Episode 9: Shackles of Judgment / Chapter 153: Collapse (5)

TL: emptycube / ED: Oer

“This place… looks like shit.”

These were the first words spoken by Lee Jinhee when she stepped into the monsters’ universe.

It was as she said. The entire place looked a stomach with indigestion. A vast space, big enough for a galaxy to fit, was covered in a semi-transparent wall that squirmed like an intestine. Larva-like monsters as large as planets and continents infested the space like parasites. Light grey poja, which gave birth to monsters, were clumped together like nebulae and light crackled amidst, but their appearance looked disgusting, like half-digested vomit.

“… Kaff… Is that the anus?”

Handke said after clearing his throat, seemingly out of embarrassment. While he wanted to find a more elegant comparison, it was difficult. He was referring to the spot where the semi-transparent wall that surrounded them gathered. It was pierced with a darkness that seemed like a blackhole. Hideous lumps of flesh gathered around it… 99 out of 100 people would think of the same body part.

“Hmm…”

However, no one laughed. Instead, they were stiff from nervousness.

Despite their prior worries, they weren’t surrounded and attacked by monsters the moment they arrived. However, the disgusting appearance of the monsters’ universe itself added a strange sense of tension to the colonizing army. Looking at the squirming universe, the infestation of larva-like monsters, and the large, dark hole, everyone’s insides churned with nausea.

{Ha… Hahaha. Why am I here…? Can I go back now?}

Naro’s hologram appeared next to Choi Hyuk. The hologram looked like a simple human-like doll made carelessly out of dough. Naro grabbed Choi Hyuk’s sleeve with its fingerless hands.

“If we slip up, you need to take us and flee. Keep your senses clear.”

Choi Hyuk brushed Naro’s hands away as though it was a pain.

{Ha, ha, hahaha, but I’m scared…}

“What kind of AI says it’s scared? Those smaller than you are more mature.”

Aide Leah said, petting Naro’s head. Naro glanced behind it to view the hundreds of spaceships brought by various troops, anchored in an imposing manner. Naro’s spaceship, which was larger and cruder looking, stood out among them. As expected of the dimensional fortress that housed the final survivors of the Naro species, its scale was eye-catchingly large. However, Naro, who was the spaceship’s personality, flinched its shoulders.

{I can’t help but be scared…}

An unusually strong sense of survival might have been implemented as it was the dimensional fortress protecting the final fate of a species.

Choi Hyuk tapped Naro’s shoulder as he said,

“That’s right. You might die since this is the monsters’ universe. We have no way of knowing what will come up.”

He crouched down and met Naro’s gaze.

“But think about it carefully. We didn’t come here to die. We came here to kill.”

The clear bloodthirst radiating from Choi Hyuk’s voice made Naro tremble despite being a hologram.

“The ones who need to tremble and scream are them. So let’s quickly do what we came here to do.”

It was impossible to discern whether Choi Hyuk’s words were an encouragement or a threat from his tone. Naro hurriedly gathered information and reported.

{I-I can sense responses of Kahur Kabkuns from those larva-like monsters!}

“Ah, really…? So those are the true identities of Kahur Kabkuns?”

Indiscernible pieces of meat floated around Choi Hyuk’s colonizing army, but looking at them more closely, they seemed to be the same material as those larva-like monsters. It seemed that its body was sliced up when Choi Hyuk ripped open the Kahur Kabkun to enter.

“And?”

At Choi Hyuk’s next question, Naro nervously replied.

{An-Analyzing… The marked larvae are for sure connected to the Shapley and Laniakea Superclusters!}

The Kahur Kabkuns connected to the Shapley and Laniakea Superclusters… There was a high chance that they were Kahur Kabkuns located on the Rotten Border.

“Good. As expected, they are connected in close proximity in the monsters’ universe as well.”

Like this, his biggest concern was resolved.

He had been worried that, while the Kahur Kabkuns densely packed in the karmalings’ universe, they might be extremely far apart in the monsters’ universe.

Since the Kahur Kabkuns took strategic actions in cooperation with each other, he guessed that they might also be arranged closely together in the monsters’ universe, and it turned out to be true. In fact, the Kahur Kabkuns in the monsters’ universe were closer together than in their universe. This made it easier to sweep through them.

Choi Hyuk opened a communication channel and shouted,

“The monsters don’t know that we’ve arrived yet! Our first targets are those larvae marked with blue lights! Sweep through them before they can pull themselves together!”

**

Baaang!

Shwaaah!

{Kiyeeeh-!}

It was a thrilling start.

“Waah— Hahaha! For there to be this sort of method!”

Whirlwind Fire, who had been very anxious before entering the monsters’ universe, temporarily forgot his worries and immersed himself in the slaughter.

When he twirled his fingers, seed-like flames burrowed in various places of a larva’s body.

Then, when he flicked his fingers, the flame seedlings that burrowed in its body exploded brilliantly with a bang.

{Kiyeeeehhh-!}

The larva monster seemed to possess a dimension-manipulating ability as it was wriggling its massive body while its tail was placed inside an empty void. It writhed its entire body in pain when receiving Whirlwind Fire’s attack.

The smaller larva monsters were the size of continents while larger ones were easily larger than Earth. Though its movements seemed like it was resisting, the monster didn’t possess any fighting ability and its defensive capabilities were terrible as well. High-ranked warriors could kill the monsters on their own as if popping balloons, and middle and low-ranked warriors could stick to the monsters and dismantle them like army ants capturing and devouring their prey.

{Destruction of Kahur Kabkuns… The monsters inside are also being swept up into the dimensional openings and dying!}

The monsters seemed to have never experienced being attacked in their own universe as they didn’t even resist. It seemed they didn’t even have an alarm system as the monsters waiting inside the Kahur Kabkuns continued to wait before dying without knowing why.

The exhausting act of destroying Kahur Kabkuns one by one had become as easy as popping balloons at a party. In one word, it was a bonanza.

“Wahaha! So easy! So easy!”

The scene had only looked disgusting at first. However, it was a scene that made cleaning it up fun. Like pulling out blackheads from your nose! Or picking out a gigantic earwax from your ears! The pleasure from removing disgusting things was incredible.

Not only that, there was a lot to obtain as well.

‘If it’s like this….! I can place the noble ‘Dark’ in front of my name!’

Adding the name of a species in front of one’s name wasn’t an honor given to everyone. Even if they were descendants of a prestigious family, if they didn’t have the appropriate class and contribution, then they couldn’t add the name of their species to their name. Black Snow smiled as she imagined her name becoming ‘Dark-Snow’.

When they burst a larva monster, the monsters inside it would automatically die. While killing large quantities of monsters, she was accumulating an incredible amount of karma. If she could change this karma into her own and report her contributions in this battle to the alliance, then it was only a matter of time before she could add the greatly desired ‘Dark’ to her name.

‘Amazing…’

Black Snow gave Choi Hyuk a profound look. Her attitude of disregarding and looking down on him had already been wiped away. Currently, she simply had thoughts of wanting to give this lucky charm of hers a kiss.

In an instant, a third of the marked larva monsters were killed. This meant that a third of the Kahur Kabkuns in the Rotten Border were destroyed. Their contributions in this short period were unbelievable.

However, this place was still the monsters’ headquarters. Although it was late, the monsters’ counterattack began like a set sequence.

The first sign was a nasty stench.

“Urk… What is this smell…? Ueck… Urrreetttch!”

It wasn’t a normal bad smell. It was so nasty that even low-ranked warriors, who had overcome physical limits, retched at the stench.

“Ureek! Wueeeck!”

Plop, plop.

The lowest-ranked warriors ended up vomiting like a waterfall.

Then the semi-transparent wall that surrounded them churned crazily like an intestine. The light grey poja that had been clustered together like nebulae discharged grey lightning as they began to surge. The larva monsters, which squirmed with their tails in another dimension, wriggled their bodies as though they were salt-sprinkled worms while opening their enormous mouths wide open. Then they vomited.

{Eeuurrk-!}

Graaareuk.

The monsters were regurgitated from inside the larva monsters’ stomachs, the Kahur Kabkuns. They poured out like a waterfall or carpet bombing.

“Euack! Dodge them!”

Cruajajak!

“Emergency retreat to the spaceships!”

The warriors’ teleportation spread out in waves. The warriors who retreated inside the spaceship activated the ship’s barrier and reflected the monsters pouring at them. However, not everyone could retreat in time. Although the alliance’s communication and teleportation technology had advanced since the last war, allowing them to overcome the monsters’ obstruction to some degree, this place was the monsters’ den. Though they were uncertain what the electric shocks discharged by the poja were doing, the properly functioning teleportation function soon went down.

The ones who were unable to teleport out or were swept up by the outpour of monsters before they could teleport fell behind the ranks, and they each began to fight frantically.

It was as though the entire universe was rushing towards them with hostility.

“W-We have to quickly grab the survivors and escape!”

Keusaero, the leader of the Keumil Troop, opened his wide mouth and shouted. He believed that they had accumulated enough contribution. Enough that it wouldn’t be a loss as long as they rescued the remaining survivors.

Yet-

“Wahahaha!!”

“Let’s go!!”

He saw the Berserkers facing the waterfall of monsters while shouting in high spirits.

“Re-reckless!”

Keusaero became anxious when he saw them.

‘Don’t tell me… Choi Hyuk won’t retreat in a situation like this? Right? No…’

Communications were offline.

Instead, Choi Hyuk sent his message through the black flames erupting in the air.

**

‘This smell…’

Choi Hyuk felt a strange sensation from the bad stench that began to spread. No, it was a familiar feeling.

‘Death…’

The end that would inevitably come for the living. The conclusion that devoured even despair. He heavily sensed the fate of death, which he had realized during the Kundle Tribe’s funeral and had dyed his flames black.

‘But it’s different.’

It was different from the ‘end’ Choi Hyuk had realized. Choi Hyuk’s was a clean, peaceful end. However, the death he was sensing now was somewhat crooked and rotten. Giving off a disgusting stench, this sensation, which was made through the fermentation of rotten death, was changing into something familiar. The monsters’ characteristically distorted karma. It was completely different from karmaling’s karma.

‘Ah… This is…’

Choi Hyuk felt as though if he could find even a small clue, he could figure out the monsters’ secret. He began to examine his surroundings more thoroughly.

The world reflected in his eyes were entirely red and black. The monsters’ universe was filled with killing intent, hostility, and ‘those to kill’. Also, within it, there was a place that was giving off an especially disgusting stench. It was so red that it seemed to be painted on his cornea rather than a light. They were the lumps of flesh gathered near the hole Handke had described as an ‘anus’.

Shiver.

He didn’t feel anything before, but now, just looking at them sent shivers down his spine. They weren’t simple lumps. They were very dangerous. Using this vast space and the numerous Kahur Kabkuns, the monsters were planning something with these lumps.

This was why he had to examine it.

As he faced them, Choi Hyuk’s mind quickly calculated the strategic merit in identifying them while his heart and blood figured out how powerful those lumps were and were surging with the desire to tear them into shreds and crush them.

An impulse stronger than when he went to watch the battle between Narci and the Steel Battleship seized him.

Choi Hyuk used his flames to write a message in the air.

{We will be starting our mission now. All forces will finish dealing with the marked larva monsters. The Berserkers, and Mack, Whirlwind Fire, and Black Snow’s troops will follow me to explore the black hole area. We will retreat once we finished eliminating the larva monsters and exploring the hole area. That is all.}

Choi Hyuk’s order brought despair to a certain few, but there was nothing they could do. From the beginning, the only reason they could come here was because of Choi Hyuk’s strange ability that could rip the monsters’ pathway however he wished and make it into a neutral pathway. This meant that it was impossible for them to return to their universe without Choi Hyuk.

At first, the leaders of each troop expressed their anger at Choi Hyuk for driving them towards their deaths, but facing an intense fight, their various calculations and schemes gradually began to erase from their minds.

The monsters’ universe shook as it attempted to turn the colonizing army into mush while the colonizing army even released their despair as karma as they faced it.

Everything else disappeared, leaving only the fight remaining.

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