Chapter 29

Chomp chomp.

Yerin had snacks stashed in her clothes, and I was happily munching on them one by one.

The only sounds inside the car were the rumbling of the wind and the crunching of me eating snacks.

With my limbs trapped inside Yerin’s warm coat, I couldn’t move, but strangely, it wasn’t uncomfortable at all.

In fact, now that I think about it, it was pretty rare for me to grab snacks myself when I was with Yerin.

How many degrees below zero is it now? It’s been a while since I last felt human, so I can’t really tell anymore.

Judging from the rosy glow returning to Yerin’s face, it doesn’t seem too cold inside the car, but who knows what the temperature’s like outside?

When even a reliable vehicle like this stops moving, you know it’s freezing. Whether it’s because the gasoline froze or if there’s another reason, who can say?

Or maybe Yerin just did a shoddy job maintaining the car, causing it to break down. Who knows?

Outside, the blizzard rages so fiercely we can’t see even an inch in front of us.

This must be what they call a whiteout.

How much longer do we have to stay here?

I’m bored, and the soft warmth is making me drowsy against my will.

***

The Reaper nestled in my arms seemed to be bored with being stranded in the snow and had quietly fallen asleep.

About two hours after the Reaper drifted off, the blizzard finally stopped.

What lay before us was a scene that made us question whether this was Seoul at all.

A world blanketed entirely in snow.

While snowy landscapes aren’t uncommon, the things moving around in the background certainly weren’t typical sights for Seoul.

Furry yetis wandered around.

These were quite famous objects often spotted during drone surveillance of Dobong-gu.

However, due to their extremely aggressive nature, they were classified as dangerous objects.

But since no data has been collected through isolation or experiments by the research institute, we don’t know how dangerous they are or what characteristics they possess.

All we know is that these violent creatures throw ice or rocks at anything that moves.

Not wanting to be discovered by these murderous monsters, we held our breaths and crouched low, waiting for the yetis to pass.

After what felt like ten hours but was probably only ten minutes, the ferocious yetis finally disappeared.

In their place appeared adorable snowmen as tall as Reapers.

They moved around, blowing icy bubbles like soap bubbles.

Using ice lyres, they played beautiful music, and with ice trumpets, they blew more icy bubbles.

These cute snowmen acted like innocent children, naturally lowering my guard.

As they wandered across the radiant snowfield, they painted a surreal fairy-tale landscape.

Normally, encountering unknown objects would instill fear, but these didn’t evoke any such feelings.

The snowmen looked completely harmless!

The warmth radiating from the sleeping Reaper in my arms further boosted my courage.

Besides, these snowmen were incredibly slow and seemed peaceful as they blew their bubbles, so they didn’t appear threatening at all.

If anything, they were kind of cute.

While admiring the view outside the window, I noticed a man fully bundled up in thick clothing sneaking past the snowmen.

He was clearly trying not to be noticed, but he was clueless.

Despite his careful tiptoeing, he was instantly spotted.

However, instead of danger, the situation turned comical.

Realizing he’d been seen, the man panicked and ran as fast as he could to create distance between himself and the snowmen.

The seemingly gentle snowmen merely watched him flee without pursuing or showing aggression, continuing to blow their icy bubbles.

So, my assumption was right—they were gentle beings.

But then, the snowmen released something sharp instead of their usual cute bubbles.

“Huhk!”

I gasped in shock.

Anyone would react the same way upon witnessing someone explode right before their eyes.

The needle fired by the snowman pierced the man’s body, turning into an ice bubble inside him. When such transformations occur within the body, the result is always disintegration.

‘Ugh… another killer monster.’

Once again, I had to hide low inside the car, holding my breath as I waited for the snowmen to pass.

The fairy-tale-like atmosphere transformed into a cruel fairytale, and the courage given to me by the Reaper vanished like a bubble.

Reaper, please wake up soon.

Please!

***

Awoken from sleep by the deafening sound of explosions and gunfire, I looked around.

Yerin was trembling violently, crouched low.

Through the window, a massive pigeon stared at us with enormous round eyes.

The pigeon, startled by our eye contact, let out a squawk and flew away.

To reassure Yerin, I pinched her cheeks.

“Ah, Reaper! You’re finally awake! I was scared.”

Shivering, Yerin clung to me and threw a tantrum.

Patting her shoulder roughly, I assessed the situation.

The gunshots indicated that a large-scale rescue operation involving the military had begun.

Military personnel would likely arrive here soon.

The pigeon that fled moments ago took a direct hit from a bomb mid-flight and fell, its innards spilling out as it died.

After some time, numerous objects were destroyed or killed, and tanks and armored vehicles began passing by.

Among the convoy of transport vehicles that followed, one stopped, and Kim Jungrwi got out and started running toward our car.

Kim Jungrwi, already large, looked like a giant bear in his fur coat.

“Senior!”

Without a word, Kim Jungrwi handed Yerin something to wear and guided her into the transport vehicle.

Inside the transport vehicle, armed soldiers were everywhere.

Of course, considering this was the second war against the Ice Throne of Dobong-gu in ten years, this level of security was expected.

At this point, I judged Yerin to be safe.

Now, it was time for me to go deal with the Ice Throne that had tormented Yerin.

***

Before the barrier of Dobong-gu stood countless golems or robots clad in ice armor, systematically demolishing buildings.

Like farmers planting rice seedlings.

The ice soldiers demolished buildings and crushed them to create a massive road.

They were paving the way for something colossal, though what exactly remained unclear.

Standing nearly 20 meters tall, these soldiers were immense, but there was one peculiar thing about them.

The oddity was that these giants weren’t objects.

Their armor was made of ordinary ice, and the mechanical components inside the ice were regular metal.

Given my limited knowledge, I wondered if it was possible to maintain such colossal structures and move such heavy masses without any object-based assistance.

If it was impossible, then some object must be providing auxiliary power.

***

As we approached the very edge of Dobong-gu’s barrier, we witnessed human-made shooting stars gracefully crossing the sky.

The evacuation of people must have been completed; a massive aerial bombardment had commenced.

It was a continuous barrage of missiles.

Ice soldiers were effortlessly obliterated by the missile attacks, just like in the video footage from the recapture operation of Dobong-gu ten years ago.

The scorching heat of explosions instantly melted the ice armor of the soldiers, reducing the metallic skeletons beneath to twisted scraps.

The ice soldiers were helplessly destroyed, and modern technology seemed triumphant.

But what followed was also a replay of events from ten years ago.

The soldiers began regenerating almost immediately.

Their steel skeletons reassembled as if rewinding time, and ice quickly refrosted over them.

Of course, humans aren’t foolish.

They wouldn’t repeat something proven useless ten years ago.

The purpose of these missiles and shells seemed singular: to obstruct the path-building efforts of Dobong-gu’s soldiers.

The sudden advance of Dobong-gu’s ice throne soldiers and whatever they were constructing along the way were clearly related.

They were firing shells to halt their advance.

Naturally, the number of shells was finite, whereas the regeneration of the soldiers appeared infinite—merely buying time.

Most likely, we’d suffer a helpless defeat, just like when Dobong-gu was lost before.

And once again, humanity would lose territory.

I decided I needed to destroy the Ice Throne and help reclaim Dobong-gu before that happened.

On a small scale, it was for Yerin’s revenge.

On a larger scale, humanity was still essential to me.

Even without the firewood burning in my heart, humanity was necessary.

The snacks I ate.

The TV I watched.

And many other pleasures I enjoyed were indispensable to me.

For those reasons, I resolved to march straight into the battlefield as artillery shells fell, heading toward the Ice Throne.