Chapter 114
Chapter 114
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 114
Chapter Title: You Said There's Nothing to Exchange?
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"Situations have gotten complicated."
When the Eight O'Clock manager muttered in a grave tone, all the other managers fell silent.
"Would someone mind explaining? We can't just keep dragging our feet like this."
Geon-woo said, looking at the Twelve O'Clock manager.
"Normally, we'd just exclude the uninvited guest. Kill them or kick them out."
"But right now, that's not an option, right? Mind telling me why?"
"The reason is simple. A path out of the Mara Blood has opened while in possession of chaos mana."
The Twelve O'Clock manager's answer was straightforward.
But the implications that could be drawn from it were anything but.
"So you're saying you managers want to escape the Mara Blood too?"
It meant that even these managers—who supposedly maintained some balance by controlling chaos mana emissions—harbored a desire to leave the Mara Blood.
"We've been stuck here for so long that even we don't remember when it started. We, made of chaos mana, can't stay outside the Mara Blood for extended periods."
"Indeed. No matter how long we endure, it's only a few hours at best."
The Six O'Clock manager chimed in agreement with the Twelve O'Clock manager's words.
"That's odd, though. Couldn't you last longer by forming a barrier with chaos mana?"
"Have you tried it? You're only saying that because you haven't."
The Ten O'Clock manager bristled at Geon-woo's words, raising her voice.
"So it doesn't work?"
Geon-woo glanced at the Ten O'Clock manager and asked.
"The explosive nature of chaos mana applies even when forming a barrier. It cancels out and dissipates at an incredible rate."
"We can't stay outside the Mara Blood for long."
"The latest among us to arrive was Malika, and even she's been here for centuries already."
"Unless chaos mana engulfs the entire world, we're not free. And flooding the world with chaos mana is impossible."
The managers spilled out their pent-up thoughts, each adding their piece.
"If the most recent manager, whoever Malika is, arrived hundreds of years ago, then the first one must have been here for thousands of years?"
Geon-woo asked the Twelve O'Clock manager.
"Time has no meaning here, really. This place barely changes with the passage of time."
The Twelve O'Clock manager dodged Geon-woo's question with that vague reply.
"Whatever. That's not my problem anyway. Let's talk about vessels for chaos mana."
Geon-woo swiftly shifted the topic to the managers' primary interest.
He could feel the six managers' gazes intensify.
"You'll see for yourself, but I can't handle chaos mana directly either. So I'm borrowing it from my retainer in a proxy format."
"We're more interested in your retainer who harbors chaos mana—more than you."
The Four O'Clock manager didn't hide his impatience, openly expressing interest in the biotic armor implant living jiangshi.
At those words, Geon-woo summoned one living jiangshi from his tattoo space.
It was a biotic armor implant living jiangshi infused with chaos mana.
"Ooh, chaos mana! Yet it's maintaining its physical form."
"That body could withstand the outside of the Mara Blood without collapsing."
"More than that, the body itself acts as a barrier, preventing clashes between normal mana and chaos mana."
"It's impossible. How can that be? Chaos mana can't coexist with anything in the world."
"But we all know there's already an exception. The land forming the Great Mara Blood is one."
"But that's just the dimensional system intervening. The land here isn't actually different from the outside."
"So you're saying that body containing chaos mana was created by the system?"
"No. There's no reason for the dimensional laws to create something like that."
"Then what is it? That thing?"
"Unknown."
The managers shared their opinions, but arrived at no answers.
A living jiangshi containing chaos mana stood right before them, yet they couldn't figure out how it avoided clashing with the chaos mana.
"No matter how much you stare, you won't figure it out. I tried to grasp the principle myself but eventually gave up."
Geon-woo spoke up once the managers' debate had stalled.
"You don't know?"
The Twelve O'Clock manager asked in a voice thick with irritation.
"Right. It's unknowable. But there's one thing I can be certain of."
"Something you're certain of?"
"What's that?"
The managers' hips fidgeted, sensing Geon-woo had an answer.
"Easter egg."
"What?"
"What's that mean?"
"Surely not something even the dimensional system can't interfere with?"
"No mere sub-dimension, but a higher dimension having something like that..."
"But it's not impossible. Just as there are multiple sub-dimensions, higher dimensions are likely the same. If it's a law from another higher dimension..."
"Then that thing is connected to an entirely different dimension?"
"That might be the most convincing explanation."
The six managers gradually converged on a single theory.
They turned to Geon-woo with eyes questioning if their reasoning was correct.
"Probably right. I possess knowledge from another dimension, and that retainer mastered it. But that's not the whole story."
"Not the whole story?"
"Mastering my other-dimensional knowledge doesn't let you contain chaos mana. Even I, who's mastered it to a higher level than anyone, can't."
"And yet you can't contain chaos mana?"
"Correct."
"Then how?"
"I'm viewing it as a result of three elements combining. One is the knowledge I have. Another is the biotic armor's factor. The last is our race's factor."
"What? Racial factor? Then that's something we can't do anything about!"
"Damn, so it was all a pipe dream?"
"That bastard's toying with us! Dangling something impossible..."
The three elements forming a vessel for chaos mana.
Upon hearing them, the managers erupted in fury.
In the chaos, some even moved to sharply increase their chaos mana emissions.
"Wait, everyone calm down and hear him out. What changes if things get worse here?"
But the managers' outbursts were quelled by the Twelve O'Clock manager's intervention.
"Well, it doesn't really change anything either way."
"No, but we got excited for a moment there. I can barely remember the last time we felt emotions this intense."
"Did we ever? Keh heh heh."
The managers calmed their heightened spirits, trading meaningless jests.
"So your special knowledge, plus the biotic armor's factor and your race's factor, created that vessel?"
The Twelve O'Clock manager pointed at the living jiangshi and asked.
"I'm not entirely sure that's correct, but it was the limit of what I could figure out at my level."
"Hmm. Then..."
The Twelve O'Clock manager's expression darkened.
It was the look of dashed hopes that there might be some method after all.
"But if I enable you to leave the Mara Blood, what do I get out of it?"
Geon-woo asked the manager with an enigmatic expression.
"What? You have a method?"
"Really?"
"You're not daring to toy with us again, are you?"
"What method? Speak up..."
"Quiet!"
Geon-woo's words once more triggered the managers' frenzy, but it was swiftly suppressed by the Twelve O'Clock manager's shout.
"What do you want from us?"
Having subdued the others, the Twelve O'Clock manager asked Geon-woo.
"Why else would I come this far? Obviously because I want something."
"Hmm. Yeah. I think I know what it is, even without you saying."
The Twelve O'Clock manager nodded as if he could guess Geon-woo's desire.
The other managers wore the same expressions.
They all seemed to know what Geon-woo wanted.
"But that seems difficult. I heard you managers can produce chaos mana. And that if the Great Mara Blood residents challenge and reach your positions, they gain that ability too."
"Not wrong. Any resident of the Great Mara Blood who defeats us can take our place."
"True. But that doesn't grant the ability to produce chaos mana."
"Exactly. So it's meaningless. Even if I fulfill your wish, I can't achieve mine."
"Hmm. A way to self-supply chaos mana. That's what you want?"
The Twelve O'Clock manager asked Geon-woo as if confirming what he already knew.
"Yes."
"But if we had such a method, we wouldn't need to struggle for a way out of the Mara Blood."
"Right. If we could produce chaos mana ourselves, we could just venture out and replenish what cancels out."
This time, the Six O'Clock manager supplemented the Twelve O'Clock manager's words.
"No method? Then what's that down there?"
Geon-woo pointed at his feet.
Chaos mana, regulated in emissions by the managers, accumulated there.
It was also where the emitted chaos mana got replenished.
"Chaos mana is definitely produced down there. And yes, it's by the dimensional system's design. But we can't detach that design and relocate it."
The Twelve O'Clock manager shook his head.
"If we could give it to you and gain a way out of the Mara Blood, we wouldn't hesitate. We have no particular attachment to the Mara Blood anyway."
The Six O'Clock manager showed a skeptical reaction too.
"Then no choice. It's a shame there's nothing in it for either side, but we'll leave it for another time."
In the end, Geon-woo concluded there was nothing more to expect from the managers.
They seemed to be hiding something, yet wouldn't show their hand.
"Wait. You're leaving just like that?"
The Two O'Clock manager—who hadn't spoken to Geon-woo once until now—called out to him urgently.
"If you want to stop me, go ahead. Or if you want to try something on me, be my guest."
The choice wasn't Geon-woo's.
His response would depend on how the managers acted.
Knowing that, Geon-woo could afford to be relaxed in their presence.
"No, that's not it. I just want to confirm if you truly have a way to free us from the Mara Blood."
The Two O'Clock manager waved his hands, insisting he had no intention of harming Geon-woo.
"I just thought a method might exist, considering you're energy beings. Of course, whether it's feasible would only be known after trying."
"So there really is a method."
"Tell us in more detail. Then we'll share how to produce chaos mana."
Geon-woo's words instilled a bit more conviction than before, and new information promptly emerged.
"A way to produce chaos mana?"
Geon-woo asked again for confirmation, despite already hearing it.
A method they'd insisted didn't exist just moments ago had suddenly appeared?