Chapter 55: Army of the Dead – 3

Robert couldn’t help but feel stunned by the sudden turn of events.

What in the world was that?

It was an overwhelmingly powerful being—on a completely different level from the corpse dragon he had created.

With just one breath from that dragon, all the corpses Robert and Christopher had raised vanished in an instant.

The heat was so intense that even from a distance, Robert’s bones had slightly begun to melt.

But…

What truly mattered right now wasn’t the melting bones.

It was the pressure emanating from that enormous being.

That pressure was so immense, he felt like dropping to his knees and bowing down right then and there.

Even in a body that had become undead, he couldn’t help but feel fear in the face of such soul-crushing intimidation.

It was a fear that made it feel like his very soul might be torn to pieces at any moment.

How could a being like that even exist?

There was one piece of news he had heard after taking over the drug cartels.

That a dragon had appeared in the faraway land of South Korea.

But why… why had that dragon from a faraway land now appeared before him?

Robert wasn’t the only one whose soul was being suppressed.

His comrades beside him felt it too.

The Dullahans, whose dark flames once burned fiercely, now had only dull, lifeless armor where the fire had faded.

…He couldn’t even imagine winning.

The corpse dragon had been his masterpiece—his greatest weapon.

No matter how many corpses he raised, they couldn’t defeat that being.

He was certain of it.

His mind, sharpened and made cold by becoming a lich, was already telling him to kneel and bow his head to the creature before him.

But if he did that—if he knelt here and now—he would be killed instantly.

If that dragon was a mutant with even a shred of moral sense, then from the moment it laid eyes on the corpse dragon, it would never let him go.

After all, that dragon had been created by slaughtering civilians and drug cartel members across northern Mexico.

They had no need for living humans, aside from a select few, so they had ground thousands of people into parts to build the corpse dragon without hesitation.

Now that that being had seen it, Robert was certain it would try to kill him.

So, to survive, he had no choice but to resist—even if it meant flailing in desperation.

His confidence that not even a nuclear weapon could kill him?

Gone without a trace.

There was a rising, undeniable fear, a gut-deep certainty that this dragon would kill him.

He raised the dead.

The power he had gained from becoming undead activated once more, resurrecting even the long-buried corpses beneath the earth.

The Dullahans’ black flames ignited again, their armor regaining its original, fearsome form.

No doubt, the others felt the same way Robert did.

That’s why they were so desperate.

They knew this resistance was pointless, but they couldn’t stop.

After dealing with that grotesque, twisted dragon, I incinerated every corpse nearby with my breath.

Breath, often called a dragon’s most powerful authority, lived up to its name against the corpse army.

There wasn’t a single body left standing where the breath had passed.

Not even melted remains.

They had simply… vanished.

The land was scorched black in their place.

Good thing I controlled my strength well.

If I hadn’t, I might’ve melted the entire ground.

By this point, they should’ve given up, but my opponents were far more stubborn than I expected.

Corpses rose again.

From the liches and Dullahans, I could feel a shockingly intense force.

It felt like… they were burning up everything they had left.

At first, before I got here, I wondered if maybe, maybe, there was a way to talk things out with these mutants.

To find some kind of solution.

But the moment I saw that vile corpse dragon, those thoughts were completely wiped away.

If it had been made from any other natural material, even from animals, I might’ve brushed it off.

But that thing… that thing had been built from what looked like thousands of human beings.

Ground down, merged together, shaped into a dragon.

Maybe they were rejected.

Maybe the nation treated them unfairly.

But…that was no excuse.

Compared to them, even demon-type mutants looked like saints.

At least the demon-type went after those who personally wronged them, targeting enemies they could identify.

Of course, even that was terribly wrong, but these monsters had gone far, far beyond that.

Not dozens, not hundreds, thousands.

The number of people killed by the flick of their hand was on the scale of a natural disaster.

This was, undeniably, a line that should never have been crossed.

Of course, from their perspective, they probably felt that the way mutants were treated was unfair, that they’d lost everything overnight.

But still… still, this wasn’t right.

Looking at the melted remains of the corpse dragon, I felt nothing but devastation.

The anger I had felt over them mocking the image of a dragon, that was already a thing of the past.

The moment I realized the true nature of that corpse dragon, an unspeakable horror washed over me.

And what followed was a deep, burning fury born from that horror.

Unlike Korea, where we were trying—however clumsily—to coexist, the United States was fully consumed by a cycle of hatred.

If only, If only there had been just a little more effort to understand each other…

Could this have been avoided?

I don’t know.

But it was too late now.

No matter how badly they’d been rejected, no matter how unfairly they’d been treated, to massacre thousands of people went far, far beyond what could ever be justified.

So I made up my mind.

I would execute them here and now.

Maybe it was arrogant of me to make that call.

But I couldn’t shake the thought.

These things can’t be allowed to live.

Even more so than when I took down that demon-type mutant, my mind felt cold, clear, razor-sharp.

Even as I carried the intent to kill, there wasn’t a single flicker of hesitation in me.

No, if anything, the very moment I made up my mind…

Click.

It was like unlocking a sealed door.

And the moment it opened, a flood of knowledge poured into my mind.

In every medium that ever described dragons, there was something that always went hand in hand with them, Magic.

Back when Si-ah had feared me so deeply, and I tried to ease the pressure I was unknowingly putting on her body and mind, I’d had this strange sense, like I’d used some kind of magic.

And now I knew it wasn’t just my imagination.

I could use magic.

…Ha. Seriously, I couldn’t help but laugh.

This is beyond ridiculous.

So even this is possible now?

Then again, I had seen a lich raise undead with necromancy, so who’s to say magic was impossible?

And in most stories, dragons who use magic are always described like this.

In full dragon form, I turned my will toward the lich and Dullahans writhing before me,
and I spoke.

Die.

In novels, films, and all forms of media, there is one force often portrayed as even greater than a dragon’s breath, a power that turns the supreme will of a dragon into reality.

Dragon Speech.

And the moment that will was projected into the world, the liches and Dullahans stopped struggling.

Crackle.

Then, their bodies began to crumble, piece by piece.

For those who had caused such devastation, their end was absurdly empty.

After ending the chaos, I released my true form and collapsed into the scorched, barren wasteland.

I felt… gross, in every sense.

My clothes were ruined.

…Yeah, this would take a while to sort out.

I’d better stay put for now if I don’t want to end up naked.

And… I needed to speak to the United States properly about what had just happened.

I saved them from a national crisis.

The least they could do was respect my wishes.

Come to think of it, Si-ah had mentioned something about creating a village for mutants.

Judging from the actions of the liches and Dullahans, there must be a deep undercurrent of hatred and anger toward mutants within the U.S.

With hatred this entrenched, conflict between mutants and humans would be inevitable.

Clashes would happen, and each one would deepen the divide.

Trying to resolve that peacefully—like we did in Korea, the U.S. was already far past that point.

If that was the case…then maybe the solution was to ensure they simply never had to face each other again.

I needed to speak with Si-ah in detail about this.

Si-ah could only stand there, mouth agape.

Because she had just witnessed it.

With a single blast of Seo-hyun’s breath, that monstrous corpse dragon had quite literally vanished.

And then, somehow—she didn’t know what exactly Seo-hyun had done, but the liches trying to raise more dead, and the Dullahans charging at her, had crumbled into ash and disappeared.

Si-ah now realized the fear she once felt toward Seo-hyun hadn’t been unfounded.

Even she had no confidence that she could’ve handled two liches, three Dullahans, and their army of corpses.

But Seo-hyun had done it.

Alone.

No, it wasn’t even right to say she fought.

From the moment she appeared…it had only taken three minutes.

Three minutes, and it was all over.

Si-ah raised the radio she’d been given, and spoke into it.

“Situation clear. Hostiles neutralized. The reinforcements defeated the liches and Dullahans.”

—“The reinforcements… you mean that dragon we just saw?”

—“Yes. Reinforcements from South Korea.”

“…Dear God.”

The commanding officer’s voice was filled with relief.

Then came the general broadcast to all units, orders to stand down and disarm.

The U.S. soldiers, who had been tense and ready to die, burst into cheers.

They had been certain it was the end, but they lived.

And for now, that was more than enough.

As Si-ah let out a long breath of relief and tried to organize her jumbled thoughts, she spotted Seo-hyun approaching—wings spread, descending toward her.

“This is the reinforcement. She’s friendly. Do not engage.”

Si-ah’s voice came through the radio again, just in case anyone got the wrong idea and dared to point a gun at her.

The soldiers stared up in stunned silence as Seo-hyun flew closer.

And when she finally landed in front of Si-ah, Si-ah saw it.

That expression.

Seo-hyun looked deeply, unmistakably annoyed.

Si-ah’s heart dropped.