Chapter 125 - Demonic Realm (1)

1

Kim ■ remembers the day he first fell into another world.

["Congratulations."]

["You have been chosen as the hero who will save this world."]

A dazzlingly beautiful woman smiled at him. Bewildered, Kim ■ stared at the angel before him.

He had seen countless celebrities in videos and on the news, but he was merely an [ordinary high school student]. This was his first time meeting a beauty whose gentle smile alone seemed to brighten her surroundings. He could not help stammering.

["Um... excuse me? Miss Angel? Where am I?"]

["Do not be too hasty, dear hero. I am the [Goddess of Protection]. That is the name of the constellation who will protect you and guide your future from now on. There is much you do not know, but you will learn just as much."]

A goddess, not an angel?

Kim ■ felt his mind growing strangely hazy.

["But I was on the school rooftop just a moment ago...?"]

["You were suffering from bullying at school."]

The goddess calmly brought her hands together.

["Young humans are sometimes like beasts, in that they act on pure malice out of sheer ignorance. Sadly, you became prey to those beasts, dear hero, and when you could bear it no longer, you fell."]

["Fell..."]

["Yes. To add a few words, you fell to your death."]

Only after hearing the goddess's words did Kim ■ remember.

The school rooftop.

The iron door leading to it had been firmly locked. Seeing the handles bound tight with chains had stirred his defiance. So he had opened a classroom window on the fifth floor and climbed out. He had climbed a pipe to reach the roof.

It was madness.

Yet as he clung to the pipe and doggedly hauled himself upward, Kim ■ felt [alive] for the first time in his life.

'How ridiculous.'

For the first time in his life, he had climbed out a window—for the first time in his life, he had climbed something like a pipe—for the first time in his life, he had reached the school rooftop. He had never once felt this while trying so hard to live.

To think he would feel life only when he was about to throw it away.

["..."]

The sky he looked up at from the rooftop was red.

Kim ■ was grateful that the sky turned red once a day.

For the first time—he thanked the sky.

The reddened sky was a little kinder than the blue sky. He wanted his whole body to fade into that kindly color.

'If I fall.'

Kim ■ looked down at the ground. Filled with sunset, the school field was red as the Sahara.

'They say you regret it as soon as you start falling.'

Kim ■ took off his indoor shoes and set them neatly on the ground. The insoles had been blackened with permanent marker. He had not put that graffiti there.

'Will I regret it too?'

A commotion broke out on the field. Had someone spotted him? The students who had been kicking a soccer ball around before their evening study session flocked together, pointing up at the roof from down below. Several faces among them were familiar.

Kim ■ quietly moved his thumb, pressing down firmly. He sent the message he had prepared on his phone. Thirty-seven students would receive the same suicide note.

+

You murdered me.

Don't forget.

You killed me.

+

A moment later, a notification appeared confirming the message had been sent.

It was done.

He felt refreshed.

Kim ■ threw his phone. It plummeted in an instant and struck the field. It shattered. The students below recoiled at the sight of the broken phone. Some had gone white, perhaps having received his suicide note.

'Let your lives be ruined too. Forever.'

Kim ■ let his body fall into the red sand desert.

Thinking that a fall was merely a failed ascent.

["I am the Goddess of Protection."]

And that was how he came here.

["I possess many powers. Idol, Compassion, Prayer, Sacrifice, Deliverance."]

Kim ■ remembers the day he first fell into another world.

["If you borrow my power, dear hero, you can do anything and become anything."]

A dazzlingly beautiful woman smiled at him.

["What would you like to become, dear hero?"]

2

[You have entered the 50th floor through an abnormal route.]

When I opened my eyes, a voice flowed into my head.

[The blessing of the ‘Shut-In Librarian’ is removed.]

[Beginner protection measures are suspended.]

[Beginner privileges are temporarily revoked.]

I smiled wryly.

'Just hearing those warnings gives me chills.'

I looked around.

The first things to catch my eye were spires soaring into the sky.

Five crooked towers stood in the distance, like a giant's fingers reaching into the air. It was strange that they did not collapse on the spot.

"Wow. Shit. It's been a fucking long time since I came here. More than a hundred and fifty years, I think?"

Fortunately, I had someone beside me who could serve as my guide.

The Sword Emperor. Naturally, an attendant spirit who had once climbed to the Tower's ninety-ninth floor had also set foot on the fiftieth.

"Not a damn thing's changed, though."

My attendant spirit surveyed the fiftieth floor with a look of... not nostalgia so much as weariness.

"What are those spires?"

"Magic towers. Some folks have been holed up in there for over a thousand years. Instead of climbing the Tower, they decided to settle down on the fiftieth floor..."

A thousand years.

"Anyway, don't go near them for now. Don't even look at them if you can help it."

"Why not?"

"If you stare for more than twenty-three seconds, they automatically detect your gaze. In their world, twenty-three means the same thing eighteen does in yours, Zombie—a number that sounds like a swear word. It's an alarm system that says, ‘What the fuck are you staring at, asshole?’ Man, doesn't that tell you everything about their personalities?"

I quickly looked away from the magic towers. An alarm that went off just because you stared too long!

"Oh, right. They originally had six towers, you know? But I knocked one down. They'll probably go nuts if they find out I've come back as a ghost. They'll mobilize everyone and chase you all the way to hell, so make sure you keep that under wraps."

"... Now I see you're not a guide. You're a troll. Damn it. I should've seen this coming."

That was when it happened.

[Void Poison begins corroding your body.]

[Your current corrosion level is Lv.1.]

I started in alarm.

"What's Void Poison now? It says my body's being corroded!"

"Right. There was that too. Hey, now it really feels like I'm back in the Tower."

My attendant spirit shrugged as though it were nothing.

"It's just poison spread all over the fiftieth floor. Who was it again? Anyway, there was this bastard acting as the floor's manager, and apparently he got way too chummy with the hunters he favored. Then the [Midnight Liberation War] or whatever broke out, and they say he croaked."

"And?"

"Apparently he couldn't go quietly, so he cursed the world as he died. They say that curse stuck around as poison."

I blinked.

"Uh, that's exactly..."

"Yeah, yeah. Remember the zombie virus that constellation unleashed when it died in the Murim world? Think of this as an upgraded version."

"No..."

In disbelief, I asked,

"People live here with that stuff floating around in the atmosphere? And they've been here for a thousand years? Are they insane?"

"Yeah. They are insane, but anyone who's made it this far has a decent foundation in aura, magic, skills, or at least a constellation's blessing. What are you doing, Zombie? Hurry up and protect yourself with aura."

As he instructed, I drew up my aura. I wrapped my whole body in red aura, reinforcing my respiratory organs in particular. Only after taking a moment to breathe did I look at my attendant spirit.

"What if I don't protect myself? What happens?"

"Uh..."

For once, my attendant spirit hesitated. He frowned, looking as though he were trying to decide how to put it.

"You acquire a very unusual appearance and mental state..."

"Kieeeeeek!"

"Oh. Perfect. There's one right over there."

I turned.

A monster resembling a toad crouched there.

"Kioeeeeek!"

The only problem, if you could call it that, was that no toad I knew had roughly thirty-six legs or shark teeth in its maw.

To add one more problem, it looked as though it weighed about two tons.

"What the hell is that thing?!"

"Who knows? Probably a human not all that different from you. Someone who ate and shat like you and occasionally spouted bullshit. About twenty years ago, anyway."

While my attendant spirit drawled on, the two-ton monster toad sprang into the air! It was plainly charging at me. Horrified, I concentrated aura in my feet and leaped far away.

BOOOOM!

The earth shook. That thunderous crash was a little too lively to attribute to a toad. The ground had been gouged out as though a small meteor had struck.

"Oh, shit."

I drew my holy sword and unleashed the Divine Art of the Demonic Heaven.

SLASH!

The strike, imbued with red aura, landed squarely and sliced the monster toad in two at the waist.

Did I kill it?

"Ah."

My attendant spirit spoke offhandedly.

"Sorry, Kim Zombie. I didn't get around to warning you... From the fiftieth floor onward, this is literally a demonic realm. Acting on the common sense you know will get you fucked over pretty often."

"What are you trying to say?"

At that instant, something sprouted from the exposed cross sections of the bisected monster toad. They were legs resembling tentacles. Dozens shot out in a flash, and the toad stood tall on the ground again.

"Kieeeeeek!"

"Kiyooooook!"

Only now there were two instead of one.

"Yeah. That kind of thing."

"What the fuck?"

"If you're scared, keep staring at the magic towers. Look for more than twenty-three seconds and they'll talk to you. ‘Who the hell are you, and why are you staring?’ Ask for help then, and wizards on broomsticks will come rescue you. How about that? Nice of them, huh?"

Unless I was imagining it, my attendant spirit had been quietly grinning for a while now. And when he grinned, there was a very high chance he was messing with me.

In other words.

"... What do they take in exchange for rescuing you?"

"Man! Look how sharp this guy is. How'd you know? You get locked into twelve years of a contract that sucks you dry, right down to your soul. Since you've got an SSS-rank skill, Zombie, you'll have all their enormous affection to yourself. I'm jealous!"

Fuck...

"Y-you there! Run, quickly!"

An urgent voice came from behind me.

"This way! Run this way! Hurry!"

I looked back to find three old men in shabby cloaks beckoning. Their cloaks were filthy, like those of homeless people, but their eyes alone held a mysterious profundity. Their voices were so earnest that I almost turned toward them without thinking.

"Heh heh heh."

But the look on my attendant spirit's face as he watched me bothered me too much to do it. My feet stopped reflexively.

Instead of running to the old men, I scattered aura at them in an attack.

"This way!"

"Run this way!"

"Hurry!"

The moment my attack landed, something horrifying happened. Something sprang up from the ground where the old men stood.

It was a... ‘something’ resembling a hedgehog.

"Y-you there!"

"Run, quickly!"

"This way!"

Except it had three old men attached to its back instead of quills.

"This is insane..."

In short, those were not living old men at all. They were merely shapes mimicked by the monster's shell. Presumably, they were meant to lure people over so it could eat them.

"Man. That's Kim Zombie for you. Naive, but you do know how to use your head. Think about where you are. Common sense says old men wouldn't help your ass for no reason, right? Huh?"

"Kieeeeeek!"

"Run this way!"

"Kiyoooooook!"

"Hurry!"

The monster toads and monster hedgehog lunged at me together. Dozens of tentacles writhed on the toads' skin, while the three old men on the hedgehog's back sang in chorus.

The sight alone felt like it was relentlessly contaminating my mind.

"Is everything here like this?!"

"There are ‘exceptions,’ but mostly, yeah. Welcome to the demonic realm where cosmic horror dances, Crow-Tit. Now do you understand what a normal, sensible hunter I am?"

"Is this really the time to be saying—!"

Fortunately or unfortunately.

"—Duck, stranger."

One of the [exceptions] my attendant spirit had mentioned appeared quickly.

"Or you'll be cut."

The voice reached my mind directly through aura. It was voice transmission. I quickly ducked as instructed. At that instant, a terrifying strike skimmed over my head with the sound of air being cleaved.

SHLAAASH!

Both monster toads were cut apart simultaneously.

Recalling the monster toad's regeneration a moment earlier, I cried out in dread.

"No, cutting them only makes them split and regener—!"

I stopped speaking. The monster toads remained motionless where they had been cut apart.

In other words, they were dead.

'What? Do they only split the first time, then die normally after that?'

"Nope~ They regenerate as many times as you like~"

'Then why are they dead?'

"Well, that's because..."

Before my attendant spirit could explain, someone else did.

"To kill [One Who Dies When Split in Half],"

The owner of the transmitted voice was speaking.

"You must split it into exact [halves], just as its name says."

Still bewildered, I looked again and found that he was right.

The monster toads had been bisected precisely down the center of their bodies. By some unknown principle, that had brought them permanent death.

"Next."

The owner of the transmitted voice immediately pointed his sword at the monster hedgehog.

He swung.

BOOM...!

An explosive roar rang out with each impact.

Despite the force imbued with such formidable aura, the monster hedgehog shrugged it off.

'Just like Lady Golden Silk Blossom when she had that blessing...'

Yet the owner of the transmitted voice kept unleashing slashes at the monster hedgehog as it charged, seemingly unharmed.

"This way."

BOOM...!

The old man on the left had his cry drowned out by the slash's explosive roar.

"Run."

BOOM...!

The old man on the right had his cry drowned out by the slash's explosive roar.

"Hurry."

BOOM...!

The old man in the middle had his cry drowned out by the slash's explosive roar.

"The true body of a Screamer lies in its screams,"

The moment the slashes drowned out the old men's cries, the hedgehog crumbled like sand.

"So you kill it by burying it in sound."

Two kinds of monsters had been dispatched in the blink of an eye.

Profound knowledge of his prey, and overwhelming martial prowess to put that knowledge into practice.

'A hunter...'

I stared blankly at that hunter, the owner of the transmitted voice.

My attendant spirit grumbled.

"Hah. Look at that bastard. Hasn't even aged."

The silver-haired young man I had seen within Sparkle's trauma.

"Lefanta Aegim..."

The Heaven-Slaying Star.

Lefanta Aegim tilted his head as he put away his sword.

"Do you know me?"

Eyes as blue as a newborn star turned toward me.