It Has Begun
A faint vibration that began deep underground rapidly grew until it became an earthquake strong enough to shake buildings. Standing atop the roof of a low building beneath the elevated highway that blanketed the sky, Agni slowly rose to his feet as he felt it. In his hand was an old smartphone, the kind rarely seen in use these days. Using it in place of a radio, he spoke into the group call connecting his subordinates in the Special Investigation Unit.
"Everyone, get ready."
He had already sent a cooperation request to the Mendelssohn Grand Duke and evacuated the citizens living in this area to shelters in advance. The official reason given was an earthquake forecast. There was no need to heighten public anxiety by revealing the truth about a terrorist incident. Therefore, Agni's current objective was to prevent the damage from spreading beyond the zone warned about in the earthquake forecast.
'I will stop it. No matter what.'
Pride had excluded him from his plan. But it was not a rejection telling him not to interfere with his own work—it was closer to a declaration that Pride would not care in the slightest about whatever Agni did. Whether he protected the citizens outside or ignored them, Pride would pay no attention. Pride had said he would do his utmost to minimize the damage, but he would not bother to believe those words or get involved even if Agni stepped forward. However, he was not to even think about interfering with the stage Pride had created or the passage built underground.
'How arrogant.'
As the leader of Violent Crime Team 1 in the Special Investigation Unit, his rank was quite high from an external perspective. But considering that the person in question was an 8-star superhuman, it could hardly be called a high position. Still, Agni had chosen to delay his promotion and settle into this role. The position of Special Investigation Unit team leader was the lowest rank that still allowed him relatively free access to the field. Rising any higher would bury him in miscellaneous duties and drastically reduce opportunities to move his body directly.
It was for this reason that Agni, despite being an 8-star superhuman, remained in the team leader position, and because everyone knew this fact, no one disregarded him simply because he was "just" a team leader. That was why Agni was experiencing this feeling for the first time since reaching the rank of superhuman—someone openly ignoring him and leaving him to do as he pleased.
'Fine. Do as you like.'
If that was the case, then he would move exactly as he pleased. Whether Pride wanted it or not.
Agni's eyes sank low as he gazed at the ground.
Crack!
Immediately after, the ground began to rise upward, splitting open with fissures like an egg hatching. A stench that stung the nose leaked out from underground. It was the smell of rotting corpses. Maggots crawled out from beneath the earth first, followed by an animal leg suddenly protruding above ground.
'Undead!'
The army of the dead was pouring in. Necromancy—a type of dark magic that breathed ego into corpses to artificially control them. A terrifying power whose strength varied wildly depending on the user. Its danger had been proven even in the relatively recent war between the Death King and the Empress.
'These aren't ordinary undead.'
The fissures grew worse, and soon the true form of the undead trying to emerge onto the surface was fully revealed to Agni's eyes. Strictly speaking, it was not the corpse of a single entity. Even at a glance, the number was so enormous that its end could not be seen. They clung together like clay, letting out incomprehensible roars in every direction.
A literal monster. A corpse golem created by haphazardly stitching together corpses. And in the world, this type of undead was called by a specific name.
Chimera.
'The undead the Death King brought out in his fight against the Empress was also a type of Chimera, if I recall.'
Of course, comparing the entity that had appeared in the middle of the Mendelssohn Grand Territory to the Death King's summon was a stretch. Unlike the Death King's summon, which had connected countless corpses to build a single massive ego, this one had skipped that entire process and simply stuck a multitude of undead together at random. Even now, countless egos were moving according to their own desires, unable to reach a consensus. Its raw power was far below the Death King's summons. But its grotesqueness was every bit as horrifying and grotesque as the Death King's summons—enough to make even an 8-star superhuman like Agni hesitate for a moment.
Boom!
And in that instant of hesitation, the undead summoned by Tenma mercilessly smashed one of the buildings on the surface and tore away part of its body. Debris from the destroyed building flew in all directions. Rebar shot upward like cannon fire, hurtling straight toward Agni.
The moment he finally came to his senses at the sound and was about to issue orders to his subordinates through the smartphone—
"Ugh..."
A strange sound came from within the debris flying past him. It was the voice of a young girl. Had someone failed to evacuate after all? Agni turned his head with an urgent expression, only to see a girl lying amid the rubble with her lustrous silver hair scattered in all directions. Covering half her face was a large eyepatch. Clutched tightly in her arms was a pale pink pillow fringed with fluttering lace. Frowning as she wrapped herself in a yellow chick-patterned blanket torn to shreds by the sharp debris, she slowly lifted her eyepatch and sat up.
"......"
She blinked a few times. With a dazed look, as if she had not yet fully woken, she glanced around. After rubbing her eyes and letting out a big yawn—
"......Was it a dream?"
Of course not. Even if it were someone else, there was no way she would confuse dreams and reality. That meant this was reality. Her house being destroyed, unknown undead running rampant, and some strange man staring down at her—everything was real.
"That damn Pride bastard."
What the hell did you do under my house?
Her face twisted in irritation. Annoyance flickered in her mysteriously shimmering purple eyes.
"Haaah..."
The girl—Sloth—stood up with a yawn. Clutching her beloved pillow tightly, she staggered forward. Perhaps it was because it had been so long since she had defied gravity. Walking on two legs felt extremely awkward. If she had not reached the level of a superhuman, her leg muscles would have atrophied to the point where even this would have been impossible.
'Hmm, I should praise my past self for becoming a superhuman despite the hassle.'
Now, she no longer had the confidence to repeat the effort she had made back then. That was why she had already become someone who was seriously messed up.
"Who are you?"
At that moment, Agni, who had been staring at Sloth, asked with a wary expression. He could not dismiss her just because she looked young. His instincts as a superhuman were sounding an alarm. The girl before him was not beneath him.
"That's what I want to ask."
Sloth replied in a disinterested tone. Unlike Agni, she did not spare him a single glance, her eyes fixed solely on the undead that had destroyed her house.
"You. What's your relationship with Pride?"
She finally turned her gaze to Agni, her purple eyes questioning the connection between him and Pride. If this was part of Pride's scenario, was this person an enemy or an ally? Her mind, long dulled from constant sleep, began to turn for the first time in ages. Her eyes widened. She knew about Pride. Her wariness eased slightly—he was not an enemy. Yet a trace of caution remained. He did not know about her. In other words, he was not an ally either. Pride had not given him any additional explanation. If this encounter had been part of Pride's plan, one of them should have known the other's identity—either her or the other party. The fact that neither did meant he was neither enemy nor ally.
"You're a bystander, aren't you?"
That could only mean he was someone Pride had excluded from his plan. Pride hated situations he could not control. He had probably excluded this person because they were not from the underworld and their actions could not be predicted with 100% certainty. Unlike her, whom Pride had observed for so long that he could predict her behavior without explanation.
"Then act like a bystander and step back to watch. Don't get in the way."
She was already annoyed that Pride had suddenly destroyed her house and forced her to work. Naturally, a curt remark slipped from her lips.
"What did you say?"
Following Pride, her attitude was clearly dismissive. Agni stepped forward, irritation flashing across his face—
—Team Leader? The call with the team members was still connected. Julia Evergreen's voice came through the smartphone.
—Look at the sky.
At Julia's words, Agni's head lifted involuntarily. The smartphone slipped from his hand and fell to the ground. His eyes widened in shock. At the same time, Sloth's voice, filled with annoyance, reached his ears.
"Do you know why Pride excluded superhumans from his plan without hesitation?"
"......"
"Because even the power of superhumans is insignificant compared to the plan in his head."
Even Pride would not carelessly exclude a powerhouse like Agni. He would find a way to use him, even if it meant making his plan more intricate. But there had been a time when Pride excluded all Seven Deadly Sins from his plan. It was during the final battle between the Master and the Empress—when even the power of superhumans was of no help. And it was the same now. Even without Agni, their forces were more than sufficient, overflowing. That was why Pride had discarded him without a second thought.
'In the end, I'm just a sideshow for cleanup.'
Thinking this, Sloth casually lifted her head toward the sky Agni was staring at. The sky that had left Agni horrified was undergoing a cataclysm. The night sky split in two. A blood-red twilight more ominous than darkness spread across it, and within it, a chilling yin energy partially halted the flow of the world. Another dimension with a completely different time axis from the present world. This was the collision phenomenon created by its interference with this world. Only those who had accumulated a certain level of karma could perceive this stopped world. Naturally, both Agni and Sloth were among them.
Swish!
A slash flew in. A single strike containing countless mysteries that even Agni and Sloth could not fully grasp. With one swing, the infinite expansion of the slash finely diced the Chimera's body that had emerged onto the surface. The Chimera was minced like meat in a blender. Following that, the surrounding buildings and roads were swept into the vortex of the slash and annihilated at the molecular level.
Whoosh.
After the Chimera vanished, leaving an empty space, someone descended from the twilight-stained sky and landed gracefully within it.
"Hah!"
And the world's time began to move again. Agni gasped for breath, his head bowed low. His lungs burned as if torn apart from the rough breathing. Fear and awe—only five beings in this world could instill such reverence in an 8-star superhuman.
'An Absolute Being.'
The appearance of an Absolute Being. That was Pride's trump card, and the decisive reason he could exclude Agni without a moment's hesitation.
'So that person is the Death King......!'
Four of the five Absolute Beings had their faces publicly known. Only the Death King remained the sole Absolute Being whose face and identity were completely veiled. Then, was that 'woman' the Death King? If the Death King personally intervened, it made sense that Pride was confident he could definitely capture his target.
"See? I told you I'm just a sideshow."
How dare you destroy my house and force me to work. Just you wait.
Pride, you bastard.
While Agni was still reeling from the Death King's appearance, Sloth, who had recovered from the shock faster, walked forward with a sulky expression.
Shhh.
And the world completely changed. It could not compare to the sky revealed during the cataclysm earlier, but a bright red sky like the sunset at dusk. Along with the characteristic symbol of an inner world, a pleasant sensation like fluffy clouds filled the world to the brim.
"......!"
The boundary between dream and reality collapsed. Everything created by the Chimera that had risen to the surface was erased as an illusion. In the blink of an eye, everything was restored to its original state. The ground was clean, without a single trace of damage. As if everything that had just happened had been dismissed as a dream.
"Still, it was good that you evacuated all the citizens in the area. Even with the rules of my inner world, I can't bring back the dead."
Restoring destroyed buildings or roads was one thing, but reviving dead citizens was impossible even for an Absolute Being. Praising Agni's contribution, Sloth adjusted her slipping eyepatch with another endless yawn.
"Well then, I'm going back to sleep. If you see Pride later, give him a good smack on the head for me."
She walked into the building that had been destroyed by the Chimera earlier and restored to its original state, clutching her pale pink pillow tightly. Watching her retreating figure, Agni finally realized who she was.
"Sloth......?"
How many people in the world could call Pride so familiarly? It would be impossible unless they were one of the Seven Deadly Sins of the underworld.
—Team Leader? What just happened......
Julia's bewildered voice came through the smartphone as Agni picked it up from the ground, staring at the completely restored scene.
"It's nothing. More importantly, maintain the alert status."
—Yes? Ah, yes! Understood.
With the appearance of an Absolute Being, the situation was essentially over. Yet Agni did not stop maintaining the alert status. As a police officer, it was his duty—someone had to keep watching the situation carefully even when everyone else was optimistic. Thinking this, his eyes sank low. The hand holding the smartphone was still trembling slightly, unable to forget the shock from earlier.