Chapter 23
Instructor Choi Mi-hee (4)
In 2020, when the fourth cycle began, the defining feature of the Legion-themed Rifts was sheer numbers.
Now, with the cycle nearing its end, the monster population had been brought under control through the efforts of countless Hunters.
But in the early days of the fourth cycle, monsters had poured out like a flood, wave after wave without end.
And now, the nightmare of those days had returned.
“It’s... over....”
An incalculable number of monsters kept surging toward them.
The demon that had appeared and shattered the minds of some instructors and fleeing trainees did nothing at all.
It simply watched as they struggled desperately.
Just as gods magnified their existence through faith, demons could magnify theirs by spreading despair.
A demon’s purpose was never simply to take human lives.
It was to present the most horrific situation possible and break a person’s will.
The brighter someone’s will and faith, the more beautiful the harvest when that spirit was finally crushed.
The demon Legion looked at the blood-soaked woman roaring before it, Choi Mi-hee with her shield raised, and could barely contain its laughter.
Foolish.
Truly foolish.
Why would she throw away her life for those who were more insignificant than herself, those who possessed neither shining faith nor hope?
Why had humans been created to throw away even themselves for such meaningless things?
“You—shall—not—pass!”
Even before the endless tide, Choi Mi-hee refused to let go of the shield in her hands.
She had long since lost all feeling in her wrists, and there was hardly a part of her body—her back, her knees, anywhere—that did not feel as though it were falling apart.
The black wall the trainees were screaming and pounding against showed no sign of breaking.
Some of them had already dropped to their knees and were crying for their mothers.
Others had abandoned all hope and simply trembled in fear.
Some even begged the demon to spare their lives.
Her arms felt as though they were about to tear off.
The malice pressing against the other side of her shield felt far too alien.
The monsters Choi Mi-hee knew had always seemed more like starving beasts.
But these creatures now felt like crystallized malice, things created solely to destroy humanity and the human world.
She was terrified.
And yet her resolve hardened.
“LOOK—AT—ME!”
Scrrrape.
Something clawed across the shield.
With the stomach-churning sound, Choi Mi-hee’s hair was chewed apart, and the exposed tips of her feet beneath the shield were bitten off in chunks and swallowed.
She felt like a single powerless human standing alone before a tsunami.
A battle whose outcome had already been decided.
Her consciousness began to fade.
Her thoughts grew increasingly muddled.
Then a sinister voice whispered from somewhere deep within her heart.
Why am I sacrificing this much?
Even if I die protecting them here, who will acknowledge my death?
What value does my sacrifice have?
Everything I warned them about has come true.
Doesn’t that prove I was better than the other instructors?
Those trainees never recognized my worth and never listened to my advice.
Don’t they deserve to die?
If I alone survive and return, I could become a hero—the one who had warned everyone about this disaster all along....
Wouldn’t that be far better than dying a meaningless death?
Choi Mi-hee could no longer tell whether the voices whispering in her ear were the demon’s temptations...
Or resentment that had been piling up in her heart without even her realizing it.
And then....
“Ms. Mi-hee.”
“When I grow up, I’m going to become a Hunter too.”
‘A Hunter who can protect anyone!’
A brief memory flashed through her mind.
‘It was an accident, apparently?’
‘Well, you see, she learned the rules for Rifts incorrectly. Looks like her training was pretty sloppy.... Tsk. It’s unfortunate, but what can you do? People dying in Rifts is hardly anything unusual....’
‘How could she not know something this basic?’
BANG—!
A tremendous impact sent Choi Mi-hee flying.
Her ruined body twisted through the air as she coughed up blood.
Her trembling hand finally lost its grip on the shield.
The shield began to tip over.
Monsters thrust their faces into the opening one by one.
The trainees squeezed their eyes shut, certain that their end had come.
Everything flashed past in an instant.
‘If only there had been a proper instructor....’
The next moment, a girl burst from among the trainees like a streak of light, her hair whipping behind her.
She seized the handle of the collapsing shield.
She pressed her shoulder and elbow tightly against it, threw her entire body weight into the stance, and held it firm so that it would not fall.
Thud.
Choi Mi-hee hit the dirt and stared with wide eyes.
‘Those assigned to the front line, listen carefully.’
‘The most important thing when holding a shield is—’
She had inherited it.
In the exact stance Choi Mi-hee had taught her.
“Tank types, get over here—now!”
In the place where Choi Mi-hee had fallen,
Choi Bom now stood.
“Anyone who can break open an escape route, do it! Anyone with free hands, get up and get over here right now! If this line breaks, we die. So hold it no matter what it takes! Nothing is over yet!”
At the same moment, dazzling light erupted from Choi Bom’s body.
Her dull training uniform melted away.
The next instant, gray armor covered her body.
The armor had looked crudely made, but the moment it was enveloped in light, it began gleaming like a star in the middle of the night.
「‘Fragment of Starlight’ has been activated.」
「[Dwarf’s Wish] is cast.」
「The final flame of a dwarf who sought to prove himself to the very end, never abandoning hope even in an abandoned world, now blossoms.」
The hands gripping the shield trembled.
Blood seeped between her lips.
Tear tracks marked her cheeks.
But Choi Bom knew that nothing would change if she simply sat there and gave up.
‘You know... you were born with a terribly cruel fate.’
Choi Bom remembered a day far in the past, when she had first met the friend who would become more precious to her than anyone else.
Back when she had spent her entire life in a hospital, seeing nothing but white ceilings and white floors, the words spoken by that first friend her own age still remained in her mind.
‘But it’s also the most beautiful fate.’
The trainees who had been behind the fallen Choi Mi-hee began shouting one after another as they rushed to Choi Bom’s side.
And before she knew it, Choi Mi-hee, who had always stood at the front of them all, now found herself looking at the backs of the people she had taught and cared for.
Just like the day, long ago, when she had left the field.
“Hold the line!”
And then—
“Hey! Is everyone okay in there?!”
A voice came from beyond the black wall.
“We’re the rescue team from Dawn!”
It was Kim Dong-seok.
“We’re going to break through the wall now, so everyone near it, please move away! It could be dangerous!”
Tears welled up in the trainees’ eyes.
The next moment—
BOOM!
With a tremendous crash, the black wall collapsed, and Kim Dong-seok and the Hunters with him finally saw the horrific scene on the other side.
Choi Mi-hee was in the worst condition of them all.
One of the Hunters recognized her and muttered,
“Mi-hee...? How did you end up like this...?”
“Not... me.... Over there.”
“Over there?”
At Choi Mi-hee’s words, the Hunters looked ahead.
Their expressions froze.
Even in the early days of the fourth-cycle Rifts, they had never seen monsters in numbers like this....
Staring at the horde surging toward them like a natural disaster, the Hunters unconsciously swallowed.
This had already gone far beyond the level of a ‘minor problem’ during field training.
If those things ever made it outside the Rift, the resulting casualties would be impossible to contain.
And against something like this...
How had they managed to hold out?
Aside from Choi Mi-hee, almost none of the trainees appeared to be dead or seriously injured.
Calling that the achievement of a single person’s sacrifice almost felt inadequate.
It was far too extraordinary.
But—
“...For now, everyone needs to fall back! Trainees, move!”
Saving all of them...
looked impossible.
“Manager, what do we do?”
“Trainee Choi Bom, the one we came to rescue, is up there. Just looking at it, she seems to be the key holding that defensive line together. If we pull only Trainee Choi Bom out, everyone here is going to die!”
“Damn it, we don’t have enough people!”
The situation was too dire.
Hearing their conversation, Choi Mi-hee tried to force her ruined body upright.
Thud.
She collapsed back onto the ground from the effort and rasped,
“...I’ll... go back.”
“What are you talking about...?”
“Trainees... are... the future.... An instructor... has a duty... to protect... trainees....”
Choi Mi-hee gasped for breath as she spoke, seemingly no longer in her right mind.
This was not a problem that could be solved by sacrificing one more person.
It was the kind of situation people living in reality encountered countless times.
Sometimes, no amount of willpower or sacrifice could solve what stood before them.
And whenever that happened,
what was needed was always—
a miracle.
“As expected, my eyes weren’t wrong.”
“Thank you for keeping the promise you made back then, when I asked you to take good care of Bom.”
And today,
there was a miracle here.
“From here on, leave it to me.”
God had not abandoned them.
「The skill [True Justice] activates.」
「An extremely powerful [Heavenly Blessing] is bestowed.」
「Until the battle against the demon ends, you are granted [The Most Radiant Hymn of Heaven].」
Lee Shin had already grasped the situation roughly through the prayers reaching him.
The Dawn Hunters, aside from Kim Dong-seok, tried to stop Lee Shin as he walked forward without hesitation.
“It’s dangerous! If you go now—!”
But Seong Chan-yang stopped them from approaching.
With no one left to interfere, Lee Shin listened to the radiant hymn echoing within him.
It was the effect of [True Justice], the reward he had received for saving Santiago and accomplishing a great feat in the past.
And this was the blessing it granted.
「The Most Radiant Hymn of Heaven」
「The abilities of your believers increase explosively.」
「Your believers are temporarily reconstructed into bodies suited to this reality.」
「All attacks are imbued with a powerful divine effect.」
「The effects of [World Interference] are greatly enhanced.」
Thud.
Thud.
Thud.
Tiny dwarves began dropping down around Lee Shin.
And with each step they took in time with the resounding hymn, the dwarves—none of whom had normally stood taller than thirty centimeters—began growing larger.
Soon, they had reached the size of ordinary humans.
The weapons in their hands grew along with them.
“What the...?”
One of Dawn’s Hunters could not hide his shock.
An ability that could summon an entire completed army?
Even the strongest known summoner did not possess anything on this level.
No.
There was probably no Hunter in existence with an ability like this.
This was not power that should have been permitted to a single individual.
“Joy to the world!! The Savior has come—!!”
At the very front of the formation, a beautiful girl with star-shaped pupils shouted at the top of her lungs.
A halo resembling the sun blazed brilliantly behind her.
At the same time, the pitch-black darkness that had devoured the earth and sky receded.
The night ended.
Day arrived.
It was the power of a saintess.
「Intermediate Believer Eve casts [Time of Light].」
「The hymn strengthens the saintess’s power.」
「The skill [Time of Light] is enhanced into [Eternal Day].」
WHOOOOOSH—!
A new sun rose into the brightened sky.
It was a pure-white sun.
The monsters touched by its pouring light howled as their bodies began melting away.
“WORSHIP HIIIIIM!”
With a smug expression, Eve stood at the rear as Santiago charged forward.
The monsters were pounding against the shields with roaring cries.
Santiago raced straight into their midst and then leaped—
higher,
and higher still.
Calling it a jump would have been inaccurate.
It was closer to flight.
「Low-Rank Believer Santiago has laid [Bait].」
「Enough fish have been caught in Low-Rank Believer Santiago’s [Net]!」
Floating high in the air, Santiago made a forceful pulling motion with both hands.
At once, the swarming monsters were yanked upward as though caught by something invisible.
They shot into the sky in droves.
Then came a tremendous sloshing sound, like waves crashing against a shore, as the ground itself rippled violently.
The next instant, the air around Lee Shin shimmered and red fortifications appeared.
A dwarf holding a flag stood atop one of the walls.
The dwarf swung the flag.
Countless machine guns opened fire.
RATATATATATAT—!
A storm of bullets poured out.
The tiny rounds expanded to full size the instant they entered reality.
「A demon’s minion has been slain.」
「A demon’s minion has been slain.」
「A demon’s minion has been slain.」
Before Lee Shin could even savor the flood of Divine Power pouring into him, Jude clacked his teeth together and raised one bony white finger.
The monsters that had just been slaughtered en masse began rising again in unison, obeying the command of their new master.
Rattle.
Rattle.
Rattle.
An army of skeletons appeared.
“New friends!”
The believers of the small world had overwhelmed the enemy the instant they appeared.
And their master, Lee Shin, stared expressionlessly at the demon seated far in the distance.
“......”
The demon’s eyes were trembling violently.
Instead of saying anything, Lee Shin slowly raised one hand.
Through the power granted by the hymn echoing around him, he instinctively understood how that power was meant to be used.
「Activating [World Interference].」
「The [Action] tab of [World Interference] has been enhanced.」
『No, wait, hold on—』
「Casting [Divine Punishment].」