-Northern District
“The ones made with orcs as the base are bigger and stronger. But the ones made with zombies as the base are troublesome because they have regenerative abilities. In any case, it’s possible to annihilate both.”
As I began talking about how to kill the chimeras, Gil weighed on my mind for some reason, so I glanced back at him.
Gil was looking at the computer screen in the situation room with Cheon Danbi. I couldn’t tell whether he was paying attention to our conversation.
“Chimeras are formed by combining multiple individuals, so they have multiple hearts as well. Those hearts are connected to one another, and a core of black magic is located at the center. If you destroy the core, even a zombie chimera can’t regenerate and will be completely annihilated.”
“So there was a way! As expected of Mage Odin. I haven’t even had a chance to examine them properly, let alone analyze them…”
Yu Jaeseon nodded in admiration. At the same time, perhaps feeling ashamed of himself, his face flushed slightly.
He was, after all, a mage specializing in analysis, and he seemed embarrassed that he still hadn’t managed to properly analyze them.
“The situation here was too urgent for you to have time to analyze them.”
“That may be true, but you must have been frantic from fighting as well, and yet you still managed it. It’s because I’m lacking.”
True to his personality, Yu Jaeseon modestly and neatly admitted it, then moved on to the next question.
“Then is there also a way to annihilate the disease energy? I’m worried because it seems to have already spread through some areas.”
“We’ve been dealing with it using purifying energy.”
When I indicated Cheon Danbi with my gaze as I spoke, Yu Jaeseon immediately understood and looked pleased.
“Ah! Purifying energy. Then we’ll have to ask for your help.”
“It’s a problem if disease energy has already spread through some areas. Have there been many deaths?”
“Yes. Many people who came into contact with the black liquid spat out by the lizardmen while fleeing collapsed.”
“Did you burn the site with high-temperature magical flames?”
“We left the cleanup to the military and told them to burn it with fire, but…”
“No. It has to be magical flames, doesn’t it?”
“I thought so too, but we’re desperately short on mages. It happened in the northern district, but I was fighting here at the time, so I had them handle it as best they could.”
It wasn’t a situation where I could blame him.
There were too few mages, and far too many chimeras. Yu Jaeseon must have done the best he could under the circumstances.
That was what a disaster was. A levee suddenly bursts, there are too many holes to plug, and not enough hands to plug them, so you can only suffer with your eyes wide open.
I was merely curious about what had happened afterward.
From what I had observed, the disease energy was the kind that could turn even corpses into hosts, allowing them to spread the disease again.
Perhaps even at this very moment, more people were dying in the northern district.
“We should go to the northern district first.”
“Yes. Once Mage An Guktae returns from the field, let’s deploy immediately. In any case, these grotesque life-forms are nasty in all sorts of ways. The disease energy is bad enough, but to stitch different races together and turn them into monsters…”
Yu Jaeseon trailed off with a gloomy expression.
I agreed. The nastiest part was that they had stripped the different races of their reason and reduced them to mere materials.
That was why, unlike when dealing with swarms of jellyfish or giant amoebas, I ended up feeling something ambiguous.
I thought it couldn’t be helped, but for Gil, who had been close to zombies, it was surely even more difficult.
Suddenly remembering something I had been curious about earlier, I asked Yu Jaeseon.
“By the way, I didn’t see a single different race among the people evacuated here. Did you evacuate only humans?”
At my question, Yu Jaeseon looked at me in surprise.
“What? Of course not. You didn’t know? There were hardly any different races living in Chinatown to begin with.”
“Is that so?”
“The residents here are so exclusionary that even the zombies living on the streets don’t come around this area.”
Last time, I had come to Chinatown while chasing orcs, so I hadn’t looked closely, but now it seemed there had never been any different races living in Chinatown in the first place.
In other words, it had been an area where human supremacism was widespread from the beginning.
Seen that way, it made sense that the merchants had been able to form an underground organization that advocated human supremacism.
‘So it was a district with strong anti-government sentiment.’
Perhaps such exclusionism was possible because Chinatown itself had been built around overseas Chinese from China, but on the other hand, I found it ridiculous.
They themselves had originally been outsiders who settled in another country’s land, and now they refused to accept different races because they were outsiders?
In the end, wasn’t it simply selfish?
In any case, whether they were selfish or not, our mission right now was to save them from the black mage’s terror attack.
“Shall we work out a strategy now?”
After saying that, I called Cheon Danbi and Gil over.
“For our movement, let’s head to the northern district first and deal with the disease energy. Then we’ll go toward Incheon Station, confirm where the chimeras are coming in from, and return here.”
“That sounds good. But we’re not just scouting, are we?”
“Of course not. We’ll kill the chimeras as we encounter them.”
At that, Yu Jaeseon looked from Gil to Cheon Danbi to me in turn, then spoke hesitantly.
“I’m truly grateful that Mage Odin’s team has come, but isn’t the number of mages still far too low?”
“It’s not as if we can just sit around doing nothing, can we?”
“Of course not, but perhaps we should wait for the other mages to arrive and then launch the assault together…”
“Is anyone else actually coming? Didn’t you say all the mages from the government and the Hall went to Incheon Airport?”
“We’ve requested support from other regions.”
“But it will take time for them to get to Incheon.”
“That’s true. So we also asked the foreign mages for help. After all, the airport is blocked right now, so they can’t leave the country anyway. A few of them agreed to come.”
“Ah, I see.”
It seemed there were still mages who hadn’t returned to their home countries after the world tournament ended.
I found myself hoping Thor would come. Not only because of his skill, but because he was a trustworthy friend; if he came, it would be reassuring.
In any case, the number of chimeras was continuing to increase, and the gray energy had spread widely, so it wasn’t a situation where we could quickly finish the assault.
Still, we couldn’t simply wait forever.
Just then, a man suddenly entered the situation room.
“This is a real disaster, a disaster. The chimeras are getting more and more numerous.”
The man, who had entered while muttering to himself, spotted us and widened his eyes.
“These people are…? Ah! Mage Odin’s team is here!”
The man looked extremely pleased and strode over.
His face looked terribly exhausted, and sweat was pouring down him like rain, but his energy didn’t seem bad.
“This is Mage An Guktae from the Administration Bureau.”
Yu Jaeseon introduced him, and everyone on our team exchanged brief greetings.
“Thank you all so much for coming. With only the two of us, we’re truly overwhelmed.”
An Guktae seemed to have a lively personality. His rounded features gave him the kind of impression that somehow made people feel at ease just by looking at him.
“Please give us a brief report on the situation outside.”
He looked very tired, but considering the circumstances, I couldn’t tell him to rest first and report afterward.
An Guktae understood as well and immediately began his report.
“The number of chimeras has doubled. I think there are over a hundred. From what the police and military have said, the chimeras are mostly concentrated in the north, and the residents there still haven’t been evacuated.”
“As expected, we should deploy to the northern district immediately.”
“But you must be careful. Disease energy has spread there.”
“We know. We’ll carry out purification first. Cheon Danbi will handle the purification, but it consumes a great deal of life force, so someone needs to help by sending mana to her from beside her.”
I asked Yu Jaeseon to take on that role.
I decided to leave the purification and rescue of the residents to those two, while Gil and I would deal with the chimeras.
“Even the weather isn’t helping, so my whole body’s in this state. Anyway, what should I do?”
An Guktae said as he wiped the sweat from his face and the nape of his neck with a towel.
It seemed he had been thinking of going back out again despite having just returned.
“Mage An Guktae, please remain in the situation room. When the other mages arrive, guide them to the scene.”
“Would that be all right? Won’t you be short on people for the assault?”
“It’s fine. We’ll take it one step at a time.”
“Understood. Then I’ll take responsibility for communications here.”
Then An Guktae let out a deep sigh. It seemed that, inwardly, he was relieved at not having to deploy.
“About the types of chimeras—have any new forms appeared?”
“Besides the forms made by mixing zombies and lizardmen with other creatures, there were giant chimeras made by combining several orcs. They seemed much more ferocious and powerful.”
That was a type we already knew about.
“Were there any other forms?”
“Well. I didn’t look around the entire area, so I don’t know if there are other forms, but the reports from the police and military seemed to indicate only that much.”
“Were there any cases where the individuals making up the chimera retained their reason?”
“What? There were ones with reason?”
An Guktae, startled, asked back instead.
“During our battle, when we sent purifying energy at them, a zombie’s reason returned once. Of course, at first it just seemed like a monster. It seemed to have happened when the black magic was washed away by the purifying energy.”
“I see. Maybe the chimera’s state was incomplete.”
An Guktae offered a fresh perspective. I was grateful that he spoke freely about whatever came to mind.
An incomplete chimera.
I thought that might be possible. Perhaps it had been a sort of failure.
I decided to examine it further on-site.
I explained once again to everyone how to completely annihilate the chimeras.
And I made sure they understood that lizardmen emitting disease energy absolutely had to be burned with high-temperature magical flames.
“Now that we seem to have grasped what’s necessary, let’s deploy.”
We had no leeway to devise a detailed strategy, and in any case, we didn’t know everything about the situation in the field.
We would have to judge the rest as we confronted it in actual combat.
Only An Guktae remained in the situation room, and the rest of us went outside.
A military truck was visible on the sports field. It seemed to be the truck An Guktae had ridden to and from the field.
Two soldiers who had been loitering there saw us, quickly saluted, and climbed into the truck.
It seemed Yu Jaeseon and An Guktae had been moving around by military truck.
“Please get in the truck.”
Yu Jaeseon said as he took the lead and approached the truck.
Even if it was the northern district, it was still within the bounds of Chinatown, so it probably wasn’t that far, but riding the truck seemed better.
It wasn’t an armored vehicle, but it was much sturdier than an ordinary vehicle.
We all climbed into the truck and headed for the northern district.