The Regressor has a dream.
In the past, he had different dreams and in the 2nd iteration, Ha Saetbyul herself was his dream.
Now that he was sprinting towards the end of the long accumulations of his sin, Yu Jitae needed to conduct an experiment. It was a test about his dream.
Therefore, he cut his mental connection with Clone 2 and sent him to Ha Saetbyul.
To Clone 2, the concept of ‘his lord’ was an absolute one, but how much freedom would he be able to reveal under his restraint?
He didn’t know the result yet and decided to wait until he received a message from the clone.
On the other hand, regardless of the experiment, sending Clone 2 was something done for the sake of Ha Saetbyul. He now had some faith in the 7th iteration, perhaps because of the words of Vintage Clock, who said that he would definitely become happy.
If so, then this iteration would flow without the flow of time being interrupted again and Ha Saetbyul had to live a happy life in that continuum of time. It’s because she had done many things for him.
That was all he felt about Ha Saetbyul.
It was the season of golden fields of wheat rustling like waves from the wind. The international political state was very complex.
The Association broke one of the promises made with the International Peacekeeping Organisation. It was about the use of magic stones.
Although it was common for matters like that to go under the radar, it was shared under the broad daylight due to a whistle-blower.
In a few days there was a commotion in the neutral country, Switzerland, where people raised a protest at the entrance of the Association’s embassy. It was a protest that denounced them for going against the promises, as they demanded the Association to explain their cause. It lasted several days and at last became an armed protest where people with guns raided the embassy.
The Association and Switzerland’s police officers reacted to the armed protest with force but it was too over the top. Although human rights weren’t viewed as important in the current era, the death of 2840 civilians still shocked the world.
There were simply way too many deaths.
Naturally, none of them were things caused by the Association. After the whistle-blower was caught, it was revealed that he wasn’t from the Association, and the ones that had mixed in with the police force and Association’s soldiers to carry out the excessive repression weren’t from the Association either.
However, those people immediately committed suicide after being caught. Someone was wreaking havoc using the Association as its mask.
Regarding these incidents, Chaliovan wrote a 17-page statement by hand and announced it to the public.
His statement summarised into one sentence was this.
Association: It isn’t us!
However, because the Association was already increasing their military might, people did not buy their explanation. The Association was excessively large and had went on for an excessively long period of time. They thus had too many weak points.
They needed 100 lines of explanations to explain 1 criticism. It wasn’t time-efficient, and that point was what Quasar effectively focused on.
The person behind Quasar actively started moving and because of their acceleration, various media all around the world began raising their claws at the Association.
They were being attacked by the media of all nations, just like the advice Yu Jitae gave.
Once again, Chaliovan announced his statements and indicated that there was an unknown person who tried to slander the Association. He named that person [Q].
It will be the start of Chaliovan and Q’s fight for power and from this point on, it was the Association’s job.
After finishing the preparations for the Fourth Night, Chief Advisor Season did not show his face at the Association.
He had to spend more time with the kids.
***
Yong Taeha’s eyes flickered with light.
“Kuk!”
His body was struck hard, floated in mid-air and flew for more than 30 metres before slamming into the dungeon wall. Yong Taeha’s chin dropped open as something gushed out from within. His mind immediately thought of the pancake he ate in the morning but what came out of his mouth was red.
“Taeha!” Someone’s shout echoed in his ears.
“Uuk…”
He slowly raised his body as a scary thought emerged in his head. The first part of his body that landed on the ground were his ribs.
How big was the shock? Thinking that, he simultaneously scanned past his rib cages with his hands. One, two, three… a total of six bones were broken but fortunately, they didn’t pierce through his organs and were piercing out through his skin instead.
Only after seeing the bones protruding out of his ripped ribs did he feel pain flooding in.
“Get up, Yong Taeha!” shouted Tyr Brzenk.
There was no time to remain sitting down so Yong Taeha stood up. His rib cages cracked and gave him goosebumps but he endured it and tightly grabbed onto the sword.
In front of him was a monster whose body was constructed of stone, reaching 8 metres in height.
The large doll moved despite half of its head missing- the A- ranked mid boss, ‘Golem’, let out a roar.
Kurururur—–
His cracked bones cried out loud.
“Yong Taeha! Move your feet! Do not fight it head-on!”
Superhumans with cold weapons were powerless against such large-type monsters. Even if they were to envelope their swords with auras, they were still nothing but skewers that couldn’t pierce through the heart.
“Look here—!”
With a shout, he jumped high in the air, once again making himself the bait.
From the corner of his eyes, he could see Yu Kaeul with trembling hands.
He had to believe in her.
*
Team Lair was currently in the middle of a restoration operation on a monster-occupied land. Roughly 15% of Earth had become the habitat of monsters and these were the so-called monster-occupied lands.
Most of them weren’t dangerous so it used to be more cost-efficient to leave them be, but with the passing of time, lands became increasingly more expensive and reclaiming barren lands like this slowly rose to be one of the prominent jobs for superhumans.
Every member of Team Lair except for Kaeul wanted high ranks and the difficulty of the raids gradually increased as a result.
On some unlucky days, they would end up with excessively dangerous operations like this.
“Oi! Ling Ling–!”
Bangg–
Her small body was struck by a fist of the same size.
She managed to react in time. Right before the strike, she strengthened the point of impact and protected her organs with mana. Despite that, Ling Ling after slamming into the ground had a nosebleed, bled from her ears and received a lot of internal damage.
The golem’s movement was abnormally fast. It punched out towards the human girl on the ground that was the size of its fist.
Standing in between them, Tyr Brzenk took out his shield.
[Stronghold Declaration (A): Aegis]
Golden light gathered into a ball.
Kwangg–!
The ground caved in.
Kwangg–!
Ling Ling’s remaining ear also erupted.
Kwangg–!
Tyr’s legs were bent into an unnatural direction.
Kwangg–!
And soon, a crack appeared on the shield of light. The moment it breaks, one of them would die for sure.
It was a make or break situation but Kaeul couldn’t stay focused. It wasn’t her fault as she had already used five enormous spells – it was due to the golem being a monster for surviving all of them.
There was a hole in the golem’s head that had been exploded by Kaeul’s spell. Yong Taeha crawled into the golem’s body but the mana moving inside its body intertwined with Yong Taeha’s mana and resulted in an explosive reaction.
Bamm- it exploded and Yong Taeha bounced out of the golem’s body with fractured bones and burned scars all around his body.
After the explosion of mana, the doll with its mana flow interrupted, twisted and turned as if it was broken, but this only bought them a little bit of time.
When the golem once again started moving properly, it changed its target to Yong Taeha who was still on the ground. Without even any time to look after Ling Ling, Tyr Brzenk immediately jumped out. He had to make the golem look his way.
However, Tyr Brzenk couldn’t do anything to grab the attention of the large golem with only one hand. The only thing he had was a sword so he climbed up the golem’s body and constantly stabbed at the joints. His palms ripped. His sword shattered and fragments of the sword bounced into his eyes.
Despite all his effort, the golem did not stop.
Standing in front of the tattered Yong Taeha, it at last raised its large fist of stone into the air.
From the frustrating sense of powerlessness, Tyr Brzenk bellowed.
“You fuc*ingg—!”
That was when Kaeul’s spell finally constructed itself.
Tuuung–
A large and sharp ray of golden light emerged forth. The ray of light erased all the shadows nearby – it was a [Magic Arrow] with an extreme amount of mana embedded within.
The overwhelming power of the spell pierced through the lower body of the golem, and melted all the mana and stone in its path. The ray of light had gone through the core of the golem and only then did the golem come to a stop.
After casting the spell from a distance, Kaeul kneeled on the ground while grabbing onto her hand. She had been using spells for quite a long time but it was still difficult to control it. Her veins were ruptured, her skin was reddened and her fingers ached all around.
“…”
Even then, she couldn’t sit still. Kaeul ran forward to check Ling Ling’s situation. There were all sorts of wounds around her body due to the aftermath of the golem’s punches. Kaeul used an emergency healing spell albeit awkwardly and the mana of the dragons helped them quickly recover themselves.
“So mysterious…”
“Uun?”
“Kaeul-unni your spell. It feels so goodd…”
Enveloped in her golden mana, Ling Ling murmured.
“Don’t say anything. You’re bleeding…”
Yong Taeha then added from the side.”
“Thank you. I almost ended up smelling incense as a portrait. We are all alive thanks to you.”
“You did great…”
“Well, it was all you. You’re just in a different league.”
He gave an honest compliment with a bitter smile.
After receiving countless compliments for saving them, Kaeul felt weird.
Was it because of their compliments? Maybe it was, but it felt as if there was something more to it. Even from before hearing their compliments, she had felt a greater sense of accomplishment the moment she realised that everyone was okay.
Before long, the rescue team arrived with the post management team. Fortunately, the raid ended with everyone safe.
The raid was more difficult than usual but it was normal for unexpected things to occur in the field – the more so if it was a battlefield.
The after-effects of their wounds were severe so Team Lair had to rest for the next week but they had gained so many points from this raid that they weren’t losing out on anything.
They didn’t die and that was more than enough. As long as they were alive, nothing was too serious for superhumans.
None of us died right?
So it was a successful raid.
We got hurt but we are doing our best.
So it’s okay. Let’s just rest for a bit.
…While the young newborn superhumans were consoling their own exhausted minds back to normal, something unpleasant popped up.
News reports on the internet ruined their mood.
*
[The laziness of geniuses? Team Lair not attending any operations for several days]
[A famous newborn superhuman group, ‘Team Coin’ denounces, “If you have more, you have to know how to do more…”, “A direct comparison to Team White”]
[Fans of Lair enraged. Team Lair should be ashamed to face all the other newborn superhumans bleeding at the forefront.]
Tyr Brzenk twitched his eyes. His eyes that were always gloomy and dark turned even darker.
“These fu*king bastards.”
Yong Taeha swore out loud.
“What the f*ck do they want… We’re trying our hardestt…”
The one who followed him up with more swear words was Ling Ling. This small young girl’s personality tended to get coarse when upset.
Team Coin – some random nameless team was talking smack about Team Lair. At the same time, they compared Team White who was estimated by the media to be the strongest with Kaeul’s team, with the logic that Team White had both talent and hard work compared to the lazy Team Lair.
“So annoying, for real. Do they think we are actual retards just because we are not saying anything?”
Yong Taeha gritted his teeth. People knew that Team Lair was a group that had the greatest geniuses of history and requested even more zealous work from them.
The overdogs – people with a lot of belongings – tended to be displayed as the villain. The more they had, the more they were expected to sacrifice. That was Team Lair’s situation in a nutshell.
“Don’t bother with them. Guys, we all know how we are doing.”
The young man who was the son of Rank 1 from his birth was used to this situation. Tyr Brzenk settled his own mood first before consoling his comrades.
“We can prove it with the outcome.”
But despite saying that, the young man didn’t feel too happy himself.
Yong Taeha had rib cages piercing through his skin, had a second-degree burn all over his body, and had both small and large fractures. He also had mana poisoning symptoms and had to suffer for two days from high fever.
Ling Ling had both of her eardrums erupted and her organs were messed up from the shock. She discharged blood for three days and cried from pain whenever she was alone with Kaeul.
What about Tyr Brzenk himself? Fragments of his broken sword had stabbed into his eyes and if they were even slightly deeper, he might have died during the fight.
And yet all their hard work was being denied.
Therefore, Brzenk only tried to console his teammates twice. He couldn’t bring himself to say the same thing three times.
Meanwhile, Kaeul who had been quietly watching them also had a frown on her face.
“…”
Kaeul wasn’t in a good mood.