Ch.5656. Black of Famine (2)

Crash! Crunch! Smash!

Lu-a was pressed against the door, carefully listening to the sounds from outside. Lena, watching her, spoke up.

“Stop that and sit down somewhere. You’re making me anxious standing there like that.”

Lu-a turned to Lena with displeasure. Lena had used her language power to transform a nearby pile of luggage into a clean, soft sofa-like seat where she was now comfortably reclining.

“Aren’t you worried? There are so many high-ranking Galaxy Empire officials out there, and Ui-seok is fighting them alone. This is a completely irregular situation. Even if it’s Ui-seok…”

“He must have a reason for keeping us here. We’d only get in his way if we interfered.”

“You’re so calm. Aren’t you underestimating Ui-seok too much?”

“On the contrary. I can afford to be relaxed because I trust him.”

“How can you act like you know him so well?”

Lu-a grumbled.

“He’s a strong-willed and charming man. Everything else is just noise. Information I don’t really need. It’s getting a bit chilly. ‘Tea cup, appear.'”

When did she start thinking so highly of Ui-seok? Lu-a felt irritated for no reason.

Lena had already created a tea set on a small table and was leisurely pouring hot tea, enjoying her teatime. She had even removed her spacesuit, suggesting she had created an atmosphere in the surrounding space.

“Haven’t you created a lot of things?”

“I can manage this much now. Complex designs are still difficult though. Hehe. Every day with Ui-seok is enjoyable. It feels like I’m being tested daily to see how far I can progress.”

Lena traced her fingertips with an ecstatic expression. Lu-a closed her eyes briefly and concentrated on Lena’s presence.

“…Language power level 11. I’m… Dark Matter 9.”

The gap wasn’t narrowing; it was only widening. She bit her lip lightly.

“Looking at Lena, it seems like going from 9 to 10 takes a really long time… What should I do?”

Just as Lu-a was feeling anxious—

CRASH!!

A loud noise struck her ears. Lu-a pressed herself against the barrier again, trying to deduce the situation outside.

“…Hasn’t it been almost 30 minutes?”

“Your memory is poor. Didn’t Ui-seok tell us not to open the door until he contacts us first?”

“What if Ui-seok barely defeated those monsters and is now critically injured? What if he can’t speak because he’s collapsed?”

“‘Rope, appear.'”

Snap! A titanium alloy rope, the kind used for securing rockets, appeared in Lena’s hand.

“Lu-a, I wish you had a fetish for being tied up.”

“Eek! Don’t say stupid things! I could be right!”

“At this very moment, Emperor Recter could be picking his nose and accidentally dig too deep and die. I could be right too, couldn’t I?”

“You’re just mocking me!”

“Don’t open it.”

Before Lena could finish speaking, Lu-a generated dark matter and touched the switch outside the barrier. The door opened with a loud noise. Lena sighed and put her spacesuit back on.

“Ui-seok!”

Lu-a immediately checked the situation outside.

It was chaos.

Rather than a field of corpses, it looked like a butcher shop after a bombing. Chunks of meat were scattered everywhere—on the floor, walls, and ceiling. Of course, they were all remains of Dark Kingdom combatants.

In the center stood Jung Ui-seok with his back turned. His body was covered in blood, but he appeared uninjured.

“Ui-seok? Are you okay?”

Lu-a called his name. Jung Ui-seok slowly turned his head. Lu-a realized something was wrong.

The dragon-man’s face had no flesh—only a skull with a ferocious expression emanating killing intent.

“Ui… seok?”

The next moment, Jung Ui-seok charged at Lu-a with a monstrous roar. Lu-a couldn’t even think to dodge.

Swoosh!

Lena intervened between them. She wrapped the rope around Ui-seok’s neck and shoulders, restraining him away from Lu-a.

“‘Become stronger.’ ‘Become even stronger.’ ‘More ropes, appear!'”

Dozens of ropes shot out from the ceiling and walls, wrapping around Ui-seok’s body. They seemed to forcibly bend his joints, but he snapped the alloy ropes like rubber bands.

“‘Harden.’ ‘Collapse.’ ‘Press down.’ ‘Stronger.’ ‘Even stronger!'”

The ceiling and floor collapsed, shooting toward Ui-seok. Reinforced metal pieces pressed down on his body like a prison. He shattered them like styrofoam.

Ui-seok’s skull opened its jawbone horrifyingly wide. He charged forward, trying to bite off Lena’s small head.

“Divarion, Ein!”

Lu-a, now alert, generated massive dark matter on Ui-seok’s chest. Unable to advance due to the powerful tension, Ui-seok twisted his waist grotesquely. Soon his waist became his stomach, and a skull formed on the back of his head, charging toward Lu-a.

“Hik—”

Lu-a let out a deflating sound in terror. The skull rapidly filled her vision. This is it. She was going to be eaten. She prepared for death.

The next moment.

A large hand landed on Lu-a’s head.

“I told you to come out only when I called.”

Lu-a raised her head slowly, holding her trembling legs. There was Jung Ui-seok’s face, filled with concern.

Seeing his face brought relief along with guilt for not trusting him. And a strange sense of defeat toward Lena, who had consistently claimed to trust Ui-seok.

Perhaps due to rebellious feelings about these emotions, Lu-a immediately ran into Ui-seok’s arms and hugged him.

“Sorry, I’m sorry…”

Lu-a apologized to Ui-seok, hiding her tearful tone.

“You both worked hard to stop me. Famine is a dangerous skill if you get bitten.”

“In the future, please give Lu-a clear warnings before using such abilities.”

Lena stood up, dusting off her skirt.

Lu-a pulled her face away from Ui-seok’s embrace and looked at Lena with a reddened nose.

“S-sorry, Lena…”

Lena looked at Lu-a and smiled lightly.

“It’s alright. You’re Ui-seok’s subordinate. It’s Ui-seok’s fault for not properly training his subordinate, so I’ll consider it a debt. It’s become a good pretext.”

Lena approached Ui-seok and gently stroked his chin with her index finger.

“I’ll have to charge quite a high price for this.”

“Understood.”

“W-wait, I’m the one who made the mistake, so I should…”

Lu-a protested timidly, but Lena looked at her with pity.

“Lu-a, if my subordinate made such a mistake, I would have already blown their head off.”

***

“So, what exactly is Famine’s black ability?”

Lena asked on the way back in the mecha.

“Simply put, it’s berserk mode. You lose your reason and become stronger. But it doesn’t increase my stats that much.”

“Then how did you turn all those combatants into meat chunks?”

“The era of Famine isn’t experienced alone—everyone suffers together. It’s contagious berserk mode.”

“Ah, I see. So the combatants fought among themselves until they were all dead?”

“Yes. Naturally, I was the strongest, so I survived until the end.”

“Interesting, but certainly limited in its applications.”

“I might be able to use it in the latter stages of battle with the Galaxy Empire, to reduce numbers inside their ships. But the problem is that they need to be bitten to go berserk, and I can’t control it, so Recter would likely escape.”

“Hmm. Then what about this? It doesn’t have to be against the Galaxy Empire. For example…”

Lena gave an example.

It was quite appealing.

“Indeed. As expected, the ideas of the #1 ranked villain are unmatched.”

“Thank you for the compliment.”

The conversation with Lena was pleasant.

There was much to learn from her as a villain. About organization management too.

I turned my head because Lu-a was too quiet.

“Lu-a, are you okay?”

“Huh? Oh, yeah…”

“Don’t be so depressed. You still don’t have much combat experience. It’s understandable.”

“Yeah…”

She’s responding, but seems distracted.

I decided to take care of her a bit when we got back.

***

After returning to the hideout, I had Deep Dive analyze the data.

“Boss… even for me, this is… the language doesn’t match, and the data storage system is completely different… They use base-128…”

She became a wreck in just one day and declared defeat. In the end, although reluctant, I used companies I had infiltrated with spies to analyze it.

It was actually a good method since I could verify errors by comparing results from multiple sources.

Vengeance leveled up smoothly as we captured Galaxy Empire monsters. The spies infiltrating various parts of society were also a great help for experience points.

Now Vengeance is a villain organization level 8. The Holy Tree is 10 and the world’s #1 is 15, so we still have a long way to go, but things are progressing according to plan.

As we were leveling up, the results of the Dark Kingdom data analysis arrived.

“Ui-seok, was what we picked up from the ship garbage or a gem?”

“I’m checking now.”

Lena sat next to my desk. I looked around.

“Where’s Lu-a?”

“She left early. She’s hardly ever at the hideout these days.”

Emma answered instead. Usually Lu-a would be sitting next to me at times like this, but I haven’t seen much of her lately.

I checked the data. I excluded errors that were inconsistent among the various company results. Slowly reading through the content.

The enhancement device.

The operating principles and effects of that cursed machine that took Somi’s life were written there.

And as I read it, I unconsciously gritted my teeth.

“…Fuck.”

“You didn’t know? Ui-seok, were you always this provocative with your swearing?”

“Don’t joke around.”

I gripped the tablet so hard that I ended up crushing it.

“Damn it!”

Unable to contain my anger, I threw it. Lena stared at me expressionlessly.

I muttered involuntarily.

“…That wasn’t an enhancement device.”