Chapter 380

Chapter 380
### Chapter 380: Intermission (1)

The massive controversy surrounding the Daeryong Group that shook Korea to its core,

…barely caused a ripple on the international stage.

Similar corporate debacles happened frequently across the globe.

The global public largely brushed it aside, with quite a few individuals viewing the outrage of the Korean populace as an overreaction.

“This will pose a problem. They are finally going after the upper echelon.”

Naturally, a few individuals held a different perspective.

These were the ones observing the events with a keen eye.

As well as those with a direct stake in the matter.

“What a terrible loss. Finding another pawn as perfectly aligned as the Daeryong Group will not be easy.”

New Delhi, India.

A dark-skinned woman murmured these words under her breath while lounging on a floor sofa inside a room adorned with intricate mandala motifs.

She inhaled deeply from her water pipe, blowing out plumes of vividly colored vapor.

Soft blues, delicate pinks, and pale greens…

The smoke drifted through the space, twisting and weaving into elegant airborne patterns.

*What a nuisance, but it was unavoidable. I saw this coming.*

The calming vapor worked its magic, easing her frustration as her thoughts began to wander.

She had, of course, purposefully limited what that ravenous old fool knew, hadn’t she?

*It is a pity to forfeit such a useful piece before exploiting its full potential.*

Yet, the situation was not entirely without merit.

The ordeal revealed that his sway and information networks inside Korea far exceeded their initial estimates.

Whether that reach spanned across international borders remained unconfirmed, but it provided a useful data point for upcoming maneuvers.

*I will step back from Korea for the time being. Meddling further right now offers little reward.*

Oracle, the woman puffing on the water pipe, gave a slow nod and pushed the issue from her mind.

Fixating on what had already happened served no purpose.

Her main concern now was modifying her upcoming strategies to fit the new reality.

“Haa—”

She let out a long breath, releasing a ribbon of soft yellow mist from her mouth.

As the vapor curled and rotated, it molded into vague, shifting silhouettes.

She gazed at the display with a blank stare, letting her consciousness float away.

*Thrum— Thrum— Thrum—*

A sudden flood of visions and ideas rushed into her brain.

She saw the fabric of the world breaking down and fusing together, with fundamental ideas warping, bending, tearing apart, and stitching back into new forms.

Peaks and seas occupying the exact same space, clouds resembling people swallowing solar hammers, and foxes engrossed in books.

Weaponry shaped like bugs, massive elephants sipping on bolts of lightning, and celestial bodies forged from wet dirt…

She navigated this bizarre, illogical sea of imagery, completely untethered from reality.

Roughly an hour later,

“Mmm.”

…her gaze sharpened once more. Drawing another breath from the water pipe, she stretched her hand toward a transmitter.

Powering it on, she initiated a call.

—”Why the abrupt call, Oracle? This is out of the blue.”

“It is nothing major… You are currently stationed in the Philippines, correct?”

—”Indeed. Those little pests have been a thorn in my side, and I intended to exterminate every last one of them… however, they have scurried into hiding. With the sheer number of islands here, tracking them is maddening.”

“Head over to Dinagat Island. It appears they are coordinating their next move in that region.”

—”Is that so? Excellent news. Eradicating them will be effortless now that I have their coordinates. They are nothing but vermin, anyway.”

She gave a deliberate nod as she absorbed the upbeat tone of the Southeast Asia Branch Manager, responding with a cool, calculated voice.

Providing the whereabouts of the rebel faction was merely a secondary detail. She had something entirely different to discuss.

“Furthermore, we will be deploying the Executioner to your location shortly.”

—”…That lunatic? Word was he had his hands full in Africa.”

The tone of the Southeast Asia Branch Manager instantly shifted to one of wariness.

While he prided himself on his own unhinged nature, the Executioner existed in an entirely separate league of insanity.

“Correct, but we must take a more aggressive stance. You are aware of our current standing. Yulryeongja, the Duke, and Scribe have all perished, while Doctor remains confined to a healing tank. We cannot sustain further casualties.”

—”Ahem, if that is the decree of Oracle, I have no choice but to accept.”

Though evidently dissatisfied, the Southeast Asia Branch Manager gave his grudging consent.

Defying the orders of a higher-up was simply not an option.

Additionally, a sense of unease gnawed at him.

Even someone as formidable as the Duke, the European Branch Manager and a mighty transcendent, had recently met his end.

“Excellent. I trust you to handle the rest.”

—”Haa… What a massive headache. I suppose I will need to… blow off some steam by pulverizing those pests.”

The line went dead.

Oracle squinted, directing her gaze into the empty air,

…searching as though hoping to spot an invisible presence.

“The vision remains obscured. However…”

Lately, a handful of unexpected factors had slipped past her, yet she was adapting.

Though lacking in sheer martial prowess, she remained a transcendent—wielding talents that vastly eclipsed the limits of regular mortals.

Moreover, she possessed a worldwide intelligence network!

Anticipating the opposition’s subsequent actions would not be a strenuous task.

*I must begin the preparations.*

It was time to lay out a proper reception for the irritating interloper who had been tearing their schemes apart.

—

Africa, a continent infamous for its unchecked brutality and absence of order.

Long before the advent of the Awakened, the region had served as an endless warzone, a territory where a person’s life held little value.

Casualties were too commonplace to even warrant a headline here.

The majority of ruling administrations fought simply to keep a grip on their central metropolises, their authority fading the moment one left the city limits.

A multitude of militant leaders and underground syndicates, wielding both conventional firearms and supernatural talents, waged perpetual war for dominance, trapping the continent in an unending loop of carnage.

Unquestionably, it stood as the most volatile theater of combat for the Awakened anywhere on Earth.

“Urk… Gah… Y-you monster…!”

Yet, the current unfolding scenario was far from ordinary.

A transcendent Awakened, a seasoned combatant who had survived this brutal territory for more than ten years, was… consumed by absolute dread.

Earning a reputation as a merciless butcher who would gladly rip an enemy to shreds with nothing but his bare hands… he was currently shaking uncontrollably.

It was a staggering image… though any individual gazing upon the spectacle before him would share the exact same reaction.

*Fwoosh—*

Crimson.

The entire world was painted crimson.

Furious fires, blackened soil, and the thick, sticky gore that coated the surroundings.

*Snap— Squelch—*

Or rather, wait.

A single element defied the bloody hue.

A silhouette advanced toward him at a deliberate pace, the burned rubble grinding under its heavy tread. Its outline was… obscure.

In fact, calling it a ‘human’ felt entirely incorrect.

The transcendent Awakened hailing from South Sudan collapsed on the dirt, his lower limbs amputated and his torso drenched in his own lifeblood. He gazed upward at the looming entity, his thoughts spiraling.

Obsidian scales caught the light of the dancing inferno, cladding a colossal frame that easily breached three meters in height. Four jagged horns pierced the sky from its skull, leathery bat-like wings stretched wide from its spine, and a slender, whip-thin tail tipped with a lethal spearhead lashed behind it.

It appeared to be a fiend violently dragged from the depths of hell.

*Can that truly be an Awakened? Or… an entity born in a different dimension?*

A pair of eyes, radiating a hellish ruby glow, shone just above a maw filled with razor-edged, shark-like fangs.

His psyche, sharpened by endless conflicts and fortified by his transcendent evolution, began to fracture beneath the creature’s stare.

“Gah, to hell with this!”

He clamped his teeth onto his own tongue, using the agonizing sting to anchor his slipping sanity.

Forcing his protesting muscles to work, he hoisted his torso upward, his mutilated limbs hanging limp.

His right leg ended abruptly beneath the knee cap, while the left was gone from the center of his shin, yet for a transcendent powerhouse of his caliber, these wounds were hardly a death sentence.

*…Victory is impossible.*

He was acutely aware of this fact.

His elite Awakened underlings—which included combatants firmly in the Master Realm—had been massacred by this solitary fiend, leaving him a double amputee in the process.

It was a thoroughly degrading loss.

*Still, I refuse to perish without a fight.*

He ground his teeth together, a savage resolve igniting in his glare.

His honor demanded action.

He was an acclaimed fighter, a slaughterer who forged his legend across endless war zones, the undisputed champion of South Sudan… He could not expire in this manner, failing to strike his opponent even once.

Driven by his martial resolve, his Aether flooded his circulatory system, wrapping his form in a defensive barrier.

Halt.

The monstrous entity, which had been steadily closing the distance, abruptly paused.

This was not due to any hesitation born of the warrior’s defiance…

…but rather because an incoming communication had reached it.

[“…Acknowledged.”]

The beast gave a deliberate nod, verifying the instructions it had just acquired.

It had fully intended to… draw out the entertainment… however, the time had come to conclude the slaughter.

*Fwoosh—*

A blood-red blaze burst forth from the creature’s palm, spiraling upward and completely cloaking its talons.

The atmosphere warped in response, and fissures spider-webbed across the dirt beneath its feet.

“Hah… Hah…”

The transcendent Awakened, his complexion ashen and dripping with perspiration, locked eyes with the advancing beast, his pulse hammering against his ribs.

That was no mundane combustion.

It was a hyper-dense cluster of raw power merely masquerading as fire, possessing cataclysmic ruin within.

This was the exact phenomenon that had liquefied his followers into gory smears and sheared away his legs.

“Uraaaagh! Burn in hell!”

Stripped of all alternatives, he launched his ultimate assault.

Turning his very physique into a projectile and converting his vital energy into fuel for his power,

…he threw himself into a suicidal gambit against the monster that had annihilated his world.

And then,

[“Heh—”]

…the previously mute abomination let out a quiet chuckle.

As though it had finally found a scrap of amusement.

*Thwack—*

The leathery wings expanded behind its back.

Its quartet of horns vibrated, emitting a deep, bass frequency.

It flashed a menacing smile, its ruby gaze tracking the approaching strike that hurdled forward like a shooting star,

…and then, with an effortless swipe of its burning claws,

———!

…it ripped the very fabric of reality apart.

Initially, silence reigned.

The mind-shattering detonation, an acoustic wave surpassing mortal comprehension, followed a fraction of a second later.

*Cra-crack—! Krr-boom—!*

The severed spatial dimension violently snapped shut, birthing a concussive blast that pulverized and shattered anything caught in its trajectory.

The bedrock quaked with the fury of a major seismic event, blowing away the cloud cover above.

Leftover kinetic force radiated outward, setting the immediate landscape ablaze and transforming the zone into a roaring firestorm.

*Rumble— Fwoosh—*

Within the epicenter of the ruin, the lingering echo of an unfathomable demonstration of might,

…only the popping of burning debris and the settling groans of the dirt could be heard.

In the exact spot where human combatants had once stood, a gargantuan gouge, resembling a beast’s scratch mark across the earth, was all that survived.

And the sole entity left upright, nonchalantly dusting the ash from its claws,

…was the demon.

[“…Disappointing.”]

It cast a glance down at its own torso, the dark armor plates shimmering amid the firelight.

A handful of its scales displayed fractures and chips.

*Perhaps the amusement would have lasted longer had I applied this level of force right out of the gate.*

Would the upcoming target provide a foe worthy of drawing out its full power?

Tilting its skull a fraction, it pivoted and extended its wingspan.

To transition to its subsequent location.

*Swoosh— Swoosh—*

Africa, a territory defined by primal brutality and disorder, its enigmas hidden beneath a veil of mystery.

The Executioner, an enforcer operating as a member of the Master of Heaven’s Turn Society’s personal guard, set a course for the Philippines,

…abandoning a gruesome path of carnage, scores of transcendent entities, and innumerable collateral casualties in his wake.

—

Deep within the 「Dragon’s Lair」, an isolated dimensional pocket serving as a private sanctuary,

“It is finally finished!”

…a coarse shout bounced off the walls of the fabrication zone.

A gigantic forge roared with heat, accompanied by an enchanted anvil and an array of cutting-edge crafting equipment.

Positioned dead center in the workshop stood a dwarf, hoisting a pair of metallic gauntlets high above his head. The armor caught the fire’s glow as the stout craftsman danced and cheered in triumph.

“Gahaha! I never doubted myself for a second! Piece of cake!”

Howard, the dwarven artisan, had been slaving away endlessly to forge the arcane linguistic translator for Andrew, shutting out all distractions to pour his soul into the creation,

…and had at long last completed his objective.

He had braced himself for a grueling, protracted endeavor, yet due to a confluence of beneficial variables, the project wrapped up far swifter than his initial projections.

*This “Dragon’s Lair”… it acts as an independent reality, completely free from conventional laws!*

It existed separate from Earth, Auterica, or Ganghwange.

Stripped of any specific regulations or limitations, he possessed the freedom to experiment with whatever materials he desired, including extraterrestrial components he had never previously encountered.

*Brilliant. The absolute peak of forging spaces. Granted, possessing “Savior”—which neutralizes inter-dimensional borders—allows me to ply my trade in alternate realities… yet mimicking these exact conditions will not be easy.*

It was a premium, top-of-the-line magic workshop, accessible anytime and anywhere, built exclusively for his use.

Paired with the near-permanent time acceleration barrier he had erected by tapping into the intrinsic energy currents of the 「Dragon’s Lair」, it was essentially a heavenly realm for crafting.

The passage of time within this pocket accelerated to nearly a hundredfold compared to the standard flow on Earth.

“Phew, I can finally provide Andrew’s operations with a proper… upgrade.”

Howard beamed, running a calloused hand affectionately over the flawlessly shaped armored gauntlets,

…visualizing Andrew’s ecstatic reaction upon receiving the gift.

Naturally, the dwarf had not spared a single thought regarding the actual aesthetic preferences of the recipient.

After all, who could possibly object to an item of such immense worth and utility?!