The Overwhelming Presence
The overwhelming presence hit like a physical force. She had my cloak clenched in her fist, my feet dangling uselessly above the ground, and she scolded me like a misbehaving child. "You little shit. What the hell are you trying to pull this time? You're not some brat scribbling graffiti on ancient ruins, for fuck's sake."
"Clack clack..."
"Don't give me that 'clack clack.' You walking disaster!"
Throwing a single dagger at Hyeon Jung-gil and carving a few marks into a rock hardly qualified me as a walking disaster... Being held up like this was embarrassing, and the memory of Kang Yeonsu from my previous life—the one who couldn't lay a finger on me—stirred up a rebellious spark in my chest.
I should just use Mimicry and turn her into a mute who swallowed her own tongue.
It was something I couldn't actually pull off right now, but the thought flashed through my mind anyway. When I stared back at her with a sullen expression, she tilted her head, puzzled.
Seeing Yeonsu's face up close suddenly brought back the day we first met. How she'd dropped her coffee the moment I greeted her, face flushing crimson, unable to form a single coherent word. For a long time after that she could barely speak whenever she saw me. Then, after she happened to help me once during a dungeon break, she became strangely proactive. Before long she was summoning me constantly, treating me like some personal servant.
...How nostalgic.
Still, having prepared my insurance made me feel much more at ease. I settled down on the ground with my companions, keeping a suitable distance from the massive crater.
"Can we go home now?"
Maybe it was the relief of knowing everything was truly over, but Arin's ears had finally returned to their normal shape for the first time in a while.
"It looks like dispelling the barrier will take some time. The person at the center of it disappeared."
"You mean the S-rank hunter Kim Jae-hyun?"
"Yes... It seems he did something to the barrier. He layered the formulas so intricately that even if every other barrier mage joins in, it could still take days."
"Haaa... That won't do. I need to get back to my siblings..."
So that's what she was worried about.
For Arin's sake, I hoped the situation would resolve quickly, but the barrier was indeed the problem. Transcendent Kim Seon-min and Hyeon Jung-gil could escape by deploying their unique domains, but the rest of us were stuck.
That bastard Jo Giman could probably manage it too.
The power of the Celestial Thunder Palm he'd displayed earlier already seemed to surpass even Hyeon Jung-gil's might. Hunters who possessed unique domains despite not being from the early awakening period were extremely rare, and rumors were already circulating that Jo Giman might become the first in our country.
Anyway, the kill notification had already appeared. Everyone relaxed while waiting for the barrier to lift.
Nom—
"This is seriously delicious."
"Right? It was a limited edition at the market. They used meat from a flying monster called Tanzarik or Hanzarik or something—"
Since I'd stocked up on nearly every type of preserved ration the market offered, the two of them were sampling each variety and holding an impromptu taste-testing session.
Thirty minutes passed like that. The entire area had become so peaceful that no tension remained whatsoever.
Huh?! W-what?!
The nature of the mana in the air suddenly twisted with violent ferocity, signaling an imminent change.
And then—
Swoooosh——!
- Kughhh——!!
A precarious death rattle echoed from the spot where the monster's remains had been left.
"?!"
In that instant, the heads of hundreds of hunters snapped toward the sound in perfect unison.
There, impaled by something resembling tentacles and hoisted into the air, was Park Yong-hwan.
- ······!!
Jo Giman, who had been speaking with Park Jin-gon at a distance, reacted first.
Slash—!
With a hand blade, he severed the forearm-thick tentacle that had pierced Park Yong-hwan's abdomen in a single clean cut.
That became the signal. Every superhuman gathered in the area unleashed their skills at the same target.
BOOMBOOMBOOMBOOMBOOM——!!
The overwhelming destructive force converged on the spot where the rock-hard byproduct had been.
Dozens of skills overlapping created an explosion like thunder.
A split second later, the hunters who had cast the skills kicked off the ground and frantically retreated.
?! Absolute Reflection?
KWAAAAAAAANG——!!
The superhumans who received their own attacks reflected back at them with amplified power deployed every defensive measure they had, faces twisting in fury.
"Fuck, what the hell is that thing?! It took my skill, amplified it, and threw it back?!"
"This can't be real!! Where the hell does something like that even come from?!"
"He's dead! The kill message appeared! Why is it still alive?!"
A higher compatibility than Cha Jin-hyeok's ability...?
That was enough to shock even the highest-ranking hunters. Even Jo Giman stared at the monster that had just crawled out of the stone with an expression of pure disbelief.
I stretched my senses to their limit, wrapping them around both the creature and the mysterious stone. Only then did understanding hit me.
...... A stone created by the Queen Slime... It was some kind of incubation device meant to produce that thing.
The stone it had broken free from was completely hollow inside. Like a matryoshka doll, stone nested within stone, layer after layer.
Dozens of concentric shells had perfectly concealed the tiny monster at the very center. The strategy had even fooled my senses—it was brilliantly executed.
Each surrounding stone was engraved with countless circuits of magical power. From what I could sense, the structure was designed to store external power received by the Queen Slime and channel it inward. Since not a trace of mana remained in the stones, it appeared the device had fulfilled its purpose completely.
Come to think of it, the Queen Slime firing thousands of cannon-like shells and creating this small creature—it had all been to buy time.
Considering it had absorbed the power of nearly a thousand hunters, its earlier attacks had felt strangely insufficient. I'd assumed it simply had poor absorption efficiency, but it had been preparing something else entirely...
It looks like that slime bastard poured every ounce of power it consumed straight into this thing. And in the end it sacrificed itself without even launching a proper counterattack, all to protect its creation. Sacrifice... I don't like this. This development is clearly dangerous.
The debuff I'd received while trying to grow feet to escape, Kim Seon-min's insects, even the skills from both Hyeon Jung-gil and Jo Giman—it had endured and accumulated all of it to create this single small monster. The realization made the back of my skull tingle.
The creature had a body split exactly down the middle—black on one side, turquoise on the other—as if mourning its mother. It stood less than 150cm tall. Its lower body looked almost human, but the upper body was a grotesque elongated oval cylinder with dozens of tentacles sprouting from it.
Each tentacle was as thick as a grown man's forearm. Occasionally the tips would flare open like trumpets. I didn't know their purpose, but the sight alone sent chills racing across my entire body, screaming at me to run.
But I knew I didn't need to flee.
The marks... So that's why they appeared. Because of this thing.
Twenty-five Flame Marks bloomed like flower buds above its shoulder. Even from this distance the fiery energy was unmistakable. The creature seemed irritated by the flickering marks, constantly swinging its tentacles to bat at them. Once the tentacles passed and the marks reappeared, it quickly lost interest and began scanning its surroundings as if searching for someone.
I hurriedly lowered my gaze and stared fixedly at the ground. If I'd been closer, I would have detonated an explosion immediately and begun stacking the five overlapping blasts.
Shiver shiver shiver—
It was late winter, yet the weather was as warm as spring, with climate crisis headlines dominating the news every day. But when the bone-chilling aura rolling off the creature wrapped around us, both Yeonhee's and Arin's bodies began trembling like leaves in a gale.
...... That's a Great Calamity.
No doubt about it. And this was an incredibly rare opportunity.
Fortunately, the monster showed zero interest in small fry like us in the distance.
Just enduring the aura of a monster like this should help me grow.
It was worth the risk to observe how things developed. Of course, if it suddenly changed its mind and began indiscriminate slaughter, the situation would change instantly. Still, with Yeonsu right beside us, the chance of being instantly killed was relatively low.
That tiny thing... possesses this much power...
A Great Calamity was defined as a being that required multiple Transcendents working together to subdue. This monster possessed exactly that level of strength.
"Hiiiiiiik!!"
Arin covered her eyes and pressed herself flat against the ground, shaking violently. Her ears were more swollen than ever, the fur standing up like needles.
Yeonhee was reflexively trying to summon her creatures, but her expression looked like a screw had come completely loose. The moment the summoned beings sensed the presence of the Great Calamity, they were forcibly unsummoned and vanished. Even the Shadow Drake.
This was a phenomenon I never would have witnessed if I'd simply triggered Flame Explosion earlier. In many ways, today's harvest seemed bountiful.
Even the Black Dragon had its summoning canceled? Is it really that overwhelming?
I certainly felt pressure from the aura it emitted, but it wasn't to the point where I struggled greatly.
Maybe it's because I killed the Queen Slime and absorbed so much of its smoke into my subspace? I can't be sure.
While I pondered this, Yeonhee's condition grew increasingly strange.
"Aaah— I should have raised my domination power higher... Aaaaaah... It's all my fault—"
Her eyes had lost focus completely. She kept repeating the same words like a broken parrot.
So higher domination power lets the summons endure it...
It seemed domination power wasn't merely a stat for suppressing unruly summons. It also granted the strength to withstand overwhelming enemies.
When I think about the monsters we'll face in the future... this has to be the essential stat I need to prioritize above all else.
I inwardly scolded my past self for thinking domination power was low priority and scanned our surroundings.
The hunters who are still standing properly seem to start at Park Jin-gon.
Even Park Jin-gon, who stood on the threshold of S-rank, was barely holding on by biting his lip hard enough to draw blood. The hunters below him were all in a groggy state without exception.
Everyone's shoulders jolted violently.
Then it began repeating the same sound like a lunatic.
Fucking lunatic...
Everyone present surely thought the same thing, yet not a single person dared open their mouth.
An overwhelming presence. It felt like watching a giant foreleg of a ferocious monster waving right before your eyes.
The mouth split open in the center of its torso like female genitalia continued repeating the same word endlessly before suddenly freezing.
- Uwaaaaaaaaah!!
- Kuuuugh!
The Great Calamity, displeased that we refused to react again, unleashed a roar powerful enough to lift bodies off the ground.