Chapter 395

Calamity (8)

What was "faith," anyway?

I'd interpreted it as unconditional belief. A feeling that affirmed the other person no matter what they did, that could believe in them without question.

"Well, that's easy enough."

Like I said before, I had confidence in this. Hadn't I already, through countless regressions, managed to earn respect, trust, even awe from people? If that was true, then a similar emotion like faith should be just as easy...

"Huh?"

Or so I thought. My first attempt failed miserably.

On the surface, nothing looked different. I reigned as the Hero, same as in past cycles. People believed in me and followed me, moved in perfect unison at a single word from my mouth, and showered me with praise day and night, calling me "humanity's hero." But after going through all of that, not a single drop of divine power appeared in me.

"..."

Maybe humans just couldn't obtain divine power in the first place. Or maybe divine power itself was obtainable, but the status window was blocking it somehow. Or maybe humanity's six billion people simply weren't enough to generate divine power. Leaving every possibility open, I tried again, and again.

Digging into the study of religion day and night, I finally understood the fundamental difference. What I'd been earning up to now was "belief" and "respect," not the "faith" capable of drawing out divine power.

Belief comes from a mutual relationship built on understanding. Humanity believed in me because I was strong, good, and possessed the power of Regression. That was the result of some kind of rational judgment. But from what I'd learned, faith existed in a realm that transcended understanding entirely, something closer to absolute "devotion."

Those who believe, believe because the other person is worth believing in. But those who have faith just believe. Because the other person is a god. Because the other person is a savior. They believe blindly. That was the decisive difference.

"...Okay, got it."

Once I reached that realization, my actions changed. The broad strokes stayed similar, honestly. I still made predictions about the future, still saved people through overwhelming power, same as before.

But the words coming out of my mouth stopped being "predictions" and became "prophecies." The people I saved weren't saved by "good will," they were saved by "miracles." The biggest difference was that I stopped adding explanations, this or that reasoning tacked onto everything I did.

I didn't explain why I devoted myself. I didn't explain the grounds for what I said. I didn't explain what I was trying to achieve. I just kept a faint smile on my lips and reshaped the world with overwhelming power. The decisive moment was probably when I used the chill to bring rain down on a parched desert, and when I froze the ocean and split it in half. (Of course, I also drew on my understanding of human psychology gained through regression, along with Curiosity and Awe, but that's a footnote.)

I planted anxiety and hope in people's hearts. The anxiety was the changing world. The hope was me. The thought that I was crossing a line into outright deception churned my stomach, but I couldn't stop. Once I'd committed to this, I had to see it through. I pushed forward with a hardened heart.

"Oh, ohh..."

"Our savior..."

At some point, the look in people's eyes started to change. Respect turned into worship. Belief turned into blind devotion. Human turned into god. The number of people carrying that kind of pure devotion kept growing day by day, until one day it crossed a hundred thousand.

"...So this is divine power."

I awakened divine power.

I won't go into detail about what happened after that. All you need to know is that a temple bearing my name got built, paintings of me spread everywhere, and someone made a scripture and distributed it. What matters isn't how Earth changed because of all that, but this power I'd gained, divine power itself.

Divine power turned out to be a genuinely strange force. Since it originated from a pure state of mind, the power itself carried an extremely pure quality too, and to put it simply... divine power worked almost like a function.

If I held a certain intent and moved divine power while holding it, the power naturally transformed to fit that intent. If I poured the wish "heal people" into divine power, it kept healing people afterward without me touching it again. If I poured in the wish "make it rain," it made rain fall without me lifting a finger.

A function that ran according to whatever value you fed it. A machine that stubbornly carried out commands. Unlike mana, which needed intent poured in and adjusted moment to moment, divine power had a persistence to it, a will to keep carrying out its command indefinitely. A fitting trait, given it came from "faith" rather than mere belief.

Afterward, I kept researching divine power from different angles. It had a genuinely wide range of uses, and a few ideas came to mind for how I might apply it to my regressions, but...

"Not enough, huh."

The problem was that divine power fell absolutely short on destructive power.

For example, divine power could continuously heal my body from the strain Heart of Eternal Winter placed on it. Or, following a command like "keep chill on my sword," it could infuse chill into my blade without me having to consciously think about it.

But it wasn't suited to destructive commands like "destroy the golem" or "crush the enemy." Divine power's strengths were persistence and steady maintenance, not raw destructive or offensive force, and mana was far superior on that front.

Maybe it was obvious in hindsight, but divine power alone couldn't bring the golem down. I could use it to make chill periodically attack the golem, but bringing the golem down required an instant burst of firepower.

I also noticed that even after regressing, a minuscule trace of divine power remained in me. Divine power was useful, sure, but that also meant I couldn't abuse it endlessly. Using too much of it while regressing carried a real risk of making me permanently stronger.

So. In the end, another failure. Not my first. Every plan I'd tried so far had failed. Not just mine, either — every fresh idea humanity had come up with had failed too. New possibilities I'd never even thought of, and none of them reached the golem.

Still, there was something to gain from it. I understood the nature of divine power now. I'd explored its possibilities and reached an understanding of how to use it. I'd taken one small but solid step forward.

Someone might ask here: So what? So what does that matter? Can some realization like that bring down the golem? Was dragging this whole thing out just to arrive at some epiphany, while burning through my willpower?

No. Now I could see the path.

The realization I'd reached through this entire journey was that I needed to get stronger to bring the golem down. Something anyone could say, but not something anyone could actually do.

Actually, back when I first revealed I was a regressor, plenty of people had raised this exact opinion from the start.

-Can't the regressor just hole up in the Tower for a thousand years, ten thousand years, and get stronger? Don't regress below Floor 15, just eat, sleep, and train nonstop in the Tower. Wouldn't he eventually be able to beat the golem that way? Just get infinitely strong.

They were right. Right, but it was also the exact method I'd been avoiding, because I didn't want to get strong that way. The odds of success were high, sure, but the risk was way too big.

Sure, if I trained for a thousand years, ten thousand years, I'd probably beat the golem eventually. But what about me in the process? What about the person I was? What about the feelings I held for Ji-won?

After going through all of that, could I still remain a "person"? I was already living in fear of slipping out of being human even now, so would I still be a "person" by the time that day came?

I didn't want it. I still didn't want that future. I was prepared to sacrifice to bring the golem down, but that didn't mean I wanted to offer up everything I was. If there was some other way, my heart wanted to choose that instead.

And there was one. A way to become as strong as possible while losing the least of my humanity. Every plan up to now could honestly be seen as preparation for this final plan. Even the failed plans had all given me something.

Running the "Prometheus" project to raise up other people, I confirmed that in the end, it had to be me who brought down the golem.

Copying everyone else's traits and clashing with the golem, I deepened my understanding of powers I'd never experienced before, while confirming that raw "destructive power" alone couldn't bring the golem down.

Stepping into divine power, I explored its many uses and possibilities. I came to understand how the thing called the "Tower" actually operated.

Having confirmed every one of these "possibilities," I could say for certain: if I used this method, I could bring the golem down.

The most plausible fragment of possibility out of all the opinions ordinary people had raised. Taking that possibility and debating it over and over again with thousands of players, we arrived at the plan everyone agreed had "the highest chance of success."

Some called it "inspired." Others called it "too much." But one thing was certain — this plan would work.

With this, I could get stronger without even climbing the Tower. Maybe I could get as strong as a human being like me could possibly get. A plan with far better odds than blindly climbing floor after floor.

And all of it started from a single question.

"What does it mean to be strong?"