Chapter 55: The Devil’s Flower (1)
“Haaaah… I feel so languid.”
After indulging in his debauchery, Yoshida Satoru let out a long, lazy yawn.
Wearing nothing but underwear and a loose blue robe, he sprawled across the sofa.
The dozens of men and women who had been locked in the basement now lay limp and emaciated, as though every last drop of vitality had been drained from them.
In contrast, Yoshida Satoru looked rejuvenated—his white hair had turned jet black again, and the wrinkles on his forehead had completely vanished.
“Make sure you take good care of them until this body returns. Heh heh heh.”
He released black mana throughout the basement.
The mana transformed into something like moist dew and began seeping into the unconscious bodies.
The people captured by Satoru had been ordinary civilians at first, but through continuous exposure to black mana, they had gradually drifted beyond the boundaries of normal humanity.
Neither fully Awakened nor demons—just in an ambiguous, in-between state.
Like caffeine addicts, they could no longer function without black mana.
Some had died along the way, but whenever that happened, he simply ordered his subordinates to bring in fresh replacements.
Taiwanese people used solely to satisfy Satoru’s desires.
But when one considered the catastrophe soon to befall Taiwan, this was nothing more than a mild prelude.
“Let’s see… Hm?”
Satoru suddenly sharpened his senses at an unusual surge of mana.
It felt quite far away at first, yet it was approaching at terrifying speed.
A torrent of mana rushing toward him like a jet fighter.
Only a handful of hunters could unleash power on this scale.
Zero-grade hunters.
And when it came to China’s Zero-grades, there was only one official name.
Minister of National Defense Liu Qinglong.
The lunatic who had renamed himself “Qinglong” and even dyed his hair blue.
“How the hell did that shut-in training maniac know to come here?”
Even as one of the Seven Prophets, Satoru found Liu Qinglong to be an overwhelmingly burdensome opponent.
The man might be insane, but his raw combat power was the real deal.
China’s power brokers had once offered him the position of Chairman, only for him to refuse and devote himself entirely to training.
That was why they had placed him in the symbolic role of Minister of National Defense—to flaunt China’s strength.
Of course, Liu Qinglong had zero interest in politics.
Recently, after the repeated blunders of GODS elements within the Communist Party—including Zhu Yinchang—he had personally drawn his blade.
Satoru had assumed the man would just dance around a bit with his sword and then stop.
Liu Qinglong hated taking losses more than anything.
“No way…”
That was when it happened.
Kwaaaang!
A massive explosion roared directly above the basement where Satoru was staying.
The entire underground space shook violently, dislodging chunks of stone from the ceiling.
Then, a sly, sinister smile slowly spread across Satoru’s previously stiff face.
“Yes, yes… this too must be another trial bestowed upon this body! An opportunity to overcome it and prove myself once more to the Godfather!”
Tzzzt—
Satoru flung open a portal and returned to the contaminated zone.
He approached the gigantic Creep flower with its eye and—
Kwa-sss-sss—
Black mana erupted from his body and poured into the flower.
Kuoong— crack-crack-crack!
The flower’s stem grew thicker and longer, shooting higher into the sky.
At the same time, the petal-framed eye enlarged until it resembled a second sun hanging in the heavens.
“Heh heh heh… Once they see this, there’s no way they won’t come here.”
Beeeeeeee—
A bizarre, piercing sound erupted from the massive eye.
Ordinary people who heard it would have their latent lust amplified and turn violently aggressive.
Hunters would suffer mental interference as well.
“Ehehe… I can’t wait.”
Satoru linked his mind to the giant eye, sharing its vision.
Just as he prepared to enjoy the impending chaos in the city—
He spotted the place where Liu Qinglong had appeared.
“Hm? And what’s that?”
Satoru noticed a man standing opposite Liu Qinglong.
A young man in a black suit, who turned to look toward the eye.
Quite handsome and youthful.
“My type…”
He muttered to himself.
In that instant—
Black tentacles burst from the man’s chest and met the eye’s gaze.
“Hup!”
Satoru’s eyes widened as he desperately clung to his sanity.
***
Kuoong! Dudududu…
The city echoed with explosions and trembling earth.
On the streets, inside buildings—everywhere—citizens tore into one another, biting, clawing, and beating without restraint.
“Uwaaaaah!”
“Grrrrr!”
Taiwan’s downtown had become a living hell.
The few hunters still in their right minds rushed around trying to contain the situation as best they could, but their numbers were hopelessly insufficient compared to the scale.
Worse still, simply separating the frenzied people didn’t solve anything.
Those who had lost their minds attacked even hunters without hesitation.
Crack-crack!
A woman plummeted from a high-rise building, glass shattering around her.
A hunter who witnessed it kicked off the ground, soared upward, snatched her mid-fall, and instantly bound her body to subdue her.
“Kiyaaaak!”
She let out a beast-like shriek with eyes wide and feral, so he couldn’t risk releasing her.
The hunter who had caught and restrained her in an instant was none other than Tian Weimin, Vice President of the Taiwan Awakened Association.
“Could she be under the influence of that grotesque eye?”
He asked the woman who appeared beside him.
Association President Zhou Zihua glanced up at the towering giant eye and replied,
“That’s the only thing worth suspecting right now. Don’t stare at it too long. We don’t know what kind of effect it might have.”
“Yes. I’ll keep calling in more hunters.”
Zhou Zihua had already pinpointed the location from which the colossal eye had suddenly risen.
Taiwan’s largest contaminated zone—Taroko.
There was only one possible reason such a thing had appeared in a zone that had remained stable for years.
“GODS has reached even here…”
The only way to stop this chaos was likely to destroy that giant eye.
But the Taroko contaminated zone was a place even 1st-grade hunters hesitated to enter.
The bigger problem was that not a single 1st-grade hunter remained in Taiwan.
All the promising hunters—including the 1st-grades—had already defected to China long ago.
Taiwan’s hunter power had weakened to the point that the country was effectively under China’s thumb.
“Damn it.”
With only a 2nd-grade like Zhou Zihua and even weaker Taiwanese hunters, the situation was beyond salvaging.
In the end, they had no choice but to rely on China once again.
“Ah!”
In that moment, she remembered that Zero-grade hunters from the International Awakener Federation were currently visiting Korea.
Korea was farther than China, but still close enough for them to arrive quickly.
She immediately contacted the Federation through her watch.
***
‘What’s with you all of a sudden?’
Except for the early days when it hadn’t been trained, the tentacle had never acted like this before.
Yet the moment it locked eyes with that giant eye, it burst out excitedly and writhed.
『An instinctive pull. I must become one with it.』
‘I get it, so calm down.’
Jin-young forced the tentacle back inside and looked up at the massive eye.
Unlike when he had faced the Demon King in Renard, it didn’t place any burden on his mind.
Still, it gave off a strangely similar feeling.
Perhaps a tiny drop of the Demon King’s power had been mixed into its existence.
“Hey, Liu Qinglong…”
Jin-young turned to suggest heading toward the contaminated zone together—
Shwaaaa—
Liu Qinglong leaped high, riding the wind he generated in a gust, and flew straight toward the eye.
He must have judged the eye to be more urgent than Jin-young.
As expected of a Zero-grade—his situational awareness was sharp.
Kwa-tz-tz-tz—
Jin-young also erupted with psionic energy and soared into the air.
Shwoooo—
Following Liu Qinglong, he headed toward the contaminated zone.
The closer they got to the eye, the thicker the Creep toxin became in an instant.
They hadn’t even reached the outer edge of the contaminated zone yet, but the same dense toxic fog that belonged deep inside was already rising like heat haze.
‘What the hell are they planning?’
Jin-young stared at the eye and recalled events from before the regression.
There had been an incident where contaminated zones expanded across Taiwan, but he had never heard of or seen anything about a bizarre eye-bearing flower.
This wasn’t just a simple demonic transformation operation.
It was either something that would happen much further in the future—or an entirely new plan.
Jin-young suddenly remembered the moment he had been transferred to the Renard continent.
‘Back then the world was pure chaos—GODS’s global terrorism, contaminated zone expansions, Monster Waves everywhere.’
The bastards who had been scheming in the shadows and carrying out localized terror attacks had plunged the entire world into pandemonium overnight.
As if everything up until then had been mere rehearsal.
In the midst of that crucible of chaos, Jin-young had been wandering the Hongcheon contaminated zone, searching for any trace of his sister.
Then he had been swept up in a torrent of mana bursting from the depths.
‘And I woke up in Renard.’
Jin-young began to wonder if what GODS called the “Great Purification” might be connected to that event.
Of course, it was still just speculation. To get concrete answers, he would have to reach the Godfather himself.
And the prophets were crucial stepping stones toward that goal.
Lost in thought, Jin-young and Liu Qinglong arrived at the heart of the Taroko contaminated zone.
Liu Qinglong landed on the Creep without any protective gear, his body wrapped in a blue storm.
Shwoooo—
The wind swirling around him blew away the Creep toxin.
For ordinary hunters, maintaining such a technique would burn through mana too quickly to even attempt.
But for a Zero-grade with vast mana reserves and the ability to handle even small amounts with extreme efficiency, it was possible.
As Liu Qinglong stepped deeper into the zone, the thick toxic fog scattered in his wake.
Jin-young followed the path he cleared with ease.
Not long after, they reached an area free of toxic fog.
Just like the spot in the Hongcheon contaminated zone where Jacob and Layla had once schemed.
The difference this time was the existence of the gigantic eye-bearing flower.
And standing beside it was a perverted-looking old man wearing only underwear and a blue robe.
“Welcome, Liu Qinglong. I’ve been waiting for you to arrive.”
At the old man’s words, Liu Qinglong’s eyebrow twitched.
“A Japanese? If it’s the old pervert from GODS’s Japanese branch… then you must be the idiot called the Prophet of Lust.”
One of the Seven Prophets—Yoshida Satoru.
This was the first time Jin-young had seen him, but the perverted old man’s appearance alone was enough to identify him.
He had expected a prophet to exude the same overwhelming presence as a Zero-grade, but that wasn’t the case.
At best, he was at the very top tier among 1st-grades.
Liu Qinglong clearly held the advantage, yet he didn’t rush in recklessly.
A prophet’s visible strength was never their full power.
“Heh heh heh… That aside, who’s the cute little guy following behind? Despite the pretty face, he’s carrying something very dangerous.”
Satoru glanced at Jin-young and spoke.
“……”
Liu Qinglong also turned to look at Jin-young.
He had vaguely assumed the man was with GODS, but Satoru’s reaction made it clear he wasn’t.
“I have no idea what either of you is saying.”
In the end, Jin-young pulled Jacob out of subspace.
The heart of a contaminated zone was normally dangerous, but this fog-free area made it safe enough.
“Huh? Aren’t you Jacob?”
Satoru narrowed his eyes at Jacob emerging from the portal.
Jacob, having anticipated meeting a prophet, didn’t look particularly surprised.
“It’s been a while.”
“You’ve been missing lately… Did you betray GODS?”
“I have simply come to serve an existence far greater than the Godfather.”
At Jacob’s words, Satoru’s face twisted into a demonic scowl.
“There is no existence greater than the Godfather!”
Kwaaaaa—
Black mana exploded outward from Satoru’s body.
Liu Qinglong spun the wind around him more fiercely to blow the mana away.
Jin-young casually gathered it into a single mass with psychokinesis and had the tentacle absorb it.
The same happened to the mana directed at Jacob.
After devouring the black mana, the tentacle spoke.
『He and the flower are connected as one. If either dies, both will vanish together.』
‘Then what if I just drain all the prophet’s black mana and neutralize him?’
『If you absorb all his mana, the prophet will perish. He is one with the black mana.』
‘So he’s not even human?’
Jin-young had no intention of killing Satoru or destroying the flower just yet.
There was still a lot of information to squeeze out of Satoru, and the flower itself was worth investigating.
‘Doesn’t look like conversation’s going to work here anyway.’
For now, he decided to watch Liu Qinglong and Satoru clash while formulating a plan.
At that moment, Satoru raised both arms and shouted,
“Today, you shall witness a historic moment!”
Kugugugugu!
The ground trembled violently as the Creep bubbled like boiling water.
Pu-hwaak—
From the depths, grotesque lifeforms contaminated by Creep burst forth.
“Kigigigik…”
“Shishishit…”
They were 1.5 to 2 times the size of an adult male, crawling on all fours.
Their human-like faces only made them look more grotesque.
The bizarre creatures poured out madly across the entire contaminated zone.
Liu Qinglong exploded with mana, unleashing massive storms in all directions.
Shwa-kwa-kwa-kwa—
The creatures’ bodies disintegrated in the gales.
Jin-young pushed the storm aside with psychokinesis while summoning the Demonic Sword from subspace.
Kwa-jijijijik—
The sword flew like a bolt of lightning, scattering black lightning as it tore the creatures apart.
Taking the opening, Liu Qinglong charged toward Satoru like a storm.
Just as his fist was about to connect—
Crack-crack-crack— Kwaaaang!
A crimson bolt of lightning struck down from the black eye and slammed directly into Liu Qinglong.
Fssss…
But it was only an afterimage.
The real Liu Qinglong had successfully dodged backward.
“……”
The realization that he would have taken a direct hit if he had been even a fraction slower sent a rare wave of tension through him.
“Heh heh heh heh… Liu Qinglong. Truly befitting the title of the world’s fastest hunter.”
Liu Qinglong’s brow furrowed at the cackling Satoru.
The enemy’s power far exceeded his expectations—he could afford no carelessness.
Pu-kwa-kwa-kwak!
As the grotesque creatures swarmed toward the eye-flower and turned the area into a sea of blood and flesh—
“If I want to get rid of you lot, this body will have to step forward personally.”
The moment Satoru finished speaking, the creatures’ blood vaporized into red mist and wrapped around his body.
Shwooooo—
When the red mist cleared—
Something no longer human stood in its place.
Curved goat-like horns sprouted from his head, beastly fur grew across his body, and massive hooves replaced his feet.
Kwa-jijijijik—
The ground beneath him cracked as an overwhelming aura erupted outward.
“Ahh… It’s been so long since I unleashed my full power. I feel utterly refreshed.”
A power that far transcended 1st-grade—Zero-grade.
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