Making Them Come to Us

A facility near Tigros City was attacked by humans.

When most demons first heard this news, they didn’t think much of it, considering it just another minor incident.

Three years ago.

The invaders’ mobile fortress from another world suddenly vanished, and without their base, the invaders suffered a devastating defeat that bordered on annihilation.

Only a tiny number of invaders survived.

Even among those, most were either killed or captured after relentless pursuit.

Naturally, the demons thought the humans who attacked Tigros City would meet the same fate as the other invaders.

However, it didn’t take long for them to realize this was a miscalculation.

[The war isn’t over! Power station in Tigros City destroyed!]

[Is the nightmare of the Dark Age returning? Innocent citizens suffering without power!]

Surprisingly, far from dying, the humans completely wiped out Tigros City’s army and mercenaries and emerged unscathed.

Only then did the demons realize these humans were dangerous and began paying attention.

Regular troops from nearby cities and mercenaries seeking bounties gathered one after another to search around Tigros City.

The ruined power station, remnants of an abandoned ancient city, forests contaminated with radiation and demonic energy.

The search area was vast, but with tens of thousands of demons and twice as many mechanical troops, they thought they would find them easily.

But after reading an article recently posted on the network, the demons realized they still didn’t properly understand how dangerous these humans were.

“…They say humans appeared near Aliman City?”

“That’s quite far away. Couldn’t it be different ones?”

“No, looking at the battle traces, it’s the same ones. These crazy bastards attacked a communications base this time.”

The demon realm’s largest portal site showed photos and videos of hundreds of shattered antennas and the burning base.

The demons immediately headed toward Aliman City.

And by the time they arrived at Aliman City, a new post appeared on the site.

[Breaking news! Fire breaks out at Paimon Industrial Complex! Video analysis confirms attackers are identical to those who targeted Tigros City power station and Aliman City communications base!] ^[1]

Something happening once can be dismissed as coincidence.

But when it happens twice, three times, it’s no longer coincidence.

Four times, five times, it could happen any number of times.

And as if responding to such thoughts, countless incident reports began flooding the demon realm’s network after that day.

* * *

“The demon realm is strong, but demons are weak beings.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“You’ll understand when you experience it firsthand.”

This was what Teresa had said not long after the quest started.

Though it seemed contradictory, Yuseong was able to understand the meaning behind these words before long.

It’s not that demons are truly weak.

Objectively speaking, demons are strong beings.

They have superior physical abilities, learn martial arts and magic as basics, and are armed with cutting-edge equipment.

Even ordinary citizens have power equivalent to C-rank Contractors by Earth’s Contractors Association standards.

But for residents of a world with a Civilization Grade of 2.02 and a thousand colonial dimensions, they seemed somewhat lacking.

‘Probably because of the demon realm’s structure.’

The demons’ goal isn’t conquering other dimensions but plundering resources.

Then strong power isn’t necessary.

If a dimension beyond the gate seems strong, there’s no need to fight – just close the gate and that’s it.

Instead, find weaker dimensions to invade, and if resistance grows fierce, close the gate and invade again later to plunder resources – this was the demons’ method.

In this situation, demons naturally didn’t feel the need for strong power.

It’s not that there aren’t strong demons, but most demons’ abilities can’t be considered very high.

Their equipment is similarly ambiguous.

They have the technology to build space fleets and artificial planets, but they only produce weapons suitable for fighting dimensions beyond gates, saying anything more just consumes massive resources without being cost-effective.

Thanks to this, Yuseong and Teresa’s group were able to achieve consecutive victories against numerically superior demons.

‘But that too seems to be reaching its limit.’

Trapped in the sword formation created by eight swordsmen, Yuseong faintly furrowed his brow.

Despite moving carefully to avoid pursuit by maximizing information use, perhaps because there were too many demons, they were getting caught more and more frequently.

This was already the third battle today.

If time was wasted here, there could be fourth and fifth battles.

“Truly impressive. To think a mage, not even a warrior, could hold out this long against us. I’m very curious how much longer you can last.”

“Maybe it’s not that I’m impressive but that you’re pathetic? Does it make sense that eight peak masters using a formation can’t even scratch one mage?”

“You bastard!”

“Stupid fool! Stop! Maintain the formation!”

‘Tch. Didn’t work.’

Yuseong clicked his tongue inwardly and focused his mind.

Though he had mocked them, their skills were real.

He could hold out thanks to the overpowered skill combination of Blood Energy and Holy Avenger – if he had lacked either one, he would have fallen long ago.

Woong!

With a faint resonance, Yuseong’s form multiplied into eight.

Eight Yuseongs, identical in appearance and aura, charged with killing intent, making the startled demons retreat.

Even knowing they were illusions, it was impossible to stay composed when faced with auras that could kill with just a graze flashing before their eyes.

Until now, even if one person retreated, the remaining seven maintained the formation, but when eight retreated simultaneously, the formation instantly crumbled.

Bang!

In the split second when the duplicates blocked the demons’ view, with an explosive sound, the real Yuseong hidden among the eight stepped with Flash Step and threw a punch.

Crack!

“Kuhak!”

A scream escaped from the mouth of the demon whose heart was pierced along with the duplicate.

And before that scream even ended, the other demons also fell to the ground, struck by attacks coming from behind the duplicates.

‘That was close.’

Though outwardly composed, cold sweat drenched his back.

Marcus is a mage, not a warrior.

Though he could barely respond thanks to Asura Perception Way and combat sense honed through life-and-death battle with Hae Cheongyeong, fighting masters for an extended period with a mage’s body was like walking a tightrope.

After wiping the cold sweat from his forehead, Yuseong began rotating his circle while watching Walter and the swordsmen buried in hundreds of android troops.

Though demon mages’ magic power field already dominated the surroundings, when it clashed with Eye of Truth’s otherworldly energy control ability, it was swept away like a sandcastle before waves.

“Damn! He’s trying to spread a magic power field! Stop him!”

“Jamming! Jam it!”

“Interfere at all costs! We can’t let him complete the magic power field!”

But the demons weren’t just taking it passively.

The mages spread their magic power fields to disturb Yuseong’s magic power field even slightly, and drones positioned around launched jamming waves to destabilize magic power.

Having realized Yuseong’s danger through countless battles, the demons gave their all to prevent the magic power field from being completed.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

Discovering humanoid weapons charging toward him with heavy reverberations, Yuseong swallowed dry saliva.

‘This is going to be quite tough…’

5m tall steel giants.

If it was just one, he could handle it while smiling like playing with a toy, but when this many steel giants charged at once, it was definitely dangerous.

‘Should I use the Absolute Protection skill?’

Though only for one minute, he could freely wield Tyrant’s monstrous strength.

Just as he was about to use the Absolute Protection skill at the sight of the steel giants now within arm’s reach, thunder rang out from the sky and lightning struck.

The steel giant, literally struck by a bolt from the blue, staggered like a puppet with cut strings before falling backward.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

The lightning didn’t end with one strike.

The consecutive lightning strikes silenced all the steel giants and then began pouring down on the demons’ heads as well.

“Damn it. Retreat! Retreat!”

“Tch, we almost had them…”

When the situation turned unfavorable, the demons began fleeing without a moment’s hesitation.

Yuseong didn’t chase after the fleeing demons.

The number of demons living in the demon realm counts in the trillions.

Eliminating them all would be like scooping a bucket of water from the ocean.

Teresa approached Yuseong who was sitting on the ground catching his breath.

“Are you alright?”

“As you can see, I’m fine. How are the others?”

“There are some injuries but no casualties.”

“That’s a relief.”

Yuseong let out a sigh of relief watching people gathering behind Teresa.

The group that originally numbered four had now grown to eleven.

Yuseong’s destruction of facilities and killing of demons wasn’t meant to damage the demon realm.

This quest had two major hurdles.

One was entering Black Citadel where the gate was located, and one was finding survivors.

Of these, the latter was the problem.

‘We can at least try the former whether it works or not. But for the latter, there’s no way.’

Finding survivors hidden somewhere in the vast demon realm was impossible through normal methods.

After pondering, Yuseong came up with one method.

“From now on, we’re going to carry out indiscriminate terror attacks against demons.”

“Are you in your right mind?”

“I told you! Users really can’t be trusted!”

“Everyone please calm down. Mr. Yuseong. Could you tell us why we need to do this?”

When Yuseong claimed he would provoke demons when they should barely be hiding, Teresa’s group fell into confusion.

Ignoring Walter and Nathan who were subtly sending killing intent, Yuseong calmly explained the reason.

“It’s simple. To find other survivors.”

“…Could you explain in more detail?”

“Realistically, it’s impossible for us to find survivors. We could find them if we tried, but it would probably take decades. So I thought about it in reverse.”

“Reverse?”

“Instead of us finding survivors, we make survivors come find us.”

Wandering a world searching for survivors whose locations are unknown.

Making hidden survivors come by letting them know you’re here.

Which would be easier was obvious without saying.

Yuseong didn’t randomly attack any facility indiscriminately.

He thoroughly searched the demon realm’s network and targeted places with human sighting reports or areas with few demons for his terror attacks.

For a while, they came up empty.

But after about two weeks, Yuseong was finally able to find a new survivor.