The monster soon climbed up to the surface.
Kwaaaaang!
Tentacles shot upward, and the half-destroyed ruins were completely smashed apart.
Breaking through the overturned earth, its enormous body revealed itself.
A gigantic black body and tentacles like pillars.
A black spider the size of a large building appeared.
Unlike the monsters I had fought until now, this one was an intact control object.
Its magic black stone hadn’t been lost, nor had it been struck dead-on by the falling ruins.
It was a complete control object, unmodified by humans, the first I had ever seen.
Its massive pillar-like tentacles looked brimming with strength, and inside the two tentacles that resembled antennae, I could see magic black stones as well.
It was a monster I would never have dared to face before.
But now that I had obtained a new spear, it was worth fighting.
I aimed the spear at the control object.
[Sof!]
At my words, Sof cast his magic.
[Gather, clouds. Divide, charges. Create a path for current between heaven and earth.]
Along with Sof’s incantation, energy flowed out from the black stones embedded in the spear, making it shine.
Next would be the turn for lightning to fall from the sky.
It was time for Sof’s main spell, cast through the reinforced spear, to appear in the world.
But instead of magic, I heard Sof’s troubled voice.
[This is difficult.]
“What do you mean, all of a sudden?”
The targeting on the control object had worked fine, and the spell seemed to be casting properly, so what did he mean, difficult?
What was the problem?
[Lightning magic will not work. There is not enough moisture in the atmosphere. I cannot gather enough clouds to create lightning.]
At Sof’s words, I looked up at the sky.
Just as Sof said, the sky was clear.
Before, it would have been full of black clouds, but now only a few wisps of cloud could be seen.
There was no way lightning magic could be cast like this.
At that moment, I sensed magic rapidly approaching.
They were fireballs launched by the control object.
I immediately threw myself aside.
From where I had been standing, the fireballs trailed after me in a line.
Kwaang! Kwaang! Kwaang!
Explosions followed one after another.
Fireballs weren’t the only things flying at me. Ice spears came hurtling in, and blades of wind were fired as well.
A control object capable of using magic was terrifying.
If not for my super-senses, I would already have been hit by magic several times over.
Even as it fired magic, the control object moved its tentacles and approached quickly.
The monsters I had sent flying in all directions by overturning the ground were also coming to their senses and getting back up.
This was definitely troublesome.
For now, I was still safe thanks to my super-senses, but there was no way I could stay fine forever.
Once the distance closed and those pillar-like tentacles joined the fight, and the other monsters entered the battle as well, even with my super-senses it would be difficult to evade.
On top of that, if the Chinese inside the barrier got swept up in the fight, it would be over for them.
If it were attacks from the other monsters, the shield could block them to some extent, but the barrier could not endure the control object’s attacks.
“This won’t do. We’ll have to use that.”
[I have not tried using it since dying…… Will it be all right?]
“We’ll have to try it someday, won’t we? Let’s use this opportunity.”
[Then evade well until the preparations are complete.]
At Sof’s words, I let out a faint laugh and threw the spear with all my strength into the sky.
Shwaaak!
The spear shot into the sky and came to a stop there, slowly beginning to rotate.
Magic circles began forming around the spear, and I once again relied on my super-senses and sprinted with all my might.
The monsters and magic followed after me.
***
At the same time.
Sergeant Second Class Liu Feng was running frantically.
He was running faster than a short-distance track athlete, but he showed no sign of tiring.
It was because he had become an energy user.
Liu Feng was grateful that he had gained such fortune.
If he had not gained power, he would not even have been able to think of escaping.
As he ran, he tried hard not to recall the monsters he had seen moments ago.
Because whenever he thought of those monsters, his vision turned white and bile immediately rose in his throat.
Trying to fight monsters like that—his superiors had to be insane.
Even now, tremendous explosions continued to roar from behind him.
That sound was surely the monsters venting their rage on the humans left behind.
It was lasting longer than he had expected, but once that sound ended, there would be no one left alive.
Before then, he had to put as much distance between himself and that place as possible.
Among those left behind was someone who had dealt with the monsters in the passage, but in his terror, he could not recall that fact.
He kept running along the fissure.
Since they had come to the ruins by following the huge fissure, returning to the base was not difficult.
Even if he returned to the base, it did not mean he could go to Earth, but he was not worried.
That man called Secretary Li had gone back to Earth as well, so there had to be some method.
Now that he knew the truth of this planet, he had to return to Earth no matter what.
He bit his lip and spat out to himself.
“To think this place was a hell like this. I must tell the general at once.”
“What are you going to tell him?”
A question came in response to the words he had muttered.
It was a woman’s question, spoken in Mandarin.
Startled, he turned around, and at that moment his feet tangled.
Thud, crash!
The man rolled across the ground.
Dust rose and his clothes became a mess, but that was not what mattered.
Because he had fallen while running at high speed, he tumbled for quite some distance, but he did not seem to be injured.
“Ghk!”
He groaned and tried to raise himself.
But his body would not move an inch.
Startled, he looked down and saw that his body was bound in rope.
It seemed this rope was what had made him fall.
He did not know when he had been tied up with it, but for now, he had to undo this rope first.
It looked sturdy, but he was different from before as well.
“A rope like this!”
He put all his strength into it.
Tudududuk.
The rope stretched taut, and his clothes tore, but the rope did not snap.
“It’s not something that breaks so easily. That whip can’t be snapped even by the Akzar monsters.”
A voice spoke again.
He looked toward where the voice had come from.
A woman was walking toward him, holding the handle connected to the rope.
It was a woman he knew.
The American who had come with the Korean called a monster expert.
She was as beautiful as a movie star, but since they could not communicate, he had not paid her any attention.
“You could speak Chinese?”
“I can speak English, Spanish, Chinese, and Japanese. Right now, I’m studying Korean diligently, but I’m still not very good at it.”
At her regretful words, Sergeant Second Class Liu Feng frowned.
“If you could speak Chinese, why didn’t you say anything?”
Her Chinese was close to that of a native.
And yet, she had not spoken a word of Chinese all the way here.
“If I pretend not to know, everyone says what they want to say, don’t they? Thanks to that, I was able to hear a few things. Unfortunately, though, I didn’t get to hear what you said.”
“Why would you do something like a spy……”
He trailed off and shut his mouth.
Because he realized that what he had said was true.
Moreover, Chinese was not the only thing she had hidden.
She was a dark energy user.
She was an energy user capable of keeping up with him, who specialized in sprinting, and she was also the first relic user he had ever seen.
Judging by the whip he could not break and the speed with which she had caught up to him, she was not someone he could defeat.
Having grasped the situation, he immediately lowered his head.
“I am Sergeant Second Class Liu Feng, a soldier acting under the orders of His Excellency the commander of the Western Theater Command. I came here to confirm the truth of the matter the Party is secretly pushing forward within our theater command.”
At his words, Margreta’s eyes widened.
She had not expected him to reveal his secret so readily.
In any case, there was a need to be kind to someone who cooperated so well.
She smiled and asked him.
“Would you explain in a little more detail what happened?”
“That is……”
According to him, Liu Feng was a member of an ethnic minority who had lived not far from Tibet.
After becoming an adult, he became a soldier of the Western Theater Command, and through the large-scale blood test that had taken place not long ago, he had become a member of the Chinese expedition.
“……After I was selected for the expedition, the commander came to see me personally. He asked me to help him set right the Party, which is committing wrongdoing. But on this planet, something far more dangerous than what the commander told me about was taking place.”
His words grew faster and faster, as though something were chasing him.
After listening to him, Margreta let out a sigh.
“In the end, the commander of the Western Theater Command persuaded you, who had been chosen for the expedition, and made you into a spy.”
“That’s not it. Even without his words, I……”
Margreta felt she understood why this man had confessed his secret first.
This man was not a proper spy.
He was only a naive soldier persuaded by someone above him.
“But why did you tell me everything?”
“There’s no time. I couldn’t waste time by lying. The monsters will come after us. Before that, we have to join forces and escape.”
In Margreta’s view, that idea was not bad.
“Besides, if I inform the Western Theater Command of this truth, the Party will fall into chaos, so as an American, you’ll be pleased.”
But at the words that followed, she could only click her tongue.
It sounded plausible, somehow, but it was the talk of someone who did not know reality.
An American, so she would be pleased by chaos in China?
At another time, those words might have been correct, but now was not the time to worry about such things.
“You’re not naive. You’re an idiot.”
“What do you mean! No, more importantly, untie me quickly. The monsters will come rushing in!”
At the man’s shout, Margreta shook her head.
“Why do you think I caught you? Why do you think I’m questioning you here? And lastly, why do you think the explosions still haven’t stopped?”
At that moment, the explosions that had been sounding in the distance ceased.
He was about to sneer while looking at Margreta, but Margreta was smiling instead.
“It’s over.”
At that instant.
Flash!
A single streak of light fell from the sky.
It was an immense light.
Liu Feng had no choice but to close his eyes.
***
Kwaaaaaang!
A mighty light pierced through the control object.
Brilliant light covered the world.
When the light vanished, what remained was the shattered monster.
An incredible spell.
It was the magic I had first seen in Sof’s memories.
Even in those memories, it had been a spell that smashed a control object in a single blow, but until now, neither Sof nor I had been able to use it.
So, after obtaining the new spear and after both Sof and I had grown stronger, this was the first time we had tried it.
The magic was as amazing as I had imagined.
Most of the energy in the black stones had been blown away, and Sof had fallen asleep, but we had finally caught up to Sof’s memories.
It was magic cast by Sof, but even that alone was immensely satisfying.
The other monsters were all smashed apart by that single spell as well.
Fortunately, the Chinese inside the barrier were safe, and the Chinese man who had fled was brought back by Margreta.
I retrieved the black stone from inside the shattered control object, and after Sof woke up, we entered the ruined remains of the relic.
After digging through the ground for quite some time with earth magic, we were able to reach the place where the control device was.
The control device was not intact either, but thanks to Sof, who had come to his senses, we were able to learn what the terraforming relic had produced.
Oxygen and water.
This planet had lacked oxygen and water from the beginning.
In the past, the terraforming relic had created those two elements, but now it could no longer do so.
Fortunately, the oxygen in the atmosphere alone was enough.
Enough for millions of people to use for thousands of years.
But water was different.
There was still moisture left in the atmosphere, but that was all.
No seas, no rivers, no lakes.
There was no water on this planet.
Secretary Li(1)