Chapter 368
Chapter 368
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 368
Chapter Title: Racial War (7)
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The destruction of the Gremlins' mothership had begun.
Another scene was broadcast across the skies of the Abyss.
It depicted the Gremlins living within that very mothership.
The screen captured their final moments from across the planet, as if viewed from the gaze of a god.
In a shabby underground workshop.
"We have to finish it. Our mothership!"
"If we complete this, we can escape!"
A few elderly Gremlin engineers clung desperately to a massive machine that had already ceased functioning, trying to repair it.
Their hands trembled from long-standing penalties, their vision blurred, but even so, they seemed unwilling to abandon their craft until the very end.
But soon, their bodies began crumbling into faint dust starting from their toes. The engineers dropped their tools in despair and embraced one another.
Without a single scream or act of resistance. In that way, they scattered across the workshop floor as handfuls of dust.
And in an abandoned factory district.
A group of young Gremlins wielded rusty pipes and scrap metal as weapons, flailing wildly in defiance.
"Stay back! Stay away, you monsters!"
"We're not dead yet! The Gremlins won't end here!"
They fought against invisible foes—or perhaps the overwhelming despair crashing down upon them.
But their struggles were futile.
Black mist began to rise slowly from their toes, and they clung to one another, screaming.
Yet the black mist mercilessly erased their forms, and what had once been fierce resistance scattered into the wind as a few strands of dust.
The situation in the underground bunker used as a shelter was no different.
Mother Gremlins held their young tightly to their chests.
The children whimpered anxiously in their mothers' arms, but the mothers forced smiles and patted their backs.
"It's okay... It's okay, little one......"
"It won't... hurt anymore... You'll be at peace now......"
Their voices trembled faintly, but they were filled only with a final love for their young.
When the black mist engulfed them, the mothers wrapped their children in their arms until the end, vanishing together as dust.
Without any resentment or sorrow to express.
Those who raged, those who resigned themselves, those who prayed, those who whispered words of love.
All the Gremlins, without exception, turned to dust and light one by one, vanishing eternally into the Abyss's depths alongside their dying star.
Even the Gremlins who had escaped the mothership met the same fate.
The Gremlin royalty who fled to other Abysses also crumbled into dust.
The last Gremlin warrior witnessed all the deaths.
"I will carry it with me. This is all because of my weakness. My kin, rest in peace."
Shwaaa!
The warrior soon turned to dust.
And for a long while.
No one could open their mouths.
Not the human representatives, not the other异種 watching them, not even the system broadcasting it all—it seemed to fall silent.
"......Is this... the end for an eliminated species?"
Reaper Johnson finally spoke, his voice hoarse.
The face that had cheered humanity's ten straight wins moments ago held no joy now.
Only deep shock at the reality unfolding before them remained.
Adriana silently hugged her own arms.
She had experienced countless wars and deaths, but witnessing an entire species—and the star they lived and breathed on—being 'deleted' so perfectly was a first.
It wasn't mere defeat or death.
It was the complete annihilation of everything that had existed.
A stark testament to the merciless, absolute laws of the Abyss.
"...I, I don't know if this is right. Damn it."
The youngest, Han Min-o, already had his head bowed, shoulders shaking.
He couldn't forget the images of the last Gremlin children broadcast on the screen.
The fact that even those children, younger than him, had vanished into dust without exception left a wound too heavy for his young heart to bear.
"It's brutal, but this is the path we must walk. No room for pity."
Ling Ling muttered lowly, her face pale.
Her voice mixed deep doubt with the instinctive terror of surviving this cruel stage.
Lee Hyuk-soo clenched and unclenched his fists, lips pressed tight.
He had urged the Gremlins to 'fight to the end' because he wanted to let them keep their final honor as warriors.
But knowing that had led to their entire species' annihilation made his chest feel heavy, like it was weighed down by lead.
Only Adora seemed to maintain her composure.
This was just the beginning.
Even more species would vanish like this ahead, and humanity was no exception.
Her red eyes calmly stared at the empty space where the Gremlins' planet had been.
"Burn the battles of other species into your memory. You never know who our next opponent will be."
"...Even after seeing that, you feel nothing?"
Reaper Johnson barely managed the words.
His voice carried disbelief and a fundamental sense of alienation toward Adora's existence.
She was a comrade, but it was hard to detect any human emotional fluctuation in her.
To remain so serene after watching a species completely erased before her eyes.
Adora slowly turned her head toward Reaper Johnson.
Her red eyes met his gaze head-on.
Those eyes were so deep and clear that they revealed nothing inside.
"Emotions."
Adora murmured softly.
Her voice seemed to make the heavy silence around them even colder.
"Pity, sympathy, sorrow. What meaning do they hold in this situation?"
Her words were brutally realistic and cold.
"This isn't a place that gives time to indulge in sentiment or share grief. All emotions become nothing but weaknesses in the end. You'd better discard that sentiment right now. If they spot humanity's weak side, they'll exploit it in even crueler ways."
"...Adora's right."
Lee Hyuk-soo nodded quietly.
Adora wasn't wrong.
This was that kind of place.
But even so, he wanted to hold onto something human until the very end.
Lee Hyuk-soo slowly lowered his head.
Toward the spot where the Gremlin warriors had been.
To remember their end.
...Total score: 13 points.
And they even got a title.
The title's effects far surpassed anything they had gained from the Creator Abyss trials.
"All stats +20?"
"...A single title can boost like this?"
Ling Ling and Reaper Johnson muttered in disbelief upon seeing the title.
The others' reactions weren't much different.
They just couldn't openly celebrate.
Then, something even more astonishing happened.
The 'Remnants of the Holy Grail' in Lee Hyuk-soo's possession began to glow.
And an additional message appeared before his eyes.
...Friend of Fallen Species?
Lee Hyuk-soo tilted his head inwardly.
As the synchronization rate rose, a title had suddenly been added.
And soon, he understood why.
At the spot where the Gremlin warriors had vanished.
Where the last warrior who witnessed their species' end had stood.
'Something's visible.'
Lee Hyuk-soo slowly approached it.
His comrades' gazes bored into his back, but he paid them no mind.
At the place where the Gremlins' final warrior had turned to dust.
There, very faintly but unmistakably, a beam of light flickered like a dying candle.
It was a sight visible only to Lee Hyuk-soo, who had inherited the 'Friend of Fallen Species' title—unseen by the others.
As he drew near the light, he felt the surrounding air quiver faintly.
And when he finally reached its source, Lee Hyuk-soo swallowed.
There lay... a small, rusted gear.
The one Shatolm—and the last Gremlin—had clutched so desperately, symbolizing their fallen technological prowess.
But in this moment, it was no longer mere scrap.
The faint light gathered around the gear, soon condensing into a complete form.
Shurrruk... Chzzzt!
As if rewinding time, the rusted surface regained its original metallic sheen, and new teeth sprouted where they had been missing.
And at its center gleamed a tiny, star-like azure gem, brilliant as the night sky.
It could no longer be called a simple gear.
It had become an exquisite and beautiful 'relic', embodying the Gremlin species' long-held aspirations, final pride, and entire technological legacy.
As Lee Hyuk-soo reached out, the relic called the 'Heart of the Gremlins' floated gently onto his palm, as if alive.
A warm heat emanated from it.
Like the final breath of a species that had never given up until the end, even in despair.
"......"
Lee Hyuk-soo quietly gazed down at the 'Heart of the Gremlins'.
His urging them to 'fight to the end' had led to this outcome.
But he had only wanted to show minimal respect to warriors fading away.
That small act, resonating with the title inherited from Park Chan-woo, had created this miracle.
'......This is the path the Prophet desired.'
He had a vague sense of it.
What Park Chan-woo had hoped for and aimed to do.
Lee Hyuk-soo pressed the 'Heart of the Gremlins' to his chest.
The relic seeped into his body with a soft light, resonating with his heart and infusing new power.
A species' annihilation.
And upon it, a small hope blooming.
...The Racial War.
A place Dragon God Sepiro's influence could never reach.
How could Sepiro claim a relic embodying a species' essence, acknowledged by another race?
But Park Chan-woo was different.
At the same time, Lee Hyuk-soo was certain.
'He is coming.'
Through the momentum of this grand racial conflict, Park Chan-woo was undoubtedly awakening.