Chapter 210
Chapter 210
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 210
Chapter Title: ACT.40 The Phoenix's Head, Xie (4)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
“W-What’s going on?”
Xie clutched her chest in surprise.
She reacted like a child caught by their parents doing something wrong.
“Came back for something I forgot.”
“You left something behind?”
I nodded.
Xie looked around, puzzled.
“All you’ve done since coming here is fight. What could you have possibly left behind…?”
“You surrendered. That means you have something to pay.”
“What?”
She looked dumbfounded.
Xie narrowed her eyes.
“There are only four of you and a thousand of us. Do you want to have a proper fight?”
“But you know it won’t be easy, which is why you stopped your guild members earlier, right? You called yourself a general or whatever. You wouldn’t go back on your word after losing a duel, would you?”
“Urgh…”
Speechless, Xie wore a troubled expression.
“What do you want?”
Her deliberation didn’t last long.
She nodded as if she had no choice.
I already knew what I wanted.
If Xie was truly a member of Salvatio and knew a lot about the game…
…then she must have brought the things I was thinking of.
“This isn’t a good place to talk.”
“…Follow me.”
Xie started walking toward her tent, and I naturally followed behind her.
The twins, perhaps scared by the glares from the other players, stuck close to me.
Jeong Ha-yeon, who had been following at a slight distance, carefully approached and asked in a voice only I could hear.
“Se-hyeon-ssi. Can we trust what she’s saying?”
I glanced at Xie walking ahead and answered.
“I don’t.”
“Then…?”
“We’re just using it as a reference.”
Information must be carefully selected.
When you obtain any information, it’s best to verify whether it’s true or not before accepting it.
You shouldn’t just believe anything; that was true even before the world changed.
“We should be able to talk here, right?”
As soon as we entered the tent, Xie crossed her arms and turned to me.
“What do you want?”
“What do you think?”
I approached Xie, a slight smirk playing on my lips.
At that, Xie flinched, her lips twitching.
“W-What is it? You’re not… surely…”
“That ‘surely’ is right on the money.”
“Wait, hold on! I’m still just a groom candidate, not your actual groom…!”
I walked past the strangely blushing Xie and opened the drawer behind her.
All sorts of rare items were laid out inside.
All of them were useful for taking on the ‘Disaster of Defiance.’
Just as I thought.
They had planned to conquer the Disaster of Defiance while they were in Korea.
The plan must have been to step in and defeat the disaster after it had ravaged Korea to some extent.
“You, wha, what…”
“Why is your face so red?”
“Eek! Just close that drawer!”
“Can’t do that. This is what I want.”
Xie made a strange noise, strode over, and tried to close the drawer.
But I grabbed her arm, stopping her. She struggled in vain, unable to move.
‘This is?’
My eyes lit up as I spotted a leaf with a deep, blood-red hue.
Jeokgwicho?
This girl, she even brought this?
“Tch.”
“Tch?”
“N-No. You misheard. I forgot my toothbrush. You have to take special care of your teeth.”
Xie quickly forced a smile and tried to cover it up.
She’s terrible at lying.
I chuckled and took the Jeokgwicho.
“W-Why are you taking that!?”
“I told you. There’s something I want.”
“I never said I’d give it to you!”
“Getting off with just this one item is a good deal for you.”
Jeokgwicho is an extremely rare medicinal herb.
True to its name, it contains a lot of yang energy and is mainly used for detoxification.
But the true value of Jeokgwicho was not in consuming it, but in ‘using’ it.
“I’ll let you off with just this, so you guys should go back to China.”
“We can’t do that. The losses would be too great if we returned like this.”
“Is it because of Shaolin?”
“Do you have any idea how much it costs to transport 1,000 people on a private plane? Well, there’s that, and… that bastard Seon Woo-jin. If I see him, I’ll kill him for sure.”
Xie gritted her teeth.
It was just as Seon Woo-jin had feared.
I recalled Seon Woo-jin’s pale face and swallowed a laugh.
“Then let’s do this. You guys won’t be able to find Seon Woo-jin anyway.”
“How?”
“I’ll capture and hand over Seon Woo-jin. However, it’s difficult for me to catch him right now, so after you return to China, I’ll send him over with a teleporter.”
“…”
“Seon Woo-jin was originally one of your guild members, wasn’t he?”
There was one reason I was surprised when Seon Woo-jin said he had evidence.
It was because the one who stole it was none other than Seon Woo-jin himself.
Normally, he would have been the first to try and destroy the evidence, so it was unexpected that he had secured it instead.
He probably had all the evidence except for the part that identified him as the thief.
‘Even if Bonghwang revealed that Seon Woo-jin was the culprit, he could easily spin the narrative.’
If he had claimed I was the culprit from the start, I wouldn’t have let it slide.
I wanted to live, too.
And even though I am the culprit, didn’t I eventually come to confess on my own?
If you appeal to emotion like that, the positive feeling from providing evidence to solve the problem would largely offset the negative feeling of being the culprit.
That’s why Seon Woo-jin asked me to stop Bonghwang, hoping we would destroy each other.
To eliminate both the one who knew his secret and the ones who were chasing him.
‘Pathetic.’
I twisted my lips.
A bat-like bastard.
No word suited Seon Woo-jin better.
‘A bat deserves a bat’s ending.’
The fate of a fugitive, cast out and unable to belong anywhere.
And even that would be a happy ending for him.
My promise to Seon Woo-jin?
I didn’t break it.
I drove off Bonghwang, just as he asked.
What happens after that is none of my business.
“…How do you know where Seon Woo-jin is?”
“Shaolin.”
“What?”
Xie’s face contorted.
“You mean to tell me Shaolin is picking a fight with us because of that guy?”
“He told me he’d make both sides fight and asked me to stop you.”
“That son of a bitch finally… I knew he was a bat, but I never thought he’d go this far.”
After fuming for a while, Xie looked me straight in the eye and said.
“Alright. We’ll withdraw for now. Don’t forget your promise.”
“Don’t worry. I don’t like leaving guys like that alone either. Oh, and the Guardian Stones that kept breaking should have stopped now, so if you set them up again, the undead will retreat.”
“That’s a relief.”
It was a result where both sides got what they wanted.
I was already in a position to gain a one-sided advantage, while Bonghwang, who could only have lost, must have breathed a sigh of relief now that an important issue was resolved.
‘If Bonghwang and Shaolin return to China like this, and the Song of the Dead also stops, I can finally catch a break.’
As things went according to plan, I began to relax a little.
If Jun Bo-ra and Hwang Chan-jin do their parts and join up, we can defeat the Disaster of Defiance with minimal casualties.
So, until then, my job is…
‘…to hold back the Disaster of Defiance.’
*Rumble…*
The sky turned black, and the sound of something churning echoed.
The sky was already gloomy, as if covered by dark clouds due to the Song of the Dead and the rituals, but this was on another level.
Jo Min-woo’s mouth fell open as he muttered blankly.
“What is that…?”
Everything around us was perfectly visible, yet the sky was as dark as a starless night.
Dammit. This timing is even faster than I expected.
*Ruuuumble…*
The calm waters of the West Sea shot up toward the sky like a waterspout, gradually turning black.
In an instant, everything became murky.
*Thud. Splat.*
It could no longer be called a sea.
The West Sea, now nothing but black mud, hinted that something extraordinary was about to happen.
“Ah, ahh…”
Jo Min-ah gripped my sleeve tightly.
She was trembling so hard I could feel the vibrations.
This was probably the first time she had felt the mana of a proper disaster.
“O-Oppa. That, it’s dangerous. It’s dangerous…!”
I quietly placed a hand on Jo Min-ah’s shoulder.
As I gently channeled my mana into her, I could feel her trembling gradually subside.
This was the mana of a ‘God’-class entity.
Even if it was sealed and only an incarnation, not the main body, there was no way Jo Min-ah, who was more sensitive to mana than others, could be fine after feeling such power with her entire being.
Jeong Ha-yeon also called out to me, her voice stiff.
“Se-hyeon-ssi.”
“It’s coming.”
From the middle of the West Sea, the black mud surged high into the air.
The mass that should have fallen under the pull of gravity simply stopped, showing no sign of coming down.
*Splat.*
Instead, from that state, a pair of giant wings made of mud unfurled.
[Grooooaaaaaar!!!]
The monster that had appeared let out a deafening roar, as if to announce that this was just the beginning.
Seeing it in reality was even more overwhelming.
‘Was it about 30km from the West Sea to the western residential area?’
It was so massive that it was visible even from here, nearly 30km away, which in a way made sense.
The sound of teeth chattering reached my ears clearly.
Jo Min-ah was in very bad shape.
At this rate, it didn’t seem like she’d be able to contribute to the disaster subjugation.
“W-What is that!?”
“What kind of monster is that…!”
The Bonghwang Guild, which had been preparing to leave Korea, also fell into a panic at the sight of the disaster and started running around in confusion.
Xie was not much different.
“The Disaster of Defiance…?! Why is it here already!?”
“Major boss-level entities have appeared earlier than in the original game before. This isn’t entirely unexpected.”
At this point, it was safe to assume that everything would appear earlier.
Did my actions really cause this?
‘…No, that’s not important.’
If a disaster appears, I’ll defeat it.
That’s all.
Besides that, there’s no other way to stop the apocalypse anyway.
“X-Xie-nim! The undead are swarming again!”
“We set up the Guardian Stones! Did they break again?”
“No! They’re ignoring the Guardian Stones and charging!!”
The master of the power that created the undead had manifested, so there was no way mere Guardian Stones could stop them.
Normally, they would have had some effect, but…
‘Would the Disaster of Defiance be any different?’
If it appeared stronger than in the original game, I expected it would make up for such differences.
I shifted my gaze to Xie, who was biting her nails.
“Since you can’t go back anyway, it seems like a good idea to help with the subjugation.”
“…”
“I’d hope you’re not stupid enough to stick to your original plan of letting that thing sweep through Korea before you hunt it. The first ones it’ll meet before reaching the residential area are you, Bonghwang, and Shaolin.”
“W-Who said I was thinking that?”
Xie’s lips twitched as she denied it.
When a common enemy appears, humans tend to unite, even if they were at each other’s throats just moments before.
Since Seon Woo-jin had already set up a temporary friendly relationship with Shaolin, if I could just get Bonghwang on board, there would at least be no infighting among people.
The story would change if the Order or unofficial guilds took advantage of this chaos, but Han Hyeok-jun was always keeping an eye on the Order, and the unofficial guilds would more likely help than hinder.
“Ah, Hyung. Come to think of it…”
Jo Min-woo suddenly called out to me as if he’d remembered something, but then he just mumbled, not finishing his sentence.
He had a look on his face as if debating whether to say it or not.
I felt like I had to ask, so I pressed him.
“What is it?”
“Well… Min-ah. She once annihilated an undead in the residential area.”
“Annihilated an undead? You mean she ignored its immortality?”
“Y-Yes. Lee Seong-chan-hyung appeared as an undead, and Min-ah burned him away, as if erasing his very existence.”
The moment he mentioned Lee Seong-chan, I knew how Jo Min-ah had done it.
‘Soul Flame.’
Dammit.
I was worried about that trait from the moment she got it.
It was a mistake to think she wouldn’t have to use it for a while.
“Jeong Ha-yeon-ssi. Please take the twins and return to the residential area. And you must never let Min-ah use that power again.”
“What? Isn’t it a good thing to have that power?”
“Absolutely do not let her use it. If she even tries, you have to grab her and stop her.”
When I spoke with force in my eyes, Jeong Ha-yeon didn’t ask any more questions.
Jo Min-ah looked at me with an anxious face, but when I gave her a small smile, her expression eased as if she was reassured.
After buying a warp scroll from the shop and sending the three of them quickly to the residential area, Xie approached as if she had been waiting.
“Let’s say we form a united front against the undead. What about the other thing?”
“Fighting the undead is meaningless anyway.”
Ordinary players have no way to deal with immortality.
Unless there were a few S-rank players with barrier or sealing-type powers.
“Then?”
“To catch a tiger, you have to enter the tiger’s den.”