Crisis
I couldn't believe it. I read the message three times.
Even as I read it three times, sensation was slowly draining from my body.
The sun was high in the sky. Which meant I couldn't do a damn thing from now on.
"...What the hell. What's going on?"
Behind me, Unni, who had been stirring the seaweed soup, peered over my shoulder at the screen.
Her hand holding the ladle froze in place.
"...Fuck."
It was the first time I'd heard Unni swear.
Right away, her association terminal started blaring like mad.
The screen filled with red letters. Emergency muster. All remaining S-class hunters. Coordinates: western Chungcheongnam-do.
"...I have to go."
Unni tossed off her apron. The person who'd been smiling just moments ago, saying "You should at least cook a little," now had a hardened face in an instant.
"Don't go."
I said it. Or tried to. My mouth wouldn't move right.
"Unni, you barely survived a few days ago. Your body's still—"
"That's exactly why I have to go."
Unni ruffled my hair.
"If I don't, there's no one else who will."
That was the reality of this country. Seven S-class hunters poached by China.
The rest of us had been filling those gaps with our own bodies, over and over.
Unni headed for the door, then suddenly turned back to look at me.
"You absolutely don't come out. Got it? You can't even move your fingers right now. And when I get back, let's reheat the seaweed soup and eat."
The door closed.
I stared at the closed door for a long time.
All that was left was me and the Outer God curled up on the sofa.
"...Outer God."
I called out to the Outer God in my cracked voice.
"Solar eclipse. Like last time. Block out the sun. Make it night, and I can go out."
Instead of answering, the Outer God slowly raised her hand.
Her fingertips trembled faintly. Blurry and faint, like a screen that hadn't fully loaded.
"...This lady is but an empty vessel now."
The Outer God smiled weakly.
"We descended upon this star too hastily, and right after, We lost a chunk to your darkness.
That wound hasn't healed yet. With this lady as We are now... far from blocking the sun in the sky, even maintaining Our form is a struggle."
My blood ran cold.
"Then—"
I stopped. Because one answer had come to mind.
The sun. The closest star, the only one that reaches even in daylight.
I could use that.
The moment I started to raise my hand.
"No!!"
The Outer God staggered forward and grabbed my arm. Who knew an empty vessel like her could move that fast.
"That one... that one alone must never be touched."
"Why."
"Before, it merely drifted. But now it's different.
It has nested on Mars, perched in one spot, listening intently."
Fear welled up again in the Outer God's eyes.
"If you now pull not a distant star but the nearby sun— that massive tremor will shake the entire solar system.
It will surely hear that sound and open its eyes."
The Outer God gripped my arm tighter.
"And it will undoubtedly come here."
"To stop one monster, you're saying wake that thing up?
If that opens its eyes— what needs stopping won't be Korea, but this entire planet."
"....."
I lowered my hand.
If I didn't use the sun, Korea falls. But if I step in, Earth falls.
Even holding the world's strongest card, once again, I could do nothing.
Same time, Chinese Hunter Management Association command center.
On the massive screen, footage showed the Sealed Beast rising from the sea off Korea's western coast.
"Coordinates confirmed. Exactly 1km from the western Korean peninsula coast."
The association president nodded in satisfaction at the staffer's report.
They'd released it into the West Sea, directed so the Sealed Beast headed straight inland toward Korea. The disaster would cleave the peninsula in two and never return to China.
"No chance of it coming our way now."
The association president leaned back in his chair with a smile.
"Just sit back and watch. Whether Korea holds or crumbles, it's all profit for us."
The gray giant tore through the sea as it rose.
With every step, tens of thousands of tons of seawater surged, and crushed tsunamis rampaged.
An overwhelming pressure, like an entire mountain range uprooting and walking.
Rank unmeasurable. Pure disaster.
Everywhere it passed, cities crumpled like paper.
No will, no purpose.
It simply smashed everything in reach as it advanced inland.
At this rate, by sunset it'd be deep inland, right in the heart of a metropolis teeming with millions.
Cameras worldwide captured the scene live.
And the world realized.
This wasn't just Korea's problem.
If the Sealed Beast wasn't stopped on the peninsula, it'd cross the sea. To Japan, to China, and beyond.
The world erupted in fury toward China, who had unleashed the sealed disaster as a weapon.
The U.S. President issued an emergency statement.
Japan, the U.S., Europe—hunters were scraped together in order of proximity and dispatched to Korea's west.
Not for anyone else. If it wasn't stopped here, they'd be next.
US President official statement "Threat to humanity's collective security" whoa
I slowly set down my phone after reading the post.
They were desperately searching for me. Firmly believing I'd fix this.
But the culprit was holed up in her own bed, unable to twitch a finger.
...No.
I might not be able to move my fingers.
But I could open my eyes.
I closed my eyes and spread my senses.
My powers were dead, but the sensation of counting stars lingered.
Beyond the room, beyond the city, to the western front. Hundreds of kilometers away, the battlefield unfolded like my palm.
The front was hell.
S-class hunters from around the world were pounding it, but there was no coordination.
Languages differed, command structures differed. They fought like hacking at a mountain with a knife, without a clear focal point.
Naturally, the defensive line kept getting pushed back.
But I could see it all. Where it'd break, where the giant would swing its fist three seconds from now, who would die.
It was all visible to my eyes.
With trembling hands, I pulled my phone close and rasped into the association channel.
"Association. Open all channels."
A brief silence, then the association president's urgent voice replied.
"Connecting to all units! Follow this comm as top priority!"
"Testing. From now on, respond according to this comm."
Objections erupted over the channel. A foreign hunter's voice.
"Who the hell is this woman?! You joking right now—"
I cut him off.
"Left flank, second row. Third one back, right foot drops. Move."
"What?!"
"Three. Two. One."
Boom—
No sooner had I finished than the disaster's foot crushed where those hunters had stood.
Those who followed the order lived; the scoffer rolled away by a hair.
"....."
The channel went quiet.
"Right ridge, second step point. Collapse it there."
Crunch—
"North blue-uniform unit. All dead if you stay. Full retreat."
That voice never erred once.
Hunters who started skeptical began obeying instantly.
Dozens of scattered forces coalesced around one invisible person.
And I played my final card.
"Outer God."
The Outer God on the sofa looked up.
"...You called, milord."
"You, with that body, block just one spot. Exactly one. I'll point it out."
The empty vessel Outer God staggered to her feet.
The next moment, a small girl dropped from the sky. Into the most dangerous spot humans couldn't reach.
The front line didn't yield for the first time.
The pushed-back defense advanced one step.
On America's ABC News live feed, the retreating allied front suddenly halted.
The casters gasped in shock.
"Th-the defensive line... the defensive line is holding! They've stopped the retreat!"
Western front live rn but hunters suddenly moving like clockwork
Who's commanding this??
Chinese command center.
The association president, who had been lounging leisurely, slowly rose.
"Why isn't it pushing?"
On the screen, the line that should have crumbled was holding. Pushing back, even.
"What the hell is that control? Who's commanding?"
Even the staffer had no answer.
But that was it.
"Urk..."
The Outer God propping the front staggered. An empty vessel couldn't hold the line. Every second bought shaved off her stamina.
And the Sealed Beast wasn't something tactics could handle.
Even reading its movements had limits for me.
Block one spot, two more broke. Chopping a mountain with a knife— it was still a mountain.
"Gah—!"
Beyond my senses, the Outer God slammed into something. Her small body smashed through a building and didn't rise again.
With the pillar gone, the aligned defense began crumbling anew.
No matter how fast I directed, it wasn't enough.
"North flank breach! Abandon it!"
"Left too—no—retreat!"
My throat cracked bloody, but I kept shouting. To save even one more.
But all those efforts turned futile.
The forcibly held dam finally burst.
"Defensive line collapse! All units retreat!"
And right in the center of that line.
"Suhyun!!"
Someone's scream rang out.
The disaster's massive arm whipped across the silver hair that had stood to the end, blocking evacuees.
Unni crashed into shattered concrete rubble.
Red blood stained her silver hair. She didn't get up.
"Hunter Kim Suhyun, combat ineffective!"
The final line was crumbling. Beyond it, people who hadn't evacuated.
And in the middle, my one and only friend lay bleeding out.
The one who'd pick my door lock without asking, nag me to eat.
The one who'd cry like it was her own problem seeing me near death.
The one who'd said we'd reheat seaweed soup when she got back.
She was dying right before my eyes.
In the Chinese command center, the association president leaned back again with a faint smile.
"Right on plan..."
My hand moved.
No time to think—my hand stretched toward the sky.
Toward the sun.
World be damned, I'd pull that massive star and erase the disaster right now.
"No!!"
The Outer God, who had crawled over, clung to my arm with her battered body. Blood dripped from her mouth.
"It'll wake! Touching the sun wakes it— I told you!"
"Let go."
"This planet! Everything ends!"
"Let go!!"
For the first time, I yelled at the Outer God.
Unni was dying. Right in front of me. And they wanted me to sit still?
World? Humanity? What use was that.
When all I had left was that one—
Heat from the sun gathered at my fingertips.
The moment the world began to blaze white.
From the western sky's edge.
The sun's final crimson sliver.
Dropped beyond the horizon.
Snap— something clicked into place inside me.
Sunset detected.
Restoring output of Stellar Script magic.
Stellar light poured into my veins like a tsunami, flooding my parched body with explosive vitality.
As I rose, sweat-soaked blonde hair fell loose. Cold starlight filled my eyes.
The battered Outer God looked up at me.
"Good work. Now rest."
The Outer God melted into the shadows. Feeling the darkness encroaching on the sky, I unleashed my power.
"Now it's my time."