Chapter 71: If you run to cross it (TW!)
Reader Discretion Advised:
This Chapter contains sensitive themes that may be distressing to some readers, including references to trauma and emotionally heavy subject matter. Reader discretion is strongly advised.
Please take care while reading.
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His eyes boredly looked around the area as the town’s population slowly, one by one, began to stir. Figures emerged from behind doors, alleys, and corners, shuffling toward the center of the town square. Without uttering a word, the townspeople—regardless of age, gender, or apparent deformity—lined up in synchronization. Their postures were stiff, movements robotic like an assembly summoned for ritual. The entire town square slowly brimmed with the dungeon’s population, leaving not a patch of cobblestone untouched. And at the very front, standing still as a statue with unmistakable power, was the dungeon’s boss, the little boy.
Cheon Areum had summoned every last person-monster into plain sight, including the boss. Now, he just needed the knives.
His hands moved methodically, pointing toward each house. One by one, from open windows, half-closed doors, and darkened kitchens, the gleam of sharpened metal answered his call.
Household knives—cleavers, paring knives, rusted old blades—all began to gather, lifting into the air like obedient soldiers. They cut through the wind in a low hum, spinning and glinting under the sun. By the time he lowered his hand, the sky above the town square shimmered with an overwhelming swarm of knives, each one hovering with deadly patience, awaiting his command.
"Areum, what are you doing?"
Forcibly turning Cheon Areum by his arm, Yoon Seoyul spoke with a rare urgency. Lee Nari, standing nearby, glanced up. Her expression shifted—first in awe, then unease—as her eyes scanned the sky now smothered with hovering knives. The sheer number of them blotted out most of the sunlight, casting a cold, silver shadow over the town square. The faint beams that managed to slip through glinted off the blades, scattering flecks of light onto the silent, unmoving crowd below.