Chapter 229: Alteration (3)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 229: Alteration (3)
Klam, a ten-year veteran of the Lumburn Mercenary Group, could not comprehend the scene unfolding before his eyes.
"H-help me—!!"
Crunch!
Just moments ago, his comrade had been laughing and cracking crude jokes. Now, he was suspended in mid-air, his intestines spilling out.
It was strange.
Strange, and utterly bizarre.
Klam saw nothing.
Nothing but his comrade’s body floating in the void.
And yet.
Despite the emptiness.
"Aaaagh!! No, no, st—!"
Snap!
In the empty air, his comrade’s head vanished.
As if someone had taken a single, massive bite.
Splatter!
Blood sprayed from the mangled torso, drenching Klam’s head.
The liquid trickled down his hair, thick and warm. That visceral heat finally forced Klam to face reality.
"Ah."
In an instant, an indescribable terror filled his eyes.
Ten years.
A decade of mercenary life had granted him the ability to maintain composure and act calmly in almost any situation.
But now, that experience was meaningless.
Composure and calm were born from experience—from the ability to predict a situation based on what one had seen before.
Thud.
The sight before him was an unknown horror, unlike anything he had ever encountered.
"Ugh... aaah..."
A voice saturated with dread leaked from Klam’s lips.
His eyes trembled as he looked down.
There lay his comrade—the man he’d been joking with just seconds ago—now nothing more than a heap of discarded meat.
Then.
Splash!
Upon the red pool of blood his comrade’s body had formed...
Footprints began to appear. They were neither human nor monster, but something grotesque. And they were walking toward Klam.
Sensing his impending death, Klam squeezed his eyes shut.
Crunch!
The sound reached his ears—
"…?"
It should have been the last thing he heard.
Klam fumbled at his own head. It was still there, perfectly intact, despite the sound of something bursting.
He cautiously opened his eyes.
What met his gaze was...
"…!"
A golden tube.
Bathed in the desert sun, the golden tube shone more brilliantly than anything else in the world.
It had appeared right above his head.
But that wasn't all.
"What...?"
Klam looked around blankly.
The space that had been a scene of cruel slaughter was now frozen. Everything within it had stopped.
The people who had been screaming and crawling on the ground were stunned into silence. Those who had been suspended in the air, being devoured by something invisible, plummeted to the earth.
At that moment, Klam witnessed it.
Dozens of golden tubes were weaving through the air in a chaotic dance.
Whirrr—
As the sound of machinery hummed behind a massive object formed from the intertwined gold, Klam slowly turned his head.
There stood a girl with blue hair.
It was Penia Kraysinne, the Vice Tower Master of the Blue Magic Tower.
Hovering her staff, which was embedded with blue jewels, she muttered something under her breath before thrusting it downward.
With a clear ping, the world began to transform, centering around Penia Kraysinne.
The world, once scorched by the hot sun, turned to ash-gray.
The gold-tinted sand lost its color.
The shimmering golden tubes lost their brilliant luster.
And then, they became visible.
The things impaled upon the golden tubes.
"Urgh...!"
Klam gagged involuntarily.
Even after ten years of seeing every foul and cruel sight a mercenary could encounter, the scene before him was enough to turn his stomach.
He couldn't even find the words to describe them.
To call them human was to ignore their insect-like traits.
To call them insects was to ignore their animalistic features.
To call them animals was to ignore their monstrous nature—
No, to call them monsters was to ignore the fact that they were merely lumps of meat.
Some had their internal organs exposed on the outside.
Some had pierced their own bodies with their teeth.
Some had limbs twisted at impossible angles.
They were...
■■■■■—!!
■■■■■■■—!!!!
■■■—!!!
Creatures that belonged only in the hells described by priests.
Impaled by the golden tubes, they let out bizarre, piercing shrieks.
And at the end of that horrific display...
"Heh... interesting."
A man stood there.
A man with a human face embedded where his heart should be. He held one of the golden tubes that had skewered the others.
* * *
"M-Marquis? I-I did what you asked for now. W-what do we do next? This—this situation doesn't look easy at all...!!!"
"…."
Alon let out a deep sigh at Penia’s panicked voice.
Even Alon found it difficult to guess why a Hungry Ghost, one of the Four Major Factions, had suddenly appeared in the desert.
If they were to move, they should have appeared at the border where the Hesitation was, not here.
"Marquis, should we run? Should we bolt? Let's bolt! I think bolting is a great idea!"
Alon looked at her, trembling beside him.
It was obvious Penia wasn't in her right mind, but Alon understood her reaction.
In the original story, the Four Major Factions possessed an overwhelming presence just by appearing.
Descriptions often depicted comrades fainting or characters following the protagonist being crushed by their sheer existence.
Because the descriptions were so consistent every time a member of the Four Major Factions appeared, players used to complain that the developers were being lazy with the reactions.
‘...This is beyond ridiculous.’
In this moment, Alon understood why those descriptions had been so consistent.
Alon had only just managed to set foot in the 5th Tier.
Yet, even for him, the Hungry Ghost before them was so chilling that it felt suffocating just to look at it.
This meant that Penia, whose magic tier was higher than Alon's, was likely feeling that despair even more acutely.
Furthermore—
"…Haa... haa..."
Line, who was skewering the Hungry Ghosts with her golden tubes, was also breathing heavily, clearly under immense pressure.
‘Revealing the hidden Hungry Ghosts through Penia was a good start, but...’
To be honest, the situation wasn't great. Just as Alon was weighing his options, the monster from before began to crawl out of the Master of the Hungry Ghosts' shadow.
The Hungry Ghost scanned the crowd, its eyes darting back and forth.
Eventually, it looked at Alon and smirked.
"Let's make a deal."
"…What?"
"Hand over that girl. Then I'll leave."
Before Alon could even process the thought, the creature spat out the demand.
* * *
"Hand over that girl. Then I'll leave."
The sentence pierced her ears.
Despite the cold sweat pouring down her face, Line constantly calculated and deduced the current situation.
This was her first time facing a Hungry Ghost directly.
However, with her knowledge, it wasn't difficult to identify its nature and origin.
...And she also knew, quite clearly, that she could never win against the entity before her as she was now.
"…."
Line looked up at the sky.
The golden tubes were twisted in the air, impaling numerous Hungry Ghosts.
They should have been forming Pluto’s summoning gate, but they couldn't.
The reason was the dozens of Hungry Ghosts skewered among the tubes.
Ignoring the death they should have rightfully met, they were expanding their flesh like a spreading infection, interfering with the golden tubes' ability to form a circuit.
In other words, the power she could currently wield was effectively sealed.
If that had been the only problem, Line might have seen a chance for victory.
No matter how dire the situation, she had prepared a final trump card after the attack by 'Greed.'
But now, even that had become meaningless.
‘How... how does he have something belonging to Greed...?’
The man demanding her surrender inexplicably possessed the power of Greed.
She couldn't guess how he had obtained it.
But his goal was crystal clear.
‘...He intends to devour me and take the Library.’
Line bit her lip hard, running through various scenarios.
But her brilliant mind reached a single conclusion in less than a few seconds.
There was nothing.
Nothing she could do.
If so, only one option remained.
The only way to ensure the Great Moon escaped this place safely—
Was to put her own life on the bargaining table.
"…."
She had no regrets.
She had already been saved twice.
Her life would have ended long ago if not for the Great Moon; her body would have been consumed and erased by Greed.
So, this was only right.
Line moved a golden tube, aiming it at her own head, and primed it with mana.
She set it so that the moment her consciousness flickered, it would pierce her skull.
The Hungry Ghost’s expression hardened as he watched the process.
Finally.
Seeing this, Line prepared to speak, but—
"I refuse."
—She couldn't.
The Hungry Ghost turned his gaze toward the Great Moon.
Line also looked at Alon.
He was still making a seal with one hand, his face as expressionless as ever.
"Heh, if you're worried I won't keep my word, don't be. I'm actually quite good at keeping my promises."
The Hungry Ghost replied playfully.
However.
"Don't make me say it twice."
Alon spoke again.
"I refuse."
The same words. This time, his face was slightly set.
Then.
"…I showed you favor because I thought touching you would be a hassle, but I didn't expect you to decline."
The Hungry Ghost’s brow furrowed in irritation.
At the same time.
"In that case, die."
The Hungry Ghost appeared in front of Alon in an instant.
Moving at a speed no one could react to, the Hungry Ghost thrust his fist toward Alon’s heart without hesitation.
"No—!"
The moment a half-finished scream escaped Line’s lips.
Blackie landed on Alon’s shoulder.
And then.
Alon’s chest was pierced.
BOOOOOOM—!!!
Everything exploded.
Ashen sand sprayed in all directions, creating a cloud of dust.
The carriages behind them shattered.
Corpses were sent flying.
And within the thick dust.
"Ah—"
Line, who had reached out toward Alon, stared ahead with hollow eyes.
The gray dust had suddenly turned into white snowflakes.
Her outstretched hand had become small, like a child's.
The metallic scent of blood lingered in her nose.
And finally, what filled her vision was...
A corpse.
Her...
Parents—
Her sister—
The result of her incompetence—
Her...
...Sin.
Thump-thump-thump-thump-thump-thump—!!!
Her heart began to race frantically.
Her mind, remembering everything, summoned the past.
The torn lips.
The guilt of that day.
The sin of that day—
The memories of her family, scattered like shards of glass.
[It is all because you did not embrace Greed.]
At that moment, a voice echoed in Line’s head.
[Accept me.]
It was an incredibly unpleasant voice.
A wicked, vile thing that seemed to scrape at her very soul—
[Then, I shall give you power.]
Yet, it was so seductive.
To that voice she could never refuse,
[The power to never lose anything again.]
The moment she reflexively reached out her hand.
"What—"
An anomalous voice cut in.
It clearly belonged to the Hungry Ghost, but unlike before, it was laced with blatant bewilderment.
Because of that, Line’s vision shifted once more.
The black thing reaching for her vanished.
The fragmented images of her family disappeared.
And.
What she finally saw was...
"!"
Alon, his heart pierced by the Hungry Ghost’s fist.
But one thing was strange—
Crackle!
"Urgh!"
The Hungry Ghost, who had pierced Alon’s heart, was the one grimacing in pain.
Bam!
The Hungry Ghost twisted his body and kicked Alon in the head.
Alon’s head dissipated like smoke.
However.
"—!"
The Hungry Ghost’s pupils dilated as Alon’s form regenerated as if nothing had happened.
"Whew—"
Blackie, who had been emitting a brilliant flash on Alon’s shoulder, was absorbed into Alon’s body. Two horns began to form on his head.
Then.
Alon uttered the final word, controlling the changes occurring in his body.
"Unification."
At first, it was just a coincidence.
A byproduct of the research on divinity he had conducted with Penia.
They had discovered that Blackie’s body could freely accept not just mana, but divinity as well.
Furthermore.
The existence of Unification—temporarily accepting the Shadow Spirit Dragon obtained from the battle with Kailas into his body to exercise its abilities directly—had presented a very interesting topic for Alon and Penia.
That was the link between magic and divinity.
By wrapping divinity around Blackie and performing Unification, he could clothe his body in Kalanon’s divinity.
In that state, by using Thunder God Form, the body that would normally be converted into mana—
CRA-CRACKLE—!!!!!
Was instead entirely converted into divinity, solving the problem of massive mana consumption.
Constructing a physical form out of divinity itself.
Transformation.
Thunder God.
And so.
Crackle!
Within the ashen world.
"…."
Eyes crackling with blue electricity gazed down at the Hungry Ghost.