The battle was not as easy as I’d thought.
The Iron Dragon, the giant beast, was close enough to touch if it stretched out its arm. To be precise, it was only a few dozen meters away…
“Take cover!”
A tactical retreat, for now.
The Hunter Team saw me retreat and immediately scattered after me into the ruins’ debris.
“Thank goodness the terrain is complicated.”
We managed to hide, but the monster’s attention was still fixated on me.
If the mecha dinosaur turned its attention to someone else, there would be sacrifices.
That thing was just that strong.
Maybe I could handle it, but amateur Hunters stood no chance.
“Aim for the legs. Stall it from a distance, and when the monster weakens, move in with melee weapons to finish it off.”
Two mages from the Hunter Team, who had retreated to the rear, tossed fireballs toward the front. The monster wasn’t injured, but at least they succeeded in drawing its gaze.
The Iron Dragon scanned its surroundings.
I gathered mana and overcharged the Prototype Hunter Rifle to its maximum.
The attached Magic Stone began to tremble—
Bang!
Once again, I succeeded in hitting its leg.
At the same time, I drew the monster’s gaze to myself.
Ming Ming unleashed fire at the Iron Dragon, but I grabbed Ming Ming’s tail and pulled him back. This wasn’t the time for a head-on fight.
The Iron Dragon charged at me, and I ran for another piece of cover. The team members were forming an encirclement.
Bang!
I pulled the trigger again, a flash streaking by.
This time, I succeeded in landing a direct hit on the monster’s head.
Perhaps it was a solid hit, because the brass teeth scattered in all directions. Black fluid dripped from the Iron Dragon’s face.
“Use attack magic!”
Once again, several attack spells struck home.
At last, the monster began to falter.
No matter how low-level the attacks, if they piled up, they could do considerable damage.
That thing couldn’t just stand there and endure forever.
I fired another shot at the monster’s leg.
“Now!”
The Hunters wielding melee weapons rushed out from their cover.
A spearman I’d seen earlier charged straight at the monster from the front.
“With an A-rank ability, how effective will it be?”
Crash—!
The result was pretty good.
The spear lodged in the monster’s head, and with a sound like gears falling out, the mecha dinosaur collapsed against the ruins.
Dark brown oil—probably lubricant—leaked from the monster’s corpse like blood.
Still, what a hassle just to take down one.
If I hadn’t been on site, it was clear this team would have been wiped out, just like in my previous life.
I used the Investigator Trait on the monster’s corpse.
[You have defeated the Iron Dragon.]
[Investigation Score +20.]
[20/200 until reaching Enlightenment Stage 2.]
Now that I’d killed the most dangerous monster in the Gate, we could catch our breath for a moment.
“Let’s see.”
A few remaining bugs of the Machine Church were gathering scrap iron and copper pieces, trying to assemble something bigger and more dangerous.
The massive mecha dinosaur must have been built in a similar way.
Those Machine Church bugs probably tore down this Ancient City and built giant killing machines all over the place.
We killed the remaining Iron Steel Spiders.
Hunting down the few robot bugs left wasn’t difficult.
They’d lost their element of surprise, and the overwhelming numerical advantage was gone.
All that was left was to mop up.
The Hunter Team checked for casualties.
Ryoo took photos of the fallen scrap-metal monster and continued speaking.
“As I was saying before—think about it. If Goblins conquered the original civilization of that world, then wouldn’t these mechanical monsters be similar?”
“It’s possible.”
“Did they conquer multiple worlds, and now their next target is ours? Is that why these ruins are left behind?”
I didn’t think so.
For that to be the case, the Goblins or the robot bugs would have to be strong enough to topple entire civilizations, and they didn’t seem that powerful.
I nudged the mecha dinosaur with my foot.
Definitely dead.
“More importantly, there are hardly any living things here. The sky is dim, no grass in sight, and the oxygen concentration is lower than expected.”
I checked the air analysis results.
Oxygen concentration: 17%.
“Still, maybe there are areas with more plants elsewhere in the world? Seventeen percent isn’t that low. That means somewhere on this planet, there are still organisms producing oxygen.”
I shook my head.
“Some recent papers came out. Most of Earth’s oxygen production comes from manganese nodules on the deep sea floor and oceanic protists. I don’t think there are any plants on the planet’s surface.”
In other words, not that many plants are needed to produce oxygen.
Ryoo nodded.
“Well, after more research, hopefully we’ll find out who made those robot spiders.”
These monsters weren’t born, nor did they lay eggs.
They just made more robots identical to themselves.
I wanted to recover the monster byproducts and bring them back to the Research Institute as soon as possible.
Perhaps this time, we’d discover new technology that would help humanity survive.
Or, on a smaller scale, maybe I’d find a way to improve or mass-produce the Hunter Rifle.
***
The world beyond the Gate was in chaos. Fires from the battle sent dust and ash swirling everywhere.
Dead monster corpses piled up around us.
The ruins of a city destroyed decades or centuries ago felt like the decaying carcass of a massive beast.
The Iron Steel Spiders we’d seen earlier were the bugs feeding on those corpses. It was a disgusting sight.
Situation: complete.
Perhaps because we’d killed all the monsters, the static from the radios that had been crackling earlier was gone.
Ah, though the radiation levels were a bit high.
Soldiers from the Supernatural Science Research Institute, wearing gas masks, secured the scene for documentation and to search for hazards.
Maybe because of the report about the giant steel adversary, there was also a team with heavy weapons like anti-tank cannons.
“That’s impressively fast response.”
Society had adapted to the Gate crisis faster than anyone had expected. There was no other choice.
What else could we do?
The world had already seen it.
On the first day the Gate opened, countless casualties occurred worldwide. Every plan for response had already been made.
Now we had to consider what we could bring back from Gate No. 2.
The core of the research was clear.
“That machine.”
Since the monsters of the Machine Church system operated by magic, some might think scientific research wasn’t as important.
But it was quite the opposite.
This was related to the Research Institute’s fundamental approach to anomalies.
The key wasn’t how much these phenomena violated the laws of nature, but what rules applied to them.
Directionality wasn’t unrelated either. You couldn’t just order someone to study magic and expect them to research magic right away.
Inevitably, we had to start with scientific methodology. This task was no different.
“Let’s just wrap up and get out of here quickly.”
We chose a suitable clearing and began moving the monster corpses for research.
With several Awakened on site, the work wasn’t as hard as it seemed. At a glance, it had looked impossible.
Ming Ming tried to help, grunting at my side, but his size in Shapeshifting State was barely that of a dog or a cat—so it wasn’t much use.
It would be weird to transform him just to carry luggage.
Still, what mattered was his willingness to help.
The larger monsters were tough, but with some effort we could move the Iron Steel Spiders.
Dozens of robot spiders, each about the size of a person.
The massive mecha dinosaur seemed to have been the boss monster here. We took it down more easily than expected.
I documented each specimen’s appearance with my camera. I’d have to dissect them again back at the lab.
“Wait, can you call this a dissection if it’s a machine?”
But isn’t it still a dissection? The Machine Church’s robot organisms had some biological traits, after all.
***
The battle ended quickly.
Armored military vehicles entered the space beyond the Gate, followed by large trucks to transport the monster corpses.
Without heavy equipment, moving these remains would have been impossible. It was a mountain of scrap iron.
I met Ryoo again, who’d left the site a bit earlier. Ryoo was sitting with Ming Ming.
“Doctor Lee, you’re here.”
“Yes.”
As soon as Ming Ming saw me, he started wagging his tail.
On a side note, unlike a dog’s, Ming Ming’s tail was a lizard’s tail, streamlined with his body, and surprisingly heavy.
Ryoo, caught off guard, got smacked a few times by Ming Ming’s tail and scooted a little to the side.
Ming Ming didn’t mind at all.
Ming Ming bounded straight toward me.
I caught Ming Ming’s charge with a practiced roll. Even in Shapeshifting State, he was heavier than he looked.
“So, what happened back there?”
Ryoo stared at me.
I have a lot of questions. The monsters we saw in Gate No. 2—do they move by magic? Or engineering? Are there elements we could study and replicate?”
“I think we can imitate them.”
“Ah, why’s that?”
There are several reasons.
“First, there doesn’t seem to be a separate entity controlling those iron monsters, right? It’s the same for maintenance. It means they can operate autonomously.”
I hadn’t seen any entity managing or maintaining them.
“Yes.”
“There’s a high possibility these are things that require little to no maintenance. Even if they’re powered by magic, as you saw, it’s not an impossible field.”
Magic Engineering.
A structure where magic and mechanical engineering are combined.
I’d studied Magic Engineering before the regression, but in Korea, the Research Institute hadn’t achieved much in that field.
“That’s why there were a lot of frustrations.”
But with more resources and specimens, and by involving more scientists and Awakened in research, the results would be different.
More precisely, it all depended on what we found while exploring Gate No. 2 right now.
“We’ll know more after we dissect them. Whether it’s a simple machine, a product of magic, or something in between.”
Just how much can we imitate?
Use whatever we can.
I sent Ming Ming back to Ryoo and moved to one of the vehicles. There was something I needed to check on the Gate detection equipment…
***
Ryoo sat stroking the white dragon.
Real name: Ryu Ji-hye.
She had always been called a prodigy as a researcher.
She’d graduated early from both high school and university.
Ryoo had joined the Supernatural Science Research Institute because of an incident during her doctoral program.
She’d worked at the Supernatural Science Research Institute longer than anyone, and was among the researchers with the most experience dealing with anomalies.
The Gate was a much more powerful anomaly than usual.
But it wasn’t the first time she’d seen something anomalous.
“Ming!”
A strangely shaped monster.
Five days had passed since the Gate incident began.
It felt like five months, but it had only been five days.
News about Awakened was piling up.
Ryoo realized just how bizarre Lee Han’s case was.
The fact that he’d entered the Goblin Gate alone.
The fact that he’d entered the Machine Church Gate, too.
The level of strength was fundamentally different.
He’d even known in advance that Gate No. 2 would open in Busan.
“Why?”
It wasn’t an easy question to answer.
Doctor Lee was hiding something.
“I’ll have to ask him later.”
She didn’t know what he was hiding or why.
Ryoo tilted her head in confusion.