Chapter 175
Chapter 175
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 175
Chapter Title: Leviathan
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Rumble rumble rumble—.
With a flick of my finger, the ark fleet pierced through the currents and launched in unison.
A light sense of elation prickled through my skull. It felt like being a pianist and conductor all at once.
The aura power I had accumulated over thousands of years was providing propulsion to the arks.
‘Old Man Show’s sneer that martial arts are third-rate while aura is first-rate is something I can laugh off now.’
No matter how much of a Swordmaster Old Man Show was, having maxed out his swordsmanship, all he could do was flail around with sword arts and telekinesis.
On the other hand, I, the Undertaker, was currently controlling twelve ships. Add just one more, and I’d be ready to debut as Joseon’s Three Provinces Waterborne Defense Commandant.
“Your piloting skills are truly exceptional, Your Excellency.”
Yoo Ji-won sensed my good mood like a ghost and sidled up to me.
That approach suddenly brought a dose of reality crashing back.
Because a faint strawberry scent wafted from Yoo Ji-won—the very perfume I had once praised her for, saying, ‘Ji-won, you have great taste in picking perfumes.’
The thoroughness of her fawning over a person in power sent a chill even down my liver. As expected of the top psychopath of the Three Hans.
“…Thanks, Ji-won. But could you back off a bit? I’m not planning to take revenge by cutting off your fingers later, so you don’t need to grovel so desperately.”
“Grovel? Perish the thought. I only want to show Your Excellency my true self at all times—my very heart, if possible.”
“If you keep spouting nonsense, I’ll break your fingers, so shut up and check the minimap.”
“Yes, sir.”
With omnipotence and reality perfectly balanced, the voyage proceeded smoothly.
Of course, that didn’t mean the ‘core’ of the Long Rain monster was immediately found. The storm’s scale, reaching about 10,000 meters in altitude, was no joke.
Anyone who’s served on a submarine would know: 99% of underwater chases are a battle against oneself. Boredom and patience are the real enemies.
Even as we activated [Minimap] and scoured every corner of the typhoon, the enemy’s presence didn’t show up easily.
-Kieeeek!
-Kyaaaaak….
Three hours into the search.
Innocent ancient marine lifeforms like megalodons were facing their second extinction.
Sharks and whales caught in the spiderweb spun by the twelve arks were diced into perfect cube steaks.
“What a ridiculously romantic aquarium date this is….”
No Do-ha, leader of the National Highway Management Corps, recoiled at the sight of shark chunks floating past the window.
The turbulent currents kept the ark crew from unbuckling their belts carelessly. Stuck to their seats for hours, they couldn’t help but squirm with boredom.
“Does this Long Rain core even really exist? If it were something like the Ten Tribes with a clear material form anyone could see, that’d be one thing, but isn’t the Long Rain just a weather phenomenon…?”
“It exists.”
The one who answered wasn’t me.
Lurch. The ark jolted like a plane hitting turbulence.
All eyes turned to one side. There, Go Yo-ri with her pink hair smiled calmly.
“And it’s getting closer.”
“…….”
The command center fell silent, filled only with the vibration of waves crashing against the bulkheads.
No one in the room was close to Go Yo-ri.
That said, I had always emphasized: ‘Be wary of Go Yo-ri.’
The best policy is to avoid her. If you must encounter her, never engage in any conversation. Treat her like she doesn’t exist.
That was my comprehensive Go Yo-ri protocol. That’s why the command staff had all shut their mouths at once.
Faced with the blatant ostracism, Go Yo-ri smiled awkwardly.
“Ahaha… Really. You all are so interesting.”
“Anyone desperate for the bathroom, handle it and go now.”
I thoroughly ignored Go Yo-ri’s reaction and spoke up.
No Do-ha was in the command center, so I used polite speech. We defaulted to mutual respect.
“We’ve swept the upper and middle sections of the typhoon. The monster’s core seems to be in the lower section. Current altitude: 2,000 meters. We’ll spot it soon.”
“Oh, then. Bro. I’ll be quick….”
It was the moment Seo-gyu unbuckled and stood from his seat.
Rumble rumble rumble!
The ark sharply banked into a drift. Something enormous had snagged in the vast puppet thread net spread outside the ship.
“Hwooooguhk?”
Seo-gyu, who had stood alone, got a firsthand lesson in acceleration.
His body whipped to the side, flying past me, Yoo Ji-won, Lee Ha-yul, No Do-ha, Dang Seo-rin, Sim A-ryeon, and Go Yo-ri in sequence.
Thud crash bang!
Seo-gyu bounced across the deck like a ping-pong ball. Showing Olympic-level drive shot skills, he finally slammed into the bulkhead, his waist bending like a bow.
And we all turned our heads and ignored him.
“Found it! Ha-yul, Morse code!”
“Roger.”
“It’s insanely huge! Dang Seo-rin, infuse reinforcement magic into the puppet threads!”
“Got it.”
“Everyone, brace for impact! It’s moving!”
Rumble rumble ruck—.
Whatever was caught in the puppet threads thrashed about. Enormous size. Overwhelming power.
With my nerves linked to the puppet threads, the ‘thing’s’ movements transmitted vividly through my palms and fingers, like a fisherman hooking a big one.
Even if not as vivid for me, everyone could feel the presence it exuded. The ark shook violently, and exclamations erupted from Awakeners everywhere.
-Uwaaaah!
-W-what is it! What’s happening?
-It’s coming! It’s starting!
Beep beep beep beep beep beep.
Lee Ha-yul’s emergency siren blared noisily across the entire ark via broadcast.
Those who’d stood at bad timing like Seo-gyu screamed, while others double-checked their belts.
Lee Ha-yul shouted.
“Charging, commence!”
From then on, the ark’s puppet threads lit up in a rainbow of colors.
It was the aura from the Awakeners aboard. They began assisting me by injecting their aura into the threads, each to the limit of their capacity.
It wasn’t just Ark No. 1.
With some delay, Ark No. 2, No. 3, No. 4, and finally up to No. 12—thousands of Awakeners sequentially fueled the aura.
A strategy leveraging the property of Lee Ha-yul’s puppet threads as room-temperature superconductors in the aura world.
The threads spread like a spiderweb in the deep ocean lit up in milky way hues.
Rumble rumble rumble….
Then, the ‘thing’s’ movements slowed.
The colossal monster thrashed to shake off the threads and swim away.
The twelve arks were tossed like driftwood by its struggles, but the threads, reinforced by Dang Seo-rin’s magic and thousands of auras, didn’t snap easily.
Instead, the more it flailed, the more the threads clung tightly to its body.
Rumble ruck…!
A roar echoed from the monster far away.
I could feel the threads—already lethal weapons in themselves—burrowing into its flesh.
‘Insanely massive monster!’
It surged in all directions with its body.
Though the threads held, the arks—especially No. 1—were rapidly closing in on its main body.
Insane acceleration hit the interior. Everyone squeezed their eyes shut and groaned.
Instinctively, I glanced out the reinforced glass window of the command center.
“……!”
My eyes met its.
Yes.
It was an ‘eye.’
A pupil too massive to be any living creature’s stared wide open in the middle of the deep sea.
The ark itself was but a tiny speck on that eyeball’s iris.
The entity known as the Long Rain—a void and monster by the name of the typhoon. Its ‘eye of the storm’ was fixated precisely on us—on me.
Rumble rumble rumble—!
We were still locked in a contest of strength with it. Our eye contact lasted only an instant.
The monster thrashed again. Whoosh! It moved with speed unfitting its colossal body.
Now, the window showed not the eye, but its body. That majestic torso was closer to an ecosystem than a organism—more landscape and nature itself.
The frame couldn’t contain the immense form that flashed past the window in an instant.
“Dragon…….”
Someone murmured.
It was such a perfect description that from then on, everyone envisioned the monster as a dragon.
The gigantic eyeball. The grand torso. A tail too fast to track with the eyes.
Even I, a regressor, was witnessing the Long Rain’s true body for the first time, and it embodied the most mystical mythical lifeform revered in the East.
At the same time, I realized its other name.
And why it was bound by the Genesis spell called ‘arks.’
“Leviathan!”
The name of the sea dragon from the Old Testament.
A monster that even the omnipotent Yahweh had to subdue personally. In other words, a font of terror that none but a god could dare slay.
“This isn’t a climate phenomenon!”
I shouted. The ship was shaking violently, so I had to yell.
“What looked like a massive typhoon was actually Leviathan’s body!”
“……!”
“The typhoon itself is Leviathan. Those bug-like water droplets were all parasites living inside Leviathan’s body! That’s why infected patients kept melting away. Because ‘anything foreign entering the body gets dissolved in the stomach’—it’s only natural!”
Come to think of it, the clues were already there.
When the Long Rain crossed the North Pacific and made landfall in Busan, the Saintess had described it like this.
‘It’s made landfall in Busan. Right now, ah. The typhoon’s waters are rapidly gathering toward Busan.’
‘No way. The typhoon……. It’s changing from a massive spiral into a straw shape, ah. The water, the horizon-spanning tsunami. It’s all heading to Geumjeong Mountain. Everyone, be careful—.’
The typhoon, swirling like a grand helix, suddenly elongating like a straw and surging toward Busan.
That shape was the dragon itself.
Since ancient times in the East, water had been likened to dragons.
Taming a ferocious dragon—that is, flood control—was deemed an emperor’s feat alone.
In Norse myth, Jörmungandr merely by appearing poisoned the world’s air and water with ‘venom’ and swept the land in flood.
Thus, the monster was Leviathan, a dragon, and Jörmungandr all at once.
The infinite terror of sea and water incarnate was bellowing.
Rumble rumble rumble ruck—!
Had it judged it couldn’t shake off the clinging puppet threads?
Leviathan’s movements changed. In other words, the typhoon flooding the arks began to shift.
The typhoon started to ‘contract.’
The massive cyclone that had blanketed all of Busan was rapidly compressing.
[Undertaker, Undertaker!]
At the same time, communication with the Saintess was restored. The telepathy, refracted by the thick great void barrier, recovered.
[Are you oka■y, Undertaker?]
“Yes. Still holding out!”
[The Long Rain’s form has changed! A massive—truly massive dragon—is coiling around you, the Undertaker, and the arks, heading into the sky!]
At that moment, the water sluicing the ark’s glass windows—after nearly ten days submerged—suddenly cleared.
It was no longer underwater.
It was the sky.
Leviathan had dragged the arks up to 5,000 meters in altitude.