Chapter 160

The body was riddled with bullet holes, apparently for confirmation. This was the source of the gunfire. The blue blood dripping from his body told me that he hadn’t been dead long.
“Ha, bitch.”
Kim foresaw this situation when she was told her godmother was in Howland. Somehow, she was able to deal with her godmother, but she couldn’t stop her.
The Godmother deliberately killed Markus shortly after the team arrived.
Win or lose, this was probably the plan all along.
To tear the continent apart with hatred and rage.
To make Kim Yi Hyun feel hopeless and frustrated.
‘It was going to happen anyway, so I’m not frustrated, but….’
I must have gotten screwed big time.
Soon, the anomaly began.
Kurrrrr!
A rumble that shook the entirety of Howland. With it, Markus’ body began to disintegrate. Massive amounts of particles exploded and swirled out.
“Shit, we’re retreating, we need to get the hell out of here!”
“So, Warden?”
“I don’t have time to explain.”
Kushan declared, as if he had foreseen the future or looked back at the past.
“There’s going to be a cataclysm…!”
Markus’s corpse spewed particles incessantly.
A storm of particles pounded all around. The soldier with the gun was helplessly caught up in the storm, leaving nothing but his mount behind.
A pipe burst, spewing out an unidentified solution. Machinery smashed and parts fell out, adding to the shock. The ceiling cracked open and a hole opened up.
The particles shot into the sky.
The weather went from clear to cloudy in a matter of hours. The world turned a blackish-purple color, ominous. Strange pellets fell from the sky like hail.
“Ha, crazy.”
“Back off! Hurry!”
The ops team quickly retraced their steps.
Cataclysm Unyun had to get out of the basement before the ceiling collapsed anyway. He shifted his heavy legs and looked back.
“Professor, Professor, wake up!”
“Argh, argh, argh…!”
The professor was clutching her head and moaning. Ghost, sensing the seriousness of her condition, scoops her up onto his back. Holding on tightly to her flailing body, he starts running.
“Ghost is playing that role. It was supposed to be Edwin.
A similar situation happened in games.
Markus dies, unrelated to his godmother. The professor complains of a headache from flooding memories and falls unconscious for a time.
And when he woke up again, the world was in the grip of a cataclysm.
“The professor will be fine.
Next, I looked at Kushan.
Rather than fleeing first, Kushan stayed behind and encouraged his men, seemingly leading by example.
But his gaze flicked to Markus. The sinners who had caused the cataclysm twice. Kim couldn’t imagine what Kushan must be feeling.
‘Leila is…….’
I rolled my eyes and saw it just in time.
Watch as some of the particles are absorbed by Leila.
That’s a toxic substance that doesn’t even compare to helixivir. If the blue water that is the main ingredient in Helixivir is the blood of the parasite, then that particle is the very existence of the parasite.
Nevertheless, Leila didn’t show any signs of anything unusual. Little crystals grew on her skin, but they quickly fell off and oxidized.
We’ve seen it in games, too.
“You’re crazy.
But the weight was a relief. Perhaps because she had used Helixivir herself. Kim is also resistant to mutations, but not as much as Leila.
It was a no-brainer.
Leila’s genetic information is more than 70% identical to the original Parasite.
“Is Raila now a 5-star?
After gathering my thoughts, I took one last look at Markus. Despite spewing out an absurd amount of particles, he was still more than seven percent dead. As befits a god upheld by the Legion.
Suddenly, I had a thought.
“I wonder why they sent Minnie to me.
Raid in St. Kitts.
I haven’t had any contact with Markus since then. I’ve always wondered why I was approached at the time.
The question remains unanswered. What is certain is that Markus’s objectives at the time were more centered on other things than assassination.
‘If she was trying to test me, why else would she do it? Did she need someone to stop her godmother? If not, why not…….’
The thought dangled in the air. With a sigh, Kim broke the chain. Until he came back to life and told her, all speculation was mere speculation.
I looked straight ahead again.
“Wounded straight up, we’re taking every last one of them!”
“There may be residual disease. Stay alert.”
“Warden, stop it and get the warden!”
The team trudged through the wounded and dead. The casualties were not light, to say the least, but many more survived.
“Hyun, please stay alive, because if you die here, I will be punished by Ainoa.”
“And if the boss gets really screwed, it’s your fault.”
“Stop being assholes, both of you! Hyun, are you okay?”
“If it’s too hard, I’ll carry you.”
Kim chuckled.
“Shut up and run.”
It will survive.
* * *
The team made it out of the underground safely. Fortunately, there was no firefight. They were able to board the helicopter unharmed and with uninterrupted power.
There was no time to waste. We had to leave as soon as the weather turned bad. As soon as the power was on, the helicopters began to take off.
Howland’s figure was rapidly fading away.
Lightning struck the tiny island we had just been on. A beautiful, yet ominous, aurora borealis stretched across the sky above the island.
Inside the hatch, Kim spoke to Leila.
“How’s the professor?”
“It didn’t look good.”
The professor is now on another helicopter with the wounded. It’s not traumatic, he says, so there’s no treatment.
“I think you’re remembering something, and it’s not a good memory.”
Leila smiled weakly. It was a dark smile, unlike her usual one.
“I know it’s confusing… but you’re a professor, you’ll get through it.”
“Yeah, that’s what a professor would do.”
A moment of silence, and then she stared at him with renewed intensity.
“You’re not asking me anything.”
“It’s not for you to ask. Kushan would know.”
“That’s not all, is it?”
It wasn’t an accusation.
Instead, Leila’s face was lined with guilt. She hated herself and Rap for not telling her anything when she needed help from Kim.
But that was a secret Leila could not divulge freely. It was something that would have to be told to Kushan, if not to her, then to the professor who would one day regain his memory.
Above all.
“I wonder how much you know.
Kim seemed to have it all figured out already. I looked at him with a questioning glance, but all I got in return was a ritualized laugh.
It really wasn’t any different than I expected.
Leila smiled bitterly and turned to the window. Howland. A particle pierced the sky, rising from the underground reservoir where the team had been a moment ago.
It was the end of Legion.
“What’s the world coming to?”
“I don’t know.”
Kim also looked out.
The letters are sandwiched between the retina and the landscape.
[ERROR!]
[An unexpected error occurred].
[confirms the death of the character “Markus Dressner”].
[Calculate the damage rate for the scenario].
[Now Loading…….]
The message was silent when you saw the corpse, and now it’s back. This must mean that Markus’s entire body is gone.
It was pointing to some future.
“It’s going to be a little harder to live.”
* * *
Historically, catastrophes have been observed for more than 200 years. Until about 50 years ago, catastrophes were infrequent and not large enough to threaten the human right to live.
“Things have changed dramatically since 2000, to be exact.”
The lab director’s office. Shortly after returning to the lab, Kushan began his explanation with a history lesson.
“It was the aftermath of the death of a parasite that Shran and Shalem had been working on together. The particles that made up the parasite dissolved into the world, and the catastrophes became more frequent and violent.”
“What is a parasite…?”
Kushan replied to Anima’s question.
“The first ‘alien life form’ discovered by CellBiology Labs in 1977.”
“What? I mean, um.”
“I mean that in the most literal sense. The genetic information of the parasite doesn’t match any other creature on this planet, and despite our research, we’ve never been able to figure out where it came from.”
However, he concludes by saying
“Similarly, there was a substance whose details were not known.”
“You don’t mean Elixir, do you?”
“Example. Chapter, Elixir, Panax…. A blue-colored liquid that goes by many names, but no one knows what it is. It didn’t take long for our attention to be drawn to it.”
Kushan held out the filing cabinet.
Kim and Anima each picked up a paper and scanned it with their eyes. It was from a study done by Cellbrossix Labs in the past.
“We made an amazing discovery. When I gave Parasite a dose of Elixir, he didn’t reject it in any way, as if it had always been part of his body.”
“I know that …… was probably around 1800 when elixir first appeared.”
“You should see the connection.”
Elixir and Parasite. And disaster.
Although they may seem separate at first glance, they are deeply interrelated.
It’s no secret what Rapp was thinking at the time.
“We were arrogant.”
Kushan said as he coughed up blood.
“I was so convinced that I could uncover the true nature of the scourge that I conducted inhumane experiments and used my own body as a guinea pig. I have cells from Parasite living and breathing in my body.”
Agelessness was a byproduct of experimentation.
Several people involved in the research have been immortalized.
“In 2000, it blew up.”
“Is this the last time Parasite is dead?”
Kushan nodded at Kim’s words.
“Our conclusion is this: in the distant past, an intersection with the Otherworld arose, and it grew steadily larger. And with the death of the Parasite, the balance was thrown out of whack….”
“…the word is.”
Woohoo!
The armrest of the chair Anima gripped broke.
“Are you saying that Celbrosys Labs… caused all of this?”
“Caused is an understatement, but I won’t deny that it accelerated it by hundreds of years.”
“You guys……!”
His whole body exuded anger and contempt. His eyes glared at Kushan, and they were filled with murderous intent. There was no sign of his usual cheerful, polite demeanor.
Kim didn’t bother to intervene.
“It’s your risk.
That his research had been heavily influenced by the Shiran Empire, or something of the sort, but it didn’t matter. Whatever his noble intentions, Kushan was, in his own mind, a cardinal sinner.
“……We, I mean, I want to atone. I’m sure Markus would have done the same, parasitizing his own flesh to cover the rift, or cutting off his contact with the Otherworld. He would have needed a lot of specimens.”
“Specimen?”
“Do you know the nature of monsters and spells?”
His voice was gravelly.
“Since 2000, the rate of spell manifestation and the frequency of beast appearances has increased dramatically. This is a result of the increased pollution index across the continent, and creatures have adapted to it, and the cadres of the Legion are uniquely evolved.”
Anima’s face turned white. Truths that were too much for him to bear pressed down on him. The spell that enveloped him felt uncomfortable.
“But the Legion failed. It was a terrorist act unrelated to the organization… and in the end, the Godmother murdered Markus. I think it’s safe to say that the Legion was completely destroyed.”
After a long explanation, Kushan sighs.
“Now we have to brace for impact.”
When she finished, Anima was silent. As if mulling over the thoughts that filled her head. After a while, he stomped out of the room without another word.
When it was just the two of them, Kim spoke up.
“That’s scary, isn’t it? You don’t want an albatross to jump on you like you’re crazy.”
“That doesn’t mean I’m going to gloss over it.”
Unlike before, the tone was tinged with bittersweetness.
“Hyun, are you not resentful?”
“Blame me? I blame you?”
“From what I could tell, you were obsessed with the Legion, but the root cause of the Legion’s existence was in the Cellbrox Labs, so I didn’t think it would be strange if you pulled out a gun.”
“They really think I’m crazy.”
Kim snorted.
“I didn’t really have a grudge against the Legion, just, you know. I just noticed the bullshit they were pulling. I’m not the most optimistic person to let that go on with both feet.”
I wasn’t lying.
So far, the “bad guys” in the scenario have been the Legion, so we’ve responded accordingly. In order to get through the second half, we took out the stronger enemies early and saved people who would have otherwise died.
“The question is when.
Markus’s untimely death pushed all of the remaining episodes forward. I lost all the time I’d gained by completing the episode ahead of time.
‘You can’t just spray shit like this.’
With no time to rest, it’s time to race to the end.
The good news is that it’s not all bad.
“Oh, right.”
Kim rolled up his sleeve to reveal his right arm. Crystals sprouted like scales on her forearm, not so much because of her previous surgeries, but now even that would be a flaw.
“Get rid of this. You can do it here.”
Kushan is an unrivaled expert on mutations. Until the Professor regains his full memory, no one else can compare.
You should have known about the decision from the start.
“I’ll schedule it at …….”
“I’d appreciate it if you could keep it clean.”
That was the end of the conversation. I stood up to leave the room.
“I’m sorry, I really am.”
I didn’t reply.
* * *
January 1, 2045.
A catastrophe of epic proportions has swept through Howland, near Shiran.
The Xuran imperial family’s swift response kept casualties to a minimum, but the outlying areas affected by the catastrophe became irreparably contaminated.
From that day on, diseases broke out simultaneously in many countries.
The creature was contaminated and mutated, and the resulting mutant was named “Parasite” by Ishrad’s ivory tower and the summit-authorized Cellbrox Labs.
The world is one step closer to the end of the world,
[Agent ‘Kim’ gets a rating increase].
[Update Agent Record].
[Agent name: Kim Yi Hyun].
[Rating: ★★★★★]
Kim reached 5 stars.
This is the second half of the scenario.