Chapter 61

Chapter 61. Reversal (1)

"Junior, we should at least plant the flag before we go, right?"

The Patriot was more cautious than I'd expected.

"We took the North Korean capital — it'd be a waste to just leave."

If we planned to push all the way to Mt. Baekdu, then we needed to bring our military into Pyongyang as an occupying force — that was the follow-up.

But a military composed of Induced Awakened and ordinary people — could they survive here?

"Can ordinary people even live here?"

"This fortress is absurdly sturdy, isn't it?"

But I came to see the Patriot's point.

Under the assumption that the fortress built here served as a base, at least.

The fortress Muratan had built was genuinely impregnable.

'He used to grumble about being bothered but then gather everyone inside anyway.'

A sight I'd seen plenty of times in [Raise a Sword].

People living inside his fortresses had even thrived on occasion.

Beyond that, there were more reasons the Patriot's words made sense.

"The polluted beasts really have thinned out."

"That's because you killed that red thing!"

I had killed Necribas, who had been dormant in Pyongyang.

I had also killed the [Eye] that had appeared when Necribas offered itself up.

As a result, the darkness from Pyongyang down to the South had faded and the polluted beasts had noticeably decreased.

To be precise, the ones regenerating after the Patriot's bombardment had vanished.

"The military needs work to do."

The Patriot had an unexpected side to him.

Before becoming a Transcendent, I'd thought he shouldered everything alone.

That his mind had cracked from the burden, and that was why he stirred up problems and reshaped things to his liking.

But the Patriot I'd met as a fellow Transcendent was different.

"If we push into China, who knows what'll happen! It's critical to establish a front line as far from the Korean mainland as possible."

He wanted to move the front line — previously near the 38th Parallel — all the way up to Pyongyang.

Distance wasn't an issue.

"That pointy-eared elf. She lays down a portal and it's done, right?"

"……"

He wasn't wrong, admittedly.

The excessively crude phrasing just made him look ignorant.

'He's not entirely thoughtless.'

That didn't mean I agreed with dragging the entire military up here, though.

There had to be more to it.

"The real reason?"

"You haven't been a Transcendent long enough to know."

The Patriot spoke.

Suddenly sharing his past…

"People need work to live. I know that damn well from bouncing between construction sites and day-labor gigs before the Gates hit, then becoming a total bum—"

"Pardon?"

"Junior, people die without work!"

As Transcendents — the beings who represented this nation — we had to consider even ordinary people's employment. That was his logic.

"That's why I donate all my Mysteries to the country!"

Purify the sea with Mysteries.

Then the fishermen have work.

"When the fishermen have work? Know what happens next?"

"The region flourishes?"

"Wrong! Scumbag distributors and wholesalers swarm in and crush the prices at auction."

The Patriot Distribution Act.

A very famous livelihood bill.

A law that prevented produce worth 100 won from ending up at 5,000 won on supermarket shelves after passing through nine layers of distribution.

"Execute the distributors and normalize the fish prices. Then I get work too."

Citizens' work eventually circled back to the Transcendent.

I wasn't sure what kind of logic that was, but…

"Look at my achievements!"

Along the same lines, the Patriot had overhauled the entire agriculture and livestock industry.

Reminiscing about the old days seemed to have fired him up, because his language was exceptionally coarse.

"Junior, Korean beef pissed me off the most."

The Patriot said.

"We were the only country in the world where domestic beef was the most expensive!"

"Korean beef was expensive, yeah."

"I'd only eaten it twice before I became a Transcendent!"

Korean beef was expensive.

Before the Patriot normalized it, I'd honestly found it hard to afford much. It was beyond a civil servant's salary.

"Why the hell is beef slaughtered right here on Korean soil more expensive than American beef shipped over on a boat? Doesn't that seem weird? Does Korean beef eat petroleum to grow?"

The Patriot had concluded that this was all the distributors' doing.

Price-fixing, distribution-margin manipulation?

Killed them all.

"Now Koreans eat nothing but Korean beef."

He'd improved Korean beef with Mysteries, he declared.

"That disgusting kimchi — trampled under shoes, kneaded with piss-covered hands."

He had eradicated the kimchi made by the Chings, he declared.

Now all citizens could eat kimchi made from fresh Korean cabbage and red pepper flakes at affordable prices, he declared.

All manner of other claims followed.

'Is he just trying to brag?'

Just as I was starting to question his purpose.

The Patriot got to the real point.

"All of this creates jobs."

In the land that Transcendents normalized, countless jobs were born.

Nearby villages came alive, money flowed, and the birth rate increased…

'—well, it didn't.'

The birth rate was still low.

But it was holding steady.

Compared to other countries that had been devastated, Korea was doing relatively well.

"There was a deeper purpose behind everything."

I'll concede.

The Patriot was extreme, but a genuine good man.

He truly cared about the nation.

At this point, I even felt like praising him.

"Same goes for the military."

Being a soldier was a profession.

A noble one, too.

Above all.

"We need them so we can catch our breath!"

This was the real point.

Transcendents were too busy handling the major crises alone.

I felt it too.

'The Red Sea, the Molten Sea, the Ghost Valley, Jeonju's Void, and now North Korea.'

The catastrophes I'd been tangled up in since Awakening.

Every last one was a nation-level crisis.

The Patriot had been the same.

"Minor Gates, monsters that pop out of Gates, polluted beasts flowing in day and night. The world can never be solved by a Transcendent alone!"

The Patriot shouted that with genuine conviction.

What can I say.

_______________________

—Ep. 21 (1).

It might have looked like the Patriot had talked me into taking a break, but the truth was, I needed time too.

⦗This maiden obtained 1 million lives!⦘

I had no idea where she'd harvested a million lives from.

But Iris claimed she'd managed to secure them.

'She always was good at picking things up from random places.'

She'd even stick flowers into the sword as 'gifts.'

Anyway, after my swords took what Iris had obtained and researched it every which way—

⦗If we just kill 100,000 people, this maiden can spend 1 more second with the Sword Master!!!⦘

They had made something truly astonishing possible.

'An insane thing I'll absolutely never do, but…'

That's right.

In theory, harvesting roughly 100,000 lives would let me extend a sword's manifestation time by 1 second.

⦗Sword Master, if we research further, it should be possible using the power that annihilates the demonic as well.⦘

According to Yuria, a similar method — using demonic energy equivalent to 100,000 lives — could also extend manifestation time.

Listening to my swords' research findings, I nodded calmly.

⦗Sword Master, I shall use the lives the little demon brought to add 10 seconds to the swords' manifestation time.⦘

Muratan made the astonishing possible.

He said it would take a bit since it was the first time, but adding time to even a single sword right before facing China was critically important.

I nodded without hesitation.

"How long will it take?"

⦗Two hours.⦘

I'd expected half a day at least, but only two hours.

I informed the Patriot of the two-hour time limit.

"Y-you're going to hit China in just two hours?"

He was overjoyed and endorsed my plan.

Honestly, I'd seen the enormous greatsword lodged in Mt. Baekdu — there was no reason to wait any longer.

'What kind of sword is that?'

A sword with a familiar feel.

Yet it was definitely not one I had raised.

Nor was it a broken sword from a failed world.

After all, every failed sword in [Raise a Sword] had shattered to pieces and scattered into nothing.

"Let's hurry."

I pressed the Patriot.

He sent his bombers to carve a path from North to South Korea.

Meanwhile, I contacted Seol-a noona via demon and asked her to bring Yuki from the frontline.

Hwiooooo——.
Kuguguguguung!!!!

Against the now-familiar backdrop of explosions, Seol-a noona appeared riding the demon.

The demon's performance outside was apparently the same.

"Wow, the demon is seriously fast. Can I give it a name?"

"It's yours now, so do whatever you like."

It hadn't been that long since we'd last met, yet it somehow felt good to see her.

Good feelings aside, this was wartime — I got straight to the point.

I pointed at the woman behind noona and asked,

"Is she passed out?"

"No, she says her body just seizes up whenever she sees the demon."

She certainly looked unconscious, but noona paid it no mind, shook Yuki awake, and brought her over.

But for some reason?

Sniff sniff.

"S-Si-woo-sama's…"

Yuki stared at me with a strange look in her eyes.

Nostrils flaring.

The sight reminded me uncomfortably of the elves from [Raise a Sword], and I felt a twinge of revulsion.

"Haaah! Mother's phytoncide!"

It was as though those words were literally emanating from Yuki's face.

Naturally, a dilemma arose.

'What do I do about the World Tree seed…'

The World Tree seed I'd obtained.

Planting it would grow a 100%-pure World Tree.

'One that turns everything in the world into fertilizer…'

Whether in its intact form.

Or in a corrupted, Fallen form.

A World Tree consumed everything regardless.

The only difference was whether it bestowed life or scattered death afterward.

While I was thinking that.

⦗Ahh, this maiden smelled something delicious and came over!⦘

Iris barged in.

She seemed wildly excited at the sight of a living, fresh elf.

'You can't eat her.'

I used [Sword Master's Dominion] to tell Iris.

Then, acting like nothing had happened, I informed Yuki of her task.

"Please connect the spirit realm between the front line and here."

"Y-you want me to lay down a portal?"

Laying a portal in the middle of demonized territory — what kind of insanity was that?

That was the face she made.

I pointed to my Inviolable Fortress and gestured at the Patriot's bombardment raining from the sky.

"We're short on time, so let's get this done fast."

In this short span, the Patriot's bombing had already driven back much of the darkness.

With Necribas dead, this area was apparently defenseless.

"I-I'll open it!"

While Yuki opened the spirit realm, I chatted with Seol-a noona.

The main topic—

"Are those two doing a good job?"

I was worried the foreign Transcendents might slack off.

"Both of them genuinely fought with their lives on the line. That Yacha guy? He was ripping apart scattered polluted beasts bare-handed, and Yuki was summoning spirits to heal soldiers and torch beasts — working her ass off."

For noona — whose performance evaluations were notoriously strict — to give such praise?

That meant the Japanese Transcendents had truly worked hard.

I nodded quietly.

Then noona started asking me questions too.

"Si-woo, why did you build a fortress?"

A fortress as vast as Pyongyang had appeared, so she had every right to be curious.

I had zero intention of lying to noona.

We were close enough for that.

"I blacked out for a moment, and my sword decided on its own to protect me by building this."

"Th-this enormous fortress?"

Noona looked at my clothes, then the fortress, then glanced at the Baby Sword in its scabbard.

"Hmm… the sword just protects you like that?"

"Sometimes, and sometimes it's the other way around."

Noona asked.

"That sword was originally a person, wasn't it?"

"A person and a sword."

Her expression was so serious that I answered that way without thinking.

"Have you still not…?"

"This trial thing is… really hard!"

The energy emanating from noona had grown slightly stronger.

But she still showed no interest in accepting it.

The short, warm chat ended, and the portal installation was complete.

Then the Patriot returned.

"Finished a bit ahead of the two hours!"

In that brief window, a path from South Korea to Pyongyang had been carved open.

The Patriot pointed at the path and declared proudly,

"Tanks are rolling up now."

Shortly after, our military emerged from the portal Yuki had opened.

Equipped with 4-tube night vision goggles to prepare for [darkness], armed with top-grade domestically-made machine guns fitted with scopes — the Republic of Korea's military.

Every single soldier looked like a special-forces operator.

"We will hold this fortress!!!"

Soldiers swarmed around the enormous fortress, moving without pause.

Once the setup was roughly complete, the Patriot turned to me.

"Junior, time for that, right?"

"Sigh…"

"When I planted one on Dokdo, the reward was seriously insane!"

"Do I really have to?"

"Of course! It's legitimate, rightful Korean territory that you reclaimed! This one's all yours!"

My turn had come.

I'd been assigned the role of putting the finishing touch on Pyongyang's capture.

Seol-a noona, who'd somehow followed along, asked,

"You're going to do… that, in those robes?"

These clothes could no longer be removed.

They supposedly vanished temporarily while bathing, but they remained fused to my body regardless.

"Great Korean Emperor for real?"

"No, that's seriously just the Patriot's nonsense."

Bickering with noona, I climbed to the roof of the fortress.

The demon's mobility was incredible — it could scale fortress walls — and despite that, its ride was so smooth it didn't affect the rider at all.

We talked normally.

"Planting a Taegukgi… on a fortress built in Pyongyang."

What kind of insanity was this?

I had the same thought, honestly.

That's right.

I was planting a flag atop the fortress I had captured in Pyongyang.

This was an act of 'occupation.'

It might even influence the [System] that had come to humanity.

[Inviolable Fortress]

A structure recognized by the World.

At its highest point, I inserted the Taegukgi into the slot at the very top.

Thunk!

Then the World whispered.

<The Republic of Korea has occupied Chinese territory.>

Something felt off.

To be continued.