Chapter 90

Chapter 90.

“I’m going to Pandemonium.”

“Understood. Then we will abandon America...”

“No, we save America too.”

Min Ji-hee turned back with her eyes round.

Her reaction said, “What are you talking about?”

I immediately called Lee Hyeong-je, and almost as soon as the signal went through, his glib voice came through.

[Yes, Apostle.]

“A Degraded Entity has appeared in America. Personally negotiate with the U.S. Hunter Association. Get as much as you can from them, and tell them we’ll resolve the Degraded Entity.”

[Yes. What will the negotiation commodity be?]

I looked at Min Ji-hee.

“...Tell them we’ll dispatch a subjugation team centered on Min Ji-hee.”

“Pardon?!”

Min Ji-hee was startled.

“A-Apostle. I have no combat ability whatsoever. Please reconsider and dispatch Hunter Lee A-un or Hunter Kim Cheol-su instead of me...”

I raised a hand and stopped Min Ji-hee from speaking.

“You understand, right? Get the strategy from Min Ji-hee, and sell everything, including this final proposal.”

[Yes. Simple enough.]

I ended the call.

Min Ji-hee was stomping her feet with a flushed face.

“Apostle...!”

“Min Ji-hee.”

At this opportunity, I needed to make Min Ji-hee realize her own value properly.

“You can do it.”

***

After the Apostle departed by helicopter.

“I’m here.”

Min Ji-hee entered the conference room with heavy steps.

Lee Hyeong-je, who had just finished the video call negotiation with America, and Kang Hyo-jun, who was beside him continuously tapping away at the keyboard, greeted her with only a slight nod of their heads.

“Phew, that was rough.”

Lee Hyeong-je wiped away his sweat and slumped back in his chair.

“How did it go?”

“You remember the video the Apostle gave us, right? They remembered that. When we said we’d take care of it, they took the bait immediately.”

A sly smile hung on Lee Hyeong-je’s face.

“We are also proceeding with civilian evacuation through Black Market’s contact network.”

Kang Hyo-jun added while continuing to type.

“America will send a private jet. One with an entire Mana Stone embedded in it. You, Cheon-jin, and Seol-ah just need to take that to America.”

“....”

“Thanks to that, I squeezed out everything we could. The private jet will arrive soon. But Ji-hee, why do you look like that?”

“I’m not confident.”

Min Ji-hee touched her own fingertips with a deathly pale face.

“Defending against Monster Waves. Subjugating Boss Monsters mixed in among them. I can do that. There is probably no one in the world better than me at it.”

“Probably not.”

“But... in a battle against a single being that is too powerful, I become more useless than I expect. It was the same during the Frost Dragon.”

Min Ji-hee lowered her head.

Even though she had received self-defense Artifacts from the Apostle, the fundamental fear had not disappeared.

It had been the same during the battles against Scathach and Resonar.

All she had done there amounted to being a high-performance loudspeaker conveying the Apostle’s will.

“The opponent is an unknown enemy we have never faced before. If I make even one mistake there, Jin Cheon-jin and Han Seol-ah, the Republic of Korea’s strongest forces, will die like dogs at the same time.”

The pressure of knowing that the lives of precious people rested entirely on her head.

That thick anxiety began to slowly tighten around Min Ji-hee’s throat.

Then, CLACK-!

A sharp sound cut off Min Ji-hee’s thoughts.

Kang Hyo-jun, who had slammed the Enter key roughly, spun his chair around and glared at Min Ji-hee.

“What kind of bullshit are you spouting right now?”

Kang Hyo-jun’s gaze had sunk coldly.

“Useless? You? Every staff officer in the world might as well bite their tongues and die.”

“...But I.”

“Excluding that Dragon bastard and the other ‘special cases,’ who has maintained this country until now?”

“Seol-ah...”

“No! You, Min Ji-hee.”

Kang Hyo-jun’s fierce gaze pointed at Min Ji-hee as if it would pierce through her.

“Han Seol-ah and Jin Cheon-jin are nothing more than the strongest pieces available for you to use. You are the one who has operated the chessboard called the Republic of Korea. From beginning to end, you created this country’s anti-Monster strategies and tactics. Am I wrong?”

“That much, anyone could...”

“Bullshit. Look at India, which had a better situation than us. They had five S-rank Hunters. Five times as many as us, who only had one. Their Floor level was twenty floors lower too. But they had no command tower. So what happened? Did they not perish?”

Under Kang Hyo-jun’s relentless rebuke, Min Ji-hee closed her mouth.

“Stop shrinking in on yourself. It makes the people watching feel like shit.”

“...That was rather harsh.”

“You are the one being harsh.”

Kang Hyo-jun growled low.

“I sincerely respect you. I believe that only two people can stand above me. The Apostle and you. That is what I think.”

“....”

“So just act like you usually do. Be obnoxious and say, ‘I knew you would say that,’ while pretending to be a prophet or something.”

“...Obnoxious?”

Just as Min Ji-hee’s eyebrow twitched and she was about to take a step closer.

“Now, now. Don’t get worked up. Calm down, both of you.”

Lee Hyeong-je subtly slipped between them.

“Tch.”

After clicking his tongue briefly, Kang Hyo-jun turned his eyes back to the laptop and began typing rapidly again.

“I also think Representative Hyo-jun is right. Ji-hee, don’t overthink it. Do the same thing you do when you command. If you are still uneasy despite that, remember that the Apostle entrusted this task to you because he believes in you.”

“...Yes.”

“Seol-ah and Cheon-jin are already on standby, so let’s move.”

Following Lee Hyeong-je’s guidance, Min Ji-hee rose.

Just as she was about to leave the conference room, Min Ji-hee asked without even looking back.

“...Why do you trust me that much?”

“Before the Apostle appeared.”

CREEAK.

Kang Hyo-jun leaned deep into his chair and continued speaking.

“...Back then, you were our hope.”

“...That is Seol-ah’s story.”

“Well, if you watched us from outside, that’s how it would look. But everyone who fought inside the Republic of Korea knows. That the ‘real one’ is you.”

Kang Hyo-jun closed his eyes.

Before he entered Black Market.

Kang Hyo-jun himself had also participated in defense battles.

That was why he knew.

After breaking Demonic Beast heads, and breaking them, and breaking them again, at the moment when the thought, “Now I’m dead,” came.

When the situation was so hopeless that despair, the certainty that this time it was over, descended on them.

With Min Ji-hee’s briefing of “Stand by,” the Healers’ healing would pour down.

The standby group would immediately charge in and pull out the wounded.

Finally, Han Seol-ah’s Permafrost would blaze forth....

Min Ji-hee’s single phrase, “Stand by.”

When that was heard, the belief that the situation was over.

That held the Tankers together and kept them from collapsing.

The Tankers standing on the front line knew Min Ji-hee would never abandon them.

So they believed. That someday, with that one phrase, a miraculous light of healing would pour down.

“...Thank you.”

CLACK.

The door closed.

Kang Hyo-jun clicked his tongue and immersed himself in work again.

***

“You look better.”

“...That little brat was being insolent.”

Min Ji-hee frowned.

An eighteen-year-old A-rank Tanker boy who had once used the name Kang Jun-hyeok.

When he had one day presented the name “Kang Hyo-jun,” saying he had become responsible for Black Market’s Korean branch, she had thought him an immature, half-baked kid, but...

‘Nine years have passed... so he is twenty-seven now. He’s all grown up.’

Min Ji-hee swept her hair back.

She gathered it into one line and tied it down.

She carefully wiped her glasses and put them on with a crisp motion.

“Let’s go.”

***

Inside the private jet headed for America.

The U.S. Hunter Association official looked gaunt.

“A-are you certain you can really catch that monster with only three people? We poured an enormous amount of wealth into you!”

“We’ll do what we can.”

“Two elite S-rank teams have already been annihilated! Please, stop that disaster...!”

“We’ll do what we can.”

‘Two S-rank Hunter teams... Considering America’s organization system, that would be four S-ranks, eight A-ranks, and twenty B-ranks.’

America’s organization system, rich as it was in Hunter resources, was different from Korea’s.

Two S-ranks each served as team leader and vice leader.

Below them were four A-ranks who handled the actual combat.

And ten B-ranks who handled miscellaneous work and combat support.

A super-luxurious organization of a full sixteen members.

The thing down below had devoured two of those teams.

Min Ji-hee waved her hand and sent the employee out.

The employee left while muttering “please, please” until the very moment he exited the room.

Min Ji-hee turned on the radio connected to the Apostle.

“As far as we can determine, no Degraded Entities have been observed in any regions aside from America.”

[Cross-verification?]

“It is information confirmed through Black Market. The Market has built an information network even in fallen India, so its reliability can be considered 99%.”

[That makes sense.]

“Could it be that they cannot control multiple Degraded Entities simultaneously?”

[No. A Degraded Entity is not something controlled like a summoned beast. The role of an ‘Apostle of an Outer God’ is only to scatter the eggs and hatch them remotely. The destruction afterward belongs solely to the Degraded Entity.]

“Then...”

Inside Min Ji-hee’s mind, dozens of tactical hypotheses and data surged in and receded like waves.

Hypothesis, review, discard. Hypothesis, review, discard.

After eliminating unnecessary variables in an instant, she reached a conclusion.

“It is a showcase.”

[I think so too.]

The purpose of this terror attack was to “show” it.

A stage for instilling the unknown terror called a Degraded Entity into the entire world.

“...You are concerned that if we touch them rashly, terror attacks may begin worldwide. At the same time, if the whole world witnesses America’s Degraded Entity being stopped, it may dilute that fear instead.”

[Yes. That is why I could not abandon America.]

The Apostle’s dry voice rang through the headset.

[You will subjugate the Degraded Entity in America and ruin their plan. In the meantime, I will strike the main base.]

The reason the Apostle had changed the operation before boarding the helicopter and entrusted America to her.

It was a thoroughly calculated diversionary operation.

“I will keep that in mind.”

When the private jet, which had cut across the Pacific at Mach speed, reached the airspace over the operation zone, the hatch clattered open without any special guidance.

“Then we will begin.”

[Yes. Show them.]

Min Ji-hee turned to Han Seol-ah and Jin Cheon-jin.

The two gave a thumbs-up signal, then jumped from the plane without hesitation.

Min Ji-hee switched to the headset connected to the two receivers.

And inside the plane.

On countless monitors, the views of cameras capturing the Degraded Entity appeared one after another.

“B-04 camera. Three degrees down. E-08 camera. Zoom in a little more. G-12 camera, not there...”

Min Ji-hee delicately corrected the camera positions.

[Target visually confirmed.]

[I’ll go first.]

Jin Cheon-jin emitted Mana and instantly flew toward the Degraded Entity.

The eyes embedded in the back of the Degraded Entity’s head, sensing his presence, rolled wildly toward Jin Cheon-jin.

At the same time, its tentacles began to rush forward.

“Do not block.”

[I’ll let it flow past.]

POP!

Jin Cheon-jin twisted his body in midair and dodged the tentacle by the width of a sheet of paper.

At the same time, adding centrifugal force, he shot toward the Degraded Entity at an even greater speed.

[Huaa!]

With gravity, centrifugal force, and even the explosive power of Mana added, Jin Cheon-jin thrust out his palm with all his might.

THOOM-! BOOM!

With a heavy explosion, dust surged up.

But the strike only lasted a moment. Through the pitch-black smoke, dozens of enraged Degraded Entity tentacles came crashing toward Jin Cheon-jin.

“Prepare to evade. Seven total!”

TAP TAP TAP!

Min Ji-hee’s hands accelerated, and the expected trajectories of the tentacles updated in real time as red lines over Jin Cheon-jin’s goggles.

Jin Cheon-jin smoothly slipped through the gaps between the red trajectories.

KABOOM!

Amid the explosive roars of asphalt being smashed apart, the mercilessly crashing tentacles only struck Jin Cheon-jin’s afterimages.

But there was no way he could dodge every single irregular blow that sharply twisted its trajectory in midair.

[Immediately concentrate Mana on your left shoulder!]

[Hua!]

BOOM!

An unavoidable blow... had to be endured with a Mana-clad body!

[Khk!]

The trajectory Min Ji-hee had pointed out without even an inch of error.

Even though he concentrated Mana on the impact area in accordance with that precise order and defended as much as possible, the tentacle’s destructive power surpassed imagination.

‘If Ji-hee hadn’t been here, I would have died just now...!’

SCREEECH!

Jin Cheon-jin’s feet dug deep into the asphalt ground as he was pushed back dozens of meters.

“Fifteen meters behind you, target the collapsed building debris. Leap and move forty-five degrees to the right. Pin the Degraded Entity’s gaze at eleven o’clock.”

[Leaping!]

No sooner had Min Ji-hee’s order fallen than Jin Cheon-jin kicked off the asphalt and fiercely shot to the right.

When the bastard’s countless red eyes all followed Jin Cheon-jin’s trajectory and its aggro was drawn,

Min Ji-hee’s gaze was scanning dozens of monitor screens at once.

Her brain spun at superhuman speed, converting every variable on the battlefield into numbers.

The trajectories of the tentacles, the Degraded Entity’s Mana flow, Jin Cheon-jin’s airborne time, and even Han Seol-ah’s falling speed as she dropped from the sky.

“Seol-ah. Current altitude, five hundred meters. Prepare ‘Ice Arrow’ at the eyeball on the target’s left shoulder joint. Casting time, three seconds. You can see it on your goggles, right?”

[Yes. I’m ready!]

“I will time it. Three, two...”

Just as the Degraded Entity was about to raise a heavy tentacle toward Jin Cheon-jin again.

“One. Fire!”

[Go!]

CLANG!

A giant spear of ice dropped from the sky like a lightning bolt and struck the eyeball directly.

The cold of Absolute Zero that always dwelled in her body exploded in every direction.

At that monstrous cold, one entire tentacle froze solid.

SCREEEEEECH!

The Degraded Entity let out a horrifying scream.

“Cheon-jin, destroy the frozen tentacle!”

[Haaaaa!]

CRUNCHHH- BANG!

When Jin Cheon-jin’s fist, heavily coated in Mana, struck, the frozen tentacle shattered to pieces as if exploding.

At the same time, black poison began to gush from the destroyed cross-section.

The moment Jin Cheon-jin’s body flinched reflexively, trying to put distance between them,

“Range, fifty meters. Highly poisonous wide-area attack! Do not retreat. Push in. The safe zone is three meters below the bastard’s front!”

The order was to close the distance instead against a wide-area attack.

But Jin Cheon-jin forcefully twisted the momentum that had been about to carry him backward and plunged into the middle of the poison without the slightest hesitation.

A blind spot formed by dozens of intertwined tentacles.

Only that place was the sole space where he could avoid the pouring poison.

“Seol-ah. Maintain altitude at three hundred! Deploy ‘Permafrost’ on the severed surface of the destroyed tentacle!”

[Yes!]

“Cheon-jin. In four seconds, block the three tentacles rising from the lower right!”

[Haap!]

BOOM!

In the brief opening created when Jin Cheon-jin cut into the trajectory and deflected the attack.

[Freeze!]

WHOOOOM—!

A storm of Absolute Zero burst from Han Seol-ah’s fingertips and swallowed the earth.

Cold that froze to the bone burrowed along the severed surface and began freezing the bastard’s interior.

[Kiiiiiii......!]

The Degraded Entity’s grotesque scream slowly faded, then cut off.

The monstrosity, dozens of meters long, transformed into a giant ice statue trapped inside a wall of ice.

“Cheon-jin, finish it.”

[I’ll end it!]

Jin Cheon-jin drove a fist filled with Mana drawn up to the limit into the very center of the ice statue.

CRAAAAACK—!

As fragments poured down like a snowstorm, the black “egg,” its original form, dropped weakly to the ground with a thud.

[Phew, phew... Subjugation complete. Ji-hee, just as you said, it returned to egg form. It doesn’t look like it’ll wake.]

Jin Cheon-jin’s breathless voice came over the radio.

“Good work. Retrieve the egg in a special Mana-blocking case and return immediately.”

Only then did Min Ji-hee remove her headset and wipe away the cold sweat beading on her forehead.

At that moment.

A system message appeared before Min Ji-hee’s eyes.

[Awakened Ability is evolving.]

[Awakened Ability: Cat’s Eye (B) → Commander’s Eye (A)]

‘...?!’

Meanwhile.

The American control room beyond the screen was already in chaos.

“Oh, my God. My God. Only five minutes? They caught that disaster in five minutes?!”

“That monster... by three Korean Hunters...!”

The American controllers’ screams of shock seemed ready to burst through the speakers.

At the same time, in the Republic of Korea conference room.

Watching the same scene on the shared screen, Lee Hyeong-je clapped his hands in admiration.

Kang Hyo-jun grinned and gave a small nod toward the monitor.

“I told you the country would fall apart without you, Commander.”

Back inside the private jet over America.

After turning off the monitor and setting down the headset, Min Ji-hee clenched her trembling hands tightly.

The Apostle had said it.

“You can do it.”

And now, she had proven it for all to see.

The fact that she was the greatest commander in the world.

***

And at that time.

I was flying through the air over the West Sea, where the Aggro Radar had marked the target.

“The location is definitely here.”

But with my naked eyes, and even with the Sword Saint’s sharp senses, I could sense nothing except the blue seawater.

‘No wonder the whole world couldn’t find it for ten years.’

At this level, even most S-rank detection Skills would be nowhere near enough.

But I had.

A cheat key that could surpass even this.

I took Nopi out of my inventory and turned it on.

The Synchronization linked to my home PC disconnected, and a familiar booting sound rang out.

“Nopi. I need your help.”

The Authority of the EX-rank graphics card, which could read the “threads of Mana.”

It was time for the “eye that sees Mana” to shine.

CLICK.

[B:98%]

Just starting Synchronization drained 2% of the battery in an instant.

And in the empty air, pitch-black threads of Mana began to intertwine, revealing the outline of an enormous Mobile Fortress.

“Found you, rats.”