Four-Way Battle

Yuseong wasn’t irresponsible enough to just wait idly knowing that gods would invade.

After the uninvited guest left their brutal warning and fled, Yuseong had devised numerous plans to prepare for the invasion.

A plan to make Earth the entire battlefield, induce a prolonged war, then gather karma with mass-produced goggles to slowly accumulate damage by mass-producing transcendents until they retreated.

A plan to join hands with Changwei, gather all of Earth’s forces to fiercely resist and make them realize they would gain nothing and only suffer losses by fighting.

A plan to formally acquire the goggles’ license with karma points earned from mass-produced goggles.

However, at this moment all those plans had become garbage.

Crackle!

“Arghhhh!”

“P-please spare me…”

The plans Yuseong had made required having enough power to at least take a finger or toe, even if losing an arm or leg was inevitable when facing them head-on.

But the power gap between humans and gods was too extreme.

Forget taking fingers or toes – they couldn’t even inflict a scratch.

With such a power difference, war, negotiation, escape, and even surrender were impossible.

‘In this case, this is the only option left.’

Using the Calamity Fragment to artificially trigger the Outer God’s thoughts and summon an Outer God.

Make the Outer God and gods clash with each other.

When he first came up with this idea, he had laughed it off as a futile delusion.

If the plan succeeded, both sides would be annihilated, or even if one side won they would suffer heavy losses, allowing him to potentially take advantage of that opening.

However, there were too many uncertainties in this plan.

The Outer God and gods might join forces to attack Earth instead of fighting each other, and even if they fought, their mutual destruction was uncertain.

But in the current situation, there was no other choice.

‘Though this might end up inviting a tiger while trying to drive away a wolf…’

They literally, not figuratively, intended to annihilate Earth and this dimension.

If they were going to die anyway, they had to at least take this gamble.

“Alice. Your hand.”

“Yes?”

“Let me see your hand for a moment.”

Yuseong pulled Alice’s hand and placed his hand on top of hers.

And moments later when he removed his hand, a dragon’s crest appeared roaring on Alice’s hand.

“Why are you giving this to me…”

“I’m going to summon the Outer God now.”

At this sudden bombshell declaration, Alice stared at Yuseong with blank eyes.

Regardless, Yuseong pointed at the sky and calmly continued speaking.

“At this rate, Earth’s destruction is certain. To stop the gods, we have no choice but to summon the Outer God and fight fire with fire.”

“W-wait a moment! The Outer God? Isn’t that extremely dangerous?”

“That’s why I’m summoning it. Nothing less can stop them.”

“No! I mean, I’m talking about you, Mr. Yuseong! You said the Outer God’s thoughts were corroding your mind! So if you summon the Outer God…”

Alice was the only person who knew him best besides Yuseong himself.

She, of all people, knew what would happen when Yuseong summoned the Outer God.

“I know too. But there’s no other choice.”

With not just Earth but the entire dimension about to be destroyed, they couldn’t gather enough karma points to mass produce users and perform the Sun Moon Ritual, and he wasn’t confident about surviving an indefinite voyage to another dimension using Dragonia.

Realizing there was no other way, Alice opened and closed her mouth without speaking.

“Don’t worry too much – summoning the Outer God doesn’t necessarily mean becoming its puppet. I’ve endured well until now, so I might be able to regain my senses after being consumed by the Outer God.”

“Then why did you give me this?”

Seeing Alice hold out the Dragonia crest on her hand, Yuseong hesitated before speaking.

“Just in case. If I don’t regain my senses and it looks like Earth will be destroyed by the gods or Outer Gods, escape to another dimension using Dragonia. Since you’re an android, you should be able to endure a long voyage.”

“I absolutely refuse! I’d rather die here with you than escape alone!”

“Alice. I’m sorry but this isn’t a request – it’s an order.”

The moment she heard the word ‘order’, Alice’s demeanor changed.

Her desperate expression turned into an emotionless mask, and her natural movements became rigid like a robot’s.

“This is an order. Do exactly as I just said. No matter what happens, don’t leave Dragonia. Understand?”

After briefly nodding, Alice spread her wings and flew toward Dragonia without looking back.

Watching her retreating figure, Yuseong gave a self-deprecating smile.

The forced command program secretly installed in the android by Sophia at his request during the time he couldn’t trust anyone, including Alice.

He never dreamed he would end up using the program installed to guard against Alice’s betrayal like this.

“…I’ve really changed, huh.”

His past self would not have cared what happened to others.

No matter how ugly and cowardly, even if destruction would come soon.

He would have chosen the path that let him alone survive even a second longer.

Yet now that self was trying to sacrifice himself for others.

Yuseong burst into laughter at this unbelievable change even to himself, then immediately put on a cold expression and raised his hand.

“Well then, shall we begin?”

Whoosh!

The five Calamity Fragments instantly turned into gray energy that enveloped Yuseong’s entire body.

His body that seemed like it could die any moment instantly returned to normal and he felt a sense of omnipotence like he could do anything.

However, in contrast, his mind immediately began to grow distant.

It felt like a syringe was stuck in his head injecting something.

Yuseong desperately tried to maintain his consciousness that was trying to sink like a boat swept up in a tsunami, but whatever was entering him was too massive and overwhelming.

Yuseong gazed into the abyss.

And the abyss gazed back at him.

‘Some…one… help….’

* * *

It appeared suddenly.

A massive gray mass that began appearing in the middle of the battlefield where gods were massacring humans.

When it appeared, a terrible silence fell over the battlefield.

That was alien.

That was dangerous.

That should not exist.

“■■■■■■.”

An unidentifiable sound began flowing from the gray mass.

A bizarre sound that could not be pronounced by human vocal cords.

The moment that sound like a sigh or incantation echoed across the battlefield, both gods and humans forgot the current situation and began pouring attacks to eliminate the gray mass.

Everyone on this battlefield instinctively realized that when that sound ended, something unimaginably terrible would happen.

Crackle!

Boom!

Hum!

Countless attacks that even transcendents, let alone gods, could not withstand poured toward the gray mass.

However, they couldn’t inflict any damage on the gray mass.

And finally when that bizarre sound ended.

———.

As if it had always been there, ‘it’ appeared in the middle of the frozen sea.

The reason for calling it ‘it’ was simple.

Even while seeing its form, they could not guess at all what it was.

A massive body that seemed to touch the clouds, a head resembling cephalopods, hundreds or thousands of tentacles extending from its mouth, huge wings the size of its body.

Each part could be recognized individually but the images could not be combined into one.

Like how the immune system activates to eliminate or expel harmful things that enter the body, their brains refused to understand ‘it’.

“Ah, aah…”

But even that had its limits.

A mere human brain’s defense mechanisms were too weak to block its influence.

“Save me. Save me. Save me. Save me! No, kill me! Kill me! Someone kill me!”

“Uu, uwaaaaah!”

“Blegh! Haah haah, s-stop! Stop! Please stop!”

“Grrrrrr!”

Those who screamed in madness or soiled themselves were the better cases.

Some gouged out their eyes to no longer see it, some burst their eardrums to not hear its sound, and some stabbed themselves with their weapons or tore at their flesh in self-harm unable to bear its gaze.

Those with weak minds committed suicide unable to handle the shocking truth or attacked people around them indiscriminately, consumed by madness.

Not just humans but angels, demons and youkai were also rampaging insanely.

It did nothing.

It just stood still.

That alone turned the world into hell.

“S-stop that thing! No, kill it!”

“Ooooh!”

The moment some god shouted, a giant roared.

Human upper body, snake lower body.

A giant that somewhat resembled it with countless snakes on its face and huge wings on its back.

Boom!

The giant charged at it while spewing a storm of lightning from its snake heads.

For a moment hope flickered in the eyes of those on the battlefield.

That giant might be able to defeat it.

Might be able to kill it.

But reality completely betrayed their expectations.

“Groooah!”

A scream burst from the giant’s mouth.

The snakes spewing lightning were all crushed in the tentacles’ grip, and the huge wings were torn off with flesh by its hands.

Even with fatal injuries, the giant wrapped around it with its snake lower body and swung its fists wildly.

Though storms that could send people flying erupted with each punch, it did not retreat at all.

Rather, it advanced forward, opened its massive mouth and swallowed the giant’s head whole.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

The giant that had been thrashing madly suddenly stopped moving and went limp.

And when it stepped back, the giant’s headless corpse slowly fell backward.

Boom!

A massive sound echoed as the giant and frozen sea collided.

That sound was the signal.

The confident gods and transcendents began flying toward the crack without any coordination.

However, it extended its massive arm first and blocked the crack.

“Kuh! Attack! Attack! Tear off that thing’s arm!”

———!

The gods and Outer God began clashing with mortal screams and wails as accompaniment.

A scene that seemed to embody the word apocalypse.

Watching all this from inside Dragonia, Alice murmured looking at the gray mass in the middle of the battlefield.

“…I have to save Mr. Yuseong.”

Though Sophia pleaded to escape right beside her, Alice didn’t even spare her a glance.

Yuseong had never given up and saved her even after experiencing 999 deaths.

He had fought the Great Witch for her sake, a mere clone, and even made her a new body to replace her lost one.

Abandon such a person and escape alone?

She would rather die than ever do such a thing.

She had to save Yuseong somehow.

‘But how?’

Due to Yuseong’s order she couldn’t take a single step outside Dragonia.

Sending unmanned weapons would be futile in bringing back Yuseong possessed by the Outer God’s thoughts from that hellscape.

Looking at how it endured the gods’ attacks before summoning the Outer God, even users stepping in would be useless.

But Alice didn’t give up.

She thought, and thought, and thought again about how to save Yuseong somehow.

Just before her artificial brain was about to overheat from excessive calculations, Alice came up with an idea.

It was such an absurd and outlandish idea it made her laugh, but there was no other option.

‘Please, please, please…’

Alice earnestly prayed as she took out and put on the goggles from subspace.

And moments later, Alice’s eyes widened.