Chapter 918 – #200_Cyberpunk And The Witch (2)
#912
1.
Some time ago, Siwoo and Deneb were trapped in a pocket dimension together.
A medieval port city divided into day and night.
It was the aquarium that housed R’lyeh’s Kraken.
Therefore, even before entering, they thought that the pocket dimension containing the sluice gate would greet them with a medieval or even earlier appearance.
Wouldn’t that be about right in terms of timing?
Even with a bit more imagination, they thought, ‘Still, since the Witch of Creation made it herself, wouldn’t it look similar to Ars Magna Town?’
Who could have predicted that a cyberpunk-like battleground would be waiting for them?
Nevertheless, Siwoo’s group ran towards ‘Daejeon, the city of entertainment and pleasure,’ which shone like a lighthouse in the middle of a dark wilderness.
Although they entered as soon as the sluice gate opened, there were two public enemies as competitors.
They needed to head to the center of the city faster than anyone else.
“What… how did this happen?”
“That’s what I’m saying.”
“Husband, was Daejeon originally… like this, um… a developed city?”
“No, it’s not even close to this.”
Everyone spoke in a half-dazed tone.
Even Rinne, who usually showed little emotional fluctuation, was asking slightly spaced-out questions.
“It’s not an illusion.”
“It seems so.”
Separately, Eloa, Siwoo, and Rinne are all Great Witches.
They are certain that this is clearly reality.
Unlike the Happy Pig incident where they mistook a dream for reality from the entry stage, they entered with full awareness, so there was no room for confusion.
Then, it’s neither a dream nor an illusion.
Siwoo looked ahead again.
Skyscrapers with steel pillars and glass curtain walls were sticking out as if they would even invade the divine.
Several futuristic Towers of Babel, not hidden by tall concrete walls, soared into the sky.
They hadn’t even looked inside yet…
But there was already something strange here.
“Wasn’t the Witch of Creation at least from the BC era?”
“There are no exact records, but… based on the timeline, she would have been from around the 2nd or 3rd century at the latest.”
“Are there any other spaces created by the Witch of Creation that are like this?”
“I haven’t heard of any such reports. Most of them were either untouched primeval forests or landscapes of very old cities.”
On the other hand, the Witch of Creation, who is said to be the origin of all witches, is a figure from ancient history.
There were no proper records, and witches only guessed her great achievements from the fragments of accomplishments found in her relics.
Here, a headache-inducing paradox arises.
The Witch of Creation is a figure from the past.
The city of pleasure, Daejeon, is a city of the future.
In other words, the Witch of Creation, a figure from the past, created a pocket dimension containing a city of the future.
Even if we put aside the question of ‘How the heck?’ for a moment, we couldn’t even find an answer to the question of ‘Why the heck?’
Besides, is this really the future? Or is it just a closed world created by the Witch of Creation’s imagination? They had all sorts of thoughts as they drove along the asphalt road for about a minute.
Soon, they reached the front of the concrete fortress that looked like a small citadel.
As they got closer, they could see what they couldn’t properly see from afar.
This wall, hundreds of meters high, must have been built to fulfill its duty as a wall.
And it must have actually done so.
“It’s a trace of magic.”
“Indeed.”
The uneven, grayish-white wall clearly showed signs of reinforcement where it had collapsed.
The scars left behind because what was broken and repaired could not be the same as before.
The traces were clearly signs of destruction caused by attack magic.
Their heads became complicated again, but there was nothing they could do here anyway.
“We should go in for now.”
“Yes.”
An arched gate with the large words ‘South Gate’ inscribed on it.
They stepped into a tunnel that resembled the ramparts of a fortress.
2.
As with fortresses built to prevent enemy invasion, there was not just one wall.
Another wall was visible inside.
Judging from the circumstances, it seemed that they were dividing the area with layers of walls, like an inner and outer castle.
It was inevitably smaller than the outer wall, but the material seemed to be more solid chrome.
Anti-aircraft turrets (probably) that pointed towards the sky like densely packed thorns also caught their eye.
The skyscrapers that were visible from outside the outer wall were all located on the inner wall side.
“Are the main facilities gathered inside?”
“It seems so. It doesn’t seem like there are any people, though.”
“Not even a rat.”
“Pocket spaces are usually like this.”
Siwoo knew about this kind of city structure.
“It’s kind of like Gehenna.”
Ars Magna Town in the very center.
Renomond Town on its outskirts.
And Tarot Town on its outskirts.
Although there were no walls, Gehenna also had a similar structure.
The thick dark clouds that had been present from the outside finally began to drop a drizzle of autumn rain.
The already desolate streets took on an even more bleak atmosphere.
It was a desolation that came from the lack of people, regardless of the level of development.
There were no people living here.
Like R’lyeh’s aquarium, all humans had vanished cleanly as if they had evaporated.
The sight of the cyberpunk Daejeon, which had become a ghost town, was a little eerie, but there was nothing particularly unusual about it.
It wasn’t a city for witches to live in like Gehenna or Hexennacht, but just a place to place a ‘sluice gate,’ so there was no need for people to live there.
The outer area between the outer and inner walls was more ordinary than expected.
If you were to ask if dozens of stories of prefabricated apartments, built by stacking uniform cubes, were ordinary, you would hesitate to answer, but at least there was no sign of an unimaginable level of advanced civilization.
Cars parked in the middle of the road without owners had strange hovering devices instead of wheels.
The logo of a convenience store franchise they knew had changed.
Neon signs flashed everywhere, so much that it hurt their eyes.
Elaborate holograms replaced the role of signboards.
There were such characteristics, but…
That was all.
It meant that it was somewhat boring to call it cyberpunk.
The prosperity and pleasure were all clearly lies.
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It seemed like it would be a silent city, but it wasn’t.
Cylindrical drones that detected pedestrians were wandering around, reciting advertising catchphrases.
“Is it because it’s a suburb? It feels kind of desolate….”
“It seems to be a residential area.”
“Usually, in cyberpunk cities, the outskirts are no different from slums, but it doesn’t feel like that here.”
They quickened their pace a little more.
After leaving the dense residential area, they could see what could be called the downtown area.
A long row of shopping streets and a large building presumed to be a shopping mall.
At first, everything was new and interesting, but the streets, with nothing special but the trite neon sign lighting, quickly became familiar.
The three, who had increased their speed, soon reached the entrance to the inner wall, which was covered in chrome alloy.
“The entrance to the inner wall seems to be closed.”
“We should go up. I wonder if those turrets work?”
Unlike the south gate, which was wide open, the tightly closed iron gate of the inner wall showed no sign of movement.
But the three were witches.
An obstacle of only three or four hundred meters was no different from a slightly steep staircase.
The only worry, the turrets, also showed no movement, and the three quickly climbed over the wall.
“…Crazy.”
“This, this is….”
“……”
The scenery seen from a high place, as if they were on an observation deck, showed a completely different world from the outer city.
The amount of light emitted from the city was different from the start.
It was a city where the boundary between night and day had disappeared thanks to the blessing of neon signs.
The buildings soared to unknown heights, showing what skyscrapers were.
Sky bars and restaurants extended like branches around the high-rise buildings.
Countless billboards, a complex network of rails and trains moving quickly on them, amidst huge holograms projected onto the streets as screens.
A large Ferris wheel made of glass and steel that rotated.
Casinos and hotels that housed such casinos were densely packed, dividing the area with colorful lights.
It was a feast and festival of light that could not be hidden even by heavy rain.
Siwoo had been to Las Vegas during his studies abroad, and visually and technologically, it was several times more splendid.
Finally, a huge building that crowned the very center of the city.
Other buildings were also tall, but the building in the very center had a different altitude compared to the surrounding buildings.
A building that stood proudly and looked down on the city.
In fact, buildings lose their effectiveness if they go above a certain height.
In terms of land utilization and the resulting cost reduction, they quickly become inefficient once they exceed a certain number of floors.
Therefore, the building in the center was a product of luxury and ostentation.
“…Master.”
But the reason Siwoo closed his mouth was not just because he was overwhelmed by the city’s scenery.
The most striking difference that could not be seen in the outer area was entering his golden left eye, which had taken off its eyepatch.
It was the flow of magical power.
The flow of magical power was emanating from various parts of the cyberpunk Daejeon, which seemed to have no connection with magic.
In other words.
The magnificent lights of prosperity, which could not be achieved even with modern science, were the product of the fusion of magic and science.
