Shlen Canyon (4)

‘But, but what?’

The unheard answer became a delusion, conjuring up tens of thousands of possibilities. But no matter what possibility I considered, I couldn’t resolve the fundamental question.

Why hide it?

There are secrets the world conceals.

Could I find out if I went to the end of Pandemonium? If I took down Barpheugos and then Amon, who unified the Demons? Perhaps I could learn even greater secrets than that.

“…”

I stared at the still-twitching Demon corpse and picked up my mask.

‘…I don’t understand.’

If I go back to the beginning.

I was an incomprehensible existence from the start. I don’t know why I came or how I came. A genius magician dropped into the world.

I possessed suspiciously strong power, but my inner self was empty, a shell just waiting to be filled by someone.

“Haa, hoo…”

I grabbed a nearby rock and exhaled a blood-mixed breath. I inhaled too much poison. Without a mask.

As expected, I felt an inexplicable sense of stability. I felt comfortable in the land where Demons live. It wasn’t a good sign.

“They’re really messing with my body…!”

The World Tree and the Demons, they can’t even take over one body and they’re making a fuss.

• Deolkeok.

I put on the mask that had fallen and was half-broken.

* *

“I’m back.”

“It took a little, no. What the hell happened to you?”

Prukaise, who was using the spare time to boil rotten meat. He was startled to see me return covered in blood in such a short time.

“I met a Demon.”

“What kind of Demon tears your clothes and drenches you in blood?”

“It was an adult, but… it was so weak that it fell apart with a single small attack.”

“Then why?”

I breathed heavily through the mask and raised my hand.

• Teok.

I grabbed the mask. I loosened the tightly fastened straps and devices, and slowly lowered it.

“Perhaps.”

My bare face was revealed.

“Do I look like a Demon to you?”

The torn eyepatch. A large stone embedded in my eye. Prukaise was speechless when he saw the cross seal he had placed was gone and a solid piece of holy iron was embedded in my eye.

But soon he turned his attention to something else. A little lower than that. Black veins spreading like roots around my eyes.

“Oh, my God.”

“…I’ll prepare the barrier.”

I watched them move busily with a dazed face. Pawin was preparing a divine magic circle using holy water. Prukaise was immediately amplifying divine power.

And Shuriel was approaching me.

Seeing that, I squeezed my eyes shut. I could roughly guess what he was going to say.

He and I exchange names before starting a conversation. Yujin. Shuriel. Yujin, Shuriel… It felt like something was being fulfilled, and it felt like it was continuing. But sometimes, like when I carried his seed in my womb, like when I had to meet him in that state, a sense of unease settled within me.

“Yujin.”

That voice calling me.

“Shuriel.”

Drives me crazy.

“Since when has it been like this?”

“I can still, manage.”

“Yujin.”

Please.

“……Yes. Shuriel.”

Please.

Don’t call my name.

“…It could be dangerous if it goes any further.”

“What, is?”

I knew it. I see. It would be dangerous to accompany him in this state. No matter how powerful a magician I am, he can’t carry a time bomb around.

The clattering mask. The hissing breath. The noise is so clear. I trembled my right eye and swallowed.

“What, what’s dangerous?”

“Confusion, delusions of grandeur, anxiety, anger. The harbinger of inner demons. It means your mind is in danger. It will get worse from now on.”

“Th-then, what?”

Shuriel closed his mouth. He projects the face in the mask. He was looking behind him. Not at me, but at them. Pawin and Prukaise preparing the barrier.

After a while, when Pawin and Prukaise had finished all the purification preparations, Shuriel’s mouth opened.

“…Go back.”

Go back.

“……….”

Even though I expected it.

How can it hurt so much?

• Jjeojeojeok…

Black veins spreading from the center of my left eye begin to spread. Past the straight, hardened corners of my mouth to my neck, down my neckline to my heart. The black veins writhe eerily and spread throughout my body.

“Damn it, Pawin! Hurry!”

Shuriel shouts and Pawin grabs my arms. I turned my blackened right eye and looked at Pawin.

Pawin’s face is in pain. The moment I saw her face,

I realize how much strength I’m giving. Pawin was holding my body in place so hard that the muscles in her arms were bursting.

“I’m going crazy too. Isn’t that happening because of you? Why are you lighting a bomb?”

“…It’s irreversible if it explodes in the deepest part.”

“Well, yeah. The Demon King’s reincarnation wouldn’t be scarier than that.”

Demon King. Hero. Demon. Those tiresome things.

Anger wells up.

• Kugung!

“Eek. It’s really going to explode if we delay any longer.”

Prukaise’s face, who was speaking playfully, was serious, unlike his voice. He brought a silver gleaming large nail and hammer from the toolbox. A holy relic imbued with a huge amount of divine power. It emitted a disgusting and dangerous aura.

“Why, why――why are you doing this to me――?”

“It’s for your own good. Magician miss.”

Prukaise placed the nail on my heart with a coy voice. It’s painful. I’m in so much pain, but he picked up the hammer and recited a disgusting prayer.

“You cursed source of evil, we banish all pain, pestilence, anger, despair, and deceit caused by you……”

“Stop, stop. Stop it.”

“By the power of the sacred star and light, I command you to come out of that body……”

“I said stop.”

• Kwajik!

“―Euk!”

I tear off Pawin’s arm that was holding me and grab Prukaise’s face. I distorted it along with the mask, but he continued to recite the prayer while shedding tears of blood.

• Kung!

And I slam it down.

A silver nail deep into my heart, very deep.

“Aaaagh, aaaaagh――!!”

Black blood spurts from my mouth. Prukaise continued to hammer with relaxed hand movements, even though both his eyes were burst and his jaw was sunken.

The nail was driven to the center of my heart and then sublimated with divine power. It felt like purifying my blackened body. The disgust soon turned into comfort.

“Ah, eu…… woo……”

I’m losing strength. Pawin, who I had been holding onto with my only remaining arm, also felt her strength weakening and dropped me with a thud.

By the time everything was settled, it was a mess.

Shuriel was reconstructing Pawin’s arm. Prukaise was healing the sunken jaw with divine magic. And the black liquids that poured out of my mouth.

“I’m sorry. I, again―”

“Again? I think I’d rather die if this situation happens again?”

I couldn’t say anything to Prukaise’s scolding and lowered my head. He turned his jaw this way and that, as if the regeneration magic wasn’t working well, and continued to speak.

“So Shuriel. What are you going to do by sending the magician? Is there a place to return to?”

Shuriel pondered for a few seconds at Prukaise’s words, then looked at the large canyon in the distance and said.

“The summit of Shuren Canyon.”

I knew it.

That’s the only place.

“The influence of magic is less there… so you can recover naturally.”

The summit of Shuren Canyon. The incredibly large canyon formed by overlapping mountain ranges is enough to rise through the holy iron mist barrier. It is visible to the naked eye even in the northern region, which is at a fairly high altitude. In other words, the summit was no different from the ground.

But Prukaise answered sarcastically.

“Well, yeah. It’ll be difficult to get support from the Holy See in that state.”

The Holy See will antagonize you. What Shuriel had said to me. Prukaise also knew that and sighed heavily.

Pandemonium. The most important thing in the land of Demons is the mind. With such an unstable mind, it can only have a negative effect. The mind of an Archmage is solid, but it was a lump solidified in an unstable state. It wouldn’t be easy to break through, but the danger when it is broken through is unimaginable.

“Can I, can I. Overcome it?”

“It’s the only way you and I can be together.”

“I, understand.”

At the end of Shuriel’s persuasion, I nodded.

* *

“Trees, it is.”

As I got closer to the canyon, I saw trees I had never seen before. The old trees that had taken root among the rugged rocks sprouted leaves without succumbing to the terrible magic.

It was because the yang energy coming from the ground spread to the bottom of the canyon at the summit of the canyon.

“It seems like we’re slowly reaching the entrance.”

“…We have to go to the summit, so I’ll change the route for a while.”

Pawin briefly folded the map recording the route and raised her head.

The road to the summit was arduous and took a long time. We could have gone quickly if we had run using body strengthening, but no one did and no one even mentioned it.

There were no complaints. It was because I knew this was their consideration. Thanks to that, I was out of breath and took breaks in between, and we chatted.

Even so, the road to the summit felt short. I deliberately walked slowly and made excuses to buy time. I led Shuriel somewhere and disappeared, and did whatever I wanted.

But time flowed mercilessly, and we reached a situation where we were right in front of the holy iron barrier.

“…You have to go alone from here.”

Pawin’s farewell. My heart is pounding.

“Shuriel.”

I said without turning around.

“Don’t die.”

Black tears fall from my left eye.

“If you die, I’ll kill you.”

Shuriel burst out laughing at the absurd warning and answered that he understood. After that, he said this and that, but only one word was remembered.

―I will return.

He will return.

Definitely.

* * *

Dozens of hours of fleeing from Amon’s army. The number of Demons had decreased from before. It was because the irate DeRaise had killed a few. Nevertheless, there were still many, but it was clear that she was not suitable for the head.

If I had power.

My head would be cut off and a new head would be born. She knew that fact all too well.

“Hey. Everyone stop.”

DeRaise raises her hand. She looked at the old trees growing around her and estimated that this was the entrance to the canyon. But that wasn’t the reason she stopped.

She felt something strange. No, something that Demons couldn’t possibly not know, something even familiar.

“Magic.”

I can feel magic here. A huge magic at that. Feeling magic in Pandemonium was as common as seeing a pebble on the street, but it was a different story if this was a canyon.

The canyon is where the yang energy of the ground directly hits. It means that the dirty Mana of the ground comes down to the bottom and blooms.

“…Who the hell is that? Does anyone know?”

DeRaise asked anxiously. But the other Demons only showed fearful faces and shook their heads.

Who on earth is the Demon who first nested in the canyon? I worry that he might be on Amon’s side.

Because.

“…If that bastard is Amon’s lackey, we’re all dead.”

The magic felt from the summit was beyond imagination.