Black Flame Radiant Star God

— Author's Note: The chapter numbering may have gotten shuffled around while the text was being moved. If you haven't read the content related to the Heavenly Demon, please check out Heavenly Demon (5). Thank you kindly. (__)

...Come to think of it, these were still here.

So much had happened, so fast and so chaotically, that I'd flat-out forgotten about them.

I let out a breath of relief and looked around.

A hospital.

The antiseptic smell particular to hospitals stung at the tip of my nose. The room was spacious—by the looks of it, I'd been assigned a private one. Fair enough, all things considered. I had put on quite the spectacle.

I stretched. Nothing ached. Nothing was even stiff.

— Lord Seoha!

In the middle of checking myself over, Yeongcheon came flying at me, calling my name. I stroked her as she bounced against me.

"What happened while I was out?"

— You defeated the High-Rank monster, and then all sorts of things happened, Lord Seoha. Yeongcheon said, as though replaying it all in her head.

"Give me the short version."

— Kim Seohyun, Erciel, and Kim Ara all performed incredibly, and it feels like America is desperately burying everything Seo Gayeon did.

"I see?"

If America was covering it up that desperately, the White Pantheon had almost certainly stepped in. Behind them would stand the knightly orders as well—and the moment they laid eyes on her, they would have grasped exactly how extraordinary Seo Gayeon's value was.

Villains were another matter, but where demons were concerned, she was as good as invincible. After all, Seo Gayeon was a Mid-Rank carrying the potential to slay Highest-Ranks.

Which meant that before the second semester, I could kill Kalia...

Even without him entering a rampage, no less.

Put that way, it really doesn't add up, does it.

I closed my eyes and turned the thought over.

The Heavenly Demon had said so: the light of destruction that affirms a demon's death—Starlight Mana—and the power of Yeokcheon could not exist in the same era. And yet, in this era, both did. A discrepancy born of an irregular named me.

The Genesis God drifted to mind. Even I, a grizzled veteran of this world, knew practically nothing about it. It had made the universe, and made the laws within it. That was the whole of what anyone knew about the Genesis God.

Come to think of it, Seo Gayeon could read my heart.

And the reverse held true as well. Every now and then her emotions reached me with a vividness that was honestly frightening. We resembled each other in other ways, too. Black and white. If my Black Wing was the single wing jutting from my right shoulder, Seo Gayeon's White Wing was the single wing jutting from her left shoulder blade.

The Heavenly Demon had said so. Yeokcheon energy and Starlight Mana were powers under the Genesis God's jurisdiction, and no one knew what ability might be born if the two were manifested at once.

The best I could conceive of right now was resonance. Or perhaps some entirely different authority.

And the complications didn't end at one. I had Faith—and where I should attune that power was a headache all its own.

It had been pushed back a step because of Yeokcheon. If the Genesis God already held completed divinity, there was no opening for me to wedge into. Which meant I ought to thread my divinity onto the alchemy track instead.

Gold and Flame were nothing to sneeze at, but they came up a little short next to Alchemy. The two divinities were useful in a dozen ways, yet it also crossed my mind—did I, already carrying Yeokcheon's power, really need to hand-pick divinities that merely raised attack?

I'll commit to Alchemy.

With that, I resolved to fuse my divinity into Alchemy.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

Status window.

...Hm.

A low hum escaped me as I studied the window. Honestly? I was a little moved. I hadn't imagined I could grow this far.

With the Body of Defying Heaven only half-formed, I'd been fully prepared to grind out a few retries. At this level, though, it counted as a genuine success. Maybe it had turned out even better than this—but I decided this much was satisfying enough.

No one died.

Yet, anyway. And I had no intention of letting anyone die in the future, either.

I have to get stronger. Far more than I am now.

I sank back into the bed and quietly took stock of my own body. There it was—a vessel so vast it registered far more clearly than before. A black sphere. Primordial force and flame. And at its heart, something bearing the weave of Breath itself.

And what on earth do I call this thing?

Until a little while ago, it had been the Black Cauldron. The Heavenly Demon had called it a vessel. So, seeing as it was a big vessel—maybe I'd simply call it a Great Vessel.

— Ungh.

A faint voice reached me. At some point, Heukcheon had appeared at my side.

— Master?

You're awake?

— I am. Though my head aches. Aftereffects of the Lone Soul, perhaps? Heukcheon tilted her head as she spoke. I activated the Hand of Midas and ran my fingers along her blade.

— Hnngh, w-wait, just a moment. HyaAAAAAAahn♡

Heukcheon shuddered from head to toe and hung her head.

Yep. That was Heukcheon, alright.

— Watching this, I almost feel sorry for Heukcheon. No, wait—considering what she got up to in her past life, even suffering far worse than this would be letting her off easy, wouldn't it? Yeongcheon muttered.

I shrugged. "Heukcheon, there's something more important than that."

— Hnngh, hah, M-Master! Wh-what is the m-meaning of this! To—to lay hands upon the body of an innocent maiden without a word of warning!

"I only gave a sword a polish. Anyway—there's something I'd like to show you."

— What might that be, Lord Seoha!

I laid a hand over my heart.

What had replaced the Black Cauldron was whirling with ferocious intensity. It was unmistakably not the Black Cauldron anymore. Like a great ocean, it cradled an immense Yeokcheon—and it was something imbued with the very natures of the Primordial and the Flame.

— Master, that is?

— Lord Seoha?

A parting gift from the Heavenly Demon. More precisely, something I had plundered from the Heavenly Demon, but there was no need to tell them that. No—they might actually like it even more this way.

"I can't decide what ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to name it."

— Hmmm, that is a quandary. A name is truly important, after all.

— It is a child of the Master and myself, so a most precious name must be bestowed. Heukcheon declared abruptly, wearing an impish smile.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

Right. Let's cherish it and raise it well together, then.

I huffed a laugh. Heukcheon's eyes cut sideways at me.

— Master, you shall truly be punished. You will be wrung dry by all those women, and in the end you will come crawling to beg for my aid!

I do have Infinite Stamina, though?

— Eek!

I gave up on riling Heukcheon and went back to surveying my body.

Black. Flame. Primordial.

A short deliberation, and a name surfaced unbidden—as if it had always been waiting there.

Heukyeomhwiseongsin—the Black Flame Radiant Star God.

— ...Not bad at all. As expected of you, Lord Seoha!

After a beat of silence, that was Yeongcheon's verdict.

The silence needled me, but I was riding high on the satisfaction of having coined a rather magnificent name, so I let it slide.

"Hm?"

A semi-transparent blue pane flickered across my retina.

...Oh.

The Dragon Knight's Lance, the Hammer of Thunder, the Spear of the Wind-Thunder God. All solid picks.

But what I would choose had been decided long ago.

So it's here, now of all times.

I gazed upon the pure-white sword wreathed in white blossoms and a blue stem.

The Spring Sword.

I was staring down one of the Four Seasons Swords.

One day, this blade would pass into a demon's grasp, and an incident would unfold that brought an entire city to its knees. Civilians and hunters, heroes and demons and villains alike—the sword would pronounce its ending upon friend and foe without discrimination, and the world would be thrown into chaos.

The Summer Sword and the Winter Sword were the intuitive pair, each carrying the power of Extreme Yang and Extreme Yin. The Spring Sword and the Autumn Sword were stranger beasts. The Spring Sword cradled the power of life; the Autumn Sword cradled the power of mana. Place the Spring Sword in a malicious hand and corrupt it, and it became a sword of death. Corrupt the Autumn Sword, and it turned into a mana bomb capable of erasing an entire city within hours.

I chose the Spring Sword without a second's delay.

FWOOSH!

The burst of light scattered, and a pure-white blade revealed itself before me. A lily-like white flower bloomed at the grip, with a blue stem wound snugly around the hilt.

I wanted to fuse it with the Winter Sword then and there, but the Spring Sword and the Winter Sword were poison to each other. If only I'd had the Summer Sword or the Autumn Sword, I could have merged them on the spot.

I checked my body's condition. The power that unlocked from High Rank onward—giving form to mental imagery and warping the laws of reality—was beyond me. My inner landscape was simply too bloated, I'd been told, for me to draw it out.

Doesn't matter. Gaining the Black Flame Radiant Star God had already shown me I could take its place.

Which meant one thing: I had crossed halfway into High Rank.

A dark alley.

The demons were ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠in full flight, retreat already written into every step. The severance from the outer dimension that Hyeong-ak had wrought at the very beginning had since curdled into a noose, cinching tight around their necks.

"Don't even think about running! We're owed back at least ten times the blood we spilled!"

"Kill every last one of those demons! The gods themselves bless us!"

Heinrich Lewis, a sergeant of the Nazi Empire, caught his breath in the alley.

At the start, they had been the ones doing the crushing. Two of the Seven Evils had entered the fray in the flesh. The White Pantheon lay paralyzed by the betrayal of its own gods. The divinity they bestowed was on the weaker side—but the mere fact that the White Pantheon wasn't intervening was enormous.

That was why the Nazis had staked so much on this battle. Committing a hundred thousand mage-soldiers was proof enough of that. And those mage-soldiers had vanished without a trace.

All because of a single woman. A woman bearing the White Wing, firing the light of destruction.

Kzzt.

In that instant, Lewis's senses screamed a warning. He obeyed them and threw himself forward.

KA-BOOOOM!

Black mana swallowed the building whole.

Beneath the wreckage stood a man. His attire was striking—traditional Chinese dress—and his face might have belonged to a man in his fifties. Strangest of all was the black mana around him, utterly untouched by any corrupting power.

"KWAHAHAHAHAHAH!"

The old man laughed. The highest executive of the Jecheon Society laughed, and beside him lay the Vice-Cult Leader's severed head, its face still frozen in dumbfounded shock.

"At long last, he has descended! The Heaven-Shattering One who will smash this rotted world to pieces!"

Corpses carpeted the surroundings. Some belonged to paladins, but the vast majority were demons'.

"The Jecheon Society! Have you lost your minds?! You're betraying us?"

"Ridiculous. We forged a temporary alliance because our purposes happened to align. But now that our purpose is fulfilled, is it not only natural that we follow our god?"

For that, he had killed the Vice-Cult Leader he had served for half his life.

"Your... god?"

"The Heavenly Demon. The Heaven-Shattering One who will drown the very sky in demon. The celestial being enthroned above all demons. Our true god descended upon this land—and lent the White Pantheon his aid."

He had seen it with his own eyes. The sight of an overwhelming power trampled flat by a power still more overwhelming.

That alone was reason enough for the Jecheon Society to turn its coat.

"My sincerest apologies, but you will find it rather difficult to reach the Heavenly Demon."

"You—"

The executive's eyes narrowed. From the far side, a figure in elegant dress stepped into view. Magongnyeo. The woman who had once coveted the Vice-Cult Leader's seat.

"Magongnyeo. So you have left the Retribution Brigade?"

"Left? It would be more accurate to say I was... made to leave."

"Oh?"

"We met the Heavenly Demon. Without even the room to lift a hand, the Retribution Brigade was swept away to the last man."

"I see. Even the Retribution Brigade, erased in a single instant..."

Admiration colored the executive's expression.

"And yet you claim the road to the Heavenly Demon is barred in your present state? What do you mean by that?"

"A simple reason. He dislikes revealing himself."

"Ah. So that is how it is."

If that was the reason, the executive could accept it.

"Which is why—shall we not bind ourselves together, just the two of us?"

"Just the two of us. Well... fine. The Vice-Cult Leader is gone from this world, after all."

The executive and Magongnyeo clasped hands, both of them smiling.

I need only purge the Jecheon Society and leave behind those capable of walking into the light. That, in turn, would serve the Heavenly Demon.

I must meet the Heavenly Demon and sound out his will. And when the moment ripens, I will kill Magongnyeo and dress it up as an accident.

Hand in hand, the two of them dreamed entirely different dreams.