NOVEL NEXT Chapter 56
“Blanca! Are you okay?!”
I huddled my body to protect myself from concrete or glass shards, then answered the one who came to check on me in a panic.
“I’m fine! But are you really okay, Boss?!”
“Yeah, looks like you’re safe too… Thank goodness. I told you to stay away from the window, and this is why…”
They brushed the dust off my body and sighed in relief.
For a brief moment of calm, I asked them what was going on. They started to explain, then stopped, saying it was faster to look outside.
Following their suggestion, I glanced through the shattered wall, and what I saw was just absurd. Something massive, resembling a giant humanoid, was stomping through the airport and military base, wrecking everything in its path.
It wasn’t human. If I had to describe it, it looked similar to a five-year-old’s clay figure made during playtime at kindergarten but blown up 500 times.
This hulking mass, towering at roughly 70 meters, was currently exploding and disassembling in real-time from magic, missiles, shining arrows, and artillery fire.
Even while deteriorating, it was swatting away hunters foolish enough to rush at it.
The one that crashed into my room was probably one of those idiots.
And I hadn’t noticed until now, but a gate had appeared in the sky. And I’d seen that before.
It looked exactly like the rift created by the Rift Creator.
That guy was surely dead at the hands of Lapiz. How could a rift open? No, more importantly, if it’s the Rift Creator’s ability, then isn’t it definitely linked to suicides?
Had suicides become competent enough to terrorize key facilities near the outskirts?
Since the nature of suicides hadn’t been adequately highlighted on the game board, this was utterly confusing.
They were depicted as mere fodder that showed up when bored, only to get beaten and decimated, so their true existence had never been revealed.
Shit, seriously. If they could pull off such stunts, they should’ve been included in the story.
While internally cursing, I pondered whether to escort the Boss to safety.
However, they gently grabbed my shoulder and reassured me.
“I’m fine, Blanca. Go find Hanchō and Wei. They should be near that military base and research facility over there. Go check if they’re safe. You can do it, right?”
“…Yes, of course! But you stay right here! I’ll be back in no time!”
If that’s what they said, then that’s what I would do. Leaving them with a hope for safety, I kicked the door open and dashed outside.
I ran into a frantic staff member on the way who questioned me, but I ignored them and burst out.
That hunter could handle it themselves. Whether they lived or died was none of my business. The only important thing was safely retrieving Wei.
“Hey! Wait… Heros Academy?! Why are you here… Whatever, it’s dangerous in there! Don’t go in! Those meat lumps are moving in pieces!”
Standing by the roadside, the hunter, who was shooting arrows at the blob monster, warned me as I sprinted towards the military base.
“Third year at Heros Academy, Hero License obtained, sidekick to Ranked Hero Justitia! Need more explanation?! My little brother is over there; I have to save him!”
As I crafted that last-minute lie, the hunter looked confused but still asked for my name.
“Bl… no, Chemicat.”
Debating whether to stick with my real name or hero name, I decided that if I was a hero here, I’d go with the hero name.
The nameless hunter either was deceived or thought it unwise to stop me as they advised me to retreat if it got dangerous while drawing back their bow.
I rushed towards the military base. There, pieces of flesh from the giant were tangled with hunters and soldiers in a scuffle.
Upon closer inspection, those flesh pieces kept pushing forward, unfazed by being stabbed or punched off.
“Bring fire!!! Or ice!!! You can’t kill these things by hitting them normally…! Damn, what kind of freaks are these to look human?!”
It wasn’t just me who figured that out; those who blindly rushed in with fists, weapons, and guns were starting to try using attributes to deal with the meat golems.
I didn’t care. Where was Wei? Where could Wei possibly be?
I infused magic into my legs, leaping between streetlights and picking my way over barbed wire or the big flesh golems’ heads as I searched for Wei.
Where on earth could he be? It was so chaotic that I couldn’t figure it out. Trying to listen for sound was futile with gunfire and explosions drowning everything out.
“You, one-eyed cat! You’ve met your match this time!”
“Die.”
I splashed sulfuric acid on the face of the oversized dough-human that seemed to recognize me without us ever meeting and ran up the lamp post to get a better view.
Even if I wasn’t as good as a spider-man, I at least had a way to scale walls.
As I secreted adhesive from my palm, I infused it with magic, digging my claws into the wall for stability, and climbed upwards.
It hurt like hell as my nails threatened to come off, but I forced my way up, numbing the pain with painkillers. Finally, I spotted the trace of Wei I’d been searching for.
From the wreckage of a nearby building, a fierce wind was whipping up, cutting through the air.
It was specifically Hanchō’s ability. However, since Hanchō and Wei were together, Wei should be nearby too.
But considering Hanchō’s ability, it probably wasn’t a good situation.
His powers were purely focused on wide-area assault, which, against those blobs, meant a terrible matchup. If I didn’t hurry to help, Wei could be in danger.
And that would be the very situation the Boss dreaded the most.
Dissolving the adhesive on my feet, I kicked off the wall and soared towards the gale blowing from the ruins.
As expected, the scene was just as I imagined. Hanchō was unleashing a storm of wind, trying to cut through the dough monsters.
“Why won’t these bastards just die?!”
The dough monsters, more than a few pieces mutilated, shamelessly approached Hanchō, patching themselves back together as they did.
Jumping into the center of this chaos would have me minced like a smoothie, so I landed a safe distance away and shouted.
“Hanchō, create a dome with your wind! I’m going to spray poison!!”
“Huh? Why are you— Hey, wait a sec…!”
Hanchō was stunned to see me suddenly, but once he saw I was reaching toward the monsters, he rushed to create a wind dome around us.
“I’m not saying we should…”
While the dough monsters approached Hanchō’s dome, they fell quickly, clutching their throats and collapsing.
That was to be expected; the dense phosgene reacted the moment they inhaled it.
Guess I’ll be drinking tap water today. I kicked away the remaining dough monsters and took a deep breath to cleanse the area around the wind dome.
“Alright, Hanchō. Don’t break the dome, but make a way for me to get in.”
“You crazy…!”
Hanchō swore and weakened the wind above so I could get in.
Once inside, I finally saw Wei’s condition under Hanchō’s protection.
“…Can you stand?”
It appeared that rubble had pierced his leg as the building collapsed.
Wei shook his head, pale as a ghost. Was it impossible? I had an inkling it would be.
Fortunately, at least he seemed to avoid severe blood loss.
His blood was trickling down, but as long as we could get him to the hospital, it looked treatable.
The only thing I could do right now was minimize his pain. I handed him some painkillers and told him to hang in there.
“Hanchō, cut the beam. We have to get Wei to the hospital.”
“Ugh, damn it. Giving orders again. Still…*sigh*. Thanks. I’d be dead without you.”
“No need for that, just cut it.”
“Even if I try to be nice…”
Rolling his eyes, Hanchō compressed the wind and shot it, severing the beam from the debris.
“You sure about this? What about outside—”
“There’s still toxic gas, so don’t even think about escaping. If you don’t want your lungs to melt and die.”
“This is really intense… Damn. Walking while maintaining a dome is tricky.”
“Get moving.”
“Ugh… Fine. You’re the boss now… Alright, let’s go. Don’t talk to me, I might lose focus and it could collapse.”
With Hanchō pretending to be scared and keeping the dome up, we began to leave the chaotic battlefield without incident.
“…Okay, drop the dome. You head straight to the hospital with Wei. I’ll report to the Boss and keep an eye on them.”
“Yes, alright. But… why on earth are you here? I haven’t really heard your reason yet.”
“I came to see the Boss. Is that enough? Now go. Even if things seem okay now, you never know when they’ll worsen.”
Hanchō looked at me in disbelief, asking if that was the real deal.
Of course it is.
It’s absolutely the truth.