Chapter 44

—FWOOOOM—BOOM!!!!

The two cannon shells streaked forward in twin lines, converging right in front of the watchtower. Then, with a thunderous blast, they slammed into it.

—Nice briefing....

—You lined that up real nice too. Good.

RUMBLE!

The enemy watchtower had already been down to almost no durability, so it collapsed fast. And the instant it fell, EYE TO EYE alliance members came scrambling out through the wreckage. But there was nowhere for them to run.

—BANG! BANG—! BANG-BANG!

As if they had been waiting for exactly this moment, gunfire erupted from alliance <47>.

—Got one.

—Hell yeah, headshot! Fucking delicious, yummy!

—Aah! We’re actually landing everything!!

The members of <47>, who had been lying in wait for this exact second like hyenas, opened fire with savage precision.

They killed them before they could even find an opening to flee, and EYE TO EYE’s attack line collapsed in an instant.

(Global) 5602: GG

(Global) me9me9: wp

(Global) IfYouTouchMeIPK: gg

(Global) GearEffectiveness: GG

(Global) DLAN: GGGG

(Global) WizardWhoRanOutIntoTheYard: GG

A stream of surrender messages from EYE TO EYE rolled by, all of them saying GG. But even seeing that, no one in the alliance said anything at first. Maybe the fight had gone on too long. It was like none of them could really feel it yet.

(Alliance) Miu: Everyone did well

(Alliance) Miu: Good work

But the moment Miu declared it over, the chat burst open all at once.

(Alliance) ShinJadu: Ugh, I’m too dead to even talk, can’t even do voice..

(Alliance) ShinJadu: Great work, everyone!!!

(Alliance) FUNK: good work good work

(Alliance) 1Poop1: Wow it’s finally over T_T holy fuck T_T you guys worked your asses off T_T

(Alliance) dude: good good

(Alliance) Opening: Sorry sorry I joined late!

(Alliance) YoureGettingSued: Aah!!! Amazing T_T good workkk

(Alliance) MyApologyLetterIsInEnglishGlobal: My babies worked sooo hard~~~~!!!

(Alliance) GoodLuck: good work~!

(Alliance) CheersInMyEyes: lol seriously T_T sorry I joined late too..T_T good work

(Alliance) BBQ: y’all worked hard,, lol

(Alliance) KimFactory: gud work!!!!!

One by one, the exhausted alliance members shut off voice and started talking in chat instead. Message after message of good work piled up.

Is it over?

Even in the middle of all that, Mo Yeonhoo just sat there dazed. It had been his first Siege War, and it had ended this spectacularly, so he was still out of it, still tired, but...

(Alliance) 0momo0: Good work!

Even so, he felt amazing.

Holy shit! I did a Siege War!

It was true that he hadn’t made the kind of standout contribution the others had. But that didn’t mean he had done nothing.

“Wow, look at my level....”

Yeonhoo checked his repair level. He had started at level 1, and somehow he had made it all the way to 10. That alone proved how completely he had thrown himself into repairs.

I blew all my money too.

Of course, when things got urgent, he had leaned on the power of money. Instant Completion Tickets definitely weren’t cheap, but every time he saw cannon shells flying in, he somehow wound up spending cash to patch the wall.

I’m so damn proud of myself.

He had no idea how many hours he had spent clinging to that outer wall like part of the structure itself. More than once, explosions had nearly cracked his skull open. But he had survived to the end, and he had held the wall.

That made him absurdly proud.

(Alliance) ShinJadu: Whew, the alliance territory is a total mess T_T

Winning didn’t mean the alliance territory looked fine afterward. Crates lay everywhere, all of them blasted open by shelling, and the ground was pocked all over with bullet scars.

(Alliance) GoodLuck: Then let’s just clean up a bit and go to sleep~

(Alliance) YoureGettingSued: Sounds gooood!!

(Alliance) dude: ok

At GoodLuck’s suggestion, everyone started sweeping and scrubbing the ground despite how exhausted they had to be. Then, while everyone settled into cleanup mode, ShinJadu spoke up.

(Alliance) ShinJadu: Still, I never expected <HamHidden> and <Hawk> to suddenly ally up and hit us like this..

(Alliance) YoureGettingSued: Seriously!!! Why would Ham do that? ?_?

(Alliance) FUNK: i thought that was weird too the sudden alliance how they got in here and why

(Alliance) 1Poop1: There’s a size gap too, so I legit don’t get why they picked a fight; did they eat some weird-ass shit or what T_T?;

(Alliance) dude: Mm... I didn’t get EYE TO EYE either

(Alliance) ShinJadu: Right, they were weird too; how’d they even get in touch with Ham and Hawk and come in here allied up..

(Alliance) MyApologyLetterIsInEnglishGlobal: What’s weirdest to me is Hawk getting involved.. weren’t they usually the do-their-own-thing type? You babies didn’t provoke them, did you?~~

(Alliance) YoureGettingSued: Aah! Same thought as me!!

(Alliance) GoodLuck: We were minding our own business~ go check the incident board~ we’ve been living all quiet lately~?

(Alliance) MyApologyLetterIsInEnglishGlobal: But baby, look... if they went after the core, that means there’s bad blood!! Seriously, nothing comes to mind??!

Still, not a single alliance member seemed to know why those three groups had gone after <47>’s core like their lives depended on it.

Then Miu suddenly stopped.

And without {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} another word, he turned sharply and started walking away.

(Alliance) 0momo0: Uh.. Miu, where are you going???

(Alliance) Miu: The core

(Alliance) ShinJadu: Ah!! Right, the core!!

(Alliance) YoureGettingSued: Aah, true! We should go look at the core! It’s been forever since we’ve seen it!

(Alliance) FUNK: letsgothe core side i kinda wanna see how bad that area got too

It looked like Miu was planning to inspect the area around the core that had been attacked earlier in the day. The others seemed bored with cleanup anyway, because they immediately drifted over to his side.

Then maybe I should... casually follow too.

Yeonhoo quietly trailed after them as well.

After walking for a while, they reached a patch of brush. Once they pushed through it and went a little farther, they found KimFactory crouched down and repairing a fence.

(Alliance) KimFactory: Leader~~~ this side’s almost fully repaired

(Alliance) KimFactory: The second it collapsed, me and Jadu got on it and repaired like crazy hehe

This is... the core?

The core was a machine shaped like a flower bud. It was smaller than he had expected, but intricate. Faded metal gleamed with flashing red circuit patterns.

New item!

<47>’s alliance core

Core structure: Bud Type (Phase-V)

Level: MAX

Time remaining until bloom: 6d

※ Warning: “Fragrance” is generated upon blooming.

※ Core fragrance increases the stimulation index of zombie entities within a certain radius by +150%.

※ During the blooming period, or while repairs are in progress, the core cannot be moved.

※ Protect your alliance territory by managing the bloom cycle carefully.

Reading the warning text in the data window, Yeonhoo was startled by how detailed the core’s settings were.

Wow, do the effects change depending on what kind of shape the core has? Blooming?

Apparently <47>’s core would flower when the time came, and when that happened, zombies would come swarming in, so it had to be managed on a regular basis.

It felt strangely alive.

Even while he stood there staring at the core in fascination, the alliance chat continued.

(Alliance) Miu: Factory, I want to ask something

(Alliance) Miu: When the attack started, they came at the core side immediately, right

(Alliance) KimFactory: Yes!!! The second the outer wall over here got wrecked they went straight for the core; the core damage alert popped up;; scared the hell out of me T_T

(Alliance) 1Poop1: Ugh just thinking about that again has me sweating like crazy

(Alliance) YoureGettingSued: Right! When Jadu yelled “the core,” I was like aaaaah!! I seriously thought the alliance was done for! lol

As if measuring the situation from back then, Miu slowly swept his eyes around the area.

The direction he was looking was the outer wall beyond the brush.

D8.

The wall where they had fought EYE TO EYE until the very end.

And that wall was...

(Alliance) Miu: D8 is the shortest route to the core

It was the fastest way to reach the core.

(Alliance) Miu: They moved like they knew where the core was

For a second, everyone froze. It was too exact a route to wave off as coincidence, even as a joke. But the other alliance members quickly started offering objections as if to deny it.

(Alliance) MyApologyLetterIsInEnglishGlobal: Baby, you’re overthinking it~ they probably just hit there first, then rushed over once the core got detected~

(Alliance) dude: Mm...

(Alliance) YoureGettingSued: Hm! If they had a Finder-type class over there, they could find the core tho

(Alliance) 1Poop1: Or maybe we left the core in one place too long and the location got exposed? Not that I knew where it was anyway...

(Alliance) dude: Even if it stayed there a long time... who would know where it was...

The conversation felt strange.

It was as if the alliance members were talking like they didn’t know where the core was.

(Alliance) 0momo0: You don’t usually know where the core is??

(Alliance) ShinJadu: Ah, momo, you wouldn’t know that yet

(Alliance) ShinJadu: The core’s too important, and we have to move it around sometimes

(Alliance) ShinJadu: So except for me and the leader, nobody knows where it is!

(Alliance) MyApologyLetterIsInEnglishGlobal: Right~ it can be a sensitive issue, so that’s probably the best way~

(Alliance) GoodLuck: yep exactly

I see. Well, if it was a structure that important, it made sense that they wouldn’t disclose its exact location to ordinary alliance members.

(Alliance) 1Poop1: Anyway, this was a freak caseㅇㅇ when zombies get aggro’d onto it we get a fuckload of loot, so we usually just leave the core blooming where it is

(Alliance) 1Poop1: Did we leave it in one place too long this time and seriously get exposed to some Finder-type players?

(Alliance) FUNK: sounds possible we dont move the core much in general

(Alliance) FUNK: finder types couldve been circling around nearby and detected it

(Alliance) Miu: No

Miu said it flatly.

(Alliance) Miu: I moved the alliance core to a completely different location this morning before I logged off

Which meant...

(Alliance) Miu: Someone sold out the core location

In other words, within just a few hours, the alliance’s secret had leaked—and the attack had come straight in.