To carry out a bomb terror attack so brazenly in broad daylight…
Not only did they not set the bomb and run, but they waited confidently for the bomb to explode, committing suicide alongside it!
They were madmen.
Mad terrorists!
Thankfully, since they shouted “long live” before detonating, everyone managed to evacuate successfully, and as a result, there were no casualties—though…
“Ugh, ughh.”
It was unclear what type of explosive they had used, but despite the defensive barrier blocking the attack, the force of the blast was such that it couldn’t be entirely absorbed. The barrier shattered under the explosive force, and even though most of the impact was mitigated, the remainder was enough to shatter bones and cause internal injuries.
What’s more, the flames emanating from the bomb were releasing poisonous gas, spewing thick, black smoke. In response, people were scrambling to find and don gas masks.
“Insane… These bastards…”
It was the kind of terrorist attack that could easily be written into textbooks.
Though there had been no fatalities yet, if this situation continued, many of the people lying on the ground would soon lose their lives.
“Those who can move, quickly put gas masks on the faces of those who have fallen!”
Even though they had survived the bomb explosion, it would be absurd for them to die merely from inhaling poison gas.
Where was the sense in such a futile death?
The embassy staff, their minds reeling despite their drained state, struggled to move their bodies and searched for gas masks to place over the heads of the fallen. They also administered hemostatic agents and blood replenishing agents created by alchemists to stop excessive bleeding. For those who were coughing up blood and tissue from internal wounds, they administered hemostatic agents, blood replenishing agents, and shock-prevention medication.
This way, everyone moved with purpose.
All this effort was for the sake of saving at least one person from this tragedy.
Their efforts paid off, as none had died by the time the ambulances arrived to carry them away.
This was truly a triumph of human will.
Thus, all the staff departed the embassy by ambulance, forcing their way through the crowd of reporters sensing a scoop and onlookers who had gathered to witness the burning embassy in the aftermath of the deafening explosion.
It seemed the terror attack had come to an end.
Fire trucks arrived to douse the embassy with water, medical staff treated the employees, and once the fire subsided, people went inside to investigate.
It looked as though it would conclude this way.
However… alas, the terror attack was not over.
Jinseong hadn’t used magic merely to throw a bomb.
If the sole purpose had been a bomb attack, Jinseong could have used another approach—recruiting identity-scrubbed individuals to use as expendable tools, or approaching homeless people on the street to deliver a “mysterious object” to the embassy. Alternatively, he could have used animals to charge into the embassy with bombs clenched in their jaws, or attached bombs to drones or birds to drop from high altitudes onto the embassy. He could have even stolen a few trucks and performed a ritual to make them move autonomously.
There were countless ways to throw a bomb at a target. By adding unethical methods and leveraging the numerous tactics he had witnessed during his past as a mercenary, the options would have expanded further.
More efficiently. More covertly.
If Jinseong had wanted, he could have easily exploited the blind spots of these peace-accustomed people to execute the perfect terror attack. After all, that was what he had done, what he had seen, and what he had endured before his regression.
Yet, despite all that, Jinseong chose a different method.
He went to the trouble of splitting a bug-based duplicate in half to create two people and even used a ritual related to “Zun Jeposal” (a type of ritual given by Korea). Moreover, he even performed a ritual invoking the symbol of the sun just before his duplicate moved.
Wasn’t this excessive for a mere bomb terror attack?
This was no carpet bombing, nor was it an attempt to obliterate the capital with a nuclear device. For merely causing an appropriate explosion at an embassy and setting it alight, this method was absurdly inefficient and utterly illogical.
But the reason Jinseong employed this apparently circuitous and inefficient method was…
Because he had layered multiple rituals—it was all for this precise moment.
Not for the bomb terror itself, but for the confusion after the bomb terror.
Not for the destruction caused by the bomb and fire, but for the contamination hidden within that destruction.
He wanted Japan to spiral further into chaos.
He craved the kind of confusion that would create casualties without being too severe, something appropriately disruptive yet vast, superficial yet uncontrollable.
What Jinseong desired was exactly this confusion.
Chiiiiik.
Flames erupted, filling the embassy with thick, black smoke.
The sprinklers appeared to have failed due to the heat and were no longer spraying water. Despite water being an obstruction, the flames that had been burning spread uninhibited across the entire embassy after no hindrance remained, growing in strength. The flames devoured the walls, the furniture, and crucial documents, while thick black smoke blanketed the interior, making it impossible to see. Poisonous gases spread far and wide, rendering the place uninhabitable.
And hidden within this dazzling yet insidious spectacle, something moved.
Chiiiiik.
From the shopping bag carried by Jinseong’s duplicate emerged a liquid.
A viscous, dark brown liquid.
The liquid, behaving as if it were a slime, undulated and slithered across the floor, untouched by the flames surrounding it. Rather than being consumed by the fire, it seemed to adjust its color and consolidate under the heat, transforming into a sticky adhesive that clung to the floor and walls. As it absorbed the heat emitted by the flames, it emitted minuscule sounds while disgorging something grotesque onto the ground.
Plop.
Blop blop.
It was a mushroom resembling an insect.
A mushroom that hatched and grew in the heat.
It carried an overwhelming vitality and had the remarkable resistance to heat and fire, as if born from the sun itself. It grew at an astonishing pace like a plant yet masked itself in the form of an insect. Under the heat, it deformed and writhed much like an actual insect.
When the flames approached, the mushroom melted swiftly—not because it was being forcibly incinerated or melted by the heat, but seemingly in an attempt to intentionally alter its form, much like Jinseong’s insect-based duplicate reshaping itself.
This melted mushroom flowed into the cracks in the floor.
Downward.
Further downward.
The liquid remnants of the mushroom continued their descent, seeping into the water pipes, sewage, and groundwater.
『In ancient times, there was a year when successive years of famine befell the land. Starving people scoured the mountains for anything edible, stripping trees of their bark and pulling grass roots from the ground. The earth was overturned to the point that finding untouched places became a challenge, and all mountain animals were hunted down and devoured. In this way, the mountains were laid barren as if swept by a plague of locusts. The stripped trees and rootless grasses lay like corpses, serving as fertilizer for mushrooms.』
『Among the mushrooms growing in this barren wasteland was one of an especially strange appearance. Though a mushroom, it took on the shape of an insect and wriggled like a live bug when touched by humans. Yet upon closer inspection, it was rooted to the earth, and its taste was said to resemble moss plucked from a cave wall.』
『To the starving, even its bizarre appearance seemed appetizing, and the ignorant ate and chewed it. Those who consumed it reportedly broke out in spots, suffered from fevers, and complained of chest tightness as if overcome by anger. They also endured excruciating abdominal pain and intense hunger, resorting to eating dirt to relieve their starvation brought by the famine.』
『Strangely, despite consuming the dirt, the people did not die. They expelled the earth as effortlessly as earthworms digesting and excreting soil. Witnessing this, the people believed the mushroom was nothing but an earthworm that had transformed into a mushroom due to lack of food, fearing that eating it would result in being reborn as an earthworm in the next life. Known as the “Toryungji” (Earth Worm Mushroom), it became an object of dread and was eventually burned entirely upon the orders of the official bringing relief rice. After the total incineration, the mushrooms never reappeared, and the common folk, seeing this, believed the famine would not return.』
Now.
Part of Tokyo has been contaminated.
