Yonghoon tracked team leader Han’s Dimensional Power and teleported to Uijeongbu City.
Yonghoon appeared on a six-lane road running north to south and saw a twenty-story building collapsing right before his eyes.
However, it was not a situation where he could just stand there and watch blankly.
The road where Yonghoon appeared was a battlefield. Many people were fighting on the road.
Ahead, the members of Team Crazy were fighting mantis monsters, while other Awakened were scattered around fighting corrupted humans.
Blood spurted from all directions, and bodies were being sliced apart.
Hundreds of humans with gray eyes charged at the Awakened at a speed impossible for ordinary people, and the Awakened gritted their teeth and swung their spears and fired their guns at the charging humans.
Bullets fired automatically rained down on the bodies of the humans, but the gray-eyed humans charged at the Awakened with bullets still embedded in them.
They seemed to feel no pain, and the damage from the bullets appeared minimal. It took a direct headshot or nearly emptying a magazine to bring one down.
However, the speed of the corrupted humans was too fast for the Awakened to calmly aim for the head.
The Awakened fired their rifles and immediately engaged the charging corrupted humans with spears and shields.
But there were simply too many corrupted humans, and the Awakened were exhausted.
They couldn’t afford to consider the charging enemies as fellow humans. They gritted their teeth and swung their spears and shields at the corrupted humans.
Team Crazy looked just as exhausted.
Team Crazy was dealing with two mantis monsters.
One was being blocked by team leader Han with a shield, while Hyangseol and Jimin were charging at the other.
Around them were shattered paving stones, wrecked cars, and fallen Awakened. Victims of the mantis monster’s spatial severing ability.
Team leader Han was able to block it with his Relic shield, and Hyangseol and Jimin managed to dodge, but the other Awakened were not so lucky.
Behind them, Dohyeon was sitting on the ground, gasping for breath. It looked like he had pushed his powers to the limit.
There was no time to keep watching. They had to clean up this situation first.
“Eunseo, left! Sunhee, right!”
Yonghoon shouted to the two women and dashed forward.
He frowned at the unexpected heaviness of his body. As expected, jumping straight into battle after Dimensional Movement was too much.
But there was no time to fight cautiously. Yonghoon forced his body to move.
In one stride, Yonghoon reached behind his teammates.
In his sight was team leader Han barely blocking the mantis monster’s attack. Yonghoon leapt over Han’s body.
The face of the mantis monster appeared right in front of Yonghoon. Yonghoon swung his sword at the mantis monster’s face.
As the sword flew toward its face, the mantis monster raised its pincers.
Yonghoon frowned at the monster’s reaction to his attack. Its movements were definitely sluggish.
In the past, he could have severed the pincers in one swing, but now he had to conserve his strength. Yonghoon created a dimensional tunnel along the sword’s trajectory.
Yonghoon’s sword bypassed the blocking pincers and appeared right in front of the monster’s neck.
Slash!
The mantis monster’s neck flew off.
But these things could still move even after losing their heads.
Yonghoon shouted.
“Shield!”
Team leader Han reflexively poured his remaining Dimensional Power into his shield upon hearing Yonghoon’s shout.
The headless mantis monster was blasted backward.
The mantis monster that had collapsed on the ground finally stopped twitching.
Yonghoon, having landed on the ground, caught his breath.
Seeing Yonghoon, team leader Han’s face brightened.
But upon seeing Yonghoon gasping with a pale face, his expression darkened again. He remembered the aftereffects of Dimensional Movement.
Team leader Han quickly scanned the surroundings.
He spotted Sunhee and Eunseo.
Sunhee and Eunseo were fighting on opposite sides.
Sunhee was taking down charging corrupted humans with her abilities, while Eunseo was repelling them with her shield.
However, they both looked weaker than before. Sunhee couldn’t take down multiple enemies at once, and Eunseo was fighting with her shield strapped to her opposite arm.
It wasn’t a situation where they could change strategies. It seemed best to retreat quickly, just like before Yonghoon arrived.
“Captain! We’re retreating now. Please take care of the remaining mantis monster!”
Saying that, he ran toward the rear.
After catching his breath, Yonghoon listened to his words and charged toward the mantis monster that Hyangseol and Jimin were facing.
The two women were fighting well.
Jimin dodged danger using her innate ability, High-Speed Movement, while Hyangseol effectively blocked the enemy’s movements with her spear.
But both were visibly struggling.
It was no time to conserve Dimensional Power. Yonghoon gritted his teeth and opened a dimensional tunnel, appearing behind the mantis monster’s neck.
He swung his sword and severed the mantis’s neck. Seeing the headless monster, the two women thrust their spears into its chest and abdomen.
The mantis monster froze in place.
Despite their exhaustion, Jimin and Hyangseol smiled warmly at Yonghoon.
A shout came from behind, from team leader Han.
“Now! Escape!”
Jimin and Hyangseol also ran to the rear. As Team Crazy regrouped, the charging corrupted humans were blasted away, and the group sprinted toward Seoul.
Dohyeon, having barely recovered his Dimensional Power, got up and chased after the group.
Yonghoon ran behind them, glancing back.
Another building collapsed, and behind it, the figure of a Dimensional Beast could be glimpsed.
Soon after, they managed to break through the encirclement of corrupted humans.
Team Crazy, now reunited, and about a dozen Awakened ran together down the six-lane boulevard.
Some corrupted humans rushed out from nearby buildings, but there weren’t many, and they were blasted back before they could even approach the Awakened group.
It was Dohyeon’s telekinesis. With some Dimensional Power recovered, Dohyeon’s ability was highly effective against corrupted humans.
Only then could Yonghoon and team leader Han catch their breath and talk.
Moving at high speed, Yonghoon asked team leader Han.
“What happened?”
Team leader Han quickly explained the situation.
Yesterday morning, the government received a warning from the U.S. government that a Dimensional Beast had appeared near the demilitarized zone. It was discovered by the third satellite launched by the U.S.
The government quickly mobilized Awakened from the metropolitan area and sent them to the location of the Dimensional Beast. Based on experience from Jeju Island, they had supplied lower-level Awakened from military backgrounds with guns and various firearms.
Thanks to the Dimensional Beast appearing near the demilitarized zone, there weren’t many corrupted humans yet, allowing the Awakened to reach the Dimensional Beast.
The Awakened’s firepower wasn’t enough to defeat the Dimensional Beast. However, they succeeded in forming teams and slowing its advance.
Their goal was to hold out until Seoul citizens evacuated and Yonghoon returned.
Team Crazy, Linkers, and high-level Awakened blocked the monsters around the Dimensional Beast, while Strike-type Awakened attacked the beast to distract it.
Meanwhile, Grace and other strong Defense-type Awakened successfully blocked the attacks from the Dimensional Beast’s orbs of Dimensional Power.
Thus, they managed to delay the Dimensional Beast’s advance for a day, but the Awakened were utterly exhausted, and then a second Dimensional Beast appeared.
The second Dimensional Beast rapidly moved south and approached the first one, and once the two beasts joined forces, the Awakened’s defenses collapsed.
As a result, they were now in retreat.
Yonghoon looked around. There were too few people.
“What about the others?”
“The second Dimensional Beast’s attack scattered the Awakened. Everyone was retreating, but the others are probably in serious danger too.”
Team leader Han’s expression darkened.
Hearing team leader Han’s words, Yonghoon checked the Dimensional Power of the people he knew.
Grace and Representative Seo’s Dimensional Power were in the same direction.
But Representative Seo’s Dimensional Power was strange. It was several times stronger and rampaging wildly.
After blowing away several charging corrupted humans, Grace planted her spear into the ground and gasped for breath. Yet her eyes remained fixed ahead. Though her mouth exhaled ragged breaths, her eyes were filled with sorrow.
Her gaze never left Representative Seo, who was fighting a giant lizard ahead.
Facing a B-Rank monster, the lizard monster, Representative Seo, who was only C-Rank, fought without retreating.
Representative Seo’s appearance was strange.
Veins bulged all over his body, his eyes were bloodshot, and his muscles had swollen several times larger. The monster staggered from the blows of his shield.
However, he didn’t seem to be in his right mind. It looked like two monsters were fighting.
Representative Seo was rampaging.
Grace straightened her posture and pulled out her spear. Her Dimensional Power had already been depleted. Most of the Link Corp Awakened who had fled with her were already dead.
Some had hidden inside buildings, but the slowly advancing Dimensional Beast eventually caused the buildings to collapse.
In the end, only a few dozen Awakened, exhausted and wounded like her, remained around.
Everyone was so drained from the many battles that their Dimensional Power was nearly depleted. Thanks to that, their defenses against the corrupted humans’ attacks were barely holding.
Their escape had slowed, allowing the lizard monster to catch up.
Grace had blocked the lizard monster’s attacks several times, but eventually, she ran out of Dimensional Power, and at the final moment, Representative Seo charged at the monster and went on a rampage.
In a rampaging state, one could not maintain rationality. However, the strongest B-Rank monster was nearby, and he charged at it.
But even now, he was being pushed back by the monster. No matter how rampaged he was, he was fundamentally a C-Rank Awakened. He could not win against a B-Rank monster.
Seeing another Awakened sacrifice himself right in front of her made Grace’s chest ache.
Yet she kept watching him. Unlike in the past, she had no thought of running away this time. Once his rampage ended, it would be her turn.
Representative Seo’s rampage came to an end.
Dimensional Power drained from Representative Seo’s body. His swollen body and bulging veins subsided.
Having returned to an ordinary human form, he lost consciousness and collapsed to the ground.
The monster, which had been fighting for a long time, stared blankly at Representative Seo.
However, thanks to his sacrifice, they had managed to deal with the corrupted humans who had been charging at the Awakened.
Grace shouted to the remaining Awakened.
“When I charge at the monster, run without looking back!”
She watched as the lizard monster approached the unconscious Representative Seo and began to gather Dimensional Power within her body.
“In the end, it was a pretty good life, right?”
“Yeah! It was good.”
Grace and the others exchanged a final conversation and gripped their spears firmly.
Her Dimensional Power began to rampage.
Thud!
“Excuse me.”
Grace lost consciousness and collapsed forward.
Yonghoon, who was behind her, caught the falling Grace.
Yonghoon, who had appeared just barely in time, had stopped Grace’s rampage.
Yonghoon laid Grace down on the ground and picked up her spear.
Sunhee saw this and looked shocked. Given Yonghoon’s condition, it was reckless behavior.
Yonghoon, excluding Eunseo, who was unable to fight due to an arm injury, jumped through space with Sunhee.
And upon seeing the scene that appeared, he urgently knocked Grace unconscious.
But Representative Seo’s side was also in a critical situation. The lizard monster was lifting its leg to stomp on Representative Seo.
Yonghoon, holding the spear, focused his Dimensional Power. His face turned even paler.
It seemed he was reaching the limit of his abilities.
Yet Yonghoon gritted his teeth and thrust the spear into the air.
Boom!
The spear exploded in front of the lizard monster, and the monster that had been about to stomp on Representative Seo fell backward. Its head was completely obliterated.
And Yonghoon was also flung backward.
Having pushed his abilities to the brink, Yonghoon could no longer precisely control the dimensional tunnel. The aftermath of the explosion caused the tunnel to backfire and attack him.
Sunhee ran to Yonghoon, who was rolling across the ground.
Sunhee supported the fallen Yonghoon. Her face was on the verge of tears.
“Why do you never take care of yourself!”
At her words, Yonghoon gave a bitter smile. He forced himself to stand up again. Dizziness washed over him.
Seeing him like that, Sunhee felt both upset and angry.
“You idiot!”
At that moment, a hallucination echoed in her mind.
[He really is an idiot.]