Hoarding In Hell [EN]: Chapter 236

“Ah, don’t be so nervous. It’s not as terrible as you think.”

Ivanov leisurely looked around with a relaxed attitude from beginning to end.

Kawaro, who had been drooping with his neck grabbed, was handed over to a giant in huge armor behind him.

It seemed he couldn’t even use his strength, not knowing what had been done to him.

Hyeon-woo recognized the giant’s identity.

It was Rampel, the Apostle of the Star of Conquest, whom he had killed with his own hands.

The scarlet armor that had been heated up was now coldly cooled, tinged with blue.

However, the hole that Hyeon-woo had pierced in his heart still remained.

It was a coincidence that Hyeon-woo was able to defeat Rampel.

Rampel was the first apostle to encounter Ivanov.

He fought heroically with Ivanov and was active, but eventually suffered fatal injuries and made the decision to ‘strategically retreat’.

Hyeon-woo merely picked it up along with the other Cursed.

Of course, many of the Cursed died there.

‘Number 2 is not visible.’

Judging from the fact that his level didn’t rise, he didn’t seem to be dead.

Number 2 is now the last surviving Cursed.

Only when he dies can he achieve 100% of the experience points he has accumulated, but it didn’t seem like he had time to chase him now.

“Did you do this alone, young man?”

Ivanov’s face, with only a pure white skull without any flesh, looked as if he was wearing a large smile.

It felt strangely grotesque that skeletons basically have smiling faces.

“Amazing. To achieve this much without a star behind you.”

“I didn’t do it alone.”

Kirson and Hahyeon were there, and the Whispering Star, Monstrill, also helped him.

In addition, it would have been impossible if the stars hadn’t fought each other and ground each other down.

However, Ivanov shook his head.

“Creating such cooperation and conflict is also your ability. Becoming a star’s subordinate is a kind of shortcut. It’s hard to say that it’s entirely your own ability, especially in this day and age.”

Hyeon-woo heard something moving in the darkness.

The temperature of the reservoir seemed to have dropped by more than 5 degrees from before. Steam was slowly coming out of his mouth.

“I think I know how hard and desperately you’ve fought. That’s why I’m even more sorry for coming late, to make all of this futile.”

Countless footsteps.

It was like the sound of waves crashing endlessly.

He could feel countless beings constantly moving beyond that darkness.

Hahyeon pulled on Hyeon-woo’s sleeve from behind.

Her face was pale.

“Hyeon-woo, over there…….”

“I know.”

Hyeon-woo replied briefly. He could tell what was there.

Beyond that, deaths as numerous as grains of sand were lurking.

All those lives that had died in this shelter until now, including Hyeon-woo’s monsters and the subordinates of other stars, were now obeying a new star.

Even the apostle Rampel.

Hahyeon was overly nervous compared to Hyeon-woo.

This was because she could accurately know the scale of the army of the dead.

In her senses, Hyeon-woo would look like a small boat in the middle of a vast ocean.

With even an apostle in perfect condition.

It was natural to be terrified.

Ivanov was also used to such reactions.

Even subordinates who serve powerful stars cannot help but be cautious in front of the army of the dead.

However, Hyeon-woo had an unusually indifferent reaction. It wasn’t even pretending to be bold or brave.

He just didn’t have any particular feelings.

“Oh, you have a pretty brave heart.”

“I’ve seen something similar before. It’s a bit smaller compared to that time.”

The Weeping Star’s forces attacking the fallen empire.

The sight of an enormous number of undead soldiers rushing towards a castle, so much that the horizon seemed to be waving, was a spectacle that was hard to see with a sane mind.

But Hyeon-woo had seen such a countless army of the dead being annihilated, and he had also infiltrated the castle in the meantime. Compared to that enormous number, this was just a handful.

“I see. Still, you’re quite an interesting friend. It’s no wonder the stars are interested after a long time.”

Ivanov took a step closer. Hyeon-woo took a deep breath and prepared to fight.

But instead of starting a fight, Ivanov kicked the pool of blood that soaked the floor.

He muttered as if he knew whose blood flowed under this sea of blood.

“What great madness. Can humans do this? No, is there even a need to do this?”

“There’s no law saying you can’t, right?”

Hyeon-woo didn’t know what Ivanov was surprised at, but there was something else surprising in Hyeon-woo’s eyes.

“In my eyes, you guys who are fighting as if you’re so great even though the world is in this state seem even crazier.”

Ivanov seemed to laugh or be interested in Hyeon-woo’s answer.

Anyway, he didn’t seem angry.

Ivanov was about to say something when he suddenly turned his head.

As if someone was there.

Hyeon-woo looked in that direction, but it was just empty air.

Ivanov nodded as if listening to something for a long time, then turned his gaze back to Hyeon-woo.

He lit a cigarette first.

Smoke began to rise, and Ivanov took his time leisurely.

As if time was always on his side.

Hyeon-woo tried not to be impatient.

After a while, Ivanov finally opened his mouth.

“I will make an offer you can’t refuse. Kang Hyeon-woo.”

“An offer I can’t refuse?”

“I didn’t come to fight. I just came to deliver a message at the request of an agent.”

Ivanov said, exhaling a long stream of cigarette smoke.

“The agent sent me to keep the ‘promise’.”

***

“Promise?”

Hyeon-woo asked, puzzled. Ivanov nodded.

“Yes. A promise. A very important promise. A promise that ruined the game to prevent immediate destruction, and that no one thinks is important now, but cannot forget.”

“……What is that? I’ve never heard of it.”

“I guess so. You seem too young to know about that promise.”

Ivanov suddenly opened his mouth wide.

It opened so wide that it seemed like his jaw would fall off, and suddenly an old woman’s voice began to flow from somewhere inside.

“[If you protect the peace of this place, we will no longer intervene.]”

“[The end will no longer proceed.]”

“[But if you finally set foot here, you will have to prepare for the end again.]”

It was a recorded voice. He could tell it wasn’t Korean.

When the end was mentioned, Hyeon-woo felt his heart beating.

That word, which he had wanted to forget for a long time and didn’t want to think about, rose to the surface again.

Star of the End.

Hyeon-woo tried to calm down and said.

“What is that outdated prophecy-like talk?”

“Let me ask you first.”

“What?”

“Young man, how big do you think this world is?”

Hyeon-woo looked puzzled at the unexpected words.

He was in Seoul, and if he traced the approximate location, he thought it was somewhere in Seocho [a district in Seoul]. So, he naturally thought that this place was Earth.

But suddenly, the size of the world?

“What are you talking about, the universe? Earth? Country?”

“Now you’re reciting things that are meaningless. I’ll tell you since I didn’t expect an answer anyway. It’s about 1500km in diameter, although it’s getting smaller every year.”

“……Is that big or small?”

Hyeon-woo couldn’t get a good sense of the subtly detailed figures.

Usually, for that distance, he would calculate how many days it would take by what means rather than the numerical value. Therefore, Ivanov’s answer was enough to confuse Hyeon-woo.

“The Korean Peninsula, it’s been a long time since the sea disappeared, so it’s not a meaningful name, but anyway, the length of that land is about 1000km.”

Then that means only a piece of land slightly larger than Korea is left.

But Hyeon-woo still didn’t know what that meant.

“The world is only that big? What does that mean?”

“It means exactly what it says.”

Ivanov said, looking into the distance.

“The space that can be reached, seen, smelled, tasted, heard, has meaning, can be alive, and can avoid heading to extinction, that’s all that’s left.”

“That is…….”

“That’s right. All other areas are ‘end’, a destroyed world. In other words, this star is already the Star of the End. A finished world, an already broken world. And we are the few remaining actors there.”

Hyeon-woo was speechless.

Until now, looking at the world with the difficulty level: Hell, he wondered if it could be more terrible than this.

And he has been trying to prevent this future from coming.

Whether he did well is another matter.

But there was a more tragic future than that.

“What is that, then what happens?”

“Nothing happens.”

Ivanov answered calmly to Hyeon-woo’s question.

“It becomes a space where nothing exists and nothing happens. That place is like a space of used ashes. It is often said that death wins in the end, but even death is meaningless in the face of that absolute silence.”

“……Why did that happen?”

Ivanov did not answer.

Hyeon-woo felt an unknown sense of guilt and regret in that short silence.

But Ivanov was still just smiling with his unique skeleton smile and staring at Hyeon-woo.

“It’s hard to say who’s to blame. That’s not important.”

Hyeon-woo narrowed his eyes.

Ivanov was trying to avoid answering.

“Until the promise, we were all losing. Even so, we fought each other because we wanted to be the owner of even a small piece of land before it was too late, to become the owner of the star and prevent the end, to pass on our guilt to others.”

It was as the document left by the White Bones said.

They strived for one goal but constantly conflicted and competed.

Ivanov would have been no exception.

“But not everyone was like that.”

Ivanov said, kicking the ground with his toes.

“Some wanted to prevent the star from completely heading to the end, even if it meant betraying the will of the star. They demanded a ‘promise’ from the other stars who remained to continue the game in exchange for stopping the end.”

“[If you protect the peace of this place, we will no longer intervene.]”

“But they weren’t just trying to protect a small piece of land.”

Ivanov muttered with a bleak smile.

“They wanted the peace of their tombs and the minimum safety zone where hope could sprout.”

“Hope?”

“That’s too positive of an expression. It might be better to express it as a scapegoat.”

“……Did you know that something like that would appear?”

“I don’t know the details either. Many gathered to scrape together the hope of mankind. But since the agent of the leading star was at the center of the plan, they may have had hope.”

“The leading star.”

Hyeon-woo muttered and repeated. The only subordinate of the leading star he knew was Lee Ji-tae.

And if it was Lee Ji-tae, it wouldn’t be strange if he was an apostle or an agent at the last point.

“I was negative about that ‘promise’, but I was also afraid because it rejects the major premise of conquering all territories and wills and subjugating them to their territory. In the end, almost none of those who declared the promise survived.”

Hyeon-woo lost his words. Lee Ji-tae and the remains of Yoo-min in the underground laboratory of the gymnasium came to his mind.

He didn’t know how or in what way they died, but he could guess that there was some kind of relationship.

“The stars don’t care about the safety of this dying star. Frankly speaking, even if it’s the Weeping Star I serve, even if this place eventually heads to the end, it wouldn’t be strange if they turned their heads saying, ‘That’s a crazy ending.’ Because the Weeping Star has countless territories anyway. But…….”

Ivanov paused for a moment and barely continued.

Ivanov had lost his appearance as a human and had become just a powerful monster, but he was still a being who was born as a human and grew up in this land.

He couldn’t be as detached as the stars.

“That’s how the end stopped.”

Ivanov said, quietly staring at Hyeon-woo.

“I don’t know what means they used to stop it, but their ‘promise’ was absolute to those who remained. Stopping the end meant that they could start it again. That’s how this land was able to rest.”

“But…….”

“That’s right. Until you appeared.”

Hyeon-woo did not answer.

Suddenly, he felt like he was wearing clothes that didn’t fit.

Hope, sprouts, scapegoats. It was like clothes that didn’t fit Hyeon-woo and he didn’t want to wear.

“I came here to keep the ‘promise’. Although I became a subordinate of the Weeping Star, this bone is human. I don’t want this land to just become nothing.”

Ivanov reached out to Hyeon-woo and said.

“Come into the Weeping Star’s faction for our last hope. I swear on the Weeping Star’s erased inscription to protect you and the safety of this land, and let this land be under the rule of death. Let’s repeat the cycle of endless birth and death, the cycle of circulation on this land again.”

Hyeon-woo’s expression changed.

Ivanov found it difficult to interpret that expression.

It had been a long time since he had met a life with an expression.

But if he vaguely searched his memory and interpreted that expression, Hyeon-woo’s expression seemed to be interpreted as ‘absurdity’, ‘mockery’, or ‘contempt’.

It wasn’t an appropriate expression for the situation.

“No, so…… the safety of humanity and the world is in my hands?”

“……You could interpret it that way. But…….”

“But why are you acting like you’re doing me a favor?”

Hyeon-woo was still the one holding the leash.