Chapter 282: Earth (5)

Year 2023.

China declared war on the new Korean government, which had unified the Korean Peninsula as it pleased.

The pretext was the Sino–North Korean Mutual Assistance Treaty.

Just like the mutual defense treaty between South Korea and the United States, China claimed that, since North Korea had been invaded, it had to intervene to help it.

Strictly speaking, it was more like a coup d’état carried out by Park Sirin, but either way China felt confident.

In Korea there were three rankers known as the Ten Greats, but in the end they were still humans.

China believed that, with the support of its overwhelming military power and its own high-level Park Sihoo, they could easily crush such a small country.

— Thanks to Vladimir Horowitz from Russia, the attention of the U.S. military is focused there.

— Our pretext is solely the liberation of North Korea. If they block us, we won’t hesitate to start a nuclear war.

Furthermore, there was another intention—getting rid of their own Park Sihoo.

The Park Sihoo were beings who surpassed humans, and high-level ones were equivalent on their own to tens of thousands of soldiers.

But the Communist Party did not like having such monsters within the country.

Some were given fortunes and appointed to high-ranking Party positions to keep them under control, but even so, no one could guarantee they wouldn’t rebel.

After all, the absolute dictator of Russia had ended up with his skull split open by the Russian Park Sihoo, Vladimir Horowitz.

The number of Park Sihoo a country had determined its development and its future, but for the Communist Party, their priority had always been personal power, above national development.

Xi Jinping did not want to end up torn apart like Putin.

Thus, their plan to throw their Park Sihoo into the battlefield to wear down and eliminate that “internal threat” worked too well.

— Huh?

Too well, literally.

Because all the Park Sihoo they sent died.

Not only those deployed as special forces, nor only the two high-level ones who secretly wished for Luo Yuhao and Huan Chong to die—every high-level Park Sihoo China had was crushed on the battlefield.

— Th-this can’t be…

And it didn’t end there.

The Northern Theater Army Group advancing toward Pyongyang, the aircraft carrier fleet entering through the Yellow Sea coast, and the hundreds of planes taking off to bomb Seoul,

— What’s happening? Why is there no contact with the commander of the 78th Army Group?!

— The North Sea Fleet has disappeared! Even the submarines stopped sending reports!

— The planes heading to the peninsula—why did they stop?! A malfunction? If not, how is it possible that hundreds don’t move?

Disappeared.

Not “annihilated,” not “retreating” literally erased from the map.

Without a doubt, the appearance of the Park Sihoo had changed modern military history.

The feats these superhuman individuals could perform were “astonishing.”
But, in other words, they were not impossible to replace.

Magic could be compensated for with missiles and artillery.

A superhero’s physical strength could be replaced with modern armament.

A country could defeat any Park Sihoo as long as it acted with enough power.

Or so they believed… until they understood.

There existed a being whose capacity completely transcended human imagination.
An existence capable of doing things neither
strategists nor scientists on the planet could comprehend.

The Demon God Park Sirin.

The nuclear missile bases, ready for a final desperate attack, melted under lightning storms that crossed continents.

The armored groups of tanks and armored vehicles fused under an inferno of flames.

The famous Chinese aircraft carrier fleet was torn apart by a tornado.

Hundreds of planes froze in the sky, turned into floating “decorations” between Korea and China.

And in Beijing, Xi Jinping and thousands of high-ranking Communist Party members were skinned alive.

Park Sirin bound them and broadcasted to all Chinese media.

[roadcast it live, you bastards.
If you don’t, I’ll detonate a magic worse than a nuclear bomb in each of your megacities.]

The sole president of Unified Korea, Park Sirin, was a lunatic completely beyond scale.

She applied healing magic and awakening magic to keep them alive and conscious, then lit fuses in their navels and burned them alive with a curse that imposed conditions.

[For every 100 million yuan of assets — including family — the time increases by one day.]

100 million yuan… about 20 billion won.

A government official could never accumulate such fortune.

One might think that, even with corruption, “two days” would already be a lot.

But the one who had the least burned for 100 days before dying.

At first, Chinese citizens were horrified, but soon they began throwing excrement at the high-ranking officials burning alive.

— Damn thieves! How much money did you steal?!

— The poorest had 10 billion? Vampires who drank the blood of the people!

To this day, Xi Jinping and several dozen officials are still burning.

Chinese and Korean people online watch the real-time broadcast as an ongoing spectacle.

— When will Xi die? Why has he been burning for 13 years?

— 5,014 days so far… calculated in won that’s 964.192 billion hahaha

— Didn’t news come out 20 years ago that he stole 4 quadrillion?

— Lol, with that amount he’ll have to roast alive another 500 years XD

— At this point it’s almost admirable…

Unfortunately, the curse included regeneration, so party members who stole tens or hundreds of quadrillions would continue burning endlessly.

As a result of the shock, uprisings exploded across all of China.

The people killed officials just for being officials and ran the wealthy through with spears.

Karl Marx would be applauding from hell—it was the birth of absolute egalitarianism where everyone was equally poor.

With internal collapse, China split.

Eastern China, supported by the Korean Magical Empire as a puppet state.

Western China, formed by the few surviving military forces from the former eastern and northern regions.

Park Sirin said, “I love China, I wish there were more Chinas.”

But after seizing nearly 10,000 trillion yuan confiscated from officials, the people finally united.

A new “Imperial China” was proclaimed, and they devoted themselves to developing a dimensional portal.

But their mages were insufficient—the high-level ones had been destroyed by the Demon God.

— I know a method.

That was when the Canton Park Sihoo, Li Chao, appeared.

In Arhan Legend of Heroes, he was a blood mage, a dark hero–type class that increases power and followers by sacrificing lives.

— According to my research, in human blood and organs there is a small amount of mana.

— This also applies to earthlings.

With one sentence, the few surviving leaders understood what he needed.

And, in accordance with their tradition of despising human life, they began offering sacrifices—criminals, the elderly, the disabled.

The most heavily sacrificed were Uyghur Muslims and Tibetan Buddhists.

While the world remained in chaos due to the Park Sihoo incident, Western China continued feeding Li Chao for thirteen years.

In the battle against Hwaran, he died at level 67.

But after 13 years sacrificing 2.7 million lives, he was reborn as the first level 99 blood mage, a true God of Blood.

The New Zhonghua Empire proclaimed the great mage Li Chao, heir of the Han bloodline, as the new president, and for the eternal glory of the nation announced the new Dimensional Portal.

And so the gigantic Blood Circle “The Gate of Truth” was born, drawn across all of Tibet.

It was a mega-magic that would turn every living creature in the region into a sacrifice.

A spell conceived for immortal beings like vampires—performed with human lives.

The result was a monstrous ritual.

And in 2036, the Tibetan Government-in-Exile mobilized all its forces to stop it.

At that moment…

— Wh-what…?

From the incomplete dimensional portal emerged the terror that scarred generations of Park Sihoo—the third great Game Over boss.

Heavenly Raksha Hwaran.

***

—Tap! Tap! Tap! Tap!

People gather.

They gather toward the center.

They bow and prostrate.

In that hell where everyone believed they would die without escape, there was a girl who saved people by confronting the Chinese army that massacred civilians mercilessly.

“Holy Buddha.”

“Incarnation of the Bodhisattva Vajrasattva.”

They revered that young girl whose presence had expelled evil thoughts and demons—a Fierce Deity in the form of a maiden.

“I’m not any Buddha or anything like that.”

It seemed they had misunderstood her. Hwaran had only saved some people she saw in danger and punched the evil horde.

“It’s not that they truly believe you are a bodhisattva.”

It was an old man. Shaved head, old and austere tattoos that had nothing to do with the colorful tattoos of the young monks of his generation.

“They believe the Bodhisattva sent you to save us.”

“I don’t even know who a bodhisattva is.”

The old man let out a hearty laugh.

“I know that. But for some reason, you are here now. You did what you believed was right and saved us, didn’t you?”

“…”

Hwaran didn’t fully understand the old man’s words. It sounded similar to those Taoist teachings spoken in sutra-like phrases.

She had simply thought that her lover would have been happy if he had seen her act like this.

A pure child, like a blank sheet, is colored by the adult closest to them.

“You’re young to have such power. Don’t think too deeply. Enlightenment and truth are not difficult matters.”

The old man took Hwaran’s hand. His old, wrinkled hands clung to hers for a long moment as he blessed her, reciting teachings.

“It is not that Buddha saves people. People become Buddha by saving others.
Whoever saves lives and accumulates merit—how would they not walk the Buddha’s path?”

“I don’t understand well what religious people say.”

The old man laughed softly again.

Such a pure child had been dyed by a warm color; someone warm must be by her side, he thought.

“Where are you heading?”

“To Korea. Do you know it?”

“Of course. It is the country that extends eastward from here.”

“Then east.”

The old man did not stop her. He did not ask her to help them nor to lend her power.

“Since I’m already passing through, I’ll take care of whatever’s left.”

Behold.

That young bodhisattva.

The white crane flying from a human body, ascending like an auspicious omen.

The 15th Dalai Lama prostrated before her as Hwaran walked away.

***

Lichao was a young nationalist molded by typical Chinese education.

Under Xi Jinping’s leadership, the 1.3 billion citizens enjoyed paradise on earth; the pigs of the decadent West only envied them.

Oh, great China. Heir of the great Han people, I offer this body for this perfect nation.

Seen from the outside, it was the kind of education that would make anyone ask, “Are they idiots?”

From kindergarten he had been fed Communist Party propaganda.

Anyone raised like that since childhood inevitably becomes a fanatic.

But China fractured, and Lichao became—or so he believed—the country’s last hope.

Thus he rallied forces shouting, “Overthrow the Korean Magical Empire. Overthrow the demon goddess Park Sirin.”

If some citizens died in the process, to him they were merely “small sacrifices” for the restoration of glorious China.

His ideas were childish and extreme, but he had real power.

And he was convinced that this power surpassed even that of Park Sirin herself.

Of course.

Everyone has a plan.

Until they take the first hit.

—BOOOOM!!

—BOOOOM!! Bang!! BOOOOOM!!

“Wh-what is this?”

The army of the new Chinese Empire was composed almost entirely of jiangshi soldiers.

Criminals, dissidents, outcasts—their organs were removed, their bodies stuffed with cotton, and they were turned into undead.

Efficient. Cheap.

And that entire army was being destroyed before his eyes.

“Is that… the Heavenly Raksha Hwaran?!”

They had heard that a mysterious figure had appeared and destroyed the magic circle that would have turned Tibetan civilians into sacrifices.

They thought it must be some Western Park Sihoo.

But Heavenly Raksha Hwaran?

She was the boss of Act 3.

The nightmare that had caused countless Park Sihoo to get game over.

Lichao had also died to her.

The sacred chain that was supposed to restrain her fed on her aura and grew endlessly, smashing thousands of jiangshi with each strike.

“…”

“Grrr… Grrrrrrrr!”

Hwaran struck the jiangshi with the same indifference as always.

That coldness had once been trauma for Lichao.

That monster who had torn off his limbs without emotion.

Now she was annihilating his army.

“Ggggrraaaaaah!! Heavenly Rakshaaaa!!”

Driven by trauma, Lichao unleashed magic.

A sea of red blood covered the land.

A major spell that concentrated the power of ten thousand sacrifices.

—Boom!

—Rumble!

The jiangshi were pulverized under the rain of blood.

But Hwaran received it without even blinking.

“…”

Of course.

She was a Heavenly Raksha body in its most extreme form.

An area-of-effect attack could never hurt her.

“Are you… the blood mage Lichao?”

“Ha! Finally saying my name? In the game you looked down on me!”

“???”

‘What is this guy talking about?’

‘I don’t know. Hwa, do you know him?’

‘Not at all.’

Unaware of these inner conversations, Lichao smiled like a madman.

“I lost some jiangshi, but if I capture you, I’ll recover any loss. With three hundred thousand sacrifices I could create talismans to control you!”

“Who said I’m going to wait?”

Her declaration that she would beat him right there made Lichao let out a nervous laugh.

“You plan to defeat me? Me, the Blood God? I possess more magical power than Park Sirin herself! I’m special rank! A million jiangshi and 450 million citizens support me!”

“Blood God?”

Hwaran’s eyes narrowed.

She knew the power of gods.

The Danann of Light, of Beauty, of the Sun, of Justice.

Each one a monstrous being, even beyond her.

Even though she had absorbed the essence of the Heavenly Demon and was stronger than ever, she could not lower her guard before a true god.

“Behold this great spell! It is the pinnacle of magic that surpasses the God of Magic!”

The blood on the ground concentrated into a gigantic spear, which was launched toward Hwaran.

Great Blood Spell, Shura Blood Spear

“???”

Hwaran tilted her head.

She didn’t even try to dodge.

“Hahahahaha! Did I scare you?! Anyone would—!”

Tap!

“Ow.”

Thud!

“Huh?”

The gigantic blood spear crumbled like wet sand against a rock.

Lichao was left gaping.

Hwaran was unharmed.

“This is stronger than a high-level spell.”

Basic, intermediate, advanced, supreme, great magic.

Everything had ranks.

When Lichao died, he had been level 67—he had barely finished intermediate spells and was just beginning advanced ones.

And on Earth, leveling up did not give you skill points.

You had to study magic. Understand it. Develop it.

Lichao had only inflated the size of an advanced spell without mastering it.

“You…”

“D-don’t come closer.”

Hwaran walked toward him.

He was going to die again. That monster would kill him again.

“Don’t come near, demon beast! I am the rightful heir of the Han people and the rightful ruler—!”

Something grabbed his ankle.

Bam! Bam bam!

Forward, backward, sideways—bam bam!

Until his magical barrier shattered into pieces.

Seven times.

Seven slams against the ground were enough to destroy all his magic.

“H-hgeeeeh…”

As Lichao groaned with his entire body fractured, Hwaran commented with total coldness.

“A very weak god.”

For a self-proclaimed “god,” it was the most devastating insult possible in the 21st century.