◈ Episode 431. Manmaangbog

There was no message in reality or on the Arcana continent.

Only in the rift.

A message that only appeared to the players inside the rift.

[Manmaangbog begins.]

High-level players who could judge danger from a single message?

At this point, there was no reason for them to target the Rift.

The Arcana Continent was full of buffs.

With the Zero Mountains full of quality monsters.

No reason to clear the Rift.

“Manmaangbog”

Perhaps because of that, the news was slow to spread.

“What is it, a new raid map?”

“Don’t you think it has something to do with that eyeball?”

“Yeah. It’s kind of spooky.”

“But what does ‘Manmaangbog’ mean?”

“Isn’t this some idiom?”

“Is there a four-character idiom on the Arcana continent……?”

萬魔仰伏 (All Demons are Bowing Down)

All demons obey and subdue (Modeun Maga Bogjonghayeo joalinda.)

Even to infer a simple meaning.

It means that a considerable amount of time was required.

However, not all the players were able to grasp the situation.

‘No doubt.’

A gushing fountain of blood.

Yoon Taeseop thought back to the quest to become a Paladin.

It included the basic skills required to be a member of the Holy War Alliance.

“That’s a possession. Don’t panic, everyone.”

dudeudeug.

Yoon Taeseop didn’t freeze when he heard the sound of a tendon snapping at the nape of a party member’s neck.

The shout made the party leader raise his equipment. He stuttered, but he understood the situation.

“So, you’re saying that she was possessed by a demon, and that’s why she bit the party members……? I’m sorry, this is the first time I’ve actually seen a demon possession! Moreover, when did a demon possess……? I don’t think there were any signs of it…….”

Yoon Taeseop shook his head firmly.

“It might not have been possessed from the rift.”

“W-what?!”

Because demons are clever.

Talim Eber, leader of the Paladins of the Goddess Church.

Yoon remembered his proclamation in Muon.

-“Knights of the Goddess. Cunning demons do not show their evil outwardly. They hide behind humans to exploit their negative emotions. Therefore, beware of demons who boast of their evil.”

That’s a demon on par with the Demon King.

‘I don’t say this to scare you.’

Talim could not have been more serious.

Mistakes of the Goddess Church.. He’d given him knowledge about the habits of demons, even telling him the story of how the Goddess Church had been manipulated by a demon disguised as a saint.

Therefore, Yoon Taeseop made a cold judgment.

“We should retreat if we have to.”

“……!”

“The atmosphere is bad.”

The actor who had been acting as a human just a moment ago had been stirring up negative emotions in the party members. The woman, the demon, had revealed black pupils and was thirsting for blood.

“Do you think we can save her?”

The party leader whispered.

“Uh, wait.”

There was an audible gasp.

“Holy shit. What the hell, what’s going on?”

“Well, I think it’s a possession!”

“Possession? Does that have anything to do with the message I just saw?”

“Is it a Manmaangbog or something?!”

“That’s right, we’re not the only ones who thought of that.”

It was all thanks to getting off the subway.

The players were also taking a break at the station.

They had run into reinforcements.

Swoosh.

The players grabbed their equipment.

“Anyway, if it’s a demon, we’ll have to subdue it.”

“Hey, is the guy who fell down okay? He’s losing a lot of blood.”

“I do have an elixir that I acquired in Yusra……!”

“Okay then. The Yusra elixir should be enough to keep him breathing.”

He nodded.

Yoon Taeseop also raised the shield and sword of the Goddess Church. Although he didn’t know the exact meaning and effect of the [Manmaangbog]. In any case, the demon lost its senses.

“Ugggggg.”

If I don’t kill it, I’ll die. It was either because of his determination or because of the players who realized the gravity of the situation and joined him one by one.

“Ugh.”

An exclamation.

A fallen demon.

An updated message.

[You’ve leveled up].

The player taps Yoon on the shoulder as he catches his breath.

“You had a hard time. You’re a Paladin of the Goddess Church, aren’t you? Somehow, even against a demon like that, you’re not slowing down……. I’ve heard that some players give up on the quest process for advancement because it’s so tough.”

Yoon Taeseop nodded wordlessly.

He was too worried about his partymate’s injury to share the joy of leveling up. Fortunately, the party leader breathed a sigh of relief.

“Huah, but it looks like we’ve passed the critical point. Mr. Taeseop.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

“Rather than that, everyone should return immediately……?”

Although the distance from their current location to the outside of the rift wasn’t far, it was too dangerous to travel with the wounded.

Several players nodded at the party leader’s words.

“I guess so. What is Manmaangbog? No matter how much newbies like us try to think about it, we can’t seem to come up with anything. First of all, it would be better to go out and figure out the situation.”

“I’m glad. No, more than that, thank you for your help.”

“No, no. I think we should help each other.”

The mood was not bad.

It was to be expected. They had encountered a demonic monster and survived. In fact, they even managed to kill it and level up. For most players, that would be enough to make them feel relieved.

However, Yoon Taeseop, who was left alone, could not be ordinary.

“……Dammit.”

As mentioned, Yoon Taeseop found himself in the Goddess Church and became a demon. And because of that, he inevitably gained a deep knowledge of status abnormalities and possession.

Talim’s voice flashes through.

-“Unfortunately, the Goddess Church has no means of saving those possessed by demons. The only salvation we can offer the possessed is death. So that they are no longer subject to the demon’s manipulations.”

An interview with a Ranker comes to mind.

-“I tried killing a demon-possessed coworker with my own hands, and, damn it, that tenacious little bastard died before my coworker, so I could hear his last words. He said to me, Thank you for stopping the…….”

Cataclysm.

After the rise of the demonic monsters.

An unwritten rule among players.

If you killed a possessed player, don’t think about it anymore.

It was an unavoidable accident.

Given the nature of the growing Demon Race monsters, someone had to do something.

So only enter the Rift if you are possessed by a demon and will not blame them if you die at the hands of another player.

“……I know.”

Yes, all of the players had made up their minds and jumped into the rift, however, Yoon Taeseop muttered while looking at the corpse of a woman possessed by the demon.

“But you don’t have to go all out, do you?”

Ranker disagreed.

The woman was the last of the last.

She died as a demon until her last breath.

Not a shred of her human form remained.

He stared at the symbol of the Goddess Church on his shield.

Sigh.

Needless to say, Yoon Taeseop didn’t believe in the Goddesses, he just switched to a higher class, a Knight of the Goddess Order, to survive as a player. Changing classes didn’t make him more religious.

‘Please.’

But Yoon Taeseop clasped his hands together and closed his eyes.

Goddess, Buddha, or God.

He prayed for the player’s soul.

Then he raised his head.

kkeumppeog.

He looked into eight pupils.

Could those be the demons, the primordial beings from the message?

Had they tainted the demons with malice and sent them on a rampage?

What is the exact meaning of Manmaangbog?

‘……Let’s go.’

Yoon Taeseop shook his head and moved his feet.

He stepped onto the escalator to catch his breath.

A shout came from upstairs.

“Son of a bitch!”

……tatag!

Yoon Taeseop reflexively ran upstairs.

He faced it again.

The sight of a possessed player biting the player.

It was horrifying.

“……shit.”

Eight pupils floated above the rift.

*

The AAU was gathering information.

“So the message only appears to players who enter the rift? As a result, eight eyes appear and demon-type monsters have seizures?”

“Even demons possessing players?”

“Do we know the exact number of casualties?”

The branch manager, Park Minjae, was quick to grasp the situation.

“This is serious.”

The high-level players were distributed in the Zero Mountains, Arcana Continent. Someone might ask, isn’t it too selfish to leave a time bomb called the Rift unattended?

Park Minjae shook his head.

“It’s pretty meticulous.”

Humanity is at a crossroads.

Will high-level players enter the Arcana Continent?

In front of a huge storm called the Battle for the Demon King. They were the power of humanity. It was a strategic choice to build a weight class that wouldn’t be swept away by the strong winds.

There was a kind of faith in that.

Raymon Sean.

The true meaning is still unknown.

That there are rules that even a guy like him can’t break.

Just look at the rift update.

After the update to the reality of the Zero Mountains, a mega-scale content, the difficulty level of the generated rifts remained at a certain level.

Park Minjae gritted his teeth.

“I’m tempted to blame you, but…….”

It’s not Raymon Sean’s fault.

The rift is a space of ‘anomalies’ that even Raymon Sean can’t perfectly orchestrate.

He had heard stories from Hoyeol.

It was bound to be serious.

“Eight pupils.”

Primordial beings of the demon world.

If they were the ones responsible for the situation…….

They’ve torn open a rift that even Raymon Sean couldn’t fix.

That’s a lot of influence.

Even that’s not normal.

“Mr. Branch Leader, the scale of the damage is staggering. Seven players have died in the Korean Rift alone. If you add up the combined casualties from all AAU branches in every country except China, we’re talking about…….”

The man breaks out in a cold sweat.

“We’ve already surpassed 300 people!”

In the span of just three or four hours, three hundred players had died.

It was a casualty count that was only seen in the early days of the Cataclysm.

Park Minjae turned to his bewildered subordinate.

“What do you think of the players?”

“……Are you saying this suddenly?”

“You might think I’m envious of them. Unlike us, who are always in the media, they have the ability to command popularity and money.”

“…….”

“But don’t overlook them, they’ve always risked their lives. It’s the players who can’t even pretend to be weak since the demonic monsters came along.”

The duties of branch leaders vary.

One of them is to change the minds of players who have announced their retirement.

Whenever Park encountered retired players, he thought he was doing something no one else could do.

It wasn’t uncommon for heroes, even those who were undaunted in the face of monsters, to eventually break down and become wrecks.

“Don’t forget their sacrifice.”

Park Minjae led a short moment of silence.

His subordinates closed their eyes as he spoke.

But the real trouble was just beginning.

Park Minjae opened his eyes.

“How bad is it?”

The rift is a ticking time bomb.

The fact that player casualties occurred means that the demon-type monsters, which are growth-type monsters, have grown even further. The stronger the monster inside the rift, the steeper the collapse of the rift.

The subordinate speaks up.

“As you might have guessed, it’s risen to 80 percent.”

It’s a spike that’s way out of proportion.

Still, under normal circumstances, this wouldn’t be a concern.

The power of the players, especially the ranked players, had skyrocketed beyond that. The problem was, they were all on the Arcana continent.

Reality and the Arcana Continent.

They’re completely different, the passage of time is different, and they can’t communicate immediately. This meant that they would have to solve the crisis among themselves.

It wouldn’t be easy.

“But we have to try.”

But not like in the past.

Just as there are human players on the Arcana continent.

Humanity had the powers of Arcana.

“Yeah, we have to try…….”

In that sense, China was the most concerning region. Unlike the AAU, which had the know-how to deal with the rift collapse, China relied on the Heavenly Unity for everything.

However, Liu Zunqun is missing.

He’s even been removed from the rankings.

It was safe to say that China has zero tolerance for rifts.

One might ask.

Isn’t it a blessing to become self-employed?

One knows one, two don’t know the other, really.

“The moment China explodes, the whole world explodes.”

Liu Zunqun’s favorite word: ‘great country’

Yes, China was too big a country to overlook.

If the demon wanted to sacrifice a billion people in China, he could…….

‘It’s not for me to judge alone.’

Park Minjae made a decision.

‘I’ll have to consult with Master Marcelo.’

.

.

.

But Park Minjae did not know.

Or the Arcana continent.

The ‘ray of light’ that had illuminated even Scavenger’s gutters.

The collapsing rift.

Elsidor looked at the regurgitating monsters and opened his mouth.

“Are you ready, trash?”

The answer comes straight back.

“Yes!”

Formerly of the Heavenly Unity.

Currently a member of Elsidor’s Holy War Alliance.

Nourishing the rotten and decayed world.

The blooming flowers were twitching their buds.

For the record, the flowers that bloomed in the harshest of conditions.

“You may die, but don’t let innocent humans die!”

“Yes!!”

Not easily broken by any trials.

After defeating the regurgitating monsters, they enter the rift.

Soon, Elsidore looked at the eight pupils and spoke.

“Close your eyes.”

Sky high.

Celestial.

He sneered at the Eight’s High Ranking Demon Kings.

“Only ‘Him’ can look down on me like that.”