Episode 20
Tracking Deiodeun was not particularly difficult.
Traces of his passage were visible everywhere.
Corpses of the demonic beasts that ruled the desert could be seen everywhere.
Every corpse was either horrifically mangled or completely pulverized and scattered.
Deiodeun had butchered every demonic beast along his path.
It was truly a terrifying might that defied common sense.
Thanks to that, Jeon was safe from the threat of demonic beasts.
“Just how strong is he? S-rank?”
Jeon soon shook his head.
He had never seen one either, so he couldn’t be sure, but it seemed unlikely that even an S-rank could display this kind of power.
In fact, even the S-rank Awakeners of Neo Seoul were reluctant to operate alone in the desert.
If it were near Neo Seoul, maybe, but traversing the distant desert alone was a fearful prospect even for S-rank Awakeners.
Deiodeun had been doing things that even S-rank Awakeners would not dare attempt since long ago.
He roamed the desert alone and faced countless demonic beasts.
He did not fear demonic beasts.
Rather, the demonic beasts feared him.
He had never seen an Awakener like this before.
“An Awakener above S-rank? Would the top brass of Neo Seoul even know about this?”
He was sincerely curious.
Whether the top brass of Neo Seoul knew of Deiodeun, and if they did, how they were reacting to him.
Deiodeun was a being that surpassed common sense in many ways.
It was then.
Smoke rising from afar entered Jeon’s field of vision.
A plume of smoke was shooting up to the sky from where the horizon met the heavens.
He knew without needing to confirm with his eyes.
That Deiodeun was there.
Jeon infused mana to increase his speed.
Swish!
His body slid across the desert.
After running for about thirty minutes like that, Jeon was able to arrive at an oasis.
It was an oasis fixed in one place, not the moving oasis he had encountered with the sand maws before.
Sand maws didn’t live in such places, making them perfect for bases or villages.
And so the village of the Desert Elves had come to be.
The small village that the Desert Elves had painstakingly cultivated was horrifically destroyed, and chunks of flesh presumed to be the elves’ were strewn about.
The moment he saw the terrible spectacle unfolding before his eyes, Jeon’s mouth fell open.
“Insane!”
The limbs scattered all around were like the remains of toys smashed by children in a tantrum.
All of this had been committed by Deiodeun alone.
Jeon urgently searched for Deiodeun.
Finding Deiodeun was not difficult.
Because he was standing not very far from where Jeon was.
Before Deiodeun, a middle-aged man who appeared to be an elf was kneeling, holding a young girl in his arms.
The middle-aged elf was weeping and pleading.
Though his voice couldn’t be heard, the atmosphere made it clear he was begging for the girl’s life.
The girl still looked very young.
Her actual age was unknown, but by human standards, she looked barely twelve.
Jeon didn’t think Deiodeun would harm a young elf.
Because even against an enemy bearing great resentment, killing one who had not yet become an adult was a kind of taboo.
Slash!
But as if mocking Jeon, Deiodeun cut down the middle-aged elf and the girl elf in a single stroke.
Fresh blood spurting from their bodies dyed Deiodeun red.
The moment he saw that, the string of reason in Jeon’s head snapped.
“Hey! You old dog!”
In an instant, sand rose like waves and surged at Deiodeun.
An enormous quantity of sand bore down on him as if to bury him alive.
At that moment, a blood-red aura erupted from Deiodeun’s entire body.
Boom!
The red light instantly blew away both the sand and Jeon.
When Jeon regained his senses after rolling across the ground, the first thing he saw was Deiodeun’s legs.
When he raised his head, Deiodeun was looking down at him.
A savage glint still lingered in his eyes.
Jeon glared back at that gaze without flinching.
“Aren’t you ashamed to kill a child who hasn’t even grown up yet?”
“A child?”
“She was a young girl.”
“Even so, she was probably older than you.”
“Tha—”
Crunch!
In that instant, Deiodeun pressed down on Jeon’s back with his foot.
Under a pressure that felt like a massive boulder crushing him, Jeon’s face flushed red.
His spine and ribs felt like they would be completely crushed; he couldn’t breathe.
Creak!
The breastplate made from the shell of a Queen Wolf Ant screamed as if it would shatter at any moment.
“Krk!”
Jeon struggled to escape from under Deiodeun’s foot. But no matter how hard he tried, Deiodeun’s foot didn’t budge.
“Hiyaaa!”
Jeon, flailing, unleashed Sand Blaster.
Boom!
Sand Blaster detonated on Deiodeun.
But even after taking a direct hit from the Sand Blaster that had blown apart wolf ant heads, Deiodeun didn’t so much as twitch.
Deiodeun pressed down even harder on Jeon’s chest.
“Kuhuk!”
Jeon coughed up blood.
Deiodeun stared silently at him.
It was not the gaze filled with madness from moments before.
It was a gaze sunken to an unfathomable depth.
It was hard to believe that these were the eyes of the man who, just moments ago, had been massacring elves in a frenzy.
He loosened the strength in the foot pressing on Jeon’s chest slightly and asked.
“Do you think I’ve gone too far?”
“Did you really… have to kill even the child?”
“Why should a child be spared? Just because they’re young? Because others say so? That brat could grow up to become an enemy.”
“But…”
“Those elf bastards are an untrustworthy race. They destroyed others’ world to survive themselves. And you’d spare such hypocrites just because they’re young? Don’t make me laugh. Those things aren’t worth keeping alive. Going forward, I’ll kill every last one of those worms I see.”
“…….”
“Do you want to say I’m wrong? Do you want to stop me? Then stop me with your strength, not your mouth. Got it? You cripple who’s all talk!”
Deiodeun removed his foot from Jeon’s chest.
“Kuhuk! Kuhuhuk!”
Jeon coughed violently.
Yet his eyes were bloodshot red.
If Deiodeun had pressed just a little harder, not only the capillaries in his eyes but his heart and internal organs would have burst.
He had known from the beginning that he was no match for Deiodeun.
He hadn’t even considered himself a being worth comparing.
Because he had thought of Deiodeun as a star in the high sky beyond his reach.
But now, his thoughts had changed.
‘I’ll become as strong as Deiodeun—no, even stronger.’
He wanted to become strong enough to say what needed to be said.
Not cowering like a wretched dog like this.
For the first time in his life, a clear goal had been born.
The goal was Deiodeun.
Jeon made surpassing him his mission.
***
Jeon surveyed the elf village.
Just in case there might be survivors.
But not a single elf had survived Deiodeun’s hands.
Deiodeun had left not a single living creature in the elf village alive.
The sight of over a hundred elves turned into chunks of meat filled him with revulsion.
At the same time, a question arose.
He recalled Deiodeun’s words.
‘They destroyed others’ world to survive themselves? Then do the elves also bear responsibility for the world becoming like this?’
If so, Deiodeun’s anger was understandable.
He himself had been born after the world was already ruined.
Therefore, he knew nothing of the previous world.
Most people living in Neo Seoul now were the same.
It remained in records, but because they hadn’t seen it directly, they couldn’t truly feel how brilliant and abundant that era had been.
But Deiodeun had been born in the previous world.
He had watched that era, and even the process of the world’s destruction.
The sense of loss and rage he must have felt in that process was perhaps only natural.
“Hoo!”
Jeon let out a sigh.
Deiodeun was alone far outside the elf village.
Staying in the elves’ village even for a moment was horrific to him.
The very act of breathing the same air the elves had breathed was no different from torture to Deiodeun.
Jeon looked around the elves’ village.
The elves’ dwellings were earthen houses made from hardened sand.
It must have been an unavoidable choice due to the nature of the desert, where special building materials could not be obtained.
They had survived until now only because the oasis was nearby; without it, the elves would have died long ago.
Jeon entered one of the houses that was still relatively intact.
The inside of the house was extremely humble.
There were only things absolutely necessary for living.
But the style of the items was unlike anything seen in Neo Seoul.
They somehow bore the grime of age, exuding an antique air.
They seemed to be items the elves had originally possessed.
Bows and arrows, beautiful ornaments, robes, and such caught his eye.
Jeon examined the items one by one.
“They’re definitely not recently made.”
What particularly caught his eye was an extremely old tome.
It was written in unknown characters.
It was surely an item brought from the world where the elves had originally lived.
Jeon stored the book and the other items in his subspace for now.
They were useless to him, but they would clearly fetch a good price if sold.
Jeon put all usable items into his subspace.
While rummaging through the house, Jeon discovered a small hidden warehouse behind a wall.
Jeon’s face contorted as he peered into the warehouse.
Because everything piled inside was of human make.
Unlike the elves’ antique items, these had efficient designs and materials.
Items made in Neo Seoul mainly had this kind of style.
The items were stained with blood that appeared to be human.
“These bastards! They robbed passing people.”
There was no way the human-hostile elves had paid a proper price for these goods.
They had clearly ambushed humans passing nearby and stolen their goods.
He had felt a slight pang of guilt for the elves killed by Deiodeun just moments ago, but now even that had vanished completely.
They were scavengers who merely differed in outward appearance.
They wouldn’t have left the people alive after stealing their goods.
Even if only to keep their secret, they would have surely killed people to silence them.
Judging by the quantity of goods, the number of people they had killed must have been staggering.
“They killed a lot.”
Jeon shook his head and searched the warehouse.
Just in case there might be something he needed.
But it seemed the elves had used all the useful items; only trinkets remained.
Such items would only be dead weight if taken.
Jeon cleanly gave up and went outside.
He checked a few more houses, but again, nothing useful.
Jeon raised his dominion over the sand.
At that, the sand throughout the area churned and moved.
Shhwoooosh!
The sand churned and covered the entire village.
The destroyed houses and the elves’ corpses alike were all buried and vanished into the sand.
In an instant, the fairly large village became a single tomb.
Still, it didn’t stand out.
Unlike ordinary soil, desert sand left no trace even when shifted or piled up.
Now even if someone happened to find the oasis, they would never know that elves had lived there.
Jeon filled his water pouch with the oasis water and approached Deiodeun.
By then, the long night had passed, and the sun was illuminating the desert.
Without a word, Deiodeun moved on.
Jeon also followed behind him in silence.