Chapter 240
From the very beginning, it had been impossible for something like mana restraints to suppress Zeon’s mana.
It wasn’t simply because the restraints had been made using Dragon Bone. Nor was it just because Zeon’s mana reserves far exceeded the amount the restraints could control.
The answer lay in his precise control over mana.
The instant the restraints had been placed on his wrists, he severed the flow of mana heading toward them.
He completely blocked the restraints from interfering with the flow in the first place.
Not a single Awakener in Neo Seoul knew such a method even existed.
And even if they did, it wasn’t something just anyone could use.
It was a technique only Zeon could perform.
The same applied to the NSSC prison.
The entire prison had been covered with special metals and magic that completely blocked external mana from entering, but that didn’t mean it could do anything about the mana already inside one’s body.
Fwoosh!
Dozens of fireballs rose behind Zeon’s back.
It was his favorite spell—Fire Missile.
The power of each individual Fire Missile wasn’t particularly impressive.
But once the number exceeded dozens, the story changed completely.
Especially in a narrow corridor with nowhere to dodge.
The enemies thought they had cornered Zeon in a trap, but in reality, this place was the perfect battlefield for him.
“Go.”
SHUSHUSHU!
At Zeon’s command, dozens of Fire Missiles shot toward the Pegasus Raid Force Awakeners.
“Goddammit!”
“Block them!”
BOOMBOOMBOOM!
The Awakeners swung their weapons and activated skills to protect themselves.
As a result, there were barely any casualties.
Still, Zeon wasn’t disappointed.
He still had so much mana left that he could continue firing Fire Missiles endlessly.
If he wanted to, he could bombard them with nothing but Fire Missiles all day long.
And that was exactly what he did.
SHUSHUSHUSHU!
Dozens of Fire Missiles fired in rapid succession.
Before the first barrage even struck the Awakeners, a third wave was already raining down on them.
Since the enemy had attacked with overwhelming numbers, Zeon answered with overwhelming numbers of his own.
KWAKWAKWA-BOOM!
Continuous explosions echoed through the corridor.
‘Fuck! Why are they so fast?’
‘I can’t even find the timing to counterattack!’
The barrage was overwhelming not only in quantity but also in speed, leaving them no room to breathe.
“Gaaah!”
“Urgh!”
At last, casualties began piling up.
Block one Fire Missile, and two or three more would fly in immediately afterward.
The Awakeners flailed helplessly before getting struck down.
“You bastard…”
“I’ll kill you if it’s the last thing I do!”
The martial-type Awakeners, driven mad with rage, tried to force their way toward Zeon despite the damage.
But most of their attempts were stopped by Eloi.
“You bastards think you’re getting through here?”
She had let a few pass at first, but afterward she became an iron wall protecting Zeon’s front.
Thanks to her, Zeon could continue unleashing endless waves of Fire Missiles without worrying about enemy attacks.
The casualties among the Pegasus Raid Force rapidly snowballed.
No matter how much they blocked, the Fire Missiles kept coming endlessly.
It felt as though they had stepped into a living hell of flames.
And in reality, the indoor air had become scorching hot.
Some even collapsed from suffocation under the terrifying heat.
“Useless trash… Move aside, all of you.”
At that moment, Bronson shoved his subordinates away and stepped forward.
The sacrifices and incompetence of his men had pushed his fury to the limit.
BOOMBOOMBOOM!
Fire Missiles slammed directly into his body.
But he didn’t budge.
A low-tier skill like this couldn’t even scratch his skin.
Bronson was a B-rank martial artist.
On paper, that was slightly lacking for the leader of a massive raid team like Pegasus.
Yet no one dared underestimate him because of his unique Awakening ability.
Bronson’s eyes turned blood-red.
The madness and killing intent within them were so intense that even the Pegasus Raid Force Awakeners felt fear.
Zeon recognized his Awakening ability at a glance.
“A Berserker?”
Those who exploded their latent potential by feeding on rage and pain.
While using their Awakening ability, they felt no pain, and their strength multiplied several times over.
“I’ll rip your head off!”
With a crazed roar, Bronson charged forward.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
Eloi tried to stop him, but it was useless.
Her weapon, the Mad Nine-Tailed Fox, had been confiscated, and the difference in size between them was enormous.
That overwhelming physique itself was practically a weapon.
Bronson slammed into Eloi like a gigantic wild bull.
BOOM!
With a thunderous crash, Eloi’s body was sent flying backward.
Even though she had relaxed her body at the moment of impact to reduce the shock, it still felt as if every bone in her body had shattered.
The destructive force was monstrous.
Having blasted past Eloi in an instant, Bronson rushed straight up to Zeon.
Bronson’s gigantic fist shot forward like a boulder launched from a catapult.
“DIE!”
BOOM!
Zeon crossed both arms and blocked the punch.
The terrifying impact forced him to slide backward across the floor.
Yet there wasn’t the slightest hint of panic on his face.
Then Bronson launched his next attack at him.
“Iron Hammer of Judgment!”
It was Bronson’s unique skill.
His gigantic fist itself was practically a war hammer.
And once infused with the dense mana unique to Berserkers, it possessed enough destructive power to smash apart even the skull of a gigantic magical beast in a single blow.
But Zeon had no intention of obediently taking his attack.
“Fire Rain.”
In an instant, a rain of flames shot toward Bronson like meteors.
BOOMBOOMBOOMBOOM!
Ultra-high-temperature flames engulfed Bronson.
The blaze was powerful enough to reduce an ordinary Awakener to ashes without leaving even bone dust behind.
FWOOSH!
“KHAHAHA!”
But it seemed to cause Bronson no pain at all.
He burst straight through the flames.
Closing in on Zeon instantly, Bronson wrapped his log-like arms around Zeon’s waist.
An overwhelming pressure concentrated on Zeon’s midsection, like a gigantic serpent constricting its prey.
As he tightened his grip, Bronson spoke:
“You are nothing. What can you possibly do without your sand? Today, you die here. By my hands…”
Crack… crack!
The sound of bones grinding echoed from Zeon’s waist.
And yet Zeon’s expression did not change in the slightest.
With cold, sunken eyes, he stared down at Bronson’s face.
The moment their eyes met, Bronson realized something was wrong.
Zeon opened his mouth.
“You people always make the same mistake. The moment we deliberately show an opening, you think you’re the ones controlling the situation.”
“What?”
Tap.
At that moment, Zeon placed his right hand over Bronson’s face.
Bronson’s face was so large that Zeon’s hand couldn’t even cover half of it.
But that was more than enough.
FWOOSH!
Flames erupted from Zeon’s palm.
This was an ultra-high-temperature fire on an entirely different level from before.
The white flames burned through Bronson’s eyes and invaded his body.
“GAAAAAAH!”
A horrific scream burst from Bronson’s mouth.
He released Zeon and tried to retreat.
But this time, Zeon refused to let go.
He wrapped both legs tightly around Bronson’s waist.
Bronson rolled across the floor, screaming:
“Fuck! Get off me, you monster!”
“I thought you said I was nothing without sand?”
“AAAAAAH!”
The white flames burned through Bronson’s eyes and into his brain.
A thick, acrid smoke rose into the air.
The smell of burning flesh made all the nearby Awakeners shudder.
Only then did they realize the massive mistake they had made.
Zeon wasn’t strong because he was a sand mage.
He was strong because he himself was strong.
They had thought a Clean Room, where sand couldn’t be used, would make killing Zeon easy.
That assumption had been catastrophically wrong.
Even without sand, even with the Scorching Gauntlet sealed, Zeon was still powerful.
While hundreds of Pegasus Raid Force members had to mobilize just to conquer a single dungeon, Zeon had wandered through countless dungeons alone as though they were his own home.
He had fought endless life-and-death battles against magical beasts and clashed with countless humans who wanted his life.
The experience and physical power accumulated through all of that surpassed ordinary Awakeners to an unimaginable degree.
“Ughhh…”
“T-this is insane… How is this possible?”
Fear appeared on the faces of the Awakeners who had recklessly charged at Zeon moments earlier.
Only now did they understand.
Zeon existed on a completely different level from them.
An unbearable terror crashed over them like a tidal wave, paralyzing their nerves.
Like frogs standing before a serpent, they couldn’t move under that instinctive fear.
After silently looking at them for a moment, Zeon turned and walked toward the stairs.
No one dared charge at him anymore.
They had realized it too.
If Zeon had truly wanted to, he could have turned this narrow corridor into a sea of flames and burned every last one of them alive.
Had he done so, every Pegasus Raid Force Awakener inside the corridor would already be dead.
“Hawk—ptoo! Serves you right, you fucking idiots.”
Eloi spat phlegm onto the ground and mocked them.
Yet not a single person dared rush at her either.
They had been completely crushed beneath Zeon’s overwhelming presence.
FWOOSH!
After Zeon left, Bronson’s corpse became entirely engulfed in white flames.
But not a single person dared approach to extinguish them.
“Goddammit!”
BOOM!
With a heavy sound, the door leading to the first-floor lobby opened.
The moment Zeon and Eloi stepped outside, they froze.
The lobby was packed with Awakeners.
And standing at the center of them was Lee Jiryung.
The moment Lee Jiryung discovered Zeon, his brows twitched.
It was the reaction of someone seeing something impossible.
“Zeon! How are you…?”
“So you really were here.”
“What happened to Bronson?”
“What do you think happened to him?”
“…That was a stupid question.”
“You also made a stupid choice.”
“I do not regret my choice. Even if I returned to that moment, I would make the exact same decision.”
Lee Jiryung considered himself a lion.
A pride leader neither retreated nor regretted his actions.
Once he marked something as prey, he bit down and never let go.
To others it might seem cruel, but to him, that was the way to protect his own kind.
Pure lions had gone extinct long ago, but Lee Jiryung believed one still lived within his soul.
As he walked toward Zeon, he spoke:
“I wanted to handle this quietly if possible. Wouldn’t it have been nice if you had simply died obediently?”
“Who would give up their life that easily?”
“You would have died more comfortably if you had stayed down there.”
“Don’t act like I’m already dead.”
“You are already a dead man.”
“Because I can’t use sand?”
“I know you keep sand stored inside a subspace. But that amount is nowhere near enough to defeat me.”
Zeon was strongest in the desert because he could draw upon an infinite supply of sand.
But this was Neo Seoul, layered with anti-magic power, defensive magic circles, and barriers.
It wasn’t as extreme as the Clean Room, but there were still almost no gaps through which sand could enter.
With only a limited amount of sand, Zeon could never defeat him.
White lightning crackled around Lee Jiryung.
He slowly walked toward Zeon.
“Come at me, Sand Mage!”