Chapter 305

The Monster Lord had taken Damian's body, and Killian had entered the Mind Image World and cut that body down.

The sword strike that cut essence could drive out the Monster Lord, but it had to cut Damian's essence as well.

As a result, he explained, a great scar had been left on the essence of the human named Damian Eurasia.

"I see."

Damian listened quietly to Killian's explanation and nodded.

"If my essence has been wounded, I cannot avoid death."

Damian murmured as he looked at the Divine Power connected to him.

It was the Divine Power Killian used.

‘If he can cut down the Monster Lord, that must mean he is already a 9-Star Knight. He has achieved something unbelievable once again in two years.’

It was not only Mana.

He was not deeply versed in Divine Power, but he could tell that Killian's mastery surpassed that of an ordinary High Priest.

The shock was strong enough to feel real, even in the Mind Image World.

By Killian's account, it was a wound that made it unsurprising if Damian died at once.

"This will do."

"……"

"Conserve your strength."

Damian spoke in an even voice.

"Even after wandering for two years, I could not find a trace of the Monster Lord. I cannot even be certain whether the Knight Order, which must do great things for the Kingdom, is alive or dead."

An existence outside the laws he knew had made him lose everything in an instant.

"Everything happened because I was insufficient."

For a moment, silence fell.

"Are you not angry?"

As Damian had, Killian asked evenly.

"Angry……"

Damian frowned as he rubbed his throbbing head.

"There is one thing I regret."

"What is it?"

"That I did not get to settle a proper match with you."

"……"

Despite the pain pressing down on his entire body, Damian was smiling.

What filled his eyes now that the red had vanished was sincerity.

"The gap between us must be even wider now than it was then."

When they encountered the Knight Slayer during the Kurt Mountain Range Subjugation, there had not been much difference between Killian's level and his own.

The difference had been whether they took a step forward or retreated even before a powerful enemy.

Damian had retreated, while Killian had stepped forward without hesitation.

That was when it began.

When he had started chasing after Killian Eurasia.

It was not because of the title of genius, the competition to become Family Head, or the expectations around him that he should become an outstanding ruler for the family's glory.

"As a knight, I wanted to become someone who could cross swords with you."

He no longer cared about the judgment of those around him.

Even after Killian became the Extermination Squad Leader and found a role of his own, Damian silently walked his own path of the sword.

He stabilized at 6-Star, mastered it, and eventually succeeded in breaking down part of the wall before him.

"When I became a complete Superhuman, I thought we could spar at the training ground until we grew sick of it."

It was a modest wish for a prince of a country.

"Well, this is how it turned out in the end."

He spoke as the headache gradually worsened.

His stomach churned.

If this was the end, he wanted to receive a sword strike in his right mind, but even that seemed impossible.

"I must leave Eurasia to you."

"……"

Damian now spoke as though he felt relieved.

Killian watched him in silence.

Then suddenly.

Fwoooosh.

He strengthened the Divine Power connected to Damian.

"What are you doing? Do not waste your strength for nothing……"

"Come to think of it, I forgot to tell you something important."

"……?"

"I did not completely erase the Monster Lord."

"What……?"

"He must have feared annihilation as well. Just before I could cut him down completely, he slipped away."

That was why Damian retained his consciousness, even if only as he did now.

What the Monster Lord had wanted was the Mana Heart that would one day wield Adamas.

"What I cut down was your Mana Heart, Brother."

Because of Palantir, Damian's Mana Heart had been shattered without leaving even a fragment behind.

Damian Eurasia the knight was dead.

But his other heart still lived.

"So I have preserved my life once again."

With vacant eyes, Damian took in his altered Mind Image World.

"You must become a knight who succeeds the Family Head."

"Young Master, you possess the talent for it."

"You bear His Majesty's blood, so Your Highness will become a Superhuman before long as well."

"Commander, you will become the strongest knight."

"Do not grow conceited. My talent is no less than yours, Brother."

"I am a prince too. Do not disregard me merely because my talent with the sword is inferior to yours."

"Do you want to become king?"

"……"

He shook off the countless words circling in his mind.

‘I have lived my entire life competing through Mana.’

Could he compete without a Mana Heart?

What could he, no longer a knight, do for Eurasia?

‘No.’

There were things he could do even without a Mana Heart.

He could become an administrator and assist His Majesty with the affairs of state, or become a diplomat and strengthen the Kingdom's power.

He would not be able to act at the front lines as he had while serving as Commander, but as long as it was for Eurasia, there was no shortage of work to do.

He did not need much time to organize his thoughts.

"I will live a new life, then. How long will it take to leave the Mind Image World?"

Damian asked as he looked at Killian, who was drenched in sweat.

Divine Power rose around him like heat haze.

‘It must be because he has expended a considerable amount of Divine Power to treat my wound.’

Not only had he made Killian separate the Monster Lord from him, but he was asking him to heal his injuries as well.

It was a shameless question.

"It is almost finished."

Contrary to his words, Killian's Divine Power was steadily growing more intense.

The sweat streaming down his face increased as well.

How much time had passed like that?

Whirrr—whirrrrr—

"……"

Damian's expression became strange at the odd sensation he felt in his chest.

He could not feel Mana.

Yet in the place where the Mana Heart had been, a new energy was stirring.

‘This is……’

As Damian wondered how he should react to this incomprehensible situation, the Divine Power in Killian's body completely subsided.

"It is a Hollyheart."

He looked at Damian's chest with a satisfied expression.

"What……?"

"I made a Hollyheart where your Mana Heart used to be."

"……!!"

The unexpected words left him dumbfounded.

Killian continued his explanation.

"I have only formed it. It is not even the size of a 1-Star Hollyheart yet."

Unlike Mana Hearts, Hollyhearts were generally innate. Their potential differed according to how much power one was born with after being chosen by a God.

Killian was the exception.

He had been born with a body that held exceptional potential for Divine Power, yet he had formed a Mana Heart.

Later, he became an Apostle of God, formed a Hollyheart, and raised both hearts to a level that could be called the pinnacle of Mortals.

"To the Pope's level……"

"It is not that remarkable."

He had not merely helped someone who was not a High Priest form a Hollyheart. He had forcibly formed one.

This was not a matter of whether it was remarkable. It belonged to the realm of possibility and impossibility.

Even witnessing such a miracle, and seeing Killian speak of it as though it were no great matter, Damian could not even give a hollow laugh.

"‘Only those chosen by a God can cultivate Divine Power.’ That is what the world believes."

Killian shook his head.

"No. I am an Atheist."

Damian's mouth fell open on its own.

"Even I, an Atheist, possess a Hollyheart of this level, so it is not impossible for you either, Brother."

It was a power fundamentally different from a Mana Heart.

‘At first, he will be lost.’

Both the way it was handled and the way it was developed differed from Mana.

It could be compared to a person with sound limbs becoming disabled overnight.

Or to writing with the left hand, drawing with the right, and reading a book with one's mind at the same time.

But.

"You will overcome it somehow, Brother."

Damian had found hope rather than despair even at death's threshold. He would be able to achieve something with a Hollyheart as well.

"You place too much faith in me."

In the timeline Killian had not turned back, Damian was the Superhuman who had become the Monster Lord and destroyed Eurasia.

Damian had accepted Divine Power rather than Evil Energy and Radiance.

The first step toward opening the future had changed.

‘The first current has been set in motion.’

Killian did not believe everything the Monster Lord said.

He was the very being that had driven countless heroes into despair with snake-like words.

‘Even Palantir could not erase him completely.’

It was not because the strike had lacked power.

He had likely secured an escape route in case of the unexpected.

One question remained: why had he not immediately gone to the Boundary and taken Adamas?

Had he done so, he would not have had to flee so futilely now.

There was only one conclusion he could draw.

‘His future changed when I returned.’

Either he could no longer take Adamas immediately, or someone else had moved first.

‘If I had known, I should have asked him to send me to where the sword was.’

At that moment, Killian's next destination was decided.

Looking at Damian's Mind Image World, incomplete but unbroken.

"Let us leave now."

Killian took Damian's hand.

***

"I cannot feel any Mana from Prince Damian."

Serena spoke as she watched Damian, who was catching his breath while leaning against a tree.

Killian deliberately did not explain what had happened in the Mind Image World.

He merely said.

"You should be on your guard, Serena."

If she did not want Damian, now with a new goal, to catch up to her, she could not neglect her training.

"Damian will become stronger than before."

He instilled a new competitive spirit in her.

"Is that so?"

Serena's response was just as he expected.

She looked at Killian with a resolute gaze.

"Then I will become even stronger, so that Your Highness may lean on my shoulder."

It was a statement that revealed whom she had made the target of her path of the sword.

"You say embarrassing things without batting an eye. You have changed a great deal."

"In any case, it is fortunate."

Serena shifted the subject as she looked at the roughly hundred knights lying across the clearing.

While Killian had roamed Damian Eurasia's Mind Image World, the Extermination Squad, apart from Serena, had entered the dungeon and found the White Knight Order.

At the dungeon's end, they had found the White Knight Order unconscious after being poisoned by Evil Energy.

"If we had left them as they were, it would have become a situation similar to what happened with Yulian."

The Monster Lord and the Empire possessed a method of turning knights into Death Knights.

Fortunately, the dungeon had come undone naturally.

It was a side effect of Killian cutting down the Monster Lord.

"What do you intend to do now?"

He had saved Serena and Damian.

He had also prevented the Extermination Squad and the White Knight Order, both major forces of Eurasia, from being wiped out.

"The map the Mayer Family obtained will not be much help."

When he combined the information Damian had gathered over the past two years, the Monster Lord possessed the ability to move the dungeon's location as he wished.

‘Unlike when Julian discovered it before, the Monster Lord must have grown more skilled at using his power.’

In any event, it would be impossible to track the Monster Lord immediately after he had concealed his presence and gone into hiding.

"I am going to the northern frontier."

"Alone?"

Serena asked in a cold voice.

"We failed at the first step, so they will move in another direction as well."

Another piece that would change the future.

Killian intended to cross the Boundary and take Adamas.

"Serena."

"Give me your order."

"I need you to meet Charles."

Rather than the worried expression she had worn before, she looked at him with her usual eyes, full of confidence and trust.

"Willingly."