Karhin had said that if Ariella and I had not become involved, his plan would have succeeded.

When I heard that.

I had thought even that couldn’t be said for certain.

And now.

At the scene unfolding before my eyes.

“...Yeah. Exactly.”

I could only mutter blankly.

Because.

“I’m telling you, there’s no way those bastards were just going to sit there and take it...!”

Countless missiles.

Were flying toward this land.

***

Papapapapapapabang!!!

An overwhelming number of lights filled the sky.

Toward those lights.

“Intercept them!!!”

I heard the two old men, Yang and Yun, shouting.

And a moment later.

Fire, ice, lightning.

Arrows flying at tremendous speed, along with all kinds of weapons, shot upward.

There were at least hundreds of thousands of awakened on this island alone.

It had been over a year since the collapse.

By this point, even awakened who were not especially outstanding had already surpassed normal human limits just by surviving this long.

Kwagwagwang...!

The missiles flying toward the island exploded in midair.

Their fragments rained down in every direction, destroying buildings.

-An air raid....

And then.

Karhin, who had been hiding inside a building to avoid the sunlight, heard the noise and muttered in confusion.

-What... is that...?

Only after hearing that did I realize it.

‘By his standards, the operation he planned probably really did look guaranteed to succeed.’

And for good reason.

That sun was the vampires’ natural enemy.

In their homeland, it had even been revered as an object of faith.

Karhin must have been certain the vampires had no way to block that sun.

But the problem was.

‘This isn’t his homeland...!’

The humans who had lived on this land had always lived beneath the sun.

And their weapons were not affected by sunlight.

No matter how wide the range of that sun’s light might be.

...Human technology, forged through long years of war, had been built to intercept even enemies on the opposite side of the planet.

If he had known human common sense.

He might have picked up on something like this too, and prepared a response.

But he hadn’t.

-Yes. Once I remembered that my essence had been human, I found that afterward I simply couldn’t eat humans anymore.

Unlike Ariella, who spoke Korean fluently.

He had always spoken through “mental language.”

Vampires inherited their master’s memories by drinking blood.

But he had never drunk human blood.

And on top of that, in order to hide his identity as a vampire.

Yang and Yun.

He had only communicated with humans through those two old men.

‘Karhin doesn’t know human common sense...!’

And the result of that.

Was being revealed right now.

“Keep firing!”

“There are too, too many...!”

“Damn it, stop talking and intercept one more!”

A barrage of iron pouring down endlessly from the sky.

Its firepower was enough to literally blot out the heavens.

“...There’s too much.”

Watching the scene, the mage.

Old man Yun muttered as he opened his mouth.

“Even a mage’s mana has limits. Blocking a barrage like that in its entirety is... impossible.”

At those words.

Old man Yang’s face reddened as he shouted,

“Damn it, how the hell are those monster bastards firing missiles!?”

“......”

At Yang’s outburst, Yun seemed to realize something and fell into thought for a moment.

Then he opened his mouth blankly.

“The Military Commission....”

“What?”

“The original guild leader and executives of our guild were made up of high-ranking soldiers and officers.”

Now, old man Yun and old man Yang held the system roles of guild leader and vice guild leader.

But that had not always been the case.

“If it was them, they would have known the locations of units that held important weapons. And the mainland, where those military bases would be scattered everywhere, was completely seized by those vampire bastards.”

“......”

At that.

Everyone around them darkened.

The high-ranking soldiers who had originally led the guild.

The moment monsters poured out from that capital, they had all disappeared.

No one said it out loud directly.

But it was something they had all been sure of inside.

“You’re saying... they became servants of those vampire bastards?”

“They would have known how to use them too... so it wouldn’t have been difficult to teach those vampires. Or maybe other soldiers became servants too.”

They had known.

But because they were afraid of facing the truth, no one had openly spoken of it.

Of course they had not been able to prepare adequately.

No, with most military weapons located on the mainland to begin [N O V E L I G H T] with.

No matter what preparations they made, it probably would have amounted to nothing more than surviving a few minutes longer.

In the end.

Kwagwagwang...!

“No...!”

“There are noncombatants over there...!”

Part of that firepower.

Broke through the interception barrage and began destroying parts of the island.

But.

Watching that.

I thought to myself.

‘...Awakened are strong.’

I had fought against bombardment before too.

And the soldiers in my unit back then had been far weaker than these people.

Even so, we had endured that bombardment.

‘As long as they don’t take a direct hit, there’ll be a lot of wounded, but not many dead.’

The firepower for interception was weakening, but it was still ongoing.

And the number of missiles actually breaking through it wasn’t that high.

No matter how noncombat-oriented they were, they already knew an air raid had begun.

If they paid attention to defense, there wouldn’t be much damage.

And.

That was exactly why.

‘...That attack isn’t meant to cause minor damage like this.’

Cold sweat was my only option.

‘There’s another objective.’

If this had been the Legion, fully equipped with sufficient firepower, they would have intercepted a barrage like that without much trouble.

But not now.

Right now they were pouring all their strength into missile interception.

If so.

Then something else was probably coming soon.

‘I need to be ready for that.’

With that thought.

I watched the bombardment and interception while conserving as much strength as possible.

And then.

While I was doing that...

‘...What’s that?’

I spotted one enormous missile.

Mixed in among them.

***

“Keep intercepting! Keep intercepting!”

“Cough...!”

“H-how long... are we supposed to keep this up...!”

Because of the continuous interceptions.

The mana of our awakened had been heavily depleted.

“There are limits to arrows and bullets too.”

“We can still hold them off for now, but....”

Unlike the mages, the other long-range types still had a little more breathing room.

But even that didn’t seem like it would last long.

Then.

“That goes for them too!”

Wei shouted as he looked over the suffering mages.

“The area covered by that sun is enormous. It goes far beyond the range of most artillery. There’s no way they managed to sweep up every weapon from every military base on the mainland without exception. Their firepower has limits too!”

“Cough...!”

“The people have already been moved to safe zones, so let the other areas take the bombardment if they have to! Intercept only bombardments headed for major facilities or densely populated areas!”

It had been a sudden air raid.

But their response was actually quite good.

Hainan Province was enormous.

On the other hand, there were not that many humans living in it now.

On land that had once held nearly ten million people, there were now only a few hundred thousand at most.

Most areas were now forests where no one lived.

And even if buildings in inhabited areas collapsed.

There were already far too many buildings for the size of the population anyway, so a certain amount of facility destruction did not matter much.

As they reduced interceptions aimed at those “unnecessary areas.”

Fires blazed in the mountains, and the sound of buildings collapsing echoed out.

But their actual losses were not that severe.

“There’s room now, so mages rotate out and recover your mana!”

Their mages gradually regained a little breathing room as well.

Fighting while recovering mana made interception even more effective.

‘Their firepower isn’t infinite either, so if enough time passes like this.’

They could definitely hold out.

That was what I was thinking when.

“...Huh?”

While directing the bombardment response.

Wei noticed something strange.

A single massive missile flying through the rain of shelling.

The thing that made it different from the rest was.

‘...Barnacles?’

Nearby.

There were things stuck all over it like black dots.

And.

The moment he saw that.

“...Fire at it.”

“Sir?”

“I said intercept that missile!”

Acting on a sudden instinct.

Wei shouted.

“What are you talking about, brother!”

“Judging by its path, it won’t even hit a major city. It’s going to land somewhere on the island’s outskirts at best. Probably just some forest.”

“If it starts a forest fire, we can put it out later. There’s no need to intercept it right now—”

Its trajectory was clearly heading for a facility that wasn’t especially important.

Under normal circumstances, it wouldn’t have been something worth paying much attention to.

That was why, when they heard the order, the others hesitated.

“Shut up and listen to me. We have to shoot that thing down!”

“...Tch. Understood.”

At that.

The mages, already irritable from mana depletion, frowned but began chanting.

Papapapang...!

A little late, but still.

Magic shot out toward the massive missile to intercept it.

‘Got it.’

Their response had been a little slow.

But still, the missile was still quite far from the island.

If they could destroy it at this distance, there shouldn’t be any major problem.

Thinking that.

Wei let out a sigh of relief inwardly, but.

Tap.

“Huh?”

At that moment.

From the barnacle-like object stuck to the missile.

A black dot dropped away.

And then.

-For the glory of the bloodline!!!

That dot...

No.

A vampire knight draped in black cloth that blocked the light shouted.

“!!!”

The people who saw it had no choice but to be shocked.

There had once been talk that those vampires might try invading the mainland by riding missiles.

But that idea had quickly been dismissed as meaningless.

‘Even if they rode a missile onto the mainland, the moment they touched that sun, they’d die.’

It was literally no different from suicide.

They had judged there was no way they would do something so pointless.

But now.

Unfortunately.

That vampire’s goal really was... suicide.

Pahk!

Red light burst out from the knight’s body as it dropped from the missile.

And that veil of red blocked all the attacks that had been aimed at intercepting the missile.

Pasasak....

Right after that... no.

Before the red light had even finished blocking the barrage, the vampire had already turned to dust and vanished under the sun’s light.

“...Interception failed!”

“What the hell was that just now...?”

The black barnacles attached to the missile... had been vampires that blocked interception.

Which meant.

“...Concentrate all firepower.”

Wei shouted in an urgent voice.

“I don’t care if major facilities get destroyed! Ignore every missile heading for populated areas too!”

“...!”

“Stop that missile no matter what!!!”

Only then.

The others, now sensing something was wrong, focused their interceptions on that one.

But...

Unfortunately, it was a little too late.

-Glory to the Grand Duke!

-Melchiorn shall endure forever!

Vampires who did not even fear burning away in sunlight.

Throwing themselves into the incoming interception fire to block it.

If interception had begun just a little earlier.

Then maybe, just maybe, they could have succeeded.

...But that tiny difference changed everything.

Tap.

When the last vampire threw itself in and blocked the interception.

That missile fell onto the island’s outskirts.

Into an empty forest where there wasn’t a single person.

And then...

Paaaaaaaaang....

From there.

A brilliant red light so intense it was blinding.

...Red plasma carrying terrifying heat.

Swelled outward on a massive scale.

“......”

Wei, seeing that.

Muttered in a small voice.

“A nuke....”

Unfortunately.

He didn’t get to finish the word.

Kwagwagwagwagwagwagwang!!!!

The massive shock of the explosion.

Covered the entire island.