Moon's Labyrinth

Hearing the voice, Sungyoon realized Hyunwoo was changing into something inhuman . He had a vague idea, but Hyunwoo’s appearance became more horrifying than what he had estimated . Hyunwoo's skin turned dark red, and his bulging red blood vessels became visible on his skin . He had already been muscular before, but now, his muscles grew beyond the limits of a human . As if it wasn’t enough, his muscles continued to grow .

Kwah-jeek!

Hyunwoo’s Device couldn’t withstand the pressure his growing muscles emanated . It broke and fell to the floor .

The part about Hyunwoo that had changed the most was his face . His hair fell off his body, his sharp teeth protruded out of his mouth, and his nose cratered . His cheekbones grew prominent, yet his cheeks became gaunt . The most noticeable part of it was his murderous red eyes of a monster .

“… What happened to you?”

“Ah! You mean my appearance . ”

Any sane person would scream at Hyunwoo's appearance, but Hyunwoo seemed unperturbed about it . In fact, it seemed he liked this look . As he looked down at his enormous hands, he spoke .

“You became one of the strongest Connectors, and you possess the Royal Gem on top of that . I thought I might find my powers lacking when fighting you . That's why I powered up a little . ”

Hyunwoo said it was a simple power-up, but it was something way more than that . Sungyoon instinctively knew it . Hyunwoo had thrown away his humanity .

“Was your desire to get revenge on humanity that large? That you threw away your own body?”

Sungyoon thought about Hyunwoo’s words up until now . It seemed logical that Hyunwoo wanted revenge against humanity . However, he was wrong . Hyunwoo clearly displayed his emotions on his face as he denied Sungyoon’s conjecture .

“No, you guessed wrong . I won’t deny that I resent humanity . After all, humanity made me move toward Grenoid’s side . To be precise, I was angry at humanity that was propping up the Connector society . I wouldn’t mind seeing humanity end, but that isn’t the reason I threw away my body . ”

“What else could it be?”

“Now that I think about it, I didn’t finish my story . ”

Hyunwoo continued his story .

“Yes . Jungbum made that damned statement . How do you think I felt as a 1st Gen?”

“You probably felt bad . ”

Hyunwoo had already known by then that Hahn Jungbum disliked 1st Gens . However, this didn’t mean Hyunwoo liked hearing it out loud .

Hyunwoo laughed . He felt happy about having an audience who understood how he felt .

“Didn’t I tell you before? If he were alive, you would've had a hard time marrying Jimin . Honestly, I was delighted when you married Jimin . Jungbum probably turned in his grave . ”

Hyunwoo sounded like a mischievous boy who had heard about a prank that someone pulled off on his friend . However, Sungyoon could tell that both men hadn’t been friends . At the very least, Hyunwoo didn’t consider Jungbum one .

“After that day, I gave up any expectation I had toward Jungbum . That was about the time when we met the descendants of Planote . ”

This was something beyond the Connectors and the Moon . It was a historical moment that had forever changed humanity's future .

“You probably heard the details from Plu-El . She’s correct . At the time, the descendants of Planote tried to cooperate with us, but we weren’t interested . They believed an absurd legend, and there was no proof that they were right . Moreover, it would've interfered with our business interest . However, a small number of Connectors, including Jungbum, believed the descendants of Planote . They said they’d introduce the descendants of Planote to Earth and treat them as equals . Isn’t that funny? They couldn't treat 1st Gens as equals, yet they were planning to do it to people they had just met . ”

By that time, Hyunwoo’s heart had only held anger toward Jungbum .

“It happened around that time . Someone from Grenoid’s side contacted me . ”

Udocus had come out to scout Hyunwoo .

“They wanted to establish an edge, so they wanted information about Earth . I fit the exact profile Udocus was looking for . He knew about the hatred my heart held . Everything afterward happened as you can surmise . I became a spy, and we killed Jungbum . We then chased the descendants of Planote into the depths of the Great Labyrinth and hid the truth from Earth . ”

Hyunwoo’s story came to an end there .

“How are you feeling right now?”

“… I feel sympathy for the position you found yourself in . ”

But that was the only thing Sungyoon felt .

“However, you don’t have the right to cause others misery, because you were treated as such . Above all else . . . ”

Sungyoon didn't say he was doing it for Earth or humanity . He didn't bring up some great cause . However, the reason he said was more important than all of that .

“I will not let you bring misery to Shinhae!”

Sungyoon gripped his sword and rushed toward Hyunwoo .

“Ha ha ha ha! Good! That’s the spirit! This is much better than looking at me with pity! This is why I like you!”

Duhp-suhk!

Hyunwoo extended his long hand toward the ground and picked up the broken fragments of the Device . Then, he put them in his mouth . His ruined Device and his Gems went down his throat .

Ooh-doo-doo-doo-doohk!

Hyunwoo’s body transformed once again . Scales erupted on his bumpy and ugly skin, and they formed an armor that covered him . His right hand twisted to take on the shape of Flamberg, and the fragments of his flying shield erupted from his back .

Woooooohng!

Lastly, blood-colored light appeared all over his body .

“Koo-ahhhhhhhhhh!”

Hyunwoo roared like a monster .

‘He absorbed the Gems?’

It seemed Hyunwoo wasn’t satisfied with just giving up his humanity . Hyunwoo glared at Sungyoon with his red eyes .

Kwahng!

He just took a step, yet an explosive sound rang out . Hyunwoo’s hand which had turned into Flamberg flew through the air as if it wanted to cut space itself .

Sungyoon’s eyes only saw a blur .

Kwahhhhhhhhhng!

He barely lifted his shield and intercepted Flamberg .

“Kooooooohk!”

Sungyoon had avoided the fate of being cut in half, but he couldn’t mitigate the shock he felt . His feet lifted into the air .

Kwahnnnng!

Flamberg hit Sungyoon’s shield once more, then sent him flying .

Kwahng! Kwahng! Kwahng!

Two . Three . Four .

Hyunwoo kept attacking Sungyoon with insane speed; he didn’t allow Sungyoon a chance to attack him .

Koo-ooh-oong!

Sungyoon hit the ground without being able to brace the fall . His body crumpled to the ground .

After holding the shield for so long, his hand became numb . He lost his grip on the shield, and when he turned his head, he saw his shield on the floor a distance away .

“Do you have the luxury to look away like that?”

Shiver!

Sungyoon immediately unsummoned his shield when he heard the voice coming from in front of him . Then, he resummoned his shield .

Kwahng!

He barely blocked the attack . A sound resembling a growl rang out as Flamberg grated against Sungyoon’s shield .

‘Shit! I’m not in a good position!’

Sungyoon bit his lips . As he lay flat on the ground, he raised his shield to block the attack . On the other hand, Hyunwoo arrogantly stood over Sungyoon and pressed down on Sungyoon’s shield .

‘I have to escape . . . !’

Puhl-ruhk!

Sungyoon’s cape turned into wings . It happened when he was about to move .

“Where are you going!”

Koo-oohng!

Sungyoon had been about to dodge Hyunwoo’s attack, but his body spun on the ground . The sound of metal grating against the ground reverberated in the room . Hyunwoo had stepped on one of Sungyoon’s wings .

Instead of surging into the air, Sungyoon rotated around the pinned wing .

Kwahng!

“Koo-oohk!”

In the end, Sungyoon failed to escape . The propulsion of his wings worked against him as he crashed to the ground . He felt his consciousness go faint .

“Careful . ”

He felt as if Hyunwoo was speaking from a distance, and he heard a buzzing on top of that, which made it sound unreal .

“Don’t disappoint me . ”

Hoo-oong!

Flamberg fell toward Sunyoon’s neck .

Kwahng!

It seemed that the sword would sever Sungyoon's neck, but it stopped before it could do that . Sungyoon had blocked it . Moreover, the power behind his move couldn’t be compared to before when he had been sent flying like a leaf in the wind .

As Sungyoon’s sword blocked Hyunwoo’s Flamberg, unlike before, Sungyoon wasn’t driven back in a one-sided manner . He held his own .

“Ke Ke!”

Even though his attack had been blocked, a smile appeared on Hyunwoo's monstrous lips .

“Yes! This is how it should be! This is how the hero Woo Sungyoon should respond!”

Puh-uhng!

Sungyoon kicked Hyunwoo in the stomach . Hyunwoo didn’t suffer much damage thanks to his scale-like armor, but the blow made him retreat .

Sungyoon swayed as he got up .

Hweek! Hweek!

He shook his head to regain his senses, and his eyes also regained focus .

‘This is…!’

Sungyoon felt a power run through his body .

‘It's the source of magical energy!’

It wasn’t the trickle that flowed out from the Royal Gem .

“I thought you merely gave up on being a human, but it seems you’ve become something similar to the officers . Am I correct?”

This was the power that Sungyoon had felt when fighting Grenoid's officers .

“Koo-hoo-hoo! I went through all this trouble to fight you . I'm facing off against the hero who’ll save Earth . ”

“Hero, hero, hero . I'm sick and tired of hearing it . ”

Despite disliking it, Sungyoon considered himself lucky . If he didn’t have this power, he would have lost in a one-sided manner .

“I don’t care if you're sick and tired of hearing it . You have two paths . Either you die to me here, or you become the hero of Earth by killing me and Grenoid . ”

“Why are you so obsessed with me being the hero?”

By this point, Sungyoon had understood something . Hyunwoo’s goal wasn’t the destruction of humanity . He didn't want revenge . He wanted to ‘heroize’ Sungyoon .

Grin!

Hyunwoo laughed .

“The other Gens consider 1st Gens useless . Everyone thought that way, even I . However, I found out that the opposite was true . You probably know about this now . The 1st Gens possess the best talent . ”

Sungyoon thought about the information Plu-El had told him .

“Our body and talent are out of sync . That damned reason is why we were always treated like dirt . Isn’t it funny? The other Gens were born with compatible bodies thanks to us 1st Gens, yet they looked down on us . However, the ones with the true innate talent are us, and this got me thinking . ”

Boom! Boom!

Hyunwoo slowly approached Sungyoon .

“I want this world to end . However, if it can be saved . . . ”

Hyunwoo yelled .

“I want it to be saved by the hands of a 1st Gen!”

His reasoning was all twisted up .

“I want you to achieve something so great that all those who ignored us can’t refute it! The 2nd and 3rd Gens shouldn't be able to touch it! Then there are the 4th Gens who are starting to appear and the 5th Gens who’ll appear in the future! I want a hero who can accomplish a peerless feat that none of them can look down on! It should be something only 1st Gens can claim!”

“… Is that why you chose me?”

“Yes! You're the being from my dream! You are a 1st Gen, yet you're as powerful as any other Gen Connector! Who else should save Earth but you?”

Hyunwoo viewed Sungyoon as the person who would realize his ideal in this world .

“Raise your weapon, Woo Sungyoon! I want you to kill me, then kill Grenoid! Make your name known around the world! Let the others know! The truly exceptional beings are the 1st Gens!”