The Regressor Only Protects Me Chapter 151

Episode 151. New Power

A little past noon.

Citizens who had finished their morning work poured into the market, and the city came back to life.

The market was crowded with not only humans, but also many other races, including dwarves, orcs, and merfolk.

Man-gyeong has now become a multicultural city where people of all races live together.

In addition, the '1st District' encompassing Seoul and Gyeonggi Province could be said to be the most stable and peaceful city-state.

All of this was possible because the person sitting on the throne of Man-gyeong was Ha Yoon-ha.

If another person had been ruling Man-gyeong during that time, it would have been absolutely impossible.

Ha Yun-ha was the third person from Man-gyeong to sit on the throne.

When the hero who had founded the city-state and laid the foundation for its power was judged to be dead, his most important confidant, the Minister of Order, took over the throne in place of the still young Ha Yun-ha.

However, she too died of a chronic illness not long after.

After the death of the second monarch, Man-gyeong was tossed around like a small fishing boat in a storm.

As the third round began, the landscape between the factions changed rapidly, but Man-gyeong, who was internally unstable, was unable to adapt and, of course, was unable to prepare for it.

Moreover, unlike other powers that waged wars of conquest, Man-gyeong did not particularly expand its territory externally.

This is because the immediate goal was to protect Anyang City, which was the center of Man-gyeong.

In the meantime, each force of Man-gyeong was on guard, pointing swords and spears at each other.

Given this trend, the approach that ordinary monarchs would have taken was war.

Because there's no surer way to solidify internal unity than to create a new common enemy.

It is true that in the midst of the already turbulent current, external forces were approaching with an even greater threat.

And even within Man-gyeong, opinions were already emerging that they should quickly strengthen their military and participate in the war of conquest.

But Ha Yoon-ha's thoughts were a little different.

War is always a structure in which a third country gains an advantage.

Even if we look at World War II, the one that gained the most was the United States, which sold war materials to the entire world, and during the Korean War, its neighboring country, Japan, achieved high economic growth based on that.

And in this day and age, there is no means of uniting citizens as powerful as creating a common enemy: money.

Taking that into account, Ha Yoon-ha refused to participate in the war and declared himself a neutral country.

After that, he began to persuade the forces of Man-gyeong one by one.

Our country must prepare for the coming economic war, not just a war by force.

I am saying that only by uniting now can we turn this crisis into an opportunity to develop into a superpower.

Ha Yoon-ha's powerful speech in the assembly hall captivated everyone present, and the high-ranking officials of Man-gyeong, who had been divided into various factions, began to unite again.

She united the people with the goal of industrial development, not preparation for war.

Man-Gyeong immediately began expanding his weapons factories, armor factories, and food production, and also greatly increased production.

As a result, the northern powers that were in the midst of a war flocked to Mankyung without exception to continue trading.

Kang Si-on's "Ogre Unit" and the "Elite Unit", which was raised by Choi Myeong-jun in the past and is now led by Jeong Hyeon-su, were formed into mercenary groups and earned a large amount of foreign currency.

Ha Yoon-ha didn't stop there.

She embraced without any restrictions the refugees from each force who fled the raging battlefield, and again used them as labor to increase the production of war materials.

In addition, by actively accepting wanderers who had difficulty finding peaceful accommodation due to the war at the time, the largest market in Gyeonggi was formed.

And this later became the first stepping stone for the population growth of Mankyung, reaching nearly 100,000 people.

As a result, Ha Yoon-ha's choice was 100% correct.

The gains that other powers gained from this great war were extremely minimal, and only Man-gyeong gained significant profits.

After the Great War, four central powers formed around Seoul.

To the west is “Daehan Incheon”.

In the east is “Gangnam”.

In the north is 〈Gangbuk〉.

In the south, there is “Man-gyeong”.

This happened two years after Kang Shi-on disappeared.

The inter-district war that lasted for several months left behind a number of casualties that were incomparable to the unification war between Man-gyeong and Dong-an.

The results of the war were as follows:

Under the pretext of continuing the roots of the Republic of Korea, “Daehan Incheon” colonized “Gangbuk.”

〈Gangnam〉 also lost the war against 〈Daehan Incheon〉 and was forced to give up part of Jamsil, where the Red Dragon's Nest was located.

Having experienced a bitter defeat, Gangnam acknowledged the difference in power and joined hands with Mankyung, which had declared itself a neutral country in the midst of the war.

As a result, a situation was created in District 1 where two allied forces were in conflict over one 'Jamsil'.

Daehan Incheon-Gangbuk, Northwest Union.

Man-gyeong-Gangnam, Nam-dong Union.

Jamsil was an important area where the 3rd round red dragons lived.

The Northern Alliance's goal was to capture the Red Dragon while defending Jamsil.

The Confederates' goal was to recapture Jamsil and capture the Red Dragon.

Now the third round is coming to an end.

The losing force will lose everything, and the winning force will have the right to advance to the next round.

In the midst of a whirlwind of upheaval where one cannot predict even an inch ahead, Man-gyeong faced a great change.

just now.

The hero who had disappeared for the past five years has returned.

* * *

“Phew-.”

I exhaled slowly and stepped over the last root.

Bright sunlight shone through the tree trunks, illuminating the expedition team.

It took quite a while to get from the center of the forest to the outskirts.

Because we couldn't just throw away all the support we had accumulated over the past five years.

Luxury items that are more precious than you might think would be worth a lot if you just took them back to Man-gyeong.

“This is the last one, brother.”

Choi Myeong-jun said as he carved a mark into the last tree with a dagger.

Then, behind Choi Myeong-jun, Choi Hyeon-ji spoke with an exhausted expression.

“Shouldn’t you take a break? Hooooooo… … It’ll take a few hours from here to Man-gyeong.”

Originally, it would have been enough to walk from Gunpo to Anyang (Mangyeong) in an hour, but after the world fell apart, the road became uneven.

Because the collapsed asphalt soared and buildings collapsed, blocking the road.

Of course, a break was needed.

“Okay. Let’s take a short break once we’re completely out of the forest.”

“Wow… … . Nice… … .”

Choi Hyun-ji cheered in a voice that was full of energy.

The expedition started walking again.

So we were soon able to escape the dense forest.

Finally, we were able to reach the area occupied by Man-gyeong.

After emerging from the dense forest, the first thing that caught my eye was the enormous length of barbed wire surrounding the area.

A sign was hung on the fence that read, "No Trespassing: Anyone found trespassing will be punished regardless of reason."

But such warning messages were not a big threat to us, and we had no time to care about them.

Choi Hyun-ji made a bridge using black objects so that she could easily cross the barbed wire fence.

“If we keep going straight ahead, we’ll see a beautiful view. No, was it Hogye?”

“Ho-gye. That’s right.”

I answered Choi Hyun-ji's words and got down from the black bridge.

Then, naturally, the black leg permeated Choi Hyun-ji's body.

As we crossed the barbed wire, we saw several traces of people.

The first thing that caught my eye was the mountain of boxes of supplies and the shabby makeshift huts.

As we got closer, we could soon see wooden tables and chairs scattered around it.

And various iron weapons placed on top of it.

A report titled “Entry and Exit Log” and leftover food scattered here and there.

Even several corpses lying there in battle gear.

Given the circumstances, this place was probably used as a border checkpoint.

And it felt like we had been attacked.

I quietly picked up the iron sword that was on the wooden table and examined it.

It was of considerable quality.

Man-gyeong now appeared to possess a forge advanced enough to produce iron weapons.

Although these were iron weapons used in the Middle Ages, they were a great advancement compared to the crude weapons used during the wars with the Tang Dynasty.

To this extent, we can say that Man-gyeong's development was quite rapid.

I'm already excited to see how Man-gyeong will change.

As I was looking around the border checkpoints, Jin Jae-hee approached me and asked me a question.

“Have you found out anything about skills? After all, they’re field boss skills?”

She seemed to ask me about my new skill right after I defeated the field boss witch.

I immediately opened the status window, checked the skill, and answered.

“Not yet. I took a look at the skill’s details, but I didn’t use it because I was trying to get out of the forest.”

[Legion of the Dead][S-Rank] [Content: An ability that a witch has worked hard to create throughout her life. It injects blood into the dead, reviving them for a certain period of time and making them attack a target of her choice. Unless the caster cancels it or runs out of mana, the zombies will live forever. ※Currently available zombies: 50]

However, when I looked closely at the corpses lying all over the place with the status window open, I saw that there were red circles drawn around the corpses.

I remembered that in order to turn a corpse into a zombie, a certain amount of blood was needed along with mental power.

At that moment, Jin Jae-hee seemed to be thinking for a moment and then spoke.

“… … If you think about it simply, doesn’t that mean you can use the same skills as a witch?”

“That must be it. Those zombies.”

“It was quite annoying. Of course, it’s not destructive, but it’s a skill that can be quite helpful. If you have high mental power like the skill name suggests, you can create an army like a witch.”

“Overwhelming.”

“Overwhelming skill.”

Jin Jae-hee nodded as if agreeing.

I can't yet judge how beneficial it would be to revive the dead and use them as puppets for my own purposes, but I think it would at least be overwhelming in a simple battle of wits.

As Jin Jae-hee said, this may not have much destructive power in individual combat.

On the other hand, it could be useful in battles between multiple people.

At that time, Jin Jae-hee asked me carefully.

“But that ‘disrupting the order’ thing.”

"uh."

“In order to achieve that, you will eventually have to completely neutralize the hostile forces, right?”

"okay."

I had absolute confidence in the method I had come up with.

Because I believed it was the right way.

This will be the ending of the story that 'no one expected'.

The next three rounds are coming.

There had to be a round for that.

“Honestly, I would like to completely agree with your opinion, but if such a situation arises, wouldn’t there be intervention on the part of the management?”

“It’s a matter of inducing intervention, so why?”

I looked at her and asked back.

“You mean, is this something that invites intervention?”

“Yes. I realized this during this expedition. About the principle of intervention by managers.”

Ultimately, the administrator cannot directly intervene in whatever the players do.

However, they had the right to set the board, so they could only intervene indirectly by setting the board for the players.

If only we could prevent everything that leads to that indirect intervention.

This league will now be able to move as I see fit.

The prerequisites are simple, but it won't be easy.

There are three things that are particularly important.

The first is resources.

The second is the region.

The third is the overwhelming fighting power of the forces and each individual.

If you can satisfy these three.

I bet they'll intervene indirectly in the league to keep me in check.

But if we block all of that indirect intervention.

'… … It's the end. Everything.'

That's the end of this league.

That's the ending I decided and created.

If you have been passively following the path set by managers up until now, things will be different now.

I finished my story while looking at Jin Jae-hee.

“And the final round you were talking about in the first place.”

The inevitable death of me and her that she had experienced.

“That too will eventually flow my way.”

I was so sure of that.

(Continued in the next episode)