Chapter 413

“I can do it. I can do it. I can do it…”

Camian continuously muttered words to bolster his will.

His body, exhausted and weary from repeated battles.

But Camian did not retreat a single step.

To protect his beloved, to protect all his precious ones.

It wasn’t just Camian.

Everyone was risking their lives, fighting with all their might against the calamity that would destroy the world.

*Click. Click.*

Diana was capturing that scene with her camera.

While shedding endless tears.

Because her emotions were surging.

Nevertheless, she bit her lip hard and continued to focus only on filming.

Because she knew what her job was.

Someone had to tell the story.

That there were heroes who fought against the calamity, risking their lives without fear to save the world.

“Heh heh, come at me as much as you want! Come on!”

Slain shouted with spirit.

Lucia, beside him, spat out.

“Acting tough when you’re only dealing with small fry.”

“Hmph, it’s just a situation where there’s no need for me to bother.”

Slain snorted.

Regardless of his bravado, what he said was true.

*Stab!*

-Kiaaaaaak!

Regina’s single sword strike finally took away all of the demon’s life force.

It was the first time a demon had been defeated.

*Slice!*

Not to be outdone, Empress Oscar’s sword cut another demon’s torso in half.

The demon, its life force depleted, could not regenerate and became a meaningless lump of a corpse.

“Oh my, I was a step too late. I guess I can’t beat the main wife.”

The Empress even muttered a joke with a smile.

That sight conveyed the current atmosphere.

Hope.

A definite hope for victory.

It was certainly so, as they were steadily defeating even the formidable demons.

“Good, good, good.”

Diana nodded her head repeatedly.

Because she felt that the tide was definitely flowing in their favor.

This flow must continue…

But it was right at that moment.

Diana’s eyes, which had been filming, suddenly shot open.

An expression of someone who had witnessed something they shouldn’t have.

Her hand holding the camera trembled.

A colossal being.

But it was on a different level from the giants she had seen until now.

Death, ominousness, ruin…

All sorts of negative sensations pressed down on her entire body.

To the point of suffocation.

“Gasp, gasp…”

Diana let out a labored breath.

Her instincts were constantly warning her.

To flee.

That she should absolutely not be in the same place as that thing.

Diana realized.

That this was a calamity that should not exist in the human world.

“D-Dark God…?”

The answer given by her instincts flowed from Diana’s lips.

* * *

“W-W-What is that?!”

“M-M-Monster?!”

The defenders were so shocked that they froze in a daze.

Any human, no, any living creature would have no choice but to do so if they faced the being before them.

A being that absurd.

The being’s arm moved.

An arm that was bizarre beyond comparison.

It was abnormally long and had ten arms.

And ten hands as well.

Various weapons that had fallen on the battlefield began to be drawn into those hands.

“Ugh?!”

“W-What?!”

The humans flinched.

At some point, ten weapons were grasped in the being’s hands.

That was the beginning.

*Swish, swish, swish, swish, swish!*

The weapons slashed in all directions.

A destructive black aura tore the air to shreds.

*Slice! Slice! Slice! Thwack!*

Shields, armor, and weapons were all meaningless before that onslaught.

Torn to shreds, they lost their form.

The human body was even more so.

Blood, death, blood, death, blood, death…

The battlefield was stained red, and then redder.

“Kuaaaaaaaaaak!”

“Kuh… Kuheuuu…”

Screams of pain and groans of the dying.

In that pandemonium, everyone clearly realized the identity of the being before them.

“D-Dark God!”

Someone’s shout.

No one could deny it.

Because the being before them was the Dark God.

The very Dark God who had driven the world to the brink of destruction a thousand years ago.

*Flap!*

The Dark God spread its large wings.

Wings of black calamity, incomparable to the trivial wings of a demon.

Those wings flapped like a storm.

The Dark God’s massive body directly lunged at the human camp.

“U-Uwaaaaaaaah!”

Along with the screams, great chaos erupted.

The tide of the battlefield was turning again with the appearance of the absolute calamity.

* * *

An overwhelming sense of foreboding that crushed everything.

There was no way I wouldn’t feel it.

My hero’s intuition was sending endless warnings.

A chill ran down my spine.

My expression hardened.

Normally, I would have urged everyone to hurry forward.

But I couldn’t.

Because I knew that absolute death was waiting there.

A death that even the Turtle Unit, who had returned alive from hell, could not handle.

“Everyone, do not advance any further!”

I shouted with a tense voice.

It was fortunate that I was their savior.

Because they respected my words in any situation.

Here, I had to go.

I, who had to become a hero.

I had to save this world.

I had to save everyone.

I ran.

“I’m going with you.”

Hiresia’s voice.

Soon, Elf Senior was beside me.

A body covered in blood and wounds.

It was clear that she had fought an incredibly difficult battle.

“Senior…”

“I will be with you until the very end. Because I will return alive with the one I love.”

If it weren’t for a situation like this, I would have been moved to tears countless times.

If it weren’t for her, I wouldn’t have even come this far.

A being for whom no amount of gratitude is enough.

I love this senior.

“Me too.”

This time, my cute, eccentric friend appeared.

Although she was an executive of evil, in the end, she was a friend who took my hand.

She too had helped me decisively countless times.

Indeed, without her, I wouldn’t have come this far.

I also have special feelings for this friend.

Just as she does for me.

“…Thank you all.”

A voice more emotional than ever before.

But now was not the time to be sentimental.

I calmly composed myself.

“Let’s save the world and see each other alive. Only that.”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

That answer was enough.

Because all our feelings were being conveyed without words.

And so, I ran towards the Dark God with my precious ones.

* * *

*Slice!*

“Brother!”

Leon’s scream.

It was a scream as if his heart was being torn apart.

Because his precious brother had been slashed by the Dark God’s onslaught right before his eyes.

The moment Leon’s mind and heart were about to be torn to shreds.

“Ha, haha… I-I’m okay…”

His brother Allen’s voice, as if returned from the dead, was heard.

“B-Brother!”

The spear Allen had been holding was miserably split in half.

But fortunately, his body was unharmed.

It hadn’t gone any deeper.

“Get back immediately! Hurry!”

Leon shouted without even a moment to catch his breath.

His brother was absolutely no match for that being.

If luck hadn’t been on his side, he would have died in an instant just now.

“A-Alright!”

Allen also knew that he was a burden.

Therefore, he had no intention of facing it from the front.

He had just been swept up when the Dark God charged in unexpectedly.

Allen fled in a hurry.

It wasn’t just Allen.

Everyone who realized they would only be a hindrance took refuge.

A few individuals who could handle the front desperately blocked the Dark God.

Ice wall, ice wall, ice wall, ice wall, ice wall.

Elaine, casting a five-layered ice wall magic.

Even for her, a master of two attributes, it was a magic that consumed no small amount of mental energy.

However.

-Trivial.

*Shatter! Shatter! Shatter! Shatter! Shatter!*

The ice walls shattered in an instant under the Dark God’s black onslaught.

“Ugh.”

Elaine let out a groan.

It was an absurd strength.

“Fall back!”

This time, Professor Karen cast Absolute Shield.

A high-level magic that could literally be called the pinnacle of shield magic.

An absolute barrier.

However.

*Grooooooar!*

The Dark God’s ten arms merged into one.

A form so bizarre it sent shivers down one’s spine.

In that state, the merged weapon blazed black.

And.

*Thump! Crash! Thump!*

Exactly three large collisions.

*Crack, crack, crack, crack, crack!*

Countless cracks began to form on the absolute barrier.

Professor Karen’s expression wavered.

“T-This can’t be…”

*Shatter!*

Eventually, the absolute barrier shattered into pieces.

“Professor!”

“Yes!”

The Empress and Regina desperately launched attacks at the Dark God.

Absolute powerhouses in swordsmanship, second to none.

However, the Dark God leisurely blocked their attacks with just two of its scattered arms.

The remaining eight arms.

They moved to unleash a counterattack to deliver death to the trivial beings who dared to attack it.

“Quickly!”

“I know!”

Slain and Lucia urgently joined in.

“Evil, return to hell!”

“May grace be upon everyone.”

“The price of death!”

Sigmund, Sister Marianna, and Esron also blocked the Dark God’s arms.

“Us too!”

“Yeah!”

Alfred and Leon also charged in tragically.

“Brother!”

“Uwaaaaaaaah!”

Emily and Ethan also threw themselves into the fray.

“Absolutely!”

Camian also moved with eyes burning with will.

Elaine and Professor Karen also prepared their magic again.

The battle between the Dark God and humanity.

It was a battle for the fate of the world.

* * *

“…That was the final battle.”

The burly middle-aged man stopped his story there for a moment.

Then, he gestured with his hand as if asking for a drink.

The waiter, as if understanding, readily brought a glass of beer to the middle-aged man.

*Gulp, gulp.*

The middle-aged man drank it down deliciously, as if his throat was parched.

The people watching him had expressions of great anticipation.

It was understandable, as the story had been cut off at a curious and exciting point.

Moreover, it was the most popular story in the world right now.

Perhaps at this very moment, the same story was being told in various places around the world.

“Hah, that hero is something else. Why of all places did he have to take a break there?”

“I know, right.”

The disappointed people.

Yet, the middle-aged man, who had already finished his beer, did not resume the story.

Instead, he tapped the shoulder of the assistant next to him.

The assistant turned his hat upside down and held it out to the people.

He was collecting money.

“No, until the very end?”

“That’s a bit much.”

They had already paid twice the amount of a normal storyteller.

But now he was asking for more money if they wanted to hear the story.

The people, while grumbling, were about to drop money into the hat as if they had no choice.

Because the opportunity to hear the story directly from a hero who had participated in the battle against the Dark God for the fate of the world was one that would almost never come again.

It was then.

“It’s fine to take money, but shouldn’t telling an accurate story be the priority?”

Someone’s sudden remark.

It was a young man.

With an unsightly long scar on his face.

The middle-aged man’s eyes narrowed.

“Young man, you’re saying something I can’t just let slide. If you’re going to make baseless criticisms of the story of a hero who saved the world, you’ll have to take due responsibility, won’t you?”

“Responsibility. Of course, I will. If you can answer my two questions correctly.”

“You said two questions, didn’t you?”

“That’s right.”

“Hmph, go ahead and ask as many as you want.”

The middle-aged man said confidently, perhaps thinking that two questions wouldn’t matter.

Anyway, there was no way anyone who could verify whether the story was true or not would be in a rural corner like this.

That was the reason why the middle-aged man, who was brazenly pretending to be a hero who had saved the world, could be so confident.

“But the responsibility will be paid with money, of course, right?”

“Of course.”

“Did you all hear that clearly? You are all witnesses.”

The middle-aged man sold out the people.

So that there would be no backing out.

Regardless, the scarred man began his questions.

“You spoke vaguely about the Dark God. Is that because you don’t know what it looks like?”

“Hmph, don’t know? I clearly said it had ten arms and large demon wings.”

“The eyes?”

“The eyes, of course, were two large eyes that glinted with the ominousness of the abyss of hell.”

At the middle-aged man’s confident answer, the people also thought, “I see.”

However.

“Wrong. There’s no way the Dark God had both its eyes.”

The scarred man shook his head firmly.

“What?”

“Because one of its eyes had already been stolen by someone beforehand.”

“W-What kind of ridiculous nonsense…”

“It also doesn’t have a heart, but let’s skip that.”

The scarred man took a step forward.

The middle-aged man flinched without realizing it.

It was the gesture of someone with something to hide.

“Then, the identity of the angel?”

“T-The identity?”

“If you were really there, there’s no way you wouldn’t know the identity of the angel, right?”

The scarred man’s expression turned cold.

Simultaneously, the atmosphere of the surroundings, which had sensed something strange, turned chilly.