Chapter 166
When 'it' revealed its true nature, a deathlike silence enveloped the sea.
All living humans stared at it in a moment of utter silence, unable to even perceive the splashing of the sea and the metallic sound of chains, frozen from limbs to head, unable to do anything but stare and stare again.
"Tamade!"
And the first to start moving in this quiet, silent space was Wang Wei, who was on the submarine.
Wang Wei gritted his teeth so hard they might crack, spat out a curse with his barely moving tongue, and immediately jumped into the sea.
Splash!
As water spray rose and melted into the darkness, and Wang Wei's curse tore through the silence, Zhang Wei also seemed to come to his senses, looked at 'it' with eyes mixed with terror, and jumped into the sea.
Splash!
It shouted at the two people who had jumped into the sea and were swimming with their barely moving bodies:
"Zhang Wei-! Wang Wei-! Where are you going!"
"You must follow the rules! Come back quickly!"
"If you keep going like that, you might get shot for suspicious behavior!"
"Why are you trying to swim when the sea is dangerous too! Don't be reckless! You don't even have suits to regulate your body temperature!"
Its voice overflowed with familiarity.
It sounded like a colleague known for ten years, or a friend who grew up in the same hometown, and its tone was incredibly kind, without a trace of malice. It was playful, but there was affection in it, and while it seemed to be teasing, there was worry hidden within.
"Wang-Wei-!"
The tongue protruding from the hole in its cheek moved to call out one person's name.
"Zhang Wei-Wang Wei---"
Its lips moved to call out the two names from the abyss-like hole.
But when it saw the two swimming with all their might towards the fishing boats without even pretending to hear its calls, it raised its hand to grab its jawbone and moved it up and down, making a clattering sound. Then it pulled out its jawbone, stuck its hand inside, and pushed it in up to the elbow.
Xuannü looked at its actions and frowned as if disgusted.
[ This is what evil spirits often do. ]
"Evil spirit..."
The Zhongming Bird standing next to Xuannü floated in the air, letting its colorfully shining feathers drape down to wrap around Xuannü's body. Then it rolled its multiple eyeballs and pierced through the essence of 'it' performing bizarre actions, figuring out what it was made of.
[ But that is not an evil spirit. Nor is it misfortune, and it's even less a materialization of it. ]
"Is it as the prophecy said?"
[ That's right. ]
The Zhongming Bird spoke while looking at it, which had stuffed half of its body into its own maw.
[ It's impurity imitating an evil spirit. ]
As soon as the Zhongming Bird finished speaking, it moved its feathers to tickle Xuannü's cheek. Xuannü understood the Zhongming Bird's signal and drew up her divine power, and then the light surrounding Xuannü's body gently shone, drawing lines that flew towards all the people on the sea.
The shining lines wrapped around people's bodies as soon as they touched them, as if melting, and drew the appearance of a surface as densely as if weaving a net with liquid. And it changed its form into the shape of a coat and settled on everyone's body.
The Zhongming Bird's divine power.
It was the power to repel the wicked and eliminate evil.
"Ah---aaaaah----! Ah-!"
It screamed, squinting its eyes, as the power antithetical to itself settled on the people.
A lump of impurity that was neither alive nor dead, without mind, soul, or body.
A clumsy form built up using the hon and baek it had absorbed and eaten by consuming the shaman and destroying the village.
Something that can't have will, merely a calamity that moves according to conditions.
The impurity.
It shouted, creating a huge vertical mouth on its face while grinning.
"Ah--- bitter impurity with painful purity! Impurity of lost breath and soul, impurity of blooming and going! Impurity of carrying and enshrining, impurity of the ten kings' private matters!"
Oh, how sad---!
The thing with a form as if people had been mixed like mud spoke familiar sounds from its mouth.
But unlike the voice that naturally made one feel affection when listening, what came out of its mouth were incredibly ominous words.
This was because the impurity that had devoured it was imitating using the hon and baek of the evil shaman spirit as materials, just as the evil shaman spirit had tried to bewitch Jinseong earlier.
The impurity created mouths here and there on its body and screamed as if in agony.
"Those whose breath will end on the sea are the nine hon-shin yeo-mang-je."
"Impurity of touching and handling wet corpses with bare hands! Impurity of facing coffin heads and bier heads!"
"Impurity where even the sound of crying was like the Milky Way! The white butterfly impurity at the head is the white butterfly purity!"
"Impurity seen at the time of fate! Impurity seen at the time of mourning!"
"Impurity seen at the time of death! Impurity seen at the time of shrouding!"
"Impurity seen at the time of encoffining-!"
The voice skillfully melted into the darkness and flew gently to them like butterflies.
And it settled sweetly by their ears as if coated with honey, trying to bewitch the people swaying back and forth with the undulating waves.
Impurity seen at the time of funeral procession, impurity seen at the time of road and field rituals
Impurity seen at the time of lowering the coffin, impurity seen at the time of leveling the grave
Impurity seen at the time of burial
Impurity that followed on the street today and impurity seen at the time of returning the soul
Ten impurities, floating impurities, impurities on the road, ten impurities under the road
Just as the evil shaman spirit had tried earlier, the impurity imitated the shaman and tried to bewitch people, making them hallucinate that the sound was coming from inside their own bodies.
What kind of impurity today, impurity heard by ears, impurity transferred by mouth
Old impurity and month-old purity
Impurity of paying condolences, praying, and coming and going
Impurity seen at the time of returning the soul in the mortuary
Impurity of coming and going here and there
"Floating impurity on the road, ten impurities under the road!"
"Water impurity, fire impurity, let them all be removed!"
"Ha-hahaha!"
The impurity spat out sounds incessantly from multiple mouths.
But Xuannü only frowned as she watched the impurity exerting itself.
[ Don't worry. It's not a misfortune spirit or a great evil spirit, mere impurity can't penetrate my divine power. ]
The Zhongming Bird stroked Xuannü's head with its wing as if dealing with a child, and while doing so, moved one eyeball to look at the impurity.
[ But it would have been terrible if I hadn't been here. From what I read, it was supposed to be just a strange presence and an evil being... That's not just evil, it's a lump of pollution that could easily devour a small country. ]
The Zhongming Bird slightly opened its beak as if disgusted and exhaled.
[ Why did the prophecy only mention it as an evil thing, a calamity, when it's something like this? I can't understand. ]
Xuannü glanced at the sighing Zhongming Bird and casually threw out words as if to comfort it.
"Isn't it because it can't harm the continent?"
[ Is that what you think? ]
"There's the prophecy, the united power of China, and me. No matter how strong that mere impurity is, it's natural that it can't cause harm. And the defeated always becomes insignificant, so of course it would only be mentioned as an evil thing in the prophecy."
After saying this, Xuannü drew up her divine power and gathered light in her hand as if to demonstrate her ability.
Then, the eyes of all the people, which had been slightly dazed, regained their sharpness, and courage filled their faces instead of fear.
"Oh! Xuannü has bestowed her power upon us!"
"Xuannü has blessed us with her divine power! Everyone, come to your senses-!"
And seeing this, the impurity realized that its imitation of the shaman was ineffective and tightly closed its mouth. Then, twisting its half-collapsed face this way and that, it spoke with something resembling a smile:
"Li Xiao says."
"Get back, you filth."
"Impurity, get back."
Then it began to collapse itself.
"Oh ho, get back, you filth."
"What safety is there for impurity to exist?"
"Impurity floating on water, moving with the surging waves."
"Impurity trapped on a small iron island, swaying in salt water."
"Washed by moldy salt water."
"Insect eggs carried far away by the current."
"Turning white with salt sticking before it can breed."
"The black thing breaks in the swaying of the waves."
"Oh ho, sea, when the sunlight shines, your color is truly beautiful."
"Sunlight, oh sunlight chasing away impurity, grabbing the hair of righteous impurity and rubbing it on the ground, oh sunlight!"
"Get back, impurity!"
"Leave only the objects and get back, impurity!"
The collapsed thing turned into black powder that looked like mold scraped together and ground into powder, settled on top of the submarine, and then slithered like a snake into the submarine. Then, whatever it did to the submarine's body, it instantly made it rust and created gaps in the welded body.
Seeing this, Xuannü shouted loudly so that everyone could hear:
"Act as I said earlier! Shatter everything into pieces without leaving even the tiniest fragment!"
"Yes!"
"Yes!"
"Yes!"
Xuannü wielded her divine power to enhance everyone's abilities.
She strengthened the eyes of even those who weren't martial artists to see through darkness, gave them superhuman strength to lift heavy shells like feathers, created armor to prevent impurity from invading their bodies, and imbued everything they touched with the power to break evil and exorcise demons.
And not only that, but also to the drones flying in the sky.
To the mines being released from under the fishing boats.
To the grenades and bullets that explode as soon as they touch the submarine's body.
To the shells that create huge water pillars.
The power of Xuannü's divine power adorned the night sky with lines of light, not distinguishing between people and objects.
The divine power moving like weaving fabric with shining lines in the darkness of the night sky made it impossible for even a grain of impurity to step outside the circle created by the boats, and made the rusted and moldy objects imbued with impurity shatter and burn on the spot.
"Don't let even a single piece touch the continent!"
Bang-!
Boom!
All the soldiers did their best to follow Xuannü's orders.
Bullets and grenades containing baek-rin burned the clothes and objects that might have been inside the submarine, and flying shells and lasers shattered the rusted metal lump and sank it to the bottom of the sea.
"Impurity, impurity, impurity."
"It's impurity. Impurity."
"Unable to touch land."
"Impurity that will go down into the water..."
And so, it disappeared without being able to set foot on the continent.
Moving the rust on the metal lump to create the shape of lips and spitting out its final death throes.
Moving bundles of unburned clothes to create the shape of sound and spitting out its last words.
Thus, it disappeared by Xuannü's hand.
Only after the impurity disappeared did Xuannü sigh in relief and begin to clean up.
"Let's undo the chains and everyone return to their units!"
She began to quickly dismantle the formation she had created and return to the unit, retrieved the divine power she had bestowed on objects and gave that much to people to prepare for any situation. And she sent Zhang Wei and Wang Wei, who had fled from the submarine and climbed onto the fishing boats, to medical scanning devices to check their bodies.
"Lieutenant Wang Wei, Lieutenant Zhang Wei. Brain tumors have been found in both of them!"
"Weren't they not there before they went on the mission?"
"That's right!"
"You're saying brain tumors developed in that short time?"
"Yes!"
"That's terrible."
Li Xiao sighed upon hearing the military doctor's words.
Considering how they had acted as if possessed by ghosts, she thought something might have gone wrong, but she never imagined brain tumors would have developed.
[ Don't worry. They're small, so surgery will take care of it. ]
"Phew."
Li Xiao sighed upon hearing the Zhongming Bird's comfort and moved into the fishing boat. Then she entered her small personal space assigned to her and looked at the Zhongming Bird with a face mixed with relief and anxiety.
She revealed a vulnerable side she couldn't show in front of others and spoke to the Zhongming Bird:
"What on earth happened in the old North Korean land? Why was something like that there, why did it follow... And... and..."
[ Calm down, Xiao Xiao. ]
"If there hadn't been a prophecy, if that impurity had set foot on the continent, what calamity would have occurred...!"
Li Xiao's appearance, trembling slightly while embraced by the Zhongming Bird, was different from how she had been on the boat.
Not a cold and charismatic woman, but a weak girl befitting her beautiful appearance.
The appearance of an incredibly weak girl struggling under the weight of the burden placed on her shoulders, feeling burdened by wearing a mask and acting.
Li Xiao was buried in the soft feathers tickling her cheeks for a long time.
And as if she had finally managed to calm her surging emotions, she pulled away from the Zhongming Bird's embrace.
"I need to work harder. I don't know what's happening on that peninsula, but..."
There was a certain determination in her eyes.
"No matter what sinister plot there might be, it won't be able to violate the great China."
* * *
Jinseong, who was watching the stars from the roof of the mansion, tilted his head as if puzzled.
"What stupid fellows took away a lump of impurity?"
He chuckled, looking at the stars that had briefly dimmed and then reappeared, and the tiny stars that had been hidden in dark spaces and then emerged again.
"It’s in the northwest judging by the direction of the stars, but whoever it is, I appreciate it."