Chapter 304

For a moment, Killian was at a loss for words.

He needed some time to fully understand what it meant to hunt the Lord.

The Monster Lord waited as though it were no great matter.

"Why me?"

[You ask an obvious question.]

From ancient times to the present day.

[There has been only one Godslayer.]

No one born a Mortal had reached transcendence.

The Monster Lord understood his own situation clearly.

[This is the last time. A seventh life will not be granted to me.]

The Lord had chosen the Emperor as the card that was more advantageous for Him to use.

[It is the Lord who activates the Formula of Reincarnation.]

Even if the Formula activated and he came back to life, it would only be to serve the Lord.

A life as a sacrifice for another's transcendence.

[That can no longer be called a king.]

Even if he was a king who had been made, he had ruled the mountain ranges for thousands of years.

In the process, the Monster Lord had become a being called a Demigod as well.

A half-complete God who could challenge Divinity at any time.

[I will go beyond the Lord and become a complete God.]

"……"

[You are the same, are you not?]

He had made two hearts—his Mana Heart and Hollyheart—9-Star.

[Did you not turn back time not to save Eurasia from me and bring down the Empire, but to attain your former level once more and take revenge on the Gods?]

Because he too had lived for thousands of years through reincarnations, he could tell.

Adamas did not believe in God.

[You and I are of the same kind.]

They were a kind that could never believe in God.

They were leaders of their species, satisfied only by trampling the Gods beneath them and rising higher.

[Do you intend to let the Gods live merely because you are using Divine Power? Recall the world they ruled.]

Before the laws of the world were changed by the existence of a Godslayer.

Mortals, humans included, had lived no better than livestock.

If the Emperor reached transcendence as the Lord intended, the world would once again fall into the Gods' grasp.

[You and I do not need to wage war.]

He said that if he did not attack Eurasia and instead cooperated in bringing down the Empire, the ancient ill-fated bond between humans and monsters would end here.

[You bring down the Empire, and I will hunt the Lord.]

The Monster Lord spoke with certainty.

[Humans have a saying: the enemy of my enemy is my friend.]

"……"

[Will you not become my friend?]

The Monster Lord held out a hand.

Killian could feel the mixed power of Evil Energy, Radiance, and Damian's Mana.

‘If I am going to cut down the Monster Lord, this is my only chance.’

[Ah.]

As though he had forgotten something, the Monster Lord raised a finger and added.

[If you are thinking of cutting down both Damian Eurasia and me here, you should reconsider. This place is my dungeon disguised as a Mind Image World.]

Hundreds of dungeons formed throughout the world over thousands of years.

[Even you cannot cut all of them down with a single strike.]

He emphasized that although he was using Damian's body as a host, cutting this body would not lead to his disappearance.

"……"

Killian's eyes narrowed.

To all appearances, he possessed a level clearly below Killian's own.

Even merely cutting down Damian and taking Adamas before he did would greatly reduce the Monster Lord's threat.

He had said that even if he obtained Adamas before Killian, one who was not a direct descendant of Eurasia could not take Edan's power.

Edan had set some measure in place without Killian's knowledge.

Whether to cut him down or join hands with him.

‘I have to choose here.’

[We do not have much time.]

If the war continued as it was, the Emperor would succeed in taking the levels of Simon Eurasia and Claudio de Cronis.

[It means that the time you went to such lengths to turn back will become completely useless.]

Killian considered the course of the war once again.

This was no longer a war waged by Mortals.

[Now, it is time to choose.]

The Monster Lord waggled the hand he had extended.

The Authority of Time would not work, yet a few seconds of silence felt as long as years.

"……"

Killian quietly stared at the Monster Lord's outstretched hand.

His answer was resolute.

It was no different from the answer the Monster Lord had given his creator.

"I refuse."

[……]

The Monster Lord's red eyes narrowed.

"I am human."

There had been a time when he had been confused about his identity after being sealed in a blade for thousands of years.

"My essence is human."

Killian tipped his chin forward.

"And you are a monster."

Even if he used humans as hosts and imitated their memories and actions.

"Your essence is that of a monster that needs human blood."

Humans and monsters could never live within the same enclosure.

[It is better to shed blood than become a puppet of the Gods.]

The Monster Lord stressed the point once more, as though persuading him.

[Do not mistake the Gods' cooperation for a sign that you are looking in the same direction.]

Shhhk.

Drawing Pisaro, he pointed the sword at Killian's chest.

[Divine Power is not your power.]

Killian nodded.

The Lord might possess an Authority that nullified Divine Power.

After all, He had brought in an existence from beyond the Boundary, one guarded by two higher Gods.

‘Most likely, that is the case.’

Even so.

"I am sorry, Damian."

Shing.

Killian drew the sword at his waist.

Anima was a sword that reaped life.

"If anyone was to inherit the throne, it should have been you."

But now, the brother he had believed to be Eurasia's future.

He was about to take Damian's life.

Whoosh.

Killian raised his sword.

Mana was conducted into Anima.

[-----!!]

The Monster Lord in Damian's form shouted and swung his sword to meet Killian.

None of it mattered to Killian.

"Eurasia Style."

The single sword strike his dear friend had completed to cut down Divinity.

Speaking its name softly.

"Palantir."

He swung the sword after casting aside his hesitation.

Whoosh.

The wave of Mana that spread like gentle ripples brushed past Damian.

***

The Red Magic Tower had been built in the Empire's heartland.

In a secret chamber there, the Monster Lord opened his eyes.

[……]

Fog and darkness filled the secret chamber, whose size could not be measured.

Kyaaa—

From beyond the hazy darkness came the sound of something howling.

It was the sound of a life that could not die even in death, writhing in agony.

Shhhk.

Evil Energy entered the Monster Lord's red eyes.

The fog and darkness that obscured his vision receded.

The wall before him was formed of bone and metal tangled together, and tentacles of something wriggled across it.

The floor was covered in blackish moss and the skulls of the dead. Between them flowed streams as red as blood.

The streams twisted and flowed without pattern, vanishing at one moment and reappearing elsewhere at the next.

An abyss brimming with the energy of death and despair.

Anyone else who saw it would surely have described it that way.

"You do not look pleased."

A man's voice came from somewhere in the secret chamber.

The Monster Lord's gaze pierced through the abyss in an instant.

There stood Krusty Heinrich, acclaimed as the Emperor of the Empire.

"Did you fail?"

His reaction was strangely quiet and calm.

No emotion showed on his face, and he carried himself with the ease of one admiring a space he had created.

The space between them was distorted.

As though the world had warped unstably, a distorted space floated there like the surface of a cracked mirror.

The distortions collided precariously, as though they might devour each other at any moment.

[This is incomprehensible behavior.]

The Monster Lord spoke.

His voice carried genuine incomprehension.

[Adamas should have taken my hand.]

Everything had been fitting together perfectly.

He could not see through the Monster Lord, whereas the Monster Lord knew a great deal about him.

"Humans sometimes engage in incomprehensible behavior."

As though it were nothing unusual.

"When it comes to understanding humans, there are limits to what memories alone can tell you."

The Emperor added the explanation kindly.

It was consideration so extraordinary that no one else in the Empire would have believed it.

It was of little importance to the Monster Lord.

"How strong was he?"

[A complete 9-Star. Not only his Mana, but his Divine Power has reached the Pope's level.]

The sword strike with which Edan Eurasia, who had mastered 9-Star, had cut down the Monster Lord and the Anomaly.

[Palantir.]

The Monster Lord named the sword strike that had struck him.

[If I had not been connected to you, I would have vanished on the spot.]

"Oh?"

The Emperor's eyes became half-lidded.

It was the same expression the Monster Lord had made through Damian's face.

"He has achieved absurd growth in only a few years."

They had attained their levels through repeated reincarnations over and over, yet the ancient human had built an equal level in less than ten years.

"Simon Eurasia and Killian Eurasia."

Lick.

The Emperor licked his lips with a familiar expression.

"Are there two tempting fruits?"

[That is not something to be pleased about.]

"……"

[From now on, no bait will work on him.]

If Killian Eurasia had taken the Monster Lord's hand, he would this time have been invited into a proper Mind Image World.

The two Seeds the Lord had planted.

He would have been trapped in the space created by the fusion of the Monster Lord and Krusty Heinrich.

There, a battle for true transcendence would have unfolded, and there was a high likelihood that they would have won.

[An opportunity like the one just now will never come again.]

By now, Killian would have seen through the fact that not everything the Monster Lord had said was true.

"In the end, you failed to take both Eurasia's body and Adamas."

The Emperor spoke with an even reaction.

Tsk.

The Monster Lord clicked his tongue.

Unlike the displeased Monster Lord, the Emperor remained at ease.

"There is no need to worry. That will not disrupt ‘our’ plan."

[I am not worried. I merely regret letting a victory that was all but won slip away.]

The Emperor gave a benevolent smile.

"I am you, and you are me. Therefore, we are us."

[……]

"In the end, we will win."

And then.

"We will become the true Lord of the new world."

At the Emperor's words, the Monster Lord fell silent.

***

His head was spinning.

Even if he had poured down strong liquor for half a day, it could not have been this bad.

He was a Superhuman who had formed an incomplete 7-Star Mana Heart.

‘More precisely, I am a quasi-Superhuman…….’

Damian frowned and pushed himself upright.

When he forced his eyes open, his vision was blurry.

Blink. Blink.

As he opened and closed his eyes several times through a splitting headache, his vision gradually returned.

He saw the outline of a person.

Soon, the familiar face came into view.

"Killian……?"

"Are you awake?"

For someone who had been missing for two years, Killian's reaction was far too calm.

"What in the world……"

As Damian spoke, he looked around.

It was a white space in which nothing existed.

Cracks ran through it here and there.

"This place is……"

"Your Mind Image World, Brother."

‘My Mind Image World?’

He knew that every human possessed an inner world.

But he could not understand why Killian and he were in this place.

‘Is this a dream?’

Just as that thought came to Damian, who had no idea what had happened to him.

"Do not be alarmed. Please listen."

Killian spoke in an even voice.

"You will soon die, Brother."