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Chapter 178

──────

Diver X

12

Let’s talk about insects for a moment.

Chung.

The word for insect.

And it’s a derogatory term.

When you think about it, isn’t that quite odd?

Since ancient times, when humans constructed the pyramid of life, it was built in the order of plants-animals-humans. The lower down the pyramid, the more those beings were treated as low-level newbies in the ecosystem.

Yet, in human communities, the phrase “tree bastard” or “you little seed” never became a common insult.

At most, “weed” might come to mind, but as you can tell from the word “mincho” (referring to hardy grass), there’s a certain admiration for their resilience embedded in it.

If you’re still skeptical:

Compare “Your life force is as tough as weeds!”

with

“Your life force is as tough as a cockroach’s!”

Notice the difference in nuance?

Throughout time, the lowest place in the hierarchy was always reserved for insects.

The long history of contempt and persecution of insects is well-documented in the dictionary.

- Harmful pests? Yup, “harmful insects”.

- A lazy person who only eats and poops? Yup, “parasite”.

- Spineless and indecisive? A spineless insect, “invertebrate”.

- A psychopath like Yoo Jiwon? A bloodless insect, “bloodless creature”.

- A follower who merely echoes others? An echoing insect, “imitator”.

What a splendid lineup of insults.

Even a tiger’s nickname was Big Bug, which literally translates to “that big insect.”

(This new word was created because the posthumous emperor of the Tang Dynasty had the character for “tiger” in his name, leading to a need for a substitute word. A very hasty creation indeed.)

In short, ancient people simply added the character for “insect” to any beast with legs.

But it would be problematic to claim that ancient people lacked the biological insight to distinguish between insects and mammals, promoting a “modern human genius theory.”

It’s just that ancient people, like modern people, understood a simple truth: when you want to insult something, adding the word “insect” to the end of it does the job.

The most lowly existence.

The scorn and disdain for life.

When humans wanted to curse something, they used insects as the most basic form of witchcraft.

Anyone or anything could become an insect.

With the advent of anomalies, humanity’s status was reduced to that of insects.

Just as a dragonfly gracefully soaring through the air could be captured for an elementary school summer project and have its wings torn off, a human taking a stroll by the river could lose their limbs and face at any moment, reduced to a mere potato.

How beautifully that dragonfly flew or how noble that human was didn’t matter to the anomalies.

What’s the big deal about the fate of a mere insect?

To regard something as “something that doesn’t matter if it dies,” it was first necessary to turn it into an “insect.”

Such was the thoroughness of the anomalies’ magic.

But the anomalies were too hasty.

As Chairman Netero pointed out, the mistake enemies made when trying to annihilate humanity was always the same.

They underestimated “the bottomless malice of humans.”

That’s right.

If the rule of the anomalies is that when you gaze into the abyss, the abyss also gazes into you, then the unyielding principle of human history is that when you treat someone as an insect, you must be prepared to be treated as one yourself.

13

“Gruoooooor!”

Leviathan roared.

Like the strongest dragon ever, Leviathan’s body was transparent. It was super strong, making it the strongest of all dragons.

But what Leviathan was facing now was neither gods nor demons nor the Balrog, which, due to copyright, we can’t even use.

After all, they were no different from the expendable extras doomed to lose in every Kamen Rider special effects show.

The enemies of the anomalies.

They were always the killers of the Earth’s ecosystem, humans.

“Gruoooor!”

Thus, Leviathan’s roar accomplished nothing except rupturing the eardrums and retinas of a few awakened ones on the battlefield.

Among them, both Cheon Yohwa and myself, to speak of the representatives of the awakened, were unharmed.

The water bugs that had charged at us as if ready to tear our limbs off suddenly stopped and began screaming.

In truth, Leviathan’s roar wasn’t something that came from its mouth. It was closer to the cacophony vomited out by the countless water bugs that made up its body.

A death throe expelled by its entire body.

“Ugh, extreme! It’s so noisy…!”

“Don’t stop! Keep reading Metamorphosis, Yowha! This is working!”

“Ah, yes. I-I got it!”

“Saintess! Please recite it in the original German instead of the Korean translation!”

[Understood.]

“Yowha, it doesn’t matter if you don’t understand, just try your best to mimic the Saintess’s pronunciation!”

“Yes, yes!”

The Saintess didn’t originally know German. But over the past few years of study sessions with me, she had naturally taken Maestro-level German language courses.

For Saintess who could read Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason in German, Kafka was nothing. She and Cheon Yohwa continued to chant the powerful “insect incantations.”

“Crreeeak.”

Leviathan’s body was crumbling.

The force that had held the H₂O and the swarms of bugs in the shape of a dragon was rapidly weakening.

Since Cheon Yohwa and I were still struggling under the eyelid-like curtains made of aura, we couldn’t fully grasp the situation.

But just by seeing the water bugs convulsing and having seizures, we could tell we had found an effective “strategy.”

[Doctor Jang! It’s working!]

Drip.

Rain began to fall.

[The dragon’s scales are falling off!]

But it wasn’t rain from the sky.

The dragon’s membrane, its flesh, its innards, its cells.

All the water bugs that made up those parts were bursting and trickling down like raindrops.

-Ribbit.

-Ribbit, ribbit, ribbit.

-Ribbit, ribbit, ribbit, ribbit.

The water bugs writhed in agony.

The frog is the harbinger of rain, a being that predicts and summons it.

Thus, the frog loudly proclaimed that this downpour was entirely within its domain, that it was not an unforeseen event.

But even if the frogs' croaking filled the skulls of every human being, it was still far from enough to stop the collapse that had already begun.

-Croak, croak.

Drip. Drip.

I looked up. A few drops of water struck my cheek.

As always, a few droplets of drizzle were merely the prelude to the torrent that would soon follow.

-Croak, croak.

Thud-thud-thud-thud.

Countless bugs burst forth.

A once-in-a-lifetime typhoon that recorded a height of 10km and a diameter of 1,200km. A monstrous force that terrorized all of East Asia with the fear of water was spewing out a downpour off the coast of Busan.

That downpour was none other than Leviathan’s blood.

It was the corpse of the sea dragon.

'It's done.'

There was no longer any need to place a blindfold on the anomaly's eyelids.

Even the dragon's pupils were swirling and sinking.

'We did it! The Great Typhoon! We found a way to defeat it with such minimal damage!'

I wasn't the only one who shouted in triumph. In fact, I was among the more reserved ones.

"It's falling! That bastard is going down!"

"Rescue the people who fell into the sea! If they get caught in the downpour, they'll drown!"

"Aaaahhhh!"

"We won! We won!"

Members of the Three Thousand Worlds Guild who had been circling outside the typhoon on broomsticks, members of the Baekhwa High School Guild who had been fighting on the dragon's body, and the Awakened who had been infusing aura inside the Ark.

The breaths they let out as they sensed victory felt vivid to me.

"Teacher!"

Thud. Cheon Yohwa, convinced that it was finally over, hugged me with a body soaked in fatigue.

"We survived!"

Considering that Cheon Yohwa had half-jokingly contemplated a double suicide, it wasn't surprising that dopamine was surging from her in the wake of this victory.

I also patted Cheon Yohwa's back vigorously.

"You did a great job! Thanks to your strike on the eye of the typhoon, things went well!"

"Ouch, ouch, ouch-. Hehe. Yes!"

Cheon Yohwa giggled as I smacked her on the back. Even a single strand of her orange hair, which clung messily to her cheek, seemed endearing.

And so we entered the epilogue of a happy ending――if only it were that simple.

In truth, there was one more scene I needed to describe before we could move on to the epilogue.

And this scene was one that I had never spoken of to anyone.

It was a secret that I am revealing here for the first time.

At this moment, except for me and a future eavesdropper, Oh Dokseo, everyone believed that the Great Typhoon had been defeated.

Noah's Ark. Lee Hayul’s puppet strings. The aura support from the Awakened. Cheon Yohwa’s assistance.

And finally, the "finishing touch" and "transformation" spell I, Doctor Jang, miraculously devised that brought down Leviathan.

However, I saw it.

Thud-.

As I stood there, embraced by Cheon Yohwa and watching the sea dragon’s end, I saw a truly strange scene.

Koyori was walking towards the collapsing Leviathan.

No one else noticed this.

Which made sense, as no one was moving, as if time had stopped.

“……”

I couldn’t even move my lips.

I was engulfed by a feeling that made it hard to distinguish whether this was a dream or reality.

Thud. Thud-.

In the world where my gaze was the only witness, Koyori was quietly taking steps.

As if it were the most natural thing, she was walking on the surface of the water.

With each step she took, Koyori’s lips moved slightly.

“You shouldn’t do that.”

A faint whisper.

Strangely enough, it felt as though her voice was not coming from far away, but rather, as if it was right next to my ear, or perhaps even inside my head.

However, the whisper wasn’t directed at me.

Koyori was smiling brightly at Leviathan, which was gradually dissolving into raindrops.

“We are supposed to respect each other’s domains, aren’t we, Dragon? At least, that’s how I understood our agreement…”

Then, something astonishing happened.

The sea dragon responded in a world that seemed frozen, or rather, in an atmosphere that felt more like a detached fantasy than reality.

-G̵ro̷o̴a̵a̷a̵a̶a̸a̶a̸a̷a̴o̸o̷o̷o̵.

Leviathan did not respond with human language, but with the gestures of a anomaly.

The scales of the sea dragon, which had been helplessly crumbling until now, suddenly sharpened once more.

Blink, blink, blink.

Countless scales transformed into "eyes."

“……!”

I recoiled silently in shock.

Leviathan’s body was no longer composed of beautiful, transparent scales.

Like Argos in Greek mythology, its entire body, from head to toe, was covered in “eyes.”

As if, in response to humans covering their eyes to attempt the subjugation, it decided to create hundreds of millions of eyes simply.

Indeed, a boss anomaly is capable of multiple transformations.

The typhoon form was Phase 1. The sea dragon form was Phase 2.

The Great Typhoon anomaly was now ready to initiate Phase 3.

‘Does this mean we have to subjugate it again?’

An overwhelming sense of dread gripped my consciousness.

Koyori wore a slightly troubled smile.

“Really. I said no.”

In a world that felt like a fantasy, a strange sound echoed.

It was reminiscent of a beast’s cry, similar to a tiger’s growl, and also like the innocent laughter of countless children.

All these sounds mixed together, creating an eerie echo.

‘This is…….’

A sense of déjà vu washed over me.

An episode from long ago.

Wasn't this the exact same sound as that night when all the citizens of Daejeon vanished, the night I conducted the "experiment" to bring Yoo Jiwon and Koyori together?

Koyori whispered.

"Become one."

In that moment, the millions of eyes of the Leviathan melted away.

No embellishment was necessary.

The Leviathan, revealing its true form for the last time, melted away as if it had always been nothing more than a drop of water, without even a single struggle.

The melted eyes vanished, mixed with the rain that had already been pouring down for a while.

It was dead.

"...?"

Suddenly, Koyori turned to look at me.

She widened her eyes in surprise when she met my gaze.

Her footsteps began to move toward me. But then, her toes hesitated.

"....."

Koyori stared down at her feet for a long time. It might have been my imagination, but I felt a hint of perplexity from her.

After a moment, a fresh smile spread across her lips like paint.

"Indeed. This, too, is a realm of its own."

What did she mean by that?

Koyori lightly lifted the hem of her long skirt, and bowed gracefully like a noble of the social elite.

"Rest assured."

"..."

"I won't touch you."

Thud, thud, thud...

As soon as she finished speaking, the rain that had been paused in midair began to pour down again.

The last rain of the monsoon season was so thick that even Koyori's figure disappeared, swallowed by the mist.

Time, which had been frozen, and the world, which had been overlaid with illusion, began to flow once more.

“――Whoaahhhhh!”

“It's really dead!”

“We did it!”

The cheers of the Awakened, which had been paused for a moment, surged across the sea in front of Busan.

To them, the Leviathan had never entered its third phase, nor had its millions of eyes bloomed.

The sea dragon was merely ordinary rain that had poured down, and it had all been poured out.

No strange phenomena had occurred in between.

"Long live Baekhwa Girls' High School! Long live Cheon Yohwa!"

"Long live Tang Seorin!"

"Thank you, celestial beings!"

"Doctor Jang! Doctor Jang! Doctor Jang!"

"..."

While everyone was praising the heroes of this operation, I silently looked toward the mist.

The seemingly endless rain began to subside. The mist sank.

The shore after the sea dragon's corpse had been completely buried.

Koyori was nowhere to be seen.

“Saintess.”

[Yes.]

“Did you, by any chance, see that just now?”

[What do you mean by ‘that’?]

“…Never mind. You really did a great job this time.”

I continued to gently stroke the back of Cheon Yohwa’s head, who was still clinging to me like a koala.

The ark's deck opened, and people who had been confined for nearly ten days began to emerge. The cheers from the sea grew even louder.

But for a while, the scent of apples lingered at the tip of my nose, more than the smell of saltwater.

The Great Monsoon.

Alias: Leviathan, Water Bug, Sea Dragon, White Dragon, Frog Dragon, Rain of Frogs, Jörmungandr, Eye of the Typhoon, Argos.

Danger Level: Lv.4 Oceanic (Five Oceans).

Patterns: Phase 1 'Typhoon', Phase 2 'Sea Dragon', Phase 3 'Opening of the Reverse Scale'.

Estimated Damage Range upon Failure: Sinking of the Japanese archipelago, flooding of the Korean Peninsula, inundation of the Chinese mainland.

Successfully exterminated.

14

There's an epilogue.

Having found a strategy to tackle the Great Monsoon after much trial and error, I prepared even more meticulously for the next summer.

"From now on, your name is Noah."

"Are you serious...?"

Naturally, in this turns too, I renamed Noh Doha as "Noah."

The ark was made even sturdier. This time, there was no need to take Lee Hayul and dive into the typhoon; I simply bound the entire ark fleet tightly together with puppet strings from the beginning.

I even made the Saintess and Cheon Yohwa memorize the original German text of Metamorphosis.

It was the very definition of preparedness.

'This time, I’ll take it down in a day! Come on, Great Monsoon!'

It didn’t come.

“...?”

No matter how long I waited, there was no sign of the Great Monsoon, not even a regular monsoon. The sea off Busan was peaceful, filled only with the aria of seagulls.

"Huh?"

Frowns were directed at me.

Everyone—Noah, who had invested budget and manpower to build an ark on Geumjeongsan, the passengers who boarded the ark with a solemn mindset, and even Cheon Yohwa, who had struggled to memorize German—was looking at me like I was Korea's Meteorological Agency.

The regressor's stock was plummeting before my eyes.

"Uh... how about we wait a few more days?"

Still, it didn’t come.

"....."

“Hey, regressor. Do you want to die...?”

Noah tore off the nameplate that said “Noah” and threw it at me. It was a direct hit to my heart.

‘No, this doesn’t make any sense.’

But the Great Monsoon had truly vanished without a trace.

I even took a flight to the North Pacific myself, but I couldn’t find any signs of a forming typhoon.

Not just in this turns, but the Great Monsoon didn’t appear in the subsequent turnss either. Busan was never again swept away by a tsunami, leading to a massive reconstruction project.

It was an unbelievable situation.

[Doctor Jang.]

However.

Every summer, another entity began appearing in the sea off Busan.

[The ‘pink creature’ you warned us about last time has appeared in Haeundae.]

"Pardon?"

[Don't worry. I didn’t use clairvoyance on that creature. I’m carefully observing it through the eyes of another Awakened in Haeundae.]

Koyori.

As the rainy season approached, she appeared again on Busan's shores.

“What on earth is she doing there?”

[There don't seem to be any unusual signs. She's taken off her shoes and splashes in the water, walking along the beach herself.]

[Oh, now she's crouched down and playing in the sand.]

I furrowed my brow.

“…Playing in the sand?”

[Yes. You know the song "Duggaebi, Duggaebi, give me a new house, and I’ll give you an old one"? She's singing that while building and then destroying a sandcastle, over and over again. She seems to be having a great time.]

[What should we do, Doctor Jang? Should we leave her alone? Or should we interfere using other awakened ones?]

“……”

I remained silent for a long time. My neck, which No Do-ha had grabbed earlier, still ached.

“…No. Just leave her be.”

[Really?]

“Yes. There's no need to poke a sleeping tiger.”

According to the Saintess’s report, Koyori spent about 60 minutes playing on the Haeundae beach before suddenly heading back to Daejeon.

After waiting until the pink entity had completely left Busan, I immediately visited Haeundae.

I went straight to the spot where Koyori had supposedly been playing in the sand.

It was right on the borderline where the waves barely reached. The sand, now damp and turned a dirty brown, had something written on it.

-Ohheung!

What?

What could it mean?

Perhaps she left it there, knowing I would come—shaking my head at the thought, something else caught my eye beneath the waves.

There were 'letters' written there.

虎.

The character for tiger.

“……”

Even if something had been written there, the tide should have long since washed the sand away, erasing every trace.

Yet, somehow, the letters remained inscribed on the seabed.

It wasn't just a few letters that had coincidentally withstood the waves.

Tiny, insect-like letters stretched out endlessly, all the way to the horizon.

虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎虎.

“……”

Just as I was about to speak, a wave gently brushed over the shore.

And then, all the letters that had covered the seabed just moments before vanished without a trace.

-Ohheung!

Only the playful sound effect Koyori had drawn remained at my feet.

“……”

Hmm.

…It was autumn.

-Diver. END.