Chapter 21
Chapter 21
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Vine
Chapter: 20
Chapter Title: It's Okay Because I'm a Genius, Even on a Time Limit
-----------------------------------------------------------------
“What is it?”
Baek Sa-young’s eyes widened in shock. Joo Ah-rin, who’d been at the front, came rushing back with a shout.
“What happened?”
It was too early to panic.
This bizarre phenomenon struck all at once, leaving no time to react.
“Snap out of it!”
“H-Help meee!”
Two, or maybe three.
The remaining team members were sucked away one after another.
The ground suddenly caved in, or the walls stretched like long strands of taffy, snatching up the team members.
“No way...”
Joo Ah-rin bit her lip, as if she’d sensed something.
She frantically pawed at the ground, checking this and that, then muttered in a pale face as if retracing her steps.
“It’s not an ordinary tunnel. This place was made by the queen—”
She was close to the truth, but it was already too late.
Fwoooosh.
Before Joo Ah-rin could finish, she vanished into the ground just like the others.
“Joo Ah-rin!”
Baek Sa-young shouted desperately, but there was nothing he could do.
Now it was just me and Baek Sa-young left. I finished what Joo Ah-rin couldn’t.
“Looks like the queen’s webs are disguised as patches of ground and walls, targeting us.”
“No, that doesn’t make sense. How could spiderwebs...”
“I don’t know the details either. But one thing’s clear. They’re making their last stand.”
“Last stand?”
“Divide and conquer. Separate us and take us out one by one, right?”
Baek Sa-young seemed to be trying to stay calm, but he couldn’t respond right away.
I kept going.
“Trust me first. Right now, it’s not about ‘why,’ but ‘how.’”
“What?”
“It’s just you and me now. You’re the strongest between us, so the queen will probably take you on directly. We need to stick together. You can’t do it alone.”
I held out my hand to Baek Sa-young.
I figured he’d grab it, of course.
Was I too nice about it?
“...How long have you known?”
Baek Sa-young’s face suddenly hardened as he looked at me.
...Oh no.
“I pieced it together from the situation—”
I tried to make an excuse too late, but then the ground under Baek Sa-young gave way.
Fwoooosh.
I grabbed his arm just before he fell.
If worst came to worst, I was ready to jump in with him...
Splat!
But Baek Sa-young shook off my hand first.
“If it’s dangerous, I’d rather go alone. At least you...”
“Hey, you idiot!”
I swung my arm too late, clutching at empty air.
That frustrating guy, seriously.
For a moment, I was so dumbfounded my head rang.
But I didn’t have time to scold him.
I couldn’t escape the queen’s clutches either.
Whoosh—
The ground collapsed under me, and I plummeted.
The space was deeper than I’d thought.
I fell for what felt like ages before finally hitting the bottom.
Boom.
Pain was secondary. What mattered was the hopelessness.
My plan, which I’d been so sure of, had gone off the rails.
I was just about to stand and assess my surroundings when—
“Park Ha-yul?”
Someone called my name from the thicker darkness than before.
“What. You fell too?”
It was a familiar voice.
“Cheon Seo-yun?”
* * *
Snap!
The sharp crack of fingers snapping disrupted the surrounding darkness.
“What. You fell too?”
Her face flickered in the shadows, making her look eerie, but it was her.
Cheon Seo-yun.
She had a longsword almost as tall as herself strapped to her back, and glowing orbs of mana floated around her.
“What the hell is going on here?”
I rubbed my forehead for a moment.
Baek Sa-young, who should’ve been with me, was alone now, and instead I’d run into Cheon Seo-yun, who should’ve been solo.
Pushing aside the confusion, I answered first.
“Things just ended up this way.”
“Your team got scattered too?”
“Yeah.”
“Damn. At this rate, we’re totally screwed.”
Cheon Seo-yun shuddered like she’d uncovered some dark family secret.
“No, but get this—I found out some insane info. Don’t freak out. This place we’re standing in? Actually...”
“It’s all spiderwebs?”
“Yeah. Even for a Rank 6 demonic beast—huh? What? You knew?”
“I had my suspicions.”
“...Tch, whatever. You still rub me the wrong way.”
Cheon Seo-yun pouted.
I had plenty to say, but I didn’t want to waste time on pointless bickering.
We needed to get out of here and find the queen fast.
“Anyway, when did you fall?”
“Not long ago. Like 10 minutes?”
“What about the Four Elites?”
“No clue. Haven’t seen hide nor hair of them.”
That meant they’d show up soon.
The faster ones might already be in combat.
I walked ahead as I continued.
“Have you checked the surroundings?”
“Of course. That’s how I ran into you. But something’s off about this place. It’s huge, too. Take a look.”
Cheon Seo-yun wiggled her fingers, and the mana orbs flew through the air.
Moments later, the darkness revealed the space’s true form.
“It’s massive, right?”
Just as Cheon Seo-yun said, this was a gigantic cavern.
The orbs took quite a while to circle the perimeter and return.
“And this spot’s especially suspicious.”
Cheon Seo-yun moved an orb to illuminate one corner.
“Doesn’t it look like eggshells? There’s tons of them.”
They looked long shattered, with fragments scattered everywhere.
“This feels kinda...”
That’s when the ominous vibe and strange sense of déjà vu hit me.
A dark underground where light couldn’t penetrate.
A massive cavern.
Eggshells—no, traces of hatching—found there.
It was definitely a familiar setting. A background I’d drawn once before.
No way...?
“Ch-Cheon Seo-yun, scrape the floor.”
“What the hell out of nowhere...”
“Just do it. Start over there! No time, hurry.”
I dashed to the opposite side and scraped the ground hard.
Chunks of stone came up in my hands, but I kept checking everywhere without stopping.
“What are you even doing? It’s all just rock.”
Same on Cheon Seo-yun’s side, apparently.
We’d covered a wide area, but not a single spot was made of spiderwebs.
“Then...”
Realizing the space’s true nature sent a chill down my spine.
I didn’t know the exact reason, but we’d already arrived.
The nest’s deepest layer, the true bottom.
The queen’s chamber, called the final boss room...
“We’re screwed.”
I swallowed my honest thought with a dry gulp.
No need to hunt around for it?
True.
But aside from that, everything was the worst-case scenario.
The person next to me wasn’t Baek Sa-young.
“What? Why are you freaking out?”
She was that stubborn kid who only used pure mana, a total pain to communicate with.
It wasn’t about skill—it was matchup.
Pure mana was the worst against attributes like earth and metal, which were inherently tough.
That’s why there’d been a huge incident in the original story.
Cheon Seo-yun, facing the queen, got badly hurt and became a burden on Baek Sa-young.
“Ugh, so frustrating. Stop acting all serious by yourself and explain already.”
“Well, you see...”
I couldn’t say ‘this is all your fault,’ so I tried to explain indirectly when—
Rumble.
Once.
Rumble.
Again.
The cavern vibrated faintly, followed by the sticky, musty feel of a demonic beast creeping over my skin.
Kikikikikikikiki—
A far stronger demonic energy than before vibrated from all directions.
No need for explanations now.
“At least Rank 7. No... the queen?”
Cheon Seo-yun, drawing her longsword, suddenly looked up.
Flash—
Dozens of stars pierced the darkness.
Eerie red-glowing stars, endlessly ominous...
Screeeeech───────!
Before the weirdness could fade, they descended like shooting stars.
“It’s coming!”
The nest G-17’s master and final guardian.
The Four Elites’ queen flashed her dozens of eyes and launched a direct assault.
“Don’t rush in recklessly.”
I quickly grabbed Cheon Seo-yun’s arm. I’d struck first, fearing she’d charge in without thinking like in the original.
“What are you talking about? Catch that spider bitch, and we’re guaranteed first place. If you’re scared, you back off.”
But Cheon Seo-yun shook off my hand effortlessly and stomped before I could stop her again.
She leaped into the air like a rocket, longsword raised high.
“It’s not just a simple Rank 6 demonic beast!”
I shouted too late. It was already over.
That idiot, seriously...
[Trait, Sensitive Perception, activated.]
I swiftly activated my trait to track the clash between it and Cheon Seo-yun.
Cheon Seo-yun’s blue mana sword slashed toward the house-sized bulk covered in black fur.
Slash—
A ferocious strike that seemed like it might cut through in an instant.
But the sword, digging into the queen’s chest, suddenly stopped.
As if hitting a solid wall, it halted, and the enraged queen yawned her maw wide open as if waiting.
Roooar.
The result: a net spreading to cover half the air.
With verdant venom, sharp spiderwebs shot out like tentacles.
“Damn.”
Cheon Seo-yun ditched her sword and twisted her body desperately.
Using the air as footing to evade, she eyed a chance to reclaim it.
Swish.
But the curving webs suddenly shot straight like sharpened steel.
“Wh-what is this?”
The queen’s special power, granted beyond her rank.
The authority ‘Transformation,’ freely altering the webs’ properties, had manifested.
Thud—
This one variable decided the fight.
One plunging web pierced her left shoulder blade.
Cheon Seo-yun plummeted like a cut puppet string.
“Damn it.”
I bolted toward her landing spot.
I couldn’t prevent the injury, but I had to stop anything worse.
But the queen showed no sign of stopping.
Kikikikikiki—
Descending at full speed to finish the intruder.
[Trait, Manifestation, activated.]
Feeling it was faster, my body reacted first.
I focused utterly and deployed the attribute combination technique I’d prepared.
I don’t know how many seconds it took.
After gauging the timing, I imagined and materialized it.
64-stroke attribute combination. Azure Flame Art, Hellfire.
[Manifestation Accuracy 79%]
A combination of Fire Control and Wood Control, using the Wood generates Fire principle.
It would burn unquenchingly until the target vanished.
Rumble.
Blue flames erupted toward it.
* * *
Meanwhile, at the command center where Lee Taek-jin and Kim Mi-young were stationed.
Joo Ah-rin’s emergency report had come in 10 minutes ago.
Static.
-Professor... Something’s wrong... Made of webs... How is that... possible?
Evaluations discouraged questions. Normally, he’d consider it rude and ignore it.
But not this time.
Lee Taek-jin, furrowing his brow, pressed.
-Student Joo Ah-rin. Report in more detail.
Static.
-General specimens... couldn’t... Even so, the queen must be... Irregular... I suspect.
The mana interference and signal disruption worsened near the final boss.
The screen glitched unnaturally, and her voice cut out badly, but at least one word came through clear.
-Irregular?
A term for demonic beasts that gained special powers beyond their rank.
These mutants, also called irregulars, appeared frequently due to beasts’ nature of absorbing ambient energy.
“P-Professor. This doesn’t make sense. Irregular? The report didn’t mention that.”
But as Kim Mi-young said, the location was the issue.
Wasn’t this a nest the government had thoroughly surveyed and rated?
An irregular, though?
If Joo Ah-rin was right, it’d be a massive data error.
-Professor. This is Baek Sa-young... I have a report...
-This is Lee Dae-ho. The ground suddenly split...
But as similar reports poured in, denial was impossible.
Signal quality varied by position, but everyone said the same thing.
Sudden anomaly!
Suspicion about the queen’s identity!
Now, action took priority over understanding.
“Professor. How about halting the evaluation now? The safety team’s on standby, so no major issues.”
Kim Mi-young cautiously voiced her opinion.
For her, usually tight-lipped, to suggest it first meant the situation was dire.
“And?”
But his response was a curt jab.
“What changes if we stop?”