Chapter 436: Connected (3)

The old man made a lap around the dust-covered palace. The burly man trailing behind him snorted.

"What, are you reminiscing about the good old days, old man?"

"There is nothing to reminisce about here."

"Huh. Still, didn't you train a few apprentices in—" The man's face grew a little pale as his impassive voice trailed off.

The old man was looking at him with cold eyes.

"I-It was a slip of the tongue. I apologize if you were offended."

"Do not speak lightly about my apprentices."

The man nodded and grumbled internally.

'People say that he has no feelings, but he loves his students a disturbing amount.'

Well, that explained why he harbored so much resentment toward Specter. After all, the Player had killed all his students.

The man, Colonel Charbork, wiped the thin layer of sweat that condensed on his neck.

"Still, we somehow managed to succeed, thanks to you. To be honest, I thought it would fail," he said.

"How amusing. Who is it that you think is capable of failure?"

The grand plan to connect the Floors was an operation decades in the making. They had received the blueprints from the demons, and the entirety of the Fiend Association worked to provide the materials.

Charbork let out a bitter laugh as he thought about the glory days he had spent with his subordinate. "...It would have been nice if the Association hadn't collapsed."

If it hadn't, they would have been able to wreak havoc from the 1st Floor to the 4th Floor using the giant Gates.

He swallowed down his frustration when he recalled how Specter had killed all his men and then changed the subject. "So, why did we come to Outland all of a sudden?"

"I have hidden something here."

The old man, Nazad Hallow, thumped the ground with his cane made of black wood.

When he did, the ground split perfectly apart, revealing a set of stairs.

"Ah, a secret chamber? I was not aware of this."

Even though he had been here several times before, this was Colonel Charbork's first time seeing it. 'It seems that he hid it with magic.'

He had never sensed an empty space below the ground whenever he walked around here.

"So, what is this place?"

Colonel Charbork followed Nazad Hallow down to the basement, and his jaw dropped.

"O-Oh my god."

The vast basement was lined with tens of shelves like it was a retail warehouse.

And they were stocked with thousands of black marbles...

"These are... demon jades?"

It was an artifact that they could force even monsters to absorb. The artifact would destroy the minds of those that absorbed it, and the artifact would make them go berserk.

However, every single time they tried to advance their research on the jade, Specter would interfere without fail. Now, they hadn't been able to do much research on the demon jades.

"Didn't we stop researching the demon jade with the test subject Telgia?" Charbork asked.

"Hm." Nazad tilted his head and looked up. As if he were actually a human with opinions. "Yes, I do believe that the Heavenly Demon gave us such a command."

"Then, how..."

"At the time, the Fiend Association did not have the means to continue the experiments, but I did."

He continued researching the demon jade by himself, in secret.

And this was the result of his efforts...

"The Fiend Association failed, but I did not." Nazad picked up a piece of demon jade and looked at it with affection as if it were his own child.

Colonel Charbork leered at him, seemingly uneasy. "...Is the Heavenly Demon aware of this?"

"There is no need for him to know."

"What?" His eyes furrowed.

The executives knew that Nazad Hallow didn't really think of the Heavenly Demon as his superior.

However, withholding information from the Heavenly Demon was a bit too much in Colonel Charbork's eyes.

"...One of the ingredients you need to make a single piece of demon jade is a human with demonic energy," Charbork said aloud.

Then where had Nazad Hallow found such a large supply?

His eyes grew cold. "You didn't kidnap them. Did you use the members of our Association?"

"They were worthless, so it doesn't really matter whether we have them or not, no?"

"...So that's what you think," He said as he pulled the full duffel bag onto his shoulder. "I can't let this go, though. I'm going to tell the Heavenly Demon everything."

"Say, Charbork."

Intense bloodlust poured out of Nazad Hallow as he studied the demon jade. He slowly looked up at Charbork with murky eyes, and the noose tightened around the Colonel's neck.

"Why do you think I brought you here?"

"...Fuck!"

He realized that he had walked right into a trap. Charbork immediately threw his duffel bag at Nazad and activated Animal Combat (S). His legs transformed into a cheetah's legs. In the blink of an eye, he had sprinted to the top of the stairs.

'I can escape.'

His skill didn't merely transform his body parts into that of an animal. It amplified the animal's traits several times.

He found his way back to the entrance and thrust himself forward into the sunlight.

Crack!

A hand tightened around his neck from behind and slammed him into the ground.

"Keuk!"

He stared up at the giant figure of a knight wearing jet-black armor.

'A death knight!'

Charbork struggled under him as an indifferent voice spoke.

"Please, do not resist. The outcome will still be the same."

"You son of a bitch!" Colonel Charbork glared at Nazad with bloodthirsty eyes as he emerged from the stairs. "You think you can get away with this? Once the Heavenly Demon finds out—"

"He will not. More importantly..." Nazad smiled coldly. "Even if he does, do you really think that man would avenge you?"

"..."

Colonel Charbork didn't know what to say. It was all because he knew—He knew that the man he had sworn his loyalty to did not think highly of him. Colonel Charbork trembled like a leaf as his eyes landed on the demon jade in Nazad Hallow's hand

"Do not be afraid," said Nazad with a smile reminiscent of a madman.

***

[King of Corpses Nazad Hallow Begins Invasion of the Ruben Empire.]

[Nazad Hallow Takes Aiatz, Ogrin, Siegrant, and Guteman At Breakneck Speed.]

[They Call Him a God in a Human's Body. The Necromancer Marches North With His Army of Corpses.]

...

Every time they blinked, a new headline would appear. Surprisingly, there was not a single piece of good news in the deluge of news.

"What are we even supposed to do?"

"Nazad Hallow was actually aiming for Frontier rather than Earth?"

"It could be a ruse. If we leave our station, he could change course and target Earth."

"Yeah. We also have these giant portals that we can't close."

Within these past two days, they had received confirmation that the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Floors were now connected to each other. The news about Nazad Hallow's movements only added insult to injury.

But despite the harrowing news, the people of Earth remained quiet.

"I'm surprised. I thought there would be tons of people saying that we should go help them," Rahmadat commented.

"...I told you. Earth and the Ruben Empire are no longer close allies," Skaya said tersely. It had only been two days since the Floors became connected to each other. "If all your friends and family are on Earth, while you're merely acquaintances with people on Frontier, which would you choose to save?"

It was clear which of the two the Players would prioritize.

"Mm. I understand that logically, but it's still a shame," he admitted.

"The problem is that leaving Frontier on their own is also a bad choice in itself." Skaya let out a heavy sigh. "Even if things are different now, we're still going to keep producing new Players."

After clearing Gates and leveling up, they would eventually have to go to the 2nd Floor.

Unfortunately, a great enemy was occupying the 2nd Floor. It was a great empire, to boot.

"The Players' growth will be severely limited," Rahmadat concluded.

"Exactly. That's why we can't turn our backs on Frontier, or rather, the Ruben Empire," Skaya said. This was likely a clever plot of the fiends and the demons. "Nazad Hallow is the issue here."

He was forcing their hand, all while mobilizing a powerful army.

"He has an insane amount of corpses," she continued.

They estimated that Nazad Hallow had at least tens of thousands of corpses, and that was only based on what they had seen in the open so far.

Of course, Players residing on the 4th and 5th Floors could easily take out several hundred corpses at a time. However, Players of that caliber were rare.

"On top of that..."

They wanted to protect Earth, where their friends and family were living, not to mention fighting Nazad Hallow would be a huge expedition filled with danger.

"Huh. Is he really that strong? To the point that even elite Players are afraid of him?"

"He is," Cha Si-Eun said flatly. "People say that the rank of a Heaven does not denote their rank in terms of power, but everyone knows that it has always been the opposite."

Nazad Hallow was currently the Second Heaven, trailing right behind the Heavenly Demon.

"The World Player Association also announced that he's just as dangerous as the Heavenly Demon," she continued. They weren't overestimating him at all.

He was a walking one-man army. Not only could he animate the dead and make them several times stronger than they had been while they were still alive, but he could also summon them whenever and wherever he wanted.

"Huh. I thought he'd be fragile because he's a necromancer, but he must be pretty good."

"He is not someone you should underestimate."

"..."

As he listened in on Rahmadat and Cha Si-Eun's conversation, Seo Jun-Ho fell into deep thought.

'The Empire is strong.' Seo Jun-Ho could still remember the knights under the Emperor's direct command, the millions of soldiers, the court mages, and their allied mages from the Magic Tower.

Frontier possessed the strongest force on all of the Floors so far.

However, they had one big weakness.

'They're strong in numbers, but it would take a ton of time to gather all those people in one place.'

The most elite warriors were stationed in the borders at the north, east, south, and west. The knight orders were located at the capital, while mages from the Magic Tower were scattered throughout the empire.

'It would require a lot of time and money to bring them together.'

However, that wasn't true for Nazad. If he were to get cornered, then he could just retreat whenever he wanted without many issues. If he wanted to, he could even use guerilla tactics.

'He's very mobile, which is why there's such a large gap between them.'

And that was the problem...

'Smaller forces are more mobile. But...'

Nazad had no problems transporting a large army. Thus, even if they caught up to him, they couldn't guarantee their victory in a head-on battle against the former.

This was why Nazad Hallow was terrifying to face.

"Sigh, my head hurts. This won't be easy," said Seo Jun-Ho.

"It won't be," Cha Si-Eun agreed.

"...!"

Their short break was interrupted as their hair stood on end. Everyone instantly took a stance upon sensing the arrival of an unfamiliar presence.

"Woah, woah! Please calm down, everyone." The man smiled pleasantly and took off his top hat, revealing his sharply curved eyes reminiscent of crescent moons.

"It has been a long time," he said.

"...Gray?"

The 1st Floor Administrator smiled cheerfully. "I come bearing good news."