Chapter 349: Ragnarok (1)

Just after Kang Geom‑Ma vanished into the sky, the training field fell into a sudden hush. He had disappeared without a word.

Instinctively, they all felt that something grave was unfolding, but their minds needed a moment to catch up—that’s cognitive dissonance.

Everyone reacts in their own time.

Those closest to Kang Geom‑Ma reflected that shock most quickly in their eyes.

Ryozo, the archer, reacted fastest of all.

“…Evacuate.”

Ryozo murmured, her gaze fixed skyward. It was blanketed beneath swirling black clouds. Beyond that ashen curtain, something ominous stirred.

Rumble…

The clouds quivered, as though they could bear it no longer.

The tension was palpable.

***

Boom!

Crackle!

Lightning struck among the clouds.

Each flash painted a silhouette of colossal figures—like giants atop a celestial palace.

There were two.

One was, unmistakably, Kang Geom‑Ma—Ryozo could tell by the outline alone.

But who was the other?

It went without saying.

Ryozo shouted into her cell phone mic.

“Initiate evacuation orders, now!”

“Y‑yes, understood!”

Across the line, Choi Seol‑Ah nodded furiously.

She relayed the command to the Parsy Academy.

Moments later, she reached Director Dante, stationed on the far end of the field.

No rest—he immediately ordered evacuation blasts across the entire camp.

Confusion among the Parsy contingent was clear even from afar; professors and guests alike wore perplexed expressions.

Then Director Dante’s voice rang out.

“What are you waiting for? Move now!”

“But… you should explain—”

“Explain what? The alert clearly warns of casualties without evacuation!”

Impatient, brutal. The assembled were uncomfortable, yet had no choice but to comply.

Kang Geom‑Ma’s sudden disappearance. The worsening weather. Any mind could grasp the gravity.

Ryozo watched as civilians evacuated, then turned back.

Abel and Leon had drawn their weapons.

Shing.

The Lady of the Sword, Abel, wielded her twilight weapon, which had once belonged to the Swordmaster.

The hero Leon held his resonant sword, a symbol of good and evil.

Without taking their eyes off the sky, they unsheathed their weapons with precise movements.

After looking at the sky, they looked at each other. In that brief exchange of glances, they were about to coordinate their next move.

“Wait!”

Yu Sein burst into the field with an explosive jump. Ryozo and Abel were slightly surprised; after all, the saint usually had a fragile image.

But now, wrapped in a radiance, she appeared like a lightning bolt between them.

Ryozo and Abel, feeling betrayed without knowing why, focused on her.

“It’s good to take initiative, but right now you can only do one thing. For one minute, just that. Before that, with all due respect, you’d only be getting in Kang Geom-Ma’s way.”

“Then… you know what’s going on, Yu Sein?”

“I’m the saint, remember?”

Yu Sein avoided a long explanation. She didn’t have the same style as Speedweapon, who enjoyed detailing everything.

“I’m not going to tell you to do exactly what I say. Not everything can be controlled. But this you must remember.”

With a stern look, she addressed Kang Geom-Ma’s close friends.

“Do you remember the events we did at the festival?”

“The capture the flag one.”

“The one with Sköll and Hati.”

Yu Sein nodded and continued.

“When those 60 seconds are up, act as if you’re following the rules from those events. This situation is like a League of Le… you know, something rule-based.”

“What’s that…?”

Yu Sein was momentarily stunned.

They had basically told her “what’s that, nerd?” to her face. “This is why muggles…,” she thought, and clicked her tongue.

“…Just follow the rules of those two events.”

“Understood.”

Ryozo accepted without objection.

It was an urgent situation.

“It’s better to listen to Yu Sein than waste time arguing.”

Too many captains sink the ship.

“As expected from the director.”

Yu Sein smiled brightly.

Ruuumble.

Gut-wrenching screams began to echo throughout the field.

But Joaquin’s group remained relatively calm.

‘Do we just have an exceptional recovery capacity?’

Not at all.

It was a matter of experience.

They had spent their school years alongside Kang Geom-Ma.

And even after that.

They had faced numerous emergencies.

Their resolve had been hardened. In fact, they had gone even further.

They wanted to help Kang Geom-Ma in moments like this.

Whether through social support or personal power, Ryozo and Abel had never stopped training.

And they weren’t the only ones.

Leon, Speedweapon, and the others also did their part.

They recovered from the impact immediately. Neither despair nor panic helps in a crisis.

“Yu Sein.”

They don’t look away from disaster.

Even when everyone else retreats, they advance.

They don’t follow the ordinary path.

“Tell us what we need to do.”

That’s why they’re called heroes.

***

A new slash across the horizon opened in a space infinitely close to the universe.

It was the scar left by Kang Geom-Ma’s cut.

Its sheer size resembled a boundary dividing heaven and earth.

Kang Geom-Ma lowered both of his sashimi blades and looked up like a flash of lightning.

He had only severed the interference of the suppression force.

The true form of the enemy still stood firm.

Whoooshhhhhhhhhh.

Amidst a rain of arrows, the Knight of Conquest, Ragnarok, exclaimed in awe.

=You’ve severed the interference of the suppression force=

“That’s simply my skill.”

=The Power to cut anything. That’s not a power meant for protection. Its nature leans closer to destruction than to defense=

“Even a knife’s purpose depends on how it’s used. Don’t criticize how I wield it.”

The old knight let out a hollow laugh, his face grotesquely wrinkled.

=Do you truly not know where that blade will end up pointing?=

“For now, it’s aimed at you.”

=So arrogant. And yet, with such power, that arrogance becomes all the more pitiful…=

At that moment—

Fwoooooooosh!

The arrows, mere dots in the distance before, suddenly closed in.

Their sharp brilliance made the fur of Sköll and Hati stand on end.

— Grrrrrrr!

There was no time to lose.

Kang Geom-Ma used [Transfer Blessing] and boosted his [Electric Magic] into Sköll and Hati.

The shock therapy worked. Sparks tore through the air around them.

Just before the wave of arrows hit, the wolves regained their momentum.

Kang Geom-Ma leapt from Sköll’s back.

He stroked the necks of the two wolves and said.

“Leave the arrows to me. You two handle that ‘sun’ and ‘moon.’”

— Grrr?

“Don’t overthink it. Until recently, those things were shackles to you. Don’t you want revenge?”

— Grrrr!

Sköll and Hati bared their fangs fiercely.

— Awoooooooo!

— Awoooooooo!

They let out a war cry and split in two directions, their legs pounding the ground with power.

Lightning-shaped wolves raced toward the sun and the moon.

=You think a pair of insignificant beasts can interfere with the judgment of the Suppression Force?=

Ragnarok barely raised his bow when Kang Geom-Ma had already stomped the air.

The clouds beneath his feet burst as if they’d been shot through.

BOOOOM!

He surged like a whirlwind—at a speed too fast to track, overloading the space around him.

He had fully unleashed his divinity.

The slash, charged with all his might, exploded.

In a clash between transcendents, no foresight matters.

No mental calculation could compare to the sheer force of a single strike.

Murasame flared violently.

Space tore open, revealing a milky interior.

Where the blade passed, a cosmic color emerged in a triangular form.

Whummmmm!

The wind roared.

The wounded dimension created a suction force.

That rift sucked in the arrows of conquest and pestilence like a vacuum.

It couldn’t absorb all of them, but Yu Sein had told him to leave the rest to her.

So Kang Geom-Ma complied.

Slash!

His arm drew a wide arc.

The dimension bled a crude oil-colored fluid. In return, the wave of arrows was completely swallowed.

Sköll and Hati deftly dodged the remaining arrows.

With the speed they ran toward the sun and moon, they’d arrive in moments.

=……=

Ragnarok was the emissary of the suppression force.

Not being human, he couldn’t express emotions with his face.

But even emotions have a scent.

Claaaaaaang!

Sashimi blade and bow clashed with a searing sound.

The impact made the clouds tremble.

At the point where weapons met, the eyes of the two transcendents locked.

“I had my doubts.”

At a distance where they could feel each other’s breath, Kang Geom-Ma widened his eyes.

“If the end of the world came as a literal phenomenon, what would we do? I couldn’t just slice the planet in half if hell descended suddenly. But seeing you appear in human form like this makes it all so much easier.”

=Arrogant!=

“You were the one who said I had that right.”

The clash of powers knocked the bow away.

Kang Geom-Ma followed up with a flurry of slashes.

Crack!

A horse [1] bit into Murasame to halt it.

Though it appeared weak, it was no ordinary steed—it was the mount of the world’s end.

But a horse has only one mouth, while humans have two hands.

Hii, hihihihihing—!

That sound emerged from the horse’s mouth as it let go of the blade.

Through the vessels connecting its head and torso, the enemy peeked forth.

Thwack!

Though its neck was caught, the horse struck Kang Geom-Ma with its front hooves.

He saw stars, shooting through the air like a meteor from the ground’s perspective.

Kang Geom-Ma braked with a slash, planting both blades low.

Space parted like lips.

With the blades embedded, he stopped his retreat.

Then, without looking, he hurled Murasame overhead.

With a mere flick of the wrist, he deflected every arrow aimed at his crown.

Clink clink clink, the hollow sound scattered. It was as if a silence spell enveloped him.

He looked up.

Behind Ragnarok, a pair of hands the size of mountains were drawing arrows on a bow just as massive.

A chill breeze brushed Kang Geom-Ma’s back.

Just their presence made the arrows feel like they’d rip the sky apart.

────────────!

The arrows shrank.

A mandala spun on their tips like a twirling octopus.

Compressed to the extreme, the arrows created shockwaves simply by being fired.

A great disaster.

No sound.

— Gungnir. [2]

The arrow, launched with spiraling waves, resembled a spear more than a projectile.

His heart pounded.

Feeling the thunder in his chest, he thought.

A force capable of destroying the world is approaching.

This is my first real battle since awakening my divinity.

Is this tension? No.

The name of the emotion stirring his soul was exhilaration.

────────────!

Gungnir closed in.

The curtain call that had dimmed the field of vision vanished.

A red thread pierced his eye.

It was meditation.

Tick.

The spiral is often likened to the law of the universe.

Because it twists endlessly upon itself, advancing toward a final point.

Tick.

Universal law is inescapable precisely because it is law.

Humans and gods alike must bow before it.

Tick.

There was no dramatic motion. Kang Geom-Ma merely flicked his sashimi blade with his wrist.

At the same time, he activated [Blessing of Strength] and placed his blade on the cog of the cosmic clock.

A tiny gesture. But the resistance it held back was infinite.

Slash!

The clock of the universe was severed in a single cut.

T/N:

(1): He went from being a “Donkey” to a “Horse.”

(2): Gungnir (from Old Norse Gungnir) is the name of Odin’s spear in Norse mythology. The spear is known for always hitting its mark and is a symbol of power, authority, and protection for Odin.