Chapter 542

Chapter 542

Tridgion moved his hand.

The metal golem’s hand responded to his will.

The fact that a powerful body over ten meters tall had come under his control pleased Tridgion.

The core that had been destroyed by Jeon, Tridgion had restored.

With the West District’s technology added to his magic, it had been reborn far stronger than before.

The core, brimming with tremendous mana, breathed monstrous power into the giant body over ten meters tall.

“This can’t be!”

Kim Hyun-soo’s pupils shook.

Even he, who had led the West District with overwhelming charisma, could not hide his confusion—the might of Tridgion was that great.

With Tridgion’s movement, the entire building shook as if it were about to collapse.

“Ghk!”

“What is this?”

Mechanized Awakeners who had rushed over at the vibration froze when they saw the gigantic Tridgion.

Mechanized Awakeners, their bodies plastered with mechanical parts, averaged well over two meters tall. Yet even they looked like dwarfs compared to Tridgion’s massive frame.

It was like a small mountain was standing right in front of them.

All the close aides who had been equipped with auxiliary AIs had been seized by Tridgion, but fortunately, the ordinary mechanized Awakeners were unaffected.

All the mechanized Awakeners inside the building gathered around Kim Hyun-soo.

Kim Hyun-soo spoke to them.

“Triox Five has stolen the golem’s body. From now on, we destroy the golem with full power. Everyone, attack.”

There was no time to explain the existence of Tridgion, so Kim Hyun-soo said Triox Five. It was easier for his subordinates to understand that way.

“Triox Five….”

“Ugh!”

The subordinates let out low groans.

The shock was that great.

Triox Five was everything to the West District.

All the foundations of the West District were managed by Triox Five.

Because of that, the mechanized Awakeners also relied on Triox Five completely.

If Kim Hyun-soo was like a strict father, Triox Five felt like a meticulous mother.

To learn that the very Triox Five they had depended on so much had rebelled left the mechanized Awakeners aghast.

At their hesitation, Kim Hyun-soo shouted again.

“What are you all doing? Attack, now.”

“Yes, sir!”

Snapping to their senses, the mechanized Awakeners attacked Triox Five in unison.

Drrr—!

Anti–great beast rounds and mana particle cannons hammered Tridgion’s enormous body like a downpour. But not even a scratch appeared on him.

With the existing force field plus the defensive magic arrays Tridgion himself had engraved, Tridgion’s defense was beyond imagination.

—It doesn’t even tickle.

Tridgion snorted and took a step.

Koo-ung! Thud!

With the impact of a ten-meter body moving, cracks split the building’s floor.

Like swatting flies, Tridgion slammed the floor with his huge hand.

Bang!

With a thunderous crash, one mechanized Awakener was crushed so completely he couldn’t even scream.

“Damn it!”

“Concentrate more firepower!”

The remaining mechanized Awakeners grit their teeth and poured in even heavier fire. But they couldn’t stop Tridgion.

“Gah!”

“Kkh!”

The mechanized Awakeners were destroyed miserably by Tridgion.

Like a tidal wave, Tridgion swept through them.

He didn’t even use weapons.

He didn’t cast magic.

Tridgion’s gigantic ten-meter body itself was a powerful weapon.

To deal with the mechanized Awakeners blocking his way, a single large, sturdy body was enough.

A massacre unfolded at Tridgion’s hands.

From the start, it was impossible for ordinary mechanized Awakeners to stop Tridgion. The gap in class was too great.

Kim Hyun-soo’s jaw muscles twitched.

No matter how much he was called a cold-blooded man without blood or tears, he couldn’t help but feel rage in the face of his subordinates’ futile deaths.

“Uraaa!”

Kim Hyun-soo let out a roar and smashed the floor with his fist.

At the instant his fist met the ground, an EMP was released.

An EMP at maximum output struck Tridgion’s enormous body.

Papapap!

As the EMP and the force field collided, sparks flew around Tridgion.

At that moment, one of the magic arrays engraved on Tridgion’s body spun fiercely and reinforced the field.

Thanks to that, Tridgion was unharmed even in the tide of EMP.

“So even EMP doesn’t work?”

Kim Hyun-soo’s face twisted ugly.

One of the weapons he trusted most had been neutralized.

Kwaaa!

At that moment, Tridgion’s massive fist flew toward him.

Kim Hyun-soo didn’t even dare to counter it and instead hurled his body aside to avoid the punch.

Boom!

A huge hole yawned open in the floor where Kim Hyun-soo had just been standing.

The destructive power was enough that even Kim Hyun-soo wouldn’t have been safe if it had hit him directly.

Having dodged Tridgion’s punch by a hair’s breadth, Kim Hyun-soo immediately launched a counterattack.

Two Gatling guns emerged from his shoulders.

They were weapons that condensed mana into bullets and fired them.

Drrr—!

The Gatlings spat out mana rounds.

Thousands of bullets made from Kim Hyun-soo’s mana hammered Tridgion’s force field without pause.

Pababababak!

They were Gatling guns capable of firing up to four thousand rounds per minute.

Kim Hyun-soo concentrated every single bullet on one point.

Like drilling a hole with an awl, he focused on a single spot of the field to break through it. And his intent succeeded splendidly.

Cracks formed where the mana bullets were concentrated, and at last a hole was punched through.

Not missing the chance, Kim Hyun-soo hurled himself through the gap.

Breaking through the field, Kim Hyun-soo landed on Tridgion’s shoulder and pronounced a death sentence.

“I’ll shatter you to pieces.”

In an instant, his right hand transformed into a blade.

A plasma blade formed over the edge.

Kim Hyun-soo drove the plasma blade into Tridgion’s head.

No matter how powerful a golem’s body was, if its core or head was destroyed, it couldn’t move—just like any other great beast.

That was why he meant to smash Tridgion’s head first with the plasma blade.

Then something happened that Kim Hyun-soo had never expected.

Pzzzt!

The plasma blade that had been blazing fiercely suddenly vanished.

“What—?”

—Have you forgotten who installed those parts for you?

“Don’t tell me you messed with my parts?”

—Isn’t that kind of preparation basic? Heh heh!

Tridgion sneered at Kim Hyun-soo on his shoulder.

While parasitizing Triox Five, Tridgion had grasped all of the West District’s technology.

Of course, he also saw straight through the parts of the mechanized Awakeners.

Kim Hyun-soo’s parts were no exception.

Unlike the others’, Kim Hyun-soo’s parts had been made and managed directly by Triox Five.

For Tridgion to tamper with them was nothing.

—You know something? Your parts are pretty useful to me too.

“What?”

—Absorb and transform.

The moment Tridgion’s voice rang out, magic arrays rose from Kim Hyun-soo’s parts.

“Don’t tell me—?”

Kakang! Kakang!

In that instant, Kim Hyun-soo’s parts disassembled.

Left with only his head and torso, Kim Hyun-soo fell straight to the floor.

Bang!

“Ugh!”

Kim Hyun-soo groaned from the heavy impact. But he didn’t even have time to feel the pain.

Because he saw his parts that had fallen from his body being absorbed into Tridgion’s.

Tridgion’s body, having absorbed Kim Hyun-soo’s parts, was wrapped in light.

Inside Tridgion’s body, Kim Hyun-soo’s parts were being digested. The digested parts reinforced and strengthened Tridgion’s interior.

“This can’t be!”

Having lost all his parts, Kim Hyun-soo looked up at Tridgion with an expression of disbelief.

Tridgion, now stronger after absorbing Kim Hyun-soo’s parts, opened his mouth.

—Watch from there. Watch how I take this city into my hands.

“Do you think that’s possible? I’m a mechanized Awakener, so I got taken by you without being able to move. But other Awakeners are different.”

Every Awakener had compatibilities.

Tridgion had the worst possible compatibility with mechanized Awakeners. That was why Kim Hyun-soo and the others could only be helplessly defeated.

But the Awakeners of the other districts were different.

Against pure humans, Tridgion’s tricks wouldn’t work.

No matter how strong Tridgion was, he couldn’t take on all of Neo Seoul’s countless Awakeners.

Tridgion agreed with Kim Hyun-soo’s words.

—Of course. In my current state, I absolutely can’t handle all the Awakeners in this city. But if I obtain the Dragon Heart, it’s a different story.

“Dr… Dragon Heart? There’s no such thing—”

—That’s why you’re a fool. You know nothing about the real truth of this city.

Tridgion’s gaze turned toward City Hall.

From the moment he parasitized Triox Five, he had known.

That somewhere right here, a dragon was lurking.

At first he thought it was a living dragon and was cautious, but before long he realized it was the corpse of a dead dragon.

From that moment on, Tridgion coveted the dragon’s heart.

The mana condensed in the Dragon Heart was truly tremendous—if he could just absorb it, he could evolve beyond the limits of a golem.

That wasn’t all.

In Neo Seoul, there existed several S-rank great beast cores that would be hard to find even if you scoured the desert.

The cores were well processed and stored somewhere beneath City Hall.

Just absorbing those would make him far stronger than he was now.

Kim Hyun-soo, who had lost his limbs and was writhing on the floor like a worm, was no longer of any interest to him.

Crash!

Tridgion smashed through a wall and went out into the street.

His destination was City Hall, where he surmised the dragon’s corpse would be.

Thud! Thud!

He advanced, leaving deep footprints in the ground.

“Ahhh! What is that?”

“A-a golem is moving!”

People in the street screamed in shock at the appearance of the gigantic golem.

“Stop it!”

“Everyone, attack!”

Mechanized Awakeners attacked to stop Tridgion’s advance.

Kwa-kwang!

Crossfire from the mechanized Awakeners poured down over Tridgion’s huge torso.

But their attacks couldn’t inflict any damage on Tridgion.

His defense was simply monstrous.

—How annoying.

Bang!

At that moment, powerful electromagnetic waves erupted from Tridgion’s body.

He had detonated an EMP.

It was an ability he had absorbed from Kim Hyun-soo’s parts.

“Ghk!”

“Kkh!”

The mechanized Awakeners fell with screams.

The EMP burned out all the circuits and components in their parts.

Countless mechanized Awakeners lost function to the EMP.

Thud! Thud!

Tridgion advanced, trampling the disabled mechanized Awakeners. Many of them were crushed to death like ants.

Tridgion was the natural enemy and calamity of mechanized Awakeners.

No mechanized Awakener could stop Tridgion.

Tridgion advanced without hesitation.

Kwaaaang!

A massive building in his path collapsed helplessly like a sandcastle.

He was knocking down every building on the shortest route to City Hall.

Everything that blocked Tridgion’s way crumbled.

“Aaaah!”

“S-save us!”

At the sudden disaster, people trembled in fear and wailed.

They hoped Kim Hyun-soo would save them from this calamity. But the Kim Hyun-soo they so desperately wanted did not appear.

Instead, someone else showed up on the rooftop of a building in Tridgion’s path.

“Whew.”

Standing tall on the rooftop and letting out a light sigh, the man was Jeon.

Watching Tridgion approaching with heavy thuds, he muttered,

“Figures. This neighborhood was the problem.”