Chapter 18 : Don’t you dare touch my house!

Natural Disasters Have Been a Source of Fear Since Ancient Times.

Even in modern times, with advanced science, humanity could only mitigate natural disasters—overcoming them remained a pipe dream. Floods and typhoons in summer, blizzards and forest fires in winter—these filled the news almost yearly.

For Lena, they were distant tales. No matter the scale, city life dulled her grasp of their terror. She’d grown so numb she wondered if people overreacted.

That complacency shattered on a Jeju Island vacation, when a typhoon hit. Cars flipped, buildings swayed, and deafening roars echoed. A glance outside revealed people airborne. That day, Lena truly felt nature’s wrath.

Afterward, she took disaster news seriously, obsessively checking forecasts before trips to avoid a repeat.

All useless once she fell into the Great Forest.

When rain poured like the sky had ruptured, Lena fled from water in terror—her first instinct here. Luckily, her senses were sharp. Whenever she felt an ominous twinge and bolted, disaster struck where she’d been.

Now, those senses screamed again.

[Survival Instinct (Lv. Max) is activated!]

Avoid that mess and slip away quietly.

[A ruler-class monster has appeared!]
[Warning! Fighting a ruler-class monster is immensely dangerous!]
[Recommendation: Challenge it only when fully prepared!]
[※ Special advice: An ally might lower the battle’s difficulty… perhaps?]

The Status Window spat warnings like it’d been holding its breath. Bright red text assaulted her eyes, vague yet urgent.

Lena swatted it aside.

“I know it’s bad just looking at it—quit freaking out.”

Clambering onto the rafters and up to the collapsed ceiling, she surveyed the chaotic battlefield. Were those black dots soaring skyward the orcs? No joy lit their faces despite their rare, unassisted flight. Few survived—bodies pulped like they’d been pestle-ground, dead before their freefall ended.

“….”

Goosebumps prickled Lena’s skin. A jolt raced down her spine, trembling through her. This foe was a monster—no, a natural disaster in flesh.

“Should I just run?”

A wise person avoids danger. Elegantly put: wibangburip—from the Analects, Eastern philosophy’s root.

In the Great Forest, instinct trumped reason for Lena. Turning into a beast, abandoning logic for a wildling’s life? No critic’s voice reached her—not apathy, but wisdom. City-bred knowledge didn’t fit the wild.

A sage advised it; her gut demanded it. Decision made.

“Let’s run.”

Who’d jump into a disaster unless they were brain-dead?

Sorry, orcs.

Lie—she wasn’t sorry. Unlucky folks break their noses falling backward. Tough break.

Badugi slumped in relief, as if praising her choice. A scout by trade, he’d bolt at the first whiff of trouble. Facing a ruler-class monster? No chance—he lacked the spine. Beast instinct, pure and simple.

Comparing strengths was one thing; this was overkill. No creature would court a pointless death against an unbeatable foe.

…But something nagged her. An unease, like leaving the bathroom without wiping.

Ominous vibes were the body’s lessons from past screw-ups. Digging through memories, she pinpointed it—akin to realizing she’d left the gas stove on.

Home. Gas stove. Home?

“Ah!”

Lena shot upright.

“There! My home’s over there!”

This wasn’t a fire to watch from across the river. The orcs’ rampage was shifting—straight toward her house.

“No!”

Her sweet home, her hard-won haven brimming with memories, her second hometown. Imagining it rubble stabbed her heart. If it happened, she’d bawl her eyes out, no question.

Sure, it might be fine. The orcs’ retreat was chaotic, direction unclear. If Python’s pursuit veered off, no worries. But banking on “maybe” was praying—and in the wild, prayer didn’t drop food from the sky. Survival demanded action.

One answer.

“Don’t you dare touch my house!”

She had to act.

Lena dashed off, no hesitation.

Kureureung!

A massive tree split; the earth fissured. A twist of its body pulped life into blood; a breath dealt death.

The ruler-class Monster Serpent Python felt nothing. It was as natural as breathing.

“Ruler-class monsters”—a human label—undersold their menace. Living calamities, they dwarfed even the Great Forest’s demonspawn.

Luckily, they rarely stirred. Humans called it fortune, citing great power with great responsibility, or intelligence weighing consequences. Wrong.

Human adages didn’t apply here. They just didn’t feel like moving. Tormenting insects was a fleeting thrill—energy spent outweighed the gain. Stirring risked rousing rival ruler-class beasts. Like human power brokers, maybe they were just beastly too.

So Python’s meddling in the orc-lizardman war was both shocking and not. No cosmic law bound them—only whims did. They could rise anytime their mood shifted.

This time, though, Python rampaged unwillingly.

[Failed to resist high-level mental magic!]
[Status Ailment Inflicted: Exasperation]
[Effect persists!]

A strange fury—raw, unpleasant—surged since black tentacles from that magic circle had gripped him. They’d faded, but his ire hadn’t.

Python didn’t care. Smash everything—that was enough. He had the power.

The orcs, clueless, fled, cursing their chieftain. Should’ve surrendered when the Silverscale Lizardmen invaded. They blamed him for enraging Python by crushing his pawns.

Their resentment missed its mark—the chieftain was Python’s first meal.

By orc law and tradition, the warleader was now chieftain, duty-bound to lead the Cold Wind Tribe. Yet he couldn’t rein in his kin. Fear drowned his rallying cries—hollow against such terror. His blood tie to the fallen chieftain didn’t help.

You helped summon this monster.

Unfair. Had he avoided war, they’d have called him unfit anyway.

The new chieftain did his best in a hostile bind, guiding his tribesmen to save who he could. That duty became his poison. Lingering to lead, he let Python close in.

As a massive tail blotted the sky, one face flashed in his mind: Lena, the monster girl masking brutality with delicacy. He’d banked on her stopping a ruler-class beast.

Ironically, she wasn’t there when Python struck.

Would her presence have mattered? Python’s might suggested no.

…Or did it?

That eye—its mind-crushing dominance—lingered vividly.

Pointless now. He’d never see Lena face Python in his lifetime. The Lena before him was a hallucination… wait, a hallucination? Too vivid for that.

His eyes widened.

“Hey, you—leader, no, warleader… huh? Chieftain? Promoted already? Congrats! Now snap out of it, gather your tribesmen, and get out—far as you can.”

No mirage.

“If my house gets trashed, you’ll regret it.”

Python’s colossal tail—an attack—was halted effortlessly by her hands.