Chapter 127
Chapter 127
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 127
Chapter Title: The Giant Beetle Puppet
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A massive something resembling a giant stag beetle, boasting such a faint presence that it's hard to perceive without focusing your senses... burrows back into the ground.
"Just now, thanks..."
I shook my head at Han Sang-ah and made a gesture to shut her mouth. She nodded faintly and raised her sword to clean up the corpses around us.
In the meantime, I gripped the crown and scanned the surroundings, emitting a white light.
"Yeah, the annoying ones are pests like this."
The ghost knight I'd faced in the Unique Trait wasn't much. If we both showed ourselves openly and fought, there was no disadvantage for me at all.
"And it's not even a proper undead in that form."
From its appearance, it was one of the ugliest-looking undead you'd ever find—hard to top that.
Even with the crown emitting light, the presence of the thing that had burrowed underground didn't sharpen at all. That meant it wasn't weakening one bit.
"Underground, huh."
The gnomes I'd fought before loved this kind of attack. Hiding in the earth, waiting for an opening, then snapping an enemy's neck in an instant.
It was a pretty effective method. Assassination was the best option when a head-on fight wasn't possible, after all.
"Poor bastards."
But the best method didn't guarantee success every time. I infused my senses with mana, feeling the movement of the thing below ground.
Faintly, but definitely, I could sense the wriggling of that stag beetle granny beneath the soil.
"Swimming through the earth like it's water."
Not even gnomes would do that. The stag beetle moved silently and stealthily through the ground, but at an incredible speed.
—How about it? Need a hand?
I immediately replied to Jeong Oh-hoon's telepathic message.
"No, support Han Sang-ah instead of me."
At my words, the direction of the red lasers pouring from Jeong Oh-hoon shifted right away. Meanwhile, I kept my mind sharp, tracking the thing underground.
Several of the spines on its back extended toward the surface. Those spines were aimed at me.
"Damn, even a dying man's last breath would have a bigger presence than this."
Its ability to conceal its presence was downright impressive. Top-tier stealth.
"Specialized in something, huh."
Honestly, once you had a way to counter that one trick, a lot of these specialized types weren't much threat.
Like right now.
I timed my retreat perfectly, and three or four thick spines erupted right where I'd been standing. Close call. Before those spines could sink back underground, I brought my spear tip to one of them.
"Bye now."
The black flames blazing at my spear tip leaped onto the spine. Carrying the Paradox Flame, the spines retreated back to their owner.
Not bothering with a barrier since it wouldn't help was a decent call.
But then, they should've prepared countermeasures for my Paradox Flame too. Well, it's not like you could come up with a simple fix after thinking it over.
"If you like holing up underground so much, die down there."
The Paradox Flame clinging to the spine would eventually burn the body of the thing hiding below too.
At that moment, our stag beetle granny, who'd been lurking underground, finally burst out of the earth. Paradox Flame was already clinging to its back.
"Molting? You've got all the tricks."
With a crunching sound, the stag beetle granny shed the hard shell covering its surface and leaped out.
The discarded shell on the ground was still burning with Paradox Flame.
A new carapace grew over the squishy flesh that emerged. Confirming that, I clicked my tongue and extinguished the Paradox Flame. No point burning an empty shell.
—You dare mock my master! And you killed the loyal retainer who served alongside me?! You filthy bug!
"Hey, ask around. See who looks more like a bug here."
Who're you calling a bug? Hilarious.
—I'll chew your flesh, crush your bones. Rip out your twitching heart and smash it. Shatter your skull, pull out your brain, and pulverize it. Dig out your spine and suck the marrow dry. Yeah, that's what I'll do.
The giant stag beetle muttered that while trembling violently. The old woman's face protruding from its open maw spun around, drooling spit and cackling eerily.
"Looks like you fight with your mouth too. Nice to meet a fellow trash-talker."
I shot forward and swung my spear at it. It scurried on its six legs, desperately dodging my spear. Pretty fast for its size.
Suddenly, its exoskeleton emitted a bizarre glow and began to fade into transparency.
"Just because I can't see you doesn't mean I don't know where you are."
I pursued the now-invisible thing without hesitation, rolling my eyes around.
This wasn't the real body of this bug bastard. The real one's hiding somewhere else. This bug in front of me was just an RC car being remote-controlled.
"Whoa, that's far."
Dozens of kilometers away. Judging by the flow and direction of its control, it seemed around Pyongyang.
Traces of effort to obscure the mana link were everywhere—distorted and scattered.
Anyway, remote-controlling with mana signals required one key condition.
"Transmitter and receiver."
The transmitter looked to be around Pyongyang. Naturally, the receiver picking up that mana signal had to be somewhere on this stag beetle. Well hidden.
Finding the receiver would take some time.
—...You're no human.
"Don't wanna hear that line from a bastard like you."
Spines on its back shot toward me. Every time I swung my spear, black flames used the spines as fuses, racing toward its main body, but the spines snapped midway.
New spines sprouted again. It alternated between turning transparent and visible while attacking me.
"Hey, granny, don't shove your face in."
The old woman's head shot out from the stag beetle's gaping maw, neck stretching as it lunged at me. I grabbed the head and ripped it off.
With a bubbling sound, a new old woman's face reformed from the severed neck. The head let out a creepy laugh as a transparent spine thrust toward me.
That wasn't the problem.
"Where the hell is that receiver? This is pissing me off."
Even if I tried to burn the whole thing, the moment Paradox Flame touched its body, the bastard shed its exoskeleton and grew a new one.
—Nothing special about you? You're nothing!
I clicked my tongue at its words. Nothing special?
"I'm just focused right now on finding that damn receiver hidden inside you."
—I didn't make it that easy for trash like you to find! No way. Exactly!
I spun my spear, and the Paradox Flame at the tip trailed like fireworks, drawing a large circle.
"I actually spotted the receiver just a moment ago. But it vanished. Seems like it changes position periodically."
—...
It shut up suddenly. If the stag beetle could make expressions, it'd be shocked right now—I was sure of it.
"I just haven't figured out the pattern of how it moves yet. Once I do..."
I glanced toward Pyongyang and said,
"Your toy breaks here."
Ask your parents for a new one. If you made it yourself, whip up another. Though I'd probably reach the owner before you finish a new toy.
With effort, maybe you'd pull it off.
—You won't find it. You lot aren't at that level yet...!
Instead of answering, I grinned. Probably wanted to say my mana understanding wasn't high enough. Sorry, but you'd better make an exception for me.
The world was fun because of exceptions, right?
Thud. My spear tip pierced its back and delved inside. Nothing yet. But soon.
"Now."
I gripped the spear tight, extending its length as the sharp tip plunged deeper into the stag beetle.
The spear tip reached my target spot at the perfect moment. Right when the receiver inside this giant stag beetle was shifting position.
A sensation like bone fragments shattering traveled up the spear to my hand.
"A totem, huh. Tasteless choice."
Making something out of corpses. Could've been more creative.
What my spear had smashed was an X-shaped totem of human bones and tendons woven together. At the center where the bones crossed was a deer's skull.
The spear successfully shattered the deer's skull. The instant it did, the rampaging giant stag beetle froze.
—You... We'll be waiting.
"No need to wait. I'll find you anyway."
With that, the receiver was completely destroyed. I yanked out my spear, kicked the giant stag beetle far away, and landed.
"'We,' huh."
Wonder how many minions this Varea guy has.
Hopefully no more than three. I could handle them one by one easily, but more numbers would change the fight entirely.
"Let's take out the obelisk."
At my words, Han Sang-ah stabbed her sword into the chest of a three-headed corpse lunging at her and fried it with electricity.
With pops, all three heads burst. Han Sang-ah wiped the chunks of flesh and blood from her face roughly and nodded.
"Once this is done, I wanna shower."
I pointed to the river behind us.
"Jump in there after we're finished."
But no time for washing now. After embedding a microchip near the giant stag beetle's corpse that had flown far off, we prepared to demolish the obelisk right away.
"Jeong Oh-hoon, can't your laser break it?"
In response, a barrage of lasers hammered the obelisk. But it held up surprisingly well against the volley.
—Pure mana-based attacks don't work well.
Got it. No choice then.
"Keep doing what you're doing then."
With that, I looked at Han Sang-ah.
"I'll take two, you get one."
She could handle that much. Han Sang-ah nodded slightly and charged at the nearest obelisk.
"Man, there's a ton of them. Easily tens of thousands, minimum."
Not just numbers. I glanced at the crown gleaming baldly in my hand and said,
"Without this and my ring, it wouldn't have been just numbers."
There was a reason Taebaek and Zanabi couldn't counterattack. If I'd only had the ring, these swarming undead would've resisted its chill.
They'd slow down overall, but three of us—me, Jeong Oh-hoon, and Han Sang-ah—couldn't have swept tens of thousands.
But the crown weakened the undead, letting the ring go beyond slowing them to outright freezing them solid.
Thanks to the combo of crown and ring, we'd sliced through the corpses like a butcher carving discounted pork belly, and once again, we smashed all three obelisks without fail.