Chapter 444: Hatred, and Conflict.
Chapter 444: Hatred, and Conflict.
And so, we entered the third gateway of the Sleeping Dragon Mountains: the Land of Hatred. We only had to cross this region and the next to reach the ruins. In a way, we were more than halfway there—though exploring the ruins themselves was another matter entirely.
“Ugh…”
“Hmph, hrrrmph!”
Barely five minutes had passed since we’d taken the right fork, yet sounds of discomfort were already starting to escape the clan members. I knew why. It was because of this region’s field effect: ‘Hatred.’
According to Vivian, the field effect in the Sleeping Dragon Mountains was a rather special case.
It was a terrifying grudge born from the combined hatred of countless ancient Residents and the curse of the ‘Dragon of the End,’ Magna Carta. This resentment would have only deepened over an immeasurable amount of time, resulting in an effect that blanketed this vast region.
Hatred that had festered for thousands of years was certainly not to be underestimated. I was clad in several layers of magic resistance, from my Player Status to the gear I wore. Even so, I could feel a faint seed of hatred taking root in my chest as the piercing resentment seeped into my entire body.
It wasn't that we had no countermeasures. I could take a mind-calming pill right now, or we could use Hangyul’s defensive abilities.
But the pills had to be saved for the fourth gateway, and Hangyul was not in a normal state. In other words, the best option for now was to pass through this area as quickly as possible.
If even I was feeling it to this extent, how were the other clan members faring? It was plain to see. Those with high magic resistance would be better off, but… the others were probably struggling to control the baseless hatred welling up inside them.
I decided I needed to pay close attention to the clan members’ conditions, not just the Dead, and calmly walked along the mountain path.
“Clan Lord! Hold on!”
Another five minutes passed before Shin Jaeryong’s shout rang out. I immediately raised my hand, signaling a halt. When I turned around, I saw Hangyul slowly approaching, his face a mask of anxiety as he scanned his surroundings with a suspicious gaze.
“Hangyul. What is it?”
“Hyung… I think this is the area.”
“This area?”
“Yes. I don’t remember the details, but I’m sure I’ve been on this path before. And…”
Hangyul paused, then frantically turned his head from side to side, as if trying to recall the situation back then.
He said he didn’t go in too deep… about ten minutes in, was it?
I took a few steps forward and activated my Third Eye. We had just passed the ten-minute mark since entering the Land of Hatred. Considering a slight margin of error… although he claimed not to remember the details, Hangyul’s memory was proving to be quite specific.
I scanned the area ahead as far as my sight could reach. I soon realized that Hangyul’s memory was accurate. Faint traces were scattered here and there, centered around where we now stood.
I need to find out what happened here.
Spotting one such trace right in front of me, I knelt to analyze it.
All the bushes on the mountain were gently bent forward. But at the spot I was examining, they were bent in the opposite direction, or trampled and torn in places.
And further down the path, a short distance from where the tracks ended, the ground was indented. This meant someone had been backpedaling, dragging their feet, before falling on their butt.
I shifted my gaze to another set of tracks. This time, it was a long, drawn-out mark, like a skid mark from a speeding car’s tire. The soil in the mark was a dark, reddish-black, as if it had soaked up blood.
The Dead must have appeared. And a battle… no, not a battle. They were too busy running away to even resist, let alone fight.
“Ugh!”
Just as I was about to investigate further, a sharp groan burst out from someone. I spun around to see Hangyul on the ground, clutching his head as if it might shatter.
I pushed through the clan members who had rushed to his side. Hangyul managed to look up at me, his face contorted in a deep frown as he struggled to speak.
“H-Hyung. Th-that’s right. I remember now.”
I nodded, urging him to speak. But Hangyul just swallowed hard, his lips moving without a sound. It seemed he wanted to say something but couldn't organize his thoughts. I waited patiently.
A moment later, he finally started speaking.
“So… we entered the fork… and after we came in… suddenly, everyone started fighting…”
They entered the fork in the road. They arrived at this spot. The clients started fighting among themselves.
The clients had likely started fighting because of the field effect. The baseless hatred that surged within them must have frayed their nerves.
Hangyul was speaking in fits and starts, but I didn’t press him for details. I could grasp the general situation just from this.
“Bang…”
“?”
“Bang… That’s right. There was a loud bang from somewhere. And even though it was just for a moment, everything in front of me went white.”
“A bang… and everything went white?”
I couldn’t understand that part, and I found myself asking him to repeat it.
I tilted my head. The Sleeping Dragon Mountains was an exceptionally quiet place. If you walked without speaking, the only sound was the rustle of grass.
But a loud explosion from somewhere? It was possible, of course. A user might have cast a spell during a fierce battle with the Dead. But the traces I’d just examined showed no signs of a fierce battle, only evidence of people being caught while hesitantly fleeing.
“Did you fight the Dead?”
“N-No. We hadn’t seen any of the Dead by that point.”
“…Then?”
“It was just… when I opened my eyes again, everything was quiet. Nothing had changed, but it was just like now… uh…?”
The moment I heard they hadn't fought the Dead, my eyes narrowed.
The Sleeping Dragon Mountains consisted of four gateways, and the Dead appeared in all of them. The reason users had divided the area and named them gateways was because the ‘method’ of the Dead’s appearance was drastically different in each region.
The Dead that appeared in the Land of Hatred were different from those at the entrance or in the Land of Wandering. They didn’t swarm as individual entities like we’d experienced before; instead, dozens, even hundreds, of them would merge into a single, massive clump. They were, in a sense, the closest thing to the true nature of the Dead.
To put it simply, the Dead that appeared in the Land of Hatred did not use magic.
It wasn’t Ahn Hyun or Hangyul, it wasn’t the clients, and it wasn’t the Dead. Then who, or what, was the source of the explosion? Faced with a growing pile of questions, I stopped thinking for a moment and looked down at Hangyul.
However.
“Ah…”
Hangyul had fallen silent. No, his mouth wasn’t closed. His lips were slightly parted, and he was staring at me with a blank expression.
Come to think of it, the end of his last sentence seemed to trail off with a strange inflection… I couldn’t read his thoughts, but he suddenly looked as if he’d realized something.
“Hangyul. What’s wrong?”
“That’s right… Just like now…”
Just like now? What a cryptic thing to say.
“Like the calm before the storm… everything went quiet…”
But Hangyul continued to mutter to himself with that same blank face. Then he abruptly lifted his head to the sky before slowly lowering his gaze to meet mine. I could read the terror in his eyes, a fear of something.
Finally, in a trembling voice that sounded more like an exhale, Hangyul spoke.
“S-Suddenly, they appeared…!”
And at that very moment.
Groooowwwl….
Groooowwwl….
Groooowwwl….
Thud, thud-thud, thud, thud-thud.
Thud, thud-thud, thud, thud-thud.
Thud, thud-thud, thud, thud-thud.
The instant Hangyul finished speaking, a long, drawn-out sound echoed from somewhere as the very earth began to tremble. I instinctively knew it was the Dead from the Land of Hatred.
Heo Junyoung’s gaze sharpened as he scanned the area ahead. Placing a hand on the hilt of his sword, he reported.
“Northwest, north, and northeast. They’re coming from three directions. Distance, forty-five meters… no. They just passed forty meters. I can’t get a number. It’s just… countless.”
“It’s three of them. Everyone, prepare for battle!”
Heo Junyoung shot me a questioning look when I declared there were only three, but there was no time to explain. They were closing the distance by five meters in just a few seconds; it wouldn’t take them long to reach us.
“Clan Lord! If it’s three of them, should we use the layered formation again…?”
Woo Jungmin’s voice cut through the air as the clan members hastily prepared for combat. I drew my Sun and Moon Divine Sword, lost in thought.
The Dead in the Land of Hatred could be described in one phrase: ‘a mass of resentment.’ It was good that their numbers were few, but we couldn’t let our guard down. Until every last bit of that condensed resentment was annihilated, they would never stop moving.
In that case…
“We won’t be using the layered formation this time. We’ll split into three teams, with each team taking one. Nam Daeun and I will handle one of them.”
My calculation was that Nam Daeun would be more than capable of backing me up.
I immediately began organizing the teams for individual combat.
“Cha Sorim, you’re the leader. Seon Yuun, Kim Hanbyul, Ahn Sol, and Woo Jungmin will take the one from the northwest. Heo Junyoung, you’ll lead Lim Hanna, Vivian, Shin Jaeryong, and Lee Yoojung against the one from the northeast. As for Hangyul…”
As if sensing he would be of no help in his current state, Hangyul scrambled to his feet and retreated. The clan members immediately formed their teams as I’d assigned and moved to their designated positions.
I turned to Nam Daeun, who had come to my side, and gave her quiet instructions.
“Nam Daeun. Don’t overdo it. Stay on the perimeter and wait for an opening. I’ll create a situation for you somehow. When you see your chance, give it a big vertical slash.”
“A vertical one?”
“Yes. Judging by how much the ground is shaking, it seems to be quite large. A downward slash will be more effective than a thrust.”
“Mm~. Got it. Leave it to me.”
Nam Daeun flicked Seol-ah with her finger and replied with a wink.
“Ahn Sol! Holy Strike on my weapon, please!”
“—. —. —.”
“Fifteen meters left! Lim Hanna! Hit it with something the second you see it!”
“Hehe. Don’t think you can just drop the formalities at a time like this.”
Listening to the shouts of the team leaders and members, I replayed Hangyul’s words in my mind so I wouldn’t forget.
A bang, everything went white, it suddenly got quiet, and then the Dead appeared.
There was more than one strange thing about that sequence. The suspicion I’d felt when we first entered the mountain range was now amplifying by the second.
THUD!
THUD!
THUD!
But I pushed the thoughts aside for now. I still lacked the information to draw a conclusion, and more importantly, I could feel the tremors in the ground growing distinctly stronger.
GROOOOWWWLLL…!
GROOOOWWWLLL…!
GROOOOWWWLLL…!
And just as expected, three of the Dead revealed themselves simultaneously from three directions.
I spoke quietly.
“User Nam Daeun. If you would.”
Then, unleashing my magic, I shot forward like the wind.
*
“Khahahahahahahahaha!”
A boisterous laugh echoed through the dark room, loud enough to shake the walls.
The figure with sharp horns sprouting from its head and a corpulent body was none other than Asmodeus, the ‘Demon of Lust’ and one of the seven great demons.
“Satan’s words were true, they were really true!”
Whatever had made him so happy, Asmodeus was laughing his head off, slapping the arm of his chair. He looked like a child who had just been given candy, so overjoyed he didn’t know what to do with himself.
Perhaps emboldened by this display, the demon prostrating before Asmodeus cautiously raised its head to look at its master.
“M-My lord. Then…”
“Hm? What is it, my lovely creation?”
“Will you accept Lord Satan’s proposal?”
“Of course! I have to! Now that what Satan said has been proven true, there’s no reason not to, is there?”
“But…”
“But?”
As Asmodeus rose from his seat, the demon immediately bowed its head again. How dare it question its master’s words. For a demon, a mere creation of a greater devil, it was an unthinkable act.
But Asmodeus didn’t seem to mind at all. He came down and gently patted the bowed demon.
“I know, I know. If you’ve heard the rumors about Satan, you’d naturally have some concerns. He surely has some ulterior motive… but this, my friend, is an investment. An investment. He even told me about it beforehand.”
“Is… that so?”
“Yes. All I have to do is side with him at the next meeting. And forming an alliance in a situation like this isn’t a bad idea either. Mmm. Good. Very good. It’s good for Satan, and I get to kill two birds with one stone.”
“C-Congratulations.”
Out of breath from laughing so much, Asmodeus took a deep gasp of air. Then, with a look of sudden realization, he glanced around and began to walk quickly.
“Ah. This is no time to be standing around. I think I need to start the work right away. Just as Satan said, this will be a revolutionary attempt. An attempt with a 100% chance of success.”
“If you give the word, I will make the preparations.”
“Kekek! It’s fine. This time, I have to do it myself. The target isn’t human this time.”
“Pardon?”
At the demon’s question, Asmodeus stopped dead in the doorway. He grinned, then spoke in a low but excited voice.
“This time, the target is… a dead dragon!”