The inside of the Gate looked anything but ordinary to anyone who saw it.
Black-stained trees and grass, fog spread in every direction to obscure their vision, and the eerie cries of snakes drifting from within the mist.
Wandering through the forest when they could not even secure a proper field of view was no different from suicide, and the expedition leader seemed to know that well, for he immediately gave the order to retreat.
“This time, we’ll be satisfied with confirming the internal environment and withdraw.”
The expedition party also nodded at his words and turned to leave the Gate.
And then, at that moment, a variable occurred.
[You have entered the Forest of Hatred.]
[A key is required to escape the Forest of Hatred.]
[Gather the Fragments of Hatred, complete the key, and escape the forest.]
[Fragments of Hatred 0/3]
“There’s a condition for escaping?”
All the Gates that had appeared until now had allowed free entry and exit.
That was why everyone in the expedition party naturally assumed they would be able to leave, and why they had entered this unidentified Gate in the first place, thinking it would be the same.
But that common sense had been shattered.
To escape this unidentified Gate, they had to satisfy a condition.
[Hatred begins to well up within the forest.]
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know. But it doesn’t look like it means anything good.”
“Damn it. How did this happen…”
While the expedition party trembled with unease, I alone was thinking about something else.
‘What’s that? Are those the Fragments of Hatred?’
Ever since entering the Gate, I had been able to see three points glowing purple.
At first, I didn’t know what they were either, but after checking the escape condition, I figured those were probably the Fragments of Hatred.
I moved my tail and poked Sin Sua in the side as she was staring at the situation with a grave expression, drawing her attention before asking,
“Did something like this happen in the future too?”
“…Yes. But Gates with escape conditions shouldn’t have appeared until four or five years later…”
“The future has already been twisted. It’s not good to rely too much on your memories of it.”
“I know that too.”
“And this time, we got lucky.”
“Pardon?”
“The Fragments of Hatred. I can see where they are.”
We’d have to confirm it to be certain, but there was about a 99.99% chance those purple points were the Fragments of Hatred.
I was just turning my head to inform the expedition party of this when—
“So does it make any sense that we entered such a dangerous place without checking properly first?”
“Did you think I knew a condition would suddenly appear for escaping the Gate? If you were that worried, you should’ve stopped us before we entered!”
“Isn’t making that decision the expedition leader’s responsibility?”
Seeing them raise their voices at one another and pour out their emotions, I realized something was wrong.
“Don’t tell me, the hatred welling up means…”
“It seems it was affecting people’s emotions.”
“But I’m perfectly fine.”
Just as she said, while the others were gradually becoming strange, Sin Sua alone showed no emotional agitation at all.
If I thought about the difference between Sin Sua and the others, then this was—
“It’s probably because I’m attached to you.”
“Lord Nidhogg. Could you move away from me for a moment?”
“Sure.”
To check whether she really was fine because of me, I got down from Sin Sua’s shoulder and put some distance between us. Not long after, she frowned.
“Indeed, after Lord Nidhogg moved away, I can feel an inexplicable irritation gradually building.”
“So it was because of me after all. Then… how about this?”
Instead of climbing back onto Sin Sua’s shoulder, I injected my power into her body.
Then her furrowed expression returned to normal.
It seemed the irritation caused by the Gate’s debuff had disappeared.
But the real problem began now.
We had to stop the Awakened, who were raising their voices more and more and acting as though they would draw their weapons at any moment.
“Everyone, please calm down! Right now, you’re being affected by the Gate! Please try to suppress your agitation as much as possible, and if you receive Lord Nidhogg’s protection…”
“A low-ranking Awakened who was crawling on the ground just a few days ago thinks she can lecture us?”
Sin Sua tried to persuade them with words, but not a single member of the expedition party even pretended to listen.
The sight of the expedition party ignoring her words and busily fighting among themselves was so pathetic that, even considering the Gate’s influence, it made me wonder if this was really what high-ranking Awakened were like.
Looks like I’ll have to step in.
“Move aside.”
“Ah, yes.”
If they were already past the stage where words could get through to them, then there was no choice but to use force.
Still, they were high-ranking Awakened in their own right. They wouldn’t die from just this much.
I drew in a deep breath and exhaled it all at once.
—Kwaaaaaaaar!!!
Along with the thunderous roar, an invisible force crashed over them.
Fear.
One of the techniques representative of dragons—or so it was called, but in truth, it was nothing more than a technique that crushed others down with sheer power.
Since this wasn’t my main body, its power had been greatly reduced, but it was more than enough to subdue a dozen or so humans who couldn’t even keep their wits about them under the Gate’s influence.
“Kuhak!”
“Grrrrgh…”
The expedition party rolled their eyes back, foamed at the mouth, and collapsed disgracefully to the ground.
“It would have been nice if you had only made them come to their senses…”
“Ahem. It’s been a while since I used it, so controlling the power was difficult.”
I thought it would be fine because this wasn’t my main body, but to think they couldn’t even withstand this.
This wasn’t my fault. It was the fault of those weak humans.
As I stood there awkwardly, feeling as if I might have done something wrong, Sin Sua approached the fallen expedition party, took out something like rope from their luggage, and tied them together.
“What are you doing?”
“We can’t just leave them here like this. We have to take them with us, even if it’s like this.”
She was right.
We couldn’t leave the expedition party behind like this.
Especially when we thought about the snake cries we had heard from within the forest as soon as we entered the Gate.
And so, while she was tying the expedition party up tightly with rope so they would be easier to drag around, we noticed something strange.
“We’re one short.”
The number of people who had entered the Gate and the number tied up with rope didn’t match.
After checking the faces of the expedition party one by one, we quickly realized who was missing.
“Baek Yeon is gone.”
“Oh… that’s bad.”
It was none other than Baek Yeon.
Baek Yeon, who was already overflowing with hatred toward monsters to begin with.
What would happen if someone like her was influenced by the Gate and injected with hatred?
No pleasant thought came to mind.
By now, hadn’t she become some kind of slaughter machine, tearing monsters apart and killing them?
“We need to find her before she causes an accident…”
Kwaaaaaang!!
Just then, a roar rang out not far away.
Both our gazes turned toward the direction of the sound, and I extended my vision to pinpoint where the roar had come from.
“Monster! Die!!”
—Shaaaaaa!!
There, I saw Baek Yeon holding a spear and charging at a monster shaped like a gigantic snake.
Contrary to my expectation that she had become a slaughter machine tearing monsters to death, her eyes were rational, and every technique she used was sharp rather than savage, making it hard to be sure whether she had truly gone mad after being consumed by hatred.
On top of that, whether something had happened as she was being consumed by hatred, her body was enveloped in thick death energy, and the same was true of the spear she held.
When I explained Baek Yeon’s current condition to Sin Sua, her expression turned grave.
“A demonic human (魔人)…”
“What’s a demonic human?”
“It refers to a being that has been corroded by the energy inside a Gate and deviated from humanity. I don’t know how far the corrosion has progressed yet, but if her eyes have turned black, then it’s already irreversible.”
“Her eyes haven’t turned black or anything.”
“Then we must hurry and save her. Once someone fully becomes a demonic human, there is no way to deal with them except killing them.”
I nodded at her opinion and was about to set off immediately, but the Awakened collapsed on the ground bothered me.
“Sigh.”
Since I couldn’t leave these behind either, I had no choice but to gather the Awakened together, grab the rope, and fly low into the air.
Then, after telling Sin Sua to follow, I began flying toward the place where Baek Yeon was fighting.
“Kek!” “Kuhak!” “Kek!”
There were minor accidents, such as the Awakened being dragged along while rolling across the ground and crashing into trees or getting struck by rocks, but even if they looked like that, they were high-ranking Awakened, so their bodies should be sturdy. I dragged them along without mercy.
By the time the Awakened tied up in a row like fish on a string were covered in dust, we arrived at the scene.
After setting the Awakened down on the ground and looking at Baek Yeon, I saw that she had already killed the gigantic snake and was making sure it was dead.
Thud!
“Die. Die. Die. Die. Die!”
“…She’s not really insane, right?”
“Probably… not?”
From the outside, she looked no different from an actual madwoman.
Baek Yeon, drenched from head to toe in snake blood, turned her head and looked this way.
“Monster…”
“She’s talking about me right now, isn’t she?”
“Given the circumstances…”
“Die!”
Looks like she really had gone insane after all.
Baek Yeon charged at me, unable to even recognize who I was.
The spear soaked in blood gleamed sharply, and thick death energy clung to its surface.
“Lord Nidhogg!”
Reacting to Baek Yeon’s attack, Sin Sua clad herself in Valkyrie standard armor over her entire body and raised her sword to block the attack.
“Move! You’re getting in the way of me killing a monster!”
“Lord Nidhogg is not a monster! Come to your senses, Miss Baek Yeon!”
“Bullshit…!”
Despite the effort to calm her, the tip of Baek Yeon’s spear aimed sharply at my body.
What mattered here was that she was targeting only “me.”
Even though she had been corroded by the death energy inside the Gate, she showed no intention of attacking humans.
So she wasn’t completely insane.
“Moveeee!!”
When Baek Yeon gripped the shaft of her spear and swung it wide, death energy surged like a typhoon and sent Sin Sua flying far away.
“No!”
“Die!”
The two women’s voices rang out like screams, and Baek Yeon’s spear shot forward in a straight line, aiming for my head.
The moment her spear collided with my forehead—
Crack!
“Huh?”
“Well, of course my head is harder.”
As she stood there blankly with her mouth open, holding the spear that had shattered into pieces, I lifted my forepaw and flicked her on the crown of the head.
Boom!!
“Ugek!”