Chapter 98: Kang Geomma Origin (2)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 98: Kang Geomma Origin (2)
Sky-blue hair spread wide like a fan across the field. A gentle breeze swayed the short grass. As it tickled the bridge of her nose, a soft groan escaped her lips.
“Ugh, mmm…”
Saki Ryozo gripped the grass tightly. The looming threat of a headache rippled through every fold of her brain.
“Excuse me.”
“...?”
A female voice suddenly cut through the silence. Saki Ryozo pushed against the turf and sat up.
“You are...”
A little girl wearing a flower wreath on her head was crouching before Ryozo. The child tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear with her index finger.
“Are you fully awake now?”
“...Is this a dream?”
Ryozo looked around. She was sitting on a rolling hill reminiscent of Daegwallyeong in Gangwon Province.
Even though she clearly remembered being on Avalon Island just a moment ago.
At her question, the little girl offered a faint smile.
“Of course it’s a dream.”
“I see.”
What a weird dream.
“How does your body feel?”
“Not quite normal, but... I think I’m okay.”
Saki Ryozo pressed her throbbing temples. It was a mild dizziness, the kind that a single Tylenol would easily fix.
“Then do you want to follow me for a moment?”
“...Huh? What?”
“Take my hand if you need help standing.”
The little girl held out her hand. Ryozo stared blankly at the tiny, delicate hand before taking it.
“Up we go!”
“H-huh?”
Her grip strength was far beyond expectation. Ryozo snapped to her feet with a bewildered expression.
The child brushed off the grass clinging to Ryozo's body, then took energetic strides forward. Ryozo followed behind her.
After walking for what felt like ten minutes, the little girl came to a sudden halt. As she stepped aside slightly, a small sapling was revealed. It was a young tree barely reaching the girl's navel, but what stood out was the color of its leaves.
“Gold...”
Though this was a world rampant with blessings and magic, a tree of such hue existed in only one place.
“Yggdrasil.”
“Ah, so our ‘Idd’ gets called by such a grand name in the future generation.”
The little girl patted more dirt around the tree’s roots, much like building a sandcastle.
“Future generation.”
A dream.
Yggdrasil.
Ryozo instantly assembled the circumstances and the words the girl had uttered. Despite having just woken up with a lingering headache, she quickly deduced the underlying truth.
“You are...”
Her form of address shifted.
“You are the Earth Mother of the Ancients.”
“Earth Mother?”
“Gaia.”
That was what she was called in modern times.
“Mmm. That name... isn't cute at all.”
The little girl pouted. In the split second it took for Ryozo to blink, the child’s appearance transformed into that of a mature woman.
A strangely familiar face. She looked like the Sage, yet also like All-Power—and conversely, both yet neither. Either way, the features of both women undeniably coexisted in her appearance.
“So Mister’s taste was like this.”
The woman thrust her face forward abruptly. She scanned Ryozo thoroughly from head to toe—or rather, scrutinizing every detail would be a more accurate description.
“No matter how I look at it, I think I’m prettier.”
A sweet scent of fresh grass seemed to waft from her verdant green hair. Radiating a peculiar mystery from her violet eyes, the woman took a step back.
“I’m Mesther.”
The woman wearing the flower wreath said.
“Mister’s—that is, Geomma’s—first love.”
*
A deafening explosion shook the entire forest.
KABOOOOOM!
Leon whirled around in haste. Metatron had been sent flying. The forest through which he had crashed was gouged open as if hollowed out by a giant tunnel.
“Father!”
It took just a single strike. With a careless swing of Kang Geomma's sword, Metatron was flung past the forest and all the way into the ocean. Metatron’s heels struck the sea surface, carving a long, white plume of spray across the water.
“Gasp...!”
Gulping in a harsh breath, Metatron beat his wings and shot up vertically. At speeds transcending subsonic velocity, he charged back toward Kang Geomma once more.
Leon and Valerion timed their moves. The three entities closed in almost simultaneously.
These three were the advance vanguard. The plan was for them to gauge Kang Geomma’s full power through direct, brutal contact before the other heroes joined the fray.
Given the dire circumstances, the strategy hadn't been discussed verbally; a mere exchange of glances had sufficed. And that was enough. The heroes—led by Abel, Rachel, and Shail—lowered their stances to reduce air resistance. The hands gripping their armaments trembled violently.
Abel raised her hand to shield herself against the squall. Through the gaps between her fingers, she caught sight of Kang Geomma, his hair turned stark white.
“Geomma.”
He was the man who had always been on her side.
Which was why she had forgotten—forgotten what it truly meant to face Kang Geomma not as an ally, but as an opponent.
Suddenly, Abel and Rachel remembered. Back in their cadet days, when the Heaven Class was opened and they had engaged in subspace sparring with Kang Geomma, they had faced the true Sword Demon.
What they faced now was far beyond that. They could simply feel it: even the dimensions of the universe could not bind Kang Geomma. His very existence was an absurdity, a paranormal phenomenon in human form.
RUUUUMBLE! CRASH!
The world shrieked continuously, as if unable to bear his presence.
Pee-r-r-r-i-k!
Speed Weapon blew his recorder until his lips nearly burst, casting a buff of swiftness. Drawing a spiraling trajectory that even Warrior-rank heroes struggled to track with their eyes, the trio closed in on Kang Geomma. One wrong move, and their bodies would explode into pulverized flesh.
Only because it’s him...
Kang Geomma observed each face with indifferent eyes. It was an unhurried gaze that rendered the extreme speed of Metatron, Valerion, and Leon entirely meaningless. It was a look that made onlookers uncertain whether he even possessed reason anymore.
Kang Geomma slowly shifted his body. Afterimages flickered briefly before stretching sideways and vanishing.
“...!”
“...!”
“...!”
The lush forest in Metatron's field of vision suddenly warped sideways. Charging straight ahead, he was abruptly shoved sideways. Glancing out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kang Geomma grabbing his flank and shoving him aside. The concussion scrambled his mind, numbing the pain spreading through his body.
Leon and Valerion fared no better. Kang Geomma’s figure multiplied into several shadows. Utilizing spatial warp alongside clone creation, he simultaneously knocked all three of them out of the frontline.
Damn it.
Leon’s head spun.
BOOM, BOOM, BOOM!
His body relentlessly snapped trees as he was hurtled away from the front lines. The scenery blurred past like an impossible illusion. It felt violently surreal.
He had to snap out of it. He couldn't just dismiss this as surreal. He bit down hard on the inside of his cheek to anchor himself back to reality.
This isn't a subjugation.
It was a rescue.
To pull a friend out of the mire, he had to become ruthless. Throw away any pathetic half-measures!
Is he someone you can afford to hold back against, Leon?!
Desperately, Leon raised Balmung. Black and white aura entwined around the blade. Harnessing the totality of good and evil, he thrust straight toward Kang Geomma's clone.
The clone evaporated into particles. Leon kicked off a giant tree. Coiling like a spring, he propelled himself off the trunk. Not only was the tree he launched from completely obliterated, but the land behind it shattered in a fan shape, creating a matching arch of spray across the ocean beyond.
At that same moment—
As he was pushed back, Valerion's eyes flashed fiercely. His human skin cracked like an eggshell, revealing his true draconic flesh beneath.
“━━━━━━━!”
Hellfire blazed within the Dragon Lord's throat.
Breath.
□□□□□□□□□□□□-!
A trajectory of pure beam energy pierced through Yggdrasil. He fired once more, but Kang Geomma interposed his Sashimi knife, deflecting its path. The twisted miracle of a Breath swept across the island in a massive concentric arc, shearing the Vast Forest diagonally. At this point, the Dragon Clan shed their human disguises, transforming fully into dragons to assist their Lord.
They rotated their necks like windmills as they spewed flames, aiming to clear away the forest obscuring their vision. Regrettable as it was, it was an unavoidable choice to increase their chances of victory. Trees were felled and swallowed by fire. The World Tree, Yggdrasil, seemed to gaze down at the scene with a sorrowful air.
The Rabbit Mask Villain barely managed to raise her eyes. The reality before her was best described as a living hell. The sky burned bright crimson under the inferno's influence.
Countless beams of light shot forth in chaotic intertwining paths toward Kang Geomma. It was godspeed executed with such intensity that merely watching it caused a stabbing pain in the corneas.
Yet Kang Geomma moved even faster. He parried with his Sashimi knife or shoved them away with his body. He seemed not to have completely lost his mind yet, given that he refrained from inflicting serious wounds where possible. To the villain, that was even more baffling.
After all, suppression was far harder than killing. The Heavenly Sword, Kang Geomma, single-handedly blocked the combined assaults of all species present. Every attack possessed enough power to easily annihilate a small village. Leaving aside its sheer destruction, the velocity of the attacks was absurdly irregular in flight time.
The Hero swung Balmung so rapidly that his sword trajectories resembled a barrier. Even as Metatron rained down punch barrages near the clouds, the shockwaves made her flesh tremble as she lay prostrate. Around Valerion and the Dragon Clan, various geometric magic circles materialized—spells of the highest order.
Yet against Kang Geomma, none of it saw the light of day. Each attempt was derailed time and again by a first strike, a second strike, a third strike.
“W-what kind of monster did we pick a fight with...”
It was a belated regret. Mid-flight, Kang Geomma spotted her. The mere weight of his gaze felt like it would induce a heart attack. The villain tried to crawl away to escape, but a rain of Sashimi knives slammed into her back.
BOOM-BOOM-BOOM-BOOM!
“AAAARRRRGH!”
A high-pitched scream echoed. Her trembling fingertips went limp. As she died, a thought crossed her mind: I’ll respawn in a few minutes anyway... A life where rerolling was an option was truly harsh.
ROAR!
Everyone poured forth their combined strength as one. The scale of the offensive was colossal, its aftermath equally intense. Baleful stars swept over the island, scorching it into vast desolation. It was beyond astonishing—it was utterly gruesome.
BZZZZT, CRACKLE!
Clouds violently collided. The sky tore open. Immediately after, Sashimi knives imbued with lightning energy bombarded the ground. Mushroom clouds bloomed over the ocean—proof that a single strike rivaled a tactical nuclear warhead.
SWOOOOOSH.
A wall of sea surged from afar.
A tsunami. A real tsunami. And with no blind spots—approaching from all directions. A raging ocean swooped in with the sole purpose of swallowing Avalon Island whole.
RUMBLE, CRASH!
A tidal wave accompanied by earthquakes. The sky turned a deep, complete red. A desolate landscape framed as if against a cosmic canvas of absolute chaos.
It felt like witnessing the downfall of the mystical island of Avalon in real time. Abel could no longer stand by. She drew Nothung and shouted to Rachel.
“Rachel!”
“On it!”
Abel perched feline-light upon the blade of the Sky-Piercing Halberd. Wingless humans found their own ways to fly.
WHOOSH!
The Sky-Piercing Halberd whipped up a whirlwind. Rachel swung it, maximizing its rotational force to the absolute limit. The moment it reached its apex, Abel launched off like a missile.
Kang Geomma’s face grew near, as if about to be etched directly into her golden eyes.
Abel pulled her shoulder back fully.
“I will...”
Nothung sliced through the air.
“...never leave you alone.”
And then, it collided with the Sashimi knife, erupting into a violent screech.
KABOOOOOOOOOM!