{I can see you have a certain knack. But.}
When Matron spoke in a voice filled with rage.
Just the aftershock of that anger alone.
Made a massive vibration ripple through the area.
{The power you hold is, in the end, infinitely small. No matter how high your goal may be, for now it is only a trifling thing.}
No. That’s not it.
At first, I thought the ground was shaking from Matron’s rage.
But only a moment later did I realize there was a separate place where that vibration was coming from.
{In the end, you are nothing more than a mortal as you are now. Your limits, too, must be clear.}
I turned my head toward where the sound was coming from.
{Bury yourself within those limits, you worm.}
And then.
What I saw there was.
“Again?”
Tanks and soldiers.
Those nauseating enemies I’d kept dealing with ever since I got here.
‘That’s a fancy way of talking, but in the end you’re saying you’ll crush me with raw force, aren’t you?’
If that’s the case.
It’s actually easier for me.
Rather than using some weird special power, something I can physically fight back against is a little more manageable.
“......No, wait.”
But a moment later.
I realized this wasn’t something I could just brush off that simply.
Because.
“I get that the army’s coming, but.”
Compared to the Capital Defense Command soldiers I’d fought so far.
There was one difference.
“Why are they coming from over there?”
The direction those troops were coming from.
Wasn’t Seoul.......
‘Gangwon.’
The very place I came from.
The Gangwon direction.
*****
The Republic of Korea Army’s strength is, unexpectedly, on the fairly strong side.
Because Korea is a country with military power that ranks among the top ten in the world.
And among that military power.
What takes up the majority of it is the Army.
Of course.
There’s only one reason they have to maintain that kind of strong military force.
To stand guard against the obvious enemy state settled up north.
And because of that.
Most of that powerful Army strength is stationed on the front line against the enemy state.
Which is.
‘Gangwon.’
Gangwon.
And now.
[Subjugate the enemy occupying Seoul!]
“I’m going insane, seriously.”
From Gangwon, where most of the Republic of Korea Army’s strong combat power is gathered.
An enormous number of troops.
Were marching south to target me.
THUDUDUDUDUDU.......
In the distance, combat helicopters were closing in at tremendous speed.
And not only that.
PHAAAANG!
They cut across the sky at a speed I could barely even track with my eyes.
Leaving their trajectories carved across the air.
‘Even fighter jets.’
Even aerial forces.
That are judged impossible for ordinary humans to ever oppose.
Now I finally understood.
Why Matron had been so confident.
‘[Matron] is a divine being that deals with regret...... in other words, the past.’
And because of that.
What it’s bringing out against me is also.
‘Every military unit from the past.’
If the Republic of Korea Army weren’t particularly strong.
Then the forces Matron could pull out of the past wouldn’t amount to much, either.
But.
“......What kind of military is this strong!”
Not now.
Just like the Capital Defense Command could move when Jang Youngwoong attacked us.
If Matron forces itself a bit and exerts its power.
It can recreate Gangwon’s soldiers and use them to subjugate me.
‘Putting it the other way around, that power is still being carried out through Jang Youngwoong as a medium.’
Of course.
It’s not like there’s no counter at all.
‘There’ll be a limit. I just have to endure and drive it to that limit.’
Every time I wipe out that army.
Jang Youngwoong’s power will be consumed.
Every time I destroy this city.
Jang Youngwoong’s power will be shaved away.
There probably isn’t much left until it hits that limit.
The last time I saw Jang Youngwoong’s face, it was pretty gaunt.
The problem is.
“I’ve got a limit too, you know......?”
Even if it has a limit.
It’s still a fact that I can’t endure that attack alone.
To begin with, I’m non-combat.
This kind of thing isn’t my specialty.
In that case.
There’s only one answer.
If the problem is that I’m non-combat.
Then a combat specialist.
“All unit members! Prepare for battle!”
My unit members.
The Legion I’d raised with everything I had, precisely for moments like this.
That’s what I was going to use, but.
“......All unit members?”
......But then.
“......Guys?”
I turned my head.
And looked toward where my unit members should be.
What was there was.
“......!”
My unit members.
With their eyes closed, collapsed on the floor.
*****
“No way.”
Collapsed unit members.
The moment I saw them, I felt my hair stand on end.
Because.
Matron was the one who showed even me those painful illusions.
There’s no way it can only use that power on me.
‘The others too......!’
My other unit members too.
They couldn’t help being exposed to Matron’s attack.
“Ha, hahah...... follow me.”
“Th-this way...... the place where the food is stockpiled is.......”
Listening to the muttering words of the collapsed soldiers, I realized something.
They’d been hit by Matron’s attack too, but it was a little different from me.
If I had to compare.
“Something similar to what Jang Youngwoong went through.......”
My unit members were currently.
Fallen into an illusion where they corrected things they regretted.
That was, at least, fortunate.
Because it meant they weren’t feeling pain.
‘But what do I do?’
For what I went through.
I could get out of it somehow by swinging my kitchen knife infused with divine power.
But I can’t just swing a knife at those guys.
“Cooking...... would have an effect, sure.”
I muttered, grinding my teeth.
“But it’s not the kind of power that’s effective at a time like this.”
They were asleep because of the power Matron placed on them.
With my cooking, I could resist it to some extent.
‘[Chef’s Special Sauce] is power that handles emotions, not power that forces actions.’
If I put “the emotion of wanting to face reality” into a dish.
Or “the emotion of being able to shake off regret.”
Then sure, they could resist Matron’s illusion to some extent.
But only up to that point.
‘In the end, it’s just emotion.’
In a state like that.
It’s hard to imbue enough coercive force to wake up.
‘There is a way...... but do I have to use it here?’
It’s not like no method came to mind.
But every single one of them was too limited.
And they were powers I needed to conserve as much as possible.
I felt cold sweat trickle down.
All I have to do is endure somehow.
But I can’t even endure in this situation.
“......Damn it. Fine. No choice.”
Just as I made up my mind.
To solve this situation even if it meant releasing power I needed to conserve.
“Khhhhhng....”
“......!?”
From far away.
I sensed someone pushing themself up.
“How, how?”
Startled, I snapped my gaze over there.
“Hoo... did I finally break out.”
“How the hell did you—!”
What was there was.
“How did you wake up, First Lieutenant Kim......!”
It was First Lieutenant Kim Hyeon-seok.
*****
Soldiers collapsed on the floor.
They were submerged in the illusion Matron showed them.
A temptation so sweet it was absurd.
Being able to rewind every mistake from the past.
That sweet scene probably made even waking up feel like something to refuse.
And dragged them into sleep that deep.
But.
Only one person.
“How did you get up, First Lieutenant Kim......?”
“......Whew! Sorry, but my head hurts, so give me a second.”
First Lieutenant Kim Hyeon-seok.
Just like me.
He overcame Matron’s illusion on his own and opened his eyes.
I didn’t do anything.
By his own strength.
...How?
“It’s nothing special. I just....”
“Just?”
“When that weird monster showed up, just in case, I activated my skill in advance.”
“......Ah!”
First Lieutenant Kim wiped off his cold sweat and pushed himself up.
I knew what skill he meant.
[Meeting Expectations]
A power that lets him actually display the ability others believe he has.
But even so.
I never thought it would be enough to withstand interference from an external existence.
“That illusion showed me things I regret, and it seemed to give me a chance to correct all of those regrets. It was definitely a pretty sweet temptation. But... it wasn’t without a way to beat it.”
The illusion I suffered also had a way to beat it.
[Matron] is an existence that handles the emotion called regret.
Shaking that regret off would’ve been the way out of the attack I took.
And.
The way to beat the illusion that put my unit members to sleep was.
“It was simple. Just thinking to yourself that you want to leave the illusion.”
Wanting to leave the illusion.
Thinking that, yourself.
‘Easy to say...!’
The illusion Matron was showing them was probably identical to what it showed Jang Youngwoong.
Sending them back to the past, giving them chances to correct everything they regretted.
‘It must’ve been an absurdly sweet illusion.’
And.
A person’s mind isn’t something you can change however you want just because you “want” to.
When you fall into a sweet illusion like that.
You might be able to think that you should get out of it.
But deciding that you will get out of it is no small feat.
I was the same.
Even though I knew the way to beat the attack I took was to shake off regret.
Just wanting to shake it off doesn’t mean it shakes off.
That’s why I escaped with the trick of swinging divine power through my blade.
But.
“The past is just the past. I decided it wasn’t something I needed to fix. Fixing the past has no meaning, so I wanted to return to reality. When I thought that, my eyes just opened naturally like this.”
“......My god.”
First Lieutenant Kim.
Beat that illusion with the orthodox method I’d already given up on.
“No—no. Even if that worked, how did you figure out it was an illusion?”
For me, I could endure Matron’s interference because I was protecting my brain with [divine power].
If not for that, I wouldn’t even have noticed the illusion was fake.
Even Jang Youngwoong didn’t notice anything he’d experienced was fake until I told him.
The soldiers lying down now were the same.
They hadn’t noticed in the slightest that what they were experiencing was just a sweet illusion.
“That, too, is the skill’s effect.”
“Yes?”
“How overestimated someone called the head of the Legion is...... even I found it ridiculous.”
The reason was simpler than I expected.
“It seems that someone who’s the head of the Legion is regarded as the kind of person with a mind strong enough to withstand most mental interference without issue.”
“......Ah.”
“While that skill is active, it seems I become immune to most mental interference. The interference that was already on me, too. More precisely, it feels like I’m enduring it through sheer mental strength.”
The position of being the head of the Steel Legion.
In this ruined world, if you lead a force of this size.
People think you must have mental strength tough enough to chew through most mental interference.
At that.
I let out a hollow laugh and muttered.
“What kind of stupidly broken skill is that.”
“Even I think so. Anyway.......”
First Lieutenant Kim looked around and said.
“It doesn’t look like the situation is good.”
“......Yes. That’s what happened.”
The enemies would reach a distance where they could attack us any moment.
Meanwhile, we hadn’t formed any defensive posture.
‘......No choice. First Lieutenant Kim is going to see it.’
It was shocking that First Lieutenant Kim had opened his eyes.
But dealing with them came first.
“Come out.”
-Yes.
KWAANG!
I kicked the shadow with my foot as I spoke.
Then.
“Hmmm...!”
The troops inside it surged out in a rush.
“My head hurts a bit.”
“Is it at the level of a problem?”
“No, not that bad. It feels like something is trying to interfere with our minds... you know, right?”
The royal guard from within the shadow.
And the leader of that royal guard.
Ariella gave a small laugh as she said it.
“No interference can stand above the Oath of Retainers.”
Matron would’ve tried to show these guys illusions and tempt them too.
But these guys were bound to me by the Oath of Retainers.
‘Even the unknown voice that bound Ariella to the bunker couldn’t overcome this oath.’
Like the other monsters that appeared at that military base.
Ariella was under mental domination that forced them not to leave that bunker.
But the moment we made the oath, even that powerful mental domination shattered into pieces.
“Give any order you wish.”
Regret, mental interference, whatever.
As my retainers, the top priority for them was following my orders.
“The task is simple. Block the soldiers coming in as much as you can.”
“Hmm, Master?”
“Why.”
At my order.
Ariella spoke with a slightly worried voice.
“From the look of it, those warriors seem to be recreations of the troops this country originally possessed.......”
“Ariella, you know I have some knowledge about this land, right?”
“I know. You said you gained knowledge while drinking people’s blood.”
“If those troops match the knowledge in my head...... it might be difficult for us alone to stop them, you know?”
Of course it would.
Not just a brigade.
But the embodiment of every military unit spread across the nation.
Even if my unit members and I fought hard against the Capital Defense Command.
That was only a tiny part of the Republic of Korea Army.
And even that was just Lieutenant General Kim Myeonghwan forcibly reviving a unit that had already been wiped out.
The Capital Defense Command is focused on defending the capital.
Its power is, in truth, minuscule compared to the full Army.
And.
Most of a nation’s forces stand guard at its borders.
Those soldiers coming down from Gangwon.
If they hadn’t suddenly been annihilated piece by piece by that malice, they’d still be intact even now.
“I have new children I gained in Gyeonggi too, and right now it’s the nobles’ time... nighttime, so I can fight for quite a while.”
“Yeah. Once the sun comes up, you won’t be able to hold any longer.”
A night noble is still a night noble.
The moment it stops being night, they’ll be helplessly pushed back by the Army’s firepower.
“It doesn’t matter. Just hold for now.”
“......Sounds like you have some kind of method? If that’s the case, then sure.”
KUUUNG.
An army made of red-eyed monsters moved to block the human army.
Watching their backs, I thought.
‘A method.’
If I’m being honest.
Up until just now, I didn’t have any real method at all.
I tried resisting in my own way, sure.
But I never even imagined a show of force like ➤ NоvеⅠight ➤ (Read more on our source) that was possible.
But.
Not anymore.
“First Lieutenant Kim.”
“Yeah.”
“Get ready.”
Right now, First Lieutenant Kim Hyeon-seok is in a state where he has the ability people think fits the Legion Commander.
And if that’s the case.
“Will do.”
There’s no way the real Legion Commander—me—didn’t think of the one thing that could get us through this.
The soldiers are all down.
What’s left is just me and First Lieutenant Kim.
And.
If you’re talking about a way to win this situation.
“There’s only cooking, right?”
Isn’t it obvious?
