Capítulo 48: Chapter 38: Stratagem: Ant Bullies, Jeju Reclaimed
A/N :
" " : Dialogue,
' ' : Thought,
[ ] : System, Akasha, Minerva,
"Italicized text" : Telepathy,
« » : Artificial Intelligence,
| | : Sung Jin-Woo's System Panels, Sung Jin-Woo's System Messages,
"Bold text" : Shadows & Deathborns.
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Narrator POV
The next day came by quickly, and many of Korea's Hunters were headed to Jeju Island to start the raid. Dante, Shiraori and Sung Jin-Woo were nowhere to be seen, but everyone knew that this was planned out to leave them with no casualties.
While the S Ranks were in helicopters, heading to Jeju Island's shores, the lower ranked Hunters were all on battleships of different sizes, with 9 of them being destroyer class battleships, and 12 of them frigates, all deployed near the north side of Jeju Island.
As for the Hunters that weren't on the ships, they were stationed at Korea's coasts, in order to prevent any escapee ants from infiltrating Korea and causing more carnage.
Despite their numbers, there was still a great deal of tension in the Hunters. Even though they had Sung Jin-Woo, an official National Rank Hunter, on their side, the ones that had experienced the raid four years ago still had doubts about them clearing it this time.
However, those thoughts didn't last long, as they all felt 3 extremely strong waves of mana sweep over them and the island. The Hunters on the battleships looked up to see a wyvern and a dragon, both seemingly made from shadows, with the wyvern's body glowing purple, and the dragon's glowing gold.
On top of the wyvern was Sung Jin-Woo, and on the dragon, were Dante and Shiraori, all three of them letting off waves of mana so great, they sent shivers up everyone's spines. In Dante's hands was an orb that was letting off miniscule waves of mana, and as soon as they were directly above the city that used to be Jeju, he threw it down.
In the air, the orb suddenly multiplied into 4, with each one going in opposite directions until they reached the extremes of the island, then they suddenly let off extremely strong waves of mana, baiting out hordes of drone ants from within the massive colony that had been built into the Hallasan Mountain.
As soon as they had flown into the air, Dante's dragon blasted them with a beam of flames that boiled all the fluids within them instantly, causing them to explode in the air
After the first blast, Dante, Shiraori and Sung Jin-Woo jumped down to the crater of Hallasan, which now led to various chambers that make up the entire ant colony, while using telekinesis to accelerate their drop.
As soon as they hit the ground, Dante transmitted the layout of the Ant Nest and the location of the Ant King to Sung Jin-Woo, who after processing the information, calls out all his other shadows to begin their assault on the ants.
To make sure that no more ants could leave the mountain, Dante created a laser grid that covered the entire crater, leaving only enough space for a single human hair to fall through any of the gaps.
Meanwhile, outside Hallasan, the S Ranks had finally landed on the shores, ready to take out any of the ants that were on the ground. Each of them had a light backpack on that had multiple potions, mainly Healing Potions, Mana Recovery Potions, Antidotes, Stimulants and the new Enhancer Potions that Dante had made.
"Did anyone know that Dante had a dragon all this time?" Choi Jong-In asked as he looked up at the deathborn dragon that was circling the sky above the island, as if looking for more ants that had made the mistake of flying high.
Of course, no one answered his question, as none of them had an idea of such a thing. "That's what's surprising you? I had known that he and his girlfriend were easily stronger than all of us together. I just didn't expect them to be so much stronger than a National Rank Hunter that solo raided an entire S Rank Red Gate." Baek Yoon-Ho said as he activated his powers, turning his eyes beastly and his hair white, and put the communicator that had bwen handed to all of them in his ear.
"Well, we've been given our own tasks, so let's get to it." The Reapers Guild Master, Lim Tae-Gyu said as he tested his bow, his communicator already sitting in his ear. ""Right!"" They all responded and began dashing around the island, searching for any of the ants that were still alive on the ground.
Choi Jong-In used his flames to give himself a boost, while Baek Yoon-Ho used the physical enhancement that his powers gave him to move faster. Cha Hae-In used her innate agility to move around, while Ma Dongwook used his Gigantification to make himself larger, so he covered more distance with each stride.
The speed at which they all moved, left Lim Tae-Gyu standing there awkwardly, as he was the one that had told them to begin moving, yet he was the last person to move. Shaking his head, he quickly refocused on the mission, and took off in search of ants to kill.
Of course, everything was being broadcasted in Korea, thanks to Dante's drones with high quality cameras built into them, that were moving about the island under concealment and protective barriers.
The first person to find any ants outside was Choi Jong-In, but the ones he found had multiple significant chunks taken out of them, as if they had been eaten. "It seems that they had started eating each other. It's either they had been lacking food, or there's an apex predator amongst them." Choi Jong-In said with his guard up.
"Well, whatever it is, it's not our problem to deal with. The Dominion Guild's already on that." Lim Tae-Gyu said as he also saw a few ant corpses that looked like they had been eaten. Everyone agreed and continued moving, searching for ants.
Back in Hallasan, the Dominion Guild's trio of Hunters had been killing every ant that they came across without difficulty. Sung Jin-Woo was using the Demon King's Daggers that he had looted from Baran, Shiraori was still using her scythe, Aranea, and Dante was using a pair of pistols.
These pistols were made using the Power Deagle as a template, but they were better in quality and had more abilities. For one, each of them was created using one of the cloned cores of Sillad that Dante had made, the corpse of a clone of Nia, the Ice Dragon from Maera, and the metal Dynamium which can only be created by Dante's nanomachines.
*Frost Bringers*
Every enemy that Dante hit immediately had their total temperature reduced to absolute zero, killing all the energy in their body and crumbled to ice dust. And since they didn't operate with the same limitations as other conventional guns do, they could fire at extremely high rates without any damage, overheating or recoil.
Of course, this didn't mean that Dante hogged all the monsters to himself. He still left some for Shiraori and Sung Jin-Woo to kill.
Back in Korea, the raid was being broadcasted all around the country. Regardless of whatever channel one switched to, they would only see the raid being broadcast. This was of course, thanks to Dante.
He had even placed drones with massive holographic projectors at different parts of Korea, just to ensure that no one missed the news of the raid.
Some companies wanted to try stealing the projectors so that they could reverse engineer them, but when the fact that they were owned by the most prominent and powerful guild in the country was considered, such thoughts immediately died out.
Back on Jeju Island, the other S Ranks had come in contact with some ants that had flown far below the dragon's blast of flames, and began hunting them. Choi Jong-In unleashed his flames with no restraint, Baek Yoon-Ho ripped apart as many as were around him, Ma Dongwook cleaved through as many as he could with his axe and crushed the rest with his fists, Lim Tae-Gyu left every single ant around him perforated, and Cha Hae-In killed every single ant around her with fast and precise sword strikes, that were seemingly done in a hypnotic dance.
They didn't come into contact with anymore ants on the ground, meanwhile the dragon had used its flame breath to extinguish the lives of the ants foolish enough to continue staying in the air, causing multiple charred ant corpses to fall to the ground. Many of them had been burned to the point that they were more charcoal than biomass.
"I wonder if they're done in there." Lim Tae-Gyu said curiously. Before he could respond however, they all felt a sudden eruption of mana come from what they assumed to be the ant nest. After the wave subsided, there was only one question in their minds; "Whatvthe hell is happening now?!"
But before they could try moving toward Hallasan, another more powerful wave erupted from the ant nest. For a moment, a short moment, the thought that the Dominion Guild's Hunters were in over their heads cropped up in most of the S Rank Hunters' minds, but then....
*Rooooaaaarrr*
The dragon let out a loud roar that shook them from their shocked states. "Am I the only one that really wants to know what the hell just happened?!" Lim Tae-Gyu shouted after he gathered his bearings.
...
Dante POV
A few minutes ago
We'd basically killed all the ants within the colony and come across the breeding ground, which only has the royal guards, the queen and the hundreds of unhatched eggs. And of course, the Ant King is still trying to find a way out of the mountain.
When we landed, I didn't just put up a laser grid that would kill any ant that would try passing through it. Shiro also cast a spatial barrier over the mountain that basically imprisoned the ants, so none of them, not even the Ant King would be able to leave.
"Well, since we're here now, we'll clear the rest and leave the last one for you to kill." I say, and nod to Shiro as we both put our weapons away. We dash into the Queen's nest and immediately begin killing her Royal Guards.
A crushed head here, a hole in the chest over there. We killed each of the Royal Guards in as many ways that one could kill with their bare hands. When we finished with them, we immediately tore off the Queen's legs and sent in a bit of electricity to attack her nervous system.
And of course, it did what we were pushing it to do. It screeched, loudly. Of course, we understood its screech as a scream for all the other ants to come and help it due to the fact that we're both omnilingual. We also felt the Ant King speeding towards the breeding ground.
Speaking of which, Jin-Woo used his shadows to destroy all the eggs, leveling himself up to 100. Between that and his stats that are all over 500, the Ant King will become Beru a lot faster this time around.
Manipulating the remnants of the jolt that we gave her, I send it all into her head and amplify it to the point that it causes her head to explode. At the same time, we feel the Ant King reach the front of the breeding ground, and we feel it, a burning rage that is quickly replaced by intense fear.
"Well, this should be fun." I say and go back to the egg chamber, where the Ant King is looking at Jin-Woo in abject terror. It doesn't know why it couldn't leave the mountain, but it also knows that it won't be able to run away from the human in front of it. It was trapped with no way out.
Seeing that it had no choice but to fight, it activates Atsushi Kumamoto's Berserker mode to increase its attributes, then tries attacking Jin-Woo with ice magic. The ice encases Jin-Woo, but I already know that it won't hold for long.
"Ice, huh? I wonder how well it'll last against lightning." He says and channels lightning throughout his body, destroying the ice on his body. Seeing that the ice is ineffective, the Ant King punches Jin-Woo in the face, and the force kicks up a dust cloud.
It's too bad for it though, that Jin-Woo is far too strong for it. I clear the dust cloud so that everyone watching back in Korea can see what happened.
The Ant King is standing in front of Jin-Woo, the terror in its mind going out of control, as it now has one less limb, as Jin-Woo grabbed and crushed its arm after the fist hit his face. "Oh, sorry about that. I was only trying to hold your hand, and I used too much strength." He says as he drops the crumbling limb of the Ant King.
In fear, the Ant King compresses its body to maximize its speed, and frantically flies away, hoping to escape this place, somehow. "You're trying to get into a match of speed, with me?" Jin-Woo says and activates his new version of Quicksilver, Mercurial Boost, drastically increasing his speed.
He uses Shūndō, just to flex on the Ant King that much more, and dashes to the area right above the Ant King and smacks it down with so much force that it craters the ground. It drags itself out of the hole and looks up to see Sung Jin-Woo looking down at it with cold eyes that glowed with a menacing purple light.
"I thought you'd be stronger. Pity." He says and punches the Ant King in the head with a lightning charged fist, crushing it and killing the Ant King. For a moment, I hear a thick silence from Korea, before a multitude of cheers erupts from the people.
With this, the raid had officially ended and Jeju could be seen as a reclaimed land. The deaths of all the Hunters that attempted the raid 3 times before can now be seen as avenged. And by Hunter law, the 3 of us are now certified National Rank Hunters.
Putting his hand toward the corpse of the Ant King, Jin-Woo says his signature call. "Arise." Due to the degree of strength that the Ant King possessed, its shadow was so powerful that it immediately surpasses every other shadow before it, and hits the General Rank.
Of course, with it being so highly ranked, it also had to be given a name. Jin-Woo starts to move away to raise the other ants, but is interrupted by a voice. "My King." He turns around to see that the shadow he just raised was speaking to him.
"Please, give me a name." It said as it bowed on one knee. Jin-Woo looks at me and remembers what I told him when he asked about talking shadows, then lets out a breath. He looks at the shadow for a few moments, thinking of a name. "Well, I can't just name you Ant or Gaemi (Korean for Ant)." He mutters to himself.
"Beru. Your name will be Beru." I sense a spike of joy in Beru's mood. "Thank you... My Master." Jin-Woo nods and goes to raise the other ants, and while he does, I call out to him.
"Hey, Jin-Woo. Don't bother raising the queen, she's basically useless as a shadow. I may have raised her, but you must understand that my deathborns are fundamentally different from your shadows." He looks in the direction of the Queen's nest with disappointment, then raises all the Royal Guards and other ants within his reach.
As he does that, Shiro puts down the barrier as we leave the mountain, and waiting right outside in between Kaisel and my dragon that I'd named Valstryx, were the S Ranks, and they were looking at us with amazed gazes.
Due to Valstryx incinerating all other ants, there was no more cleanup required, so we could start getting ready to go. I walk toward them and Valstryx brought his head down close to me and rubbed his snout on me, not unlike a pet dog or cat, increasing the amazement that the others felt.
Jin-Woo soon comes out of the mountain , his army having increased by over 5 times its former amount, and Beru's magic stone in his inventory. "Well, since we're done here, I think we can go home and leave the restoration to the experts." I say as Shiro and I mount Valstryx's head.
"Oh, yeah. That's right. We've actually finished the raid and gotten Jeju Island back." Baek Yoon-Ho says as he regains his bearings. Jin-Woo starts moving towards Kaisel, ignoring everyone else.
'Okay, that's enough waiting. How dense can one motherfucker be' I think to myself, exasperated. I manipulate his perception, allowing him to be more sensitive towards Hae-In's advances, then pat Valstryx, giving him the signal to leave.
...
Narrator POV
With his sensitivity to Cha Hae-In's advances increased, Jin-Woo looked at her differently from before. And he even started to wonder if they could work as a couple. Then he shook his head and mounted Kaisel, then flew away on him. But deep down, he knew that their interactions and relationship would never be the same.
Chapter End.
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Word Count: 2,879
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