Chapter 59
**Line 1:** `CHAPTER_TITLE: Bright Light's Furious Pursuit`
**Line 2:**
“Fly Heaven Shaking Light.”
A swarm of light trails bloomed in the empty air, each one long and whip-like, streaking across the sky in perfect, merciless unison.
Were they simply reading my every move, or did each individual trail bear its own will?
They circled me like a meteor shower, never touching me, but whipping around in a frenzy that left me no breathing room.
Whoa—!
Three-quarters of the light trails shot forward first, charging straight toward the center of the dome.
“Kruu…! Impossible!”
He had dismissed it at first, but the Bright Light Teraden had squeezed out of every drop of his sweat was far from ordinary. Each trail carried lethal power.
So the man had to dodge them one by one while fighting me.
But the moment he dodged, the trails twisted and chased him again with relentless hunger.
“Die!!”
Ohban screamed as he slipped the Bright Light barrage and lunged at me.
His movements were faster than before, but his body—driven by pure instinct—moved in mechanical, one-note repetition.
When his shoulder twitched to tell me he was about to swing with his right arm, I countered by reading the opposite side.
“Kruuuu!!”
Fwoosh—!
But the light trails that had flown in from the side exploded against his left flank before he could complete the swing.
“Kruuuuuk!!”
The instant Ohban’s posture shattered under the direct hit, I poured everything into a fist and drove it home.
Crunch!
“U, ueep! Uuu….”
Boom!
He staggered back, then collapsed forward.
“Ha, haa….”
Thud.
The moment I confirmed Ohban had fallen, all strength left my body.
Sweaty palms shone even in the darkness, my back soaked with cold sweat.
My limbs felt heavy as wet cotton.
Now I understood. The crazy luck I had enjoyed in Dongye had only been borrowed time.
It had been the slimmest of margins. If not for Teraden, I would have died no matter how hard I tried.
The overwhelming killing intent I had just faced—and the near-death that could have happened in an instant—sent violent tremors through every nerve.
I turned to check on Teraden. He was lying flat on his back, completely spent, eyes closed, not even twitching.
“What are you doing?! Now! Grab that bastard!”
From the back, Carbin shouted orders to his men.
His party rushed forward and bound Ohban so tightly he couldn’t even twitch a finger.
“Are you alright?”
Carbin approached me and Teraden, both of us sprawled on the floor.
“Barely hanging on.”
Teraden lifted only his face to look at Carbin.
“Hmph. I was sweating bullets the whole time, scared you two might actually lose.”
“Eh? Why didn’t you help then?”
Teraden sat up, looking utterly confused.
“Well… I couldn’t intervene and tarnish your honor.”
“Honor? When we’re about to die, honor is worthless!”
“Even if we had stepped in, it probably wouldn’t have helped much….”
“Tsk.”
Teraden clicked his tongue, and Carbin immediately changed the subject.
“Ah, no! I spoke hastily! Forgive me! But… you actually defeated him! Amazing! Truly amazing!”
“Defeated him? I barely scraped by. Ugh… I’m done for. Just let me rest until Maru and the others get here.”
Teraden flopped back down on the ground.
“Life really is never easy.”
“You’ve suffered enough. Your injuries look serious. Leave the cleanup to us and rest properly.”
“Understood. Thank you.”
Carbin and his party took responsibility for finishing us off out of consideration.
As we lay there waiting, Blanser’s voice echoed from the passage where Maru had vanished.
“Come on! Hurry!”
“Yeah, I hear you…”
Out of the corridor stepped Blanser, grinning ear to ear, with Maru and Junior at his sides, and a woman named Erien behind them.
Maru looked cheerful, but Erien was crying, which meant Maru had won the woman without breaking a sweat.
Wait… the woman’s head looked oddly flattened. Could she have been smashed with a hammer…
…
The memory of the welcome party flashed through my mind. I almost laughed. If Maru had been there, she probably would have done it herself.
No way…
“Kyaaak!! Ohban!!”
Erien rushed over the moment she saw Ohban collapsed and unconscious, screaming his name over and over.
Teraden, undeterred, greeted Maru and Blanser warmly.
“Oh, you’re not hurt, Maru?”
“Nope!”
Maru nodded vigorously.
“Good, good. Glad to hear it. You were bound to…”
“Yup—!!”
Blanser answered even louder.
“Eh? Hey man, ‘yup’ is informal.”
“What? No, hyung, you never said anything when Maru said yup.”
“Maru’s my little sister, so it’s fine. You’re Maru? Whatever. Junior, come here. Let me see what’s wrong.”
Boom.
Blanser, muttering “I’m not your brother either,” casually tossed Junior to the ground.
“Whoa, look at his face. He really turned you into a pulp.”
“I told you not to go overboard.”
…
Blanser avoided our narrow-eyed stares, sweating profusely.
“H-hmm. It’s all my doing.”
Teraden examined the mess that was Junior.
“His condition is dire.”
He had entered the ruins alone and ahead of us, searching for Ouparts, and endured terrible torture. No wonder.
Good news: despite looking gaunt, his breathing and pulse were steady. The only real problem seemed to be the brainwashing.
Probably because Junior’s body was naturally sturdy.
“He’s not in immediate danger. The real issue is breaking the brainwashing.”
After everyone was ready, we gathered in front of Erien.
“How do we break the brainwashing?”
“Before that, what exactly are you planning to do with me? With Ohban?”
“Answer the question! What is—!”
Instead of answering, Erien asked questions, so Teraden rolled up his sleeves and unleashed a threatening aura.
“Hiiik!”
“Teraden, stop.”
“I’ll tell you everything… just don’t kill us…”
“Very well. I never intended to kill you anyway. You will simply have to pay for your crimes.”
“Pay? Even if we don’t die…”
“I can promise you that. Now tell me how to break the brainwashing.”
Erien swallowed hard, glanced uneasily at Teraden, then spoke.
“My Ineung controls the puppets, but there are too many of them… I have to inject tiny, special insects into their bodies and control them with those insects. To break the brainwashing, I need to remove all the insects, which means I need the queen…”
“Skip the details. I don’t want to die.”
“Y-yes! After I extract the queen, the control will break and all the insects will swarm to her at once.”
Teraden frowned at the complicated procedure.
“Hmmm… Can’t I just pull it out? Queen or not.”
“It’s already settled inside hundreds or thousands of insects. Impossible for one person to extract them all by hand.”
“Then what happens if I just leave them?”
“They’ll… die? The insects will hatch and gnaw everywhere.”
“To save Junior and the others, the queen’s role is crucial. Where is she?”
“Inside me.”
“Really? Then we can start right now.”
Teraden pushed forward, but Erien twisted uncomfortably.
“But there’s one problem.”
“What is it?”
“The insects without the queen go berserk and explode the moment they sense an Ineung. The puppets I controlled… as you can see, they were all normal people.”
“So?”
“Y-yeah? Wait… if I break the control, the insects will swarm to me and then I’ll be told to die? They’ll go berserk and explode the moment they sense an Ineung!”
“Is that right…? Um… Hey?”
“Ah, excuse me.”
“One of the dummies among them—any ordinary one will do. Can you bring one?”
“Of course.”
One of Carbin’s men brought a dummy.
Teraden tested it by blowing Bright Light into the gaps. The dummy suddenly twitched.
After a few moments, dull thuds echoed and thick liquid oozed out.
He tried another dummy and got the same result.
“Tsk. Then I’ll extract the queen first.”
“U-um… but there’s another problem…”
Erien’s voice trembled as she curled her fingers, so Teraden’s face twisted like crumpled paper.
“Ugh, you’re really all over the place. What now?”
“The queen dies instantly in the air.”
“What kind of nonsense is that? Then there’s no other way?”
Teraden’s patience snapped. His face reddened, so Erien hurriedly dug into her pocket and pulled out a small pill, offering it to me.
It looked like an ordinary tablet.
“Take this.”
“What is it?”
“A medicine that kills only the insects I control.”
“Why didn’t you say that earlier?! Hand it over!”
Teraden snatched the pill from her palm.
“But… is that all? And can I trust it will kill the bugs?”
“Yes. Only… right now I have nothing else…”
Erien’s hopeless answer made Teraden sigh and slump.
“This is getting complicated.”
“There’s only one way to save everyone. The Ineung-less person must swallow the medicine after absorbing all the insects inside the queen.”
“Wait. Are there any Ineung-less people here? Anyone?”
Teraden scanned the room, but no one raised a hand.
Of course it could be genuine Ineung absence, but even if they had powers, their position was understandable.
How many strangers would risk their lives for people they didn’t know?
“No one? That’s impossible!”
“They’re strangers to us—puppets or not. We can’t force them to help. It’s on me.”
“Hey, you’re not going! We’re both one step from death!”
“That’s right. Both of you hyungs are in bad shape. Let me do it.”
“Oppa! Maru’s here too!”
“I appreciate it, but this is my choice.”
“Hey, if something happens to you, what then?”
“I don’t have an Ineung, so nothing bad will happen.”
“Tch…”
Teraden clicked his tongue in frustration and turned to Erien.
“If anything happens to Haru, I’ll split you in half.”
“Y-yes! I’ll do my best!”
Erien, suddenly threatened with death, switched to formal speech and shook her head frantically.
“Stop. You promised not to take anyone’s life. These people are villains, but that doesn’t mean we can kill them casually. Let’s begin.”
“O-okay. Then sit in seiza facing me. The others, gather the brainwashed people over here…”
Erien guided me to sit opposite her and placed a hand on my head.
Soon a tingling sensation spread, and she whispered.
“The queen is inside me now. Shall I break the control?”
I nodded slightly, and the very next instant.
Swarm after swarm of insects rose from the bodies of the brainwashed individuals.
They rushed toward me and covered my entire body before pushing inside.
Whether searching for the queen or not, they tore through every organ and crevice, churning everything inside until it felt like being shaken in a blender.
The sensation of thousands of bugs crawling all over me was an indescribably terrifying experience.
“K, kugh…”
“Oppa…”
“H-hey… this is dangerous…!”
“Hey! Snap out of it and swallow the pill!!”
Teraden’s voice jolted me back. I brought the pill to my mouth.
I won’t give up on anyone…
Thud.
““#@$%^&#@%!!””
My vision dimmed and consciousness slipped away, but I could hear the screams of everyone around me.