Ch.93Chapter 93 – The 12 Heroes (5)

“I have never once considered you my son.”

That statement was the trigger. Shin Jaehyuk could no longer hold back. He released all the anger he had deeply suppressed at once. His muscles, pulsing with holy energy, broke the bone chains that had been constricting his entire body.

When the skeletons restraining Shin Jaehyuk snapped like paper, Iscariot hurriedly drew demonic energy to his fingertips. But Shin Jaehyuk’s movements were several times faster.

In the instant Iscariot’s vision lost track of Shin Jaehyuk’s shoulder, a spear filled with rage pierced through the lich’s mouth and exited through the back of his skull.

Crack. His skull fractured with a splitting sound, then the upper part of his head shattered, leaving only the lower jaw attached to the neck. The headless body naturally toppled backward. The skull bounced several times on the concrete, making sounds like an empty can.

Roughly pulling his spear from the remains, Shin Jaehyuk couldn’t hide his complicated feelings.

“…To think I wasted my time on the streets just to hear such nonsense.”

To think their relationship would end with just one surprise attack. What a truly empty end. Just like the comrades who died from Iscariot’s betrayal….

But before Shin Jaehyuk could be consumed by his thoughts, an impossible voice was heard.

“As if I would approach you without any defenses.”

With the upper part of his skull gone, the lower jaw alone clattered as it completed the sentence. Shin Jaehyuk was bewildered. Still alive? It was common knowledge that the soul resides in the head, and this was no exception for the undead. Typically, an undead with a shattered skull would have its connection between soul and body severed, returning it to an ordinary corpse….

The voice betrayed Shin Jaehyuk’s common sense and mocked him.

“You haven’t improved at all compared to four hundred years ago.”

The headless corpse suddenly stood up and grabbed Shin Jaehyuk in a tight embrace. Demonic energy surged. Before the startled Shin Jaehyuk could react, the lower jaw completed two words.

“Corpse explosion.”

“—!!!!!!”

And the bone fragments clinging to Shin Jaehyuk’s body simultaneously emitted light.

KWAAAAAAANG—!!!!!!!!!!

***

“Rise, Lion King.”

At the sound of someone calling him, Kyle opened his eyes with a start.

‘…What? Am I alive?’

Wasn’t he dead? Could this be heaven? Kyle Leonhardt was consumed by questions.

But as he gently opened his eyes and checked his surroundings, the place was not much different from where he had closed his eyes. The hellish desert, covered in sand in all directions.

What had changed was not the place, but the people. Longino, who had been lying there, was already gone, and instead, three other companions stood before him.

Or more precisely, those he had believed to be companions.

The mystic scholar Gode,

The assassin Sabah,

And

The black mage Iscariot.

‘These—’

Traitors—!!!!!

Kyle wanted to scream in rage and thrust his sword, but his body betrayed his will. Kyle’s body knelt before Iscariot like a knight swearing allegiance.

‘Huh—?’

While Kyle was still trying to understand the situation, his body moved his tongue on its own.

“Master. Your orders.”

Sabah let out a frivolous laugh, mocking his disgrace. Red-tinged saliva sprayed from his pair of sharp fangs.

“Wow! Kukukuk! The high-and-mighty Lion King submitting so obediently? Black magic is seriously overpowered.”

“Indeed… Even with the help of King Beelzebub’s elite forces, to face four opponents alone. If I had known this, I would have studied black magic instead of sorcery…”

“Golden Seven… was a gamble possible only because he knew he could be revived through the contract even if he died. And it was all thanks to you, Gode, for distorting our companions’ senses with sorcery so they couldn’t notice the ambush at all.”

Iscariot, reborn as a lich, brushed off Sabah and Gode’s admiration as if it were annoying.

“By the way, is your task finished?”

“Of course. While Gode distracted Hurik and Raika, I sliced their throats. As for Orion, I took care of him earlier when he went out scouting.”

“What about the corpses I asked for?”

“Hmm, unfortunately, not a single one…”

Iscariot kept silent at Sabah and Gode’s testimony that they couldn’t salvage a single intact body, even though he knew it was a lie. As mentioned earlier, if the assassination had been successful, there was no way the bodies would have been damaged. Those two had deliberately damaged the corpses out of fear that a necromancer with too much power might turn against them.

Sharp ones, indeed…. Muttering inwardly, Iscariot calmly replied.

“…A pity, but it can’t be helped. At least we got Kyle Leonhardt.”

Not obtaining the corpses of the other heroes was slightly disappointing, but not a big deal. Longino’s body alone was more important than all the other corpses combined.

However, when Iscariot was revived as a lich from death, Longino’s whereabouts were already unknown.

“By the way, did you see Longino? He should still be alive, though barely.”

“Longino? He was already gone when we arrived.”

“What?”

Gode, who had been worried that Iscariot might launch a surprise attack, relaxed and smiled slightly when he didn’t. Gode mistakenly assumed that Iscariot feared Longino because he had been killed by Longino’s hand once.

“Don’t worry… What can a paladin do alone? Without water, food, or a single companion. If we leave him be, he’ll be caught by Baal’s territory guards and die horribly.”

Iscariot instinctively tried to frown as he used to when alive, but his skinless face conveniently hid his anxiety. For the first time, Iscariot was grateful for this uncomfortable undead body. If they knew he wanted Longino’s corpse, they would hinder rather than help him….

I’ll have to track him down alone after sending them away. Hiding his impatience, Iscariot changed the subject.

“So what will you do now? Any additional orders from your masters?”

“Well, not particularly… My master doesn’t seem to care much about me in the first place. And the feeling is mutual. It’s rather unusual for him to directly request something like this plan. So I’ll probably settle in hell and continue my research on demons as before.”

That was Gode’s answer—a man who had started researching mysteries, then extended to demon research, and eventually became fascinated by demonic mysteries. Sabah, who had a contract with Samael, the fallen angel of death, also pondered before speaking.

“Hmm, I don’t have any specific plans either. But unlike Gode, I don’t want to stay in this gloomy hell. I might go to the human realm and gather some subordinates. Then I’ll play king and live luxuriously until the world ends.”

Sabah had already made a contract with Samael when he started his career as an assassin, and thanks to that, he was able to make a name for himself as the best assassin and enjoy the wealth and glory he desired. An assassin who moved solely for money, without beliefs or causes. That was Sabah.

Gode looked at the materialistic Sabah as if he were pathetic.

“Mere material satisfaction? In the end, gold coins are meaningless before the truth… Rather than that, why don’t you join me in researching the beauty and mystery of demons as a species? The mystery of life forms created directly by God, the source of life… Aren’t you curious about that?”

“Well… not really.”

“Hmm, then let me tell you something more interesting. Did you know that demons and humans share over 90% of their genes? More human than humans. Like a prototype of the human species…”

“Ah, no thanks, not interested! I said I’m not interested! I hate such nonsense from wizards.”

Waving his hand dismissively at Gode, who was babbling about his research findings, Sabah gestured to Iscariot.

“So this is the end of our association? It’s been disgusting working with you all, let’s never see each other again.”

“Agreed. I hope I never have to see you again either.”

After exchanging farewells, Sabah turned to leave but suddenly stopped in his tracks, as if something had occurred to him.

“Come to think of it, we didn’t ask about your plans, Iscariot. What will you do now?”

“I still have contract terms to fulfill… It will take a very long time to complete.”

“What are the terms?”

Iscariot was silent for a moment. Well… I suppose it doesn’t matter if I tell them.

“The extinction of humanity.”

Both Sabah and Gode widened their eyes.

“Oh… That’s quite a harsh condition? It’s almost like a slave contract. What did you put on the scale?”

Demonic contracts are unfair, but in a way, they are fair. The more powerful the reward desired by the contractor, the more powerful the demon’s conditions become. As fellow contractors with demons, Sabah and Gode were curious about what Iscariot desired so desperately.

“…Resurrection of the dead.”

Hooh. Gode let out an admiring sound. Indeed… Now Iscariot’s past made sense.

“Come to think of it, you were originally a priest who became a fallen one by researching taboos. The taboo of resurrecting the dead…”

A scenario roughly formed in his mind. Even with holy spells that can heal any wound, one can never bring back the dead. Life and death are the domains of the Creator, Eloah, so resurrection spells don’t exist in the first place, and the Papal Office has strictly forbidden even the research of such spells.

Nevertheless, humans who research resurrection have existed throughout history. Such humans usually fall into two categories. First, those who desire immortality for themselves. But Iscariot, who had already achieved a form of limited immortality as an undead, wouldn’t belong to this category.

Then, he must be…

“…I can roughly guess the scenario.”

Gode smiled slyly. To discover such an unexpected side to Iscariot, who seemed devoid of blood and tears. Or perhaps this made him the perfect black mage, willing to sacrifice everything for that one thing.

Sabah, who also guessed the truth, looked surprised.

“Ho! So that’s why you became a necromancer. Quite the romantic, aren’t you? Who are you trying to bring back? Wife? Parents? Friend?”

“Shut up. We’re done here, now get lost.”

“Wait, don’t be so hasty. I haven’t heard your full answer yet. What will you do now? We need to know to avoid accidentally crossing paths, don’t we?”

“…Well.”

Iscariot stroked his chin with the white bone joints of his fingers. The extinction of humanity. Where should he draw the first stroke to achieve such a grand task? He muttered while looking at the death knight who was once an emperor of the Empire.

“First, let’s try to bring down the Empire.”

And all this conversation was being heard by Kyle Leonhardt, trapped in the prison of his own body. Unable to move even a finger, helplessly.

***

There was a blinding light followed by a deafening explosion. What came after was a searing heat that melted the body, and bone fragments riding the pressure wave. Sharp bone shards shredded Shin Jaehyuk’s body, and flames scorched his airways.

In the face of such overwhelming explosive power, Shin Jaehyuk couldn’t even resist. There was no time to cast holy spells. Within just a few seconds of exposure to the heat, his body was tattered like a rag. His skin was covered in severe burns with no intact areas, his chest was flayed exposing his ribs, and half his face had been blown away, repeatedly regenerating and rupturing.

Excruciating pain. There was only pain. Shin Jaehyuk writhed.

“AAAAAAAAAHHHHH-!!!!! FUCK, FUCK, FUUUUUUUCK-!!!”

He roared until his vocal cords gave out. Air passing through his burned airways caused pain, but right now, the pain caused by his anger was greater—anger at being deceived by the same method again, anger at failing to eliminate the traitor who stood right in front of him due to his carelessness.

There was a figure looking down at Shin Jaehyuk, who was rapidly regenerating his wounds. Surprisingly, it was a lich with exactly the same appearance and wearing exactly the same robe as the skeleton that had just exploded with the corpse explosion spell. The lich emitted a mental wave.

“Hehe… My four hundred years of research were not in vain… I developed a technique to transfer between spare bodies.”

Shin Jaehyuk’s eyes widened. Still intact after using his own body for self-destruction? Iscariot gestured toward the astonished Shin Jaehyuk. A rising skeleton grabbed the regenerating Shin Jaehyuk and supported him to prevent him from falling.

“But you are as foolish now as you were then. You’ve grown soft. I didn’t raise you that way…”

“You, son of a— *cough*!”

Shin Jaehyuk struggled, but due to his unhealed internal injuries, he only coughed up a mouthful of bloody fluid.

“You asked earlier why I betrayed you? Why I made a contract with a demon.”

Why he abandoned his comrades, his homeland, everything he had built up. Chuckling self-deprecatingly, Iscariot placed his hand on Shin Jaehyuk’s wounded area.

“You’ve grown soft, Longino. To obtain what is most precious, one must be willing to discard everything else.”

“Kuh, AAAAARGH!”

The demonic energy emitted from his hand penetrated Shin Jaehyuk’s body, tearing through flesh and hindering regeneration. As cells repeatedly regenerated and ruptured, causing pain, Shin Jaehyuk screamed and desperately reached out toward Iscariot.

Nevertheless, Iscariot turned his back coldly, unconcerned. Human relationships are inherently unequal; one person doesn’t necessarily think of another as much as that person thinks of them….

“Well then, let’s head back now. I need to perform the summoning ritual.”

Iscariot decided to return to the ritual site, having recovered Kyle’s corpse and captured Longino. Given this fortuitous encounter with Longino, he was certain that now was the time for summoning, as subtly hinted by his king, Belphegor.

Once he returns and summons Belphegor to devastate this planet, his long-cherished wish will finally come true….

“According to the contract, I’ll receive that soul, and by extracting the ‘divine blood’ from Longino to complete the body, the preparations for resurrection will finally…!”

Just as he was about to return to the gate, feeling emotions he hadn’t felt in a very long time, suddenly the arms of the skeleton holding Shin Jaehyuk were severed with a crunch, and it collapsed like a puppet with cut strings.

“Kekeke, where are you rushing off to? If you must go, leave that young man behind.”

Immediately after, someone’s voice was heard, and Shin Jaehyuk lost consciousness.