Chapter 364: The buried natives (1)

—booom!—

Hansoo frowned as he stared at the monster furiously attacking him.

‘God damn it.’

Quirae.

Integrating the genes of the things it’s eaten to reinforce its weak points and strengthen its strong points.

They repeated this and strengthened their race as a whole.

Their strength hugely depended on what they ate.

So Hansoo knew—

—that this strength was not something that came from eating humans.

…ssssss…

Hansoo frowned as he felt the 4th-level monster threatening to break apart his arm.

It wasn’t much different from before in terms of looks.

The Quirae’s armor-like exoskeleton was still there, and if one ignored the spikes on the back of their bodies, they still looked like armored humans.

The issue was what was inside of it.

If the thing inside the armor was once a human, it was something much more cruel and evil now.

A new race.

‘The original owners of the blue armor… they seem to have been quite strong.’

—booom!—

A force shocked his entire body, and not even his evolved blue armor could handle it, even as it sucked in energy at an insane rate.

They didn’t have anything particularly special about them.

But they had focused on their abilities as a ‘lifeform’.

Powerful physical strength.

Endless vitality.

Powerful defense and adaptability.

Overflowing mana.

Whatever it had eaten, the Quirae had definitely eaten something with immense physical abilities.

And Hansoo thought of a race.

‘This is what I wanted to become.’

Change a weak body to something powerful, providing a tremendous amount of adaptability with the Spirits.

Generate mana with the Mana Jade and a powerful life force from the World Tree.

Gain the weapon from this zone and continue upwards.

Although the ones in front of his eyes didn’t have the Dragon God Armor, it was almost similar since of the Quirae’s hard exoskeleton.

Although he had to open the Abyss due to a change in plans, if he hadn’t done so then he would’ve first taken over Nelkipa and then headed towards the moon which stored the Dragon God Armors, the .

‘Well, the story’s a little different now.’

Lost in thought, Hansoo swung his hammer and smashed down at the head of the 4th-level Quirae.

—boom!—

The Quirae’s exoskeleton, which was as hard or even harder than the Dragon God Armor, smashed apart and its inner flesh crushed.

—kiiiing!—

The blue armor went berserk as it started crazily sucking in Hansoo’s energy.

And the blue armor condensed all around Hansoo’s body and released the stored energy inside it, providing him with powerful strength.

As if it were saying that it couldn’t let its precious host die.

—crunch!—

Hansoo’s original strength had combined with that of the blue armor’s.

And Hansoo used this newfound strength to grab onto the Quirae’s mouth that had opened up wide.

—split!—

The mouth that could even crush the city’s alloy walls couldn’t withstand Hansoo’s strength, and he ripped it apart.

But even as it died, the 4th-level monster grasped Hansoo’s arms as he ripped apart its mouth.

—crunch!—

Literally overflowing with life force—

—the 4th-level Quirae continued to survive and linger on.

Kyaaaak!

And as if the others couldn’t waste the small chance that 4th-level Quirae had created for them, the surrounding 2nd and 3rd-level Quirae screamed as they charged towards him.

Hansoo scoffed at this sight and squeezed out the mana in his body.

And the Mana Jade made a strange sound similar to a complaint, since the blue armor was already draining it.

As if complaining about how this was all too much for it to take.

But apparently the Mana Jade knew that it was also nothing without its owner, and it seemed strain itself to squeeze out more mana.

Soon the blue mana turned red.

—booom!—

Hansoo’s Pandemic Blade exploded out from his body and surrounded him.

—swoooosh!—

“Kya… kuhak!”

The 3rd-level Quirae managed to withstand the Pandemic Blade before it started to melt down like snow under a blazing sun.

Hansoo breathed in deeply as he examined this new strength from the Pandemic Blade.

It was growing.

The Immortal Soul was continuously growing from the outside stimulus.

As his Immortal Soul grew, he also became stronger.

And as his overall strength rose, his Pandemic Blade became stronger as well.

Stimulus and battle created powerful beings.

Like a steel-blade being tempered with every swing of a hammer, he became stronger every time his path was blocked.

He continued to grow and became stronger.

‘But it’s still… not easy.’

—booom!—

Hansoo smashed away the 4th-level Quirae after covering his hammer with the Nine Dragons Strike and frowned.

Melchizedek wasn’t suppressing their growth since it just needed to teleport them away.

And as if they were thankful about it, the Quirae didn’t go against Melchizedek and only focused on increasing their forces.

The result of their collaboration was beyond reason.

Despite having crushed countless 4th-level Quirae, they continued to crawl out from the depths.

Unlike the 2nd and 3rd-levels who seemed numb to the deaths of their comrades, the other 4th-levels screamed at seeing the deaths of their own kind and charged at him crazily.

Towards him, who was killing their kind, but could still strengthen himself.

A precious food source.

And Hansoo frowned at this.

‘…I cannot get past them at this rate.’

No, he could buy time.

But at this rate, Melchizedek would activate the Quantum Transmission.

And at this rate, he’d fail to escape this place as well.

He and Kiriel would fail at becoming stronger, and Enbi Arin would die.

‘Kiriel. What are you doing now?’

Because the Quirae had devoured another race, an unknown variable had occurred.

And he needed a new variable as well.

—booom!—

Hansoo smashed away a Quirae charging towards him and looked into the distance.

…………………………………………….

“The inner area is a bit a different from the outskirts. Those things are really vicious… ugh…”

Kiriel, covered in the green liquid, frowned as she heard N-Aroel’s speech.

“So what was your original plan?”

N-Aroel pointed with trembling fingers.

“If you go a bit off from the central area… there’s a control center where you can control Mimir and the Fusion Reactor. Even if you don’t break the Quantum Transmission machine, you can still stop it. Damn! I didn’t mean that we should head towards the center!”

The nine Dragon God Soldiers, including R-Zairon Nell, frowned.

But they still didn’t feel good about this.

‘Slightly off from the center…’

According to the current pattern, these things were stronger the closer they got to the center. Moving slightly away from the center wasn’t enough to make them sigh in relief.

Not when they were looking at the corpse of the 4th-level Quirae in front of them.

And their gruesome expressions proved it.

“Haa… Haaaa.”

“Dammit… You’re telling me that these things will swarm us once we go deeper?”

“Ugh… Captain. Can’t we just go around?”

The two 4th-level Quirae.

They’d almost died from just dealing with two.

No, if that woman called Kiriel hadn’t helped, then at least one or two of them would’ve died.

‘But she wants to go into the same place these things are swarming?’

The Dragon God Soldiers freaked out.

Even if they’d lost the strength from the Flame, they would have a higher survival rate if they hid in the outskirts.

Dying like this—it would be a worthless death.

And R-Zairon Nell thought so too.

‘…Should we escape?’

Charging in was only possible when they had a chance at winning.

Even if it were the outer areas of the center, the Quirae would rip them apart.

Since countless others would swarm in while they were busy fighting a few.

‘Dammit… How can a race like this exist?’

<…Analyzation Impossible.>

Words continuously appeared on the panel while they scanned this 4th-level monster, but every sentence was full of errors and failures.

The aliens and these insects were annoying enough, but for these things to be on Nelkipa…

‘Damn… Right. This whole Nelkipa is suspicious too… We need to take into account the other variables as well.’

R-Zairon Nell made a decision.

To retreat.

“We’ll retreat. There… is no chance of survival at this rate.”

All the other Dragon God Soldiers nodded.

They could only move forward by paying with their lives.

They’d fought for a very long time and knew that reality was colder and harsher beyond reason.

But at that moment—

—a single streak of light ascended into the sky.

It looked like a skill had created it.

And Kiriel sighed in relief as she spoke to the surrounding Dragon God Soldiers and N-Aroel.

“Let’s go inside.”

“…I told you. It’s the end if we go in and get surrounded.”

—crack—

R-Zairon Nell stepped on a corpse by his feet and shook his head.

“I told you, I’m not alone.”

‘I trust in you, Hansoo.’

Kiriel giggled as she looked at the bright and blue light that had risen far up into the sky.

………………………………………

“Phew. I know she’lld understand.”

Hansoo breathed in and out and then looked towards the hole projecting the bright blue light.

Although it was originally covered by a metal wall, the 4th-level Quirae had broken past it in a hurry.

It was impossible to get to the Quantum Transmission machine in time.

But Kiriel would do it.

She was a smart child.

He just had one job.

To create a path for them.

Also, he was curious.

‘Let’s see… what could be inside?’

As to why these things were trying to stop him from entering.

—booom!—

Hansoo started to charge towards the giant hole where countless Quirae had formed a blockade, preventing him from advancing further.