[725] Face Off
* * *
Seongeum and Sambo stared out at a vast crater, as if a meteor had struck.
"That place…."
It was the very center of the Maze Jessica.
"Something seems to have fallen."
Munkyeong's voice was grave—the crater's scale defied any sane imagination.
'And yet I can't see the thing that fell. What on earth could have crashed here?'
Jix, leader of Volcano, muttered.
"Imir's molar."
Seongeum, who had annihilated Volcano and forced them into service as guides, had never reached the center herself either.
There were, however, legends.
"Rumor says Jessica is where Imir's molar fell, long ago."
"A molar? One tooth made a hole like this?"
The crater spanned two kilometers.
"Your Highness, ancient texts describe Imir as a giant who absorbed over ten thousand bodies. If a molar were pulled from such a behemoth, its mass would still be enormous."
Jix gave a hollow laugh.
"You're mistaken."
Munkyeong turned, displeased.
"Mistaken?"
"You know about Heaven, don't you. The Ilhwa's Art melts humans to create giants. Imir was the unprecedented giant who reached the tenth level of the Ilhwa's Art. Do you know what that implies?"
Seongeum asked without expression.
"What does it imply?"
"The Ilhwa's Art consumes roughly eight to ten humans per iteration. Those giants then gather in tens to form the next-stage giant. By that math, the number of humans needed to reach the tenth level is…."
Jix held up a finger.
"On the order of ten billion."
"Ten billion…."
Munkyeong couldn't even form an image of Imir.
"That is Imir, the king of giants. Setting aside how one could integrate ten billion minds, the number itself is absurd. Even if not in a colossal form, a molar from such a being could easily make a pit of this size, in my judgment."
Seongeum rested her chin and fell into thought.
"If that's so… what could have pulled a molar from such a being?"
"Who can say. Maybe someone before recorded history fought Imir and tore it out."
Jix surveyed the vast crater.
"As you know, once a giant passes the sixth stage, they qualify to depart to a new world. That's because they can start manipulating telomere levels."
Munkyeong recalled classified files from the Jincheon Space Agency.
"Fragmentation and gigantism."
"Right. A sixth-stage giant can make a new individual from part of its body. If it exhausts telomeres to the extreme, it can revert to massive form. The average height of a sixth-stage giant is eighty meters, but if it triggers gigantism it can reach nearly two kilometers."
Jix's lifetime of giant research rivaled the Space Agency's knowledge.
"The strange thing is that beyond the sixth stage the average height actually shrinks. We call that the condensed form. As size falls, power increases. Volcano estimates Imir's condensed form would be barely around three meters."
"A three-meter giant made from ten billion humans?"
"Imir who fought here in the distant past might not have been as enormous as we picture. I don't even want to think about it—humans look so unbearably small by comparison."
Munkyeong fell silent while Seongeum lifted her head.
'From so high…'
Before artificial skies, in the true heavens, Imir must have fought some other being.
'The force of a single molar.'
A molar had been torn free and fallen here; the shockwave would have swept everything away.
Where civilization vanished, giants raised pyramids to honor Imir.
"So these are giant relics."
Only one thing remained among the ruins: Imir's molar.
"All right. We've confirmed it; that will do."
Jix's gaze softened.
"Though we didn't achieve it ourselves, our comrades can now rest in peace."
He had spent his life chasing this sight.
"Kill them. My part ends here."
He had followed Seongeum—who'd killed his comrades—only to complete Volcano's business.
"It's too early to end the journey."
Seongeum moved toward the crater.
"Imir's molar. We should see with our own eyes what it truly is."
"Your Highness, but…."
Munkyeong hurried forward, then abruptly stopped when she felt the distance to Sambo and retreated.
"It's dangerous."
She sensed the nature of the power.
This was not a fragment of Imir but a place where an actual piece of Imir's body remained.
"I fear some abomination might arise."
"No—stop this, stop that."
Seongeum clicked her tongue and turned to Munkyeong.
"If one tooth frightens you, how will you face the Ivory Tower trials? I hear one of the candidates has already been to Heaven."
Before leaving Hwangseong, an inspector from the Jincheon Space Agency had visited Seongeum and said this:
"Your Highness, one of the Ivory Tower candidates is someone I know. His name is Shirone."
"No advice needed. This isn't a children's talent show. If they stake their lives in combat, they'll produce results."
"Of course. Your Highness's firmness is known everywhere. But that is precisely why I warn you."
Seongeum's curiosity stirred.
"Is he strong, this Shirone?"
"He is."
The answer came without hesitation.
"Shirone is certainly strong. But this isn't simply a matter of wins and losses. Your Highness is a heroine of the realm; the heavens will decide outcomes. What worries me is…."
The inspector looked away, remembering Shirone observed at Alpheas School of Magic.
"He is a man with a temperament utterly unlike those Your Highness has fought before."
"Utterly different?"
"Your Highness's nature is to bend not at all—unbreakable. That unbreakability is remarkable, like a pine forged a thousand times. But Shirone…."
Here the inspector's worry surfaced.
"He will not try to break Your Highness."
"...."
"No gale will budge Your Highness. But the gentlest breeze can erode steel."
Seongeum slapped her knee.
"What are you saying—do you take me for a mere woman? No matter who Shirone is, I will never give my heart to him!"
"Not because Your Highness is a woman."
The inspector's face grew grave.
"Because he is human."
Seongeum's brow furrowed.
"No—perhaps because he is a living thing."
"What are you talking about…."
"Perhaps!"
The inspector cut in firmly.
"Perhaps simply because Your Highness exists."
Seongeum adjusted her expression and asked,
"Is he really that vast?"
The inspector pressed his folded hands to his forehead.
"I cannot gauge his size."
"Hmm—Shirone, you say?"
"Your Highness, the strongest candidate in this test is a man named Rian. But his strength is obvious and visible. Your Highness will never yield. Yet…."
The inspector slowly lifted his head.
"You can't collide with something that isn't there."
Seongeum's eyelids fluttered.
"Your Highness, beware Shirone. Never let him into the space within your gap."
"I understand what you mean."
Seongeum lifted her chin.
"But don't worry. No one in this world can enter my sphere."
Shaking off the memory, Seongeum resumed walking.
"The other candidates I compete with are not trifles. If they risk their lives to contest me, there's no danger I must avoid."
Munkyeong sighed and followed, unable to bend Seongeum's stubbornness. Jix and Sambo entered the crater with them.
The two-kilometer-wide pit plunged hundreds of meters in places and funneled inward like a drain.
'Small. It really must have been struck with overwhelming force to make a pit like this without a truly massive object.'
Jix's shoulders trembled as Volcano's hypothesis proved true.
"Where on earth is Imir's molar…?"
As Seongeum murmured, the crater shuddered violently and the ground at north, south, east, and west began to slide inward.
"Do not come closer."
Seongeum halted the party as four enormous statues rose from the sinking earth.
"Those are ancient war machines! Your Highness, it's dangerous!"
Jix warned Munkyeong.
"Wait! Those are Yol! The gate of the trial! If we approach we'll be bound by the Law!"
Just as the angelic Law bears the name Hera, in Heaven the giants' Law is called Yol.
-You who have come to this place.
The four figures slowly cleared the ground and rose ten meters high.
Curled like fetuses, they looked down at Seongeum; their faces were beastlike and long horns jutted from their foreheads.
-Are you a being that crosses the cosmos?
Their iron bodies trembled, the sound striking like a drum on the heart.
"If you mean to ask whether I am a giant—no. But if you ask whether I can cross the universe…."
Seongeum covered her mouth with her sleeve and sneered.
"Why would there be anything you can do that I cannot?"
-…Prove your Yol.
Blinding flashes leapt from the four horns and struck Seongeum.
"Your Highness!"
The unavoidable activation of the Law wrapped Seongeum in light and lifted her; an immense flare burst forth.
"Hah!"
A tremendous shock slammed into Seongeum and flung her consciousness to the far reaches of the cosmos.
'This place…'
For a moment she saw her planet, then dense blackness studded with stars—the vastness of space—opened before her.
'I'm being hurled forever.'
As her awareness hurtled away at near light speed, Seongeum perceived an overwhelming terror of scale.
'Compared to the vast universe, humans are dust.'
The distance felt so absolute she thought she might never return.
'And this is…'
Seongeum's body, engulfed in the Yol's glare, straightened upright and her petal-like lips parted.
"It is but my single step."
Aetheric Wave—Mugan Path.
Space crumpled from across the void where she had been flung and rushed back toward her true body.
"Your Highness…."
Munkyeong's shoulders shook; tears of awe fell as Seongeum's single step was confirmed.
'The true Seongeum's single step crosses the universe.'
No one could approach her.
"Is it done now?"
When Seongeum landed, the four statues sank back through the ground.
At the same time, something white shot up from the center and fell before her.
Jix's eyes shone as he cried out.
"Imir's molar!"
Seongeum, who hated foreign flesh touching her, stabilized the space and watched from a distance.
A single molar—small enough to pass for human—glinted in the light of the artificial sun.
'This is serious. The legend was true!'
If Imir's scale allowed a single tooth to birth a new individual, Munkyeong hurriedly drew her sword.
"What is it?"
After a long moment with no response, Jix offered an opinion.
"Imir is the only being in Heaven who can choose his battlefield. Perhaps his will is preventing rebirth."
"Hmph—anticlimactic."
Seongeum, stung in pride, tossed the tooth; Jix caught it hastily with both hands.
"Ra Enemi isn't here. It's a shame, but there's nothing to be done. Let's move on."
From the start, only Seongeum could have explored all three labyrinths.
"Then where will you go next?"
Andre was closer by distance, but to Seongeum who leapt stars, it made no difference.
She looked beyond the horizon and said,
"I will go meet Shirone."