"Help! Somebody help me."


    "Run."


    "I don''t want to die."


    "I already escaped death but I don''t think I can escape a second time."


    "Run as fast you can."


    The remaining survivors of Aethelgard City ran with all their strength.


    The monster had already destroyed half of the city when it demolished the lodging section along with General Dray''s quarter and with that, it killed thousands of humans instantly.


    The remaining survivors became even more frightened and ran for their lives.


    However, to their misfortune, only a small part of the city remained intact. Even General Dray''s quarter, which had been reinforced by the Space Tear''s restriction, was destroyed.


    So, there wasn''t a ce left for them to run. Aethelgard City itself was quite a small city so after it was almost destroyed, there were little to no ces for the remaining survivors to hide.


    They could only take cover behind the broken debris and rubble and hope that the monster wouldn''te in their direction.


    In the meantime, Orion had been observing the giant. He noticed that its newly found hands appeared to be made up of earth too, just like its torso. So, from the outside, the monster appeared as a half-golem with an octopus head. It was a very strange creature.


    "Anomaly detected"


    However, at that moment, Orion and all the survivors in the city heard the giant talking.


    ''It can talk?''


    He was surprised.


    "Searching location."


    "Searching?" Orion wondered what it meant by anomaly and now it started searching.


    Recalling what General Dray mentioned about this creature being one of the rarest species of monsters called an Apocalypse-level monster, he had thought from the term ''Apocalypse'' that it would be a type of monster specialized in destruction.


    But now he heard it talking. This revtion sent a chill down his spine, shattering his previous assumptions about the creature''s nature.


    If an Apocalypse-level monster possessed the intelligence tomunicate, the threat it posed was far more insidious than he had ever imagined. It wasn''t just a force of mindless destruction—it was a sentient being with unknown motives, making it all the more terrifying.


    "Searching failed. Initiating searching again."


    However, as Orion heard its voice again, he felt that it spoke like a robot. No intelligent being would talk in the manner in which this monster was conversing with itself. The words were disjointed,cking emotion or nuance, and delivered in a mechanical cadence just like how an AI would talk—just like how his system talked to himself.


    ''Is this a robot?''


    He wondered for a moment but shook his head. He couldn''t believe this monster was a robot. From what he could see, it was clearly a living being, but for some reason, its voice sounded like that of an AI.


    The dissonance between its organic appearance and mechanical speech was unsettling.


    "Searching failed again. Initiating x-rays, gama rays, beta rays, ultra vision…"


    Orion heard the monster again and from what he could tell from his mechanical-like voice, it appeared as though it was looking for an anomaly but it couldn''t find it. So, now it had activated its special abilities?


    Moreover, he felt very suspicious about this monster the more he heard its voice.


    ''There is definitely something wrong with this monster.''


    He couldn''t help but feel that it sounded too much like his system—the way it talked was exactly the same as his system.


    ''System, is it possible that you are essible to races other than humans?''


    [I am only essible to the human race.]


    However, hearing the system deny his suspicion made him feel relieved. It meant that it didn''t have a system like humans did. Yet he was sure that this Apocalypse-level monster possessed something simr, or he was wrong the whole time, and this monster was actually a robot.


    The uncertainty gnawed at him, making it difficult for him to focus. If it wasn''t a robot, what could exin the creature''s mechanical voice and behavior? The possibility that the monster had been augmented with some form of technology seemed increasingly likely.


    "Searching failed again. Initiating a different approach."


    "Target Anomaly wasst sensed on the Sad."


    "Target Anomaly at present couldn''t be detected."


    "New Mission: Destroy Sad and Target Anomaly will be killed."


    "Initiating the new mission."


    "Fu*k"


    Orion cursed as he heard the monster. Since it couldn''t find what it was searching for, it decided to destroy the itself so that if the Anomaly was hiding on Sad, it would definitely die when the was destroyed. The sheer ruthlessness of the monster''s logic was chilling.


    He then saw the monster start moving in the direction of the big, gaping hole from which it had previously emerged. But because of this very reason, a chill ran down his spine because he knew what was down there.


    ''Is it going to destroy the core?''


    From the direction it was moving to the objective it had, the core was the only thing that could easily help the monsterplete its mission.


    But to Orion and the remaining survivors of Aethelgard City, this was the nightmare they wanted to avoid the most. Destroying the core meant destroying Sad and all beings living inside it.


    "Damn, this just makes the situation all the moreplicated."


    Orion had originally gone to stop General Dray''s team from killing thest gold rank monster, but his final objective was to prevent them from extracting the energy of the core. Yet now he faced almost the same situation, but the difficulty skyrocketed a thousand times.


    ''There should be a way to not let the monster reach the core.''


    Orion''s mind raced as he tried toe up with a n—any n—to stop the monster before it reached the core.


    In fact, he already had a n, but it wasn''t aplete one. He wanted to distract the monster from reaching the core until someone from his family arrived to stop this menace. However, he didn''t know how to distract with something like that.


    "Stop you, imbecile."


    A loud shout reverberated throughout the destroyed city at that moment, drawing Orion''s attention, who was deep in thought.


    He saw an old man flying towards the monster on a cloud, and Orion recognized him. It was the same person who had almost found the masked girl hiding in the room—the one responsible for handling the Valen family''s mission of extracting energy from the core—Elder Torry.


    Elder Torry soon approached the monster and appeared in front of it, blocking its path.


    "You can''t go there."


    He said this, looking at the monster, his expression solemn. He also understood that he wasn''t an opponent of an Apocalypse-level monster, so the best he could do right now was to distract it until backup from his family arrived.


    "Intruder detected. Initiating extermination."


    However, hearing the monster, the old man almost cursed.


    Almost instantly, the monster''s eyes glowed and it released two beams of purple light from those purple eyes towards the old man.


    Elder Torry swiftly dodged those beams of light by flying sideways; however, to his shock, the two beams of light followed towards him like a pair of relentless predators. No matter how he twisted and turned, they stayed hot on his tail, closing in with each passing moment.


    "Damn, I will have to block it."


    He stopped running away and conjured a big ck cloud around his body as a defense against the two beams of light. The dark cloud crackled with energy, swirling around him like a protective barrier against the oing assault.