Encounter
Hss… haah.
With a brown hood pulled low over my face, I drew the night air deep into my lungs and walked the streets at an unhurried pace.
Gangnam. It's been a while.
Ever since the world had turned upside down, people had flocked to Seoul—to Gangnam. Perhaps for that reason, Gangnam's public safety had reached a level that made every other city look pitiful by comparison. The neon-soaked night streets still blazed around the clock, and the crime rate had supposedly fallen even further. Once the Hero Alliance relocated its headquarters here, the district had become an outright fortress.
"My God. Would it not be safer if I remained at your side?"
The black-dyed Alkar spoke from within my shadow. Staying beside me as a bodyguard would let him react far more quickly than lurking in the dark—but Alkar could not emerge without my permission. His bulk and that distinctive head of his were far too conspicuous; the restriction was unavoidable.
Crowds thronged the streets. Plenty of them would be players. This close to the Hero Alliance, I could not guarantee that no one would recognize Alkar for what he was. And even if they didn't, the way he treated me might still cause problems. If anything went wrong, the headache would be considerable.
Besides, the Hero Alliance isn't the only power here.
Powerful figures from every corner of the globe had gathered in Seoul—some for smooth exchange with a Korea whose infrastructure still stood intact, some to forge alliances with the Hero Alliance that now ruled the Ruins City of Rundela, and for any number of other reasons. Of course, the greatest draw of all was the Dragon Vein.
Korea—the nation that had halted Isera's advance and claimed the Dragon Vein as its own. Worldwide attention was inevitable. Researchers alone must have poured in by the dozens.
Somewhere in this city, a warp linked to God's Island has almost certainly formed.
Plenty of people here satisfied the entry conditions: the unfinished ones.
"Drink up!"
"Drink till we drop!"
"Hahahaha!"
The hour was sliding toward dawn, yet the streets still teemed with life and energy.
Same as ever.
Watching them, I found myself nodding. Only now did the sense of having truly returned settle over me—feelings I could never experience in Pangenia. This sense of connection, something only Park Hyunmyung could feel, never Randolph. This was a Korean night.
"My God. You seem to be in good spirits."
"…Not bad."
"Korea's public safety can rightly be called the finest in the world. Seoul, under Park Taewoo's protection especially, overflows with Awakeners driven by a sense of duty."
"It certainly… looks that way."
Among the crowds, figures kept watch over the streets. Not police—Awakeners standing ready for a monster invasion at any moment, from any direction. Their caliber looked far from ordinary.
"Even so, my God—no matter how solid the defenses, gaps will always exist."
"What are you trying to say?"
"…Forgive my presumption, but should anything happen, it would take roughly three seconds for me to re-summon myself from the shadow."
Three seconds. Not a long time—yet more than enough for a life to end.
The black-dyed Alkar fretted over me day and night. Blade Dragon God Hana, the other Demon Blood Species—all of them worried about me far more than necessary. I understood why well enough.
Transforming with a fragment of the Golden Rule takes roughly three seconds.
If something happened, I would be defenseless for those three seconds. The Guardian Wall, which had reached Level 15, existed to protect a logged-out body. Strictly speaking, I was currently logged in as Park Hyunmyung—so the Guardian Wall only safeguarded Randolph's form. If I were ambushed, I could die within three seconds. That was the gap Alkar kept trying to close.
But this was Gangnam. And more importantly, I was a little different from other players. Even without a fragment of the Golden Rule, I could produce force well beyond an ordinary human's.
"Whoa, is that who I think it is? Park Hyunmyung?"
"Holy crap, it really is. Hey, Park Hyunmyung! Long time no see!"
A group had just spilled out of a bar—men who looked somehow familiar.
"It's been a while, Manager Kim."
"Haha! Kid, I'm a director now."
The potbellied Manager Kim swaggered over, slapping his gut. People from my old company.
He closed the distance, reeking of liquor, and clapped me on the shoulder.
"Well, well. Good to see you're still breathing, you bastard. After the way you walked out, I figured you'd completely gone to seed. You live around here?"
"I don't live here."
Manager Kim smacked his lips as if he'd expected as much.
"Figures… There's nowhere left to rent in Gangnam these days. Me and the staff live in company apartments, but you—ugh. You disloyal little shit. Couldn't you have stuck it out a little longer?"
"……"
"This is the age of absolute loyalty. Stick with a corporation or you don't survive. Do that and they give you a place to live, bodyguards, the works. My quality of life is better now than it ever was, you know? In an era where the classes have been carved out this cleanly."
Not a place of fond memories—but not of bitter ones either. Still, the Manager Kim in my recollections and the man standing before me now were different people.
He pulled a wallet from his coat.
"Tsk tsk. Hang in there. And drop by the company sometime soon. Headquarters moved here too… Come by and I'll buy you a meal."
"……"
"Take it, kid. Don't get prideful. Life's hard enough, isn't it?"
I was speechless. In all my life, I had never been treated like this—handed a bill as if I were some beggar receiving alms. And not even a fifty-thousand-won note. Ten thousand. There was no greater insult. The whole performance was transparently meant to use me as a prop, to demand even fiercer loyalty from the people still at the company—to parade the gulf between the man who left and those who stayed.
"Aaaah! My God! If you would only permit it, I shall carve that faithless wretch to pieces, sever his head, and fling it to the dogs!"
Alkar's voice seethed with rage. This was exactly why I kept him hidden in the shadow—to prevent any "accidents."
Then it happened.
KRRRUMBLE!
An earthquake erupted from beneath the ground.
WEEEEEEEEE—!
Alert! Alert!
Sirens painted the entire city. But the invasion outpaced even the sirens.
KRRRUMBLE! KRRRRUMBLE!
In an instant, monsters burst up through the pavement.
"Wh-what the hell?"
"Hybrids!"
These were no ordinary monsters. They were Hybrids—beings that had lost their own existence in the Abyss and degenerated into monsters.
…Why are Abyssal monsters invading Earth?
This had never happened before. Pangenia's monsters had invaded, yes—but Abyssal creatures had never once crossed over.
The question barely had time to form before—
"Aaaagh!"
The first to fall was the guard protecting Manager Kim. His throat was torn out. He had been a player, but until he transformed he was no better than a civilian.
"S-save me…!"
Manager Kim and every employee with him shook like leaves.
Behind.
Sensing a presence at my back, I instinctively drove off the ground and threw a punch.
KRRRUM!
CRACK!
The ground trembled faintly as the Hybrid's face caved in. It flew like a deflated balloon and smashed into the pavement.
That just now…?
Even I was a little startled by the punch I'd thrown. The force had exceeded anything I'd expected. And that vibration through the ground—why did it feel so familiar?
"Suppress them!"
"Threat Level 3! Threat Level 3!"
"Citizens, please evacuate to the rooftops of the nearest buildings!"
Fortunately, they were ordinary Hybrids; the suppression did not take long. Fragments of the Golden Rule flared from every direction, and players poured into view like a flood.
The Hero Alliance. At their head stood a man—
Park Taewoo.
The moment Park Taewoo took the field, the situation was brought under control with startling speed. They soothed the terrified civilians and shoved the slain Hybrids into a corner. The entire operation took barely ten minutes. An extraordinary response time. Hundreds of Hybrids had appeared, yet civilian casualties were nearly nonexistent. The only fatality was the bodyguard whose throat had been torn out at the start.
I was just turning away from the mopping-up when—
"You…?"
A slender voice, and a woman entered my field of vision. She wore sunglasses, yet the instant I saw her I knew she was looking straight through me.
Who was she? A complete stranger. And yet something about her felt wrong—an incongruity I could not place. She was walking directly toward me.
"My God, please—grant me leave to act."
"She is a dangerous woman."
The black-dyed Alkar warned me. She was strange, no question. Human, unmistakably—and yet something about her felt alien.
People around us began to murmur.
"It's Lady Arin!"
"Ohhh, Lady Arin!"
"That's Lady Arin?"
"Yeah—the Hero Alliance's youngest Vice President!"
…Vice President?
The Hero Alliance had President Park Taewoo and two Vice Presidents. One of them was this woman—Arin.
The woman so praised under that name closed the distance in a heartbeat. When she came near enough that I could feel her breath, she looked me up and down and spoke.
"Was it you? The one who used the Heavenly Demon Dominion Step."
"……"
I was inwardly shaken. Not only had she recognized it at a glance—she had spoken the name aloud. That should have been impossible. The Heavenly Demon was a Primal being. No one who was not themselves Primal, or a denizen of the Abyss, should have been able to identify it. That she had done so at a single glance meant this woman shared their context.
…Who is she?
Cheonma Shingong. Randolph could not learn it—but Park Hyunmyung could. That much had just been proven. And the moment it was proven, this woman of unknown identity had appeared.
"Curious, though. You don't seem to have Awakened. Did you use it on pure instinct? Or…"
…Arin—no, the Seventh Lord of Hell, Basara—was just as surprised. Her eyes lit with interest. She was certain of one thing: this man had not used a fragment of the Golden Rule. In other words, the Quake Step he had stamped into the ground had not been performed in a transformed state. He had not even Awakened. The sensation was utterly different from every other Awakener she had encountered.
There was only one explanation.
A pure martial artist.
A type that did not exist in this world. At least, a type of human she had never once seen on Earth. And that was not all. The feeling when he stamped the Quake Step had unmistakably been the Heavenly Demon Dominion Step. Yet Cheonma Shingong could be learned and used only by the Heavenly Demon himself. As far as she knew, the Heavenly Demon currently resided in the Abyss and had taken no disciples.
Which meant—
Every so often, such a human is born. One who carries the Heavenly Killing Star.
Once in tens of thousands of years, a human was born with that disposition. Wilhelm had been one. But the temperament she sensed from this man was nothing like Wilhelm's. He was Wilhelm's complete opposite—his polar reverse. And the refinement of the body she could see was considerable in its own right.
Polish him, and he might make a decent gem.
Was this what it felt like to land a big catch in an unexpected place? He lacked the brilliance she had felt facing Wilhelm, but if this man were properly honed, he would not make a bad jewel. At the very least, he would serve as a diversion.
"Join the Hero Alliance. You… look like you have potential."
Basara, Seventh Lord of the Demon Realm. For the first time since coming to Earth, she felt a fierce interest in a human.