, there's nowhere to slip away…!
"Khuk!"
A storm of collisions hammered down on me like a collapsing roof. The golems didn't care about their own damage; they piled their maces on top of each other and crashed in with raw violence. I wrenched my protective aura to its peak and caught that crushing weight on both arms. The aura groaned, and a shock twisted through my organs.
"Khrrr…!"
Dozens of tons of pressure, at the least. Even so, I held it—and started pushing back.
"Urgh!"
Me, the Heavenly Demon, stalled by leftovers like these? Unthinkable.
"Bring it, you tin cans…!"
A colossal Demon God erupted from my back.
So Magi doesn't work on you?
Then I'd just have to crush them by force. Six enormous hands swatted the golems pinning me skyward. With room to move again, I vaulted onto one of the flung golems, wrenched every scrap of Magi in my body upward, and unloaded a storm of pure, explosive strength—no technique, just raw violence.
The golem's body finally failed under the physical onslaught.
PUBUBU… PUH-EONG—!
Let's take this all the way, you worthless pests.
Mithril of the highest grade or not—to me, it was still scrap. I wrenched joints free, crushed mithril gauntlets in my bare grip, and shredded them apart. Before the transcendent power of a body honed through endless growth, the golems collapsed one after another in pieces.
After repeating that a few more times, dozens of golems ground to a halt as inert scrap, every function dead.
Only one remained—the first golem that had blocked my opening strike.
"Let's see just how far that fancy mana conductivity of yours will take you."
The Demon God behind me locked its limbs in place. Then I poured pinnacle Magi into its core like a waterfall.
KWAAAAAAAA—!
The golem's emergency alarm shrieked as it registered the threat.
BEEEE—!
Mithril that had absorbed Magi past its limit overheated, bleeding excess heat. The overloading mithril plating finally caught fire, and the core inside could take no more.
PUH-EONG—!
Even the last golem's eye-lights dimmed and died.
"That's what you get for mouthing off."
I muttered it while staring down at the wrecked scrap of what used to be a golem.