『SYSTEM MESSAGE: WARNING. THE [STAR-SEED] HAS NOT BEEN PROVIDED WITH ITS DAILY DOSE OF MANA.』
『SYSTEM MESSAGE: THE UNUSUAL DENSITY OF MANA AND NARRATIVE ENERGY FROM THE SUDDEN APPEARANCE OF AN [ABYSS KRAKEN] HAS MADE THE STAR-SEED HUNGRIER THAN USUAL.』
『SYSTEM MESSAGE: STAR-SEED IS FORCIBLY EXITING THE INVENTORY SUBSPACE.』
"Wait, not now—!"
Kang Min hissed, his eyes widening.
In the middle of the dark, panicked subway station, reality began to shimmer in front of his chest.
Yellow pixels, bright and sharp as fractured sunlight, materialized out of thin air.
Within seconds, the pixels coalesced into a spherical glass casing, glowing with an intense golden light.
The Star-seed hovered right in front of Kang Min's nose for a brief, confused second before it began to drift backward slowly and slowly.
It seemed like the egg and Kang Min had their eyes locked.
Kang Min's reflexes kicked in.
Before the survivors or the remaining players could fully process the glowing orb, he lunged forward, grabbed the Star-seed, and shoved it straight under his black t-shirt.
He stood there, frozen, his stomach now protruding in a perfect sphere.
He looked up to find the Tank who had launched Kim Jin into the sky staring at him with a look of pure, unadulterated bewilderment.
'Was he pregnant when we arrived here?'
He wondered, his mind struggling to compute the physics of a man suddenly developing a glowing, perfectly round belly.
He gave Kang Min a look of deep, silent judgment.
Kang Min maintained a stiff, incredibly awkward smile eyes closed.
Suddenly the Star-seed lurched to the left, dragging Kang Min's entire torso with it.
Then it lurched to the right.
"Stop it, you little—!"
Min whispered hoarsely
With a sudden, violent tug, the egg took off.
Kang Min was yanked off his feet, his hands wrapped tightly around the egg under his shirt as it dragged him across the station.
-CRASH!
"Son of a—!"
Kang Min yelled as his shoulder smashed into a concrete pillar, shattering the stone.
The egg didn't care.
It veered toward the tracks, slamming Kang Min's back into a stationary train car with a metallic clang that echoed through the tunnel.
"What the hell is that porter doing?!"
A player screamed.
"Is he flying?!"
Kang Min was currently a human kite, hugging the egg for dear life.
The Star-seed, seemingly offended by his cussing, took a sharp dive, slamming Min's face into the top of a train cart before pulling him back up into the air.
"You're a bad child! Do you hear me?!"
Min screamed, his voice fading as the egg accelerated.
"You aren't even born yet and you're already a delinquent!"
The Star-seed let out a pulse of indignant yellow light and shot straight up through the hole in the ceiling, dragging a screaming Kang Min into the open sky.
It reached the Kraken's tentacles in a flash of gold.
As it moved, it didn't dodge.I
It simply used Kang Min as a human battering ram, or rather, it moved with such force that everything in its path was obliterated.
It spiraled around a massive limb, slamming through the bodies of the spawning one-eyed monsters.
-Splat! Splat! Splat!
In one fluid, gore-filled motion, every monster on the tentacle was turned into a mist of green ichor.
Kang Min, now thoroughly soaked in monster blood and slime, was barely holding on.
"I'm going to ground you!
I'm going to put you on sale on the system shop...DO YOU HEAR ME??!!!"
The Kraken, sensing this golden nuisance, swung a secondary tentacle to swat them out of the sky.
The Star-seed instead increased its speed to a sonic roar and pierced right through the center of the massive limb.
SKREEEEE—!
The Kraken's roar was a tectonic tremor that shook the entire district.
The tentacle holding Woonhee was severed cleanly in half.
Her limp form, still wrapped in a segment of the rubbery meat, plummeted toward the roof of a nearby skyscraper, smashing through the top floor with a thunderous thud.
High above, Kim Jin was sliding down a separate limb, his eyes widening as he witnessed the golden streak.
He leaped from the tentacle, landing on the roof of the building where Woonhee had fallen.
He rushed to her, frantically unwrapping the slime-covered tentacle.
She was covered in purple goo, her face pale and unconscious, but she was breathing.
Kim Jin looked up at the sky.
[LIVE STREAM CHAT]
—"WHAT WAS THAT? Did anyone see that?!"
—"The camera just caught a yellow blur! Was that a skill?"
—"wait the Kraken is actually losing limbs!"
'Was that the new porter?'
Kim Jin asked himself, his brow furrowing.
Meanwhile, the Star-seed was circling the main body of the Abyss Kraken like a hungry shark.
Kang Min was still hugging the egg under his shirt, his hair windswept and matted with ichor.
"Stop! Stop right now!"
Min yelled, his voice cracking.
"I'll feed you!
I'll give you all the mana you want once we're back on the ground!
Just stop!"
The egg pulsed aggressively.
"I can't let go!"
Min screamed at the egg.
"We have a contract, you idiot!
If I let go at this height, I'll die!
Is that what you want? To be an orphan?!"
When the egg didn't slow down, Min tried a different tactic.
"Listen to your father!
What a disobedient child!
When we get home, I'm putting belt to your ass! Do you hear me?!"
'Does this thing want me to die?'
Min thought desperately.
The Star-seed seemed to take the threat of the belt personally.
It doubled its speed, turning into a saw-blade of golden light.
It zipped around the Kraken's remaining tentacles, slicing them all off in a flurry of light.
The massive limbs fell from the sky, crushing buildings, cars, and roads.
One particularly large tentacle crashed through the street and into the subway station below.
Down in the tunnel, the Tank and the other players scrambled, grabbing civilians and leaping out of the way just as the massive limb demolished the very train they had been hiding in.
The Star-seed then changed direction.
It dove toward the Kraken's main body.
It slammed into the beast's chest and began pushing, its golden light flaring with enough power to rival a sun.
It shoved the massive Abyss Kraken backward, higher and higher, forcing the mountain of meat back into the black-red gate.
Still dragging a protesting Kang Min, the egg surged through the event horizon.
Inside the gate, the world changed.
It looked like deep space, an endless void filled with swirling red nebulae.
Kang Min looked back to see the gate, the ruins of Seoul visible through the closing rift.
"HEEYYYY!!! WE'LL DIE HERE IF WE DON'T GET BACK!! TURN AROUND!"
『NOTIFICATION: THE STAR-SEED IS CONSUMING THE FABLE: [KRAKEN OF THE ABYSS].』
The Kraken's massive form began to break apart into billions of shimmering yellow particles.
The Star-seed hovered in the center of the nebula, acting like a vacuum.
The particles swirled into the egg, the golden light within it growing brighter, warmer, and more stable.
Kang Min's head spun.
His eyes began to drift shut.
But just before the darkness took him, he heard a sound.
「..a!」
「...ppa! 」
「Appa!」
Kang Min's head lulled to the side as he slipped into total unconsciousness.
****
In the silence of the Seoul night, the survivors and players watched as the black-red gate flickered and then snapped shut.
On the roof of the skyscraper, Kim Jin stood over Woonhee.
The system windows of every player in the area chimed in unison.
『EMERGENCY SUB-MISSION: [THE HUNGER OF THE DEEP] — CLEARED.』
『DISTRIBUTING REWARDS BASED ON CONTRIBUTION...』
『SYSTEM MESSAGE: CATASTROPHE CLEAR REWARDS』
『THE "LONG NIGHT" SURVIVAL MISSION HAS CONCLUDED.』
『CALCULATING INDIVIDUAL CONTRIBUTION...』
『REWARDS SHALL BE DISTRIBUTED TO ALL REGISTERED PLAYERS BASED ON THE MAGNITUDE OF THEIR VALOR. COINS WILL BE GRANTED ACCORDING TO THE TOTAL TALLY OF CALAMITIES ELIMINATED BY EACH PLAYER INDIVIDUALLY.』
『CALCULATION CRITERIA:』
『NORMAL-TYPE CALAMITY: 100 COINS PER KILL』
『ELITE-TYPE CALAMITY: 1,000 COINS PER KILL』
『COMMANDER-TYPE CALAMITY: 10,000 COINS PER KILL』
『CHECK YOUR PERSONAL INBOX FOR THE FINAL SETTLEMENT.』
A massive, world-wide announcement window appeared in the sky, glowing with a stern, golden hue.
『WORLDWIDE ANNOUNCEMENT: STAGNATION TRIAL PHASE 1 CONCLUDED.』
『HUMANITY IS EXPECTED TO CONQUER A NEW FLOOR WITHIN THE NEXT 3 MONTHS.』
『FAILURE TO PROGRESS WILL RESULT IN THE PERMANENT OPENING OF GREATER GATES.』
---
The survivors, still clutching the blankets and water bottles Kang Min had provided, stood amidst the rubble of the demolished train.
"The porter..."
An elderly woman whispered, her voice trembling as she clutched a small child.
"Where did he go?
He saved us... he took that thing back into the hole."
She looked toward the remaining players, her eyes pleading for a miracle.
"What will happen to him? He's coming back, right?"
The Tank looked at the ground.
He shared a grim glance with the other hunters.
Even the Variable X girl, standing further down the platform, remained eerily still, her eyes fixed on the spot where the gate had snapped shut.
"No one has ever been inside a gate before."
One of the players finally said, his voice flat and devoid of hope.
"If these gates are the arteries that bring the Abyss to our world... then he is at the source. He's in a place where those monsters are born... he'll be dead in minutes."
"There is nothing to do..."
The player replied solemnly.
"All we can do now is honor his bravery."
A somber atmosphere descended over the group.
Civilians wept quietly, and even the battle-hardened players bowed their heads.
They began the slow, mournful process of moving toward the exit, stepping over the severed tentacles of the Kraken.
However, an old man at the back of the group who had been the first to eat the ramen Min had cooked suddenly stopped.
He squinted through his spectacles, noticing a strange distortion from the corner of his eye.
"Look!"
He cried out, his spindly finger pointing toward the sky visible through the ruined ceiling.
The others looked up.
High above the skyscrapers, where the gate had been, the very fabric of reality was shivering.
A massive, jagged crack began to spider-web across the empty air, looking as if the sky itself were a mirror being struck by a hammer.
-Crrr-ack!
From the center of the fracture, a blinding bolt of yellow light erupted, plummeting toward the earth with the velocity of a falling star.
It whistled through the air, trailing golden sparks that illuminated the dark district.
As soon as the light passed through, the crack in the sky sealed itself instantly, smoothing over until the atmosphere looked untouched and serene once more.
-BOOM!
A deafening crash echoed from the street level just outside the station entrance.
The impact was so violent it sent a tremor through the subway floor.
The players and civilians scrambled up the stairs, driven by a desperate, frantic curiosity.
They burst onto the street to see a crater of smoke and twisted metal.
Laying in the center of the wreck, atop a luxury car that had been flattened into a pancake by the force of the descent, was an unconsious Kang Min.