Chapter 177
Chapter 177
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 177
Chapter Title: Extermination Squad -6
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The mansion lay in ruins, knights and soldiers scattered everywhere with broken limbs. Men in black uniforms stood motionless like grim reapers.
At their center cowered the territory lord, pale with terror.
As an extension of the "Nest Entrance Sealing Operation", the Extermination Squad had questioned the lord of Elmeister Territory about anomalies and succubus sightings in his domain. They were attacked—and won.
Now in a dire position, the lord flatly denied any involvement and staunchly refused a full domain search by the Squad.
Even when shown the Second Prince's decree, he shook his head, claiming it could be forged, and that he wouldn't believe it unless the Prince came in person.
He was making a desperate fuss.
Sweat beaded on the lord's brow. He seemed overwhelmed by the intense pressure from the Squad members lined up rigidly on either side.
This level of defiance all but confirmed he was in league with the succubi. The moment they attacked the Squad, it was ninety percent certain.
But without hard evidence, it remained just a possibility. He was a noble, and the Squad's authority was limited. Pushing further could spark real trouble.
Seris asked quietly.
"What now... Senior?"
"Time for some sudden solo action. Any volunteers?"
At Yuri Lanster's words, several Squad members raised their hands. Among them was the one-eyed old man who had advised the boy earlier.
She pointed at him.
"Rat. Ready to retire?"
"Yeah. I've done it all, and it's starting to bore me. Tired of babysitting you juniors as a pastime. Time to go."
The one-eyed old man drew his dagger and stepped forward.
He had lost his family to a vicious serial killer and avenged them by slaying the bastard about ten years ago. With his life's vow fulfilled, all that remained was a long, heavy stretch of empty days without kin.
No energy left to build new bonds or grasp at happiness. The ashes of a burned-out life wouldn't catch fire again. The old man was exhausted.
But even the harshest eras come to an end. It seemed his time had arrived. As he approached the Elmeister lord, he left one last piece of advice for his junior.
"Pink-haired Lanster."
"Yes, Rat."
"You... left the Extermination Squad once. It was astonishing. The fiercest one among us actually escaped this place... It made me happy."
To them, it hinted at hope.
If even Yuri Lanster—the wildest of them all—could return to a path of peace and happiness, then everyone else in the Squad could too.
It whispered that even to this ragtag bunch who'd abandoned themselves for revenge, a second chance might let them reclaim what they'd discarded. That they could rediscover happiness.
"But... you came back. Why?"
"Because an opportunity arose."
"Should've stayed gone. Seeing your face again just makes me sick of living."
"I won't apologize. Everyone, turn around."
Click.
The black-uniformed men turned as one. From behind, they looked like a thick black curtain.
Beyond that curtain, the one-eyed old man began his "sudden solo action."
"Wh-what are you doing?!"
"You won't leave this world until you spill everything you know, surrender all authority, and lighten your load. We'll start with the fingers."
"Y-you dare touch a noble?! St-stop him! Stop this bastard! This eye-for-an-eye bullshit while blindfolded...!!"
Screams echoed.
While the Squad members rested unguarded, before they even noticed—the former Squad member, the one-eyed old man, brutally murdered the Elmeister lord.
By the time the Squad discovered the scene, the place was drenched in blood.
"Why did you do it?"
"Nobles just piss me off that much."
He cackled with laughter.
The one-eyed old man confessed to the blind hatred-fueled crime against the nobility and turned himself in. The Squad arrested him and placed him in temporary custody.
Evidence soon surfaced of the Elmeister lord's close ties to the black mage forces. This might provide ample justification—or it might not.
The nobles could unite to protest, claiming it undermined imperial authority even slightly. They might rage that laying hands on a noble without a full investigation was an outrage.
When the blame game inevitably arose, the old man would hang himself. He'd close his eyes in peace.
Classic Extermination Squad tail-cutting.
Without scruple for methods, things progressed swiftly.
Torturing the lord yielded the info: the Nest entrance lay beneath the Goddess Church building in Elmeister. The Squad charged in without delay.
Shoving aside nuns at prayer and local parishioners, they first subdued the flustered priest waving his hands in panic.
"D-do you know where you are...? The Goddess is watching, you—urk!"
"Squad 1, interrogate him. Squad 2, with me—we're breaking through."
"Yes!"
Boom. Yuri Lanster stomped. Heightening her senses to the extreme, she felt the vibration resonate through the space. Right under the goddess statue.
There had to be a hidden mechanism nearby. Twist a candelabra a certain way, and a underground passage would reveal itself. But there was a simpler method.
"Prepare demolition."
"Demolition ready!"
Several Squad members peeled suicide scrolls from their person and affixed them to the statue. No hesitation in smashing an idol.
The locals, stunned by the sudden black-uniformed intruders, soon felt a sharp sense of crisis and began fleeing.
Counting down, they activated the scrolls.
Kaboom!!
The goddess's benevolent face shattered into dozens of shards, scattering. Some frail nuns fainted from the dizzying blasphemy.
Yuri Lanster kicked away the statue remnants and stomped again, crunch, revealing the underground passage. She wrinkled her nose at the musty odor brushing her nostrils.
Down they went.
Navigating the pitch-black stairs without a single torch, relying on sharpened senses. A key black mage and succubus facility. She knew how much stronger mages became in prepared spaces.
Even a mad mage wielded near-divine power in his constructed world—his lab. Yuri still remembered that vivid virtual realm.
He had fooled even the immature Elaine Crown at her peak fable mastery. Had he harbored malice, resistance would have been impossible.
Thus, this place surely brimmed with dozens of traps and dizzying perils.
A long brick corridor emerged.
"Senior, artifact reaction detected. High-level trap—beyond our gear to disarm."
"I see."
Yuri turned to the boy she'd half-crushed earlier. Bandages wrapped his body; ingrained terror made him tremble.
Her eyes conveyed the message.
If you hate cowardly runaways, now prove you're not one yourself.
"......"
The boy gasped for breath. Advance into the trapped corridor? That was as good as a death sentence.
His body shook like leaves in the wind. Spine-chilling dread surged. To the hesitating boy, Yuri asked calmly.
"No courage?"
"I-I... I'm..."
Seris flared up at the sight. All that big talk, and now he valued his own skin? She spat venomously.
"Hesitating now? Pathetic. After yelling at Senior like that... Senior, want me to toss him in?"
Yuri raised a hand, stopping Seris. Indifferently, she said.
"You can strip your uniform and leave. A friend once told me everyone deserves a second chance."
The meaning was clear. Can't do it? Get out of the Squad.
"U-uu... Uwaaaaaah—!!"
In a frenzy of scratched pride, fear, dread, and rage, the boy abandoned thought and charged the corridor.
Before he took many steps, the inscribed magic circle glowed red and activated. The spell seeped into his mind; ensnared, he thrashed his head, dancing wildly.
The pre-attached mental barrier artifact on his wrist flashed relentlessly. Even with defenses, this potency marked a formidable trap.
The Squad members observed calmly, analyzing.
"Frenzy, lust amplification... Mostly mental traps, Senior."
"No physical traps observed. Didn't want to risk collapsing the facility, maybe?"
"Fitting for a succubus den."
Analysis confirmed: mental traps galore. Simple enough solution, then. They could pass easily—if she took the lead.
Yuri dyed her soul with apathy, delving into past memories.
The village folk who'd lived in harmony and joy, stabbing each other with smiles that day. When a small curiosity dragged everything to ruin.
Amid the orgy of dying in ecstasy, she swore.
Suppress it.
Suppress it. No sorrow, no joy. Bind dreams in iron chains, weight them with corpses, sink them deep into the heart's abyss.
Until the day I slay the Queen...
"Metamorphosis - True Desire Binding: Foreplay."
⟨ Benmang Gusok: Jeonhui ⟩
Clink...
Chains leisurely bound Yuri's heart. The swirling emotions in her mind sank below the surface, leaving the lake mirror-still.
She walked.
Multiple magic circles triggered, viciously stabbing at her heart. Confusing, inciting.
They seized guilt and shook. You used that boy to scout the trap. How's that different from the Queen? You have no right to judge. Yuri Lanster.
Sink it.
They whipped up lust. I know your hidden desires, curiosity, intrigue. You want it. No need to hold back. Follow instinct. Yuri Lanster.
Sink it.
Absorbing every trap with her body, she advanced. Chains tightened. Wrapping arms and legs like serpents, climbing, binding so fiercely circulation faltered.
And so, the Extermination Squad reached the altar.
Hundreds lay neatly upon the massive altar, eyes gently closed, blissful smiles on their faces.
At the center floated the gateway to the Nest, shimmering like heat haze. It resembled a rift in the air. Beyond gleamed a pink paradise.
Succubi with ecstatic faces flew about, each clutching prey, frolicking amid geometrically impossible structures defying physics.
Beyond that rift lay the dream realm. The rift bridged dream and reality.
Stitching human dreams to form the entrance? They weren't lying there for nothing—essential to succubus magic.
Thus, the simplest, most efficient fix was one. Yuri decided. Coldly, she declared.
"I'll seal the entrance. Everyone else—kill all the sleeping appendages."
"Th-they're innocents... and you're just going to slaughter them? Yuri."
"......"
Tension rippled through Yuri's body. A voice like jade beads rolling on a tray, like sticky honey dripping into the ear, from behind.
Slowly pivoting on her toes.
Atop all-fours Seris—crawling unwittingly—a snow-white woman sat legs crossed. Just seeing her made the lower belly throb, heat flushing the body.
Caught off-guard by her appearance? No.
This was a strike on the succubi's core facility. Unless brainless, the Queen would show herself.
Thus, countermeasures were ready. Every Squad member wore mental barrier artifacts like the boy's. Yet.
"Hahk... huk... heuk..."
Panting breaths leaked from those around, one by one.
The snow-white woman's mere presence neutralized most of the Squad. Only Yuri and a few clung to reason.
Squeeze.
She bound herself tighter with chains. To avoid being swept by the waves.
As if finding that pitiful resistance adorable, the succubus Queen smiled like a budding flower. Then, like greeting a dearest friend, she spoke intimately, warmly.
"I thought you'd forgotten me, Yuri."
"...Never once."
"Oh? But you... stayed away so long?"
"You were the one hiding in a hole like this."
Hiding, indeed. The Queen nodded agreement. Stroking drooling Seris's crown, she cooed softly.
Yuri clenched her fist. Aiming for an opening to strike. But none appeared. The Queen's vicinity brimmed with uncanny pressure.
Strange.
Her Metamorphosis... True Desire Binding perfectly countered the Queen.
Resisted all mental magic. For succubi—near-powerless physically sans mind-shaking—it was ideal matchup.
Close in now, and she'd snap the Queen's neck in under a minute.
Why, then, the hesitation...?
Cold sweat traced Yuri's jawline, dripping. Then she spotted it. What the Queen cradled so preciously... a pitch-black statue.
Why notice such an obvious item only now? The Queen's body was all white— a black statue should've been visible from the start.
"...Th-that."
Realization dawned.
Not hidden by illusion magic. Yuri's instincts had willfully ignored the ominous statue. Like an ostrich shoving its head in sand before a predator.
Unconsciously fleeing the creepy foreboding.
The Queen continued.
"I made something fun. Truly splendid, beautiful... You'd love it too, Yuri."
"......"
"Pleasure Evil God Statue—one of the four faces of the Evil God. Hehehe... With this, I can finally become human, not a puppet. Escape fate."
The Queen caressed the Evil God Statue with near-ecstatic bliss. Not just a potent artifact—something deeper, more vital.
Move. Move, Yuri Lanster.
Move.
Before she unleashes whatever that artifact enables. Move. Stop her. No time to freeze.
This moment was why she lived. Why she postponed destined happiness. Left her friend's side. What was there to hesitate over?
The weight of all she'd discarded demanded it, if nothing else. No time for this.
—Now!
"Urgh... Raaagh—!!"
Yuri roared, swinging her fist. The Queen lightly intoned.
"Succession Sublimation - Gear: Heroine."
⟨ Topni Bakwi: Hiroin ⟩
Click.
A colossal something meshed and turned.