Thumbs Up, Level Up - Chapter 276

There were several videos from different angles. As they watched the videos, everyone realized what was happening.

-Um…so…that’s not from a movie or something?

-Our government is doing the briefing right now… They just confirmed that the mountain is actually flying in the air…

↳Holy…

↳22222

-What the hell? Do I need to leave the country? Where’s my suitcase!

-Holy shit! DEFCON 1 has been ordered!

-Is Korea at war?

↳Yes. China has declared war against us.

The chat went crazy. Meanwhile, Ji-Cheok appeared on the screen again.

“I am streaming right now in order to give you my first and last warning.

“If any Chinese troops attempt to cross the Yalu River, they will be met by an orbital bombardment. As for Mount Kunlun, take your mountain back to where it came from, or I’ll turn it into sand.

“With that said, everyone, have a good day. Hopefully, I will be back with a smile on my face for the next livestream.”

Ji-Cheok ended the livestream. The world was even more chaotic than it had been when that six-star dungeon had appeared in Antarctica.

Just then, the front door of his house was flung open.

“What the hell is going on? I go out for five minutes and the whole world is on fire!” Mu-Cheok said as he entered. He was looking at his phone with an incredulous look on his face.

⁎ ⁎ ⁎

Ji-Cheok was in the studio at his house. As soon as he finished his livestream, he asked Cheok-Liang, “What’s the status of the Chinese Army?”

«It looks like the Chinese also saw our livestream, Master. But they are still trying to invade from the North.»

“Execute orbital bombardment of the perimeter without hurting anyone. Maybe if they see how destructive it is, they will change their minds.”

«Yes, Master.»

“And take out all their satellites. Hack into their military communications networks and destroy all of their military computers.”

«Yes, Master.»

Ever since Cheok-Liang had upgraded and gotten several skills from Ji-Cheok, he had become essentially an all-around cyber Spirit. There was no one on Earth who could beat him in electronic warfare.

In other words, he could hack into anywhere he pleased. Even if the Chinese government wanted to go to war because they were manipulated by Mount Kunlun, they could not do anything about Ji-Cheok locking the borders and Cheok-Liang messing with their computers.

«Currently, I am disabling the Chinese satellites. Please take a look.»

Cheok-Liang showed Ji-Cheok the video of a war fought in outer space. The satellite he launched fired mana bombs. They flew at the Chinese satellites and collided with them. Their satellites exploded, scattering debris all over.

«That’s space debris. Each piece of junk in space can be a vicious weapon, Master. It flies at incredible speeds and can destroy other satellites. We have to retrieve the debris later.»

“Good. You’re doing a good job, Cheok-Liang.”

«Also, I have just shut down China’s military installations. The missile bases, the airfields, the ammunition depots for the artillery, and so on. They are all shut down. It is going to take another thirty-eight hours before they can be restarted.»

‘Wow!’

«I also delivered retreat orders to the advancing Chinese troops, then I made all their communications equipment and electronics useless.»

‘He is so fast!’

“Good job.”

‘Alright. So we have shown the Chinese what we are capable of, and all that is left is that damned flying mountain.’

“Hyung! Are you inside?”

Mu-Cheok flung open the door to the studio and walked in just as Ji-Cheok used a skill to swap clothes, changing from his formal suit into a combat suit.

“You’re back.”

“Hyung, what’s all the fuss about? I just saw the news, and I’m still confused.”

“Well, it’s a long story, but to cut it short… Remember the secret societies I told you about?”

“Yes.”

Mu-Cheok stepped backward and squatted down as if he was trying to sit on an invisible chair. As he did that, a metallic rod grew out of his back and became a chair.

‘Wow… Where the hell did he learn that?’

“You… have changed a lot,” Ji-Cheok said.

“I’ve been training my ass off to be as strong as you. So, what’s going on?”

“I provoked one of the secret societies, Mount Kunlun. They pulled out all their cards and even manipulated the Chinese government to declare war on us.”

“Aren’t you kinda skipping a bit of the story?!” Mu-Cheok shouted.

‘But it takes me too long to explain everything from the start.’

“So what are you going to do?”

“Well, I’ve already stopped the Chinese troops from advancing. I also have stopped them from using long-range missiles, and now I just need to stop Mount Kunlun.”

“Can you do it by yourself?”

“I don’t know. I need to check out how strong they are, so I am not sure yet. Call Reable and Ji-Han.”

“What about me?” Mu-Cheok said with a serious face. “I can help you too, you know.”

Ji-Cheok checked his younger brother’s description to see how much stronger he had become.

Mu-Cheok’s level was a whopping 158.

‘When did he level up that much?’

“You leveled up quite a bit, I see.”

“It wasn’t easy.”

Ji-Cheok felt a little bad when he saw his brother smiling. He didn’t want Mu-Cheok to push himself so hard.

Mu-Cheok had always been like this, way before he became a Hunter.

When Ji-Cheok told him to go to college because he was going to pay for it, Mu-CHeok studied like crazy, figured out the fastest way to make money, and got into law school. To him, lawyers made the most money.

Ji-Cheok always told him not to push himself so hard, but his brother never listened.

‘You dumbass…’

“Alright. Let’s do it together.”

“That’s why you are my brother.”

“First, before we get to work, we need to talk to Ji-Han about—”

Ring, ring!

His phone rang.

«Speaking of the devil.»

‘It’s like he knows we are talking about him.’

“Is that Director Ji-Han?” Mu-Cheok asked.

“Yes. I need to take this call. Yes, this is Ji-Cheok.”

—It looks like you have caused a big problem.

“I was just thinking of provoking Mount Kunlun just a little, but they went ballistic.”

—You did a good job tying down the Chinese military. The Blue House is in a state of panic right now. DEFCON 1 has been activated, and the South Korean military is in full deployment.

“Wow. I guess our country is pretty fast too.”

—National security is important. You are probably not going to be able to attack Mount Kunlun, however, because that barrier is in the way. Unfortunately, that barrier cannot be destroyed or removed. So you will have to give up and try something else to get to them.

“The barrier can’t be destroyed?”

—That barrier is produced by a formation technique called Heaven Reversal Taiji Array, which is formed by orbs placed around Kunlun Mountain according to the Eight Trigrams. It blasts attacks from a distance into the infinite expanse of space beyond. To put it simply, you can think of it as… teleporting all attacks into some random part of space.”

‘That’s crazy. So they have that barrier surrounding them? Even while the mountain is on the move?’

—You can’t break it unless you go inside and destroy four of the eight trigram formations, but while you are doing that, you are going to collide with the full force of Mount Kunlun. In other words, you basically have to take out all of them before you can break the barrier.

“So you are saying I need to destroy the mountain with brute force?”

—Yes. I will be busy dealing with the remnants of Lake of Dawn, coordinating with the government, and bringing in outside helpers, including A/B. Ji-Cheok, I need you to destroy that mountain.

After a moment of silence, Ji-Cheoks started to talk.

“That is the obvious thing to do, but do you even know what is in there?”

—I have some files on them, so I will email them to you. Good luck.

Ji-Han hung up the phone.

“Hm… I still think he is hiding something from us…” Mu-Cheok said with a frown. He had been listening in on the conversation from the side.

“He’s doing his best. You shouldn’t mistreat people who are doing their best.”

“Yeah, okay.”

“Anyway…I think it’s going to be a bit hard with just the two of us. We need some help.”

“How are you going to do that? The place we are planning on going to is incredibly dangerous, I’m pretty sure that if we bring in some mediocre Hunters, they are just going to be a burden to us.”

Mu-Cheok was absolutely right. It was going to be hard to pick the right team for this job.

“Let’s take our original team members and some from the Tama Clan.”

The Tama Clan was now one of the leading Hunter organizations in the Philippines. They had all mutated to some extent while trapped in the dungeon, so their appearance was a bit strange, but their abilities were as strong as the top-ranked Hunters in the world. Now that they had become his retainers, their abilities had skyrocketed thanks to the skills Ji-Cheok had bestowed upon them.

The Philippines’ current national power was also a result of the Tama Clan taking over the country and cleaning up the criminal organizations.

They were definitely a good fit for the job.

“Let’s get the team together. We are going to strike in ten hours.”

“I’ll call the guys.”

“Sure, I also got people to call.”

‘If they’re going all out, I’m going all out too!’

⁎ ⁎ ⁎

The highest rank in the Chinese military was General.

Yen Tao, the top commander of the invasion force advancing toward South Korea, sat in his hastily arranged command center with a dejected look on his face.

“Have we not recovered yet?”

“Not yet, sir.”

Next to General Yen Tao, the second-in-command was reporting the situation with an equally serious face. Emergency power was up and running, and the lights were working as well, but all electronic devices, including computers, were dead.

There were a few computers that were up and running due to being completely independent and not connected to any external network, but they could not fight a war with only those.

“It appears that our enemy is also capable of radio interference, hacking into our internal communications network, and shutting down our computers.”

“And our Hunters still can’t do anything about it?”

Electronic warfare was one of the most effective and powerful tools in the modern world. It was useless against monsters, but it was incredibly practical in a war between nations.

Surprisingly, some of the Hunters had actually Awakened power that was related to electronic warfare. However, even with all of them, the Chinese army could not overcome the Korean side, and all of their data was stolen.

Because of this, General Yen Tao could not do anything. All he could do was sit in the commander’s office and bite his nails.

How could he move his troops if he could not communicate with the outside world?

Besides, with the need to break through the volatile Manaforming Forest to enter Korea, a defeat in this electronic warfare meant that they had already lost the war.

Until this was resolved, he could not move his troops at all, because the enemy already knew about what was going on there.

South Korea was a country obsessed with artillery. They had powerful self-propelled artillery before the dungeon anyway, but now they had massive self-propelled artillery with a range of 1,500 kilometers. Combined with various skills and mana, the military had produced a destructive weapon that could throw metric tons of iron at ridiculous distances.

The force of the physical impact of the shells alone was enough to cause a massive explosion, and the explosive detonated on impact produced an even greater blast.