Chapter 383
Chapter 383
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 383
Chapter Title: Racial War (22)
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As soon as the third round began, massive screens like those in the sky across the entire Earth started broadcasting the brutal survival struggle unfolding on the "Isles of Chaos" once more.
In major city squares, shelters, and even living rooms on TVs and smartphones everywhere.
All eyes were fixed on the aerial broadcast screens.
The third journey of humanity's representative team, bearing the fate of all mankind.
Amid a mix of anticipation and anxiety, the scene on the screen plunged the entire Earth into shock and rage in an instant.
The footage showed humanity's representative team landing on a dank beach.
Earthlings, buoyed by the previous round's victory, now wore puzzled expressions.
Adora's absence, followed by the sudden appearance of the Windtrace tribe.
At first, there was a sigh of relief at the arrival of potential new allies, but it was short-lived.
"Wait, what the hell is going on?"
A young man watching the giant screen in Seoul's Gwanghwamun Square muttered.
His friend beside him was already covering his mouth.
In the footage, the moment Queen Sylphia uttered the word "sacrifice," the beautiful fairy queen's smile vanished, revealing her cold, ruthless true nature.
The Earth froze.
And then came Lee Hyuk-soo's outburst declaring Adora's "betrayal."
"What? Adora betrayed us?"
"No way, that's gotta be Lee Hyuk-soo's strategy! It can't be true!"
Murmurs spread like waves.
But the confusion didn't last. Queen Sylphia promptly sealed humanity's team in a wind barrier, speaking of offering them to the Dragonkin and even announcing a bounty. Shock turned to fury.
"What? Betrayal?"
In New York's Times Square, an old man shouted into the air in disbelief.
"What's with the Windtrace tribe? Weren't they allies?"
A student in London's Trafalgar Square asked her friend, voice trembling with tears.
"Can fairies really act like that?!"
When a child in the crowd under the Eiffel Tower in Paris asked her mother, the mother couldn't respond and simply covered her child's eyes.
But Earthlings' rage exploded in the very next moment.
Sylphia asked Han Shin, "Do you still believe in him?" To Lee Hyuk-soo's desperate question, Han Shin coldly replied, "It's true," confessing that he had sold out humanity for his own safety. The scene was broadcast vividly.
And without the slightest hesitation, he joined the Windtrace tribe. It stabbed every Earthling in the heart.
"Han Shin...!"
"That filthy bastard!"
Angry curses erupted from a bar in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Someone smashed a glass on the floor.
"Pah! Disgusting scum!"
"Selling out his own teammates? Is that even human?"
"Did he naturalize with the Windtrace tribe or what?"
Internet communities and SNS worldwide were instantly flooded with vitriolic denunciations and curses aimed at Han Shin.
His past actions and every word he'd said were reexamined, branding him a traitor.
Voices that had cheered for him turned to hatred in an instant, and even his family's personal information was dragged into the fray, signaling the start of a reckless witch hunt.
The representative team's dire crisis, the ugly betrayal by a trusted comrade, and the emergence of powerful enemies.
At that moment, as the entire Earth seethed with fury toward Han Shin and despair for the team, on the Isles of Chaos.
"Nooooooo!"
Sylphia's scream echoed across the Isles of Chaos, and at the same moment, the power of "Lost Star" was finally unleashed from Lee Hyuk-soo's fingertips.
A pure white flash that seemed to devour the world.
All sounds vanished, all colors faded.
That was the final scene witnessed by the Windtrace tribe, who had arbitrarily interpreted the prophecy and betrayed them—and by humanity on Earth through the broadcast.
And just before the flash exploded, in that split second.
Han Shin, standing beside Sylphia, moved ever so slightly.
From his fingertips, pitch-black demonic energy shot out like a flash.
But it wasn't aimed at Lee Hyuk-soo's attack.
Instead, it bizarrely twisted the wind essence emanating from her wings—the final defensive barrier she had instinctively tried to deploy.
Kwaaaaaang-!
With a tremendous explosion, the pure white flash swept through the space where Sylphia stood.
The barrier had long lost its meaning.
The aftermath of the flash alone turned the surrounding Windtrace warriors to dust without even a scream.
"Kuh... ugh!"
At the explosion's epicenter, Sylphia barely maintained her form, vomiting blood as she was flung away.
Her beautiful wings were half-torn, her body a mangled wreck.
She had avoided a fatal wound, but she was clearly out of the fight.
With eyes full of disbelief, she glanced alternately at the remnants of the pitch-black energy that had grazed her side and at Han Shin, still coldly looking down on her.
"You... you bastard... why...!"
Han Shin didn't answer.
His gaze briefly turned to the battlefield, whitened by the flash's aftermath, then back to the fallen Sylphia.
For the first time, a faint but utterly chilling smile curled his lips.
Like an actor who had worn a mask and performed a play for so long, finally revealing his true face in the last scene.
"This was the plan from the start."
A suppressed voice leaked out.
He had plotted everything from the moment of first contact with the Windtrace tribe, when he received Sylphia's seductive offer.
Humanity's representative team's strength, the Windtrace tribe's power.
And their queen Sylphia's cunning and formidable barrier abilities.
A head-on clash offered slim chances of victory.
Even with Adora, it would have been the same.
The Windtrace tribe was under the Dragonkin's protection and patronage.
Proof: even with all Windtrace warriors annihilated, Queen Sylphia alone endured steadfastly.
'If we can't win, then take the leader's head.'
That was Han Shin's conclusion.
The most despicable and dangerous method, but also the surest.
Assassinate Sylphia or at least render her combat-ineffective to collapse their chain of command.
To do that, he needed to get close—earn absolute trust.
The mask of betrayal was the only means to make it all possible.
Sylphia gasped for breath, looking up at Han Shin with eyes of utter disbelief.
"You... tricked us all...?"
Her voice cracked.
More than anger, it was laced with hollow despair and the humiliation of being deceived.
It was hard to accept that the one who had just pledged loyalty and joined her was, in truth, an assassin who had approached her from the start to take her life.
Han Shin looked down at her impassively.
His eyes held no pity or triumph—just the dry confirmation that everything had proceeded as planned.
Instead of answering, Han Shin slowly approached her.
There was no hesitation in his steps.
He stopped before the barely breathing, broken Sylphia and fixed his gaze on the ring on her finger.
A platinum ring intricately crafted to resemble dragon scales.
At its center gleamed a red gem like a flickering flame, and faint but potent Dragonkin magic emanated from the band itself.
The token of the Dragonkin's blessing bestowed upon Sylphia, her final bastion protecting her life force.
The decisive reason she alone survived while all Windtrace warriors perished!
"The moment I saw this ring, I knew you were in league with the Dragonkin."
Han Shin's icy voice crushed even her last shred of pride.
Gasping, she barely managed a retort.
"Just... because of that...?"
"Ring of the Dragon Emperor."
Han Shin murmured lowly, reaching for the ring on her finger.
"To bestow a treasure imbued with this level of power on the queen of a mere mid-tier seed race. That's clear proof that you Windtrace have a far deeper bond with the Dragonkin than mere pawns."
His hand unhesitatingly slipped the "Ring of the Dragon Emperor" from Sylphia's finger.
As the ring left her hand, the faint Dragonkin blessing that had enveloped her body dissipated like smoke.
Han Shin smirked.
"You, who share such deep ties with the Dragonkin, go out of your way to ally amicably with us humans? Doesn't that strike you as odd? I never believed your nonsense about prophecies or Park Chan-woo from the start."
Han Shin trusted no one.
Only himself.
That's why he wasn't deceived.
Sylphia's eyes rapidly dimmed, the light of life fading.
"Ugh... The Dragonkin... will never... forgive you...!"
Her final curse went unfinished.
The last light vanished from her eyes, and the being who had once reigned as queen of the winds slumped lifelessly.
Without the Ring of the Dragon Emperor, no more miracles awaited her.
Han Shin merely gazed coldly at the cooling corpse, offering no retort to her dying struggle.
He silently looked down at the "Ring of the Dragon Emperor" in his hand.
The red gem gleamed coldly, like his own eyes.
This single band was the link binding the Dragonkin and Windtrace tribe—and the source of Sylphia's immense power.
And now, it was in his grasp.
Han Shin knew how to use the ring.
It had been one of his goals from the beginning, and his contract with Belial had granted him forbidden knowledge of such ancient artifacts.
"I am your new master."
He infused his magic into the ring.
Thump! Thump!
The red gem began pulsing like a living heart.
The faint Dragonkin magic clashed with his demonic power, producing a dissonant harmony, it seemed.
"...Hm?"
For the first time, the cold smile on his lips twisted into bewilderment and displeasure.
The "Ring of the Dragon Emperor," which he believed fully under his control, began rejecting his will like a living creature and acting on its own.
"...What is this? Where do you think you're going? I am your master...!"
Ignoring Han Shin's shout, the Ring of the Dragon Emperor left his hand, slicing through the air straight toward the fallen Lee Hyuk-soo.
And as if it had always belonged there, it gently slipped onto Lee Hyuk-soo's limp finger.
Whooooom-!
At that instant, the ring on Lee Hyuk-soo's finger erupted in dazzling light.
The ring no longer maintained its small band's form.
The light condensed and twisted in the air, creating something massive from nothing, as if birthing existence from the void.
Even the surrounding rocks, dust, and remnants of the Windtrace warriors' magic were drawn into the light.
Finally, a colossal being materialized, blocking Lee Hyuk-soo's front.
Aurum and Yoo Jin-seo cried out simultaneously upon seeing it.
"Arcana...!!"
The Dragon of Despair.
The Primordial God, Arcana, had appeared.