Ch.1Chapter 1: The Final Moment

# Desire

In the Grand Corridor at the heart of the Demon Realm, commonly known as the Realm of Desire.

This is a beautiful space adorned with obsidian, befitting its name with its grand scale.

However, contrary to its name, this place is currently busy not with welcoming guests but with eliminating visitors who have come to subjugate its master.

In this place that heroes must pass through to reach Desire, the Demon God of Lust residing in the deepest part of the Demon Realm.

I alone swing my sword.

Outside, the clashing of cold-forged steel against steel creates a melodious sound that fills the space.

The intense heat and smell of blood are making their way here.

Yet I stand in the middle of the Grand Corridor, empty except for myself, swinging my sword while waiting for someone who will eventually arrive.

I say I’m swinging my sword, but it’s nothing special.

From top to bottom, from left to right.

I swing my sword however I please, and my footwork simply follows where the sword goes.

I repeat these movements that would make any dedicated swordsman point fingers at their crudeness.

If I wanted to, I could perform something beyond mere swinging—perhaps not perfect, but at least a sword dance with better trajectories.

“This is my limit now…”

My current physical condition was so poor that I was only a few steps away from death.

So I could only repeat the basic movements.

Talented swordsmen can express their inner state through these basic movements, imbuing them with profound sword principles.

Unfortunately, the person holding the sword now—me—doesn’t possess that level of talent.

After a long time, when my sword-holding hand was trembling from exhaustion.

“It’s not working…”

Lamenting my failure to achieve the sword trajectory I aimed for, I lowered my sword-wielding right hand and hung my head.

“The final failure.”

Literally.

Though I desperately wanted to continue.

“Hmm…”

Though there was no pain in my chest, I felt something hot welling up, and I stopped not just my hand but also my feet that had continued moving.

Boom

As heavy footsteps echoed through the Grand Corridor.

“Cough.”

Black blood, completely dead, poured from my mouth.

It was an indicator of my body’s condition—one that could die at any moment.

“Is death approaching…”

Yet my response to seeing this was merely indifferent.

“Just a little longer to wait.”

The light that will end all this will come to me.

As I knelt briefly, repeating these words to myself, I sensed a presence behind me.

Swish!

Squeezing out what little strength I had left, I swung my sword toward the pitch-black darkness where I sensed the presence.

Clang!

Instead of the sound of cutting flesh, my sword made a crisp sound of metal striking metal.

Along with a sensation that made my hand tingle numbly.

It seems that light has arrived.

“Ugh!”

Though it was just a clash of swords, the impact was enough to make me lose consciousness, but I managed to regain my senses.

Pretending to be unaffected, I created some distance to avoid a counterattack and was about to launch my next strike when.

“How tiresome.”

From the darkness before me came a voice so beautiful it seemed otherworldly.

Though everything was shrouded in darkness except for the brilliant sword wrapped in radiant light held by the voice’s owner, I could easily infer the beauty of the person before me from that elegant voice.

“But now that the moment has come to deliver righteous judgment upon you, I can endure this tiresome task a little longer.”

Yet all I could feel from that beautiful voice was a coldness reminiscent of absolute zero.

Of course, for me, this coldness she displayed was nothing but welcome.

“What do you think I’m feeling at this historic moment? Answer me, Karl Ranos, betrayer of humanity.”

That’s my name.

Karl Ranos, the black sheep and disgrace of the Ranos family, which traces its lineage to the great hero Lumen Ranos who restored light to humanity during the darkest period a thousand years ago—the Demon God’s Advent.

“Ah, do you not understand when I speak like that? Let me rephrase.”

However, compared to my current state, my past self seems almost cute in comparison.

Now, I am…

“Guardian of the Demon Realm, protector of the Demon God’s Temple. Karl.”

“…”

…That’s right.

The culmination of ugliness reached after repeatedly making wrong choices, blaming the world and those around me instead of trying to overcome my unfortunate circumstances.

“I didn’t expect an answer, but your silence is extreme.”

That’s who I am.

“Very well. Representing the Human Alliance, I, Lillian Siz, Knight of the Celestial Sword, will punish you.”

The woman before me, exuding cold anger, is Lillian Siz Proxian.

The heir of the prestigious Proxian sword family, an invincible sword saint whom none can match when she wields a blade, and the wielder of the holy sword of light Lumen, named after the first hero—the representative warrior of this era.

And.

Once my fiancée.

The one ray of light illuminating the world that I—who had been making only wrong choices and falling apart—managed to protect through the only right choice I ever made.

Of course, she doesn’t know this.

“Prepare yourself.”

From the tip of Lumen, held by her who calls me with an icy voice that rings clearly despite being buried in darkness, emanates a killing intent ready to separate my head from my body.

“I will eliminate Karl Ranos, the impurity of humanity.”

Flinch

I involuntarily trembled at that voice like an absolute zero blade.

Was I trembling because I was overwhelmed by her intensity as she called me an impurity and seemed ready to behead me?

Or was my dying body signaling through these tremors that it could no longer endure?

Step, step

Though I desperately wanted to know the reason, my brief contemplation was interrupted by confident footsteps emerging from the darkness.

As the footsteps drew closer, my eyes were filled with the flickering radiance of the holy sword and the equally brilliant light emanating from the armor enveloping her body.

And finally, as she, Lillian Siz, approached me, the dazzling radiance grew even brighter.

Her appearance in the Blanc Lily—pure white armor completely enveloped in light that, while not comparable to the holy sword, beautifully sparkled.

As she revealed herself where the faint light penetrated, the unique light emitted by her armor and holy sword blended together, creating a bright, pure white radiance in this demon realm.

It was a sight that perfectly embodied the expression “light illuminating darkness,” but before the beauty of the sword and armor’s owner, the radiance of the weapons was no more significant than a candle flame.

Even though bloodstains from the fierce battles she had fought to reach here stained her golden hair in places.

She was beautiful.

That dignified appearance.

Those cold eyes filled only with well-tempered anger directed at me.

Her breathing, undisturbed despite having fought her way here.

Was I intoxicated by that beautiful sight?

“Siz…”

Without realizing it, I uttered the nickname I had briefly called her during the very short time we had known each other.

I immediately regretted it, but the words had already left my mouth.

Her reaction upon hearing this was intense.

“Don’t call me that with your filthy mouth!”

From her voice, which had been well-contained in coldness, erupted anger reminiscent of an active volcano.

I made a mistake.

A truly big mistake.

It was my fault for not keeping my mouth shut when I knew perfectly well what reaction would follow.

“Do you know what I regret most in my life?”

Though I briefly reproached myself, even such a short moment seemed like a luxury for me.

Siz questioned me with a voice expressing hot anger.

Unlike her voice, her expression showed she was clearly trying not to lose her composure, but before long, that expression distorted into incomparable hatred toward me.

What words would come from those lips?

Would she say she regrets not killing me the moment she first saw me?

Or would she say she regrets not being able to save the innocent lives lost by my hand when I was rampaging out of control?

Whatever she might say, I would have to endure it silently.

Because I couldn’t even make excuses.

The situation had gone too far to seek forgiveness by claiming I was brainwashed and had lost my reason.

I could only wait.

Whatever she said, I would accept it calmly and then die by her hand.

But as I heard the words that finally poured from her lips with a nauseating intensity, I almost broke my expressionless facade.

“That I once felt warmth in my heart when I looked at you.”

…What?

Those were terrifying words.

Far more terrifying than words of curse or hatred.

“I may be the fool for being deceived, but that moment when I briefly felt warmth looking at you—I regret it so much it’s pathetic.”

From her lips, which had always expressed only cold anger since I became like this, poured unrefined hot passion.

In the form of hatred toward me that only grew, fueled by regret that could not be reversed by anything.

Had the nickname I unconsciously called her touched her sore spot?

‘Ah…’

Holding back a lament I couldn’t express aloud, I felt the need to cut this off before her emotions developed in a strange direction.

“Right. The one who’s deceived is the fool.”

So I spoke harsh words.

Words necessary to remind her who I was before she became caught in strange sentiments looking at me.

“You…!!”

In response to my retort, Siz’s voice, gritting her teeth, now contained only a scream filled with malice.

Simultaneously with her scream, as if responding to the passion Siz was emitting, the radiance from Lumen’s blade rose like a heat haze.

Satisfied that she had properly responded to my words, I opened my mouth again.

“If you regret it so much, then end it here.”

Click

“By ending my life.”

I raised my sword diagonally, preparing to take a stance.

Tremble

‘Ha…’

…It wasn’t a stance, just a pretense of raising my sword.

It couldn’t be helped.

My body, trembling imperceptibly, had reached its limit.

This was the result of self-harm inflicted to break away from the demon god, after being unintentionally resurrected and becoming a servant of the demon god.

‘So I should just die quietly.’

As I organized my thoughts, I watched.

“I will never forgive you!”

The gallant figure of the warrior of the age who had arrived here determined to cut off everything about me.

An incomparable radiance rose from Siz’s body.

As if bringing brilliant light to this demon realm filled with pitch-black darkness.

Now the preparations were complete.

Preparations to end a life ruined by repeatedly making wrong choices.

To create the most devastating defeat at the hands of the opponent before me, in order to decorate the finale of my life that would soon disappear due to curses.

And to become the most brilliant stepping stone for the victory she could achieve through me.

Let’s begin.

Grip

I tightened my grip on the sword, squeezed out what little strength remained, took a step forward, and then.

“Haaaaaaaa!!!”

With a battle cry into which I poured nonexistent strength, I closed the distance between us and, upon reaching a certain point, swung my sword downward.

It was a terrible movement, with disrupted breathing and footwork, barely maintaining the proper distance—a mess that could only be described as awful even to my own eyes.

Though I swung without even thinking it would connect, my sword didn’t reach her to an embarrassing degree.

Just as I was about to feel self-deprecating at this pathetic result that demonstrated the gap between us.

The end approached.

Flash

Just as the blinding radiance of the holy sword captured my gaze.

Thrust

With a speed I couldn’t even react to, the trajectory Siz drew with her holy sword reached its destination—my abdomen.

“…!!”

The moment the holy sword pierced my stomach.

My limbs trembled and I almost dropped my sword, but I managed to hold onto it.

I almost screamed from the heat of the radiance burning my flesh corrupted by impure energy, but I managed to endure this too.

A body certain to die no matter what.

Even if I was going, I didn’t want to show an unsightly appearance before her, so I endured.

“This… is the end!!”

And then came the final strike.

Slash

Along with Siz’s cold voice heard alongside the sound of the holy sword tearing through the air.

A fountain of blood rose from my chest.

I lost.

It was a perfect defeat, beyond any need for words.

It was such an elegant slash that I didn’t even feel the holy sword cutting through my chest.

And as soon as the slash ended.

-No…!

A voice tinged with subtle grief, audible only in my head among those present, reached me.

The demon god’s scream, heard only by me because all the pain I felt as its agent was directly transmitted to it.

I succeeded.

It was obvious that the demon god’s power, which had granted me many abilities, would weaken with my death.

Forgetting the pain of being stabbed by the holy sword and about to sink into satisfaction, another voice with strange melancholy reached my mind.

-After saving you from the swamp of death, you choose death again…

I have no obligation to answer.

It stimulated my desire to live, causing me to destroy everything around me.

And after I tried to end all my wrongs through death, it forcibly raised my body and made me an agent of evil.

Who asked you to save me?

After treating me like a plaything, calling me an agent with fine-sounding words, and enjoying from your throne the pain I suffered.

-Ahhh… Power… Gradually… Another thousand years… Karl…

The demon god’s voice, uttering incomprehensible words, briefly called my name and then was finally expelled from my mind.

My consciousness and vision turned toward Siz, who was staring at me with a gaze sharper and colder than the holy sword that had left a wound on my chest.

“How does it feel to end a life lived as an impurity of humanity and an impurity of my life?”

Immediately after these words, which cut more cruelly into my body and heart than the fatal wound she had inflicted on me.

Click

Siz, whom I thought would completely end my life, suddenly sheathed her holy sword.

“After sealing the demon god, I’ll transport you to the capital and inflict upon your living body all the humiliation and pain one can experience.”

Siz, having vented her anger by mutilating my body with her holy sword, calmly told me of the future awaiting me in a much more subdued voice.

Thud

Only then did my knees slowly buckle, and my ugly body collapsed to the floor.

Interestingly, the pain that had resonated throughout my body when pierced by the holy sword was now completely gone as I lay on the floor.

It seems the radiance of the holy sword had burned my body, corrupted by impurity, completely destroying even the nerve tissue.

“So just lie there and watch quietly as I reclaim the light. Don’t even think about trying to escape.”

With these final words, Siz rushed with fierce steps toward the deepest part of the Demon God’s Temple where the demon god resided.

Only her retreating figure remained in my sight.

But there was one fact that she, who had declared she would inflict all kinds of pain on me, didn’t know:

Crumble

“It’s beginning…”

That my body had reached its limit.

Despite losing everything and falling due to repeated wrong choices, the hero’s blood flowing in my body constrained me even more strongly despite my fall.

Even though I had become a body granted new life by the demon god’s power inhabiting an already dead body.

Even the demon god couldn’t completely exclude the blood dwelling in my body; the more its malice deeply corrupted my body, the more strongly my blood rejected it, and over time, my body deteriorated.

I somehow endured when I lost my reason and completely surrendered everything to the demon god, but the collapse of my body that began after I regained my reason and turned against the demon god, ready to sacrifice my body, reached its peak after self-harm and being directly hit by the holy sword.

The evidence was my body slowly but steadily turning to ash, starting from my toes.

The moment I collapsed to the floor, even the nerves that would allow me to feel pain had crumbled, so pain no longer permeated this body, but I am now in great pain.

“She told me to stay, but I can’t…”

Because of the regret of not being able to fulfill her request until the end.

“To think I’d die unable to keep even such a simple promise…”

Feeling regret, I thus completed my preparations to calmly face the death approaching me.

The ceiling of the Grand Corridor, made of obsidian, was pitch black.

Like a night sky full of dark clouds about to rain, without even starlight.