Ch.181Chapter 181. Monsters and Humans

A frigid blizzard rages.

Over the believers who fell for the cunning demon’s tricks and the alien bloodline that devoured them…

A harsh cold wave crashes down upon the meaninglessly dismembered monstrosities, gradually subduing their madness.

“GRAAAAAAAAAHHH!”

He roared from the center of the collapsed castle ruins.

Despite having dealt with the demon responsible for everything, his distorted front paws wouldn’t stop, repeatedly striking at the empty space.

“UWAAAAAAAHHH! UWAAAAAAHHH!!”

Is the accompanying cry one of sorrow, or is it from the pain etched deep within?

No, he simply doesn’t want to acknowledge it.

In this moment, having crushed his target of vengeance without leaving a trace, the fact that nothing remains for him.

-Boom, boom!

He lost his homeland, his family, and after becoming a beast, even the fellow tribesmen who had become his life’s purpose were massacred.

Even the life as a beast he had resolved to pursue could no longer continue with this distorted body.

In such circumstances, what remains for someone who has completed their revenge?

For someone who has lost even the mission that suppressed their rising pain and madness, what remains when even the target of revenge they’ve pursued disappears?

“KUWAAAAAAAAAHHH!”

No, it’s not over yet.

If it’s not over, he must move, so he instinctively sought a reason to act.

If the scent of the demons who violated and killed his family that day still remains.

Thinking he could continue a little longer, just to crush that scent-producing dust into finer pieces.

-Whoosh.

Even in this meaningless struggle, emotions accompany it, and countless spirits following him began to raise fierce cold winds in response.

The more anguished he becomes, the colder the wave grows, and the more enraged he becomes, the more sharply the frost will carve into the flesh of any who approach.

Only such disasters continued at this site.

Even if the target of revenge disappeared, such disasters would repeat endlessly on this land until the scent detected by his nose completely vanished.

“Please, stop.”

But at that moment, a faint voice made his gestures pause, and the mouth that had been roaring closed momentarily.

The gaze of the monstrosity, unable to ignore that voice, gradually turned toward its source.

“Please, remain… human…”

Coincidentally, his distorted vision could only make out a silhouette.

The snowstorm, sympathizing with his suffering, bleached even the color of that silhouette, barely allowing him to recognize it as a moving being.

‘What…’

But he couldn’t sense anything stimulating from the scent emanating from it.

Despite his beastly body, twisted into creation, despite the vampire blood flowing through him forcing a ravenous hunger toward living beings at every moment.

For some reason, he felt none of that toward the moving being before him.

“Fri…”

In this moment, facing such a being, something akin to comfort arose in his heart.

He doesn’t know exactly why.

No matter how unstimulating the person before him might be, in this moment when reason is buried under madness, only instinct drives him.

And such instinct is primarily composed of the most intense emotions he felt before becoming a monstrosity.

“Lady Friga…”

Yes, what was uttered in this moment was a word faithful to such emotions.

Having lost his tribe, family, and homeland.

For a pitiful being who has crushed even the target of his revenge with his own hands, all that remains to pursue is longing for a great being he can only look up to.

“Lady Friga. Lady Friga…”

The distorted monster, understanding this instinctively and harboring expectations.

The being quietly observing him soon answered softly through the fierce snowstorm.

“Yes, Lord Phobia. Your god is here.”

He cannot understand what is being said.

All he can do is feel nostalgia from the stability of this moment, and interpret the current situation based on those echoes.

Recalling the belief that the god he served would always smile at him when he worshipped in the past.

“So, please don’t suffer.”

Yes, if she has appeared before him at this moment, she must surely be smiling brightly at him.

Just the clarity of that belief made him feel his rising pain disappearing.

“All your suffering, your pain… I’ll take it all for you.”

As his suffering subsided, he felt his obsession toward the one before him growing stronger.

“So, please…”

And following that are fragments of will that remember him from when he communed nobly, despite having fallen into a distorted monster.

The spirits, who had been mimicking the environment of the harshest land on the continent, hoped to continue their communion with him, which they had maintained steadily to calm his beastly madness.

“Please, at least you, remain human…”

Such connections persist unchanged even if one has fallen from beast to monstrosity, so the coldness they emit begins to target the object of his obsession.

“Lady Friga.”

Despite the cold from him freezing his idol, the monstrosity did not stop and bowed his head toward her.

Expressing gratitude toward her who made him not just a mere monster, but a being awakened to faith.

“I will… serve you.”

Praising her who awakened faith in him when he had lost everything and fallen into a distorted monstrosity.

“I will… serve you.”

Awakening the belief that such expectations would always be rewarded, he began to pray with his front paws joined toward the frozen idol before him.

Of course, this action belongs to the realm of instinct, not reason. It’s merely following nostalgia for the past, repeating past actions.

But just with that, he feels the pain subsiding.

If being free from such pain means being alive, then there is nothing wrong with this action of a living being faithful to instinct in this moment.

“You…”

So he worships.

With a monster’s body, he tries to imitate the time when he worshipped his god as a human.

“I will… pro…tect… you.”

Even if the cold, growing stronger in response to the faith that overturns even madness, completely freezes her body.

Rather, he endlessly yearns for such a frozen body to be preserved eternally, so that his worship may continue forever.

“I will… pro…tect… you.”

At the end of such longing, what appeared in his gradually lifting gaze was an ice statue built around his idol.

The girl, trapped in a thick ice wall, seemed to accept her fate, quietly trying to fall asleep there.

In the prison of cold encasing her body, with only one small hope in her heart—that she had seen ‘the monster return to being human’ one last time.

-Crack, crack.

Starting with that, the scattered flesh pieces around began to freeze, rise, and gradually take shape.

The forms of believers, crosses, other statues modeled after the idol…

And the framework of a temple based on pillars and glass walls supporting this space.

“I am…”

Yes, all of these would be the glorious and noble traces that once occupied this land.

The monstrosity, feeling memories becoming prominent from the atmosphere created by such an environment, began to speak what came to mind.

“I am… Phobia Homer.”

The first thing he recalled was his name.

“Knight who… protects Friga…”

Following that, he recalled his role.

“From now on, eternally… I will protect my idol from here…”

As he awakened the mission to be carried out by wishing for it, the spirits raised fiercer cold to prepare to raise the collapsed land again.

Using the foundation of the fallen sanctuary as a cornerstone, using the remains of the still-reviving monstrosities as fertilizer.

Repeatedly affirming that what will be built at the end will be a ‘true sanctuary’ that will not break even under the harshness of this world.

-Whoosh!!!

But that time is not now.

And expectations held in this harsh world easily crumble just by someone’s hostility rushing in.

-Whoosh, whoosh!

A shadow appeared before the monstrosity who was unaware of this, beginning to reveal its presence before him, cutting through the snowstorm.

What rose behind were weapons engraved with runes.

The fierce flames arising from them were suppressing the harsh cold wave from freezing his body.

-Pop pop pop!

And those flames spread from him, melting and breaking everything around.

The believers praying with him, the crosses erected between them, and the pillars of the temple about to be completed.

“Grrrr…!”

The despair that filled his eyes upon recognizing the being that appeared destroying his hope was soon buried under madness.

There was no way he could feel anything like reason.

Because the scent detected even in the raging snowstorm was stimulating his instincts as a beast and an immortal monster.

“Phobia Homer.”

In contrast, there was no madness in the one facing him.

Rational, calm.

The anger arising from him was quietly being tempered in this moment.

“Although you’ve strayed from the human path… I thought you were more human than anyone else I’ve seen.”

But there is no hatred in it.

What he resents is neither the Beastman named Phobia Homer nor the monstrosity freezing this land…

But the world itself that created such a fate.

“I thought I would fight you someday… but I’m truly sorry it turned out like this.”

A voice tinged with sadness.

The monstrosity, not understanding this, began to drool and writhe, raising his body.

“You… are…”

If he succumbed to instinct, it wouldn’t be strange for him to charge immediately.

Yet what was finally uttered from his mouth, enduring to the end, was not a roar but something that could definitely be called language.

The man listening partly hoped it was spoken in remembrance of him, but ultimately shook his head to dismiss such thoughts.

How futile it is to hold onto such expectations was something he had thoroughly realized while traversing this world.

“What… are you…”

Yes, hadn’t his master, who had subjugated countless aberrations until now, told him directly?

The opponent is a hybrid of Beastman and vampire. A being created from the fusion of alien knowledge and alien blood, formed from concepts that don’t exist in this world.

There was no way they could know how to return such a being to human form.

Having seen even beings more excellent and stronger than himself fall into the same state as the one before him, there was no way he could harbor hope now.

“…A human.”

So he steeled his resolve.

The resolve to abandon the fight he respected and hoped would have honor and glory.

Furthermore, the resolve to risk his life to pull down the idol, destined to be preserved frozen forever, to just a girl who loves humans.

“A human… different from you…”

The man, having buried this in his heart.

Soon pronounced judgment toward the honed eyes.

“So get away from that child right now, you monster.”

A monster protecting an idol, and a human who came to save a girl.

Two beings that cannot mesh will collide in this moment.