The Second Coming of Gluttony - Chapter 75

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 75. Reverse Scale (2)

Cho Hong kicked off the ground with barely a motion. The impact sent her soaring upward, and she landed gracefully near the nest’s perimeter. The tendrils that had been creeping toward the two of them froze. A few branches lashed out at the warrior who’d drawn close, but—
Clang-clang-clang! The gleaming Inverted Triangle Shield blocked each one effortlessly. The warrior maiden didn’t even flinch. She simply raised her arm to catch them, her eyes burning with silver light.
The moment her Mace swept through the air, the tendrils erupted in bursts of ichor that never reached the ground before Holy Fire engulfed it, consuming everything to ash.
As the long tendril was gradually eaten away by white flames, the nest shrieked. Recognizing that its opponent had changed, it hastily retracted all but one of its appendages, which still stretched toward the cave entrance.
But the bundle of tendrils that had been assembling so swiftly suddenly hesitated in confusion. Cho Hong had vanished.
Even Seol Jihoo, who’d been dragging the unconscious Mikhail and Veronica toward where Maria was, opened his mouth in shock. In a single blink, Cho Hong was already airborne, gliding through empty space. Her noble gaze fixed downward on the nest as she descended in a smooth arc, then struck the body with all her might.
Boom! The bulbous surface caved inward before tearing open completely. The gushing streams of mottled fluid were swallowed whole by the expanding Holy Fire in an instant.
Uuuuggghhh— For the first time struck at its core, the nest recoiled with an agonized wail.
Yet Cho Hong, pursuing at even greater speed, swung her Mace again. Another hole opened, flames took hold, and the nest thrashed in response.
But then Cho Hong was gone again. Her speed outpaced the nest’s ability to perceive her.
Growing frenzied, thirty tendrils rose at once as if to pierce the ceiling, then began raining down in chaotic fury on everything around them.
Crash-crash-crash-crash!
The floor heaved violently, belching clouds of dust. The tendrils, cutting through the air with deafening noise, struck indiscriminately in all directions. The nest’s frenzy, born of survival instinct, was so ferocious that Seol Jihoo, who’d been quietly preparing to assist, instinctively stumbled backward.
‘I can’t get in.’
But what defied belief was that Cho Hong was in the very center of it all.
Swish-swish! Even just hearing the sound made the hair on one’s neck stand on end. The whip-like tendrils thrashing through the cavern with brutal force missed her by the thinnest of margins.
Cho Hong moved like flowing water. Her eyes half-closed, she gracefully extended both arms, deflecting and sweeping the tendrils aside with the elegance of a figure skater. The tendrils seemed almost to slip past her rather than strike—so precise was her motion.
When Cho Hong spun her body fluidly, her long silver hair whipped around like a hula hoop. Spinning and trailing a faint blue-silver afterimage, she drove forward, pierced through the thicket of tendrils, and landed another solid strike. A third shriek erupted. Seol Jihoo gasped. Hope, which had been fading, blazed back to life.
‘We can win this!’
Then Seol Jihoo noticed something odd about Cho Hong’s condition. Her usually serene expression had twisted slightly. Her pale cheeks flushed red, and her breathing had grown ragged. A flicker of anxiety seemed to cross her features.
For reasons unknown, the situation had begun to shift. The once-solid enemy was visibly wavering. More than half its tendrils hung limp and useless, and large portions of its body were charred black. Most tellingly, its massive frame had shrunk noticeably—the greatest sign of progress yet.
But the nest didn’t remain passive. Its tendrils suddenly swelled like balloons. With a hissing sound, it vomited forth a great rush of greenish fluid.
It wasn’t just one or two expelling matter—for a moment, it seemed a colossal fountain was pouring forth. Yet Cho Hong was nowhere to be seen. She had already withdrawn.
The desperate spray melted only the ground itself, and the nest howled in frustration.
Cho Hong gritted her teeth. Shield raised, she charged forward with absolute determination. This was the moment she’d told him to seize. Matching her pace, Seol Jihoo gripped his spear and ran.
One chance—that was all. He was about to channel the surging power into two paths: through the spear and through his Earring.
A tendril that the nest had hurled in desperation was deflected by Cho Hong, but she suddenly stumbled.
“Cho Hong?”
Startled, Seol Jihoo realized that the light enveloping her body had dimmed drastically.
No—it had vanished entirely. Both the Armor and the Shield were gone.
“Ah!”
At the same moment, Cho Hong’s expression snapped to sudden wakefulness. She managed barely two steps before dropping to one knee. Gasping for air, her mouth hung open as saliva dripped. Her face twisted with unmistakable frustration.
The reason was simple. The Valkyrie Skirt was an incantation that summoned a warrior maiden and raised one’s combat power by a full tier—allowing her to display strength rivaling the high ranks. But its duration was only thirty to forty seconds. After that came utter exhaustion.
Even as she felt her strength draining away, Cho Hong fought desperately to steady her breathing. It seemed the nest was also dazed and reeling. Just one more blow, one solid strike, and it might be over.
“Not yet…”
‘I haven’t even created a certain opening for him.’
The nest’s unexpectedly fierce resistance had thrown her calculations into disarray.
When Cho Hong withdrew, Seol Jihoo hesitated as well. The nest, bulging and writhing with unprecedented urgency, seemed to sense something was wrong with her condition.
Uhhhh? The nest trembled as it raised a single tendril. Cho Hong remained completely motionless. But then another powerful aura surged forth behind him.
Breath drawn— Maria slowly pushed herself upright. Seol Jihoo’s eyes lit up as he saw the Altar before her and the Cross crumbling to ash.
Even as she swayed on the verge of collapse, Maria managed to steady herself and raise both hands.
“Mall Te Oculorum Meorum!”
In the next instant, white electricity crackled through the air and a colossal hammer materialized. The nest recoiled in shock. The mass of light expanding in size carried a force that could not be dismissed lightly.
No one in the cavern could wait any longer. Seol Jihoo activated the Festina Earring. The panicked nest lashed out with its full might toward Maria. Eyes wide open, she cried out:
“Mjolnir!”
A blinding explosion of light. At the same instant, Seol Jihoo’s eyes widened to saucers as he pushed off from the ground. Even Cho Hong turned in shock. A hammer of light fell like divine judgment while a tendril shot toward the priestess like a bolt. Maria stood transfixed, her face damp with sweat, staring blankly ahead.
In that split second.
Facing the opportunity that had finally come after so much struggle, what was Seol Jihoo thinking?
One thing was certain: Maria would die. The warrior could barely escape, much less a priestess.
His feet pivoted ninety degrees. Pop! He activated Overlap. In that instant, Seol Jihoo ran with every ounce of strength he possessed, drawing on reserves he didn’t know he had. He heard someone call out but ignored it, hurling himself forward. As the tendril rushed toward him, Maria squeezed her eyes shut.
“Damn—!”
The next moment, a tremendous flash and explosion filled the cave. The deafening boom swallowed every sound—someone shielding him, the nest’s scream, everything.
A moment later, Maria slowly opened her eyes and drew a shaky breath. Seol Jihoo was holding her tight against him. Did he take it for me? Yet to her surprise, Seol Jihoo was unharmed.
His own shock matched hers. He hadn’t even had time to defend. He’d simply clung to her, braced to endure one blow at most. Yet both he and Maria were safe. Blinking, he understood at once. Cho Hong stood before him, her left arm raised.
“Cho Hong!”
In a moment of overwhelming relief, Seol Jihoo cried out. Cho Hong’s back trembled violently. Creaking like a marionette with its strings cut, she turned her head. Her lips moved weakly, voiceless.
“…damn… you… idiot… ah….”
She drew ragged breaths, lowering her left arm with agonizing slowness.
“Finish… the kill….”
“…Cho, Cho Hong?”
“Why… are you just… sitting there…?”
“You.”
Seol Jihoo felt something wrong. Cho Hong’s left arm was not visible. More precisely, everything below the forearm had been severed clean away. And her back—her back was slowly soaking through in vivid crimson. Seol Jihoo’s face went slack.
“…Of course.”
Seeing his expression, Cho Hong’s lips curled upward—a pitiful, aching smile.
“…That’s so like you….”
With those words, her head swayed. Slowly. Cho Hong crumpled slowly to the ground. As she fell, a massive hole in her left chest became visible at last. The shattered deck, the arm that had been flung away. The stubborn, defiant nose that had labored with each breath—it stopped moving.
At first, Seol Jihoo’s expression did not change. But then his pupils began to tremble violently, and his face abruptly aged a decade or more in an instant.
He had done nothing. He should not have merely watched for opportunities—he should have created them for her. Even if it cost him his own life. But he had not.
Regret came flooding back, delayed and merciless. And with it, a suffocating sense of helplessness—
Thump!
His heart convulsed. His pulse quickened violently.
Maria, who had been watching Cho Hong, let her gaze drift upward. Impossibly, the Nest still lived. Hammered by the Mace, struck head-on by Mjolnir—yet despite being utterly wrecked, it still drew breath. Such was the stubborn tenacity of this creature’s life force.
But there was more. Suddenly came the sound of wet swallowing, and it began attempting regeneration.
Mjolnir had indeed dealt a mortal wound. Yet grey-white flesh bubbled upward steadily from the rupture. In the next moment, the creature’s tentacles spat out the spear and shield before Maria’s eyes, and she let out a hollow laugh.
“Ha.”
If her eyes were not deceiving her, that equipment belonged to Gyerulshal. Which meant the Nest had fled only to be caught anyway. And now, with things grown dire, the creature had absorbed the corpse as sustenance—she’d wondered why it kept trying to touch the fallen bodies, but now she understood. It had its reasons.
‘Damn it. Useless bastard to the very end.’
On the other hand, regret gnawed at her. She should have chosen a stronger incantation. She hadn’t so much aimed to reduce the backlash as she’d rushed the ritual to match the timing—and that was the sorrow she would carry forever.
“…It wasn’t supposed to follow us.”
Maria muttered bitterly to herself. The Nest, having recovered after a fashion, raised several tentacles and began to undulate. Kee-kee-kee—the sound it made seemed almost like mockery.
“Should’ve just let it die.”
Maria pouted. And the instant she leaned her head against Seol Jihoo’s chest in exhaustion—
“If only I’d seized that chance earlier, at least you and Cho Hong would have…?”
Her eyes went wide.
Thump-thump-thump-thump. His heartbeat had become sickeningly, impossibly fast. Tremor-tremor-tremor-tremor. His whole body seemed to be shaking violently. Then it happened.
Grind—crunch—
A grinding of teeth so terrible, so inhuman, that it was scarcely believable a human throat could produce it.
Maria stiffened in alarm, her gaze lifting cautiously.
“You…?”
In that moment—

[Innate ability ‘Future Thought’ has been activated.]

Maria saw it clearly.
A man with blood trickling from his lips. No—a man whose face had twisted into something monstrous and malevolent.
As though possessed, he pushed away from Maria. His grip on the spear tightened until his knuckles turned white.
Suddenly.
Death. A palpable, unmistakable malice crashed over everything. Merely standing nearby made goosebumps rise on her skin; an aura of such dreadful, suffocating darkness descended—
“Grrr….”
A sound like a beast’s snarl, barely restrained, escaped his throat.
“Don’t… play….”
His eyes blazed blood-red, burning with a fierce, terrible light. The ground cracked and trembled beneath the shockwave of his unleashed power.
The Final War.
The malevolent spirit of the battlefield—the demon who had once raged across the killing fields like a madman—had returned.
“Don’t you dare mock me, you bastard!”
His furious roar shattered the cave itself—
Splurt!
Body fluid exploded outward. Maria spun around in disbelief. A single spear had pierced the Nest. Even the creature itself reacted a beat too late. The tentacles that had been moving in mockery convulsed in shock.
“Be careful…!”
Maria was about to shout a warning, but her mouth fell open. Seol Jihoo reached out toward the descending tentacles. Drawing upon an immense reservoir of magical power, he caught it—and crushed it between his bare hands!
Crunch-crunch-crack! The Nest thrashed and flailed as its living flesh was torn asunder by agonizing force.
Then Seol Jihoo’s spear sang out. From its tip erupted an ice-blue aura of killing intent, shaped like a blade some four feet long.
‘This can’t be real…!’
How many more shocks could she possibly endure? Witnessing the crystalline power manifest before her eyes, Maria’s mind reeled in horror.
‘That’s… that’s something only High-Rank warriors are supposed to wield…!’
To be precise, it was a technique only a handful among the High Rank could employ. And if her knowledge was correct, it was an ability she’d glimpsed only once in all her time operating in Paradise.
Level 7 Highlander Secret Art.
Sword Energy Wound.
Seol Jihoo thrashed his arms violently. Bluish sword energy flickered left and right across his body like a traveling performance. The tentacles clinging to him were severed clean in half and fell away with wet thuds. Those stubborn appendages were neutralized with almost embarrassing ease.
It wasn’t over. If anything, it was just beginning—Seol Jihoo gripped his spear in both hands and swung it like a man possessed, slashing without mercy. With each contact of the blade, the nest sprayed flesh and body fluid in all directions as if being shredded by a saw.
“Aaaaaaahhhhh!”
At some point the creature’s movements ceased. But he didn’t stop. The sheer ferocity of his assault was so overwhelming that even Maria looked sick of it.
Until it was utterly pulverized into paste.
How much time had passed?
The spear struck the ground with a wet thud. He kept striking until the form vanished entirely. All that remained was finely shredded tissue, dark and red.
“Ha… ha….”
Seol Jihoo, catching his breath in a sea of body fluid, only then seemed to regain his senses. He glanced around in a daze, but only briefly. Then he spun and shouted.
“Maria!”
Seol Jihoo rushed over. Maria flinched in alarm and instinctively retreated, but the moment she saw his face, she stopped. His color had returned to normal. The gap between then and now was stark enough to feel like a lie. Maria opened her mouth with a skeptical look.
“What… are you?”
“Excuse me?”
“Stop messing around! If you had that kind of strength all along, why didn’t you use it sooner!”
Then we wouldn’t have suffered like this! Do you know how much I lost? Maria shrieked at him.
“I, I didn’t know either. When I saw Cho Hong collapse, my mind just went white, and—”
Seol Jihoo shook his head violently. Maria’s expression said she didn’t believe him. She just let out one exasperated sigh after another.
“This is ridiculous. The dying protagonist suddenly gets back up because the heroine sheds a few tears. That’s what you sound like.”
“Th-That said, Cho Hong—!”
Seol Jihoo started. Now that he thought about it, hadn’t Maria been chanting? But she quickly felt for Cho Hong’s pulse and opened her eyes sharply.
“Get her arm. Now!”
“Yes? But… the backlash—”
“Do you know Mjolnir is an advanced spell like Cure Colossal Wounds? It’s manageable enough, so hurry and bring it.”
That was a relief then. Seol Jihoo quickly retrieved Cho Hong’s severed arm.
“She’s not dead yet. Her heart is still beating, however faintly, and not much time has passed, so treatment is possible.”
Maria emphasized the word “possible” as she skillfully reattached the arm and began chanting rapidly.
“Cure Massive Wounds.”
Warm light enveloped Cho Hong’s entire body. Deciding one casting wasn’t enough, Maria spoke another incantation. The hole in Cho Hong’s chest closed, and her severed arm fused back into place.
“She’ll live, won’t she? She’ll live, right?”
“I’ve done what I could. The rest is up to the patient. Well, she’s been rolling around Paradise long enough that at minimum she won’t die of shock.”
Maria spoke curtly, then rose to check on Mikhail and Veronica as well.
So there was a good chance she’d live. That’s true—Cho Hong wasn’t weak. She was a strong woman. The words about being able to treat her if she survived likely meant exactly that. Seol Jihoo exhaled with relief.
“Ah….”
Only then did unavoidable exhaustion and a sharp dizziness crash over him. The cost of channeling mana far beyond his limit to execute an advanced technique that skipped multiple levels. Seol Jihoo collapsed and simply lay down. He gazed at Cho Hong’s face, peaceful in sleep.
He didn’t understand what had happened. The memory seemed to cut off the moment he saw the Future Thought message.
But in any case, he’d lived. He thought he was going to die, yet he’d survived. More than anything, Cho Hong hadn’t died. Right now, he wanted only to rejoice in that fact and give thanks.
“Well, well.”
When Maria returned and saw the two figures sprawled out side by side, she let out a hollow laugh.
“Now you’re not seriously asking me to carry all four of you, are you?”
“Co-Could we rest just a little? I’m so exhausted.”
Maria stared down at him, her disbelief still evident. Suddenly she rubbed her eyes hard. Tap, tap. As a couple of tears rolled down her cheeks, Seol Jihoo’s brow furrowed.
“That’s enough. Get up now.”
Seol Jihoo was speechless.
“I don’t want to stay here anymore. I want to leave. Now.”
Seol Jihoo agreed entirely, but the wave of fatigue washing over him was so overwhelming he just wanted to sleep.
“Why? No strength left? Running short on tears?”
Maria taunted him, her eyes wet with tears.
“That’s not it….”
Seol Jihoo considered for a moment, then voiced his thought.
“I think it’s because you’re not the heroine.”
……
Maria, who had been staring silently at him, suddenly kicked him hard.

(To be continued in the next episode)

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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