Chapter 124: What Do You See?
Walking out of the surf, Seo-jin kept his breathing steady, posture loose, but every instinct in his body screamed to flee. The memory of the monstrous thing that almost killed him still hammered through his skull like a bell swung by giants.
He stepped onto the sand, let the water drain off him, and forced down the urge to shake the fear out of his bones. Grimm hovered at the side of his head, flickering in tight anxious loops.
The waves rolled in again, quiet, patient.
"I don't like this."
Thragdur's voice had dropped into a low growl. His four hands flexed, his aura swelling like a forge ready to rupture.
"Relax. Nothing's coming ashore."
"Sorry, Boss. You are about to eat those words."
Grey system light flashed around Gregor as he pulled his rifle free and backed up a step, barrel aimed at the waterline.
Beside him, Min crouched low, shield gauntlets blooming around her with a pulse of raw force. Her grin split wide.
"Drinkin, fuckin, fightin… best vacation I've had in years."
The dwarves went pink, Gregor choked, and even Seo-jin shot Thragdur a look. The forgemaster scowled, throat clearing like a boulder grinding loose.
"Brund uzûn, khazûn!"
His command snapped the dwarves into formation. Weapons rose. Hammers locked. Rifles cocked in a single harsh clatter.
Seo-jin pushed a pulse through the broodlink.
'Form up.'
'Yes, Broodfather!'
Snare and his swarm surged behind him, fangs dripping, claws twitching, eyes burning like scattered embers. Grimm pressed closer to his head, glow trembling.
Seo-jin swept the horizon with both normal sight and [Soul Sight]...nothing. No aura. No pulse. Nothing he could target.
"How far?"
Gregor spat into the black sand, eyes narrow and unblinking.
"You should see them now. There."
Every head turned.
Seo-jin followed Gregor's finger, and the cold he'd tried to bury punched straight back up his throat.
The ocean was bubbling.
[You really surprise me sometimes. Throwing your brain straight into the gutter when you make decisions is an impressive talent.]
'Yeah. I shock myself too.'
The ocean shifted. A wide patch of water began to froth, surface rolling like something underneath was boiling it alive. The churn angled straight for them. Only then did his [Soul Sight] finally catch it, an ugly cluster of green auras packed tight together.
His heartbeat steadied into a slow, even thud. He didn't even bother reaching for Butcher's Wrath.
"Back to the treeline! Gregor—first thing that touches sand, drop it. I'll handle the rest."
Everyone moved to his order, even while confusion cut across their faces. All except Min. She planted her feet, cracked her knuckles, and grinned like she was about to tear into dessert.
"You can suck my dick if you think I'm sitting out. Mama needs a stretch."
She slammed her fists.
From the ocean, the sound rolling toward them began to drown out the surf...wet thrashing, choked gurgles, the scrape of bodies grinding together beneath the tide. Gregor's aura flared hard enough to rattle the air.
"They're here!"
The churning mass reached the breakers. Something enormous dragged the water with it, bulk forcing the waves to bow and curl around it. Spots of reflected color glinted under the surface, eyes, plates, teeth, he couldn't tell.
The wave arched, then collapsed forward. A wall of bloodlust hit the shore and cracked open, spilling bodies.
BANG!
Gregor's rifle snapped a beam of light so bright it carved the shadows apart. The shot split midair into six streaks and punched holes clean through the first row of Abyssal beasts hauling themselves up the sand.
Recognition surged like vomit. Seo-jin's stomach clenched.
Trenchers.
Everyone on the beach locked up. Even him.
Compared to most monsters, hell, compared to anything dragged in from other realms, Trenchers were bottom-feeders. D-rank at their peak, but most barely scraped F or E. Two feet tall, built like a mess someone slapped together in the dark. Part crab shell, part octopus flesh.
Hard carapace like rusted armor, all ridges and spikes that never lined up right. Tentacles dragging behind them in wet knots, curling and uncurling like they were searching for a throat. Their eyes burned low and red inside the shell, faint but hungry.
Every mouth was a ring of teeth that didn't match, some serrated, some blunt, all packed tight enough to grind bone to paste. Two claws clicked nonstop, not strong enough to crack metal, but strong enough to shear a finger or take a chunk out of a calf if you slipped.
Weak. Annoying. But only when they crawled alone.
"Trenchers" wasn't their real name, no one remembered it, no one cared. The nickname stuck because of what they did. During the Convergence, these little crab-octopus bastards turned whole fronts into slaughter pits. In swarms they ate ground the way fire erased snow, dragging whole chunks of land into the surf for whatever waited below.
Today, they wouldn't get the chance.
[Corpse Harvest // Activated]
[Sacrifice // E Rank]
[Summon +3 Lesser Broodling // F Rank]
Black smoke boiled up inside the swarming mass.
[-12 SM]
[SM // 39/51]
[Black Pit // Activated]
[-30% Speed / Radius 4m / Duration 30 sec]
The sand under the Trenchers writhed. Their scuttling slowed, joints dragging as the smoke sharpened into a shriek. Then a thunderclap hit the beach. Min slammed into their ranks, her aura burning gold.
Just more bodies.
[Corpse Harvest // Activated]
[Sacrifice // F Rank]
[Summon +1 Lesser Broodling // F Rank]
[Corpse Harvest // Activated]
[Sacrifice // E Rank]
[Summon +3 Lesser Broodling // F Rank]
[Corpse Harvest // Activated]
[Sacrifice // F Rank]
[Summon +1 Lesser Broodling // F Rank]
Smoke swallowed the field. Clicks, scrapes, and wet cartilage pops rolled through the haze as the Trenchers struggled to crawl forward, only for the screeching to rise over everything.
Beside Seo-jin, Gregor's rifle dipped. His aura froze. He stared at Seo-jin, then at the battlefield, color draining from an already pale face.
The tide churned red. Broodlings began tearing free from every corpse.
Seo-jin didn't move. He only pointed. Each gesture claiming a fallen crab, each kill Min punched, stomped, or ripped apart erupting into smoke before it even hit the sand. Even she halted, springing out of the melee to watch the field twist under his command.
They enemy clawed forward, pincers stabbing into wet sand, bodies dragging in a frantic surge toward prey. Then the line buckled. Fast. From inside their own ranks, teeth and claws began to tear into existence and shred the nearest Trencher.
The front stopped advancing...it folded. The swarm turned inward, twisting over itself in a churning pit of smoke, shell, limbs, and blood, writhing like a school of fish eating its own tail.
Small experience ticks blinked across Seo-jin's UI rapidly. He glanced at the humans, both stood rigid, faces stretched thin with disbelief. Good. They needed to see this. After today, as long as he stayed ahead, he shouldn't need to prove himself to the two ever again.
Hundreds of Trenchers still crawled in the surf. Broodlings filled ranks as each corpse hit the sand, but with Min out of the melee he needed to push harder. It would also help drive his message further.
He pressed the hidden rune beneath his pauldron.
Two metal snaps cut the air as the Twinback Growths unfurled. They shrieked and vomited immediately.
Behind him, meat slammed against the beach. Wet lumps heaved, swelled, and dragged themselves together, quivering knots of flesh stitching into new shapes. Min and Gregor went cold watching them form. Even the dwarves, locked between fear and respect, stared with a pride born only from recognizing brutal strength.
Over the battlefield, Seo-jin's bloodlight flared, freezing every motion on the beach for a single breath as he raised both arms towards his prey.
"Devour everything."
On one knee, Pain, Snare, Hex, Widow, and Bile responded as one.
"Yes, Broodfather!"
The two Commanders hit the sand first, their newest brothers a few steps behind. Pain and Snare's troops followed without hesitation, fire-lit broodlings and broodlings with stolen guns driving their lessers forward in a crushing wave.
Pain launched himself high, ripping Surtur's Tooth out of his burning throat mid-air. He crashed into the heart of the swarm like a burning meteor made of meat and steel, his greatsword carving a crater of splitting shells and boiling ichor.
Hex drifted in after him, moving with a loose, effortless sway. Even sightless, nothing touched him. Claws, fangs, and elbows cut in tight arcs, every motion clean and certain, every kill a neat, efficient offering to the Broodfather.
Widow and Bile barreled in next, rookies, but rabid. Bile shocked Seo-jin the most, the little bastard foaming with a frenzy that made his earlier cowardice look staged.
Snare directed them all, voice sharp over the carnage. Each skill, every command hit like steel through viscera, guiding broodlings through gaps, exploiting breaks, dragging the enemy apart with clean, surgical violence.
With the Commander Skill [Terrain Advantage] their father earned from slaying Lilid, Pain and Snare's troops moved across the shifting sand like it was solid stone. Every broodling kept perfect footing. Even the Trenchers, born from the depths, slipped and lurched in comparison.
Blood sheeted across the beach, waves pulling ribbons of red back into the sea.
Death walked the island again, and the Brood screamed for more.
"What do you see?"
Seo-jin's voice rolled out low, steady. Min and Gregor barely heard him, but Thragdur did, though he stayed quiet, arms crossed, knowing the question wasn't his.
Neither human responded.
"Answer me!"
His aura erupted. Bloodlight blasted out in a wave that drowned the battlefield's noise.
"What do you see?!"
Gregor cracked first. His reply crawled out of him small—
"Strength..."
Then surged—
"...and I see that bastard's death!"
Aura flaring wild, his rifle vanished into storage and his pistols snapped into his hands. Laughing like something unhinged, he charged straight into the red haze, guns barking in manic rhythm.
Head bowed, Min's face was swallowed in shadow. Her body twitched...muscles coiled, veins writhing like flood dragons under her skin. The sand trembled, her feet digging deeper as her aura grew. A massive spectral shark manifested over her, jaws wide, spirit-flesh writhing as she lifted her head and roared.
"I see war!"
She launched forward, ground splitting under her heels, firing through the battlefield like a missile aimed straight at slaughter.
Heavy footfalls thudded up behind him, steady as a war drum. Thragdur didn't need an introduction, his presence weighed on the air like hammered iron.
"Mind if I join in?"
Seo-jin glanced over. Both sets of the dwarf's arms were plated in raw steel, flexing like living forge-work. Even from where he stood, he could hear the forgemaster's pulse, it was slow...volcanic.
"You may."
Pressure detonated outward as Thragdur let his unseen aura break loose. The force shoved against Seo-jin's skin, dense and violent. The dwarf launched forward in a single bound, and the first Trenchers that met him burst under his fists, no bodies left, nothing for Corpse Harvest to cling to. Just spray.
Gunfire cracked behind him. Dwarves roared as they thundered in after their chief, boots chewing through sand, barrels flashing like strobe fire.
Then Seo-jin stood alone, save for Grimm hovering at his shoulder. The little ghost twitched, jerky and frantic. Begging for release.
"You can go too."
Blue sparks rippled across Grimm's bones. Ribs twisted, organs writhed, and the creature shrieked as it tore forward, darting between limbs and claws, spinning through gore like a child through puddles.
[You were right. Watching things for yourself really makes a difference.]
'Imagine it...do you see it? Do you see what they'll become?'
[Legion.]
The word struck something deep inside him. Something older than hate, older than hunger. A slow ignition of murder that hummed through his DNA, not wild or frantic, but rooted and absolute. A truth, not an emotion.
What unfolded before him wasn't just a display for his humans. It wasn't simple motivation. It wasn't theater.
It was a message. A declaration.
A warning.
The world would see it. The Network would feel it.
The Brood was growing.
----
They were forced to wait another full day for the sea to settle, waiting for whatever had stained the horizon red to drift back into its depths. The island held its breath. Almost all drowned the time in noise, but two sank into a deep silence.
The only two humans on the island spent that day buried in their own heads, memories and emotions shaken loose by hope they'd kept buried.
Dwarves and broodlings drained their last casks together. Crab meat filled every hall, piles of steamed flesh and cracked shell, ale spilling across stone floors, voices slurred and loud. A strange, drunken peace.
Now back at sea, Seo-jin had felt that familiar unease crawl over him the moment the boat cut away from shore. But after hours without a single aura flickering beneath the waves, the tightness finally eased from his shoulders. He leaned into the cold spray, letting it slap against his face as they cut a line toward Shatterbay.
Gregor was the one who broke first. He stepped beside him at the bow, leaned his weight into the railing, and rubbed a slow hand across his bald skull.
"I stay behind while you and Min go out to level."
Seo-jin lifted a brow. He'd planned exactly that, but hearing Gregor volunteer it forced his curiosity.
"What's your reasoning?"
Gregor glanced back toward the cabin, then gave a tired half-smile.
"Think she would do it?"
Seo-jin huffed, shook his head once.
"She wouldn't be able to do what needs doing either."
Gregor's jaw tightened as he faced the water again, eyes narrowed at the dark stretch ahead. Watching him, Seo-jin felt a thought creep up and break the moment.
"Oh—right. Our contract. I forgot with everything going on. When we get back I'll write out—"
"No need."
Gregor cut him off without raising his voice. Just stating a truth.
"Min's the same. We already decided. We follow you regardless the outcome. Even if we end up enemies of the world—you keep your word, demon. That's enough."
Then Gregor did something Seo-jin never imagined in any memory...his or the original's.
Gregor went to one knee, and bowed his head.
"Broodfather."
The system struck instantly.
[System // Notification]
[Title // Broodfather // Upgraded]
[Effect Added]
He wanted to laugh. Wanted to mock the melodrama. But instead, Wohan Seo-jin...Azakh-Tur...the Broodfather, let his Bloodlight answer for him.
Crimson roared out across the sea, staining the water long before dusk could take the sky.