Opportunities from the Game Become Reality, Episode 176
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Opportunities from the Game Become Reality, Episode 176
42. Dragonlands (2)
There are typically two ways to break an illusion spell.
The first is the most orthodox method finding and destroying the magic circle or artifact that maintains the illusion.
That is exactly what Blake wants me to do.
The second method is a bit more extreme destroying the spell itself through sheer force.
Which is why Blake drew his sword and threatened to kill the people of Gangnam-daero spread out before our eyes.
"W-What? A movie?"
"Let's avoid them for now."
As Blake drew a longsword radiating a chilling aura, the people nearby hastily backed away.
They reacted just like real people.
I stopped Blake for the time being.
I knew this couldn't be real, but still, I didn't want to stain the long-awaited sight of my hometown with blood.
"Let's save that as a last resort. This is a relic from the Mythic Era, so who knows what unexpected situations might arise."
"Hmm, I suppose so."
Blake sheathed his sword, accepting my words.
With that, I cast a detection spell.
The wavelength of Mana spread in all directions, and information about my surroundings flowed into my mind.
But I couldn't sense anything.
No, to be exact, the detection spell told me that everything before my eyes was real.
[Lee Min-young / 2nd year student at H University]
[Ahn Seok-hoon / Unemployed]
[Kim Hyeong-tae / Manager at L Display]
Even the Myriad Mirror recognized the illusion as real.
'The technology of the Mythic Era really is impressive.'
I shook my head.
Blake said he could sense a door behind us.
So it was certain that this place wasn't real yet even the Myriad Mirror, which I considered the Grand Duke Lucas's greatest invention, couldn't distinguish truth from falsehood. There was no other way to describe it but amazing.
However, the Myriad Mirror hadn't lost its function it simply couldn't tell real from fake so I wasn't too worried.
"This doesn't look easy."
"It seems we'll have to search through everything as we go."
"Is that possible? This field looks quite vast."
"Yes, searching is my specialty."
I lightly snapped my fingers in the air.
-Creeeak!
At that, from the empty space behind us, the support unit Black Eagle appeared.
"Aaaahhh!"
"W-What!?"
When an eagle the size of a car suddenly swooped in, chaos erupted all around.
Many people had been watching us from a distance like we were a spectacle, but the moment the black dog appeared, every single one of them was terrified.
"A mutant!"
"Wait, aren't mutants supposed to be only insects?"
Mutant?
Was that referring to the monsters Benjamin said appear in the poisoned lands?
Poisoned lands refer to the anomalous zones that appeared on Earth after the great calamity.
I'd heard that in those poisoned lands, insects undergo mutation and become monsters and judging by what the people around us were saying, this illusion was following that setting.
'Is this place created based on my knowledge?'
There was no other way to think about it.
"Let's move somewhere quiet for now."
"Agreed."
I immediately flew up using magic, and Arcia and Blake chased after me, leaping off traffic lights and street lamps.
"Huh!?"
"They flew?"
The rooftop of a building seemed like the quietest spot.
I used float magic to lift Arcia and Blake up as we headed to the rooftop of a nearby building.
"Oh my god!"
"W-Who are these people?"
The rooftop we flew to had a designated smoking area, so there were a few people there too, but compared to the main street, it was far quieter.
To drive even those few people away, I set off a light spell like a camera flash.
The terrified people fled.
"The air is terribly foul."
"That's just how this world is. But really, they went out of their way to replicate even this."
Not just sight and hearing touch, smell, and taste all felt completely real.
I mobilized the Black Eagle to properly search the relic shrouded in illusion magic.
"Blackie, I'm counting on you."
-Squawk!
The Black Eagle, Blackie, used its doppelganger skill and flew off in different directions.
I shared the visual information from all three of them and thoroughly combed through the Gangnam area.
"The space is quite large."
"Is it?"
"Yes, the area we've covered so far is already the size of a decent small city. And since we haven't finished searching yet, it could get even bigger."
"Not bad."
"Not bad?"
"Doesn't that just mean the relic's worth is higher the more extraordinary it is? Naturally, the rewards we can obtain will be greater too."
That made sense.
Still, it was impressive how he could think about rewards even in a situation like this.
'Well, it's true that this doesn't seem to be a system that threatens our lives.'
But it didn't take long for my expression to harden.
The Black Eagle's official name was the Sonic Black Eagle.
In other words, it meant a golden eagle that flies at the speed of sound.
Those creatures were flying in zigzags across the sky searching, and the area expanded beyond Gangnam District to include Seocho and Jamsil, then soon encompassed cities in the surrounding Gyeonggi Province.
If only it had ended there. But when its activity range was about to reach past Bucheon into Incheon, my expression couldn't help but harden.
"The scale has exceeded that of a major city."
"Is that so?"
As I kept searching in a you-versus-me spirit, the range continued past Gyeonggi Province into Gangwon-do, Chungcheong-do, and even Gaeseong in North Korea.
And so, three hours passed...
Having finished searching the Korean Peninsula, I massaged my temples.
"I couldn't find any place where I sensed traces of artifacts or magic."
"Hmm..."
An area the size of the Korean Peninsula couldn't possibly fit underground in the Dragonlands.
The judgment I could make about this was...
Either this place was a truly different world, or it was a virtual world like Chronicle Online.
"For now, I need to send one of my doppelgangers flying in a straight line. I need to check whether the edge of this world exists."
This was a precaution in case the scenery we were seeing right now happened to be real.
"Even if it's not related to magic, was there anything special?"
"There is. There are anomalous terrains called poisoned lands, and peculiar landmarks that shouldn't exist on Earth."
According to the search, a total of 25 poisoned lands and 12 peculiar landmarks were discovered.
"Let's explore those places first. Perhaps there's some kind of trial to break through this place."
If this world wasn't a simple illusion but a virtual world, then approaching it game-like, as in Chronicle Online, might be the better option.
We headed toward the poisoned land in Hanam, Gyeonggi Province, which was the closest one.
The poisoned land we arrived at was so large it took up half of Hanam City.
Inside, it was filled with mutated plants and monster insects, and another notable feature was the sheer number of soldiers surrounding the poisoned land and people in protective suits constantly going in and out of it, searching for something.
"Huh? W-who are you people? Didn't you just fly through the sky?"
"It's dangerous! You can't go in there with bare skin!"
Ignoring the people clinging to us from all sides, we headed into the poisoned land.
"A fairly potent poison. But it doesn't even measure up to the light-bloom herb."
The light-bloom herb was a poisonous plant from the Dragonlands that even 7th Circle magic couldn't easily cure.
If it was weaker than that, it posed no threat to us at all.
I cast a 7th Circle wide-area detoxification spell.
'Greater Cure.'
Then the poisonous mist that had shrouded the poisoned land like fog slowly lifted, revealing the mutated venomous insects that had been guarding the area as if it were their home.
I, Arcia, and Blake each drew our weapons and dealt with those venomous insects, and it took less than a minute to eliminate the thousands of insects that were visible.
"What is this?"
The soldiers and the people in protective suits going in and out of the poisoned land were so shocked that they fell flat on their rears on the spot.
It felt like being Superman.
We observed the changes with an attitude of not caring what reactions the surroundings showed, but nothing changed at all.
-Bang!
No, actually, should I say it wasn't entirely nothing?
Along with a single gunshot, a bullet fired by one of the soldiers flew toward Arcia.
"Huh?"
But that bullet failed to harm Arcia.
Because Arcia snatched the bullet out of the air with her bare hands, wondering what it was.
Even without catching it, it wouldn't have pierced the barrier one gains upon becoming an Aura Master anyway.
Arcia sent the bullet back, and it retraced its path, embedding itself into the muzzle of the soldier who had fired it.
-Boom!
-Ting!
"Gah!"
"Agh!"
But the force was too great.
The bullet, which had seemed to be flicked off casually, pierced straight through the gun itself, penetrated the soldier's bulletproof vest, and lodged into his chest.
Also, in the process of piercing through the gun, it struck the automatically loaded bullet, causing a chain of accidental discharges.
A soldier standing nearby, with a dumbfounded expression, had his neck pierced by a bullet that popped out of the ejection port.
"Uh? Sorry."
It was actually Arcia who was flustered when the two soldiers collapsed bleeding.
"Corporal Kim!"
The surroundings erupted in chaos.
They fired first, then all got excited at once and pointed their guns at us.
But seeing that the soldiers' emotions were tinged with fear, I let out a small sigh and cast healing magic on the two who looked like they could die at any moment.
"Huh?"
"The wounds...?"
"Oh my god..."
For something to be an illusion, the healing magic worked far too well.
At my actions, Blake grumbled, asking why I bothered saving them.
"Why not just let them die?"
As he said, if a human died, some kind of change might occur.
But that's something to check at the very end.
"If this is a relic from the Mythic Era, it could be something belonging to the gods. Monsters aside, wouldn't it be better to refrain from killing humans?"
"Is that so?"
"We can try that anytime, so let's save it for last."
"Well, if you say so..."
Blake looked displeased, but nodded in agreement for now.
"Oh, a miracle."
"It's a miracle."
Once I healed the soldiers, their hostility vanished without a trace.
They kept muttering the word "miracle," and some even bowed to me.
I have little Resistance to such cringe-inducing situations, so I led the group and flew back up into the sky.
Afterwards, we headed toward the strange structure.
"Indeed, the building's style is different."
A tower that soared, unaware of how high the sky was.
Such a tower stood in a secluded mountain in Gangwon Province.
'Hellfire.'
After confirming there was nothing in the tower, I destroyed it with the most powerful attack spell of the 8th Circle.
"No change."
"And the eagles?"
"Still no change."
At this point, I began to wonder if this was actually real.
Even so, I kept denying it in my head, because treating the Earth that Grand Duke Lucas so desperately wanted to return to in this manner felt like cheating.
"Wait, may I go somewhere?"
"Where?"
"To where I lived in my previous life."
"Hmm, that's not a bad idea. If this illusion is based on your memories, retracing where you lived before would be a good method too."
I simply wanted to see my family, but Blake interpreted it favorably on his own.
Next, I headed to Bucheon, where I had lived with my family.
I had heard that Earth was thoroughly destroyed in the Great Cataclysm, but Korea was surprisingly well preserved in its everyday state.
Especially the major cities were unchanged from before.
Benjamin, who was from Singapore, had told me Korea suffered little damage, but seeing my hometown, whether illusion or real, so intact, made me feel inexplicably pleased.
A moment later, we arrived at Bucheon, and I took in the old apartment complex in Bucheon Jung-dong.
I thought I had forgotten many memories of Earth after living 21 years in Rondel, but facing it now, they came flooding back.
-Ding-dong.
And standing before the front door that remained in my memory, I pressed the doorbell.
"Who is it?"
A familiar voice came from within the familiar scenery.
It was my Mother's voice.
"Huh?"
And when I saw the typical Korean ahjumma peeking out from inside, my eyes welled up with tears without my meaning to.
After all, she was a Mother who had been gradually fading from my memories.
This kind of sentimental reaction doesn't suit me.
"Wh-what business do foreigners have here?"
Arcia and I have appearances similar to Eastern Europeans by this world's standards, but Blake clearly doesn't look human to anyone.
It was just like Mother to lump him in as a foreigner.
"I'm Minki."
"Pardon?"
Korean slipped out of my mouth.
Thanks to my abilities as a Grand Mage, even my hazy Korean flowed out smoothly.
"I'm Kim Minki. The unfilial son who died right before being discharged from the military."
"Are you joking right now..."
Of course, a foreigner in strange clothes suddenly popping out and claiming to be her son wouldn't hold up.
But Mother trailed off mid-sentence.
Did she sense something?
Suddenly, Mother's eyes flew wide open, and she cupped my cheeks with her hands.
"I-is it really you?"
"Yes. I'm the son who came back from his last leave after drinking too much and drew a map on the blanket."
And then came the tearful reunion.
Whatever convinced her to believe I was her son, Mother embraced me and burst into tears.
At that, Arcia's eyes welled up with tears, and Blake poked my butt with his scabbard, telling me to snap out of it.
"G-get inside first."
After weeping bitterly for a long while, Mother led me and my companions into the house.
Soon, I arrived inside a home that felt warm and cozy.
But then... .
-Pft!
Suddenly, the surroundings changed.
Mother, who had been right in front of me, vanished like mist, and the modest apartment that seemed smaller than my room in Rondel was replaced by a space white on all sides.
"What is this?"
"Oh, looks like we escaped the illusion! It seems your memories really were the clue to breaking out."
Naturally, I couldn't help but be bewildered by this situation.
And angry.
"So all of that was really an illusion?"
It was too real to just dismiss as fake.
"There's a device that looks like a controller over there!"
Whether he knew my feelings or not, Blake gleefully ran around the white space here and there.