Master Sergeant An and Kang Hanna.
The two of them were alive.
The place where they were was the eye of the storm, at the center of a basin deeply hollowed out of the sand.
There, a building made of stone stood alone.
It was wide, but low.
A building that would not have been visible when the basin had been covered in sand.
It seemed the sand swept up by the storm had exposed it.
Aside from the entrance, there were no windows, nor any other exits leading outside.
The two of them were inside that building.
They were just inside the entrance, in a place that looked like a lobby.
Both of them were alive, but being alive did not mean they were unharmed.
“I’m… I’m dying here.”
Master Sergeant An sat leaning against a pillar, clutching his blood-soaked stomach.
It looked like a severe injury, but he still had the presence of mind to speak.
The one who had no time to speak was, rather, the uninjured one.
“If it had been before, I would’ve passed out from a wound like this… Now it just hurts like hell. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.”
The girl did not answer the words he spoke while pressing down on his wound.
No, she could not answer.
It was unclear whether she had even heard him.
Because she was too busy fighting.
Slaaash!
The spear split the earth, and the enemy collapsed.
Watching that, Master Sergeant An continued.
“My mouth’s starting to hurt, and I’m getting sleepy too, but I shouldn’t stop talking, right?”
The reason he was rambling on and on was because the girl had told him to.
She had asked him to keep himself from losing consciousness.
Even out of guilt, he had to keep talking.
He was only sitting still and running his mouth, but the girl had been swinging her spear for hours, protecting him.
“Huff. Huff. Huff.”
With her rough breathing, the clods of earth swept apart by the spear scattered across the floor.
That mass of earth had been a mud giant charging at her only moments ago.
A mud giant about three meters tall.
If a fantasy fanatic had seen it, they would have called it an earth golem.
Hanna leaned on her spear, panting.
How many times had she brought them down by now?
The two of them had long since given up counting.
It was not that there had been so many giants.
The problem was that these giants revived endlessly.
Shrrrrk.
The collapsed piles of dirt gathered together, then began moving again in the shape of dolls.
The other piles of dirt were the same.
Every pile of dirt she had painstakingly created revived as a mud giant.
“If… if they hadn’t given us time, we’d have died long ago, wouldn’t we?”
Master Sergeant An said gloomily as he watched the mud giants revive.
The revived mud giants did not immediately attack.
“!#!@#!@#!@”
They merely stood in place and spoke words that could not be understood.
Of course, once time passed, they would surely attack again just like before.
But thanks to that brief period when the giants did not move, the two of them had managed to endure here for two days.
The two had taken turns fighting, using those moments to rest.
They had endured like that for a day and a night, but in the end, their limit had arrived.
Exhausted, Master Sergeant An finally made a mistake.
He failed to dodge a fist swung by a mud giant.
It was a weak fist that broke apart even under its own strength, but even that had been enough to tear open Master Sergeant An’s stomach.
“I guess… I guess getting something called dark energy doesn’t make you a superhuman. I thought I’d be able to fight like Sergeant Hyun too.”
Rambling without thinking, he looked at his bloodstained hand and shook his head.
There was someone fighting desperately, so he could not show any sign of despair.
Instead, he brought up a story Hanna wanted to hear.
“Did I tell you before? That I once went on an operation with Sergeant Hyun?”
At the words Sergeant Hyun, Hanna’s ears perked up.
Even while leaning on her spear, she was like that.
Even through his pain, Master Sergeant An was dumbfounded.
“He was truly incredible. He wasn’t even from the special forces, but the special forces members who were with us ended up following his lead instead.”
Seeing that she was listening intently, Master Sergeant An continued.
“He found traps on his own, spotted enemies first, guided us along shortcuts where there were no enemies… He was really capable of everything.”
He had heard there was no dark energy on Earth, but back then, Sergeant Hyun had truly seemed like a superhuman.
“Though I’ve learned with my own body that having dark energy doesn’t let you do things like that.”
Seeing Hanna listening closely to his words, Master Sergeant An felt a little peevish.
“But Hanna, why do you cling to Sergeant Hyun so much? Ah, was that too much? Sorry. It’s not easy to choose my words right now.”
As soon as he said it, Master Sergeant An realized his mistake.
To say nonsense to a comrade who was saving his life—his mind must really have been going in and out.
He apologized to Hanna.
Hanna did not accept Master Sergeant An’s apology.
Instead, she spoke of something else.
“I saw light from Oppa. The light that has guided me all this time.”
Her harsh, ragged breathing could no longer be heard.
At some point, she had steadied her breath.
Hanna pulled her spear from the floor, then infused it with energy.
The spear glowed faintly, then darkened again.
As the energy moved, pain came with it.
During her rest, her energy had not recovered.
She was not far from depletion.
Her stamina was lacking as well, but the bigger problem was that her energy was reaching rock bottom.
If her energy ran out, she would not be able to bring down the mud giants.
If that happened, there was a high chance she would follow in Master Sergeant An’s footsteps.
After that would be total annihilation.
She could not allow that.
“How did I make it this far? I finally found it… I can’t let it end like this.”
Born into a single-parent family, then placed in an orphanage and raised there, she had come to possess one special ability as she grew up.
It was not a grand ability.
It was a small ability that had allowed her to endure a world painful enough to kill her.
A small light that had allowed her to make her way through the discrimination and persecution of the world.
She could see that light.
The reason she had fled from the children who tried to assault her and hidden herself in a taekwondo school was because she had seen that light from the taekwondo school.
The reason she had been able to receive the taekwondo master’s protection and properly take lessons was because the master’s head had shone brightly,
and the reason she had learned archery and been able to enter competitions was because the light had shown her the way.
She had seen that light on this star.
A light brighter than ever before.
It was a light coming from one person.
“You’re saying Sergeant Hyun’s head was shining? He still had plenty of hair, though.”
Unfortunately, Master Sergeant An had not properly understood her words.
Now his mind truly seemed to be wavering.
He had obtained dark energy, but too much time had passed since the bleeding began.
If more time passed, his life would be in danger.
But there was no way.
Right now, she could not see the light.
When the monsters appeared yesterday, and when the sandstorm suddenly blew in, she had seen the light and run here.
But now, she could not see that light.
Even though she could not see the light, she did not give up.
She had never once given up.
Even when she could not see the light, she had struggled desperately and endured.
She had no intention of giving up this time either.
“They’re moving again.”
As she bit her lip, Master Sergeant An’s dazed voice reached her ears.
“!!@#!@#!@#”
At the same time, the mud giants began approaching while spitting out different words.
Master Sergeant An had said the mud giants seemed like guards protecting this building.
He said that was why they had moved when the two entered the building, and why they gave them time.
But she had no room to concern herself with things like that.
She would simply bring down the enemies approaching her.
‘If only I could use a bow…’
She could use any weapon, but the one she was best with was the bow.
But she could not keep regretting what she did not have.
She swung her spear with all her strength toward the approaching mud giants.
Hanna fought well this time too.
But the energy she possessed had its limits.
In the end, her energy ran out,
Bang!
“Kyaa!”
and with a scream, she was flung away beside Master Sergeant An.
Even though she had crashed beside him, Master Sergeant An said nothing.
Enduring the pain, she checked on him.
He was not dead.
He had only fainted.
Since he had fainted from lack of blood, it was not a good sign.
Hanna forced herself to suppress her dizziness and tried to raise her body.
Her body would not move.
She had not realized it because she had been moving with energy, but her stamina was already at its limit as well.
Unfortunately, there were still mud giants left.
Unharmed mud giants were approaching the two of them.
As Hanna bit her lip, a dazed voice reached her ears again.
“It’s light.”
It was what Master Sergeant An, whom she had thought unconscious, said while looking toward the entrance.
At those words, Hanna also looked at the building entrance.
The sandstorm that had been blocking the entrance was no longer visible.
Just as Master Sergeant An had said, the outside of the entrance was brighter than before.
The sandstorm had stopped.
They had to get out immediately, but her body would not move.
“Please, please, move!”
Hanna shouted, pounding her legs with her fists.
But her legs did not move.
Instead, voices came from outside the entrance.
“It’s a human voice!”
“They’re alive. There are survivors!”
It was English, but she understood what they were saying right away.
Hanna tried once again to squeeze out her voice.
But before she could, people rushed inside.
“There are earth dolls ahead!”
“Stop the earth dolls first!”
The blonde beauty who entered first, Margreta, shouted loudly upon seeing the approaching mud giants, and Carlo, who came in after her, gave orders to the others.
“Uaaah…”
Unlike the two of them, the Korean who entered behind them tried to retreat when he saw the mud giants.
“Move already! You’d better fight properly, even if it’s here!”
Thanks to the black man’s kick, he had no choice but to move forward again.
With those four stepping up to block the mud giants, Hanna barely managed to save her life.
Hanna was not looking at them.
She was staring at the entrance through which they had come in.
“It really is shining.”
Just as Master Sergeant An had said, she was looking at the brilliant light entering through the doorway.
**
Thankfully, we were not too late.
Only as I entered the building could I finally breathe a sigh of relief.
Both of them were alive.
Master Sergeant An was injured, and Hanna seemed to have exhausted her energy as well, but both of them were alive.
The earth dolls were being held off well by the survey team members.
Even while fighting the survey team members, the earth dolls continued to emit voices.
It did not sound like human speech, but thanks to the translation relic, I could understand what they were saying.
“The base has been closed. All illegal intruders are requested to vacate the premises. Those who do not comply will be forcibly removed.”
[They are guardians.]
As Sof said, those earth dolls were guards of this building.
Guards that prevented people from entering.
[There is a sandstorm blowing outside, yet they are blocking entry from inside. Does this place not have any emergency refuge protocol?]
[It is broken. Tens of thousands of years have passed; there is no way it would still be intact.]
This time, too, it was because of the passage of time.
It was not wrong, so I had nothing to say.
Besides, thanks to Sof, we had made it here safely, so it was hard to nitpick.
It was not even a formation from a martial arts novel, yet within the sandstorm, there had been a single path that led inward against its flow.
[A back door. A back door for the creator, made to stop magic that had already been activated. One must be able to see dark energy to move along the path, but since you can do so, it is not a problem.]
Just as he said, when I informed him of the dark energy I could sense, he picked out the path and brought us here.
Strangely, the storm weakened atop the path he found.
Just like how the storm outside was calm now.
[And when did you remember that?]
[I remembered it piece by piece as we came here. This place was an old colleague’s workplace.]
Regret was buried in the mage’s words.
[The magic outside was something I helped install to protect her workplace as well…]
As his words continued, the spear began absorbing dark energy.
It seemed the mage intended to cast a spell.
[Those guardians also use magic I taught her.]
With those words, the magic was cast.
[Cohesion Release.]
Fortunately, I was able to aim the staff in time.
The earth dolls I aimed at with the staff collapsed one after another.
“Huh? Why are they suddenly falling apart?”
“Did they run out of energy?”
“Maybe they reached their limit.”
The survey team members fighting the earth dolls did not know why the earth dolls had collapsed.
Only one person had seen me point the staff at the earth dolls.
The girl who had been staring only at me from the moment I entered.
Hanna was looking at me, her eyes sparkling.