Chapter 66 : The Puppet Show on Frozen Land

“Li, do you think ‘nation’ is a concept that actually exists? If it does, how is it formed?”

The girl with fluorescent green hair wearing a black coat, who had been watching the endlessly sparkling light from the mountain range beyond the plain, suddenly started a conversation.

“Belief.”

The black-haired girl, sitting cross-legged with her eyes closed on the plain where the wind blew so cold it seemed even breath would freeze, answered.

“What is that belief?”

“The belief that it will exist there.”

“Are you saying a nation is faith?”

“No. This is a human affair.”

A dark gray robe that seemed to chaotically mix all existing colors fluttered in the winter wind, and the black-haired girl’s body visible between the wide folds of cloth shone coldly like snow.

“Then what kind of belief are you talking about?”

“The belief that safety will exist if freedom is given up.”

“Did you make the nation your enemy to break that notion and awaken freedom?”

“No. The thoughts of those left behind don’t matter.”

When the black-haired girl opened her eyes, her dark gray eyes shone. The gray pupils gathered in the center of her eyes were slightly unfocused, looking into the distance.

“It’s to tie up 40 years of grudges and favors as the last head of the Black Sword Sect.”

“Is that because of the words your parents left before they died?”

“No. The grudge left by my mother and father is merely two hundred swords.”

“What are the remaining nine thousand eight hundred swords drawn for?”

“Because it’s the teaching of those who drew the way of the sword with their mouths and passed it on.”

In an era when the martial world was forgotten in people’s memories and even the martial artists continuing the lineage were just waiting for the end.

Some people shouted that the reason we were poor was because we didn’t discard the old ways.

A hundred martial artists whose arm and leg tendons were cut in front of tens of thousands of people following madness despaired.

Because the end of the martial world they had imagined was not a sacrifice to madness for the nation’s existence.

So they crawled to gather at the old site of the Murim Alliance and drew ten thousand initial forms for revenge using tree branches held in their white teeth.

The White Sword Alliance.

The white swords wielded by a hundred martial artists were madness and delusion to forget reality.

Among the hundred martial artists who pondered initial forms to cut down the enemy called the nation while chewing mud.

One girl was born.

“This is the grudge and favor left to me, the successor of the concept called martial artist, and the concept called nation.”

“It’s very romantic but full of contradictions. What does it have to do with the people remaining now in the first place?”

“That’s right. But I must cut down the concept called nation with the swords left by 100 masters before destruction comes.”

For what did we have to disappear?

“Unreasonable and endless. That is what grudges and favors are.”

“Huh, that was an extremely romantic and abstract view of the nation. Are all Chinese people like that?”

“…”

The black-haired girl who had uncrossed her legs and stood up didn’t answer those words and slowly walked somewhere, her robe fluttering. Doctor couldn’t sympathize with those words at all, but they were always like that.

“Live as we please, die as we please.”

Let’s tie up human affairs before the destruction foretold by the transcendent being comes.

One girl had a baseless desire for destruction.

One girl had grudges and favors forgotten even by the other party.

One girl had a desire for revenge against all things dominated by one person.

And…

“Kihihihi, I just want to play with dolls.”

Playing with and toying with humans using human hands. affairs had to be accomplished by their own will.

They had to hurry and play before the gods destroyed all humans with unreasonable deception.

“Before the apostles come flocking to interfere.”

Fully bloomed 3-star magical girl of [Puppet]

Doctor

The girl who firmly believed that all humans, including herself, were puppets acting out their roles, was filled with anticipation. Because all preparations were complete before starting the game.

Surely what lay ahead would be an exciting and wonderful game.

“Kihihihi, let’s go Behemoth, Jiz.”

Grooooowl-

The huge mountain range that Doctor had been watching moved, and the entire ground shook and vibrated. Something emitting fluorescent green light shot up into the sky from atop the mountain range and disappeared far into the sky, leaving a trail of light.

Flutter flutter

Tens of millions of birds took flight simultaneously from forests spanning dozens of kilometers around where snow was fluttering, and wild beasts moved.

Naming her human creations after beasts believed to have been made by gods was Doctor’s own humor, but there was no one who would understand it.

* * *

“…”

“…”

The Grand Council fell silent.

30 minutes ago.

The Grand Council had already gathered and was discussing the movements of Russia and the Middle East. But the meeting was temporarily halted due to an emergency report coming in to the Korean self-governing body, the Supernatural Ability Countermeasures Team.

“Oh, isn’t Hong Nayeon the unbloomed magical girl living in Busan?”

And during the brief interruption of the meeting, Kang Dorim met Natalia, a magical girl who came from Russia through the warp gate, and heard the whole story. The situation in Russia, which had closed its borders and remained silent, was more serious than expected.

“So… this magical girl of [Puppet] persuaded high-ranking military officers and politicians by saying she could make them immortal bodies in just one day.”

“Th-they accepted that…?”

Natalia nodded with a gloomy face.

“Of course, not a few people were suspicious since she claimed to belong to a group calling themselves Scavengers.”

But the ‘puppetization’ ability she demonstrated on low-ranking soldiers and a few test subjects was enough to captivate the high-ranking officials.

Those who were old became young again.

Those who were ugly became handsome and beautiful.

They were fine even when shot, exposed to radiation, and even when chemical gas was finally deployed.

If they were exposed to magic power for just a few minutes, they shed their weak human bodies.

This was a level of temptation difficult for human reason to overcome.

‘Aren’t we also equally guilty of bloodshed?’

After that day, in just a week, most of Russia’s top brass accepted the ‘puppetization’ bestowed by the magical girl of [Puppet]. The new miracle shown by the magical girl of [Puppet] stimulated human instinct in a state where their sense of reality was numbed by the miraculous healing abilities and magic commonly shown by magical girls.

And two months.

They converted all kinds of weapons and tanks from the Middle East into puppets and militarized them, firmly believing that the magical girl of [Puppet] who restored their youth was on their side. They thought they were under the protection of another powerful magical girl different from the magical girl of [Beginning] who was active mainly in East Asia and Europe.

“…Even so, all we could do was just follow orders.”

“How… how… could such a thing…!”

“Then what on earth happened to those magical girls?”

Sumire spoke in a deliberately calm tone while looking at photos of the girls isolated inside the Supernatural Ability Countermeasures Headquarters.

Eyes that had lost reason.

Girls with their limbs limp, completely relaxed.

Fluorescent green magic power was blinking in the blood vessels of their faces, which couldn’t be resolved even with healing magic.

“The magical girl of [Puppet], who had captured the hearts of the top brass, proposed a method to completely control magical girls to their will.”

Puppetization of magical girls.

The Russian top brass, who had been fretting over how to continue controlling the girls using transcendent powers while watching the helpless state of countries that had lost control over magical girls, were once again tempted by those words.

“They summoned 151 magical girls active throughout Russia to the Moscow headquarters.”

Because it was impossible for everyone to gather on the same day across vast Russia, magical girls near Moscow were summoned first. Natalia and 5 others active in the east through the sea received summons from the headquarters in Vladivostok.

“I said I would return after fixing the ship I summoned with my ability, so I went in later than my team members…”

Six girls caught by fluorescent green puppets in the form of all kinds of animals.

As soon as Natalia saw that sight, she summoned a large navy blue ship in the room, half-destroying the building. Then she took care of her team members with telekinesis and fled, avoiding pursuit by the puppets.

“Those ominous-colored animals chased us wherever we went. It wasn’t easy to escape by sea either, as even the military issued a wanted order.”

After fleeing by sea for several days through the Sea of Okhotsk like that, the pursuit of the puppets was cut off as soon as they entered [Cyberbrain]’s domain.

“…That’s how we came here.”

“…”

“…”

“By… top brass, you mean the president or generals or such high-ranking people, right?”

Natalia nodded at Kang Dorim’s words.

“Doesn’t Russia… have a lot of… nukes.”

Silence.

A silence incomparably heavier than ever before fell upon the Grand Council.

“…What if they fire them?”

“Hiccup.”

Li Meilin hiccupped with a pale face as soon as she heard those words.

* * *

I slightly wounded the hands of the isolated girls and then cast Heal imbued with deception magic.

The girls were breathing with their chests heaving even though their eyes had lost reason.

And as the deceptive Heal entered, the frequency of their breathing with heaving chests gradually decreased and…

Beep-

“Wh-what!! [Beginning]!! What’s going on?!”

Park Saebyeok, who had been checking the girls’ condition with me, widened her eyes and stood up when she heard the sound indicating cardiac arrest.

“I put them in a state of suspended animation.”

“Suspended animation?!”

The magical girl of [Deception]’s telekinesis has an illusion curtain.

If the instantaneous movement ability has doppelgangers.

The healing ability could put injured people into a state of suspended animation for a while.

‘They can wake up immediately if they have their own will, but.’

At least there would be no chance of these girls waking up and following Doctor’s orders while we’re away.

“We can’t let the magical girl of [Puppet] called Doctor run wild in the Supernatural Ability Countermeasures Headquarters.”

“I see… all we could do was isolate them as much as possible.”

“Physical space constraints are meaningless to magical girls.”

It was something I had desperately realized while often sparring with Yuki in the training ground afterwards.

“So what do you plan to do now, [Beginning]?”

“…”

Russia was very close to our domain.

Nuclear weapons, the most threatening weapon of the old era.

[Puppet], threatening as a magical girl.

The two most threatening elements to humanity at present are both in Moscow.

Should we lock the door and guard, or boldly attack?

“This time… we won’t just take it.”

I looked up at the huge Sirius floating above the Supernatural Ability Countermeasures Headquarters.

“…”

I judged that we needed to boldly strike before the magical girl of [Puppet] could be fully prepared.

And whether it should be called fate, someone who could pilot the Sirius that couldn’t move asked for help.

Bloomed born 2-star magical girl of [Navigation]

Natalia

I couldn’t hesitate once I confirmed that her kindness and gentleness, which had helped Yuki heading towards Russia in the original work, was still there now.

“Let’s go. To Russia.”

And one more thing.

Although I had only fought the magical girl of [Puppet] once, I felt she had a stubbornness to only put forth puppets and a cunning to prepare double plans.

‘She put Alex at the forefront while actually leading the plan to strike Seoul.’

If this time too, rampaging in Moscow is to divert attention and there’s another attack method left behind…

The magical girl of [Sword].

The magical girl of [Revenge].

Where [Revenge] is aiming is unknown.

But where [Sword] is aiming is certain.

She, who has a strong obsession with a specific country, felt like the blade that should be drawn now.

“…We might need to call Ichika.”