Chapter 55: Demonkin (1)

Whirr—

The air vibrated ominously, a suffocating aura even non-awakened could sense.

Uiji’s skeleton, Skully, stopped clattering and hid in his grip.

A Hunter, hands trembling, crushed a return stone. Unsurprisingly, it didn’t work.

A bottomless black hole opened in the crumbling cave floor, swallowing mermaids.

Hunters retreated from the growing hole, huddling like cornered rats.

A dense, electrifying pressure emanated from the hole.

Grrrr!

The Kraken’s tentacles, lunging forward, hit an invisible barrier.

“—–?”

“—-.”

Voices echoed from the hole.

Wooong— With a strange vibration, three humanoid figures appeared above it.

Pale, bloodless skin and two horns on their foreheads—otherwise, they looked human.

“They’re… small. Not Giants…?”

Hunters, expecting a massive hand like in Korea’s Monity Dungeon, murmured.

Ion wasn’t surprised.

Demonkin, a hybrid of humans and Demons in the novel, naturally resembled humans.

Their black leather armor covered only vital areas, revealing much skin—a sign they weren’t nobles.

Demonkin Knights… Why are they here now? This wasn’t in the novel…

No, saying it wasn’t in the novel was meaningless now. Everything had diverged.

Why are they in the Monster Domain? They see monsters as filthy and beneath them.

Demonkin were prideful, arrogant, believing only Demons and the Demon God stood above them. They even considered war with Giants shameful.

They had no reason to be in the Monster Domain.

“Why so few mermaids?”

The male Demonkin on the left spoke, his young voice auto-translated by the system, like the Giant’s.

The Demonkin scanned the wary Hunters, dying mermaids, and the Kraken’s blocked tentacles.

The central figure raised a hand. Black discs appeared, halting the cave’s collapse. He spoke.

“Otherworlders in the Monster Domain. No matter. More mermaids are deeper in. Kill them all and secure their scales.”

“Yes.”

“Yes.”

The left male Demonkin vanished into the cave’s depths, while the female Demonkin leaped toward the Kraken.

Despite being nearly bare at 700 meters underwater, she moved effortlessly, a whip in hand.

It took less than five seconds to shred the Kraken into hundreds of pieces, floating in the sea.

Now, the humans’ turn.

As the female Demonkin turned, the Hunters felt an overwhelming darkness crush them.

“Hnng.”

A Hunter beside Ion gasped, stepping back. But there was nowhere to flee—only collapsed cave walls behind.

“Raise your weapons! We can’t die without a fight!” Elliet roared through comms, likely audible to the Demonkin.

“Whoever they are, we’re not easy prey!”

“Don’t worry, I won’t let anyone die!”

Uiji raised mermaid corpses as summons. Joseph generated white rings, ready to heal injuries. Others, cursing, gripped their weapons.

The female Demonkin’s red lips curved into a smile.

“Your struggle to survive is cute, but no luck today.”

Unlike with the Kraken, she discarded her whip, forming black spheres in her palms.

Can I negotiate with Demonkin too?

Ion stepped forward, planning to talk his way out like before.

“O great souls of the Demonkin Knights!”

Someone spoke first—Dam Il-on.

Hunters stared at Il-on in shock. She removed her comms.

“I know you’re here for the war with the Giants, to secure Solminium in bulk. Give us a moment, and I’ll share information to ensure your victory.”

Il-on’s voice echoed through the cave.

The approaching female Demonkin frowned, her gaze asking, How do you know that?

Ion, too, was stunned, his dive suit’s breathing warning flashing.

Here for the Giant war, to gather Solminium?

It was shocking.

In the novel, Demonkin and Giants were in a truce at this point.

The Demon Realm had four domains: Monster, Giant, Demonkin, and Demon.

Giants and Demonkin were at odds, for simple reasons.

Demonkin were Demon-human hybrids.

Giants were Demon-monster hybrids.

Demonkin despised Giants as tainted by filthy blood; Giants scorned Demonkin as diluted by foolish blood.

Initially, Giants dominated.

“Giants named their domain ‘Titan,’ declaring it an independent world, their power was so great.

Demonkin, however, bowed to the Demons, the de facto rulers of the Demon Realm after the Demon King’s disappearance, serving as their vassals.

Demons cared little for Demonkin, too busy searching for the sealed Demon King.

While Demons hunted their king, Giants and Demonkin fought territorial wars, slandering each other. Giants won early, but Demonkin’s relentless progress evened the score, leading to a long truce.

A seemingly peaceful era persisted until…

“Two years later, monsters lost reason to madness, and soon, Giants began to rampage mindlessly too.”

‘Madness’ spread like a virus to the Giant Domain, eroding their intellect and collapsing their civilization in just two or three years.

Around then, Earth and Idea reached System Level 4. As Giant Domains became dungeons, humanity learned of beings beyond monsters. They met only two or three sane Giants.

Demonkin realized madness was contagious then. They avoided invading the falling Giant Domain for that reason, sealing it off to prevent entry or exit.

At this point, unaware of madness’s contagion, they likely came to the Monster Domain.

But the seal didn’t work. Demonkin eventually succumbed to madness.

It didn’t end there.

Earth and Idea fought monsters, Giants, and Demonkin tainted by madness, eventually facing Demons.

Humanity realized areas infected by madness became dungeons.

Fortunately, madness affected only the Demon Realm, sparing Earth and Idea’s people.

But another issue arose.

Humanity barely handled dungeons up to Demonkin Domains, but mad Demons were terrifying. Each Demon dungeon opened with Hunters dying like ants in a flood. Many main characters died in the novel’s latter half.

At least it’s Demonkin, not Demons. If they’re here for the Giant war…

Ion recalled the Giant from Monity Dungeon.

“There’s a traitor among you working with the Demonkin.”

Ion had revealed the traitor’s name.

“Jin Seongha recalled Giants, driven mad years ago, losing intellect and falling to Demonkin. The decisive cause was □□□□’s betrayal, handing the ‘key’ to the Demonkin.”

In the novel, the ‘key’ was a means to stop madness’s spread. After □□□□’s betrayal, madness spread faster.

If madness was creeping into Titan then…

That Giant was searching the Monster Domain for the key and learned the traitor’s name from an otherworlder.

Now, Demonkin were here for Solminium to fight the Giants.

Did the Giant reclaim the key, stopping the madness, sparking a war? Then I practically caused this war…

Unlike the Hahoe and butterfly mask breeders’ interventions, this was massive. Ion no longer had grounds to caution them against disrupting the plot—he didn’t plan to anyway.

“How do otherworlders, bound to the Monster Domain, know of the war?” the female Demonkin asked, puzzled, her black spheres still active.

“I know more. You recently lost the key you’d acquired, sparking the war. You’re here for Solminium to prepare for all-out war.”

“…What information can you offer?”

“Mermaid habitats.”

“…”

“I know three.”

Each word from Il-on stunned everyone—humans, Demonkin, and Ion.

Other mermaid habitats weren’t in the novel. How does she know? Is she bluffing, or does she have a related skill?

She seemed to know Demonkin would appear.

Did she really have a foresight skill?

Ion stayed silent, observing.

The Demonkin clapped her palms, dissipating the spheres like dust.

“Captain, what should we do?”

“…”

The commanding male Demonkin approached, footsteps heavy.

Glossy, oiled long hair, deer-like horns on a smooth forehead, red eye makeup on sharp eyes, and large hoop earrings stretching his earlobes. His attire, barely covering shoulders, lower abdomen, and calves, made Ion, raised in a Confucian culture, grimace.

“Ugh… Skully, don’t look,” Uiji said, covering his skeleton’s eyes, suggesting even Westerners found it excessive in this tense moment.