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Chapter 224: Prophecy of Apocalypse (2)

In the last iteration, Park Sihu and I had a much easier time compared to how it was like in the game.

We didn’t take the proper procedures in terms of quests, and leveled up at a speed that would be only possible through cheats. It was relatively easier than how it should have gone.

Although I had to swing the spear like crazy as someone who possessed the body of a side character, it was still an undeniable truth that Park Sihu’s elixirs provided a large amount of assistance along the way.

Like that, we quickly became strong and were easily acknowledged by others. We were able to create a tremendously strong party but… there was still a problem we couldn’t fully solve.

One of such was wealth.

No matter how much money the player was to collect, it was never more than tens of thousands of gold coins.

The amount of gold required for monster carriers like Hresvelgr, one of the end-game contents, was around 15,000 gold coins or more.

Taking into account the money you needed to create a guild and the money required to hire mercenaries, the player needed to earn 20~30 thousand gold.

Of course, that was excluding the amount of money that had to go into the actual gear and equipment of both the player and the party members.

“Korin. We got the bill for this month, but there’s still too much budget left. So I called a circus troupe, some chefs and massaging experts. Let’s go get a massage together~”

3 Hresvelgrs.

56 top-notch wyverns.

Tens of primary members, 300 from the Warsky Mercenaries and 300 from the Arden elites. 400 slave mages from the Tower of Mages… each equipped with high-quality gear made by the best craftsmen of the kingdom.

Food and consumables were also nothing but the best of the best.

“Ko~rin~dongsaengg! I’m distributing the new prophecy statements to all the chapels located throughout the kingdom. And the preparations for munitions are also under way! The Old Faith though! You should have seen the look on their faces! Kyahaha!”

Estelle, the Saintess of the Zeon Order.

The New Faith, which was supposed to incur chaos in the kingdom alongside the Old Faith, were all purged by the Saintess.

The pope and the cardinals were all gone, leaving behind only the blind and faithful believers of her miracles. 

After all that, the Saintess was making use of what she accomplished 200%.

Originally, the prophecy of apocalypse spread by the Xeruem Order was supposed to bring chaos into the kingdom and increase their public authority. This naturally would have affected the final battle as well.

But what was going on now?

Thanks to Estelle meeting a false prophecy with a false prophecy of her own, the confusion and chaos of the populace was heading in a different direction.

It was towards the savior referred to as the ‘New Sun’.

As for who it was that Estelle was inferring at… it was obviously me.

This lady was serious. She was serious about making me into a god being worshiped by the common people.

And to be frank, it was very effective.

[The New Sun will rise!]

[Saintess Estelle speaks of salvation through the apocalypse!]

[Who exactly is this New Sun!?]

Due to the intentional efforts of the Zeon Order and the media, the Saintess’s prophecy was being spread to all corners of the kingdom. 

The distressing prophecy of apocalypse, was reframed with a hopeful future of salvation.

Even though that was my plan… It was weird to see how effective incitement and propaganda were.

“This is far more than just ‘easy’.”

The absurd amount of wealth provided by the Dunareff… on top of the absolute position of the Saintess…

Is it really okay for everything to sail this easily?

“I will hereby announce the investigation group!” said King David with a sonorous voice, personally announcing the contents of the scroll.

The formality and its format reminded one of a ceremony and a speech that was usually given before a war, which didn’t sound right, because technically this was just an investigation to research what was happening with the weather.

The higher-ups of the kingdom were still just viewing the longer winter as a temporary abnormality in climate, and didn’t see it as a grave issue. All they thought was that the weather was a bit crazy.

“This investigation group has a tremendous responsibility of investigating the current abnormality in weather as well as finding clues related to the prophecy of Saintess Estelle.”

Added to the investigation of climate issues was the prophecy of the saintess, the loftiest lady in the world who was personally connected with the god.

Whatever she said had to be true. No-one could possibly say no when the saintess claimed that she personally heard it from the god.

“The Saintess has prophesied that the origin of this incident is related with the north. As such, we will increase the size of the investigation group and keep an expedition troop at bay. Every troop must therefore be ready to march through the winter.”

Of course, some of the priests of the Old Faith tried to tackle the Saintess for distorting their ‘prophecy of apocalypse’ but Estelle returned the same response to them.

‘I heard it. For real.’

‘Like I said, I heard it from the lord!’

‘Do you think I’m lying? I’m the Saintess, you know? Whatever I say goes. Stop blabbering.’

That wasn’t exactly what she said and it was quite heavily paraphrased, but that was what she said to them in a nutshell.

As a result—

“I grant full rights of this investigation to Baron Korin Lork, who may form the group at will. I also give permission for Saintess Estelle Hadassa El Rath to form the divine expedition.”

I was the commander of the investigation group, but also had the right to give commands to the expedition in an emergency. Although the expedition was technically under Estelle, it was the same thing anyway and didn’t really matter.

“It’s finally about to begin.”

“Everything seems to be going the way you wanted it to.”

Master said while taking my side with a smile.

The first investigation group amounted to 800 in total, comprised of absurdly exceptional talents.

Master Erin, Lady Josephine, Marie, Hua Ran, Alicia… and me. There were 6 with the word ‘Unique’ in their title, and added to that were 794 who were all knights and mages.

“This looks enough to start a war,” commented Lady Josephine while lifting her glasses.

“Most of them are reserve guardians I’ve summoned as the president and 300 of them are slave mages, so the official number of the investigation is 500.”

“That’s the ‘official’ number, is it?”

“That is exactly right.”

In preparation for the final war which would happen simultaneously at numerous fronts, I stationed the reserve guardians wherever necessary, and squeezed out all the remaining guardians that could be utilized.

Along with this legion of 800 knights and mages…

[Side Quest: Fallen Valkyries

※ Difficulty: S

※ Deadline: April 31st]

“Northern borders. That’s our first destination.”

It was one of the places that would go down if everything went according to the game scenario. The wall was where the valkyries of the north would escape through, after losing half of their numbers, all the way until they could reach the player.

We had to protect the valkyries that were against Tates Valtazar, as well as the great wall at the northern front, which will save the lives of countless humans.

****

Ever since the start of the winter holiday, Rashid had to move with his father after a long time off work.

“Uhp… Uhpp! Uhp!”

It was ironic how he was back with the head of Hasassin, the race of assassins, despite escaping it to walk the chivalrous path of a knight.

Kidnapping, secret investigations, assassinations and destroying facilities.

Those were nothing new for the Hasassin race, who were one with the darkness from birth.

For Rashid, it was slightly disturbing how this was a request made by a senior, whom he had been considering to be the greatest example of a model knight.

Korin requested while tapping on his shoulder.

[I’m not saying the result is the only thing that’s important. But there are just too many bastards in this world.]

[Are you talking about yourself?]

[Damn it! Don’t look at me like that! I know that already! I know!]

In any case, the mission he had assigned to them after entrapping his father and paying a huge amount of gold was finally coming to fruition.

– KUAAAAHK!

– Please! PLEASE STOPPPPP!!!

The basement was echoing with screams. Rashid felt slightly skeptical about doing something that felt so greatly distant from his chivalrous dream, but his thoughts changed after reading the documents they gathered.

“What horrendous fuckers.”

It was mind-blowingly shocking, and Rashid felt first-hand how humans could stay quite rational and unsurprised when the truth was absurdly ridiculous.

“Fuu~. These guys are tougher than expected.”

The steel door to the basement creaked open as his father, Sinnan Ib Salman Mustali, walked back up. As always, his face reeked of blood.

“Is it not going well?” Rashid asked.

“Fellows with disgusting convictions don’t tend to open their traps so easily. But this won’t take that long.”

“I believe you should hurry. I’ve heard that the expedition is being formed with haste.”

“That’s pretty fast. Something like that would normally take months to go through. Looks like our employer has quite the political power.”

That’s… probably thanks to all the women.

Rashid wanted to add but refrained from doing so.

Korin Lork was definitely a respectable knight. He was a kind-hearted hero, who was a great target for aspiration and mentor as a fellow knight, but…

‘He has too many women.’

It wasn’t like he indulged in such matters, and yet there were still way too many women around him – each of them were abnormally extraordinary on top of that.

Even Rashid thought the preparation would take until May at the very least. But from the looks of things now, ‘May’ sounded like a joke.

The super-wealth of the Dunareff, power of the Arden, full-on support from the royal family and the false prophecy of the Saintess.

The synergy of his messy relationship with women allowed everything to be resolved in the blink of an eye. It was to the point that it seemed like he was going against the laws of the universe, and be possibly met with a backlash.

“Ehew…”

“What is the matter, son?”

“Nothing. I was just… thinking how being ripped into 5 parts won’t be enough for some people.”

“…How sinful must they be for you to say such a thing about them?”

“I guess you could call it a sin.”

Although he respected Korin Lork as a senior knight, Rashid was greatly concerned about his future.

‘He’ll probably be ripped into different parts, right?’

All who live by something, will die by something.

Rashid was reminded of that line from somewhere.

****

The El Rath Kingdom, in possession of most of the continent, had clear distinctive traits for each region.

The east had a great military as well as a trade route to the east.

The south had wide plains of grass and abundant resources which in turn made them exceptionally wealthy.

The west was the center of religion, while the capital city was the core of culture and administration.

Each region of the continent had their distinctive traits, while the ‘north’ had two possible interpretations.

One of them was the immediate north of the El Rath Kingdom. It was referred to as the north for being on the north of the capital city, but the lands were infertile and were therefore few in population. 

It was widely known how everywhere except for the ‘northern walls’ were basically free from the eyes and hands of the central administration.

Because of how independent the location was, the end of the wall was where the Tower of Mages, the sanctum of magic, had been located, but that in turn proved just how barren and uninhabited these lands were.

One of the fundamental reasons for the lack of population was the infertile lands, but there was also the presence of barbarians, who loved harassing the kingdom ever since its establishment.

The kingdom had several times tried to eradicate the barbarians of the north, but it wasn’t easy to annihilate those, who were living in the harsh wintery regions of the far north.

In the end, the El Rath Kingdom made a compromise by creating a large wall around the Northern Kingdom, to stop them advancing down south.

That was the first definition of ‘north’.

As for the other definition of ‘north’, it was a very broad terminology.

It referred to everything beyond the northern walls the kingdom had built – the vast land of barren nothingness, that was as big as the El Rath Kingdom itself.

That seemingly cursed and uninhabitable land was where they were situated.

“Unni. We have a message.”

“Can you pass it to me, Hilde?”

The lady with hair as white as snow read the letter passed onto her.

[Mist is trying to stop them. The Frost Giant appeared. Some of our sisters escaped. We are nearing our limits.]

The message conveyed by one of her sisters contained depressing news.

Niflheim – the remnant of mythology which should have vanished from this land along with the end of the era – the demonic land that should have forever vanished from the memories of people in the deep underground, was being brought back to life by one man.

Tates Valtazar.

That man’s objective… was to destroy the world.

“Unni… Do we really have to stop him?”

“Hilde…”

“But think about it. If he succeeds… we can regain our past glory. Even if we continue living on like this, we will wither away and eventually disappear. That’s why the sisters of spear… Olrun and Alvit are on his side…”

[A man carrying a spear will give us our new mission.]

That was the prophecy given by one of their sisters who could read the destiny, which ended up dividing them into two factions. Because of that prophecy, half of the valkyries became followers of Valtazar.

It wasn’t like the lady with snow-white hair didn’t understand her sisters.

After the fall of gods, the valkyries who had lost their purpose had similarly fallen from grace, but there was now a being who could grant them a new battlefield.

However, siding with him meant discarding this current world.

“Hilde. Over that small brook is the village of Geron and the little children. The grandparents of their grandparents of their grandparents received my blessing when they came into this world.”

That wasn’t the end.

“The forest across the village is where the village of the forest keepers are. They’re little children who cultivate nature, communicate with the elementals and help the forest survive through the harsh winter.”

“Unni…”

“That’s not the end. There’s more. There are also the half-giants, who occasionally shared their game with us despite being a long descendent of the titans.”

The lady with snow-white hair, Brunhild, recalled the history of this land which she had overlooked for the past 1,000 years. The reason they were still alive, despite failing their mission of assisting the gods in the final battle, was simple.

“They have nowhere else to go. They won’t be able to survive without us.”

It wouldn’t be long until the horde of demons and giants would come south. The Master of Winter will descend and shake the earth with its footsteps.

Brunhild wanted to protect the citizens of the north, who would be otherwise swept away in that turmoil.

“We… should have died back then. We lost our chance to die an honorable death.”

“I know.”

They had lived for too long.

For far too long… they had lived in harmony with humans.

Like that, the female warriors, who couldn’t meet a glorious end along with the gods, had ended up falling from grace.

“But even if we fight till our last breath… everyone will die. For them to survive…”

“We must cross the walls of the kingdom that are stopping us.”

“There’s no way they’ll let us in. They will probably think of us as barbarians.”

“…”

Brunhild knew that as well, but there was no other option.

If need be… she might even have to gather her sisters and the tribes to break that wall.