Legend of Legends

The new monsters’ bodies were highly elastic. To cut them up, first she had to apply the decomposition liquid to the area, and then she had to use a laser cutter.

By using the muscles from those corpses, Elise was trying out new things. She was currently trying to make a new mechanical body. The monsters’ muscles were superior to those of previous muscles and could easily withstand the mechanical pull. However, the muscles would lose tension over time, and that was another problem.

Elise was extremely busy with her research nowadays. By finishing what she was currently working on, she would be able to create even stronger iron soldiers. They would reach a new level.

A new core had been developed. It was better than those cores within regular iron soldiers, but the new core remained empty. She already had a mana stone in mind to fill it, and only Doyeol had a specimen of that mana stone. Junhyuk hadn’t been able to get another one like it since the first time.

It was priced at $700 million, and Elise would use it as the core.

To make the strongest iron soldier, Elise had taken a few measures of her own. She had planted a nerve system into the monster’s muscle, and to control that muscle, this new iron soldier would be fully controlled by a supercomputer.

She needed a supercomputer that would only control that iron soldier and nothing else. Elise had made a supercomputer with artificial intelligence before, but she had taken no breaks and spent her time completely focused on that.

—

It was a weekend, and Elise was working at home when she saw an emergency announcement through Zaira. She walked out of the lab while spraying herself with decontamination liquid. Elise didn’t know if the monster corpses carried any virus, so she always wore a hazmat suit and cleaned herself with a decontamination compound when she exited.

Then, she turned on a monitor to see a member of Pentagram, Charles Rockefeller, on screen.

As soon as he saw Elise on screen, he started speaking.

“There is a problem.”

“What kind of problem?”

“A lab was researching porings, but communication with that lab has been cut off.”

“I thought you were prepared for anything that might happen?!”

“R-agents and iron soldiers were stationed that, but we still can’t get through.”

“The R-agents I can understand, the iron soldiers were also destroyed?”

“That’s right.”

Elise frowned a little. After the mass production of iron soldiers, each member of Pentagram had gotten ten unique iron soldiers, and Charles’ iron soldiers had been destroyed!

“Show me what happened on the screen.”

“Sure.”

The got an email, opened it and watched the video attachment.

“They are using long range attacks.”

There were two people who could use long range attacks, and all of their eyes were entirely green. Just like when Eunmi rampage, they didn’t display any personality. They were people who could massacre the innocent.

“How can I help you?”

“I’ll send their GPS locations. Can you intercept them?”

“How can I intercept any of them?”

“I need Guardians’ iron soldiers.”

Elise took a moment to think. The fact was that Zaira controlled Guardians’ iron soldiers, and while members of Pentagram had iron soldiers of their own, the two groups had different artificial intelligence capabilities.

The iron soldiers with the members of Pentagram lacked battle experience, among other things, so they had failed to engage the enemy successfully.

“You should ask Guardians’ CEO about it.”

“You know what’s happened, right? I want to you move secretly.”

Elise thought of something else and said, “Even if I moved alone, the American military would know of it. On top of that, there’s no monster distress call right now.”

“I’ll take responsibility for the American military.”

“Then, I should just give up on my research?”

Charles Rockefeller thought for a moment and said, “We needed more preparation. We planned poorly.”

Elise sighed and answered, “Fine, but send me your research and your findings. I need to know everything if I’m going to find out what happened.”

Charles took a moment longer to think and answered, “Sure.”

“I’ll delete everything after I eradicate the infected.”

Charles Rockefeller nodded, and the feed cut off.

Elise watched the recordings of the battle. They were capable of long range attacks, so even though the iron soldier was moving at high speed, it got destroyed from three hundred meters away. Elise had to find out who had delivered that attack.

“I need to pay more attention.”

—

Elise used Zaira to take control of the iron soldiers being manufactured in the United States. They hadn’t been distributed to every country yet, so nobody would know what she was doing.

She murmured to herself, “There are all kinds of powers.”

Elise couldn’t see all of the powers on the screen. She had just deployed twenty iron soldiers and was following their feeds. All of the iron soldiers were extremely well armed, all equipped with midrange weaponry. So, Elise thought they would be able to handle it.

There was GPS tracking for ten survivors, and when Elise found then, she started attacking. The survivors had a range of three hundred meters, so Elise used the twenty iron soldiers to attack from five hundred meters away.

Their shoulders opened, and small missile launchers appeared. Twenty missiles flew at high speed toward the enemies and exploded on impact.

Boom, boom, boom, boom!

After the smoke dissipated, Elise could see a large green shield covering all of the enemies. However, Elise had expected something like that and planned for it.

Another volley of missiles flew toward the enemies. That green shield was a power beyond the laws of physics, and it looked amazing, but powers also had limitations. They were limited by time, and once you knew that, they didn’t seem that dangerous.

The missiles swept through the enemy position again, and the enemies reacted instinctively. Elise smiled at the sight.

“Keep far away, Zaira. Make sure they don’t get too close. Torch the area.”

Half of the iron soldiers extend their hands in front of them, raining bullets down on the enemies from their arms so that their enemies wouldn’t get any closer. The others fired more missiles.

The enemies were massacred, but three of them still survived. Elise thought the job had been simple enough and murmured, “He couldn’t do this and had to ask me to do it?”

Missiles flew toward the surviving enemies, and a woman with black hair stepped forward. She also had green eyes, and as she touched the other two survivors, they disappeared.

“Hm?!”

Elise tried tracking them through GPS, but she couldn’t find them. Then, and urgent announcement came from Zaira.

[A dimensional tear has suddenly appeared in Yongsan.]

“What?!”

The enemies had disappeared suddenly, followed by a sudden dimensional tear. Elise tapped her tablet and said, “Check the area surrounding Yongsan.”

Soon, footage of Yongsan appeared on screen. It showed a dimensional tear. From it, three green-eyed people walked through. They blended with the crowd and disappeared.

“NO!”

They had just been in a desert in the United States, and now they were in South Korea just like that. Someone had the power to create dimensional tears.

Elise was extremely shocked and knew she couldn’t keep it a secret anymore, so she called two people at once.

Eunseo picked up up her phone first, and Elise spoke fast, “Poring-infected people have appeared. I’m requesting the deployment of iron soldiers.”

“An infected person? Did Eunmi escape?”

“The people appeared through a dimensional tear.”

Eunseo nodded.

“Permission for deployment granted.”

Elise deployed and took control of three iron soldiers through Zaira. Then, she bit her lip.

“Why isn’t he picking up?”

The iron soldiers couldn’t deal with the situation by themselves. She wanted Junhyuk’s help, but she couldn’t reach him. She frowned and bit her lip even more as she looked through the iron soldiers’ feeds.

“I haven’t finished the infected detector yet.”

She had wanted to make one, but she hadn’t finished the research on it. So, there was no way for her to find them at that moment, but the three of them suddenly appeared in downtown Seoul.

They could start infecting other people, and Elise was afraid.

“I have to finish this today.”

Were they going to infect others or would they just go on a killing spree? Elise couldn’t do anything at that point, so she ordered Zaira, “Keep calling Junhyuk.”

—

On Sunday, no A-ranked monsters appeared when he went to train in the morning. He couldn’t deal with one of them alone. Once he entered the training facility, he let mana travel to his veins til lunchtime, then he exited the facility and walked out of the bathroom.

He could let others enter his facility, but not without him. Sarang was supposed to join him that Sunday, so he exited a little earlier to shower. After washing himself clean, he changed into new clothes and walked out of the bathroom into the house. His cell phone was going wild, and he had twenty-three missed calls. When he finally picked up, he heard Elise’s panicked voice, “Junhyuk, this is an emergency!”

“Is it monsters?”

If it was monsters, he couldn’t do anything. He couldn’t engage monsters outside of his facility. If he did, management would send even stronger ones.

“No. People infected by porings have appeared!”

“Poring infected people?!”

With the exception of Eunmi, they had all been killed! He was curious about what she was saying, so Elise spoke quickly, “It started in the US.”

“How did they come to South Korea?”

After a moment of silence, she said, “I am not sure. It looked like a warp.”

“What?”

Junhyuk didn’t know what she meant by that. Some people activated powers after being infected, but warping? And from the US to South Korea?

“They are inside Yongsan station. The iron soldiers have been deployed, but it’s crowded, and I can’t do anything.”

“Where are they exactly?”

“I trying to use a detector, but I can’t locate them. If they infect others and escape, it’ll escalate.”

“Have you stopped the trains?”

“Yes. All trains are on standby.”

The government had already experienced an incident with a poring, so it wasn’t hesitating like last time. Junhyuk thought it was a serious problem, and when he walked out of the house, he saw Sarang coming through the gate.

“I’ll call you back.”

He hung up and walked toward Sarang.

“There are people infected in Seoul right now. I have to go.”

“Another poring infection?”

“Yes, it started in the US, but they warped to South Korea.”

“What?!”

Sarang was shocked, and he told her calmly, “Warping is breaking the rules. I’m not sure if that person activated the power because of the poring infection or not, but before they warp again, I need to kill them. If I let them escape, things will escalate.”

“Then, take me with you.”

He shook his head.

“I’ll do a better job going alone.”

Junhyuk could teleport over a distance of a hundred meters, and his defense was extremely high now. Sarang was a champion now, but she lacked the proper equipment.

He couldn’t take her with him, and Sarang agreed and nodded.

“Fine, but do be careful.”

He entered the training facility with her and exited alone. Junhyuk could get to Yongsan in ten minutes, but during that time, anything could happen.

He called Elise back, and when he heard her through the receiver, he said calmly, “I’ll be there in ten minutes. Tell me the details.”