By Zephyria 
Feeling a tightness in his chest, Ho-eun deliberately inhaled the cold air. He brushed his cheeks, which were stinging from the battering wind, and blinked rapidly to moisten his parched eyes. He wondered how long he had been standing there.
“They’re here.”
Tae-muk spoke. At those words, everyone lowered their bodies in unison, as if by prior agreement. Ho-eun also lay down atop the Crimson Rain Brigade cloaks that Tae-muk had spread across the ground in advance. They had to hide their presence. They could not let the enemy know they were being pursued.
Tae-muk knelt on one knee and gazed beyond the horizon. Ho-eun followed his gaze, but saw nothing. The boundary where dust and air mingled was merely a hazy blur, like an unknown world. Then.
“There aren’t many of them.”
Byeonguk, who had been looking through the telescope, spoke. He then handed the telescope to Ho-eun. Ho-eun pressed his eye to it. Through the round, stained glass, he saw a swarm of Devouring Ghouls running, kicking up clouds of dust. There seemed to be roughly two to three hundred of them. And standing tall among them was a golden tentacle. It was a Fan Type.
“This probably isn’t the main force—I mean, the real swarm,” Ho-eun said, his eye still pressed to the telescope. Two to three hundred was not a small number, but it was too few to be the main base.
“Do you think there’s another group?” Byeonguk asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Yes. The Crimson Rain Brigade also split into several groups when moving their station—the vanguard, the rear guard, the scouts… Wouldn’t they do the same? The Fan Type in the fir forest might have been the vanguard or a scouting party.”
Ho-eun returned the telescope to Byeonguk.
“If the vanguard is two hundred, then just how many are in the main force…?”
Byeonguk took it back, letting out a deep sigh, unlike his usual self. A dark shadow seeped into the corners of his normally steadfast eyes.
“Let’s wait a bit longer.”
Tae-muk said this and looked at Ho-eun. His gaze held a subtle mix of worry and irritation. He was clearly displeased that Ho-eun was lying on the ground of all places. Noticing this, Ho-eun smiled faintly and whispered.
“I’m okay.”
“…”
Tae-muk frowned as if that answer was also unsatisfactory, but he turned his head back forward without further word.
How much more time did they kill? By the time the sky had turned red, Ho-eun suddenly felt the ground vibrate. It was a very faint tremor, but because his entire body was pressed against the earth, he could feel it clearly.
Just as he wondered if it was an illusion, a small pebble in front of him rolled right up to his chin. As Ho-eun stared at it blankly.
“Ha…”
Tae-muk suddenly let out a hollow laugh. It was a scoff of disbelief. Or perhaps it was a lament. At that, Ho-eun looked at Tae-muk, then turned his head following Tae-muk’s gaze. And then.
“Ah…”
He had to let out a long, deep groan.
It was like a black wave. It looked as if a midnight sea were swallowing the land.
Even though they were far away—so far that the distance was impossible to gauge—their presence was vividly felt. This was because the horizon was being dyed pitch black. The way they surged and swallowed the earth was beyond terrifying; it was almost mystical.
“…”
Ho-eun froze with his mouth agape. Byeonguk also stared blankly, the end of his telescope thumping into the dirt.
How many were there? A thousand? No, ten thousand? No, perhaps over a hundred thousand.
A hundred thousand Devouring Ghouls.
Since ancient times, they had been called the Myriad Calamities—ten thousand woes—but even that referred to only ‘ten thousand’ creatures. A hundred thousand.
Watching the world turn black, Ho-eun thought for the first time that he wanted to run away. He had resolved himself to be torn apart by the ghouls, but he had never resolved to flee. Now, he wanted to turn around and run for his life immediately.
That was how vast the number was. Even counting the trees in a forest, the grains of sand on a beach, or the clouds in the sky, it felt as though they would not be as numerous as this.
As the black wave drew closer, the trembling of the ground intensified. Now, the shaking of the earth was visible to the eye. Consequently, Ho-eun’s body trembled as well. He couldn’t tell if he was shaking because of the vibration or if he was trembling out of fear.
Ho-eun forgot to breathe, mesmerized by the ghouls. Everyone else was the same.
“…”
“…”
Everyone lost their words. Perhaps they had lost their will to fight along with them. It was then.
“Choi Ho-eun.”
Tae-muk, who had been staring at the ghouls without blinking once, called Ho-eun.
“…”
Ho-eun couldn’t answer. His vision and hearing had both been stolen by the ghouls. His chest tightened. It felt as if the ghouls were not running across the land, but trampling over his own heart.
“Ho-eun.”
Tae-muk called him again. Only then did Ho-eun snap back to his senses.
“Yes, yes. General.”
“Look at them.”
“Pardon?”
When Ho-eun asked back with a foolish expression, Byeonguk handed him the telescope. Ho-eun hurriedly pressed it to his eye, saying, “Ah, yes.” And once again, he had to gasp.
“My god…”
Among the pitch-black waves, numerous Tentacle Plant Monsters protruded here and there. There were Leaf Types, Sprout Types, trident types, Double Horn Types, and even Fan Types. The Mongolian woman was right. All the leaders were together.
Ho-eun checked the tentacles one by one to see if there were any new types they didn’t know about. Fortunately, there were no new shapes. However, there was something strange.
“What on earth is that…?”
Among the black carpet of ghouls, there were things—how should he describe them, clumps of ghouls?—that rose up in irregular bulges. The ghouls were creating giant spheres by pressing their hardest parts, the Helmet Bones, tightly together. Stacked dozens of layers deep, they looked at a glance like houses, or perhaps carriages.
One could tell at a glance that something was hidden inside. However, it was impossible to know what it was. Since there weren’t just one or two of these clumps but dozens, it was even harder to gauge.
It must be something important to them. What could it be? Food? Weapons? Or another Tentacle Plant Monster? He couldn’t tell. Perhaps each clump contained something different.
“I think there’s something inside. What could it be?”
To Ho-eun’s question, Tae-muk answered in a flat voice.
“I don’t know.”
“…”
“But it’s definitely a weakness.”
“What?”
Ho-eun pulled his eye away from the telescope and looked at Tae-muk. Tae-muk was still staring at the ghouls.
“Otherwise, they wouldn’t wrap them up so tightly and hide them from view.”
“Ah… Yes. You’re right.”
To hide something meant it was precious. It meant it must not be damaged. In other words, whatever was inside was certainly their weakness. That was welcome news. Until now, their only weakness had been the brain inside the hard Helmet Bone, but now another one had appeared.
“Fortunately, they aren’t moving fast,” Byeonguk said. The creatures were moving at a speed that was neither running nor walking. It seemed to be because the swarm was so large and they had things to protect.
“How many days will it take to reach Hanyang?”
At Tae-muk’s question, Byeonguk tapped the dirt floor rapidly with his index finger and soon gave an answer.
“Since they seem slower than a galloping horse, it will likely take 20 days at the shortest, and 30 days at the longest.”
“…”
Tae-muk’s eyes narrowed. It was slower than he had feared, but it wasn’t a generous amount of time. It was fair to say that there were perhaps 30 days left until the country fell.
What should they do? Should they stop them here, or defend Hanyang?
As Tae-muk pondered, scraping the inside of his cheek with his tongue, Dong-ja suddenly crawled up from behind and came to his side.
“What’s there to think about? Can’t we just, fuck, kill them all right now?”
Her eyes glittered with intensity. She was filled with a fervor for revenge. Tae-muk frowned and glared at her.
“What if your body gets ripped apart? You are excluded from combat until Man-soo fully recovers.”
In truth, he hadn’t intended to bring Dong-ja on today’s reconnaissance, but she had insisted and thrown a tantrum until he let her come along.
“Ah, why!”
Dong-ja shouted, huffing like a bull. To this, Tae-muk spoke with his characteristic expressionless face.
“Do you want to leave Man-soo all alone?”
“…”
Dong-ja’s mouth snapped shut. Then, as if frustrated, she let out an “Ugh!” and slammed her head against the dirt floor. Bang! Bang! She slammed it so hard that the ground actually shuddered. Her tightly clenched fists trembled with spasms. Even so, Tae-muk warned her in a low voice without a single change in expression.
“Just try acting out. I’ll discharge both of you.”
At that, Dong-ja’s eyes widened. Her clenched fists trembled violently. However, she did not rebel against Tae-muk or behave rudely.
“Sister, come over here.”
Gil-sang grabbed her ankle and gave a hard tug. The sprawled-out Dong-ja was dragged away like a piece of luggage.
Tae-muk continued to contemplate something while watching the ghouls for a long time. He furrowed his brow, rubbed his eyebrows, and clenched his molars so hard that the veins in his temples bulged.
It was an unusual level of deliberation for him. It was impossible to tell what he was thinking.
Feeling an inexplicable sense of anxiety, Ho-eun found himself staring only at Tae-muk, rather than the surging tide of ghouls.