Chapter 260 – Growth (10)
Team: HH, thursdays, Yahiko (2/12)
The player who mocked the gods will receive a godly punishment.
That was the order Poseidon suddenly gave to his servants.
Athena, who had eyes and ears all over Olympus, had heard about it.
It was obvious who that player was.
Cha Yeon-woo. It was someone Athena was looking after with great interest. Since Poseidon said that such a child would be hurt, of course she would go looking for Hermes with an angry face.
Grin.
Hermes unintentionally laughed when he saw his sister.
She must’ve been annoyed at his reaction.
She raised an eyebrow and glared at Hermes.
“What’s so funny?’
“Nothing. It’s just that I’ve never seen you this flustered.”
Athena furrowed her eyebrows. She shut her mouth and didn’t say anything.
It was hilarious to Hermes.
Actually, although Hermes had met Yeon-woo often, Athena had never contacted him other than when Yeon-woo sacrificed Aegis.
But still, Athena cherished Yeon-woo like a child of her own. No, like her own apostle.
Since he knew the reason why, he didn’t say much about it, but it was still interesting to see the goddess of war, one who made the demons shiver in fear, acting like this.
What kind of faces would their siblings make? Their father? Of course, their father was in a deep sleep, so he didn’t know the situation outside.
‘Thanks to that, we can act like this.’
Hermes spoke as he organized his thoughts.
“Don’t be too rushed, sister. We know that child better than anyone.”
Hermes crinkled his eyes.
“He’s a child who turned Agares into rags. He has a few sly allies inside him, like the boa constrictors that I raise. We can just sit back and watch Uncle suffer. If he needs help, we can help him then.”
“…..Must be nice to be so carefree.”
Athena snorted as she left Hermes’s residence. Hermes smiled sourly and watched his sister leave.
“But there’s nothing we can do, sister. We can’t do anything here. The same goes for Uncle.”
The damned system. And Allforone, who deserved to suffer more than death.
Hermes muttered to himself, sighing. Then, he turned around and closed his eyes.
As he was locked into the consciousness of his real body, a new view opened.
There, he could see Yeon-woo moving.
Hermes suddenly became curious about how many gods and demons were using this ‘view’ to observe Yeon-woo right now.
* * *
“I hope this is enough.”
The Head Elder put his brush down on the inkstone. He had looked at the book for so long that his eyes were tired. He rubbed his eyes, but the feeling didn’t go away.
Actually, this tiredness wasn’t physical tiredness. For that, all he had to do was circulate the energy around him to feel better. But mental tiredness wasn’t something that could be that easily taken care of.
This was all because he had been writing a Mugong book that he hadn’t planned on writing.
<Blood Lightning Martial Book>. A writing of divination that the Head Elder had learned back during his younger days. He had spoken coldly to Phante, but the Head Elder began to organize all of his information into a scroll for him.
However, it wasn’t an easy process. It was a Formless Strong Energy that the Head Elder used just through concepts, so he didn’t know where to start.
On the other hand, it was something he wanted to do because of that.
The Head Elder had been completely absorbed by Mugong when he was younger, and when he was older, he had missed the chance to get married because he was studying. He didn’t have any successors because he didn’t have time for a disciple.
All people wanted to leave a trace of themselves behind when they left the world, so he had been thinking of searching for a successor soon anyhow.
Phante had whined at him to teach him. Still, the Head Elder couldn’t easily give it away, so he touched Phante’s pride, but he had entered closed training, and hadn’t left since.
It meant that he had tenacity in addition to his current potential. The Head Elder would have to check for himself when Phante escaped the Myunbyeok Building, but he had pretty much passed now.
The Head Elder began writing with a light heart, but things didn’t go as he hoped. He realized that it was hard to write about the concepts in his head.
However, going over his thoughts cleared his head, and his understanding of Blood Lightning was deeper once he was almost finished.
Now, all he had to worry about was how to give this to Phante.
‘I don’t want to because I can already see his reaction.’
All members of the tribe acknowledged that the person most like the Martial King’s younger days was Phante.
Once he received it, he would probably cause all kinds of commotion because he was so happy. The Head Elder was the one who suffered the most because of the Martial King.
Just when he was wondering how to give it to Phante quietly…..
“Phante will be happy when he sees it.”
The Head Elder got to attention at the sudden voice. Yeon-woo had been standing in front of him for some time.
Even though he was deep in thought, he hadn’t felt someone come up to him? The Head Elder spoke with widened eyes.
“Hm? When did you come?”
“I called for you several times outside. There wasn’t any answer, so I just came in. Sorry if I was rude.”
“It’s fine. We’re all one family. I feel like it’s been a while since I’ve seen you.”
The Head Elder looked Yeon-woo up and down strangely.
After Yeon-woo was finished with Galliard’s training, he almost never went outside.
However, the Martial King, the Head Elder, nor the other members of the tribe went to ask how he was doing.
The One-horned tribe members had experience with holing themselves up to go over things, so they just thought he was busy with things too.
Rather, they wondered how he had come out so quickly.
Also, Yeon-woo seemed quite different from before.
He was sturdier and heavier.
Before, he had exuded a sharp aura, like he was going to explode any moment, but now, it was completely settled to the point that it was calm.
‘He’s done it so fast. It seems like he’s found his path. He won’t stumble even if he adds other things on.’
However, it also occurred to him that it would be hard for Yeon-woo to climb higher from where he was.
Still, he was proud that Yeon-woo was now at an expert-level where he could use Strong Energy.
“But why are you here? If you’re looking for the tribe leader, he’s probably in his office.”
“I already went to greet Seseungnim.”
“Then?”
“Could I know where Edora is?”
Unlike Phante, Edora was climbing the floors.
He just heard that Edora had passed the 30th floor some time ago, but he didn’t know what happened after that.
Yeon-woo’s communication artifact was broken. He hadn’t fixed it because he was busy training.
“She came here some time ago. She’s probably on the 36th floor.”
Yeon-woo’s eyes flashed.
“She’s made a lot of progress.”
“She’s also become pretty skilled. The Yang Sword is settling in.”
Yeon-woo smiled faintly. The other side of the Yang Sword, the Yin Sword. When would he be able to unlock that?
“But why Edora suddenly? I can contact her if you need.”
Yeon-woo shook her head.
“It’s fine. There’s no rush, and I can meet her up there.”
“Ah. Then are you…..?”
The Head Elder’s eyes widened, realizing what Yeon-woo was trying to go.
Yeon-woo nodded his head heavily.
“Yes. I’m officially starting again.”
* * *
Yeon-woo finished his goodbyes to the One-horned tribe with the Head Elder. After he made a contract with By the Table, he had already finished everything he needed to set up a clan.
Now there was only one thing left.
‘The Summer Queen.’
Yeon-woo left the Head Elder’s residence and headed to Boo’s dungeon.
The dungeon had changed a lot since the last time he was there, and the difference was visible from the entrance.
Skeleton warriors in armor kneeled. The master of their master. It was their respect for such a high being.
As he walked along the path, many undead stopped what they were doing to bow to Yeon-woo. They were like citizens greeting their king.
Clip, clop—
Boo arrived with Skeleton Knights on ghost horses in tow.
It was an incredible change considering how it had been filled with lower-level ghosts at the beginning.
Yeon-woo was surprised. After he left the dungeon to Boo, he hadn’t paid any attention to it.
The armor of the skeleton knights all shined. They were things they stole from the Summer Queen’s armory.
「Have you. Arrived?」
As Booo bowed to Yeon-woo, the skeleton knights got off their horses to kneel to Yeon-woo. When he looked closely, he could see mages, shamans, lancers, and others behind the knights.
Also, there were golems, zombies, ghouls, banshees, and specters. It seemed like he had brought all the undeads that were spread out in the dungeon. Everywhere he looked, he could see a respective greeting of the undead.
However, to Yeon-woo, it wasn’t a respectful sight but ridiculous instead.
“…..What’s all this?”
「Of course. It’s for. You. Since our. Master. Has come」
“Stop it. It’s over the top. Do what you normally do.”
「Accepting. Your orders.」
Boo nodded and waved his hand in the air. As he did, the undead stood back up and returned to where they were.
Yeon-woo sighed. It was nice since Boo could do more things as he became stronger, but on the other hand, he was embarrassed because Boo overreacted sometimes.
Still, it wasn’t a bad thing. It was kind of fun being served like that. Yeon-woo just wanted him not to cross the line.
“What about the work?”
“We’ve reached the middle.”
“Let’s go.”
By ‘work,’ he was talking about making a Bone Dragon.
Yeon-woo entered the center of the dungeon with Boo.
They had split Intrenian into an outer section, middle section, and center section.
The deeper he went, the higher the level of the undead, and he could occasionally see a Demonic Beast or Ghost Beast flying around.
The dungeon was a complex maze.
If you took a wrong turn, you would easily lose your way, and there were different kinds of magic circles and traps set up for defense.
He could see how much effort Boo had placed into making the dungeon.
When he arrived at the center section, the long and narrow maze was gone.
There, the Summer Queen’s corpse lay on top of a large magic circle. However, its color was a lot different than before. It had been red as rubies, but it was completely black now.
It was because they injected Devil King Poison to mature the corpse.
Clack, clack!
Tak tak—
Countless skeletons were taking apart the corpse with sharp knives.
The scales were so strong that they had to be careful during the process.
It was a relief that the skeletons didn’t have any thoughts of their own; they couldn’t make any mistakes because they only did as they were ordered to. There was someone else who was ordering them.
『Be careful. It can’t be damaged in the slightest. Separate what you already split.』
Rebecca showed an energetic side to her as she ran around the skeletons. Fitting of a hunter, she made sure not to waste her experience. Shanon and Hanryeong stepped up to do what the skeletons couldn’t do.
On one side, Henova was leading a skeleton squad to do something Yeon-woo ordered.
His touch was needed the most. Next to him, Brahm was helping. Ananta wasn’t completely healed yet, but she was getting better, so he did small things on the side.
Yeon-woo passed them to where the Summer Queen was sitting blankly.
She had to watch her body being dismembered bound in Divine Iron.
Her face was dark, and she was powerless. She had come a long way down from where she was.
“Ismenios.”
Yeon-woo approached the Summer Queen’s side.
She looked blankly at her corpse and slowly looked up at Yeon-woo.
She hadn’t completely lost herself yet.
「I guess it’s time now?」
The Summer Queen smiled coldly. She had realized how her last moments would be.
Yeon-woo slowly took his mask off. He didn’t deny it.
“Yes.”
「Are you satisfied?」
“Of course.”
Yeon-woo smiled faintly. His eyes turned cold. As his eyes opened vertically, they shined like those of a snake going after its prey.
「Haha! Hahaha! Sure. Revenge… If that’s what you were after, you did well. Very. Only Allforone made me like this. But Allforone was always that kind of guy, and it’s amazing that you were able to make me like this.」
The Summer Queen burst out laughing. All this time, she had always been the predator. But now, she was prey in front of Yeon-woo.
So this was how it felt. The Summer Queen giggled.
Most people in front of her cried and begged. But strangely, she didn’t know how to express that feeling.
The Summer Queen just laughed.
She could only think that the last dragon was now disappearing.
She closed her eyes. She had given up a long time ago. She didn’t want to show fear.
That moment—
‘Ah.’
The Summer Queen realized what the ‘way of thinking’ that Cha Jeong-woo also spoke of was.
The greed that she always had to be the best.
The curse of being lonely was only being lifted.
-But. If you can release that curse, you’ll be able to see new things. Then, I’ll help you, Ismenios. Call for me anytime.
Wasn’t this what Cha Jeong-woo had been speaking about?
Yeon-woo put his hand atop of the Summer Queen’s and activated Bathory’s Vampiric Sword.
The Summer Queen’s weak soul began to flow into Yeon-woo.
Hwak!
A fire began to blaze above Yeon-woo’s body.