Episode 7: Tidal Wave of Monsters / Chapter 119: Alien Troops from Earth (4)
TL: emptycube / ED: Obelisk
Richard went to the residence of the El tribe, the ‘inverted tree’. It was to ask that they participate in the war against the monsters.
Three elders met with Richard.
“Why have you come here? As we have already made an alliance with Overseer Choi Hyuk, we have no relations with you. Also, the Great Warrior of the First Branch, Lantz, who was assigned to interact with the humans, is currently on break.”
The great elder, who was the oldest among the El Tribe at over 200 years old, drew a clear line between them on their first meeting.
His well-built figure, which was over 2 meters tall, possessed thick muscles, making the fact that he was the oldest meaningless.
This place was the heart of the El Tribe. Elders with imposing appearances stood at the front to meet with Richard, while other great warriors of the El Tribe watched from behind them. The elites of the El Tribe surrounded them.
The El Tribe didn’t welcome them. In the midst of them stood Richard’s aide, Leah, and himself. Although a situation like this would make most disheartened, Richard stood dignified. Even though he possessed the small figure of a human, he looked as big as anyone present.
“That’s why we came here. How about we create a new alliance? This time with all earthlings.”
Richard didn’t talk in circles and went straight to the point. He already knew that the El Tribe was aggressive and forthright. From the Berserkers remaining on Dragonic, he had heard of the simple method Choi Hyuk had used to ally with the El Tribe.
As expected, this sort of speech was effective.
The great elder wasn’t taken aback by the straightforward proposal as if he had expected it. Only, his reply was negative.
“… Our tribe’s numbers aren’t as large as yours. An alliance with Overseer Choi Hyuk is enough. Though… we don’t know how things will turn out.”
“Aren’t as large… Are you referring to the El Tribe members here or the entirety of the El race?”
“The entirety of the El race? No, of course, I am talking about the El Tribe members living in this tree.”
“Then what is the total population of the El race?”
At Richard’s series of questions, the great elder frowned.
“Stop with the unrelated questions. Also, sorry but we have no thoughts on taking action in your fight against the monsters. It doesn’t look like the situation will reverse even if our tribe, whose numbers only reach tens of thousands, participates. To be honest… In this current situation without Overseer Choi Hyuk, we judge that there is no chance humanity will come out victorious. If you have no other business, come have a meal before you go back.”
At the great elder’s words, Richard laughed, not suiting the situation. After nonchalantly telling him that earthlings would fail and that they wouldn’t participate, he told him to ‘have a meal before he went back’. They were a cool-headed yet strangely warm-hearted species.
Richard did his best to swallow his laughter before saying,
“That’s why I am asking. It’s not an unrelated question.”
The checkered muscles covering the grand elder’s body squirmed as he looked blankly at Richard, seemingly wondering what he would say next.
Richard said,
“I, no, us earthlings want to make an alliance with the entire El race.”
“The entire El race?”
“Yes. Not only the El Tribe living in this tree but all the El Tribes living on Dragonic. We want to make an alliance with all the El Tribes.”
At first, the great elder didn’t seem to understand Richard’s words. However, after slowly realizing his meaning, he made a shocked expression.
Richard continued,
“It’ll be difficult with just humans. However, if all the El Tribes join, we have a chance at victory. Let’s combine our strength and chase out those monsters from Dragonic forever.”
Murmurs.
As soon as Richard said those words, the expressions of the other elders standing behind the great elder and the great warriors, who had been spectating, changed greatly. The surrounding El Tribe elites began to murmur to each other.
Even the great elder didn’t continue to speak as he simply opened and closed his mouth a few times. Only after some time had passed did he speak,
“With… the other El Tribes?”
“Yes.”
Richard was inwardly taken aback by the unexpectedly intense reaction, but he replied calmly, not showing it on the outside.
‘What’s this? Were my words so surprising?’
The question on Richard’s mind was answered with the great elder’s following words.
“We’ve never… never thought about that. Although we do communicate with each other through the inverted tree… We have never even met a tribe living in another tree. We never even thought it was possible. This… really is a difference in perspective!”
Dragonic was a planet that had collapsed long ago. The El Tribe, who had hid themselves in the inverted tree and avoided ruin, led monotonous lives. Even if they went out for necessary supplies and occasionally fought monsters, these actions would only take place near the tree. They had never met with other El Tribes living in trees far away from them.
Although they could communicate with one another through the tree, this sort of communication didn’t allow them to meet in person. In reality, they had lived thinking of each other as imaginary existences.
Even the most elderly great elder, who was over 200 years old, had never met another tribe. This was the same for his mother’s mother. The idea Richard, an earthling, had easily thought of was something beyond their realm of imagination.
“Meet other tribes?!”
Asking himself, the great elder’s voice had a hint of unconcealable excitement.
Richard shrugged his shoulders and whispered to his aide Leah,
“See. If we just give it a shot, there are cases where the unexpected occurs.”
Having shared the same pessimistic thoughts as Naro, Leah simply stuck her tongue out at Richard, who was putting on airs.
**
The expedition from Earth was becoming more and more renowned each day.
“Move aside! Move aside!”
When Chu Youngjin’s troop, led by Kim Honghyun, charged forward, allied horned aliens, who had been fighting arduously, became surprised and scattered in different directions.
Rumble!
Only shredded monster corpses were left behind in the places Chu Youngjin’s troop, who prided themselves on their strong power, passed by.
Looking at them, a strange feeling welled up in General Lee Kangjin.
“Haa… Astonishing. Was that bastard’s name Keushisuit?”
Back when Lee Kangjin was a captain, he had carried out a Consumables mission with Choi Hyuk. That time, Keushisuit, who had slaughtered Lee Kangjin’s troop members, was of the same species as the horned aliens who had scattered just now. Yet they were now overwhelmed by Chu Youngjin’s troop’s force and were busy moving out of the way. They were still catching their breaths with the short break Chu Youngjin’s troop had provided them. They could no longer look down on earthlings like they did in the past. Instead, there were more instances where they became timid in front of earthlings.
The earthlings, who had only been disregarded previously, were now pulling their weight.
“Yeah… I always fought with my life on the line for this.”
Lee Kangjin followed President Shin Woojin as a South Korean soldier. However, his heart greatly resembled that of a Berserker’. He had never forgotten how Choi Hyuk saved him back when he was dying in the hands of Keushisuit, not for even a moment.
“Yeah… This, this is the start!”
Biting down on his lip, he ripped apart the ‘poja’ that was creating monsters. Although its outer appearance looked like a rippling liquid, the poja possessed a hardness that was incomparable to diamonds. Yet it was ripped apart like tissues and melted under Lee Kangjin’s sword. Lee Kangjin had reached the 4-star level, a low-ranked warrior. He pushed himself even harder to become stronger.
How many species had crawled their way up from being judged as Consumables to proper alliance members? At least among the aliens gathered in this battlefield, there were none.
The dispatched expedition this time were the top elites of Earth. The majority of them had started in the Ring of Rebirth and were heroes who had faced death countless times and had survived. Their mindset towards fighting differed from others. Because of this, even if their stats were similar, the earthlings fought much more skillfully than low and lowest-ranked alien warriors.
Choi Hyuk’s flames burned endlessly at the front, and from behind him, earthlings charged forward like a blaze.
Every time they saw looks of admiration or timidity from other aliens, the earthlings felt great pride.
However, this pleasant feeling didn’t last long.
Humanity was certainly no longer at the bottom. However, they were only now at the starting line. Humanity had to get much stronger.
Just as they destroyed another malformed Kahur Kabkun, an urgent order came down.
{3rd Garrison Team 17, immediately leave the battlefield! Immediately leave the battlefield! Two hellhounds and one highest-ranked monster are moving towards you! Immediately fan out and leave!}
As soon as they received the order, a roar, which seemed to not only almost burst their eardrums but also crush their bodies, erupted. Something so gigantic they couldn’t see how large it was warped above the heads of Choi Hyuk’s troops and Lankin’s troops, which made up team 17.
“Kuak… What’s that? What’s just arrived?”
Lankin’s face distorted. ‘We only now heard the warning, yet it already arrived? That makes no sense!’ He had an ominous premonition.
However, what had appeared was not an enemy but luckily an ally. A gigantic battleship that dyed the sky in a metallic light. Lankin shouted happily,
“Steel Battleship!”
Steel Battleship. Choi Hyuk turned his gaze when he heard his words. ‘That’s the Steel Battleship?’ He had heard of it before. After killing the Wyvern of Destruction and awakening as a sovereign, Choi Hyuk had been called to the Steel Battleship. He had met the Giant Orc Karik there. He had first heard the words ‘Exalted Wings’ back then.
“Giant Orc Karik…”
When he said that name, Choi Hyuk’s voice boiled with expectations of battle. When he had first met Karik, all Choi Hyuk could do was not put down the sword he had raised. The spirit Karik exuded made all the sovereigns lower their gazes and lower their bodies. Back then, Choi Hyuk estimated that Karik was at the 5-star level.
If he really was at the 5-star level, then he was a middle-ranked warrior, meaning he was at the same level Choi Hyuk was at currently. Was he really?
Beside him, Lankin cut in,
“Huh? You know the Great Warrior of the Steel Battleship Karik?”
“Just… I saw his face once. Is he strong?”
Looking at Choi Hyuk who couldn’t conceal his fighting spirit, like a middle schooler asking if a guy was strong, Lankin laughed while rearranging his external armor, making clanking sounds.
“Not a chance. Karik is a high-ranked warrior. You know, right? How hard it is to go from the middle rank to the high rank? Even among those high-ranked warriors, he’s an elite who rides on the Steel Battleship.”
“Steel Battleship… Is that amazing?”
“Of course, it’s amazing. That troop is under the center’s command, not the Laniakea Supercluster’s. They receive direct orders from the Exalted Wings. They go around carrying out missions throughout the Laniakea Supercluster!”
Speaking like this, Lankin’s voice was filled with envy.
Paaaah!
A bright light burst out from the Steel Battleship. A mystical symbol filled the sky, which was lit with a metallic light.
Blaze!
When the blue flames of the hellhounds, which flowed like rivers, made contact with the symbol, they would fruitlessly die out.
Then a voice that made one’s hair stand followed.
<<It doesn’t look tasty. Lifeforms here carry around weird things.>>
It was a human-sized monster. It possessed a thick tail and horns that curved down to its waist.
When Lankin saw it, he let out a ring in alarm.
“Is that a highest-ranked monster? Looking at how it can talk, it might be a new type of monster? No, that’s not it. Run!!!”
Lankin, who had been about to flee by jetting his karma, saw Choi Hyuk standing vacantly and halted his body, almost falling in the process. He hurriedly shouted.
“What are you doing? Run!”
“Over there… It’s the commander. Karik’s there too.”
Over twenty warriors were flying to the place Choi Hyuk was pointing at. Among them, there was Commander Mack, whose Crystal of Sentiment ‘Mack’s Desire’, which had previously been hidden in her hair, was floating next to her shoulder. There was also the Giant Orc Karik who held an enormous sword.
“Of course, they are! We are currently missing a highest-ranked warrior on our side! The high-ranked warriors are trying to hold that monster back using the power of the Steel Battleship! Hey! Aren’t you going to run?!”
“Wait.”
Choi Hyuk ignored Lankin, who was urging him. High-ranked warrior, high-ranked warrior. Although he had heard a lot about them, he had never seen their actual abilities. On top of that, wasn’t the monster they were facing a highest-ranked one? He wanted to confirm their power with his own eyes. He couldn’t miss this opportunity.
The clash between the monster and the high-ranked warriors only took a moment. When the Steel Battleship emitted a light that seemed to burn up, unknown symbols layered above the monster’s body. It looked like it was a karma technique that limited the monster’s actions, but the monster coolly said, <<What an amusing technique. I must examine it and take it,>> before rushing in. At the same time, the twenty high-ranked warriors simultaneously launched their counterattacks.
As soon as they clashed, with a whoosh, sounds were the first thing to disappear. Soon after, the sky was dyed in all sorts of colors. Then invisible, formless energy gushed out everywhere.
“Kaff.”
Choi Hyuk vomited blood.
The clash occurred in the sky a distance away and he had simply been looking up at it from the ground, yet he was beaten up by the after effects and vomited blood.
Crrreeeak!
Lankin’s armor emitted a crushing sound under the pressure.
“Hey! Let’s quickly run! Are you doing this in hopes that you’ll grasp something? Give up! We won’t be able to tell even if we see it! There’s a difference of heaven and earth between them and us! Anyone below middle rank will die simply by being near the fight!”
Lankin prepared to flee by himself.
All of Dark City was trembling due to the collisions in the sky in the distance. Various lights erupted in a seizure, and shouting from the side, Lankin’s voice gradually disappeared. Even though the ground and buildings were being destroyed, he couldn’t hear anything. It felt like the world was being erased by their fight. Choi Hyuk kept vomiting blood.
It was like this. Humans had become much stronger. They could now face the Steel Battleship and the Great Warrior Karik inside it, both of which they had considered to be similar to gods or natural disasters, with proper understanding and status.
Even still, the difference between them and humanity was like the difference between heaven and earth. They fought in the sky, while Choi Hyuk, who was regarded as the strongest human, was pressed against the ground like an insect.
Still, Choi Hyuk smiled.
He wiped his blood-soaked lips, tapped Lankin’s shoulder and left the battlefield with him.
As they left and as he gazed at the mythical battle which dyed the sky in colors, he said in a pleasant mood,
“Still… Now that I see it, I can sort of understand a little.”
Even when Lankin looked at him, thinking, ‘What? This bluffing bastard,’ the smile on Choi Hyuk’s lips didn’t dwindle.
