King of Dobong-gu (6)

"How rude. A zombie, am I?"

"You're a necromancer? Then… how is the number of people you've killed so low?"

"Because I haven't killed anyone since then. And that's not all — I've even saved people."

I pointed up at the rooftop of the building I'd been hiding in. Se-a poked her head over the edge and nodded.

"Don't lie to me. You're saying someone who hasn't killed a soul somehow raised this entire undead army?"

"Don't believe me if you don't want to."

"Fine. I don't believe you. I refuse to. You're being controlled too, aren't you? I'll free you from that bondage."

The Flame Emperor strode toward me, raised his sword, and brought it down.

Or rather — he tried to.

"You can't cut me down, can you?"

"……."

"I know your type well."

How could I not? I'd been one of them. These days, killing people left me feeling nothing at all — but it hadn't always been that way.

Is it really just a monster?

It's just a goblin. Stop making a fuss.

But—but it's pregnant!

The second day I ever entered a gate. The day I watched a fetus spill from the belly of a goblin my senior had cut down. I threw up everything in my stomach and didn't show up at the office for two days.

Maybe that was the day my future as a shut-in was sealed. From then on, I couldn't shake the thought that monsters were living things too — that all I was doing was committing slaughter on a massive scale. That was why I'd crumbled so easily the first time I faced a monster with mental attacks.

Those memories barely stirred anything in me now. But meeting someone so much like my old self left a sour taste in my mouth all the same.

"Your heart isn't that strong, is it?"

"What?"

"The sight of people dying makes you want to vomit. Even killing goblins turns your stomach. You hate finishing off the undead who've already died once."

"That's… not true."

"This world is far too cruel for someone with a heart like that. Isn't it?"

The Flame Emperor looked strained. Whether it was from burning through so much power in so short a time, or because I'd struck a nerve — his hands, blackened like charcoal, were trembling hard.

"Then why didn't you kill the criminals on Bukhansan?"

"That was the Special Safety Department's…"

"Sure, you had your reasons. But was that really why? Or was it that you didn't want to commit an unauthorized killing and create a mess you'd have to answer for?"

The moment he stepped out from under the Special Safety Department's shadow, every life the Flame Emperor took would become his responsibility alone. Of course, in the apocalypse, murder meant nothing. But his fragile heart couldn't bear even that "nothing" of guilt. For a boy who measured good and evil ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠by the body count of the people he'd killed, that was far too heavy a burden.

"Want to hear something interesting?"

"Don't. I don't want to hear—"

"I never killed those undead. All I did was give them life again."

"…."

"But now you've killed them all over again. People who had come back, even as undead — and you finished them for good."

The Flame Emperor sucked in a sharp breath. He turned, and behind him lay a field of ruin: bones melted down, skulls smashed by his blade rolling across the ground.

On a whim, I had one of the still-intact skeletons walk over. Ah — I remembered this one. One of the skeletons I'd first raised in that room of the residential complex.

"She was married. They held out in their apartment for months after the collapse before they died. Right?"

The skeleton nodded.

"Your husband… burned to death over there."

This time she couldn't nod. She only turned her head toward the blazing plain.

"You've seen them. These people could barely have killed a single human being between them."

"…You—! You can revive them! They came back earlier! Bring them back again!"

"There's a limit. You killed too many. They can't come back."

A lie. One click of Se-a's mat and they'd be up again. I'd just turned it off for the moment. Even the skeleton that had turned its head had been obeying a command through Possession.

"Then… then I…"

"You looked at Lahan, who killed a lot of people, and condemned him as a villain. By that logic, you're worse than anyone standing here."

I took another step closer. The searing heat had dropped considerably — a sign that the Flame Emperor's mental state was cracking. We were close enough that a simple swing of his arm could have driven a blade through my heart. Softly, gently, I said:

"If you want to kill me, kill me. If you believe you're in the right, then do it."

"……."

Of course, Grim Reaper's Protection meant a crude attack like that would never land. But to him, it would look as though I were staking my life on this persuasion — the picture of someone pure and sincere.

"You can't, can you? You're the villain now. Can someone who just slaughtered thousands pass judgment on me for killing a mere two people?"

"Ha… hahaha…!"

The Flame Emperor snapped. His eyes went hollow. His body shook violently.

"I'll make you an offer. Come with us. We can accept even someone like you—"

"Bullshit."

His sword flashed toward me without warning. In that same instant, Grim Reaper's Protection activated. A Grim Reaper bloomed out of a scatter of smoke, caught the blade, and swept its scythe through the Flame Emperor's gut in a wide arc.

"Ghk—!"

"What? I thought your mind had completely broken."

"You're right… it has. Cough. And that's how I realized."

In that moment, he had shattered completely. I'd fled to a corner of my room before I broke; but in a world that was hell no matter how far you ran, he had nowhere to go — and so he broke right where he stood. And he chose to keep living broken.

"So what if I'm a mass murderer? If it means I can destroy a greater evil, I'll gladly become one. The undead are evil. A necromancer is the greater evil that commands them. You deserve to die."

But his next attack never reached me. Awakened zombies surged in at that exact moment, each unleashing a different ability as they charged.

"GRAAAH!"

Ice hammers. Fireballs. Iron chains erupting from the ground. Zombies lunging with spear-blades aimed at his vital points. The Flame Emperor had no choice but to turn his attention on the zombies, and in that opening I scrambled back out of range.

"Lahan! Now!"

"As you command."

A deep, rolling rumble filled the air. Just like the one he'd forged at Bukhansan Fortress, a colossal greatsword materialized overhead and plummeted toward the Flame Emperor. He didn't simply watch it fall. He gathered his power again, preparing to shatter it—

Clack.

The instant the Flame Emperor moved to destroy Lahan's greatsword, Ttacttac-i crashed into the fray!

Clack!

"Ttacttac-i!"

My first undead barreled into the Flame Emperor and tackled him hard. The Flame Emperor's fist missed the greatsword entirely.

"What—?!"

That short, final cry was all he managed. With a sickening crunch, the Flame Emperor was crushed beneath the massive stone greatsword and died.

The heat blanketing the area vanished in a rush. The fires still devouring the wreckage sank low. Only when the system window appeared did I finally trust that we'd won.

"Whew. Finally dead!"

He was ridiculously strong. Against Lahan I'd barely had any cards to play, so that was one thing — but even pouring everything I had into this fight and shaking his mind with lies, I'd barely scraped out a win.

But who won in the end? Me. The King of the Underworld!

"Alright… then of course, Death Knight."

Honestly, I was a little disappointed I hadn't managed to recruit him while he was still alive. Turning a Legendary-class into an undead was bound to nerf him, right? The skill that preserved an Awakened's abilities intact, Immortal Legacy, was only Heroic-rank. There was no way it could fully restore someone Legendary like the Flame Emperor.

"Can't be helped, I guess."

What mattered was that the Flame Emperor was mine now! Grinning from ear to ear, I selected Death Knight.

"What?!"

What on earth was this all of a sudden?! I'd been busy imagining all the things I'd put him through once he was a Death Knight!

Fortunately, more system windows stacked up one after another, so I was spared the indignity of thrashing on the ground throwing a tantrum.

"Ohh!"

I had no idea what those censored names were, but they'd clearly struck some kind of deal. Anyway — that meant the Flame Emperor was becoming a Death Knight, right?

"And what's this supposed to be?"

Not a very necromancer-sounding skill name. Come to think of it, the longer name had been the one interfering with the undead servitude, hadn't it?

Not that I even know what either of them is. Can I really divide them into sides?

Still, I had a hunch. The "higher beings" Lahan had mentioned — that had to be them. The masters of the system that handed out classes and skills to people, maybe?

"Apostle… apostle, huh."

I watched the Flame Emperor before me, wreathed in blue smoke as he became a Death Knight. The system had clearly called him an apostle. If he was the apostle of the higher being that had tried to stop me… then was I the apostle of the shorter-named one?

Come to think of it, the fact that my class is Mythic-rank has been bothering me too.

Mythic. Higher beings. Entities that freely handed down skills…

"……Ah."

"Ohh, he's up!"

That line of thought didn't last. Unsolvable worries evaporated the moment the Death Knight that had been the Flame Emperor rose to his feet.

"Ohh, he looks incredible. Now that's a Death Knight!"

Sleeker and longer-limbed than a Dullahan — a knight with a lean, sharp elegance to him! I waited for him to swear loyalty the way my other undead always did. The Death Knight dropped to one knee before me, exactly as I'd hoped, and then…

"You filthy necromancer — turning me into an undead?! I'll kill you!"

…bowed his head toward me and launched into a full stream of curses.