-Neo Forest
“They said Vanaheim obtained one of the golden apples that grew in Neo Forest last year and used it as the basis for a prototype.”
“They said only five grew, and that the government took them all. So they handed them out to corporations?”
Ren and Yantu were talking.
Not only the World Tree, but Neo Forest as well, was a place strictly managed by the government.
Ordinary people were forbidden from entering, and even mages could only go in when harvesting materials needed by the government or corporations.
The reason South Korea had become the world-leading mecca of the bioindustry was thanks to the plants that grew in Neo Forest.
“It’s Vanaheim, after all.”
“Well, that’s true. But immortality, you say? Good grief, reaching into forbidden territory again, are they? Was merely extending life not enough?”
Yantu shook his head from side to side. It seemed Yantu, like me, had a negative view of immortality.
“Immortality obtained through a health supplement. That sounds nothing but ominous.”
I quietly chimed in.
“At Vanaheim, they seemed to think people would be overjoyed once the Golden Apple was completed. They called it immortality, but for now, they said it was a product that prevents aging and disease and recharges vitality.”
“Of course. If something that good existed, I’d want to take it too. But doesn’t it feel unsettling? I mean, what exactly are they making after joining hands with a black mage?”
At Yantu’s words, Ren nodded and continued.
“Exactly. Just imagining how a black mage saved people who were dying scares me. The truth is, I also took that prototype.”
“What? Then that time you went berserk—was that because you took the Golden Apple?”
“Yes. I think they wanted to know whether the Golden Apple would strengthen my polymorph ability. It did, in fact, enhance my trait. Though I nearly became a monster because of the side effects.”
“A monster? What was it like?”
“My biological rhythm went berserk, and transformations occurred on their own. Sometimes I appeared in forms where different species were mixed together. Fortunately, I managed to take control in the end, but it was terrifying.”
“Phew… Thank goodness. Those bastards.”
Yantu let out a deep sigh.
I felt my heart pounding. I could tell by instinct. The Golden Apple was an extremely dangerous thing.
There was no way anything done in league with a black mage could be anything but dangerous.
In my previous life, I had seen more than enough of how far people would go when drawn in by the idea of immortality.
In a cult, they had dreamed of immortality while offering up children as sacrifices.
A black mage who had joined hands with a bio-company would commit terror through human experimentation without batting an eye.
“The Golden Apple is a dangerous drug. I don’t think it should be released into the world. People might die, or they might turn into monsters.”
Ren spoke as though she had read my mind.
She was looking straight at me. As if asking me to stop them.
“We’ll have to stop it somehow. I’ll look further into the Golden Apple. And into the Magic Tower and the black mages as well. I was already tracking black mages these days anyway.”
After saying that to Ren, I turned to Yantu. I hadn’t forgotten the reason I had followed him into this dwarf district.
“You need to give me the backup information, don’t you?”
“Ah! Right. Wait just a moment. I’ll copy it for you right away.”
Yantu sprang to his feet and went into the room.
He had promised to give me the backup, but I had worried it might have been empty words meant to lure me in. Apparently, the backup information really did exist.
And it seemed he had now decided to trust me for certain.
A short while later, Yantu came out of the room and handed me a memory device without hesitation.
“Here. Take it and analyze it properly.”
“Thanks.”
“And if you’re thinking of looking into the Golden Apple while avoiding Vanaheim’s eyes, go to Neo Forest. I mean, if you want to know the true components of the Golden Apple.”
“You want me to sneak into the forest?”
Thinking he meant I should investigate the golden apple tree that might still remain in Neo Forest, I asked that, and Yantu answered with a chuckle.
“No, not that. Go to an herb shop. It’s an herb shop called Yggdrasil, and it’s near Neo Forest. The owner there is a complete expert in that field.”
“An herb shop near Neo Forest. Got it. I’ll pay it a visit.”
The conversation, which had once again stretched on before I knew it, finally seemed to be over. I picked up the memory device and the detection equipment and rose to my feet.
Even thinking back on it, I had heard truly astonishing things.
Ren’s pitiful story and the dangerous information she had given me. While listening to Ren’s story, Yantu and I had shared similar emotions, and before we knew it, a bond had formed between us.
Let’s just let the matter of him locking me in an underground cell slide. After all, I had completely destroyed that cell, which had been quite an impressive device in its own way.
“That’s everything now, right? I should get going before it gets any later.”
“Yeah. Hurry up and go. I smashed the drone, but the Vanaheim bastards might be waiting outside, so be careful.”
“You don’t need to worry about me. You just do your part. Protect Ren well. They might come to the dwarf district, so keep your defenses tight.”
“Don’t worry about that. The security in our dwarf district is enough to make even the Pentagon weep…”
Cutting off Yantu, who had begun boasting again, I spoke to Ren.
“Ren, take care of yourself and hide here quietly for the time being. Leave Vanaheim to me.”
“Thank you, Mage.”
I left Yantu’s house. It was pitch-dark outside. As I left the dwarf district, I immediately cast detection magic.
Within the range of my detection magic, I didn’t sense any watchers. But that didn’t mean I could call it safe.
They might be monitoring me from a distance with another drone.
For Vanaheim, it wouldn’t seem unreasonable even if they were watching me with a satellite instead of a drone.
I headed toward the subway station at a brisk pace. I could have taken the subway all the way to Seoul, but after a few stops, I got off, went outside, and took a taxi.
Whether or not there was someone watching, I needed to throw them off for now.
“To Namsan, please.”
I said to the taxi driver as I folded myself into the back seat.
Rather than going straight home, I decided to take the opportunity to visit that herb shop.
“You mean the lower side of Namsan, right? Which way should I take you?”
“Please drop me off near Neo Forest.”
“Neo Forest? At this hour?”
The taxi driver asked back in surprise. He even glanced into the rearview mirror and examined me. Was he trying to see whether I was a mage?
It was late at night. It seemed that at such a late hour, even mages didn’t go to Neo Forest.
“Please drop me off in front of the Hyatt Hotel.”
“Ah, understood.”
Only after I corrected myself did the driver answer cleanly.
By the time we entered Seoul, it was already nearing eleven at night.
“Once night falls, the roads in the city open up nicely too. During the day, there were disturbances all over the place, so traffic was completely jammed.”
“What sort of disturbances?”
“Didn’t you see the news? Zombies were going on a rampage. Whether they all went mad or what. I mean, why accept immigrants like zombies in the first place…”
The driver grumbled. I gave no further reply and looked out the window.
It seemed there had been zombie incidents during the day as well. Quite a few of them, at that.
If it had made the news, people would now be talking about it.
Suddenly, I thought of Gil. The boy who lived together with zombies.
The zombies’ abnormal behavior was also one of the terrorist acts carried out by black mages, but most people seemed to accept it as merely a zombie problem. Everyone except Gil, that is.
I thought that the eyes of the boy were more accurate than those of adults who looked at things through prejudice.
But the Hall of Magic should have analyzed the zombies they took yesterday and discovered the cause. Had nothing like that appeared on the news?
“We’re here, sir.”
“Thank you.”
After getting out in front of the Hyatt Hotel, I stood with my back to the hotel and looked at Neo Forest across the road.
All of Namsan was dark. It was a completely different landscape from my previous world, where Seoul Tower had stood.
The forest was submerged in pitch-black darkness.
A darkness far thicker than ordinary darkness. A darkness that could only be called deep blue covered the entire forest, as though deliberately blocking people’s gazes.
At the center, the World Tree stood tall, looking even blacker, as if it were swallowing the light.
But I could feel the World Tree and Neo Forest with my entire body. An immensely powerful wave of mana energy was surging.
It was a windless night, but mana energy billowed as though the entire forest were swaying.
Wuuung, wuuung.
The waves came in and receded like the tide.
‘The World Tree. Could this be the singularity of this world?’
Overwhelmed by the intense mana waves and deep darkness, I thought this with a feeling akin to awe.
Just then, a noisy, clamorous burst of human voices suddenly rang out, breaking my reverie.
“Oh! Amazing!”
“Incredible!”
When I turned around, the front of the Hyatt Hotel had grown crowded before I knew it. Quite a number of foreigners had come outside and were looking at Neo Forest.
‘What’s with those people? Tourists?’
Access to the World Tree and Neo Forest was restricted, but there were tourists who came from overseas just to see them from a distance.
Avoiding them, I began walking quickly toward Neo Forest.
I didn’t know where the herb shop was, but if I walked along the boundary of Neo Forest, I should be able to find it.
But then I sensed a subtle mana from behind me.
I turned back and activated detection magic. The mana was flowing from the foreigners standing in front of the hotel.
They weren’t using magic at the moment, but I could tell they were mages.
‘Foreign mages?’
Now that I saw them properly, it seemed those people were mages who had come to our country to attend the World Mage Conference.
Because they looked so carefree, I had thought they were tourists.
Well, most of the people who came to see the World Tree were mages, after all. They came to feel the tremendous mana of the forest.
The fact that the World Mage Conference was being held meant that a crisis had come upon the world.
And the fact that it was being held in our country must mean the black mages’ movements in Korea had become quite serious as well.
The grotesquely transformed orcs secretly brought into Incheon Port, and the zombies that appeared to have gone mad after being infected by a virus.
They were signs that the black mages’ terror had begun.
‘It can’t be just that old black mage at Incheon Port. Where are they all hiding, quietly spreading calamity?’
I had to hurry in finding Samir and the Magic Tower.
I had to chase down every trace. I had to combine every clue and find them. I had to mobilize every means possible.
It still wasn’t certain whether the black mage involved with the Golden Apple was Samir, but I had an intuition.
The one who desires immortality—that is Samir.
‘This time, I will stop you for sure.’
Leaving the relatively bright area in front of the Hyatt Hotel, I reached the boundary below Neo Forest, where thick darkness lay as though waiting to swallow me.
I had walked while lost in thought, but I had not lowered my guard.
Suddenly, I came to a halt.
At my feet within the dense darkness, something even blacker was slowly crawling out. I felt a sharp wave of mana energy.
At that moment, a shout rang out.
“Watch out!”