Chapter 156: Do Not Listen
More and more voices joined together until he could no longer distinguish one from another.
The sound made him feel an irresistible urge to join them in recitation.
We beg You to listen...
We beg You to listen...
We beg You to listen...
An indescribable and overwhelmingly powerful sense of rejection spread through Joo Joowon’s heart.
His body, however, felt as though it had fallen victim to sleep paralysis.
Only the deepest part of his mind retained a trace of clarity.
Everything that belonged to his physical body seemed to be stripped away little by little.
His hair fell out.
His skin sank away.
Like the remains of a whale sinking to the ocean floor and nourishing the countless creatures below, his body was decomposing into nutrients for this nameless space until only the deepest layer of his soul and will remained exposed.
Joo Joowon felt that he should still be conscious.
In reality, however, he could not move at all.
Under these circumstances, his Mental Power felt as insignificant as an ant.
There was no way it could manipulate a body that had become as stiff and immovable as stone and force it to swim upward.
He was on the verge of drowning there.
As he grinding his teeth, Joo Joowon simply abandoned the shell of flesh that no longer belonged to him.
Only that final spark of spirit continued to swim upward without pause.
Below him, it felt as though a gigantic whirlpool was trying to drag him downward through suction alone.
Joo Joowon desperately struggled upward.
The sacred chants of men and women blended together around him as his personal will gradually began to blur.
The underwater world seemed to flip upside down in an instant.
The currents wriggled and twisted like enormous worms.
He struggled with all his strength to swim upward, yet somehow it felt as though every stroke only carried him deeper into the abyss.
Countless negative emotions flooded his mind.
Joo Joowon ignored all of them.
Without the slightest hesitation or wavering, he continued swimming upward.
No matter how fiercely the force below tried to drag him down, he remained himself.
Time itself became strangely distorted.
It was impossible to know how long he had been swimming.
A year?
A hundred years?
Or merely a single instant?
Other than the sacred chants, he could hear nothing at all.
It felt as though the voices were calling every lost lamb to throw themselves into the embrace of some great master.
His body had already surrendered.
His mind, however, stubbornly developed a rebellious streak that rejected any opportunity to merge into the so called collective.
No matter how desperately he swam upward, the underwater world seemed infinitely deep.
The hopelessness of his endless struggle naturally gave rise to despair.
Even the fuel sustaining his willpower felt as though it was running dry.
Little by little, doubt began to creep into his heart regarding whether his choice had ever been the right one at all.
Joo Joowon remained unwavering in his belief that his choice was the correct one, yet within this vast and directionless space, he could not find any way out.
Where was the exit?
Just as his consciousness was beginning to blur and drift away, a loud and powerful cat cry suddenly rang out.
"Meow!"
Byeol!
It was like the first ray of sunlight tearing through the horizon, like an anchor for his soul.
Almost instinctively, Joo Joowon reached out his hand and leapt forward without the slightest hesitation.
It was like finding a lamp in a dark room.
Like clouds parting to reveal the sun.
Bang!
"Cough, cough..."
[ Ding! ]
[ You have passed an Will Check from è°·%#. Mental Power +5 ]
Joo Joowon collapsed onto one knee, unable to stand steadily as he covered his throat and retched violently.
He had finally returned to reality.
His face was deathly pale, his eyes bloodshot, and his entire body looked as though he had just been dragged out of the water.
He had thought an incredibly long amount of time had passed.
In reality, only an instant had gone by.
The crescent-shaped eyes of the boss widened in surprise, changing from a narrow crescent into a half moon as though it could not believe that Joo Joowon had actually managed to break free.
However, this insignificant resistance was clearly not something the creature considered important.
It spread apart legs as thick and powerful as those of an elephant and continued forcing its way into the room.
The doorframe groaned under the overwhelming pressure.
Then, with a wet popping sound, the boss forcibly squeezed itself inside.
The doorway itself finally gave way and crashed onto the floor with a loud impact.
Hwi charged directly toward the boss.
Its body tightened like a spring stretched to its absolute limit.
As the boss drew closer, Hwi’s body suddenly expanded in size.
Its tightly packed muscles erupted with explosive power.
Sharp claws shot out from within its paw pads and buried themselves deeply into the boss’s enormous mass of flesh.
Then Hwi pulled with all its strength.
Rip!
The wound spread apart like freshly sliced fatty meat peeling open to both sides.
Yellow-black grease mixed with unknown substances burst out from the opening and dripped onto the concrete floor, while a mass of black smoke burrowed directly into the wound.
There was no time for Joo Joowon to be shocked by Hwi’s transformation.
While suppressing the urge to vomit, he pushed himself up from the ground and finally recovered enough to move.
Without thinking, he immediately fired three bolts straight into the wound Hwi had carved open.
Thunk! Thunk! Thunk!
The Immobilization has been triggered!
An enormous spider web slammed down and pinned the creature to the ground.
However, the immobilization effect that should have restrained the target for two seconds lost its effect in barely a single breath, allowing the Boss to break free from the control almost instantly.
But that brief moment of restraint was enough to give Hwi another opportunity to close the distance.