Ch.9431. It’s Up to the Other Person (2)

“The world.”

It was strange.

As if it had stopped, yet somehow clear.

As if… everything I had seen with my eyes… had been a lie.

The world was infinitely vast and expansive.

Yet unbearably cramped.

It’s a sensation difficult to put into words.

‘This is….’

As if to shake the world, massive lightning bolts surged from that thing.

Its color was red and brilliant.

It’s invisible to the eye.

Yet I can see it, feel it.

The red lightning extending from that being eventually spreads in all directions.

Like spider webs forming in the atmosphere, incredibly dense.

And it reaches all the way to where I am.

When I touched that subtle thing, my entire body stung as if electrocuted.

But simultaneously.

My empty body fills with power, suddenly becoming full of strength.

Even though I shouldn’t have been able to move my body at all.

I moved, based on that power.

And that too.

Faster than anyone else here.

Until the red lightning flowing through my body courses through my entire being and disappears into the ground through the soles of my feet.

Its aftereffects and aftershocks remain, guiding my body.

Perhaps because this process repeated several times.

The one who was about to pierce and kill me immediately was now caught in bewilderment.

That’s not all.

The small force of stepping on the ground.

The axis of the sole, the heel.

Even the process of weight transferring through bones and muscles and then reversing.

The heart beating, blood flowing through vessels.

I could feel how this process affected me down to the marrow.

No, it’s the opposite.

From the beginning, it had originated from there.

Eventually, all kinds of processes were occurring inside my head.

Electricity.

His red current flows through my body, as if replacing something previous, generating new electricity.

Though subtle, it was clearly an electrical current.

…Even the phenomena unfolding naturally within my body were the utmost mystery to me.

In such complex and diverse forms.

Is this how we’ve been moving all along?

We collide.

No, it’s completely different.

This is, in other words…

I’m being drawn in.

As if my body is responding to the opponent’s body.

It acts on its own.

My mind was complicated, but that’s because I was trying to understand it.

This isn’t about understanding, but accepting.

If I let my mind grow complacent here.

All harmony would be broken.

…I had such a premonition.

====

“…How perplexing.”

Why is it responding to his movements?

Moreover, even that response was correct and far beyond his own movements.

He knows that one’s methods well.

Not just mana manipulation, but the technique of controlling mana itself according to their will, ultimately neutralizing others by taking away their bodily autonomy and influence.

He doesn’t know the principle.

But those who have faced such types.

They all felt something in common.

As all who faced Grandeus claimed.

It feels like being drawn into something.

His successors and followers used similar techniques, but.

At this moment.

The closest to that is the one before his eyes.

‘I thought it would be enough not to touch.’

Who wouldn’t know that?

But that one’s reaction, that response is precisely.

What Grandeus showed—that not touching alone couldn’t defeat him or resist him.

That such a complacent response could never be a solution.

That very technique.

To be precise, it was a method of reacting with thorough defense rather than offense as its purpose.

The most frightening thing is when it’s converted to offense.

The prolonged battle with Grandeus taught many a simple and direct fact.

[Then why not throw everything you have before making contact?]

[If you face it with pure physical violence, it should be resolved.]

[With numerical violence. And if that’s not enough, fight with a giant body to remind that small flesh is useless.]

For instance, after manipulating mana right before contact, shoot your body like an arrow.

Thus, the shot body becomes like an arrow or a thrown stone.

Against an offensive based on inertia and kinetic force, there’s no mana to consider.

Or push with a large body that a small body can’t resist.

A simple yet concise conclusion.

But those who came up with such countermeasures.

Immediately faced the next wall.

‘No doubt about it.’

It’s not that the opponent matched his speed.

It’s the opposite.

Because of the distance between them, if one could match his speed and velocity.

Overwhelming him as he reached right in front would be no great challenge.

And what makes this possible.

…It means that even without contact, it can react as if touched—it has acquired some special skill.

“You truly are his successor, without a doubt.”

Even among the Salvation Knights.

None had reached that level yet.

If he hadn’t known Grandeus, it would have been Bargo himself who would have panicked and self-destructed in this situation.

However, Bargo knew Grandeus too well for that.

‘Therefore, that won’t be enough.’

They say there’s a third wall, but.

It’s impossible for that one to reach it now.

An area that was never possible for anyone except ‘him’ to begin with.

No.

It’s certain that what that one has achieved now is also an area no one else has reached.

He doesn’t understand the principle.

Nor the method.

Where does it originate?

What is its source?

‘The Black Star.’

Bargo too had received teachings, or something like teachings, from Grandeus.

At that time, he said that though he would teach, one wouldn’t understand.

And that was true.

“I pay my respects.”

In such a short time, with a human body, to have reached that far.

He is an enemy, the son of a nemesis.

If he had been our comrade.

He could have become a hero capable of shouldering our era.

“Haah.”

With a desolate heart, raising his snow-white left hand to clutch his chest.

Bargo steeled his resolve.

From his right hand gripping the pitch-black spear, an intense light burst forth.

The red lightning illuminates everything around, scattering intense radiance.

Eventually, it intertwines with the pitch-black spear and oxidizes into a dark red light.

The sight of brilliant light being swallowed by a small darkness was truly unnatural and artificial.

But as it was clear what that would aim for.

All who watched alternated their gaze between one point and another.

One was like a light extending as if to devour the world, yet contradictorily, a darkness trying to swallow and forcibly chew everything.

If that was a catastrophic sight of those things entangling.

The other point held a person.

Who was quiet.

As if even silence had settled.

That area was particularly quiet and still.

‘As if.’

As if even space itself had melted into his atmosphere.

The area around Kariel was particularly captured in static silence.

====

-As expected, the opponent wasn’t favorable.

Though I solved the compatibility issue, the opponent pushed more trials, more walls, as soon as I overcame one.

“……”

His method is simple.

Unlike the clumsy responses shown so far, this time he’s about to throw everything with full force.

The power Kariel himself can accept is extremely limited.

For instance, the power the body can accommodate.

If it far exceeds that total amount.

…Without even the possibility of reversing it, the body would break first.

Previously, my body was sturdy but lacked the technique and ability to accept such things.

Now it’s the opposite.

Above all.

…Whether I could handle what’s before me head-on, even with an intact body.

Honestly, I couldn’t grasp it.

‘If I could use that.’

What I used against Elhermina without knowing what I was doing.

Though I realized then that it was the direction I should pursue.

…But the Demon King said it’s not something you can just use as you please.

The reason Elbat is needed is to fulfill that condition.

Then.

How did I use it back then?

The Demon King said this at that time.

[You should see it as the opponent helping you. Where in the world is there a premise that an opponent would exert such overwhelming power without hostility?]

In other words, if faced with power matching his, I would have died long ago.

But Elhermina’s power was overwhelming yet within bounds that wouldn’t kill or hurt me.

…Giving Kariel room to struggle, was the story.

But, it was because it was Kariel himself at that time that he could resist.

[If you had learned something else, resisting that would make no sense.]

This too is a compatibility issue.

The powers named as the Great Demon King’s legacy, the powers the Great Demon King possessed in life.

And Grandeus, to break, collapse, dismantle, and shatter them head-on.

Brought forth the Black Star, they said.

Moreover, this was one of the few methods the Great Demon King himself said could break him.

He directly told and passed it on to him?

[If you can complete it, that is.]

And currently.

I knew nothing about it.

…That was the only clear reality.

The dark red lightning was now swallowed by darkness, transforming into a bizarre electric current that was dark yet emitted white light.

At that moment.

The whole world was covered in dark black light.

‘That is….’

Something clearly different from what I had deployed in the past.

But perhaps it was trying to imitate that, to resemble its form.

The black current spreading in all directions, like branches blooming from a tree.

Draws countless shapes in the void.

Like a tree extending black branches for a moment.

It begins to fill all space.

Without a corner to flee to, not even space to step back.

But my current body didn’t have even a bit of leeway to move or withdraw from the beginning.

Even my reactions were solely based on reversing the opponent’s actions.

The same goes for my responses.

I am now.

An empty corpse in every way.

The fact that I haven’t reached that state yet is miraculous.

‘My heart is beating.’

Slowly.

Incredibly slowly.

The flow of blood, even the sensation is infinitely slow and faint.

But the world is accelerating faster than ever.

‘Death….’

Is coming.

The black lightning, becoming light, extends its branches toward me.

-Let’s just pray now.

The Demon King was smiling.

And cheerfully began.

In this world.

If there’s one being that won’t allow your death.

If by chance there’s just one such being left.

And if that being is an absurd existence.

“?!”

The branches.

The black branches meet new branches shooting up from the ground.

And scatter.

Collapse.

Overlap.

“What—?!”

Starting with cracks on the ground.

In an instant, branches extend.

Not just branches, but something like a massive pillar.

Something writhing, breaking through the ground relentlessly, showing its head, its waist.

Revealed itself.

-The grudge attached to you seems to have a very clear desire.

But what if you die?

-It can’t even beg to be saved, right?

The whole body rots.

Spewing dark, murky liquid.

The sight of giant tree branches, stems, and vines entangled and rotting.

How should I describe it?

-I don’t know well. I can somewhat grasp that you somehow saved the World Tree from rumors I’ve gathered, but even that seems to be based on hearsay. So I’m just guessing.

But Bargo, didn’t he say he almost killed you there?

And he also babbled as if the World Tree and elves saved you?

-There might be things said without knowing… regardless of the truth. Based on that, thinking about various things, at least a few things can be inferred.

The debt to the World Tree.

The unlimited grace of the elves because of it.

Moreover.

-Most of the abilities you possess align more with elves than humans.

This is probably the influence of the World Tree.

And I think it’s the aftermath of when you might have died once.

-Memory disorder, mana incompatibility, all related to this.

Well, it’s all conjecture.

Anyway, we can figure out the truth later, right?

-But what is the identity of that grudge? While you were asleep, I had quite a few meetings with it.

Of course, it just threw tantrums one-sidedly.

Each time, you were in a life-or-death struggle, weren’t you?

“……”

Seizures.

Is that what he’s talking about?

What broke through the ground was literally a monster.

But it had only emerged halfway.

It resembled an earth dragon or soil dragon.

But most of what constituted it—scales and skin—were all murky and contaminated.

…Above all, with rotten branches and vines attached like tentacles.

It had a very, very ominous and obscene form.

-This confirms it. That grudge is obsessed with you.

Why?

-“Save me too.” It’s always been that way, right? Take those words at face value.

It’s been a constant request.

When that seemed difficult, in the end, it was as if it would strangle Kariel to death…

-But it can’t really kill you. So it must have done something to make you take action like this.

Just when you were about to die.

-And the identity of that thing is nothing else.

Born with the same fate as the World Tree.

But standing on different land, in a different world.

The World Tree and that are beings considered to stand above and below, front and back in a planar world.

But they can never share the same world.

-There’s something similar to the World Tree in the demon realm too. So in the demon realm, they call it the ‘Demon Tree.’

And now it.

-Has exerted its influence to invade another world.

Even at considerable sacrifice.

-They must be in chaos too. Since things have happened arbitrarily.

“…Is this possible?”

Even amid the confusion, the world I see is still slow.

Showing off.

-Nothing is impossible. Once it happens, it’s possible, right? We just didn’t know. Didn’t want to see. Never considered it.

The Demon King said.

-There’s one more thing here that won’t simply accept your death. If you die… hmm. Wouldn’t this become interesting in its own way?

To it, you seem to be the only hope.

-If the world destroys that hope. To use an analogy… if your savior? Or your child died in a foreign country… could you mercifully forgive all the people of that foreign country? That person was the only one who could save you. Or was to be your successor, but those distant people killed them as they pleased? Wow! This has become really interesting.

The Demon King burst into laughter.

-Aren’t you happy to be loved, to receive attention?

“……”

Nevertheless, raising its massive body, it let out a hideous roar never heard before.

Roughly.

Grr—rrr—rik!

-A path to life has opened there. Only after opening the gates of hell has our life been opened.

Looking at the golden girl reciting unknown words and phrases.

Kariel held his breath.

Despite the murky, dark, dim air that made his chest tight.

Even that now had to be utilized.

He naturally continued breathing.

The very same breathing he had always done.