Chapter 14 – Elementalist’s Island (3)

When the earth pillar fully rose, everyone else could notice it too.

“Ah!”

Alda’s concentration was disrupted. Even though they were competing in strength, she was still her master. She couldn’t comfortably watch her master’s crisis.

“Haha, look. Now I’m much stronger. I’m not the me who used to agonize over your growth! I’ll take revenge on everyone who has looked down on elementalists!”

When she regained control of the fire serpent, the volcano began roaring and Alda, seeing this, squeezed her eyes shut.

Stab!

A sword protruded from inside the earth pillar and pierced through the elementalist’s back. Although a flame wall interfered with the sword midway, the sword infused with qigong pierced through the flames and penetrated her heart.

The elementalist looked down with an incomprehensible expression.

“Why…”

At the same time, Daniel shouted to Alda.

“Control the spirits! There’s no time!”

At his words, Alda stretched out her hand while shedding tears like rain.

Roaaaaar!

The fire serpent, disconnected from the elementalist, began being drawn to Alda’s dominance.

“N-no.”

As the serpent was taken by her disciple, the elementalist reached out with a regretful expression. But the spirits that had lost dominance didn’t listen to her, and the surrounding temperature immediately began to drop.

Then the earth pillar crumbled and Sun-woo revealed himself. He had dug through the ground during the battle to reach behind the elementalist.

As time passed, the fire serpent and lizards disappeared from sight. Alda, who had seized control of the spirits, had sent them back to their world.

Alda, who had sent the spirits back, hurriedly ran to her master. With the temperature dropping, the other group members could also follow her into the inner hall.

“Master!”

Alda knelt in front of the elementalist and burst into tears, while the elementalist spoke to her with her last breath.

“Unfortunately, you’re too late.”

Rumble rumble rumble!

The elementalist closed her eyes and once again, the mountain began to shake.

[You have eliminated a Level 2 contamination source. Grade experience increased. Level increased. No remaining skill slots, so points will be awarded.]

Soon rewards for eliminating the contamination source were announced, but that wasn’t important right now.

Sun-woo and the other group members turned their gaze to Alda, but she couldn’t do anything either.

“All the spirits are fine. They all came into my embrace. Salamander and the fire avatar are all my friends now… Ah!”

Alda’s face turned pale.

“The fire avatar that was controlling the volcano has left the volcano. There’s nothing controlling the volcano now.”

“Send the spirits back to control it!”

“I can’t! The volcano has now left the spirits’ hands. There’s no method now!”

At Alda’s words, the group’s faces became serious too.

“Hey, anyway we eliminated the contamination source, so send us back quickly!”

Michael was the first to shout toward the sky, but no voice came.

“It seems they have no intention of ending the quest unless the volcano issue is resolved.”

“Crazy bastards. They should consider the situation.”

“Let’s get as far away from the volcano as possible first. We need to survive first.”

At Daniel’s words, the group nodded. The group immediately began running out of the cave.

“Sun-woo, you should hurry too!”

Nan-seol shouted toward Sun-woo who hadn’t moved yet.

“Please go ahead. I’ll move in a bit.”

At Sun-woo’s words, Nan-seol, remembering his sorcery, nodded. If it was Sun-woo who could move underground, he at least wouldn’t die.

“Don’t be late!”

After confirming Nan-seol had left, Sun-woo approached the plaza wall and placed his hands on it. The wall was solid.

The wall heated by the heat tried to burn Sun-woo’s hands. The entire mountain seemed to be seething with lava.

Sun-woo turned his head and spoke to Alda, who was sitting slumped on the floor. Alda was looking at her dead master with a forlorn expression.

“Are you planning to just sit there and die?”

At Sun-woo’s words, Alda raised her head and glared at Sun-woo. But she soon sighed with a complicated expression. He was the person who killed her master, but she couldn’t hate him completely.

“This island and the islanders are my and my master’s responsibility. I can’t retreat just because I can’t find a method.”

At her words, Sun-woo tapped his head with his finger.

“Hmm, then help me a bit. Sitting around stupidly waiting for the mission to fail doesn’t suit my temperament.”

At Sun-woo’s words, Alda’s eyes widened.

“Could you possibly stop the volcano from erupting?”

“Well, stopping the eruption is difficult. But I think I can minimize the damage.”

“How?”

Alda jumped up and clung to Sun-woo. At the mention of there being a method, all her discomfort toward Sun-woo seemed to disappear.

But when Sun-woo explained his method, she looked bewildered. Sun-woo’s words didn’t seem to make sense to her.

“Since you’ve made the fire avatar your ally, creating strong heat is easy. But you can’t stop the volcano from erupting.”

At Alda’s words, Sun-woo answered while taking out a potion from his phone.

“That’s enough. You just need to create heat at the time I tell you.”

Sun-woo drank the potion to fully replenish his consumed qigong and sorcery and began calling spirits throughout the entire cave.

Dust began to fill the entire cave.

***

The group that escaped the cave continued running down the mountain.

“This, no matter how much we run, the uneasiness doesn’t disappear? Just how big is the explosion range!”

Michael’s sixth sense kept making his nerves sharp. Moreover, he was getting more annoyed that Hayden had disappeared far away alone.

“No, why is that girl dawdling in front again?”

Michael was irritated by Nan-seol’s appearance of constantly slowing down and checking behind. It was natural for Daniel to fall behind due to his slow pace, but there was no reason for Nan-seol to be a hindrance in front.

“Worrying about the remaining guy? Tsk. Worrying about that guy is probably useless.”

In Michael’s view, Sun-woo’s adaptability and survival skills were extraordinary. He seemed like someone who would survive no matter where he was.

That’s when it happened.

Bang!

Suddenly a tremendous explosion erupted from behind. The surprised group all looked back and a small groan flowed from Nan-seol’s mouth.

But the volcano hadn’t erupted yet. Unexpectedly, a big explosion had occurred inside the cave the group had entered.

But that explosion wasn’t the end.

Roaaaaar!

Before the aftermath of the explosion ended, another huge explosion occurred.

This time it sounded like the mountain was bursting. The explosion that occurred inside the mountain destroyed the cave while tearing out the mountain’s side.

Huge water vapor and smoke spouted from the cave, no, from the huge hole in the mountain’s side, and soon even lava began spouting out from there.

The group stopped walking and looked at the cave spouting lava with bewildered expressions. The lava was pouring down the mountain’s side into the sea.

“Huff, huff, what exactly happened?”

Daniel asked with a bewildered expression while gasping for breath. But Michael was equally clueless.

Nan-seol stared intently at the cave where lava was pouring out.

“Hey, with that much lava, it’s hard to even approach. If he’s alive, we’ll see him later, so it’s better to wait here.”

Michael objected, but Nan-seol kicked the ground. Her body shot toward the volcano, crossing between trees.

When lava poured out of the cave, the vibrations that had been shaking the entire island stopped, and the smoke that had been spouting from the volcano’s peak actually decreased.

The volcano’s eruption seemed to have stopped now. Rather, it might be more accurate to say the eruption was flowing out from the mountain’s side.

***

“Really exhausting. Was the steam release operation successful?”

Sun-woo, lying sprawled at a distance from the cave, muttered while watching lava pour into the sea.

Sun-woo had become a gray person covered entirely in black soil and ash, and Alda sitting beside him was no different.

Next to the two was a hole Sun-woo had emerged from. Although Sun-woo had blocked it as much as possible while escaping, smoke was still seeping out through the hole.

Alda was sitting with a bewildered expression, looking at Sun-woo. What had just happened was incomprehensible by her common sense.

Sun-woo looked at the bewildered Alda and breathed a sigh of relief. The possibility of success wasn’t very high, but fortunately this world also seemed to follow scientific logic.

He used two scientific principles for this task.

Dust explosion and pressure difference.

First, Sun-woo filled the cave with sulfur-mixed dust, then used Alda’s spirits to blow out heat, inducing a dust explosion.

Fortunately, the explosion occurred well, and unfortunately the hole to the volcanic interior with lava wasn’t pierced, but the air pressure inside the cave was rapidly lowered due to the heat.

And the powerful pressure inside the volcano with nowhere to go due to the magma’s heat rushed toward the cave where pressure had been lowered by the explosion, smashing the cave wall blocking the lava and causing an explosion.

After that, all the volcano’s pressure escaped through the cave, and even the lava began flowing out through the cave.

[Party member Min Sun-woo made a great contribution to eliminating the contamination source. 160 points awarded. Points can be exchanged for ability enhancement, equipment, or money.]

Rewards were heard by the exhausted Sun-woo. It was decent, but a very disappointing reward compared to the hardship.

Fortunately, the voice didn’t end there.

[Although you couldn’t completely prevent the volcano’s eruption, you minimized damage to the island. This is entirely party member Min Sun-woo’s achievement. An additional 600 points are awarded. Good work.]

Sun-woo was a bit surprised hearing the voice. It was the first time he heard “good work.” The prevention of the volcanic eruption seemed to be very appreciated.

Following that, a reward window appeared before his eyes, but Sun-woo couldn’t focus on the reward window.

“Hello. We meet again so soon.”

A blonde woman had appeared before his eyes.

“Aftermath handling department Caroline?”

“You remember. Yes, I’m Caroline. Mr. Min Sun-woo.”

Caroline, who appeared in a suit again this time, smiled toward Sun-woo. Behind Caroline, two white men in uniforms were positioned like last time.

“Wow, this time wasn’t ordinary.”

Caroline, who had been greeting Sun-woo, looked around and made a surprised expression. The sight of a volcano spouting lava from its side was an unfamiliar scene even to her.

“Um, who are these people?”

Alda, who had been beside them, interjected into their conversation with a puzzled voice. She was curious about the people who had suddenly appeared.

“Hmm, looking at the mission, only this person noticed. Like last time, exposure to only one person in such a disaster. Really impressive.”

At her words, Sun-woo’s expression became serious as he remembered the corpse being disintegrated.

“Pfft, don’t worry. We don’t disintegrate living people or anything. Living people are my team members’ responsibility, not mine.”

As her words ended, one of the two men standing with stern expressions stepped forward. He spread his hand in front of the bewildered Alda’s face.

“Could you look at this hand for a moment?”

A low, polite voice flowed from the man’s mouth, and Alda looked at his hand with a puzzled expression.

At that moment, light burst from his hand. In the bright light, Alda immediately changed to a blank expression, and the man continued speaking to her in a small voice.

“From now on, you will forget several facts. They are…”

Seeing this, Sun-woo’s mind recalled white and black men in suits wearing sunglasses from movies.