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The Red Gate (1)

Our meeting was held quietly, undisclosed to Earth’s media. It’s because the Union made such a request. As I entered the Union officials’ temporary residence floating over New York, a small drone-like machine welcomed me.

– The Commissioner is waiting inside.

It was a machine that emitted telepathy. I looked at it with an interested gaze. I saw a very small Mana Core mounted inside the Machine, but it was certainly not a creature. It was also some sort of artifact.

– Welcome, Earth’s Awakened.

The presence greeting me in the room with delicate lighting was a huge chunk of flesh. If a turnip were to be attached with fat, would it be like that? The alien, fattened up to the point that its length and width seemed almost familiar, looked more than five meters tall, and wrinkled fat flowed down throughout the body. In the middle, there were several thin tentacles that were like the roots of a radish. It didn’t seem to act as a hand or foot, and perhaps it would be a sensory organ.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Commissioner.” – Call me Bachurka.

To be honest, she looked like she was struggling just by opening her eyes and looking at me. We had never come across each other in the past life, so I didn’t know until recently, but it was said that their species grew massive as they aged and became bloated as their muscles changed into fats. Also, she held a high-ranking position in the Union, but she did not appear to be an outstanding Awakened. By Earth’s standard, perhaps she would only be around C-Rank? Compared to ordinary people, they might experience slower aging, but their flesh wasn’t entirely free from the flow of time. Therefore, that appearance proved that she was an ancient being among their species.

Wing! Weeing!

Around her, dozens of large and small drones were busy flying. It was reminiscent of honeybees coming and going around the hive. I looked at what each drone was doing. One of them poked around the flesh with a syringe-like object, injecting its contents, while another raised the folded flesh and exposed it, while the one next to it applied a coolant spray on the exposed skin. Meanwhile, her anatomy’s lower part was attached to a device that allowed her hefty body to float in the air. Apparently, she was in a state wherein she couldn’t even move on her own. In fact, only the brain was working decently, but artifacts replaced everything else. She asked a question.

– Do thou have any idea on thy summon?

Her attitude was quite polite. As Adam assured, there was no threatening energy sensed. I answered back.

“I was only told that before the Earth’s registration to the Union can be finalized, something needed to be confirmed through an interview first.”

Then a brief silence flowed.

– …Hmm?

She leaked a mental wave in a tone as if she had heard an unexpected answer. Then immediately, I noticed signs that told me she was confirming it with someone. After a while…

It must be that the business team working under me had exercised excess caution. Those gents must have been careful to avoid words leaking before the official announcement. “What? I don’t grasp it quite well.” – To put it bluntly, the Earth’s alliance with the Union has already practically been confirmed. “!”

Adam also guaranteed that if it’s a dimension of Earth’s level would easily be able to join, but it was a relief to receive direct confirmation from such a high-ranking alien. It’s going well as planned. But then…

‘Hmm? Then why was I summoned?’

She talked about that portion as if my curiosity had been revealed on my face.

– I hath asked thee to meet with me to make an offer.

Then she spoke as she caught me off guard. She talked about not what I should concern myself with, but what would become Earth’s problem from then on, and at the same time, that it would become the Union’s business.

– I’d like to talk to thee today about the species called Mercadius. “…”

Thump, thump. My heart pulsated heavily. I waited for the next word without a hasty answer. The Commissioner gave off relaxed telepathy.

– I do not know if thou already knoweth, but not long ago, the Union dispatched four selected warriors to try to subdue the Mercadius individual. Do thee know the consequences? “I heard that an undersea volcano erupted at the site of the attack, causing a tsunami and damaging only the Earthling inhabitants of the area. And that in the process, both the Union warriors and Mercadius went missing.”

mixed into her mental wave. Most of them were connected with suspicion and anxiety.

– That is right. If Mercadius is dead, it’s the best outcome for the Union and Earth, and if he’s fled to a different dimension, it’s good news for the Earth, but it’s a pity for the Union. However, if he’s just on the planet but has hidden more diligently, it will be the worst outcome for everyone. Unfortunately, however, our analysis showed that the last assumption is to be more likely the case. “May I ask why you made such a judgment?” – When our warriors launched an operation to suppress him, the Union Command observed the scene in real-time.

Lately, governments on Earth had also monitored operations in real-time, even if it’s done from the other side of the globe. The Union wouldn’t have been blind and only waited for news to be heard in such a crucial situation.

– As a result, the Mercadius species’ abilities… the individual’s skills that fought with our warriors have been identified. Do you know what’s the most threatening among them? “…”

Why did she keep asking me questions? Did she think that I was aware of something?

– We assume that he hath the ability to overtake and control the spirit of his opponent.

[Mercadius’ Seed]. Based on what had been revealed, it was a unique skill that was judged to be much more powerful and semi-permanent than Angelica’s mental manipulation skill. The grade was of the same SSS-Class, but the skill performance differed too significantly. The reason was presumably that Mercadius’s skill had already been improved several times. I asked her a question.

“Were the warriors manipulated by him?” – The half did. “?” – We haven’t figured out the conditions for manipulation and brainwashing. We’ve only confirmed the aftereffect. Two of the four best warriors suddenly showed an unknown reaction and started attacking the other half.

So even they had been defeated.

– The brawl continued in that manner… Then suddenly, the volcano erupted. The next is as thou knoweth.

The eruption indeed seemed to have been the doing of Mercardius, not of the Union.

– Well, I think we should receiveth to business.

The eyes revealed between the swollen flesh were covered with something foggy. She stared straight at me.

– I’ve read the records of the Union Audit team’s interview with thee. It was interesting.

The Albanos bastards.

“I heard that it did not end well for them.” – Aye, they were all dismissed.

It was just as Adam told me.

– Even those already dead or gone missing have lost their honor. The Albanos must have thought that if they have correctly taken care of what they were told to do, the headquarters will not pry on whatever they do in their free time, but…

She muttered something along the lines of ‘it was a foolish and small-minded imagination. They’re always like that.’

-Crucially, thanks to the intervention of the ‘great being’ that you serve, the situation has become a big deal. It became an issue that even the headquarters couldn’t leave alone. Perhaps it would have differently ended if they hadn’t seen it, but it was evident that they had made a mess as they were up to something.

The Albanos, which failed to kidnap me quietly, seemed to have been searched inside-out by the Union headquarters. They were in a situation where not only could they not even dare touch me again, as I was considered the reincarnate candidate for Igras-Sho, they had to surrender their position on Union’s audit team.

– Anyway, back to the contents of the interview… You seem to have profound bad blood with him. With that Mercadius thing, I mean, considering a few beings around you have their paths crossed with his curse and went crazy or dead.

I made a gloomy expression for the show.

“It’s a painful wound.”

In the interview with the Albanos, I left out the fact that I was also under the curse.

– But there’s one thing I’m curious about. “?” – The means that thee got to identify the fact that the people around you were under the curse of Mercadius. Did I hear correctly that they each revealed their madness towards you and ultimately tried to kill you?

Well, that wasn’t a lie.

– In the process, the curse’s identity was revealed thanks to the Iponia that thou take care of.

That, of course, was a lie. That was the only way to recognize the curse other than [The Successor’s Eyes], so I reasoned out with that. I couldn’t help but sell out the guy that must be taking a nap and lying around in my house right at that moment. The animal was still actually too young to handle my curse. I nodded.

“Yes, indeed.” – That’s the exact reason that made me wonder.

The eyes shone strangely between the rotten tofu-like flesh. And what she said was…

– Perhaps, couldn’t it be that thou too art under Mercadius’s curse as well?

Thud! My heart pounded once again. Instead of pretending to be expressionless, I asked back with a moderately shaken tone.

“Me, too? What do you mean…?” – There’s a lot we don’t know about the Mercadius species. Although there are many areas where it hasn’t been adequately proven to be considered information among the secured contents… looking at the interview records reminded me of it and bothered me.

She telepathically spoke, leaving a peculiar reverberation, saying that very few beings knew about it even in the Union.

– It is said that they propagate through the method of scattering their seeds.

The seed of Mercadius.

– And among the other names of Mercadius, there is the one that says: ‘the one that breeds by the soul.’

An entity that multiplied through the soul instead of the body…

– When we combine information that has already been scraped from the doomed dimensions… Although it’s only a story considered speculation as there is no evidence, his seed appears to be divided into two types. One is the seed to produce a new Mercadius, and the other is the seed that exists to become the nutrients of the true seed and be consumed.

Lee Chang-Hee, Han-Seol, and Seo Gyu-Cheol passed by my head. The ends they faced were similar. The curse hidden in the Core revealed itself and was destroyed by the curse leeching on me. No, I thought it was destroyed. What if those weren’t just destroyed in vain? What if the seeds of Mercadius in my Core absorbed what was in the bodies of others?

‘My curse ate them up?’

Whenever their seeds disappeared, the memory of the host was passed on to me. That, too, was explained if that was one of the processes of absorption.

‘Then, why did they bear hatred and obsession toward me in the first place? Lee Chang-Hee, Han-Seol, and Seo Gyu-Cheol that is.’

… Could it be that it was ultimately arranged for them to be consumed by me? Amid such thoughts, the Commissioner continued.

– But thee did not go mad, unlike other hosts. That’s why thou may not have noticed that thyself is cursed. In other words, only you are free from the mind manipulation of the seed. We now know the reason.

The reason was [The Successor’s Eyes].

– The reason is that thou art the person who is chosen as the incarnation of a great being.

The Commissioner in front of me was also under the mistake and the misunderstanding that the Albanos had. In fact, the attitude shown by Igras-Sho was abnormal and terrible enough to think that it could also be true. However, the certainty of whether the god’s power indeed suppressed Mercadius’s seed hadn’t been proven, and there would be no way to prove it from then on. It was only proper to think that it’s the effect of [The Successor’s Eyes] for the time being.

– I think the reason why two of our brave warriors were suddenly mind-controlled is that seeds were transplanted. Of course, it’s not the seed that produces offspring, but it must be the seed that serves as nourishment for the real offspring. We still don’t know why it affected only two of them, however.

She spoke in an angry tone.

– They indeed had an artifact that allowed them to resist mind control. But they still got defeated. In the end, it means that the remaining method is to use an EX-Class or System-Class mental control resistance item, but no such artifact has been found yet.

In the end, the only defense seemed to be the EX-Class unique skill [The Successor’s Eyes]. The Commissioner, who wasn’t aware of that information, thought the only way to resist it was through a god’s power.

– We plan to send 500 new observers to Earth in the future. If your kind becomes a member of the Union, it’s not that difficult of an investment to make. “Just to find one Mercadius, you must mean.” – Yes. If that individual is still on Earth, we’ll find it in the end. However, if we get mentally manipulated again, we’ll have to be defeated in the same manner.

She stares at me, saying, ‘But…’

– I think only a god’s power can counter that. As confirmed, there is no incarnation existing in the material world at this time. But there is a person who was chosen as a future incarnation—a man of divine protection.

She looked at the holy wound on my finger. According to the devil’s sword, the sacred power in it had been growing stronger day by day since the tutorial had ended.

– This is my suggestion. I need thy help in the Mercadius hunt we’re currently planning. Considering the threat of the apocalypse they’ll bring, the people of Earth must help us, of course. How about that? Why don’t you lend me your power to hunt for the unidentified signs with us?