Do You... Desire Power?

"D-Doctor."

"Loka! Loka!!" Falmu's repeated shouts dragged Dr. Loka back from his shock.

The current leader of Kalleva had completely lost his air of authority. His earlier kindness toward Loka was gone, too. The burly man grabbed Loka by the collar, frantic.

"Quit **spacing out! Get a grip! What do we do now?!" Falmu shouted in the doctor's ear.

Though Falmu had been prepared for the possibility of playing with fire and getting burned ever since Kalleva had secretly begun building the factory to study the Great Emperor's Relic, now that the moment had actually arrived, he still tried to salvage the situation.

The Scarlet Star in the boiler's core was trembling more and more violently. The innermost Isolation Shield had already shattered completely.

Several backup shields on the outside were still struggling to hold, but cracks had already appeared across them. It was only a matter of time before they failed.

After their initial confusion and stunned silence, the Kalleva gang members at the scene finally came to their senses. They bolted toward the exits in a panicked stampede.

If anything in this world was more terrifying than nuclear radiation, it had to be a Corrupt Calamity leak.

Once the contamination from the Scarlet Star in the boiler spread, high concentrations of Corrupted red mist would engulf the entire factory in an instant. The gangsters had seen countless times what a miserable fate awaited anyone caught inside.

The body of the unfortunate man who had gone mad and lost his mind in the transparent lab, then eventually turned into a Corrupted Corpse, had not even gone cold yet.

The enormous factory was now in complete chaos. Dr. Loka shuddered and immediately shouted furiously at the researchers at the control panel:

"Idiots! What the hell are you doing?! Activate the emergency safety mechanism and lower the Relic underground!"

When Loka had designed the boiler system, he had certainly accounted for this kind of emergency. That was why there was an emergency button on the control panel.

Once pressed, a tunnel more than ten meters deep would open beneath the boiler, allowing the Scarlet Star to drop straight down.

"I-I've pressed it several times, Doctor! B-but it's not working! Not just the button—the whole control panel's failed!"

The researcher looked on the verge of tears.

Loka realized how serious the problem was. The Isolation Shield must have crumbled far too quickly. In less than half a minute, the Corrupted red mist released by the Scarlet Star had seeped through the cracks and into the entire boiler, contaminating the circuitry and other components. The equipment had completely failed under the Corrupt Calamity.

Damn it!

There was only one last option.

"Falmu! Get your men to the bottom of the boiler, right side at the back! There's a manual safety switch there. Pull it, and it'll send the Relic underground!"

The reason Dr. Loka explained all this to Falmu in such an emergency came down to one cruel question.

Who would go?

Anyone with half a brain could see that the closer they got to the boiler, the more dangerous it was. Corrupted red mist had already leaked out around it.

Going over to pull the manual safety switch now was no different from going to their deaths. Even if they managed to stop this major leak, they wouldn't make it back alive.

Was anyone willing to sacrifice themselves for Kalleva's factory?

Obviously, neither Dr. Loka nor Falmu, the leader, was willing.

The gang members under their gaze either turned and ran or trembled in place, fear and refusal written across their faces.

Forget running over to pull the switch. They'd probably turn back in terror before they even got halfway there.

Furious, Falmu pulled out his gun and aimed it at his own men.

"Do as the doctor said! Get to the boiler, now!"

The leader of Kalleva roared. In his heart, no number of his men's lives could compare to the factory—or to the Great Emperor's Relic, their hope.

Any sacrifice was worthwhile if it meant making it through this crisis safely.

But before Falmu could shoot one of them to make an example, a commotion broke out nearby. Several of his men suddenly shouted excitedly:

"L-Leader! Someone's going over there! Someone's heading for the boiler!"

What?!

Falmu and Dr. Loka were overjoyed. They hurriedly turned their gazes back toward the boiler.

They spotted the person the men were talking about almost at once.

After all, nearly every gangster in the factory was running for the exits. Only those two "members" of Kalleva were moving against the crowd, heading straight toward the boiler. They stood out like a sore thumb.

And judging by their expressions, they were remarkably calm. The young man in the lead was beyond calm.

There wasn't the slightest trace of fear or panic on his face. To put it mildly, Falmu almost had the absurd impression that the young man was strolling leisurely through an area where a Corrupt Calamity outbreak could happen at any moment.

Regardless, Falmu felt a little relieved. The leader of Kalleva secretly swore that if the young man and his companion made it to the boiler and pulled the emergency switch, he'd give them a huge bonus and promote them straight to squad leaders.

Of course, that was all assuming the two of them made it back alive.

What Falmu didn't know was that the two Kalleva members he saw as the factory's hope were, in fact, the very culprits behind the Scarlet Star disaster.

At least, the young man was certainly one of them.

"Old fossil, w-what's happening? What are we doing here? And I-I have a really bad feeling about that thing!"

The girl's anxious voice came from behind him.

But Liao Ji didn't turn around to reassure her. He spoke plainly instead:

"If you still want to find your mother and rescue her, then... stay close to me."

At the young man's words, Irin stared at the Scarlet Star drawing nearer in the distance. A shudder rose from deep within her. She didn't need her scavenger's instincts to tell her how dangerous it was. Anyone who wasn't blind could see the Corrupted red mist swirling wildly around the boiler, as if dancing through the air.

It felt as though there were a fiery pit plunging ten thousand feet ahead of her, and all she was doing now was following the young man into it.

Irin answered Liao Ji with action.

The girl gritted her teeth, overcoming the fear deep in her soul. She kept herself going with sheer conviction, taking one step after another in pursuit of the young man's figure. She followed right behind him, never letting him out of her sight.

It wasn't only her determination to rescue her mother. There was something else, something deeper, that she couldn't put into words. Maybe it was just sheer stubbornness. She... didn't want to "fall behind" Liao Ji.

Twenty meters. Ten. Five.

With every step Liao Ji took toward the Scarlet Star, its tremors grew more rapid and the Corrupted shockwaves it released grew more intense. Each vibration seemed to make everyone in the factory's heart clench painfully.

One meter.

At last, the Scarlet Star's trembling reached its peak. In an instant, everyone at the scene, including Irin behind Liao Ji, was engulfed by intense dizziness.

The girl felt as if her heart would burst at any moment. All her blood rushed to her head. A roaring filled her ears, her neck felt as though someone were choking her, and the suffocating sensation nearly made her pass out.

This was Corrupted contamination.

A Class B contamination.

And then—

Boom!

Crash!

First came the sound of something heavy being struck, followed immediately by a loud shattering. After those two sounds, all the discomfort disappeared. Even the red mist that had spread through the air vanished without a trace, as if it had all been an illusion.

As a result, when everyone finally came back to their senses, gasping like drowning people who had just reached shore, nobody could believe what they were seeing.

Falmu, Kalleva's leader, stood frozen in place. Dr. Loka beside him was even worse. He kept rubbing his eyes, then slapped himself hard across the face.

Smack!

But the pain in his cheek told him this wasn't an illusion.

What he saw was real. It was reality!

There, at the boiler's core, the protective shield that had contained the Scarlet Star had been smashed open. And the one responsible for the breach—

Was the very young man they had pinned their hopes on only half a minute ago!

Of course, that wasn't the real point.

The point was—

The young man had reached out and grabbed the Scarlet Star inside the Isolation Shield.

Gr-grabbed it.

He had seized the terrifying Class B contamination source in his hand. He had grabbed the Great Emperor's Relic that Kalleva had studied for decades, carefully keeping it in an entire secret factory?

And judging from his expression, he had done it as casually as eating or drinking. As if it were the most ordinary, effortless thing in the world.

Thump.

Dr. Loka reacted most strongly. His legs gave out, and he dropped to his knees. As if possessed, he stared fixedly at Liao Ji—and at the Scarlet Star in the young man's hand. It was no longer trembling violently as it had when it was about to erupt and spread contamination. Instead, it was as docile as a kitten.

As Loka watched, he felt something in his mind shatter.

It was the worldview he had built over the course of decades.

It was... it was...

That simple?

Yes.

It was that simple.

To hold the Scarlet Star in his hand—oh, no. Forgive me. Now it should be called by its proper, more professional name.

[Damaged Corrupted Source Essence]

[Quality: ★★★★☆ (Calamity Rank)]

[Rarity: Epic]

[Effect: When used on a Corrupted with a quality of four stars or below, raises its rank by one star]

[Corrupted Deviation: When used on a four-star Corrupted, there is a 60% chance of failure and its rank will drop by one star. When used on a three-star or lower Corrupted, there is a 40% chance of awakening an "exclusive" skill]

(Those ants who imprisoned it. Those filthy rats who stole its power. It yearned to make them pay dearly.)

(Cut off their limbs! Tear apart their souls! Slice open those filthy bodies! Chop them to pieces! Let them feel the fury it had been suppressing for five hundred years!!)

The Corrupted Source Essence was a precious, rare item in Falling. As its description showed, it was a valuable "star-raising" item.

After all, no Corrupted had ever been born with six stars. Even Liao Ji, who had completed his first playthrough perfectly, had no six-star Corrupted among the five wives he'd raised. Rena, the gifted psychic-type Succubus, had started with only five and a half stars.

The least gifted of them, and the one who had joined Liao Ji earliest, Stia, had started with just four stars.

But the reason they had all eventually become top-tier six-star Disaster Rank Corrupted was that Liao Ji had continually fed them Corrupted Source Essence, raising their potential, breaking their shackles, and helping them climb the ranks one star at a time.

Of course, Corrupted Source Essence came in different qualities. The higher the star rank, the greater the quality of Source Essence required—and the more of it.

This piece of Source Essence had been dug out of the Relic Cave. On the first-playthrough world map, the area was part of Liao Ji's early-game territory, so the stored supplies there naturally weren't anything extravagant.

The Source Essence in his hand belonged to the lowest tier. It could only raise the rank of a Corrupted with four stars or fewer.

And judging by the look of it...

Liao Ji read through the additional details under Corrupted Deviation again. The reason for them was clear at a glance.

The Source Essence had an additional "Damaged" tag. Holding it in his hand, Liao Ji could also feel how much of its power had truly drained away. Perhaps less than... forty percent remained? That explained the added chance of "instability."

And then there was...

Liao Ji glanced at the note in parentheses at the bottom of the panel. In games, those were usually there to give players background or historical details about equipment and items. But now...

Well.

Not only did the words tell him something; he could also faintly feel the anger and grievance the Source Essence was constantly conveying to him.

All of it seemed to paint a picture for Liao Ji of what the Source Essence had endured during the five hundred years he had been gone.

And now, at last, it had returned to its true owner.

At last, someone could unleash its true power.

There was only one thing it wanted now.

Revenge!

But the Source Essence wasn't a weapon or other piece of equipment. It was merely a star-raising item, so there was only one way it could take revenge.

Through a Corrupted.

This Corrupted Source Essence had sensed that someone nearby possessed its master's Contract.

Only a Corrupted who possessed the Great Emperor's Contract was qualified to use it. Only someone like that deserved it. Only someone like that would be permitted to use it.

Liao Ji sighed.

Perhaps that was the difference between games and reality. In a game, he could stay calm and analyze the benefits from an omniscient perspective, ensuring he maximized the gains from every move and wasted not a single resource.

But now...

As everyone watched, Liao Ji turned around with the Scarlet Star in his hand.

When he saw the girl still behind him, refusing to retreat from the Corrupted contamination released by the Source Essence and stubbornly refusing to "fall behind," Liao Ji shook his head.

He seemed to understand now why Irin's luck had been rated E on her panel.

So, was she lucky or unlucky?

Regardless...

Since Irin had persisted this far and followed him here, he would give her this chance. She had earned it. She had fought for it.

So—

Liao Ji met the girl's eyes and asked softly, each word deliberate:

"Irin."

"Do you... desire power?"