novelraw Chapter 3 : Chapter 3
Chapter 3 : Chapter 3
Chapter 3: Intrusion (2)
Because humans can swim through the perilous sea of ignorance and set foot on the solid land of civilization, that reason must be the most powerful weapon.
The power to see the world correctly.
Or, the path to that process.
Reason.
It is truly a bright and warm lantern.
It drives out the night and allows one to pass a warm winter.
Also, as it fills our stomachs and lets us sleep in safe places.
Gods are right to fear reason.
For healing and stability, which were the authority of gods, humans achieved with their own hands.
If reason were compared to a spear, the heads of gods would be severed and hung from its lofty tip.
‘That lantern.’
Ttak!
As the woman who descended from the sky snapped her fingers.
The ship's lights, which had broken down and wouldn't work at all, came back on.
‘How truly crude it is.’
But the people couldn't even think of going inside the ship.
Everyone sent their gazes to her.
-Everyone.-
Her desirable lips opened, and she spoke.
-I apologize for being late.-
It was a voice that resounded inside their heads.
It was a beautiful voice, more than anything.
At the same time, the ship's lights illuminated the river's surface, and they could see corpses and pieces of clothing floating down.
They were mostly corpses that looked like soldiers or police.
-I am the Witch Morsallia.-
It was an unrealistic sight.
However, no one was surprised by it.
-I am here to help you proceed with the scenario.-
Before their brains could reject reality, they had understood it by instinct.
No explanation was needed.
That the ordinary days had scattered like an illusion and would never return…….
They had realized it without needing a poor explanation.
-Also, I am in charge of monitoring you, so you do not stray from the path to the great Constellations.-
There was no rebuttal.
There were no questions.
At the sound of swallowed breaths, even the air seemed to have frozen.
Seureureu-
The witch who descended from the sky stopped, floating about a handspan above the air.
-I know you must be curious as to what kind of beings the great existences called Constellations are.-
She wore a round helmet, covering everything above her nose.
Nevertheless, she possessed a captivating jawline and lips, enough to guess that she was a great beauty.
And wearing clothes that revealed her thighs, shoulders, and cleavage, to the point of giving an impression not just of beauty, but of lewdness.
She spoke in a calm tone.
-Any language is insufficient to express their greatness. But you do not need to worry. There are those who are watching this place closely.-
Despite her achingly beautiful voice, the people felt anxious.
Like the growl of a beast, that voice had the power to stimulate people's hearts and drive them to the edge of a cliff.
-But first.-
As the witch gestured once more.
Jjeojeojeok!
A tearing sound was heard, and a crack appeared in the empty air behind the witch.
-‘It would be good to show courtesy before meeting ‘them’.-
From beyond the crack, grotesque monsters began to pop out.
Dwarves with green skin, holding weapons.
They were Goblins.
They threatened the people, holding crude spears or clubs.
In the darkness, their eyes glowed red, and they revealed sharp teeth, letting out threatening sounds.
However, as if wearing invisible shackles.
They would start to charge, then stop.
Behind them.
A bigger, more robust monster.
An Orc appeared.
The Orc, with its considerable build, was radiating a much fiercer aura than the Goblins.
And at the very back.
There was a giant that looked to be almost 4 meters tall.
It was an Ogre.
A monster that enjoyed cannibalism, its skin so thick that even a knife would not seem to enter it easily.
Leaving such monsters there.
The scenario was asking.
[Scenario (1)]
[Struggle of the Mythological Age]
[There is no boundary dividing humans and monsters. Which side are you on?]
Which side to stand on.
It seemed to be forcing a fight.
[Monsters are impure beings. You can earn the qualification of a monster by murdering a human.]
[Life is a struggle. You can earn the qualification of a human by slaying a monster.]
Their aura was violent and threatening.
How were they supposed to face such monsters with their bare hands?
“Kyaaaaak!”
One middle-aged woman couldn't bear it and even attempted to jump into the river, but.
Ttuuk.
Her body, draped over the railing, stiffened, and she couldn't move.
“Eok? Eoeok?”
She made gasping sounds as her body grew rigid.
It was because the witch had looked at her.
She said to her.
-Be careful. The river is very cold. Isn't it dangerous if you fall in?-
The witch, stepping lightly on the air, approached her.
-To resolve yourself to death, you must have a very urgent reason for it.-
She extended a hand to the middle-aged woman who was trying to jump.
-Which side are you on?-
In the speaking witch's hand, a ‘dagger’ had appeared at some point.
She was offering it to the other person, hilt first.
“Wh-Which side? What do you mean.”
-A person or a monster. It doesn't matter, just kill one.-
“Ah…….”
On one side, she saw threatening monsters.
And on the other side, there was a frightened group of people.
Kill?
Slaughter?
She couldn't choose either side.
-You are deciding your own destiny.-
“I……”
The woman somehow felt like she shouldn't answer the witch.
Like prey standing before a predator.
All her experience and senses were flashing red lights.
It was an answer that her instincts rejected.
Suddenly, around the time tears welled up from her intense emotions.
-Now, quickly.-
The witch pressed for an answer.
At this moment, no one on the deck could stop their conversation.
A silence fell, as if nothing existed besides the two of them.
Only the sound of held breaths, barely escaping, was their audience.
Finally, the woman squeezed her eyes shut and answered.
“I…… can’t. I can't do it.”
At that, the Witch Morsallia nodded her head with an impressed look.
-Ah, what a civilized choice this is. A form that has taken a step away from barbaric struggle. It is so moving.-
There was no malice in her words, but that point was even more frightening.
-If you could not choose to be a human or a monster, then you must be nothing.-
She just passed sentence in a peaceful tone.
-I will make you into nothing.-
It was after that.
“……Ah. Aaaak!”
Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak! Aaaak!
The woman repeated the scream like a broken machine.
Soon, her body exploded.
Peong!
Puseuseuseuseu-
Scattering flesh and drops of blood.
Did so much blood flow from one person's body?
The gushing blood dyed the area red, and yet it continued to spurt like a fountain.
Ulkeok.
Ulkeok.
The blood, which had surged violently a few times, subsided, and the deck grew quiet.
Only a corpse, dyed crimson, remained.
Pung- Tidik.
Only the muscles, seizing and contracting, lived longer than their owner, convulsing and trembling.
-Now, everyone! Choose your destiny!-
Only the witch, with a clean smile unstained by a single drop of blood, shouted as if giving a speech.
-You are taking one step closer to a great destiny!-
From that gentle smile, one could even feel a faint light flowing.
Only then.
Tak!
As if the reins had been released.
The emotions locked inside people's hearts ran rampant.
People cried, screamed, vomited, and some even fainted.
Feeling like rice grains inside a gimbap roll, people rolled on the floor, letting out screams.
The startled people clung to each other, were swept to the opposite wall, and stuck to it.
However, it was an isolated place with nowhere to run.
They swarmed in a rush to the small entrance, trying to hide inside the thin walls.
But wherever the people hid, the witch was looking, clearly, even through the walls.
‘No wall built by civilization can protect you.’
Watching the people flee in a horde, she waited.
It was not simply to harvest lives, so she needed time for something more important to ripen.
‘Now, let go of it all.’
She watched the backs of the fleeing people.
Everyone was only going down, down, to the lower parts of the ship.
However, the witch did not want them falling into the river.
To those fleeing 'outside', just a single glance…….
Pik-
The witch looked.
A single gaze was enough.
“Kyaaaaaaaak!”
The target of her gaze froze, draped over the railing.
They died right there, letting out an endless scream.
Only after herding the people into the ship like that.
-Now, then. We will begin the interviews.-
The witch said.
Mysteriously, the voice reached even the people who had fled inside the ship.
Kwajik.
The Goblins, as if released from their shackles, began to run wild violently.
“Kyahak!”
“Keuhak!”
The witch herded them and entered the ship.
[The Goblins are entering the 4th floor.]
Behind them.
The Orc and Ogre just held their ground, as if it wasn't their turn yet.
***
Kkiik.
The man driving the bus stopped before the bridge spanning the river.
‘There’s still time.’
And then for a moment…….
After getting off the bus.
Tuuk.
He plucked a flower from the weeds.
It was two shabby, white flowers.
***
And inside the bus.
From her seat.
A woman watched his actions.
It was Kang Yuha.
‘Just who is that man?’
His face was vaguely familiar.
It wasn't clear, but should she say he looked like someone she had seen somewhere?
But he wasn't a celebrity she had seen on TV or the internet.
‘Who is he?’
He had tossed aside the employee ID that was around his neck.
Kang Yuha picked it up and checked the name.
‘Han Chulwoon?’
There was nothing else she could find out.
She was just scared.
Tearing open a closed bus door with his bare hands, or killing a person with a single punch.
They were things that made her shoulders flinch just thinking about them again.
But the bus he was driving dodged the cars speeding chaotically and plowed through the charging monsters.
No one could judge whether it was safer inside or outside this bus.
They were just too afraid of the man to talk to him, and too afraid of the monsters to get off.
There were so many corpses on the streets that even the shock of the murder Han Chulwoon had committed was faintly subsiding.
There were even people who felt relieved.
It might have been thanks to his indifference toward the passengers.
That man returned to the bus and tossed a flower.
Seureureuk.
The flower landed on the dead young man's chest like a snowflake.
Was it, perhaps, mourning?
But the man Kang Yuha saw was indifferent to the corpse.
He sat in the driver's seat without a single glance back, just staring at the dark front where nothing could be seen.
Just, as if waiting for something.
He put a cigarette in his mouth and checked his pockets.
At that moment, Kang Yuha was absurdly swept by the impulse to tell him that smoking was prohibited on the bus.
She was that kind of person.
A person who, despite this whole incident, followed proper common sense.
“Ah, Fuck.”
In that moment, Han Chulwoon said quietly.
“To forget a lighter……”
He leaned back in the chair and tilted his head back, chewing repeatedly on the filter of the unlit cigarette.
“…….”
Like that, for about 3 minutes.
Leisurely time passed.
In the process, he impressively smacked away a monster that tried to enter the bus.
Afterward.
“We're leaving, so hold on tight.”
He said.
Kwaak!
He stomped hard on the accelerator, driving the bus roughly.
The people staggered for a moment from the sudden start.
Geudeudeudeuk-
While advancing, the bus scraping and colliding several times.
On a certain bridge.
The bus that was rushing down the empty sidewalk…….
Kwaang!
It broke through the fence.
After jumping up for a moment from inertia, it fell, and the bus tilted downward.
Below it, there was a ship.