Chapter 68
Chapter 68
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 68
Chapter Title: A Day's Deal (4)
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“Min-ah, I’m counting on you!”
“Yes!”
Jo Min-ah, who was already waiting on top of the wall, answered energetically.
As long as Jo Min-ah was here, I didn't have to worry about burning the monsters' corpses.
Fire-based abilities were quite common, after all.
This is a defense game.
Powerful enemies don't swarm you from the first wave. It just gets harder over time due to various conditions.
“Jeon Do-jin-nim! Please take command for a moment!”
“Understood!”
Jo Min-ah and Jeon Do-jin.
With these two, we could hold out for a while without any casualties.
After giving a simple order, I immediately moved to where the former Rulers were imprisoned.
Jun Bo-ra, who was already there, had just freed the three of them. As soon as Yoo Seong-hoon saw me, his face crumpled, and he was about to charge, but he stopped immediately upon seeing Kim Ji-hyeon.
“Kim Se-hyeon!”
Park Seong-woo flapped his white coat as if he had been waiting for this very moment.
But before the machines hidden under his coat could be revealed…
“Don't act rashly.”
He was restrained by Lee Seon-yul and Kim Ji-hyeon, who had moved in an instant.
Kim Ji-hyeon was in front of him, and Lee Seon-yul was behind him, both holding their swords at a distance where a slight push would be enough to pierce him.
Jun Bo-ra shrugged.
“It's not like you can win against them anyway. You've fought them, so you should know, right?”
“...Tch.”
Park Seong-woo bit his lip in frustration, then raised his arms and knelt.
If he had acted out any further, Kim Ji-hyeon would have taken his head off right then and there.
Yoo Seong-hoon and Kim Tae-woo were quick to catch on and remained silent.
Not that their hostility had disappeared, though.
“That bell from earlier... don't tell me it was *that*?”
“Yeah. It's started.”
“Damn it... Kim Se-hyeon, what are you going to do now!? If the Rulers were still around, we could've responded easily, but thanks to you, we have to face all those things without any buffs!”
Yoo Seong-hoon shouted, unable to hide his anxiety.
Kim Tae-woo seemed to agree, slowly nodding his head.
Then, Hwang Chan-jin dismissed it with a single word.
“It's possible.”
“What?”
“You're talking without knowing anything.”
Jun Bo-ra said with a snort.
“If we don't permanently delete the Ruler trait, the devil who's been raking in coins will just keep interfering and making things harder. You really think being a Ruler is a good thing? Knowing a little is the most dangerous thing.”
“It can't be helped. People try to understand things based on their own cognitive framework.”
“Wh-what are you talking about?”
“Forget it.”
I had no intention of kindly explaining it to someone who knew nothing more.
When I took on a tone that suggested I didn't want to tell him, Yoo Seong-hoon's eyebrows twitched, but he could only fume inwardly and didn't take any action.
“Then let's do as we discussed. Jun Bo-ra, if you would.”
“Yeah, yeah, I got it. I'll be collecting on this debt, you know.”
“If you don't want to clear the chapter, then don't.”
“Hey, you bastard! I'll do it! I'm doing it!”
Using teleport, she moved the former Rulers to the sectors they were originally in charge of.
Since Jun Bo-ra had to help me and would be leaving her post, Lee Seon-yul would take the east, where she was originally stationed.
And Kim Ji-hyeon agreed to take the north. I would also be leaving my position to be part of the detached unit.
Even with Jeon Do-jin there, it was the most vulnerable area due to the aftermath of the war, so we had to invest a lot of our forces there.
The members of the detached unit were me, Hwang Chan-jin, Han Hyeok-jun, and Jun Bo-ra.
And joining us, Jo Min-ah.
Since a lot of our strong fighters would be leaving, we had to get everything we could done here quickly before we departed.
Each member of the detached unit decided to handle their personal affairs while fending off the monsters, and we would regroup in a few hours.
I didn't have much time either if I wanted to put my plans into action.
‘It'll get a bit easier once the guilds return.’
I let out a long sigh.
It wasn't long until that chapter.
What felt like a short time in the game felt so long now that it was reality.
‘By the way, what's Hwang Chan-jin's basis for so firmly believing that Jun Bo-ra is not the Strategy King?’
I'm certain because I am the Strategy King, but that can't be the case for Hwang Chan-jin.
Hwang Chan-jin knows something.
He's openly showing it, but Jun Bo-ra doesn't seem to care much.
Hwang Chan-jin and Jun Bo-ra.
They're important figures, and their cooperation would be a great help, but it's just as hard to know what they're truly thinking.
Jun Bo-ra is the easier one to deal with. The problem is Hwang Chan-jin.
He must have some kind of goal, but it's hard to figure out exactly what it is.
I clicked my tongue softly and opened the shop.
[Hello, we meet again! How may I help you?]
“Chronos's Deal. You have it, right?”
[Pardon? A deal with *him*?]
“The pocket watch-shaped item. The one for 5,000 coins.”
[Ah! I remember now. I'll pull it up for you right away.]
The shop's scroll went down on its own and stopped at the desired item.
Chronos's Deal.
According to the original strategy, there's no need to use this.
But I had a strange certainty that I would have a reason to use it.
[5,000 coins have been paid.]
[You have acquired the item, 'Chronos's Deal'.]
Tucking the pocket watch into my clothes, I curled my lips into a smile.
The 5,000 coins the devil allowed me.
He probably has no idea what consequences that will bring.
***
“Has it finally quieted down…?”
Park Seong-woo, who was in charge of the west, stretched his back and sighed as if he were about to die.
Looking down from the wall, the monsters' corpses were piled up like mountains.
Park Seong-woo, who had chuckled, thinking he'd never seen them piled this high, suddenly felt a sense of unease.
Why had he never seen monster corpses pile up like this before?
It seemed Park Seong-woo wasn't the only one who felt this unease, as others were discussing the same topic.
“Huh? Wait a minute. Don't monster corpses usually disappear naturally after some time?”
“Why haven't they disappeared even after a few hours…”
*Twitch.*
A corpse moves.
At first, people tried to pretend it was nothing, that they had seen it wrong, but when one corpse slowly began to rise, they fell completely silent.
A dreadful silence fell over them.
Only then did Park Seong-woo recall what Kim Se-hyeon had said.
‘Let me tell you something in advance. Don't get happy just because you've stopped the monsters. Burn every last one you kill.’
At the time, he had dismissed it as some scientifically erroneous nonsense.
Hadn't it been proven countless times?
That monsters disappear a certain amount of time after death.
Without a single counterexample, it was as good as a confirmed fact.
That's what Park Seong-woo had believed.
“Th-the corpses are getting back up... Aaargh!?”
“Zombies! The monsters have turned into zombies and are moving again!!”
“Th-that can't be…!”
And so, Park Seong-woo couldn't shake the feeling of having been struck hard on the head.
He had to admit what he had to admit.
A counterexample existed.
He just hadn't witnessed it, and it hadn't been revealed to the world until now.
Biting his lip, Park Seong-woo stood up and prepared to fight again.
“Damn it…!”
***
“Watch that one closely.”
At my words, the people who had come up to the wall gulped and watched the corpse of the Death Bite.
Even though it had been quite a while since its neck was severed, literally splitting it in two, and even though there was no more blood to spill.
The monster's carcass remained, not disappearing.
It was a grotesque sight just to look at, but this kind of thing had to be seen firsthand to be truly felt.
*Srrk.*
Something like mycelium grew from the severed surfaces, connecting the head and body.
It was restored so cleanly that not even a suture line was visible, as if it had never been cut. Then, just as it had when it was alive, it shot up and began to growl lowly at the people.
“Hic.”
Someone made a sound like the air being forced out of their lungs.
Something that was clearly dead had come back to life.
Was there anything that could incite fear more easily than that?
“I-is it a... zombie?”
Jo Min-ah asked cautiously, her voice filled with fear.
It wasn't a loud voice, but it seemed to echo around, and many people trembled.
Even if they had fantasy-like powers, they were all ordinary people until recently.
No matter that they could defeat it, they couldn't help but feel a certain amount of fear.
“Now it really feels like an apocalypse.”
“Of course, an apocalypse needs zombies!”
“…Aren't you two a little too relaxed?”
On the other hand, Jeong Ha-yeon and Cha Eun-ha nodded as if they were satisfied, to which Jo Min-woo gave a bitter smile.
“I've always liked zombie movies.”
“Oh? Me too. I watched one every weekend. My master said he hated them, but I forced him to watch with me.”
I glanced over at Jeon Do-jin.
In that short time, Jeon Do-jin's face seemed to have aged several years.
…He's been through a lot.
“But even if you like zombie movies, isn't it scary for something like this to happen in real life?”
“In zombie movies, people usually don't have the power to fight back. But we have fantasy-like powers. And…”
“Anyway, the important thing is the flower on its head.”
I clapped my hands, bringing the slightly derailed conversation back on track.
Besides, people were mistaken about something from the start.
“Actually, that isn't a zombie. If you had to classify it, it's closer to a cordyceps.”
“Huh?”
The two who had been excited about zombies made strange faces.
“A plant is dominating and controlling the body. It controls the living by making them lose their ego, and it simply controls the dead. Rather than a zombie, it's more accurate to call it a pseudo-zombie. The main body is the flower blooming on its head. Simply removing it is usually enough to cure it, but it tends to spread spores around when it senses danger, so getting close is not a good idea. It's also difficult to remove since its roots are embedded in the brain.”
In Han Hyeok-jun's case, I was able to remove it easily by pulling it out because I found it early. But if more than a day has passed, you can't do that.
A single day was enough for the roots to take control of the entire nervous system.
Once that happens, it's incurable.
“A pseudo-zombie caused by a cordyceps? Was that even possible?”
“What's impossible about it? This is a world with monsters and fantasy-like powers.”
At my signal, Jo Min-ah conjured flames and incinerated the entire monster.
She seemed to have gotten quite used to handling flames now.
“Jo Min-woo.”
“Wh-what is it, hyung?”
Jo Min-woo, who had a complicated expression while watching Jo Min-ah use her ability so naturally, answered with a start.
“Are you jealous of Min-ah?”
“…”
Jo Min-woo clamped his mouth shut.
He usually acted tough, vowing to protect Jo Min-ah, but Jo Min-woo was still just a petulant boy, not even out of middle school.
And in that situation, only Jo Min-ah had awakened a powerful ability.
It was obvious what Jo Min-woo was thinking.
“Min-ah is moving forward like that, but I feel like I'm the only one falling behind…”
“There's something else that's right for you. It just wasn't this. In time, you'll naturally awaken to it too.”
“Is that so?”
When I nodded, Jo Min-woo's expression brightened a little.
I wasn't just saying that.
It was a confirmed future.
Even if something went wrong along the way, I would make it happen somehow.
Only then would these two be of great help to me.
“Kim Se-hyeon.”
“You're back. How is it?”
“…Not good. Not at all.”
Right after blocking the first wave, Choi Yeon-soo had moved out with a reconnaissance team.
I had told her not to go too far and just do a simple recon, but even that was enough to make her expression turn grim.
“The scale is unusual. We can't hold out for long. Three or four days at most. Any longer than that and we'll probably…”
She trailed off cautiously, glancing around.
It was an accurate analysis.
The monster waves don't come just once a day, and they don't stick to a schedule.
If people fight without eating or sleeping properly, they'll be worn out in a matter of days.
Meanwhile, the enemies get stronger and come in greater numbers.
Those who had been content in their small bases would meet their end with this event.
I answered nonchalantly.
“It's fine. It'll be over in a day.”
“…What? A day? What do you mean?”
Turning to the bewildered Choi Yeon-soo, I gave her a slight smile.
“Just trust me and follow along.”