Chapter 340

Chapter 340. The Great Demon of Avarice

Inside the glass tube.

The consciousness of the 6th Prince, Harpel Elian Cretian, had left his body.

Trapped within the prison of flesh, he could glimpse the outside world only through dreams.

His ability, Dream Weaving, allowed him to freely wander through others’ dreams, weaving their memories and emotions together like threads.

Tonight, the place his consciousness reached was Aaron Darius’s dream.

A gray world where countless books were stacked like walls, blotting out the sky, heavy with the smell of ink.

At its center stood a young Aaron.

He sat before a desk far larger than himself, clutching a quill in his small hand as he desperately copied something down.

Helio stood before him, bearing the dignified and cold presence of a true mage.

After watching Aaron’s clumsy transcription for a moment, Helio spoke softly.

“Aaron.”

“Yes, Father—”

The word that slipped out of Aaron’s mouth scattered into the air.

Startled, the child clamped his hand over his mouth and nervously watched Helio’s expression.

Helio’s face did not change.

In an indifferent tone, he merely corrected Aaron’s mistake.

“You should call me Master, Aaron.”

“……Yes, Master.”

Young Aaron nodded with a dejected expression.

His small shoulders slumped.

A child who wanted to call his one and only master “Father.”

Harpel could vaguely feel the pitiful longing resting upon those small shoulders.

Dream-time flowed quickly.

The scene shifted, and a teenage Aaron stood motionless like a statue, staring endlessly at Helio’s back.

Completely absorbed in his research, Helio did not spare even a glance for the disciple standing behind him.

The room was filled only with the sound of a magical lamp burning and parchment turning.

Aaron, watching his master, finally asked,

“Master. Why did you choose me as your disciple?”

Without turning around, Helio replied,

“Because of the mana you possess.”

It was meant as praise, yet to Aaron it struck like a blade.

A shadow of disappointment flickered across his face.

“Ah…… I see.”

Aaron forced a smile.

Unaware—or uncaring—of his disciple’s heart, Helio continued,

“Remember this well, Aaron. A mage must have strong mana. That is the only truth in this world. Those without mana do not even deserve to set foot in the Mage Tower.”

“Yes, Master.”

From that day on, Aaron devoted himself to magic like a madman.

He cut back on sleep, skipped meals, and shut himself off from the world.

His only world was the cold laboratory and endless grimoires.

He wanted his master’s recognition.

He wanted to become a disciple who exceeded Helio’s expectations.

At last, after months of grueling research, Aaron succeeded in recreating a complex defensive spell.

His heart pounding, he ran to Helio.

When Helio saw the perfectly formed magic circle before him, the expression Aaron had longed for finally appeared on his face.

Admiration.

Pride.

And satisfaction.

“Excellent, Aaron! Yes, it is you! You are the rightful successor of this Mage Tower!”

With those words, Aaron’s world was complete.

‘I am Master’s one and only successor.’

That belief became the pillar supporting his entire world.

But cracks soon began to form in that solid world.

A small child appeared, soaked from the rain and cradled in his master’s arms—Armandy.

When Aaron sensed the pure and powerful mana flowing from the body of that child with clear blue eyes, he felt an ominous premonition.

One clear afternoon.

In Helio’s greenhouse, Armandy asked innocently,

“Master, did you take me as your disciple because I have a lot of mana?”

“That’s right.”

At Helio’s answer, Aaron—pretending to read a book some distance away—curled his lips into a faint sneer.

‘Of course.’

But his sense of relief shattered at Armandy’s next, innocent question.

“Then if I did not have mana, would I still have been able to become your disciple?”

In an instant, the air in the greenhouse froze.

Helio pondered for a moment, then gently patted Armandy’s small head with a kindly smile.

“Well. I think you still would have been my disciple. You are very clever, after all. Haha.”

That warm laughter stabbed straight into Aaron’s heart.

Standing at the boundary of the dream, Harpel quietly watched Aaron’s face twist.

He spoke into Aaron’s consciousness.

“Why are you angry?”

Aaron replied,

“Because Master always said mana was the most important thing.”

“Just as you cannot imagine yourself without mana, Master simply could not imagine you without it either.”

Aaron’s red eyes burned with despair and rage.

“Do not make me laugh. Master said he took me in because of my mana.”

“That was not his true intention.”

Aaron ground his teeth.

“Then why! Why did he never say something like that to me, not even once?!”

With Aaron’s scream, the dreamscape tore apart.

The scene changed once more.

A bedridden Helio lay pale with illness, while a now-grown Armandy stood beside him, watching with a sorrowful face.

Through a slightly open doorway, Aaron, who had gone to fetch a bottle of water for his master, suddenly stopped at the sound of their conversation.

“Armandy…… there is something I must tell you.”

“Yes, Master.”

Helio slowly raised himself and placed his thin hand over Armandy’s.

“I would like you to become my successor.”

“……What? B-but I am still young…… and Senior Brother Aaron—”

Helio’s gaze toward Armandy was warm.

“This is the will of the Mage Tower.”

Thud.

The sound of Aaron’s world collapsing echoed in his ears.

‘He betrayed me.’

Thud. Thud.

His heart pounded madly.

‘That was my place.’

Behind him, Harpel’s voice sounded once more.

“You were never decided to be the successor.”

At those words, Aaron roared like a beast.

“It was mine!”

His master’s attention, praise, recognition, the seat of the Mage Tower Master—

He had never once doubted that all of it existed solely for him.

Not until the moment his master betrayed everything he believed in.

Behind Aaron’s blazing rage, a blue light flickered.

It was Mammon, the Great Demon of Avarice.

“Yes. It was all yours.”

With a greasy smile, Mammon placed a hand on Aaron’s shoulder.

“So this time, make sure you do not lose it.”

After whispering to Aaron, Mammon turned his gaze toward Harpel, who stood at the boundary of the dream.

It was as if he had known Harpel was there from the very beginning.

He pulled his lips into a crooked grin.

“You, too, wait patiently. Something interesting will happen soon.”

***

Aaron Darius lifted his heavy eyelids.

It had been a dreadful nightmare.

Yet upon waking, a strange heat and excitement lingered on his face.

He sprang from the bed and walked straight to the large full-length mirror in one corner of the room.

Slowly, Aaron removed his upper garment.

On his back, a sinister sigil burned clearly, like a brand seared into flesh.

It was the crest of Mammon, the Great Demon of Avarice.

At last, proof of his contract with a great demon had been carved into his body.

“So that was the contract.”

A mutter slipped from Aaron’s lips.

He recalled Mammon extending a hand to him when he had been drowning in despair within the dream.

The moment he grasped that hand, it felt as though a part of his soul had been torn away, and a flood of incomprehensible knowledge poured into his mind.

Flash—

It was not mere knowledge.

It was forbidden power, long coveted and feared by humanity.

Cursed rites that used the soul as collateral, dark magic that twisted space and time, and sly whispers that ruled over the desires of others.

The very essence of power, sweeter for being forbidden, surged through his mind like a tidal wave.

“Kh, khahaha……! Khahahahaha!”

Intense ecstasy pierced his entire body.

He felt as though he could do anything.

The knowledge his master had accumulated over a lifetime, Armandy’s genius—

Before this forbidden power, all of it felt like childish play.

There was no need for hesitation anymore.

He had received no report yet from the mages sent to deal with Armandy, but it no longer mattered.

‘Now that I have contracted with a great demon, I do not even need that pendant.’

If anything, this was better.

He could end everything with his own hands.

It was time to subdue his master, seize the 6th Prince, and become the true master of the Mage Tower.

Aaron donned his robe and left his room without hesitation.

From him flowed a sinister, dark mana unlike anything he had possessed before.

At last, he arrived before his master’s laboratory.

As he opened the door, the barrier Helio had erected appeared.

It was a powerful defensive spell forged from the remnants of his master’s strength.

The old Aaron would have needed considerable effort to break through it.

But he was different now.

Sneering, Aaron extended his hand.

From his fingertips, a cursed ritual glowed with dark light and began to absorb the barrier in reverse.

Crack—

With a sound like shattering glass, Helio’s barrier collapsed uselessly.

Step.

Aaron walked over the scattering fragments of light and entered the laboratory.

But what greeted him was a chilling silence.

An empty space.

The cold laboratory was devoid of any presence.

His master was nowhere to be seen.

Had he collapsed somewhere?

As he looked around, Aaron spotted a massive glass tube at the center of the laboratory, exuding mist-like cold.

“……Ha.”

A hollow laugh escaped his lips.

It was empty.

The glass tube where the 6th Prince should have been sleeping was completely vacant, as though nothing had ever been there.

His master.

The 6th Prince.

Everything he sought to claim had vanished like smoke.

“……Where did you go?”

A vicious killing intent flared in Aaron’s red eyes.

***

“Are you awake?”

A low voice stirred Harpel’s consciousness, which had been dormant for years.

Harpel lifted his eyelids.

Dim light pierced into his vision.

He had been peering into Aaron’s dream.

Mammon’s ominous whispers and Aaron’s screams still seemed to echo in his ears.

Slowly opening his eyes, the first thing that came into his blurry sight was the back of an unfamiliar boy.

The boy was carrying him on his back, moving somewhere.

Was this another dream?

Had he become trapped in yet another person’s dream?

Harpel was confused.

But the sensation coming from the boy’s back was far too vivid.

……It was the warmth of a living person, something he was feeling for the first time in years.

The warmth of a living being was melting his frozen senses.

Then, the boy carrying him spoke casually,

“Since you are awake, I am going to speed up a bit now.”

A calm tone.

As though he were merely going out for a leisurely stroll.

Yet the content of his words was anything but calm.

“We are sneaking out, and if we get caught, we die on the spot.”

Before Harpel could even process the situation, the boy added in a cautionary tone,

“Please keep your mouth shut. You might bite your tongue otherwise.”

The moment he finished speaking, the boy’s body shot forward.

Whoosh—

The surrounding scenery blurred past at an unrecognizable speed.

Narrow, dark passageways.

Dim torches.

Everything merged and was sucked away in a furious rush.

Harpel’s body was violently jolted up and down without mercy.

The first intense sensation he felt after regaining consciousness for the first time in years—

“Mmph, mmmph!”—was a violently churning, nauseating wave of motion sickness.