Chapter 66 (1/2)

Episode 4: The Great Colonizing Age / Chapter 66: Demon King’s Leaders.h.i.+p

TL: emptycube

Editor: Obelisk

The transparent dome, that covered the sky, faded as if melting away. It was night.

The monsters, which made their minds act violently, had all died. The moment he realized they had all died, almost like a flip of a switch, Choi Hyuk came to his senses. Choi Hyuk, who had regained his senses, looked inwardly at the madness inside him.

His mind was blank after burning all the monsters that attacked him. Now his madness seemed to be fueled by itself.

‘Kill.’

‘Kill more.’

But Choi Hyuk shook his head.

‘This much is enough.’

Choi Hyuk swallowed down his ferocious madness and buried it deep within his stomach. His madness, like a well-trained beast, returned to where it resided. It wasn’t able to beat Choi Hyuk. ‘Patience’. This was what Choi Hyuk lived his whole life with.

He was as confident in his talent for fighting as he was in his talent for patience.

… It was also the only inheritance his mother had left him.

{Dimensional isolation released. Successfully completed dimensional transmission. Obtained the inheritance of a ruined civilization. Inspecting… Discovered a B rank Artificial Intelligence. Nothing else is of value. Provided 10,000 Mission Points as a reward.}

The message appeared. It wasn’t a message he was expecting.

“… Artificial Intelligence?”

He held his forehead.

‘Ah, whatever. I don’t care.’

He was too dizzy to think about it now, and his ears rung with the sounds of cicadas.

“What about the message that says I succeeded in the Sovereign Mission…?”

Whether it had come up, but he had yet to see it, or if it hadn’t ended… Now that he thought about it, it seemed like the king of observers said something before it died. ‘It’s not… the end…’ was it? Whatever. His memories weren’t clear.

No, from the start, when did monsters even talk?

Choi Hyuk shook his head and looked around.

It seemed the Berserkers’ fight had ended slightly earlier than his own. The field, which was filled with broken machines, was littered with ripped and sliced monster corpses. The Berserkers were scattered throughout.

The Berserkers succeeded in destroying the monsters before destroying themselves, but their Stamina had hit rock-bottom. Although there were still some remnants of the madness, because there wasn’t enough energy to fuel that madness, it was peaceful. They were even starting to get hungry. The Berserkers were spread out. Some were gathered in groups, chatting with each other, whilst others were sitting absentmindedly, or even chewing on something. Then, one by one, they looked up to watch the dimensional isolation wall melt away. They were currently in an alien area with no streetlights. The Earth’s sky they saw from here was very dark as countless stars s.h.i.+ned.

And there were people spectating this from outside.

Later on, when people talked about this event, they usually started with this moment.

How unfamiliar the area they saw when the dimensional isolation wall faded away was. That place, which had no buildings, random hills, no dirt or asphalt, and looked like a planet piled with broken machines and monster corpses. How terrifying it was to see the Berserker scattered however they wanted on the dark ground. They always described this in great detail.

The Berserkers’ appearance was like the Asgardian G.o.ds who had overcome collapse.

While they all captivated by t

his overwhelming scene, a change occurred.

A red fog spread from the dead observer corpses. At first, it was faint, almost indiscernible. The red fog crawled low on the ground as it spread. Then, when it met other monster corpses, it would ‘devour them’ and grow.

At some point, the red fog grew at a terrifying rate. By the time they thought, ‘Huh? What’s that?’ the red fog had already devoured its surrounding. There were hundreds of thousands of monster corpses it could devour. As soon as it started to grow, the whole area had become engulfed in the red fog.

“What is this…?”

The ones, who thought it was poison and were taken back, tilted their heads when they didn’t feel anything wrong. It was somehow frightening. Some sort of karma was melted into the fog. They felt both an ominous feeling and feeling of relief simultaneously.

Then, not long after.

“It’s slowly disappearing!”

Someone shouted. It was as he said. No, to be exact, it wasn’t disappearing but rather it was being absorbed through their mouths and noses. The process was so quick that the awakenees couldn’t see it.

“… What was it?”

Like how it suddenly appeared, the red fog suddenly disappeared as well. It felt like a hallucination as no traces of it remained.

Of course, it wasn’t as if everyone was simply tilting their heads.

“Haa… d.a.m.n. This is troublesome…”

Baek Seoin shook his head.

“We finally finished and now this…”

Baek Seoin had seen the ident.i.ty of the red fog with his Mind’s Eye and blocked it. It was a simple, yet powerful curse left by the observers. It was a curse which dumbed their patience and judgment, and instead, maximized their impulses.

“Did they wait for this opportunity?”

If there were only Berserkers present, it would have been fine. First of all, the Berserkers who possessed the Mind’s Eye trait would have been able to resist it, and those who couldn’t wouldn’t have been a problem either. Berserkers had overcome countless life-or-death situations together. Because they subconsciously differentiated between friend or foe, they wouldn’t fight their comrades simply because they were under a curse which increased their impulses.

The problem was that the first army division and the Super Soldier brigade were encircling them to restrict civilian access, and beyond them was crowded with thousands of colonizers who had come from various places. The sudden appearance of the curse, and a situation where the excitement of the battle had yet to calm. It was easy for there to be clashes between them and the Berserkers. Baek Seoin was uneasy as if he was looking at a bomb which was about to explode.

“Leader. I think it’s best we quickly clean up and leave this place.”

He immediately requested Choi Hyuk. As Choi Hyuk was also aware of the situation, he understood what Baek Seoin was saying. However, his judgment was different. Because his eyes saw what Baek Seoin’s didn’t.

‘It’s red.’

It was deep into the night, yet the world Choi Hyuk’s eyes saw was as red as a sundown.

‘Were there this many people who wanted to kill me?’

Because their patience and judgment had become dull and their impulses were maximized, their inner intentions they had hidden deep within themselves had risen to the surface.

Choi Hyuk saw the killing intent pouring in from everywhere. From the Super Soldiers to the colonizers far away, red light shone. What was more… there was no small number of Berserkers emitting it too.

Choi Hyuk said,

“Too late.”

There were many who resisted it, but more than half were definitely under the curse. Since it was such a wide-scale curse, it was impossible to dispel it with the guardian’s power. You could only wait for time to pa.s.s and its effect to fade.

But, it seemed it would be difficult to leave without clas.h.i.+ng with each other since the number of groups unreservedly emitting killing intent wasn’t small, and there were many groups who held hostility within the Berserkers. It was too late. He couldn’t stop them from clas.h.i.+ng.

“Pardon? What’s that supposed to mean…”

Baek Seoin was taken aback by Choi Hyuk’s remark, where he gave up before even trying.

However, Choi Hyuk didn’t reply and turned around. His eyes landed on Lee Kijin in the distance. Lee Kijin. He was someone Choi Hyuk was very familiar with. He was a drifter who voluntarily joined him on his first colonization attempt. Like most of the people who joined at that time, he was someone who was looking for a place to die while fighting. Unfortunately, due to his naturally good fighting senses, he hadn’t died and had survived until now. He was an elite member who was selected as a captain-level troop leader.

Choi Hyuk saw his face. It wasn’t certain what illusions the observers had shown him, but both his cheeks were stained with dried tears.

“Is it you?”

Choi Hyuk remembered Lt. Col. Lee Kangjin’s warning. The traitors connected to Lao Ban. Although he thought it would be fun, now that he had confirmed the faces of the comrades he had fought together with, it didn’t feel good.

Lee Kijin met Choi Hyuk’s gaze. He instinctively knew that his betrayal had been figured out.

His original plan was different. He had planned on attacking the exhausted Choi Hyuk when the Berserkers had dispersed and were returning. Lee Kijin and a few other Berserkers were to lure Choi Hyuk to a designated place and wound him with a sudden attack. Then the Super Soldiers and colonizers, who had agreed to cooperate, would attack altogether.

Unfortunately, their plan was now useless.

Lee Kijin smiled with his black eyes.

“It’s a good day to die, right, leader?”

Choi Hyuk could tell when he saw his face. The reason why Lee Kijin betrayed him. He could tell simply by looking.

“Come. I will let you on your way with no regrets.”

Choi Hyuk raised the tip of his sword, which had been on the ground.

Unable to follow the situation through their dialogue, Baek Seoin simply opened and closed his mouth.

“What is this…”

That moment, a commotion broke out with a shout. It wasn’t certain what was going on, but some of the Super Soldiers were fighting against the Berserkers. Due to the curse, everyone had lost their self-control, and once a fight broke out, it immediately intensified and spread. Even the colonizers, who were outside the civilian access line, became agitated. There were many groups bearing hostility towards the Berserkers amongst them.

‘We just fought a dogfight, and now this?’

Choi Hyuk said one thing to Baek Seoin, who was grabbing his head in annoyance,

“Baek hyung, take care of work.”

Then, perhaps it was because they were stimulated by the commotions nearby? Lee Kijin and Berserkers who followed him, whose lips were oddly distorted, rushed towards Choi Hyuk at once. Choi Hyuk didn’t evade their attack.

Bang!

Cras.h.!.+

Clas.h.!.+

He met each swinging sword. He precisely hit the tips of their swords to shake them.

Clang!

“Urk…”

Every time he clashed swords with Choi Hyuk, Lee Kijin felt a ripping pain in his hand. Yes. Pain. Sometimes pain was the best anesthetic. Lee Kijin wanted more pain.

Unconcerned if his hand burst or not, he gripped his sword to the point of shattering and swung. It was fine if he could never use his hand again. It would be of no use if he died anyways.

Choi Hyuk didn’t attack. He stood in place as he deflected the attacks of the surrounding Berserkers swinging their swords at him.