Atla Raid (4)
Before long, a massive island rose into view in the distance.
Anyone could tell it was Jeju Island.
Its sheer size alone was unmistakable, but the familiar tower thrusting skyward from the island’s center left no room for doubt.
The tower on Jeju sits right at the summit of Hallasan, doesn’t it?
It was the absolute worst possible location.
Of all places to drop, why the top of a mountain?
Kuuung!
Pungjo settled onto a suitable clearing near the shoreline.
Si-woon had wanted to fly straight to the tower itself, but that was impossible. There was no telling whether a Ranker had nested atop Hallasan. There was no point inviting unnecessary conflict by trespassing on someone’s territory.
In the end, they would have to climb the mountain from the very bottom.
“What a pain.”
As Hyun Si-woon grumbled, Ha-wol scolded him.
“Think of it as a blessing. You still need to train the Moon Spirit Steps, do you not? Practice the Swimming Step the entire way up and erase your presence.”
She wasn’t wrong.
The Swimming Step was both the first footwork and the core of the Moon Spirit Steps.
The Moon Spirit Steps, the fundamental movement art of the Moon Spirit Divine Art, were divided into three stages:
First Step: the Swimming Step.
Second Step: the Crescent Moon Step.
Third Step: the Moon Spirit Step.
Hyun Si-woon was currently drilling the Swimming Step; he had only tasted the Crescent Moon Step so far.
“Given that you have reached the Heart Lake stage, your sense for reading the flow of your surroundings should be incomparably sharper than before. Use that fully. You are already proficient in the Silent Step that erases sound and the Afterimage Step that leaves residual shadows. Now it is time to master the New Moon Step, melting into darkness like a waning moon.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
Si-woon answered half-heartedly and began ascending the mountain.
Truthfully, he would rather have practiced the next stage—the Crescent Moon Step—than the Swimming Step. The sensation of Void Stepping, treading upon empty air, was still precarious, and that thrill was addictive.
But Ha-wol was right: foundations mattered more. Only when the base was perfected could higher realms be stacked upon it.
“Pungjo, hold position here. I’ll be back once the event’s over.”
“Kii-ru-ru-ru!”
Hearing Pungjo’s reply, Hyun Si-woon sprinted uphill.
His steps were never hurried. Roughly five days remained until the raid. There was no need to rush.
Had he climbed about halfway up?
A noisy clamor reached him, and a vast encampment came into view.
Hundreds of tents stood packed tightly together, campfires burning here and there.
This part’s nice, at least.
A faint smile touched Si-woon’s lips.
In other regions where towers had risen inside cities, climbers tended to scatter into abandoned buildings and alleys, each looking out only for themselves. The open space made the distance between people just as wide.
Here it was different.
The harsh environment of Hallasan had paradoxically forced people together. Climbing routes and major water sources were limited; naturally the climbers had pitched their tents as neighbors and formed one enormous community.
Jeju has its own strengths, I guess.
Perhaps it was also the effect of Owl’s announcement. By rough estimate there were well over a thousand people.
Just as Si-woon began climbing the trail at a leisurely pace, a middle-aged man who had been watching him waved.
“Hey there, young fellow. Face I don’t recognize—come for the event, have ya?”
The thick dialect was warm and rustic.
“Then you came to catch that turtle this time, eh? Come over this way and rest with us. Better to be many than alone. We’ll make room for one more.”
Other climbers nearby nodded and chimed in.
“That’s right. There’s an open spot next to those tents over there.”
“Normally we’d take TC, but since even the Wandering Merchant’s helping out, just stay with us.”
Warmth came before wariness.
Hyun Si-woon offered a light smile at their kindness and politely shook his head.
“I appreciate the thought, but my party is waiting higher up.”
“That so? Well, if you insist, can’t be helped. Anytime things get rough, come on down. Our hospitality ain’t stingy.”
The middle-aged man didn’t press further and turned away cleanly.
Si-woon left the trail entirely and slipped into an isolated stretch of mountain.
I need to practice the spirits anyway.
On a rugged slope, atop a peak ringed by cliffs on every side, Hyun Si-woon immediately drew out the Covenant of the Spirit King.
Ping, ping, ping, ping!
He drew and released the string four times.
Summoning the low-rank fire spirit ‘Kasa’.
Summoning the low-rank water spirit ‘Undine’.
Summoning the low-rank earth spirit ‘Gnome’.
Summoning the low-rank wind spirit ‘Sylph’.
Cute little things.
Called all at once, they flitted about in high spirits.
The Moon Spirit Divine Art is good, but for a while I should get used to handling the spirits. First, let’s build a temporary shelter.
How to go about it?
First, before giving any command, he painted a clear image of the finished cave-home in his mind.
For that… the rock cleft over there needed to be a little wider.
“Gnome.”
“Nong?”
The squat spirit waved its short arms and legs.
“Think you can manage?”
“No-ong, nong~!”
It flew straight for the cliff.
At the same moment a bizarre phenomenon began.
The instant Gnome’s tiny hands touched the stone, the hard granite softened like wet clay.
And then—
“Hmm?”
Hyun Si-woon felt a faint trickle of energy—his internal power—leaving his dantian. The more force Gnome exerted, the more his own internal energy was consumed through their linked sense.
Oh.
He had just learned something important.
The power of the spirits might scale directly with my internal energy.
Kurrung! Kurrurrung!
Gnome, clearly delighted, began kneading the softened cliff face. A cave began taking proper shape in the rock wall.
“Hmm.”
Watching, Ha-wol murmured with interest.
“The more I see it, the more wondrous this ability becomes. In this lady’s world, such a feat would demand immense martial power… How can something only an immortal should manage be done so easily?”
Next Kasa moved.
“Kyaaaa!”
From Si-woon’s shoulder the fire spirit darted into the cave.
Fwoooosh!
The searing flames Kasa breathed swept across the clay-like walls.
Hissss—!
Moisture evaporated and the walls hardened in an instant, turning smooth and firm like well-fired porcelain. Even the uneven floor was leveled and polished by a single pass of the flames. Every insect inside died in the process.
“Shall we try water too?”
“Kyarut!”
This time Undine slipped inside and gestured. Clear streams of water began bubbling up from cracks in the rock. The water followed carved grooves in the floor and gathered into a small pool on one side. In moments a natural water source and washbasin were complete.
Undine did not stop there; she used the current to wash every speck of dust and stone powder from the cave and flush it outside.
Cleaning service too—nice!
On a roll, Si-woon tried Sylph as well.
“Ihihit!”
When the wind spirit beat its wings, a refreshing breeze circulated through the interior, banishing every trace of dampness and filling the space with fresh air. The usual mustiness of a cave was gone without a trace.
In the blink of an eye a temporary residence stood finished.
“….”
Hyun Si-woon stared at the result, briefly lost for words. He had imagined it would work, but he had never expected it to turn out this clean. Flat floor, smooth walls, flowing water, crisp air… and that was not all. While using the spirits, he felt their bond deepen another notch.
The communion will matter too.
With the spirits there was no need for complex language. Simply imagining was enough; they grasped his intent and shaped the result. The deeper the bond, the more precise that shaping would become.
“Heavens, remarkable.”
Ha-wol was impressed as well.
“I thought you would merely smash some rocks and throw up a shack, yet you built an entire stone chamber.”
Instinctively she understood: not every spirit-handler could do what Hyun Si-woon had just done.
Overwhelming sense.
Ha-wol saw straight through to his essence. A perception on a different plane from ordinary people. That razor-sharp sense was abnormally amplifying the communion channel with the spirits.
He was not simply tossing vague images. Hyun Si-woon was painting the structure, texture, temperature—even the very flow of air—of the result he wanted in extreme detail, then loading that image onto his qi and transmitting it directly to the spirits. Like an architect sending over blueprints. That was why the tiny spirits moved with such perfection.
“Tsk. This rascal never does anything the ordinary way.”
Ha-wol clicked her tongue yet made no effort to hide the smile on her lips. Even spirit arts he grafted onto his own martial path and wrung efficiency beyond imagination out of them. That uncanny talent was precisely her disciple, Hyun Si-woon.
Time flowed swiftly.
Hyun Si-woon’s daily routine was brutally simple: training and rest, nothing more.
By day he polished the New Moon Step of the Moon Spirit Steps, immersing himself in the erasure of presence. By night he communed with the four spirits, researching how to draw their power to the absolute limit. He poured himself into those two things alone.
Before sleep he checked the community or exchanged letters with his members…
★Wandering Merchant★’s affairs were being handled excellently by Park Du-shik. Even while frantically coordinating with Yoo Jin-hyeok for intelligence and supplying goods, the reports arrived without fail.
The members, for their part, had finished their preparations smoothly in their respective locations. Some had entered the control of large guilds; others, like Si-woon himself, waited in silence for the moment.
Their goal was singular.
The instant the raid began, snatch first place in contribution with maximum efficiency.
And at last, five days passed.
In 10 seconds, the event will begin.
Only climbers may participate in this event.
10.
9.
8.
As the countdown began, the sky darkened, as though something immense had blotted out the sun.
Kugugugugugung!
The earth trembled; the sea heaved. From the encampment below, climbers’ cries of shock drifted up faintly.
7.
6.
5.
Gulp.
Hyun Si-woon likewise gripped the Formless Sword and swallowed dryly. To claim he felt no tension before an overwhelming event he had never experienced would have been a lie.
4.
3.
2.
At last the countdown ended.
1.
Kurrurrung!
In that instant the earth screamed.
The entirety of Hallasan shook as though in an earthquake. Climbers lost their balance and tumbled across the ground; massive landslides roared down the mountainside from every direction.
“W-what the hell?!”
“It’s an earthquake!”
But it was no mere earthquake.
At the summit, directly beneath the tower, the ground began to swell like a living thing. Soil and boulders poured away; thousand-year-old trees were shredded like paper.
And at last—
“Kiaaaaaaaaaaah!”
Something vast tore through the earth and rose, carrying the mountain upon its shell like a burden. A turtle so enormous it seemed ready to swallow an entire island whole. Upon its shell still lay the soil and forest that moments earlier had been part of Hallasan, making it look like a living mountain range.
Atla reared its massive body like a newly awakened god. Its eyes, glowing red like molten lava, fixed steadily upon the Tower of Despair that stabbed upward from the peak.
“Gwoooooooooh!”
A roar packed with pure enmity toward the tower.
The raid had begun.