episode_0237

Bang! Crash!

Lightning bolts fell continuously from the sky. The thick beams of light turned the giants into ashes one after another, but.

“Ugh…”

It was woefully insufficient to perfectly block the endless onslaught of numbers.

No matter how outstanding the firepower, there was bound to be a limit to a single person’s strength.

Cheon Woohyuk bit his lips hard enough to draw blood and circulated his mana.

He was already on the verge of mana exhaustion, a state where it wouldn’t be strange for his energy to be completely depleted, yet…

‘…Endure. Endure.’

He couldn’t collapse. He mustn’t collapse. The reason the giants had been held back on this beach until now was precisely because of Cheon Woohyuk’s presence.

Hadn’t all of the S-rank Archmages in this country already departed for the Arctic Ocean?

It was a miracle that the front lines hadn’t been pushed back and that the damage to the land was still minimal.

Though the Awakened forces within the country weren’t weak, Cheon Woohyuk was their core.

“…Still, just a little more…”

If collapsing was inevitable, he wanted to endure for as long as he possibly could.

With only that mindset, Cheon Woohyuk once again gathered lightning above his hand, and.

“──.”

Thud!

His legs gave out immediately. He fell in an ungraceful heap, but the war situation wasn’t leisurely enough to care about individuals.

Cheon Woohyuk didn’t wish for anyone to attend to him and simply tried to steady his breathing.

“Huff, huff…”

His mana was depleted. That alone was an undeniable fact, and thus, focusing on recovery was the best option for now.

It would be fine if he somehow regained his strength while others struggled to hold on.

After all, he was a mage specializing in lightning bombardment. His position was in the rear, so he didn’t have to worry about being swept away by a giant—.

“Ah.”

A shadow fell. Suddenly. That is, along with a massive body descending from above.

…In a state of mana exhaustion, vision also blurs, so he was late to notice.

Whoosh!

It was a giant’s foot. With the sound of immense physical force pushing the air aside, it began to descend, aiming to crush Cheon Woohyuk.

Cheon Woohyuk instinctively tried to convert the last remaining bit of mana into a barrier, but…

“Cough!”

He failed. Dark blood poured from his twisted mana circuit, and Cheon Woohyuk coughed several times before weakly lifting his head.

The scene reflected in his blurry eyes was, first, the giant’s body obscuring the sun, and.

Second,

“…Dodge, Oppa!”

“…!”

It was his younger sister.

Flash! Crackle!

In an instant, a golden flash filled the sky. Then, with almost no interval, a streak of lightning swept away the giant.

Cheon Soyul, her entire body imbued with golden lightning energy, gasped with ragged breaths.

“…You…”

Cheon Woohyuk forgot the gravity of the situation and could only widen his eyes for a moment.

Because an astonishing phenomenon was unfolding before his very eyes.

“Huu, hoo, uh, wait, Oppa. Don’t talk to me for a moment. Even I don’t exactly know what’s going on right now…!”

“…S-rank.”

“Huh, what, huh?!”

Cheon Soyul, startled by her brother’s murmur, whirled around.

Even now, giants continued to stampede forward like a surging tide, but.

Crackle! Crackle! Crackle!!!

The mindless giants, just as they had been unable to harm Cheon Woohyuk, couldn’t penetrate Cheon Soyul’s golden domain, which had reached a higher realm.

Even though she did nothing, they were incinerated by the current merely by approaching.

Because… at this moment, a circular magnetic field had been generated with Cheon Soyul at its center.

Creatures that lacked upper bodies and couldn’t extend their hands, nor shoot lasers from their eyes like some other giants, were helpless before it.

Crackle! Sizzle…!

The magnetic field, nearly the size of a building, crushed the bodies of approaching giants as if marking its territory.

It was the deployment of a large-scale magic that would be impossible for anyone of ordinary skill to even temporarily form.

“You’ve crossed the wall, my sister.”

“Huh, uh…?!”

Cheon Woohyuk, still bleeding profusely, managed a faint smile. It was because a sliver of hope had appeared in what was already a desperate situation.

Cheon Soyul, however, was genuinely bewildered and simply looked down at her own body.

Her body, which often emitted lightning even during peacetime, now had a completely different nature.

If the sparks of the past were adorable little things that flickered near her eyes…

“…W-what on earth is this?”

Now, it was the manifestation of massive electromagnetic waves that obliterated legions of giants in an instant.

Cheon Soyul couldn’t hide her bewilderment and looked over her body as if it were unfamiliar.

After a moment, she blinked, and then extended her hand forward. The electromagnetic waves advanced automatically, as if responding to her will.

Crackle! Crackle! Crackle!─!

By unleashing another burst of lightning, she made the sea off Busan ablaze.

The bodies of the giants continuously fell. Even so, they would soon rise again, but…

‘What is this, it’s scary, I don’t know…’

Somehow, Cheon Soyul was simply bewildered. This experience was too alien.

An unfounded sense of omnipotence, as if she could truly do anything in her current state, stimulated her entire body and mind, yet—.

“Gasp…!”

Boom!!

The enemies were not to be underestimated either. Was ‘something’ observing the war situation in this world in real-time from beyond the torn sky?

As soon as the amount of mana Cheon Soyul emitted drastically changed, more giants were summoned and fell.

“…Ah. This is really driving me crazy.”

At such a desperate sight, Cheon Soyul muttered that with genuine feeling.

Just how long would they keep being reinforced?

It was revealed when information and news were exchanged across the world that the deployment of giants differed depending on the regional power.

If so, her own evolution to the next stage might not necessarily be good news.

Because that was why those giants had ultimately increased. Moreover, it wasn’t just an increase in numbers; their appearance had completely changed as well.

For instance, thorns sprouted from their knees, or flames flickered at their fingertips…

“Ah…?!”

With such drastic changes, the front lines, which had barely been held, also reached their limit.

Hong Yeonhwa was deeply bewildered by the sudden surge of flames.

She was, by name, a possessor of the ‘Flame Dominator’ trait, yet somehow, even with her resistance ability, the flames before her were difficult to block.

While she was flustered by the sensation of ‘heat’ she felt for the first time in a very long time, the war situation gradually began to plummet to a disastrous level.

The gathered Awakened desperately tried to evacuate in the face of the transformed giants’ momentum, but.

Slice!

“──.”

The terrible catastrophe had already begun long ago. One of the giants on the front line produced a saw-like blade from its ankle.

Cheon Soyul could only gaze at the swirling crimson mist with an empty expression.

‘…What just happened?’

It was difficult to comprehend the situation. Yet, paradoxically, her mind had completed a more rational assessment of the situation than ever before.

Just once. Truly, with just a single sweep across the ground, dozens of lives were extinguished.

That was all. There was nothing else.

People died. Before her very eyes.

Thud, thud, thud…!

Staring at the helplessly falling fragments of those bodies—.

Clench!

Cheon Soyul clenched her teeth.

“These damn, invading bastards—.”

Zap!

And in a flash, she folded space and burst forth. Having witnessed death head-on, her eyes flipped, and that emotion erupted as lightning.

Boom! Crash! Crash! Crash!—!!

Thus, Cheon Soyul, using the circular magnetic field enveloping her body as a weapon, leaped into the midst of the giants.

Her realm, nearing S-rank, allowed her to slaughter the giants, but.

“Ugh, h-!?”

That was her limit. It was as if the ruler of the otherworld would no longer tolerate the situation, as an even stronger aura was projected onto the ground.

In an instant, Cheon Soyul’s waist was seized by the formless grasp of an emerging giant.

“Let go of me…!”

It was a situation where her entire body could be crushed at any moment, and it wouldn’t be strange.

Indeed, the grip continued to tighten, and Cheon Soyul’s complexion turned pale.

Dozens of surrounding giants were wiped out by the forcibly emitted lightning repulsion field, but one giant remained stubbornly persistent.

It gripped Cheon Soyul tightly, as if receiving some special power.

“…Ah, uh.”

As her pupils gradually lost their light, and as Cheon Woohyuk, who had strenuously managed to get to his feet, was about to overload his mana circuit.

“──Ah.”

Behind the giant, space opened.

Crack, tear.

Ripping…!

No.

It tore.

‘W-what…’

Cheon Soyul gazed at the scene with vacant eyes. Each fleeting moment her empty gaze fixed upon it, the fissure flickered with a faint light.

As the gap between the fissures widened, and something large enough to be called a ‘pathway’ finally took shape.

“…Aha.”

Cheon Soyul could see it. The solution to this hellish situation, something she could undoubtedly trust to provide it.

A sphere only such a being could create, with ice and lightning energy clinging to it unstably.

“You’re too late…”

“… .”

“You idiot, really.”

Cheon Soyul let out a bitter laugh, and then, from beyond the space, a silver-haired young man appeared.

“──Ice Lightning.”

Lee Hyunjin, having appeared, flicked the sphere that had formed at his fingertips without hesitation.

Crackle, sizzle…

The next moment, blue lightning appeared at seven coordinates across the world.

Those blue lightning bolts, incredibly mysterious and brilliant.

Boom! Crackle! Crackle! Crackle! Crackle!!!

Soon, with a single flash, disintegrated thousands of giants at an atomic level.