Humanity Itself is Strong

Chapter 50

Chapter 50 – The Key

Gwanghwamun SY Building 23rd Floor.

Two men were having a conversation in a small office.

“What’s with that guy?”

When Philip told him about Lee Jin-seong at the military academy, the man laughed.

Philip, who couldn’t hold back his anger, shouted.

“How can you laugh right now?! That dude played me for a fool!”

Seeing his outrage, the man with messy hair apologized.

“Ah sorry. I laughed because the guy called Jin-seong you just talked about is more absurd than I thought.”

Hearing that, Philip waved his hands with a tired face.

He answered as he sighed.

“No… I think I reacted too sensitive, administrator.”

Then, Philip asked with a calm voice.

“….Are we really the only ones here?”

“Yes.”

Philip sighed and he took out a portable keg of purple wine and a cigarette from his arms. When he put a cigarette in his mouth, the administrator took out a lighter and lit it as if he was used to it.

“Whew…..”

Philip, with a cigarette in his mouth, exhaled white smoke as he talked.

“There’s no way for me to relieve stress because the Pope recently banned smoking…. I wouldn’t even have imagined taking my cigarette out in front of the interpreter.”

The administrator smiled.

“Of course. Without this, we won’t have been able to talk comfortably like we’re now.”

Then, the administrator took out a small stone from his arms. It was an orange stone with unreadable Sumerian language written on it.

Philip smiled as he looked at it.

“Isn’t the ‘Piece of Babel’ really useful? Just by possessing the stone, you can understand any language.”

“It is very useful. How’s the construction of Babel Tower going?”

Philip answered.

“The construction is about 90 percent done but we need to find the core relic to finish it.”

Knowing what the ‘relic’ is, the administrator began to laugh.

“Our wish will come true.”

“If the Babel Tower is built, the Millennium Kingdom will come, and humanity will finally win the battle against the demons. Aren’t you excited?”

This time, Philip opened a keg made of silver and took a sip.

“Do you want some?”

“No, I don’t drink.”

The administrator spoke as he turned down Philip’s offer.

“Don’t worry too much about the holy spear. I know a way to take it from him.”

“Oh…. How?”

The government also had the minimum information about Lee Jin-seong.

Lee Jin-seong had been in an orphanage for 12 years and he was the only survivor from the orphanage.

Also, the administrator was speculating that he might have played a role with Muhyuk at the Dawn Banquet. But none of the dead survived from the banquet so there was no way to find out what happened.

‘How come none of them escaped the banquet?’

Anyway, after the Dawn Banquet incident, Lee Jin-seong was appointed as a new professor by the decision of the faculty council. It is said that he served as the squad leader at the Forest of Decay.

However, considering how he played Philip for a fool, he concluded that Lee Jin-seong became the professor thanks to his wheeling and dealing, not his quality as an opener.

So, the government, or the presbytery had no problem with having Lee Jin-seong as a professor since it wasn’t difficult to threaten or kill an unskilled ranker at any time.

“We have to take it from him by force. Anyway, even if Lee Jin-seong has the skills, he would be nothing more than an average ranker. This is why he served as a bait for the Lord of Corruption subjugation.”

“Bait?”

“In the process of subjugating the Lord of Corruption, Lee Jin-seong played a role as the bait. While he was attracting public attention, Muhyuk subjugated the lord and the dead. In other words, Lee Jin-seong is just an insignificant subordinate of Muhyuk.”

“Ohh….. So Lee Jin-seong is Muhyuk’s subordinate?”

“That’s right. He’s nothing more than a bait to catch the dead.”

The presbytery was very wary of Lee Jin-seong when he first appeared.

He appeared at the Hwanin Military Academy out of nowhere, contributed to the subjugation of Kim Oh-seong, and suddenly became a professor.

However, through the subjugation of the Lord of Corruption, it turned out that the person that they had to be afraid of was Muhyuk, not Jin-seong.

The reason Kang Min-ah and Lee Jin-seong fled to the Forest of Decay was only to serve as bait, and according to survivors’ testimony, it was Muhyuk who beheaded the lord.

The administrator seemed already determined to subdue Lee Jin-seong and take him to the Holy Kingdom. He explained to Philip.

Hearing the plan, Philip’s face turned bright.

“So, with the method we prepared, it won’t be difficult to subdue Lee Jin-seong.”

“Oh… I’m already excited!”

“Should we continue our conversation while eating?”

“Sure.”

Philip threw away the cigarette in the ashtray.

Creak…. Bang….!

Even when they left the office, the smoke was still coming off the end of the cigarette butt.

Then, a black shadow appeared and rubbed the cigarette in the ashtray. The smoke was no longer coming off.

Lee Jin-seong, who hid him out of their sight, was there listening to their conversation the whole time.

The administrator and Philip went out to the street.

“You must be hungry. Let’s have a quick meal and return to the office.”

“Haha, sounds good. I enjoyed eating galbi when I visited here last time.”

“Oh, okay. Then-”

Tuk-

Suddenly, a man ran into the administrator.

“W, what?”

The bodyguards hurriedly pulled the man away from the administrator.

“Ah, I’m sorry… I was somewhere else for a sec….”

A man, whose face was hard to see, apologized and walked away from the administrator.

The bodyguards, including the administrator, all seemed confused by the man who appeared so suddenly out of nowhere. Most of all, everyone was perplexed by the fact that the man broke through the bodyguards and approached him in a flash.

Philip, who was standing next to him, talked to him in worry.

“Stai Bene?”

Hearing a strange language, the administrator stared at Philip.

“…..Huh? What did you just say…..?”

They stared at each other without saying anything.

The conversation that was going on fluently until just before had stopped.

The administrator began searching his inner pocket.

“It’s gone, it’s gone….!”

He realized that the Piece of Babel, which was supposed to be inside the inner pocket near his chest, was gone.

“Fuck!”

The administrator and Philip pointed in the direction where the man disappeared.

“That bastard! Catch that bastard!”

“Figlio di puttana! Rompicoglione!!”

But the man has already gone to a place they cannot pursue.

Jin-seong took off the hood he was wearing.

Then, he looked at the orange stone that he stole from the administrator.

+
Name: The Piece of Babel
Rating: Myth
Effect: Within a 30m radius of the place where this stone is located, any language can be understood without an interpreter.
Description: A small piece of Babel Tower, when all these pieces are put together, the black sky will open.
??:??
+

“The Piece of Babel….”

Then,

Tiring!

[You have achieved ‘Pickpocket’!]
[Achievement reward is in the inventory.]

An unexpected achievement alarm appeared in front of him.

‘….Is there a reward for this?’

Jin-seong opened the inventory.

What’s inside was a portable keg made of silver.

+
Name: Portable Keg
Rating: F
Description: Just like the name, it’s a keg where you can store alcohol.
+

“….It’s really a keg.”

As much as it was an insignificant achievement, it was a worthless reward.

Jin-seong, who wore the hood again, put the Piece of Babel beside the keg and headed to the next destination.

Military academy basement.

Excavation site near Dwolven High Forge.

After Kim Oh-seong’s death, the Oh-seong Enterprise he operated also collapsed.

This ‘Dwolven High Forge’ under the military academy that used to be run by Kim Oh-seong was also put up for sale. Lee Young-woo’s Samjeong Enterprise did not miss the chance and purchased it. Now, it has become an arsenal operated by Samjeong.

And as it turned out that there are hidden ruins under the Dwolven High Forge, Lee Yeo-jin has been staying to investigate the ruins.

Lee Jin-seong stood in front of Lee Yeo-jin’s worktable and asked.

“Can you take a look at this?”

Lee Yeo-jin, who was wearing magnifying glasses, responded as she looked at the Piece of Babel that Jin-seong handed to her.

“Wow…. Where did you get this from? I thought only very few people have this.”

“….Do you know who else has it?”

“Umm, I’m not sure…. From what I know, I heard that all the Pieces of Babel were returned for the construction of the Babel Tower.”

The Babel Tower.

The tower under construction by the Pope, who received the divine message, was the Tower of Babel.

This tower, which is being erected again in the Middle East, Iraq, was being built by the divine message the Pope received. The content of the divine message was as follows.

When the construction of the Ancient Tower is finished,

“Humanity will once again be united, and the Millennial Kingdom will come upon the earth.”

However, it was nothing more than an altar to summon demons.

Jin-seong asked Yeo-jin.

“Do you think the Millennial Kingdom will come once the Babel Tower is constructed?”

Lee Yeo-jin tilted her head and thought for a moment.

“…..I’m not sure from my perspective. They say that they’re constructing the Babel Tower because the Pope received the divine message, but according to the bible, the Babel Tower was destroyed because of human’s arrogance. So, I don’t think it makes sense that the Pope is stepping forward to reconstruct the Babel Tower.”

Jin-seong nodded at her words.

‘Lee Yeo-jin knows that what they’re doing is nonsense.’

This time, Jin-seong took out a rusty key from his arms and handed it to Yeo-jin.

“I see…. Can you also take a look at this?”

“…..Wow?”

Yeo-jin, who received the key, carefully looked at the key with her eyes filled with curiosity as she adjusted the magnifying glasses.

“…..Where, where did you get this from?!”

Lee Yeo-jin asked in excitement.

“….I got it as a reward. Do you know the meaning of the letters engraved there?”

Lee Yeo-jin spoke calmly as she looked at the letter.

“It’s Hebrew. It means land, indicating the earth.”

“Oh…..”

Lee Yeo-jin took off her glasses and spoke to Jin-seong.

“By the way…. I saw these letters somewhere else too.”

“Really?”

“I saw a door engraved with the letters that are engraved on this key….. If you want, we can go take a look?”

Jin-seong smiled slightly at her request.

“Good. Let’s go now.”

Lee Yeo-jin also smiled at Jin-seong’s response.

“It’s near here.”

Lee Yeo-jin put on her jacket.

They rode Jin-seong’s Humvee to the empty field outside Seoul.

Closing the heavy car door, Lee Yeo-jin started walking quickly.

She explained to Jin-seong who was following her.

“It’s a place used to be called Seokjeong Full Moon Well, but it disappeared after the Cataclysm when Gahwa-dong was destroyed. But recently, a ruins dungeon was discovered in that place.”

Yeo-jin immediately opened the closed wooden door next to the well and started walking down the stairs leading to the basement.

“But the dungeon only had one large monster room without a boss room, and the monsters inside were just ordinary humanoid undead. So I thought it was just a small normal dungeon but…”

Yeo-jin took out the flashlight that was hanging on her chest from the dark passageway.

With the flashlight, she crossed the large room.

“……I found this.”

In front of Lee Yeo-jin, there was a heavy rock gate carved out of orange rock.

Then, she pointed at the letters engraved at the top of the rock gate.

“There.”

The letters engraved at the top of the rock gate were exactly the same as the letters on the key.

Jin-seong held up the key.

Yeo-jin spoke.

“We tried so many things to open the gate but we couldn’t…. So we kind of gave up on it.”

“I see…. If so, I wonder what kind of clue this might be.”

Jin-seong nodded silently.

‘I should check what’s beyond the gate.’

Jin-seong closed his eyes and started concentrating.

[The Queen of Pentacles, slot No.1 clairvoyance is activated.]

Chssss….

Jin-seong concentrated his consciousness on the place beyond the gate.

“…..”

A landscape slowly began to appear in a place full of pure darkness.

However, as if being interfered with by an unknown great power, all he could see was pure darkness. Only the figures that vibrated like noise were busy moving.

Fortunately, they didn’t seem ominous.

“…..”

Jin-seong deactivated his clairvoyance.

‘…..I can deal with them.’

Jin-seong spoke to Yeo-jin.

“What should we do now?”

“Um…. I’m not sure. Since what you have is a key, shouldn’t we put this into a keyhole or something?”

Hearing that, Jin-seong stared at Yeo-jin without saying anything.

“….For real?”

Lee Yeo-jin smiled as she shrugged her shoulders.

“That’s how we work though.”

“…..”