The Author's POV

339 Setting the pieces in motion (3]

"...That took way too long."

I muttered wearily, taking my eyes away from the panel in front of me.

It has been about a week ever since I infiltrated the place, and so far, everything was progressing smoothly.

Well, sort of.

The deactivation of the second beacon took a lot longer than my initial expectations.

Compared to the first beacon, the process was a lot different.

The whole process was coded in a completely different manner compared to the first beacon, making it almost impossible for me to complete it quickly.

Any wrong step and I would end up locking the whole system.

Furthermore, the panel I was currently using was less advanced than the one I previously used when deactivating the first beacon.

With those factors added together, the whole process took a lot longer than originally anticipated.

Fortunately, using the excuse that Jomnuk's memories were too jumbled up and that I needed to reorganize them properly, I managed to placate some of the impatient elders.

It wasn't easy, but given my previous performance, they let it slide.

It had to be noted that they were all individuals whose minds were corrupted by demonic energy, so the fact that I managed to calm them down was a miracle in itself.

"Are you done?"

A cold voice reached my ears. It was Angelica.

"Yeah, I'm pretty much done."

Before I knew it, Angelica was standing next to me, looking at the panel in confusion.

Seeing the confusion on her face as she looked at the panel, I shook my head at her.

"Don't bother trying to understand it, even I don't know what I did. I won't be able to explain even if you asked."

I only did what the instructions told me to do.

I had no real idea of what I was doing.

Had I known what I was doing, then perhaps I would've completed it at a much faster pace.

"I see..."

Relaxing her brows, Angelica proceeded to move towards where Tomnuk was.

Standing next to him, she put her hand on the helmet and asked, "What should we do with him?"

"Him?… Good question."

Turning around and staring at Karl, I frowned.

"Also, don't touch that. I don't know what that thing does."

It was a fact that I couldn't kill him.

If he died, then everyone would know that I wasn't the real Karl. After all, the demon that he was contracted with would definitely report back.

That was part of why I didn't want Angelica to touch the helmet. If something happened to Karl, then everything would come crashing down.

"Okay."

Fortunately, Angelica understood that. She removed her hand from the helmet.

"Thanks."

Thanking Angelica, I turned my attention back towards Karl.

'Could I use him to my advantage?" I pondered.

So far, the plan that I set up was perfect. At least, that's how it seemed to me.

But I knew better than anyone else that no plan was ever perfect.

Even if there were no apparent flaws in a plan, anything could ruin it at any time. There were too many unknown variables to account for, especially in my situation.

or even a minor miscalculation, the whole plan could crumble at any time. And that, I couldn't afford to

it wouldn't hurt to

of my brow, I spoke up

him be for now. I'll figure something out

"...Okay."

"Good."

panel, I double-checked the values to make sure that nothing

'Everything looks correct.'

the values seemed

the

were no errors,

Di. Ding-

"Haa…. Done."

of the second beacon, leaning back on my chair, I closed my

how much damage will the second beacon's loss do

beacon's deactivation weakened the barrier

would have a similar effect,

then proceeded to tap on

long, video images appeared in front of me and I

***

the same time, in Henolur's outer

second beacon is

echoed the hymn of despair

those words faded, one of the lights in the sky started to fade away before completely

scene firsthand had horrified looks on their faces as they vividly watched the

"It's the second beacon!"

what in the world is

Crack! Crack! Crack-

any worse,

slowly started expanding all over

BANG-! BANG-!

of the barrier, the demons attacked with greater ferocity. As they attacked, they had bloodthirsty,

BANG-！

those standing behind the barrier, it looked as though the attacks were working as the earth shook and the blasts were no longer getting dispersed like they used to before. Even the barrier seemed to shake in the face of such

"Over here."

of the barrier, Hein glanced behind him and pointed towards a small

forming over here! Quickly report this to

"Got it."

a communication device from her

and Ryan taking care of the logistics, they had asked her and the others to report to

head right, towards Newton, she ordered, "Newton, go check if there are any more small

*Twiit*

wings and flew

high up in the

"Good boy."

her shoulder, Ava quickly sent a

in the location that I'm currently in. So far, the crack looks small. but it appears as though it is increasing in size, although very slowly. I've sent you the coordinates already.

Click-

everything, turning off the communication device,

this site. Let's go look

"Okay."

Hein left the area

***

much damage with just the

to weaken that much, just from two of its beacons not working, it seemed

had to be

of weakening from the fourth beacon's deactivation,

by just losing two beacons, something had gone terribly wrong with my

by much, but I now needed

"This is fucking annoying."

development. I couldn't help

"What happened?"

asked from the

her, I scratched the back of

it looks like we have less

do you

asked, narrowing her

in an exasperated tone, "I mean that we are going

say

but things

plan was originally going to span a month's period, just the right

small communication device, I sat back on my chair

could now freely text