Rust - Chapter 877



Only Krnovel

RUST -877

The war against the spiders that have taken over Quebec’s underground was not easily resolved, even though two million vengeful field rats charged in.

[They say the spider webs are the problem.]

As we descended underground, the temperature became warmer, and the frozen spider webs began to function.

When Ms. Kim entered, a huge number of spiders appeared as the warm cocoon space appeared. The reason she retreated was not only because of the huge number of spiders, but also because it was difficult to handle the webs that were being shot by so many spiders.

A space filled with traps and spiders hidden on the ceiling, walls, and floor, starting with spider webs hanging like curtains. If you went down there without any equipment, you would have hit a bottleneck at some point and gotten stuck.

It may be a bit funny to talk about equipment, but considering that the rats belonging to the Holy Kingdom were given various equipment, it was not a loss for nothing since they had many days to fight.

“Tell him to come up.”

[yes?]

The nurse blinked. Her eyes looked like, ‘Are you telling me to just tell the kids who ran out to the temple to come up?’

“Tell him I told you to come up.”

[Ah-ah- yeah.]

At the nurse’s words, the messenger rats descended into the basement. Thus, the large-scale battle between the rats and spiders was temporarily brought to a halt.

The actual engagement lasted about half a day. In that short time, this side suffered about 800,000 deaths, while the Spider side suffered at least 1.5 million and up to 2 million deaths.

The number of field mice absorbed in the vicinity was reduced from 2 million to 1.2 million at one time. It was not known how many spiders were left.

“Patrol the area and bring in any wild rats you see.”

[Uh- You must have brought all the kids nearby?]

“Further.”

[Uh-huh.]

Is it possible that 800,000 people died in just half a day? If you include spiders, that would mean that between 2.3 and 2.8 million lives were lost in half a day.

Thump-thump-

With the thought that a huge number of people had died, I began to feel my heart beating faster and faster. I felt an urge to go down to the basement right away.

Huuuungheup- Huuuup- Haaaaaah-

As Maru took deep breaths to calm his mind, at his feet, small vines and blades of grass rose like shadows of death, as if they wanted to go outside.

no.

no.

Come in.

The vines of death that had been slowly and steadily sprouting up slowly disappeared after lingering around like a pet dog with its tail tucked in.

Maru took a deep breath and thought back to the warning Na Ju-yeon had given him. The warning that killing multiple lives at once could be dangerous.

Of the 100,000 rats that refused to join, they only intended to kill 10,000 to 20,000. However, things went wrong the moment the rats launched a preemptive attack.

The death that unfolded automatically literally wiped out the rats. The time it took for tens of thousands of lives to be extinguished was only about ten seconds.

The time it took for 100,000 to be reduced by half was around 30 seconds. So if it took 10 seconds to kill 10,000, it would take 20 seconds to kill 40,000 more. This meant that they could kill more quickly.

On the surface it appeared to be under perfect control, but that was not the case.

Thump-

Thump- thump-

Maru calmed his breathing as he felt his heart, which had warned him of danger, beating strangely.

Life changed into the concept of death, and the physical form of death was the form of a garden. A garden that blooms by using life as fertilizer.

Whatever that means, it was something that came about as his life changed. That’s why Maru had no intention of being dragged around. Even if it meant true death.

Thump-

Thump- thump-

‘I won’t just let it go.’

Maru had already erased the death that had peeked out of his head. The sparkling black particles melted into the air.

‧

At Maru’s command, the newly incorporated field mice began to search all around as if they were catching lice.

Surprisingly, there were almost always a group of field mice near human villages. From food scraps discarded by humans, to food stored by humans, to animals wandering around looking for humans, and even humans themselves. Human villages were like a flowerpot for field mice.

[There were a lot of smaller groups of field mice than I expected.]

A whopping 1 million more field mice joined the ranks. They had decreased by 800,000, but increased by another million in just one day.

Of course, there were some groups of field mice that refused to join, but those whose devotion to the floor was sky-high condemned the refusal to join as distrust and heresy, and sentenced them to the ‘lunch box’ punishment.

While absorbing the group of field mice, I was able to obtain various information.

“The field mice that have settled in the outskirts are fighting with ants?”

[Yes, it seems like there are quite a few small-scale ant kingdoms.]

Indeed, there were dozens of small ant colonies in the Detroit area alone. The Canadian region was larger and less densely populated, so it would not be surprising to see many ants and mice.

“To what extent?”

[I think there are more than a colony of field mice.]

Ants were also a problem. Not all ants had mutated, but they are probably still mutating.

I didn’t know what would happen as time went by. According to some entomologists, ants were not in the trillions but in the kyongs.

One of the reasons Maru thought about building a floating city and even a space colony was because of ants. If there had been no hydrogen bomb, would it have been possible to completely wipe out the ant empire?

Maru thought no.

What would have happened if the upper echelons of the ant empire had fled and started a new power?

Ants swarming in hundreds of millions. Was there any way to stop them, especially those that were digging holes and pushing in from below? Other than with hydrogen bombs?

As time passed, Maru began to think that it was difficult to guarantee safety and survival with just a floating city.

A few people could survive by living on the airship and coming down to the ground whenever they ran out of resources, but to put it another way, this story was based on the premise that most of the citizens of the Holy Kingdom would be abandoned.

The moment they were abandoned, it meant that many of the auxiliary AIs were also abandoned. It meant that most of the wolves, crows, magpies, and acid gulls were also abandoned.

Can such a small elite survive in an environment that changes every moment? The size of the group was disadvantageous to survival, but sometimes the small size itself was dangerous.

Above all, Maru had no intention of breaking his promise. He had no intention of letting go of the citizens and animals of the Holy Kingdom who followed him.

“This spring is going to be really dangerous.”

The nurse simply blinked at Maru’s monologue.

“I need to finish moving into the floating city before May. Is that possible?”

[It is quite possible now that the basic work, nuclear fusion power plant, and barrier construction have been completed.]

The floating city has gradually grown in size and now has a considerable area. The reason it was made larger than originally planned was one thing: to prepare for danger.

“One mass driver is not enough. I need at least four.”

[Are you going to start building a space colony right away?]

“Considering the empirical experiments and trial and error, I think it would be better to proceed as quickly as possible.”

[Yes. I will prepare it like that.]

Despite the heavy workload, Na Ju-yeon answered calmly.

“thanks.”

[···Don’t mention it.]

Na Ju-yeon answered in a small, embarrassed voice.

[Wouldn’t it be difficult with just the water city?]

“I see that my premonition is starting to twist a little bit.”

It would be nice if it ended at the floating city line without going all the way to space, but if even spiders are this annoying, there was no answer for the small ants no matter what I did.

[A hunch? A hint? How?]

“Not to warn of danger, but to take life.”

‘What are you talking about?’ As Kim Yang looked at him, Maru unconsciously thought of spring and the hundreds of millions of ants attacking him.

In the past, if it were true, my heart would race, I would feel nervous, and my nerves would get on edge, but not anymore.

A billion-unit life forms come with hostility. How can we kill a billion-unit life forms? At the same time, death reacted by wriggling again.

The small, blooming vines of death realized that there was nothing dangerous around them, so they slowly started to grow towards Nucleus before transforming into black particles and dissolving into the air.

[What is it now?]

“I thought ants would come in hundreds of millions, but that’s what happened.”

So, in the past, if danger came, you would avoid it and prepare for it, but now, the impulse has started to change to wanting to go towards the danger.

[Then isn’t it dangerous?]

“It’s okay, but it’s not completely transformed yet.”

A sigh escaped Maru’s mouth.

“I’m tired.”

[Huh? Then you should rest.]

The nurse jumped up and down. She was fussing that he absolutely had to get some rest. Maru smirked and said that he would finish up his work and rest.

To explain the situation, he imagined a billion ants swarming, but in fact, Maru’s mind was seeing more than that.

The sight of ants in groups scurrying across the ground and spiders in groups similarly spreading their webs all around.

There was no place for humans on Earth, where hordes of rats and giant carnivorous and herbivorous animals were running wild and shaking the axis.

Death, writhing again, tempted Maru. He said he could wipe everything away and start over. It was no coincidence that life had changed into death.

What would happen if you absorbed lives in the trillions, not just the billions? It was hard to tell whether my pounding heart was a warning or an explosion of anticipation.

Maru swallowed the twisted sensations and emotions with superhuman patience.

“It’s impossible to eradicate the spiders of Quebec in the short term. So we have to cut off their food supply and press the numbers.”

[A number?]

“Yes. Numbers. From now on, any field mouse that wants to participate in the war must reproduce at least three times.”

[to?]

A rat seeking revenge will have three offspring. So, it was decided that in order to participate in the holy war and enter the rat paradise, one must have three offspring.

‧

‧

‧

The number of field mice, which would have increased explosively even if left alone, skyrocketed in an instant.

The food provided to the field mice contained a small amount of the growth accelerant drug made by Na Ju-yeon, which drastically shortened the growth period of newborn baby mice.

By early April, the Quebec battlefield had become a battlefield of tens of millions, not millions, with a single engagement killing a combined million.

‘Common sense seems to be becoming strange.’

Did they die in traps and hundreds of thousands? Did they kill a million in a diversionary attack? Isn’t the unit a bit strange? What’s even more absurd is that the number of people killed and wounded on both sides in a month exceeded ten million.

In a terrible war of attrition, Gi-sun was defeated. The rats, who had been pushed back little by little by the spider webs, were able to push the front line again as the rat-specific equipment provided by the Holy Kingdom was supplied.

‘Certainly. Maru’s judgment was good.’

With the resources to arm one regular infantryman, you could arm 20 to 25 rats. With the resources to arm 100,000 men, you could arm 2 to 2.5 million rats. With the resources to arm 1 million men, you could arm 20 to 25 million rats.

Maru prioritized the armament and supplies of the field mice, and kept their fighting power at its peak. The results began to show after a month.

Now the tide was clearly turning in favor of the Holy Kingdom.

[But is that okay? Even if the rats believe in you, isn’t it dangerous to give them a special rifle?]

A variety of rat-specific weapons were provided. Starting with a single-shot rifle, a chemical agent that de-sticks spider webs, small grenades made to fit the size of a rat, a gas mask, a helmet, and even military gear.

[They say that your ability to detect danger has also become a bit strange.]

[There’s nothing we can do. What we need is time and numbers to buy us time. Did you tell General Dan Brown about the situation? What did he say?]

[It seems like there’s no need to dig through the basement to find a spider, but it’s not worth it.]

[What the-]

Maru was dumbfounded.

[It seems like the old man thinks that going to a maritime city is the answer.]

[So? You’re not even going to check if there are spiders living underground?]

[What? Didn’t we say we wouldn’t interfere?]

[···okay.]

Do it. Do it well. Okay.

Diana filed an emergency report.

[Report of a raid on a Quebec spider burrow.]

[A little while ago. It is said that the 112-08th Rat Corps succeeded in conquering the spider den.]

The terrible Siege of Quebec ended in a victory for the Holy Kingdom.