Chapter 573

Everything had an order and a progression.

Mutated Gates were no exception.

When a magical power reading crossed a certain threshold, an alarm sounded and everyone nearby received an evacuation order.

But the ordinary Grade C Gate had become a Mutated Gate and then a Monster Wave in just a few dozen seconds.

The reading was so far beyond anything on record that the Gate management office could only suspect a measurement error.

Their deliberation lasted less than a minute. Then the Kraken tore through space into this world and smashed the Gate management office before anything else.

Boom!

And the flames of disaster spread in every direction in an instant.

The Kraken was the terror of the black sea, a king of immense power. And a king like that had savage, loyal soldiers.

—Ssssss!

Fins moved without pause. Gills opened and closed.

A Merman appeared, making a strange cry, and the intersection crowded with cars and people fell silent.

“What is that…?”

The question went unfinished.

Whoosh—crack!

It happened in an instant.

A barnacle-covered trident pierced through a human body and continued flying, punching straight through even a vehicle waiting at the light.

Boom!

Vehicle fragments flew in every direction with the sound of an explosion.

As people stared at the impossible sight, alarms around the intersection sounded and warnings arrived on their smartphones.

Weeeeeeeeng!

Ding. Beep-beep. Bzzzz.

The noise broke the silence.

People looked from the burning car to the Merman standing in the road. Only then did they realize the danger was right in front of them.

“M-Monster!”

“It’s a Monster Wave!”

“Aaaaaaaah!”

The crowds scattered, screaming.

All they could think about was getting away from the monsters and staying alive. Rules and laws meant nothing now.

“Fuck, move!”

“W-wait…!”

Crash! Crack!

“Graaagh!”

People knocked one another down. A car sped through a red light and struck a pedestrian in the crosswalk.

Hooooonk! Thud!

“Ghk!”

After the Great Cataclysm, Korea had become the most densely populated country in the world.

An intersection in Busan, the country’s second-largest city, plunged into chaos and terror.

But there were exceptions.

Whoosh-whoosh-whoosh!

Figures pushed against the current of the fleeing crowd.

There were only four of them, but their calm eyes and lightning-fast movements marked them as seasoned Hunters.

“Three o’clock!”

“Okay. All at once?”

“Cut down the ones in front first.”

“Don’t let them scatter!”

They had never met, but a few words were enough.

Each had spent anywhere from one to ten years fighting monsters. They knew exactly what they had to do.

If we don’t stop them here… we’re finished.

We have to hold them back somehow.

Fortunately, only around a dozen Mermen had appeared at the intersection.

None of the four was a particularly high-Grade Hunter, but against that many, they might be able to hold out and buy time.

“Surround them!”

They charged toward the Mermen. Then they stopped, despair taking hold.

Thud. Thud-thud. Thud-thud-thud!

—Ssssit!

—Ssssss!

The asphalt trembled beneath the weight of hundreds of Mermen charging toward them.

The first group had only been the vanguard. The main force had arrived.

And even this many might be just a fraction of it.

“…Ah.”

We’re finished.

All four thought the same thing.

Fighting a dozen Mermen would have meant risking their lives. For four low-to-mid-Grade Hunters, taking on this many was nearly impossible.

No—it was impossible without high-Grade Hunters to back them up.

“W-we could hold out until reinforcements arrive…”

“Hold out?”

A middle-aged Hunter muttered through clenched teeth in response to someone’s almost desperate suggestion.

“We’d get hacked to death a thousand times faster.”

“…Damn it.”

His entire body felt as heavy as cotton soaked in water. He had to fight, but he could not bring himself to do it.

They had families. They wanted to live. Only their duty and resolve as Hunters kept them from backing away.

But they would not be able to hold themselves back much longer.

—Aah, aaaaaah!

When had she appeared?

A song spread from atop a tall building. Its singer was a pale beauty wearing a pearl crown, her long, flowing hair covering her naked body.

A Siren.

A witch whose beautiful voice bewitched listeners and led them to ruin. The queen of the black sea.

There was only one, but her haunting, powerful voice filled the wide intersection.

People who had been screaming as they fled looked up at the half-human, half-bird monster floating like an angel. They stopped, rapture on their faces.

The Hunters gritted their teeth against her magic, but it did no good.

Drip. Drip.

Blood slipped between their clenched teeth and ran down their chins.

The song burrowed into their ears. Their grips on their weapons weakened, and the hundreds of Mermen drawing closer blurred before their eyes.

“God… damn it.”

They could see death coming. Neither they nor the nearly thousand civilians around them would escape it.

And the massacre wouldn’t end here. Even if high-Grade Hunters arrived, they couldn’t protect every one of Busan’s millions of citizens.

Fuck. I didn’t think I’d die like this.

It was too late. There was nothing he could do.

The middle-aged Hunter had given up. He was staring at the Siren through blurred eyes when—

—Aah, aaaaaah…!

Fwooooosh—crack!

Something shrieked through the air, and the song cut off.

Dark blue blood, the color of the sea, burst from the Siren. Her beating wings snapped, and the half-human, half-bird monster fell from the sky onto the asphalt.

Whoooosh—thud!

“Huh?”

—Ssssit?

With the enchanted song gone, their minds cleared.

The surviving humans and the Mermen who had watched their queen die stared at the fallen Siren.

Her eyes were frozen wide. The impact had knocked off her pearl crown and spread her hair apart, revealing something long and pointed jutting out between her breasts.

Was that…?

“Bone?”

The question had barely left the middle-aged Hunter’s lips when—

Whooooooosh!

A strange noise rang out, and a shadow fell over everyone’s heads.

Everyone looked up.

Something enormous and pure white covered the sky far above them. At its center stood a man.

“This body. Descends.”

The arrogant yet powerful voice pierced everyone’s ears.

When golden hair flashed briefly in their vision, the unidentified man pointed toward the hundreds of Mermen and continued speaking.

“You. Die.”

—…!

The Mermen’s eyes widened. At the same instant, the white mass casting its shadow over them flashed.

Papapapapat!

Bone. It was bone.

Sharper than spearheads and as fast as arrows, bone fragments rained down on the intersection.

Fwooooosh! Thud-thud-thud-thud!

Thousands of bone fragments fired at once smashed scales and tore through fins.

A Merman that barely managed to knock away several bone fragments with its spear was immediately turned into a pincushion by another fragment that came flying at it, then collapsed.

Thud-thud-thud!

The downpour of bones struck monsters alone.

Amid that horrifying spectacle, the humans stood frozen as they watched the neatly paved asphalt road become stained with monster blood in an instant.

Thump. Thump. Crash!

In little more than ten seconds, nearly half of the two hundred Mermen collapsed.

No. They had melted.

One Merman, apparently their commander, let out an urgent cry.

—Ssssit, ssssssit!

—Sss. Ssssit!

As half-human, half-fish creatures, Mermen were monsters of considerable intelligence. At their commander’s order, they moved as one, raising the enormous scallop-shell shields strapped to their backs to form a wall.

The stranger—the Skeleton King—clicked his tongue.

“What insolent wretches. How dare you resist this body?”

It would make no difference. The Skeleton King’s power was beyond anything mere Mermen could contend with.

“I shall make you pay dearly for defying a king… Hm?”

Rrrrk. Boom!

Sensing something amiss, the Skeleton King turned his head.

Far away, Mermen swarmed toward him like a colony of ants. His golden eyes took them in from behind his mask.

“…Would you look at these wretches.”

There were more than five hundred at a glance.

As he took fresh offense at their insolence, the Skeleton King remembered something he had briefly forgotten.

Ah. Undead.

However urgent things were, he couldn’t raise an undead army in the middle of a Busan intersection.

Especially not with nearly a thousand humans watching him, eyes wide open.

“Oh. This isn’t right.”

He muttered uneasily. Then anger surged through him as the face of the wicked human who had placed restrictions on him came to mind.

That damned human. He puts me through all this?

The thought that the bastard had deliberately sent him to the area with the most monsters made his breastbone feel twisted.

The Skeleton King whipped his head toward the distant sky, in the direction Jin Taekyung had gone moments earlier.

Whoooooosh!

Gwooooooar!

Boom! Krrrrr-boom!

Even from here, he could clearly see enormous tentacles and hear the explosions.

The Skeleton King silently watched the scene, then turned his gaze back toward the cluster of Mermen gathered below.

“…On second thought, they look like a girl group.”

It was the first time the hideous Mermen had ever looked pretty to him.

Whoooosh—boom!

Seawater surged upward with a sound like an exploding shell.

But the attacks were much weaker than before, and their reach had clearly diminished.

That was probably because the Kraken’s nearly thirty tentacles were down to nine.

Slash!

No. Eight now.

—Gwooooooar!

“Now that’s a proper octopus.”

I shot forward with all my strength toward the roaring Kraken.

I dodged an incoming tentacle and stepped on empty air, leaping higher. Beneath my feet was a gigantic pair of eyes.

Time to finish this.

Fwoosh.

Flames wrapped around the spearhead and spun faster. I poured all my internal energy into the spear and drove it down toward the creature’s eye.

Fire Dragon Divine Spear, Third Form: Takoyaki.¹