Leveling Up Through Eating

Chapter 732: God of Birth Gaerna

After the Gaerna Hunt episode was released, the video of the defeat of the allied forces led by the Rothschilde Kingdom and the Qingdao Kingdom quickly became ZTube’s ‘Best Video of the Week’.

The leading BJs from all over the world were left speechless after watching this video.

Click—

Someone gulped dryly as they clicked on the video with hundreds of millions of views, prompting the video to start.

[You can feel the burning passion from the 500,000 soldiers that gathered around Calauhel and Xu Jiaqi.]

[The Allied Army that Calauhel and Xu Jiaqi gathered this time has many legends and strongmen sent as support by various kingdoms and empires from all over the continent.]

[Calauhel is the head of the Rothschilde Family. He has immeasurable amounts of money. He exchanged a portion of that money into gold to hire many legendary NPCs and mercenaries.]

[Master Reflector Xu Jiaqi has received the enthusiastic support of the Chinese people. She was originally the leader of the dark gamer guild Black Dragon Order. Dark gamers play games for a living and there are many top players among them. When she established her kingdom, many of the dark gamers knocked on the doors of her kingdom.]

[There’s one thing that I can tell you. Even one of the Six Monster Gods would not be able to deal with the army gathered here so easily.]

These were the commentators’ observations.

In the video, Calauhel and Xu Jiaqi climbed on their horses and looked at the approaching Gaerna arrogantly. Gaerna had a grotesque appearance. Anyone that took a look at her dragonfly face, mantis lower body, and the butterfly wings on her back would most definitely have goosebumps on their skin.

[God of Birth. Gaerna. Not much has been revealed yet about Gaerna’s power.]

[That’s why the Allied Army seems tense as they approach carefully.]

Finally, Calauhel and Xu Jiaqi sent forth 30,000 cavalry as vanguard. There were also tens of thousands of mages and archers standing behind them for support.

“Fire!!!” Xu Jiaqi cried as tens of thousands of arrows and magic rained down on Gaerna and exploded.

Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang!

“I’m… hungry.”

From what it looked like, Gaerna did not receive any damage from the explosive magic and arrows.

“I’m huuuuuuuuungry!”

Gaerna’s mandibles opened widely as her loud and tearful cry resounded in the area. Then, the tens of thousands of arrows and magics that were raining down on her body were sucked into her mouth.

[Huh…]

The moment one of the commentators voiced their confusion, Gaerna spread her butterfly wings and soared above the Allied Army.

“…!”

“…!”

No one had been able to sense when she made a move. Gaerna’s dragonfly eyes scanned them.

“Looks… delicious…”

At the same time, the tens of thousands of arrows that Gaerna swallowed before poured out of her mouth.

Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang, bang!

Fwoosh, fwoosh, fwoosh, fwoosh, fwoosh, fwoosh—

“Keuhaaaaaaaack!”

“Uwaaaaaaaack!”

“Ugh, aaaaaaaaaack!”

“Keooooooook!”

The Allied Army was caught off-guard by the sudden bombardment of arrows and magic from the sky. Master Reflector Xu Jiaqi hurriedly used her reflecting ability to try and return the bombardment, but with one swish of Gaerna’s wings, her skills disappeared into nothingness.

In just an instant, around 20,000 of the Allied Army forces died. Then, something bizarre happened. The players that died were supposed to turn into ashes and disappear into nothingness. However, their bodies remained intact.

“God of Birth Gaerna… No way!” Calauhel mumbled, furrowing his brow as he realized something.

“Uweeeeeeeeeeeeck!” Gaerna vomited something that fell on the dead members of the Allied Army.

What did Gaerna vomit? Nothing other than larvae. The larvae had the color of human skin, while their faces varied. Some were yellow, some were blue, and some were red. Regardless of their colors, they each moved to find the head of the corpses and dug into their flesh to eat their brains. At that moment, those that had fallen and died stood up once again.

There were also quite a few Korean players among the members of the Allied Army. One of the players, who had joined the alliance with his friend, called out to his friend. The problem was that his friend’s brain had already been eaten by the larvae.

“Min… Min-Seok…”

Stab—

In response, the man named Min-Seok stabbed his friend with his sword without any hesitation.

“Damn it!!!”

In an instant, the 20,000 allies had turned into enemies.

“Click, click, click!”

“Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick!”

“Krrrrrrrrrrr!”

Those that had been afflicted with the parasites could no longer speak and could only make inarticulate, insect-like sounds. But that was not all. Their strength had grown by around 10~20% while their defenses increased by at least 30%. Fortunately, they were not able to use skills or magic.

However, that was still not the biggest problem.

“You, you can’t die!!!”

“We can’t die!!!”

It was the fact that they could not die on the battlefield. Otherwise, they would be ‘revived’ and turned into those creatures. However, it was impossible to not die on such a chaotic battlefield. On top of that, Gaerna would never let them go.

“Urk…!”

Every time Gaerna let out a weird cough, hundreds of moths would come out of her mouth and cling to the bodies of the members of the Allied Army.

Sizzleeeee—

Someone’s arm slowly started to melt.

“A, aaaaaaaaaack!”

Another was subjected to an abnormal status and lost their vision.

“Keheok! My, my body has become weak!”

Someone lost the strength in their body.

Just like that, the number of their enemies continued to increase, while their own forces continued to decrease rapidly.

“Damn it…”

“Fire. It seems like fire magic is able to deal additional damage to them.”

They could use fire, but unfortunately, there was a problem with that—whether they were friend or foe, fire would devour them all.

By then, the number of enemy troops had grown to 150,000.

This damned situation required the allied forces to either completely behead their comrades or turn them to ashes. Otherwise, they would just come back to life.

It was literally hell on earth. After just half a day, the number of surviving members of the Allied Army was only 2,000, and they were only thinking of how to escape from their enemies faster. On the other hand, the enemy troops had increased to 180,000.

The person that clicked on the video gulped dryly once again when the video ended.

“How can they kill that…?”

***

Alexander, the world’s top ranker, stood with Calauhel on the walls of Faelbert Fortress. Calauhel had promised him a huge sum of money to join his side. However, he did not come here because of the money. One wrong move and one of the Six Monster Gods could potentially destroy all of Athenae. So, Alexander had come here and joined them as a player that was a model for all the other players.

“Calauhel, we don’t have much time. Hurry up and contact Player Minhyuk.”

“…Bullshit.”

Calauhel was a member of Black Stone, an organization that had now become the backbone of the Rothschilde Kingdom. Black Stone had run into Minhyuk several times, which was the basis of his hatred for the man.

“Gaerna will arrive here in half a day. That mongrel is very smart. She is deliberately going all over the place to devour the troops before coming to the final defense line. The number of people that died in her hands has already reached three million. Even her parasitic soldiers have reached 1.2 million already.”

“…”

The people had resorted to calling those that had their brains devoured and controlled by Gaerna as ‘parasitic soldiers.’

“There are quite a few legends of their own continents among that army. They might not be able to use their skills but their power alone is not something that we can afford to deal with just our numbers. And if we don’t stop her now, then…”

Calauhel turned to look at Alexander when he heard those words.

“In half a month, almost half of the territories in Athenae will be devoured by Gaerna. You have to know that the Great Luvien Empire is keeping quiet on purpose. We have to stop her now.”

“All of our preparations are done. We have already purchased a thousand dragon rubies.”

Dragon rubies were named so because they resembled the eyes of a dragon. To be exact, dragon rubies were not gems, but bombs that could blast apart an area fifty meters in radius. It was a very efficient method to deal with Gaerna’s parasitic soldiers, who were vulnerable to fire.

However, dragon rubies were very expensive. They cost around ten platinum each and were very scarce. Even though Calauhel had scoured every place he knew and bought supplies from all over the world, he was only able to gather around a thousand of them.

“Do you really think you can prevent their advance with just that? We have only seen a little bit of Gaerna’s power.”

“…”

It was the truth. They had only seen an extremely small fraction of Gaerna’s power.

There was actually a reason why Alexander wanted Calauhel to call Minhyuk.

“If we fight against Gaerna by ourselves, then we are the only ones who will be at a disadvantage. There are currently a lot of global top rankers in the alliance now. What do you think will happen if I and the others become parasitic soldiers?”

“…”

If that happened, then it would be impossible to stop them.

“Even so…” Calauhel tried to refute Alexander’s words, the veins on his neck popping out at the thought of doing what he asked.

However, before he could finish his sentence, Alexander had already grabbed his collar. “I know that you’re a f*cking bastard that swims in money and feels like he’s on top of the others. Weren’t you the one who declared it? That the Rothschilde Kingdom would be the one that will kill Gaerna? But what’s the situation now? Gaerna is even turning ordinary NPCs into her parasitic soldiers. If you don’t stop her here, then the Rothschilde Kingdom and the Qingdao Kingdom will be over.”

“What you’re trying to say is…”

“That’s right. Minhyuk must become the Alliance’s King.”

It was a disgrace for him, a stain on his pride, but Alexander still chose to say it.

“Calauhel. The high-rankers here will move only if Minhyuk comes. What do they care about your money? Those high-rankers will definitely make a run for it. Why would they stay here if there was a chance that they would turn into parasitic monsters? They could just run. Nobody wants to become like that. The best way to deal with the enemies is to utilize only a small number of the best of the best.”

He was right. The more allies Gaerna had, the more disadvantageous it would be for them. The best course of action was gathering the best rankers to fight in this war.

“We have to deal with millions of enemies with just a few tens of thousands of allied forces.”

If Minhyuk and the NPCs that he led joined those tens of thousands of allies, then the effect would be tremendous. Calauhel knew that it was unavoidable. If they lost this battle, the Rothschilde Kingdom would collapse within a week.

“…I understand.”

They only had a few hours left before Gaerna arrived at the fortress. Was there any reason for the Beyond the Heavens Kingdom to join the hunt for Gaerna? There was none. Even if they tried to frame it as something done for the sake of the players of Athenae, even Calauhel knew it was bullshit.

In fact, the Rothschilde Kingdom had declared that they would be the first to kill Gaerna. So, if the Beyond the Heavens Kingdom came here, they would receive severe criticism.

After receiving Minhyuk’s code, Calauhel sent him a whisper.

[Calauhel: This is Calauhel.]

The reply came not long after.

[Minhyuk: Okay.]

Calauhel felt his blood starting to rush to his head the moment he saw the reply. However, he was the one requesting the other party’s help. So, he had to think more deeply about his choice of words.

‘I have been harassing and bullying Minhyuk since he was still at the intermediate level.’

Therefore, Minhyuk’s reaction was only natural.

[Calauhel: We’re currently at Faelbert Fortress with 600,000 troops…(omitted)…We are in desperate need of your help.]

After a while, he received Minhyuk’s reply.

[Minhyuk: K.]

“…”

Calauhel clenched his fists tightly. Once more, he had to remind himself that he was the one that was requesting help.

[Calauhel: I am hoping that you will come.]

[Minhyuk: Hmm.]

It seemed like Minhyuk was seriously pondering over the matter this time.

[Minhyuk: You want me to help you stop Gaerna’s millions of troops with just a few tens of thousands of troops. If I really answer Rothschilde Kingdom’s request for help, how much are you willing to pay me?]

This was business. It was only natural to discuss things like this. Was he supposed to just fight for the sake of the players from all over the world? Of course, it was no surprise that he was looking out for his own self-interest in the process.

[Calauhel: You should know by now that I have a lot of money. State your terms.]

He certainly sounded arrogant, but Calauhel was the head of the Rothschilde Family. His wealth and assets were truly immeasurable.

‘I think five billion should be more than enough, no?’

The players that had participated in the Battle of the Thrones received around two billion in cash for joining him in this endeavor. It was even under the condition that they could choose to no longer participate in the hunt if they died once. They would just work for a few days as mercenaries, but they would be able to gain that much money. It was practically a windfall.

As for Alexander, he received a little over three billion. It was a huge sum of money. However, in exchange, the Rothschilde Kingdom would gain an astronomical amount of money if they could kill Gaerna. That was why Calauhel did not mind spending that much.

With that range in mind, Calauhel predicted that Minhyuk would ask for five billion at most. Then, Minhyuk’s reply arrived.

[Minhyuk: Two hundred billion.]

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