Chapter 447

The main base of the Eastern Witch Coven.

Among it, the underground sanctuary stuck at the very bottom.

Normally, it would be a space densely packed with unidentified magic tools or alchemy ingredients, but right now, a pitch-black magic power vortex was wriggling and swaying bizarrely.

"Are you really going? To the bottom of the Sea of Destruction?"

The Grand Witch Ananke, wearing a scorched monocle, clicked her tongue. The Abyssal Sea is split into a total of five zones from the shallowest: the Outer Sea, the Inner Sea, the Deep Sea, the Extreme Sea, and the Sea of Destruction.

In the past, it was general common sense for witches to aim and hunt for the Abyssal Lord when it crawled up to the Outer Sea or Inner Sea to breathe once every 100 years.

But the place Kim Minwoo was about to dive straight into right now was near the territory of the Outer God where not a single ray of light reached.

The very bottom of the Abyssal Sea, the Sea of Destruction.

"I have to go. There is something I must absolutely get from there."

"Even if you have become a Higher God, the Sea of Destruction is a dangerous space. Because it is a perfect void that completely erases the ego itself."

Ananke's sincere warning fell, but Kim Minwoo's reaction was indifferent.

"I have my own thing to trust in."

―Kkuu!

Thinking it was calling for it, Hayangi on Kim Minwoo's shoulder flapped its wings energetically.

Seeing that, Ananke let out a hollow laugh as if dumbfounded and finally raised her dragon bone staff.

"Alright. I will open the entrance for you."

Kugugugugung―!

As soon as Ananke's chant fell, the empty air of the basement split wide open jjeok.

A pitch-black dimensional door without a single ray of light roughly opened its maw.

Unfortunately, Mary could not enter.

It was because the size of the entrance passing through the dimension was far too small compared to Mary's size.

Instead, she took on the role of assisting with computational power through a connection.

Actually, it wasn't like there was anything to do even if they returned to Earth right away.

Leaving the mothership at the Witch Coven, Kim Minwoo threw his body into that pitch-black darkness, accompanied by the four Legion Commanders Cedric, Merhen, Vulcan, and Olivia, without a single bit of hesitation.

Paaaaat―!

[Entering the special dimension Abyssal Sea — Outer Sea!]

As soon as he crossed the portal, an unpleasant moisture digging into his bones along with an ink-like fog that completely obscured his vision washed over Kim Minwoo's entire body.

"It's been a while. This musty smell."

Resting Hell Rhapsody on his shoulder with a tuk, Kim Minwoo smiled with a pishik as he stepped on the ash-gray floor of the abyss.

He remembered the time when he first stepped foot in this Outer Sea to hunt the Abyssal Lord after receiving a commission from the Eastern Witch Coven in the past.

At that time, his level was low, and he had to wrap himself in all sorts of buffs and set his nerves on edge with every step he took due to the murderous intent of millions of abyssal rat swarms and beasts pouring in from all directions.

A distant memory of breaking through the path while sweating profusely in a fog where he couldn't see an inch ahead.

But now, the board was completely different.

He had moved past the newbie days of struggling while bound by the system's shackles a long, long time ago.

An absolute who had risen to the ranks of a Higher God looking down on the universe after robbing Megacorp's capital and absorbing the faith of the entire universe, and the stagnant water among stagnant waters who pierced through all sorts of demon realms as if entering his own house.

Unchanged from the past, the ferocious abyssal monsters that had been crouching on the floor of the Outer Sea sensed Kim Minwoo's life force and began to flock like a pack of dogs from all directions.

However, Kim Minwoo didn't even think about drawing his sword.

"Clear the path."

Kim Minwoo's dry single chin gesture.

That was enough.

Cedric and Vulcan shot out explosively.

From the tip of Cedric's spear, a blood-red spear aura fusing the overwhelming dragon strike of the Hwangrin Duke Drakan and the berserker momentum of the Iron-Blooded King Carnos stretched out like a thunderbolt.

With a single thrust, the rat swarms and monsters covering the Outer Sea were pierced like skewers by the thousands and crushed into bloody water.

At the same time, Vulcan opened his jawbone jjeok and spewed the hellfire of the underworld. The black flame burned using the abyssal fog itself as fuel, instantly turning the surging monsters into a pile of ashes.

"Very refreshing."

The Outer Sea, which was a fierce battleground in the past, had now devolved into a walking trail where he could stroll comfortably along the blood-red carpet plowed by the Legion Commanders.

As if riding an escalator, Kim Minwoo unhesitatingly continued his descent along the blood-red trajectory plowed and created by the Legion Commanders.

Beyond the Outer Sea to the Inner Sea.

Beyond the Inner Sea to the Deep Sea.

Then finally, he reached a borderline where the surrounding air and water currents distorted bizarrely.

[Entering the Abyssal Sea — Extreme Sea!]

[Warning! It is an area where the physical laws of space and time collapse!]

Seuseuseuseu—.

"……Ugh!"

The moment he stepped foot into the Extreme Sea, Kim Minwoo's figure wavered minutely. A very subtle foreign sensation intervened between his brain's calculations.

A terrible sensation where space stretched and shrank, and even if he tried to focus his mind on one place, his ego seemed to struggle to scatter like a sandcastle.

The reason why even Grand Witches could not carelessly step beyond the Extreme Sea was precisely because of this segmenting effect on the physical body and mind.

―Lord, my vision is…… overlapping.

―Minwoo! I'm dizzy!

Even the Legion Commanders bound by the authority of the Underworld revealed bewilderment as their movements slowed minutely before the bizarre pressure of the Extreme Sea.

Aiming for that opening, the formless guardians of the abyss that had been hiding at the bottom of the Extreme Sea surged like a thunderbolt.

[Deploying the skill, Descent (EX) at maximum output!]

[The divine status of a Higher God presses down on the distorted space and time of the Extreme Sea!]

The pitch-black coercion of a Higher God completely froze the waters of the Extreme Sea.

A radius of several kilometers centered around Kim Minwoo.

The distorted space and time was ironed out into its original physical laws in a single breath, as if shattered glass was forcibly glued together by a rough grip.

"Merhen. Field."

―Yeah! 『Stop.』

Stepping forward with her silver hair fluttering, Merhen tapped the floor with her dragon bone staff with a tuk.

Along with her chilling heavenly word, the absolute debuff field [Ice Domain], forged by swallowing the soul of the Witch of the White Night Elise, covered the entire Extreme Sea.

Jjeojeojeok! Jjeojeojeojeok―!

As the absolute zero cold that freezes even the fragments of space and time spread, the named guardians of the Extreme Sea became ice sculptures unable to move an inch even before they could draw up their magic power.

Toward those frozen targets, Olivia surged from within the shadow.

Seugeok―! Seugeogeok―!

Her formless sword, having swallowed Grand Duke Paimon and become even more stealthy, soundlessly slashed the napes of the guardians.

Nevertheless, they had only forcibly nailed down space and time.

The Extreme Sea's unique creepy foreign sensation and murky magic power dregs were still floating all around, dizzying the party's vision.

"Ah, this is really uncomfortable."

Kim Minwoo tapped his shoulder with a tuk-tuk.

"Hayangi. Dessert time. Clear it all out."

Hayangi flashed its two eyes open.

The seven-colored bird, whose stomach capacity had increased significantly compared to last time, surged energetically and opened its beak jjeok.

Ssuaaaaaaaap―!

The sticky dregs of chaos that were twisting space and time while floating around the Extreme Sea began to be sucked into Hayangi's small beak like dirty water being sucked into a drain. Hayangi's stomach, chewing and swallowing that massive amount of twisted magic power whole, puffed up round like a balloon.

And finally, having perfectly collected all the dregs blurring the vision of the Extreme Sea, Hayangi alighted on Kim Minwoo's shoulder with a tuk.

"Kkeueueueok―!"

Like a department head who had polished off 5 servings of pork belly at a company dinner, Hayangi patted its belly and let out a refreshing yet bizarre burp.

Tuk. Degureureu.

Along with that burp, a round crystal shining pitch-black rolled to Kim Minwoo's feet.

[The Divine Beast Hayangi spits out the byproduct of digesting the Extreme Sea's twisted space and time!]

[You have acquired the special potential liberation material, 'Crystal of Chaos'!]

"……Huh?"

Picking up the rolled-over pebble, no, the Crystal of Chaos, Kim Minwoo let out a hollow laugh as if it was absurd.

The original reason he intended to visit the Sea of Destruction was to mine the Pearl of the Abyss.

But, truly out of nowhere.

The Crystal of Chaos had popped out.

'It's not that there's absolutely no connection, but…….'

Wasn't Hayangi's attribute chaos in the first place.

One of the 6 great potential liberation materials that he was at a loss to find. He truly hadn't imagined in his wildest dreams that he would get it for free through a mere pet bird.

"My bird is truly the best. I don't regret a single cent spent on snacks."

Slipping the Crystal of Chaos into his inventory, Kim Minwoo accelerated further and continued his descent.

Then finally.

At the end of descending while ignorantly tearing apart the collapsed space of the Extreme Sea, a borderline of perfect nothingness—where even the presence of abyssal monsters was completely erased—revealed its form.

[You have reached the deepest part of the Abyssal Sea — the entrance to the Sea of Destruction!]

[From here on is the realm of perfect void, distantly beyond light, sound, and the cognitive range of the system.]

Kim Minwoo stopped in front of the entrance to the Sea of Destruction.

All the sounds of the world were cut off with a tuk at that moment.

Sight, hearing, touch. Every one of the five senses possessed by humans became perfectly muted as if sucked into a massive vacuum cleaner.

It was the entrance to the sea of perfect void, the Sea of Destruction.

Deep at the bottom.

He could feel two strands of heterogeneous waves faintly leaking out.

One was his original goal to unlock the -999 potential, reaching the Pearl of the Abyss.

Another was the fifth legacy of the Death Lord that would rewrite the new order, spewing a red light in resonance with Kim Minwoo's belt and crown.

It was the moment he crossed the entrance to the Sea of Destruction like that.

"……This is."

Kim Minwoo's footsteps stopped abruptly.

A sea of void that should have been without a single ray of light. Sticky silver threads were densely draped all over the place. Up, down, left, and right. Cobwebs densely woven in every direction his vision reached completely plastered the void of the Sea of Destruction.

The transcendent senses of a Higher God ruminated over the magic power permeated in every single strand of that thread. This unpleasant texture that was sticky, damp, and even harbored a toxic aura.

It was definitely a smell he had caught somewhere before.

Kim Minwoo narrowed his brow. And he flicked a strand of the cobweb with the tip of his finger with a tok.

Instantly, the lingering scent of purple venom seeping from the surface of the thread.

At that moment, something clicked together in his mind with a tak.

'……Hadronox?'

The apostle of the Outer God and the Shadow Spider.

Kim Minwoo's pupils settled with interest.

Hadronox is in the Sea of Destruction?

Come to think of it.

Back then when he went to hunt the Abyssal Lord on a commission from the Eastern Witch Coven in the past.

A strange venom had definitely flowed out from the corpse of the lord.

'Was that this guy's doing?'

The fifth legacy of the Death Lord.

The Pearl of the Abyss.

And the apostle of the Outer God.

Resting Hell Rhapsody on his shoulder with a tuk, Kim Minwoo pulled up the corners of his mouth.

"It looks like this will be an interesting expedition."