Transmigrated as the Cuck.... WTF!!!-Chapter 186. This Entire Area...

Sneakily—step by step, breath held and blades ready—we reached the far edge of the battlefield.

The monsters, thank the gods, were concentrated toward the center. Hundreds, maybe thousands, swarmed the frontline in a tide of claws and screeches.

Our absence went unnoticed. Not a single grotesque head turned. They didn’t care about the edges. Their attention was singular: frontal slaughter.

And we used that tunnel vision.

Slipping past the crumbling treelines and darting from cover to cover, we found ourselves at the monsters’ rear flank.

Finally, we got behind them.

And what we saw...

Was the same damn thing.

A stretch of broken terrain, a horde of grotesque monsters with blackened skin, exposed ribs, glowing purple veins, all marching in mindless, mechanical formation—like possessed corpses.

Kaelira’s pout was audible before her voice even formed.

She tapped my shoulder with her knuckle and muttered, "Hey... this is just the same shit. Same monsters, same formations. Déjà fucking vu. Wanna try attacking from behind and see if they die any differently?"

I stared out grimly at the mass of monstrosities. "No. Not yet. We still don’t know where they’re even coming from. No point in slashing blindly. We need to find the root."

She nodded, and we broke into a quiet sprint again—zigzagging past cracks in the ground and weaving between thick, gnarled roots.

We chased the trail to what seemed like the very end of the horde.

But when we reached the back?

The same damn thing again.

More monsters. Same figures. Same gait. Same grotesque bodies.

’What the actual fuck.’

My brow furrowed. "Kael," I said, stopping in my tracks. "Can you mark something here? Anything. I want to be sure... that we’re not just running in circles like fucking morons."

Kaelira raised a brow, then gave a confident nod. "Leave it to me."

She raised her hand, muttering the incantation, "[Track]."

A luminous, golden-white thread surged from her palm and latched onto one of the gargoyle-like monsters near the rear.

A soft, ethereal halo spun gently around its head—subtle, almost artistic.

I whistled low. "That’s slick. Real slick. Now—round two. Let’s go."

And so we ran again.

Same trail.

Same sprint.

Same eerie silence between us.

Until we came back to the exact same spot.

Same crumbling rock. Same mist. Same weird tree that looked like it wanted to eat me. Same gargoyle monster with a golden halo circling above its fucking head.

Kaelira gasped, stepping back. "No way. Are you kidding me?!"

She spun to look at me. "We are running in circles. This place is looping! Like some illusion—or, or a cursed barrier!"

I exhaled deeply, nodding. "Exactly. We’re stuck. Just knowing that we’re looping helps, but it doesn’t get us out. The hard part starts now."

I closed my eyes.

Trying to feel again.

Feel the world beneath my feet—the mana veins threading through the earth, the subtle pulse of energy that surrounded every living being.

But...

Nothing.

Not the numbing crackle I was used to.

Not the invigorating thrum of the storm that always made my blood boil.

No.

What I felt here was... wrong.

It was dull. Erratic. I gritted my teeth and dug deeper.

My eyes snapped open as they surged with amethyst light. I glared at the monsters ahead, trying to see what was wrong. To read mana the way a conductor reads a symphony. But what I found made my skin crawl.

There was nothing.

No mana.

No flow.

The monsters... were voids.

Absences.

Empty husks, hollowed out to the soul.

My breath caught in my throat.

Kaelira seemed to notice something was off. "Hey," she said, her tone uncertain. "What did you see? You’re pale as fuck. Like you stared at your own face."

I didn’t answer.

I kept trying to probe the surroundings. There had to be something. A thread. A trace. Anything.

Then—something clicked.

The distorted mana I’d felt earlier, the dull erratic presence... it was everywhere.

Like the very air was poisoned.

The trees. The soil. The sky. Even the monsters.

And that horrifying thought hit me all at once.

’This entire area is a monster.’

My voice escaped before I could stop it.

"Fuck..."

Kaelira jumped, grabbing my shoulder. "Hey, hey! Don’t go cryptic on me now! What’s going on? What did you see, you bastard—tell me!"

I let out a bitter laugh. A self-deprecating, exhausted chuckle as the realization settled like a curse on my spine.

"We’re inside it."

Kaelira blinked. "Huh?"

I pointed to the sky. To the trees. The air. "This place—it’s not a forest. It’s a body. A creature. A domain. Whatever it is, we’re inside it. The monsters? They’re not the enemy. They’re the cells. The antibodies."

Kaelira’s eyes widened. She looked around, slowly, like she was seeing it all for the first time.

Then she let out a nervous chuckle. "You mean... like some kind of beast has swallowed us whole?"

"Exactly," I muttered.

She exhaled shakily. "And here I thought the fog was bad..."

I nodded. "We’re not fighting an army. We’re walking through the guts of a goddamn abomination."

Kaelira groaned, slumping slightly. "We are so incredibly fucked."

I smiled grimly, my heart pounding against my ribs.

"Yes," I muttered. "Yes, we are."

Kaelira shook me back and forth, panic rising in her voice. "What are we going to do? Personally, I’d like to surrender... how about that?"

I flicked her forehead, hard enough to make her wince. "Utter garbage, just like you. If you wanna surrender, go ahead. But I’m gonna try something — even if it means using that foggy mode of mine."

Kaelira practically jumped in excitement, her eyes shining like a kid who just got candy. "Oh hell yeah! Your foggy mode might actually do something! Come on, use your power, Amethyst Boy— I mean, Foggy Boy."

I shot her a middle finger, shoving it right in her face to shut her up. She paused for a second, eyebrows twitching, probably preparing some smartass retort. But I ignored her and closed my eyes, trying to activate my ’sage mode’.

"Wait... let me think. I might find a way to hurt this bastard," I muttered, more to myself than her.

She was clearly dying to insult me again but held herself back. Maybe she realized she needed me to get the hell out of this mess too.

But even with all that ’sage thinking’, I found jack shit.

I didn’t have the strength to erase mana. If I did, it would’ve been easy. Just destroy the damn mana—the lifeline of that thing—and boom, dead. Simple.

But I couldn’t do it.

Maybe my ’Nothing’ form could’ve done it... but I wasn’t risking that. Not yet. The situation wasn’t that grave.

"Hey, Kael!" I called.

She gave me a nonchalant hum in response.

I cleared my throat and said, "Let’s go back. Or at least try to. Maybe we can go back but not forward. One thing’s for sure, we can’t damage this bastard alone."

She turned her head sharply, gave me the most pissed-off glare I’d seen all day, then stormed off without saying a single word. Completely ignoring me. Just sprinting back like I didn’t exist.

I sighed and ran after her, catching up in a few seconds.

It didn’t take long for us to return. We reached the camp again — or what remained of it. And now that I was back, something hit me.

’So... only going further is blocked. Maybe this isn’t a monster. Maybe it’s an illusion... or a barrier. Something that stops people from reaching its core.’

I didn’t waste any time. I walked straight up to Art, who was leaning against a shattered boulder near the backline, catching his breath.

"Hey, Art. I’ve got some leads."

He looked up at me, his expression tired but focused. "Yeah? What’s that?"

I quickly explained everything—the circular loop, the distorted mana, the barrier-like feeling, the possibility that the entire damn area was either a living creature or being controlled by one.

He listened closely, then nodded. His usual cocky attitude was gone for once. He sounded serious. "Alright. I can erase mana from the surroundings. If what you’re saying is true, we might be able to break that illusion or barrier. Or even damage whatever the hell is behind this."

I gave him a quick nod. "So? You ready now or wanna rest up?"

He stood up, brushing dust and dried blood off his coat. "No time. Most of the students are already dead tired. If this horde doesn’t end soon, we’re all gonna drop."

We exchanged a glance, and without another word, moved toward the back of the monster line again.

But this time... something had changed.

The atmosphere had shifted.

Unlike before, the moment we approached, the monsters actually turned to face us.

Their heads twisted in unnatural, jerky motions. Their mismatched, erratic eyes locked onto us. Their gaping mouths dripped with saliva, opening wide in grotesque hunger.

Like they had finally noticed we weren’t just flies buzzing around—we were threats.