Terrestrial Savior Archetype - T.S.A Chapter 16 (part 2): The March of Cats (4)

Diameter 2 meters. 4 meters. 8 meters… It kept growing.

Subsequently, everything it touched was cleanly erased.

Slides, iron bars, suspension bridges… Even the pack of cats that was too close to the gate.

Crash!

After around ten cats disappeared, a lump of essences fell in their place.

And finally, ‘it’ appeared.

“Ah…!”

Sun-woong gasped.

From inside the gate that had widened to a diameter of 15 meters, a protruding funnel emerged.

It was the snout of the “cleaner” that he had encountered earlier this morning.

After swiftly devouring the essences near the gate, it extended its elongated arms toward the earth.

Then, even more arms emerged from the darkness behind.

Sook, ssuk, ssusook.

Long, slender black arms.

About a dozen cleaners crawled out.

Current time, 1:47 PM.

The sight of the pitch-black cleaners crawling out from the gate on the playground covered with white sand was quite impressive.

The contrast of black and white.

Earth was under invasion by these dark entities. Not symbolically, but in the very real situation in front of them.

*Attack!

*Defend!

It seemed certain that some leaders were interspersed among the thousands of cats.

Jeong-woo clearly heard them give orders, and all the cats indeed rushed towards the cleaners.

Gyahhh!

Kwiaaak!

The small creatures of the mammalian carnivore Felidae family.

One of the characteristics of Felidae was that they were carnivores and could retract their claws.

However, not a single one of the creatures present here had retracted their claws, behaving as if they were true predators.

Although the average length of a cat’s body was around 60 centimeters, when these creatures gathered in groups of a hundred, they appeared to distort the ground beneath them.

Still, Jeong-woo and Sun-woong couldn’t afford to be optimistic about the situation.

No matter how many heads they had, without utilizing the essences, it would be difficult to defeat the cleaners.

As expected, as the swarm of cats attacked the gate, the bodies of the cleaners were scattered in the air.

Puh-ver-ver-buk!

A sound of striking impact.

The cleaners were sweeping away the cat groups using their arms, which reached up to 2 meters.

These creatures easily threw aside cars.

It was unimaginable for cats, which weighed around 5 kilograms at most, to stand against them.

Gyaaaah!

Kyaah!

Volatile cries.

The vanguard of the cat swarm was becoming decimated.

Due to each cleaner’s sweeping attack, around ten cats were crushed at a time, and the carcasses of the fallen cats flew like grenades.

Gyaaaah!

Jeong-woo observed the cats near him flattening their ears and bowing their bodies each time the bodies of their comrades flew.

Yet, they didn’t leave their positions.

‘This is… a war. Can humans really do something like this?’

Pah-aat!

Another pile of essences shot up into the air just in front of the gate.

Come to think of it, the cleaners hadn’t been able to pick up the essences on the ground since earlier.

It was because the cats were relentlessly attacking from all directions, leaving no opportunity to move or extend their beaks.

‘Even so, this is a futile battle… They’ll all end up dead.’

Jeong-woo stared at the growing pile of cat bodies.

Then he turned his head back toward the gate.

The constant onslaught of the cats was having at least one effect: it prevented the cleaners from advancing further from the gate.

In the darkness inside the gate, Jeong-woo felt that there were many more cleaners than what he could currently see.

In fact, he could see the hands and feet of more cleaners on the surface of the gate.

It was just that the ones who went out first were unable to clear the path, causing the movement to be blocked.

“You’ve come here without ever experiencing a proper fight, haven’t you? Whoever you are, collect those essences and fight using them!”

As Jeong-woo shouted at the cat swarm, someone clearly responded.

*Yes. Use. essence. Cluster.

“What…?”

Essence cluster.

He had heard that expression before.

It was from the pigeon who took on the role of the savior.

*Human. Go.

*Go!

*The path. Opens.

This time, the cats near him shouted their encouragement as if passing on the message.

Although Sun-woong had a low degree of essence sensitivity, he could partially understand what was happening.

“Jeong-woo, they’re asking for cooperation, right?” He omitted the part about being a savior.

Even before Jeong-woo finished speaking, the cat swarm split left and right, opening a path toward the gate.

The miracle of the Red Sea…

Jeong-woo was dumbfounded by the unbelievable scene.

Yet, he was already running through the narrow passage that the cats had provided.

• It’s an incorrect decision. It’s impossible to close this gate. Please evacuate the area immediately.

The evaluator was still objecting.

But Jeong-woo was already gripping the fountain pen in his right hand.

‘Let’s at least crush the ones that came out just now. If we run away like this, what will the cats think of us?’

He might indeed be unable to close the gate as the evaluator said.

However, his pride didn’t allow him to simply run away.

In the first battle with the cleaner, he had 25 essences.

And now, he had 128.

There were only about twelve cleaners currently in battle with the cats near the gate.

If he aimed well, he might be able to deal with them in one strike.

‘Right now, the cats are physically blocking them. I can do this.’

Papak!

He thrust his full strength into his legs.

Jeong-woo felt the evaluator’s perplexed expression but ran toward the battlefield.

---

3:42 PM,

As planned, Jeong-woo and Sun-woong arrived near Sandang Station Starbucks.

And they were a little surprised.

All the store lights were off, so they couldn’t see the interior from outside.

In fact, the sunlight made the outside too bright, turning the glass into a mirror.

An effective and simple hiding technique.

However, the opponent wasn’t unusually clever.

They were just underestimating them.

They were all somewhat similar people.

Jeong-woo reminded himself of this. He didn’t want to underestimate the opponent and fall into a trap.

On the other hand, Sun-woong, who had become essentially a porter after leaving the front line, had a different perspective.

‘They’re all smart people… Yet they’re dying like this.’

Perhaps it was the difference between the strong and the weak.

Sun-woong looked at the glass window reflecting the outside scenery and expressed his condolences.

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