37 — Chapter 37

The moment the boat set off, tentacles swarmed from every direction.

The corpses tangled among them were dragged along, and their voices rang clearly.

— I’ll curse you!
— Damn you humans!
— I’ll curse you, curse you, and drag you into the deep sea!

“Damn it, what the hell is wrong with them?!”

“Seems one of them has a grudge against us!”

“What? Who killed enough monsters to earn that kind of hatred?”

“Hm, can’t say I know that much.”

The only stroke of luck was that tentacles didn’t have vocal cords like the dead.

Those without mouths could only make chittering noises, just like Mala-nim. That meant no one could tell I was the real culprit.

The furious tentacles bunched together, forming the shape of a massive hand.

It slowly reached out, as if demanding someone be handed over.

“They want us to give someone up?”

“They’re pointing at Agent Hayan with their fingers!”

“They’re even writing letters in the air! ‘Hand him over… and we’ll let you go’?”

“This is a vile trick. How can we trust the words of wicked monsters and weigh one life against the rest?”

“Well, yeah, that’s true…”

See? Not so easy, is it?

No matter how badly they wanted to swallow me, politics was my specialty.

When collective bargaining failed, the tentacles tried something else: capsizing the boat.

Like a piece of bread thrown into a carp pond, the hull rocked violently side to side.

“Faster! Or we’re going to flip!”

“Damn it, this is the max!”

“They’re swarming in front too!”

“Everyone, hold steady!”

“Commander?”

Before the blue path to the core was entirely swallowed by black, Ha Yeri drew her greatsword.

She ran past me toward the bow, loosening the tie that bound her hair. Then she leapt lightly into the sea.

Her sword swung once, twice—four directions at once.

The arcs of her strikes bloomed like flower petals, cutting off the tentacles clinging to the boat.

“Strike Repulsion.”

But she wasn’t done. Landing on the surface, she thrust her sword into the sea.

Her strike multiplied within the water, creating a literal mountain of corpses and a sea of blood beneath the waves.

I remembered her saying during interviews that her ability was too much of a hassle to explain.

Watching closely, I could guess the principle.

The greater the gap between herself and her opponent, the stronger her attack.

Judging by her loosened hair, she was using the number—or length—of strands as a basis to multiply her strikes.

Unlucky for the dead—they were mostly bald.

And tentacles didn’t even have hair.

“Keep moving. We still have far to go.”

Shaking off the tentacles, we pressed deeper into the sea.

Once the boat steadied, Ha Yeri explained the second key factor for success.

“In the core, you’ll encounter Awakened who failed the assault before. Some are those who hated the world itself.”

In other words, there would be enemies that appeared regardless of personal grudges.

She listed the three most frequently sighted ones.

“Jin Sa-min. Some of you may know him by his epithet, the Mad Monk.”

“The same guy who toppled the 63 Building?”

“Correct. His ability is monstrous strength that ignores parts of physics. Dead, he’s even more dangerous—he no longer worries about damage to his body.”

“And the other two?”

“Chinese Awakened. We don’t have full details. We asked the Public Security Bureau for information, but they didn’t reply. All we have are their aliases. Apparently, in China they call them titles instead.”

One was female, the other male. Both were assumed to be Upper Level.

“Lin Xuefei, alias Ice Ghost. Black Magic, specifically cold manipulation. The other is Du Fu-ming, a swordsman known as the Blade Emperor.”

“Pffft!”

“Problem, Agent Sae Hayan?”

“No, please continue.”

“These three are especially dangerous, but there are others. The moment we enter the core, they’ll attack without discrimination. Stay sharp.”

As she finished her explanation, a sound of water came from beyond the horizon.

Waves were natural when floating at sea, but this was different—it was the sound of something falling.

The other agents sensed it too as the current grew harsher.

The boat began sinking lower. I stepped onto the water’s surface and formed hand seals with both hands.

“Extreme Magic—Endless Outer Path.”

Mana radiated from the soles of my feet, stretching the distance between me and the surface.

One more step forward would drop me into what looked like a bottomless blue hole.

Beyond that threshold lay the core of the Sea of Decay.

“We’ll advance while avoiding unnecessary combat. No matter what happens, do not stray from formation.”

The mission wasn’t to fight the dead, but to destroy the Seed of Calamity beneath the waves.

After driving the point home, Ha Yeri dropped into the gaping hole and vanished from sight.

It was like something invisible had split space itself.

Kang Nabi went next.

Moon Ah-rin and I were last.

Part of me wanted to charge first, but as a member of the assault team, I couldn’t object.

When Moon Ah-rin spread her wings and disappeared, I whispered to Mala-nim.

“Do you feel a Star Scar down there?”

『Fear not.』

Mala-nim tilted her head, unsure.

If Karzos had already succeeded in summoning an Archduke, then it was possible no Star Scar remained inside.

I stepped slowly past the boundary.

My vision spun violently.

Then came a frail scream.

Moon Ah-rin’s.

“Kyaa!”

“Are you alright, Ah-rin?”

“H-Hayan! Look over there…”

Collapsed on the damp, black ocean floor, she pointed toward a massive wall of water beside us.

Behind it, countless dead stared at us as if waiting for a signal.

Not a single one of my own tentacles mixed among them. That meant every corpse here was an Awakened.

If even a fraction emerged, our small party wouldn’t stand a chance.

“That many…?”

“Well, of course. Plenty have died here already.”

“Stay calm. Like I said, not all of them will attack us!”

“Let’s scout the perimeter without provoking them. The Seed of Calamity should be nearby…”

“Commander, someone’s ahead!”

Unlike the others sealed in the wall, one corpse stood outside.

A man as massive as Alexei, rusted gauntlets dangling from his hands.

His face was obscured in the dark, but I already knew who he was from Ha Yeri’s description.

“The Mad Monk!”

“Prepare for combat.”

At Ha Yeri’s signal, Kang Nabi’s spear flew.

—KRRRACK!

Thunder tore the air as the spear tip pierced straight through the Mad Monk’s neck.

The corpse blackened as yellow current seared it, then collapsed limply forward.

Agents crept closer, baffled by how still he was.

“Looks dead.”

“Of course he’s dead, idiot.”

“No, I mean we killed him. Doesn’t that seem strange?”

“Yeah… odd.”

Even with a surprise strike from the Spear of Thunder, there was no way a man who once terrified Korea would fall so easily.

The other corpses only glared, showing no sign of stepping out.

As the squad murmured, Ha Yeri called to me.

“Agent Sae Hayan.”

“Yes?”

“Come take a look. Do you see anything?”

She didn’t say it directly, but her eyes told me… you know more about Black Magic, don’t you?

Curious myself, I approached the body.

Nothing unusual on the surface.

The remains of an Awakened under magical control looked surprisingly clean. Besides the hole in his chest that killed him and the wound at his neck, there were no other marks.

It was eerie, like a corpse already prepared for a funeral.

One possibility came to mind. I carefully leaned closer and sniffed.

Blood and rot. And faintly—sulfur.

Suddenly Karzos’s words at the Council flashed back, and the puzzle pieces clicked together.

“Tch. So they lacked sacrifices… I didn’t think they’d try this.”

“Did you find something?”

“Good news and bad news. Which first?”

“This isn’t the time for… wait, you’re not joking?”

“No.”

Seeing my serious expression, Ha Yeri thought for a moment, then nodded.

“Good news, then.”

“The other two are almost certainly the same—unfit for battle. I can’t explain here, but I’m nearly sure.”

Most likely, this was the aftermath of an attempt to forge Incarnations.

Failed, but unmistakable.

Which meant among the demons seated in the Chair of Silence, there was one versed in necromancy and body reinforcement.

And if so, the other two corpses had already been retrieved.

“And the bad news?”

“We may not have much time left to destroy the Seed of Calamity.”

I answered Ha Yeri without hesitation.

The reason the dead behind the water wall weren’t moving was because they were the sacrifices.

Just like Patel had tried to offer up Revelation’s cultists.

And the vessels prepared for Incarnations were the corpses of Upper Level Awakened.

That alone met the minimum requirements for summoning an Archduke.

“Let’s hurry. I’ll find the path.”

“You will?”

Suspicion was inevitable, but it didn’t matter.

If the Archduke manifested, the Seed would no longer be a Seed.

With our current power, we couldn’t hope to resist.

I pulled out the 89th Tentacle—Tentacle of Stimulation—and stabbed it into my body.

“Ugh.”

“Hayan! Are you alright?”

A dizzying rush—my senses multiplied dozens of times over.

I ignored the nauseating stench of rot and focused on sound.

From beyond the darkness, I heard the voices of demons I’d only heard at the Council.

— Hurry! They’re coming!
— Don’t rush me! This is the last vessel!
— The preparations are complete. Now we wait for the master’s response…
— Wait, what’s this fire!?

They weren’t far.

Judging from their panic, the summoning had already begun.

Had we come too late? Should I call for retreat?

But then came the screams.

— Gyaaaah!!
— Damn it, it won’t go out!
— Check the spellwork again! Something’s wrong!
— Impossible, this fire is…!

Their voices were so loud even normal Awakened could hear.

The assault team moved immediately toward the source.

I sharpened my heightened senses to grasp what was happening.

The flesh and blood of the dead were being sucked into a single point, condensed mana flaring with strange hues.

The Sea of Decay trembled violently, as if about to collapse.

This wasn’t like the Prayer House incident—this felt closer to a successful summoning.

Yet Karzos’s lackeys were shocked and terrified, not exultant.

The Apostle of an Outer God was here, so the only remaining possibility was clear.

A different Archduke had been summoned.

“Do you smell burning?”

“I do. But we’re in the middle of the ocean…”

“Something ahead!”

“That’s… a Familiar! A demon’s here!”

At last, the core of the Sea of Decay came into view.

A corpse that looked like the Blade Emperor lay shattered. Two demons burned and rolled on the ground.

And another demon—likely Karzos’s subordinate—knelt before a figure opening its eyes at the center of the ritual circle.

They had used the corpse of China’s Lin Xuefei, the Ice Ghost, as the vessel for an Incarnation.

“I-I greet the almighty master of the Demon Realm.”

Normally, a different Archduke manifesting through a Gate was unheard of.

Familiars received power from their master through blood-pacts.

If the ritual failed—because the vessel broke or the spell faltered—it simply failed. Summoning the wrong Archduke was nearly impossible.

But this time, two factors made it possible.

First, the Dimensional Core used belonged to the already-dead Forneus.

As the Council had feared, if there was even a tiny chance an Apostle of an Outer God could emerge, then another Archduke slipping through was also possible.

Second, no being higher than the ritualist could be summoned without its own will.

Only an Archduke with the determination to descend could use another’s Familiar as a gateway.

Both exceptions had aligned here.

“I am Varein, puppeteer in service to the Archduke of the Symphony. I humbly request permission to ask your name and purpose for descending to this place…”

“Flauros.”

The kneeling demon trembled as the woman whispered softly.

The name was familiar. I dug through memory—then the next words made it clear.

“I came to find the one who gave me a humiliating defeat.”

Flauros, Archduke of Flames, 64th throne of the Demon Realm.

Months ago, during my return to Earth with Mala-nim… she was the one I killed to take a Dimensional Core.