Chapter 138: The 9th Floor – Starry Expanse

9th Floor, Entrance to the Evil Sovereign.
A place no one from any academy, including Zeryon Academy, has ever reached.
Even the generation of Azure Sky, who managed to reach the 9th floor, ultimately failed to get this far.
And yet, here I was—together with Isabel—standing in that very place.
Even I was bewildered by the situation.
“What is this place… This pressure.”
Isabel instinctively sensed that this door must not be opened.
And those words—I’d seen them multiple times in the Blazing Butterfly route.
‘Upon arriving at the door of the Evil Sovereign on the 9th floor, the character always utters this exact line.’
And not a single one of them is ever able to open the door.
They are crushed by the oppressive presence of the Evil Sovereign.
【 This is a realm unattainable for a mere challenger. 】
A window that appears when one reaches the entrance of the Evil Sovereign on the 9th floor.
It only appears when you get here before completing the scenario.
After that message, the character always retreats immediately.
Entering the Evil Sovereign’s domain is only possible after finishing the scenario.
But I know what lies beyond this point.
‘Once you reach this place after finishing the scenario, there’s nothing there.’
All the player finds is an empty room.
A large, unremarkable room filled with nothing but silence.
And then the ending credits begin to roll.
This was why I questioned the Evil Sovereign’s death.
At the scenario’s end, you face off against the Evil Sovereign.
But did we really defeat him in that final confrontation?
If so, why is the Demonic Palace left with nothing but an empty room?
Players had countless questions about this, but the developers never gave an answer.
And now…
Here I stand, before that very door.
My gaze lands on the gate that leads to the Evil Sovereign.
Isabel had already backed away, her face deathly pale.
From the look of her, she seemed ready to flee at any second.
But me?
My feet were firmly planted on the ground.
Like Isabel, I too could feel the overwhelming pressure.
Every instinct screamed that I must never step inside.
And yet—I didn’t step back.
The reason was simple.
‘The Veil Bandages.’
The lost love tied to the Veil Bandages.
That love held many meanings—and among them was the love I had for myself.
That part of me had been damaged.
The part that cherishes one’s own life… was broken.
‘Right now…’
My hand stretched out toward the door of the Evil Sovereign.
I can open it.
I definitely can open it.
“Y-you!”
I heard Isabel shouting from behind me.
My hand stopped right before the door.
If I open it now, I will come face to face with the Evil Sovereign.
But what then?
Can I defeat him as I am now?
My fist clenched tightly.
As I am now—I cannot defeat the Evil Sovereign.

To defeat the Evil Sovereign, I would need to carefully select and bring the very best of my full power.
That much, I was certain of.
I pulled my arm back.
Even if I could open it—what would it matter?
I wouldn’t be able to defeat the Evil Sovereign lurking inside anyway.
‘I only got here by coincidence.’
This wasn’t my own strength.
Reaching a floor by relying on mere luck held no value.
But to the Evil Sovereign beyond this door, I made one thing absolutely clear.
“I’ll definitely come back next time.”
And I’ll slam my fist right into that damned face of his.
Leaving those words behind, I began to turn away.
That’s when my eyes caught something at the base of the Evil Sovereign’s door.
My eyes widened slightly.
‘…What is this?’
There were drag marks on the ground, as if something heavy had been pulled across it.
The problem was—the marks were connected to the Evil Sovereign’s door.
Back when I played the Blazing Butterfly route, I would’ve overlooked something like this.
Pixel graphics had their limits—details like this weren’t visible.
But now, this was reality.
And I could see everything clearly.
My eyes returned to the door of the Evil Sovereign.
‘No way.’
Could one of the Apostles have reached the Evil Sovereign?
The thought flashed through my mind—but I quickly shook my head.
‘That’s too much of a stretch.’
If that were the case, an Apostle would’ve already emerged and the surface would’ve been in ruins.
Still, it bothered me.
‘Beganon… maybe I should talk to her.’
She was part of the Azure Sky generation—she might know something.
I decided to save the matter for later and finished turning my body.
“Isabel.”
“Ah, yeah?”
“From this point on, it’s a time attack.”
Isabel’s eyes went wide.
She hadn’t fully grasped what I meant.
So I decided to explain.
“This is the 9th floor of the Demonic Palace.”
“N-ninth floor?!”
Isabel’s face froze at the revelation.
Even the usually cheerful Isabel understood how dangerous the 9th floor was.
At the very least, we would’ve needed another year before we were ready to move through this place.
“This time, the Demonic Palace opened a little earlier than usual.”
That likely explained why we got caught up in the palace transfer.
Since it opened so abruptly, the entire space had become unstable.
As for me—maybe I got here by chance.
But Isabel? That couldn’t have been coincidence.
‘Isabel has the Wings of the Goddess.’
The power the Evil Sovereign hates most.
The divine grace that destroys evil.
The Demonic Palace must’ve subtly sensed the power of the goddess’s wings and twisted space around her.
“In other words, the Apostles were probably born earlier than expected too.”
The Apostles, born in haste, would have rushed their beginnings.
Which meant the upper floors were likely already swarming with Apostles.

Of course, it won’t be easy for academy students to break through the Apostles.
“We have to get out of here before even one more of those Apostles reaches this place.”
But there’s another lurking problem.
That is—an Apostle who survived, hid their presence, and remained in the Demonic Palace for a long time without being dealt with.
A named Apostle.
The longer an Apostle survives, the stronger it becomes.
A named Apostle—one with a title—is obviously well-known for how dangerous it is.
But I know every single one of those bastards, down to the last detail.
‘At this point in time, named Apostles aren’t that big of an obstacle.’
During the Autumn Demonic Palace Event, named Apostles are scattered throughout the palace for various reasons.
The Demonic Palace is absurdly vast.
As long as you know the path, you can escape without encountering a single one.
And who am I?
A veteran of the Blazing Butterfly route, 29th playthrough.
If you count the bad endings I deliberately sought out, that number easily doubles.
‘I need to climb up the floors, opposite of how the others are coming down.’
That’s why we’re on a time limit.
Before the terrain shifts from the Apostles flooding in, we head up the path where only named Apostles are.
“From now on, just follow behind me.”
No acting on your own.
I won’t listen to objections.
Our one and only goal is to survive and get out safely.
“…Got it.”
Maybe it was the sincerity in my voice—Isabel nodded without a word.

Demonic Palace Escape Team.
Time to move out.

* * *

2nd Year Autumn Demonic Palace Event.
9th Floor of the Demonic Palace.
The Starry Expanse.
The 9th floor, where countless stars pour down from the night sky.
The environment on the 9th floor never changes.
That means the named Apostle who resides here also doesn’t change.

Named Apostle: Star Keeper
An Apostle who controls the countless stars embroidered across the Starry Expanse.
This is the named Apostle recorded by the Azure Sky generation—the only group to ever reach the 9th floor.
To face this being, there are very specific conditions that must be met.
But right now, we don’t meet a single one of them.
Which means there’s only one thing we can do.
Crawl—inch by inch—across the field of starlight, glowing just as brightly as the stars in the sky.

Isabel and I are currently connected by the Veil Bandages.
Thanks to that, and our camouflage—like a ghillie suit—we’re nearly indistinguishable from the Starlight Field.
It’s been a full week of crawling.
My body was on the verge of cramping up, but there was no other choice.
Even sticking your head just slightly outside the Starlight Field would cause stars to rain down from the sky.
If we want to live, this is the only way.

“…I never imagined I’d be moving like this on the 9th floor.”
Isabel’s face showed visible exhaustion.
After crawling for a week, of course she was worn out.
“Better than standing up and dying.”
Isabel hadn’t expected we’d be advancing by crawling, and let out a weary groan—so I calmly replied.
“The Star Keeper… with our current level, we don’t stand a chance.”

“Yeah, I definitely get that now.”
Isabel also had the ability to gauge the strength of an opponent.
The Star Keeper, who moved freely among the stars, was simply too much for us to handle.
“Don’t worry. The Star Keeper never touches anything below the Starlight Field.”
But that only applied to the Star Keeper.

Thud—
The ground we were crawling on suddenly trembled.
I pressed up close to Isabel and pushed down on her back.
It was to stop her from instinctively reacting and getting up.

“…You know, it kind of hurts when you press down like that.”
“Sorry. Just bear with it a little longer.”
Isabel complained about the discomfort, but there was no helping it.

THUD!
That’s because, just ahead of us, a massive snake-like body made of stardust was slithering by.
It slammed its belly against the ground in steady intervals as it moved forward.
But its head was nowhere in sight.

Apostle
Cycle of Rebirth
A massive Apostle whose colossal body bridges the heavens and the earth—the largest being in the Demonic Palace.
It moves like a single, unified form.
So far, no one has ever seen its head.
The one thing we know for sure is that it travels endlessly from the beginning to the end of the 9th floor.

At any rate, the part of the Cycle of Rebirth that passed by just now is one that lost its senses long ago.
It likely didn’t even notice our presence.
But if we were to obstruct its path in any way, we’d be met with disaster.

“…I really understand now just how dangerous the 9th floor is.”
Maybe it was the sheer difference in scale from the lower floors—Isabel swallowed nervously.

“Still, I think this is better. On the 8th floor, there’ll be a lot more situations where we won’t even be able to talk.”
But I couldn’t exactly say the floor above was better than the 9th.
The beings on the 9th floor are so out of scale that they rarely pay attention to anything besides themselves.
As long as you follow the rules, you can pass by without ever having to fight.

That’s why even the Azure Sky generation had wondered—
Why hadn’t these beings reached the Evil One, awakened their full power, and descended to the surface?
It was a question even the Azure Sky generation couldn’t answer.

But the 8th floor is different.
The named Apostles that dwell there are starved for human prey.
Just as humans descend the floors of the Demonic Palace, Apostles must also descend—
But they can only do so by accumulating power on each floor.
‘Because only by fully absorbing the Evil One’s power can they be born as true Apostles.’

For them, the top priority is how much of that power they can absorb.
That’s why they’ll go down floors, but never up.
Until they’re fully formed, this rule is strictly imposed on them.

On the 9th floor, the Star Keeper and the Cycle of Rebirth are draining away the Evil One’s power.
That’s why many named Apostles on the 8th floor—despite being capable—never try to reach the 9th.
They stay and gather strength instead.
‘And among them are Apostles so dangerous that even the Azure Sky generation had to avoid them.’
That’s the reason the 8th floor is even more troublesome than the 9th.

‘Just a little farther now.’
Avoiding the Star Keeper and Cycle of Rebirth, we finally arrived at the stairs leading up to the 8th floor.
At last, Isabel and I could stop crawling and stand up.

After spending a week on the 9th floor in constant tension, Isabel already looked exhausted.
But that’s okay.
Our goal isn’t to push forward—it’s to return.
We just need to retrace our steps in reverse.

“Isabel, we’ll rest on the stairs. Take a breather.”
“Got it.”
Isabel finally relaxed and caught her breath.
It had been so long since we last stood up—our bodies were aching all over from muscle fatigue.

My eyes turned to the stairs leading to the 8th floor.
Would we be able to escape without a fight?
I couldn’t say for sure.
But it was something we had to accomplish.