Chapter 18
Chapter 18
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 018
Chapter Title: Is a God Made?
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Three years ago, Park Sun-woo's world came crashing down.
In his days as Korea's top artifact engineer, a fatal design flaw was discovered in the Guardian Shield he'd poured his heart into crafting.
During a C-rank Gate raid, the shield's mana circuits backfired, the barrier vanished, and three fellow hunters—who'd trusted him and stood at the front lines—lost their lives.
The accident investigation committee pinned all the blame on him, the creator.
Rumors spread that he'd skimped on materials by using low-quality mana stones to cut costs, and his guild kicked him out.
No one cared about the truth.
They just needed a scapegoat to shoulder all the blame.
He lost everything.
His honor, his wealth, his comrades... and even his wife, unable to bear the despair, left his side.
All that remained was a mountain of crushing debt and his one light in the world: his daughter, Min-ji.
But the world tried to snuff out even that final light.
Rare mana overload syndrome.
A horrific disease where his newly awakened daughter's uncontrolled mana rampaged, gnawing away at her tiny body from the inside.
Her life force dwindled like a flickering candle, day by day.
The only cure was implanting an S-rank artifact perfectly resonant with her mana to stabilize the flow.
The doctor said cautiously,
"It'll cost at least tens of billions of won."
"And even then, we can't guarantee success."
Tens of billions.
Once, it hadn't been an impossible sum for him.
But now, it was as distant as the stars.
From that day on, his life became hell.
He took any job that came his way.
From grueling construction labor to repairing broken artifacts through shady back channels.
His once-delicate hands, which had crafted tools to protect the world, were now caked in grease, metal shavings, and calluses, losing their former grace.
Yet even that barely covered Min-ji's expensive meds and hospital bills.
Time wasn't on Min-ji's side.
Every door in the world slammed shut in his face.
At the end of his despair, when he thought there was nowhere left to turn,
he spotted a light on the monitor screen of his rundown studio apartment.
Or perhaps it was a darkness deeper than any light.
'I am Lee Jung-woo. Emperor of the Necrosia Empire.'
The man the whole world pointed at as a madman.
His arrogant declarations, leaking through Go Se-gu's YouTube stream, struck a different chord in the hopeless Park Sun-woo.
'A land without Gates...'
'A new order...'
'Prove the value of your world...'
Above all, his overwhelming power that defied common sense.
With that power...
One sleepless night by his daughter's hospital bed,
as he held Min-ji's tiny hand, her breaths growing faint, a mad spark of hope ignited in Park Sun-woo's empty eyes for the first time in ages.
He made his resolve.
If there was no god, he'd sell his soul to the devil himself.
As long as it saved his daughter.
The next day, clutching only a weathered photo frame with his daughter's picture, he left home.
And headed straight for Suwon, where the eyes of the world were fixed.
Thus, he walked toward the grand gates of the Necropolis palace.
Unknowing whether salvation or deeper ruin awaited him.
Before the palace's main gate.
His appearance was pathetic.
A threadbare work jacket and hiking boots patched multiple times.
His face was darkened by years of toil and worry, and even in his mid-thirties, his eyes were hollow, like those of a man who'd lost all hope.
"Who's that guy? An evacuee?"
"Nah, doesn't look like one. Maybe a guild rep?"
"No guild mark. Just looks like a regular guy..."
As the reporters buzzed, Park Sun-woo crossed the barricade line like a man possessed, heading straight for the Necropolis gates without hesitation.
"Danger! Do not approach any further!"
The police shouted through megaphones to stop him, but nothing reached his ears.
His eyes held only that massive, ominous gate.
When he finally reached the gates, flanked by Dullahan statues standing like sentinels,
Park Sun-woo knelt before the cold steel without a trace of fear.
And bowed deeply, his forehead touching the ground.
All who watched held their breath.
He was the first to come here on his own two feet since Lee Jung-woo's declaration.
Time passed.
Kiiiiiieek—
Defying all expectations, the massive gates groaned open once more.
What poured from the crack wasn't pitch-black darkness, but a presence radiating an even denser intimidation.
Elder Lich, Belial.
He gazed down at Park Sun-woo, prostrated before the gate, with the indifference of one overlooking an insect.
"Are you the one? A mere mortal daring to seek an audience with my lord."
"That YouTuber fool too... Here, any dog or cat gets a private meeting with the master."
Belial's voice carried a chill of death, as if it could freeze the air around them.
Not lifting his head, Park Sun-woo replied in a trembling voice.
"...Please let me see him. I'm not here to fight. I've come only to beg for salvation."
"Salvation..."
Red light gleamed mockingly from Belial's empty sockets.
"My lord is no philanthropist. He has no interest in saving vermin like you. Before my darkness devours your soul, begone."
Park Sun-woo didn't back down.
Instead, he carefully pulled a photo frame from his jacket—his last remaining treasure.
"I offer everything I have. My life, my soul, all my skills... Please, show mercy."
Abandoning even his last shred of reason, he pleaded with near-religious fanaticism.
To Belial, the sight of this mortal casting aside all pride to beg an absolute being for salvation looked like that of a zealot.
A frailty incomprehensible to him, a contemptible spectacle.
Just then, the report reached Lee Jung-woo in the living room via the soul network.
"He calls himself the first devotee."
A genuine, amused smile crept across Jung-woo's lips for the first time in ages.
"A devotee?"
"What an interesting guy..."
Jung-woo issued a direct command through the soul network.
Belial fell silent for a moment, then spoke lowly to Park Sun-woo at the gate.
"...My lord permits your audience. It seems your desperation has piqued his whim."
"Follow me."
Guided by Belial, Park Sun-woo staggered to his feet and took his first step into the Necropolis.
Behind him, the massive gates boomed shut once more.
He wobbled briefly but steadied himself on trembling legs.
"This way."
He followed silently.
The bizarre yet perfectly ordered cityscape he'd glimpsed once on Go Se-gu's stream unfolded before him.
He lost himself momentarily in the overwhelming sight but quickly refocused on his goal.
After a eerie journey through shadows instead of an elevator, Park Sun-woo stood before an ordinary front door.
Knock. Knock.
Belial rapped politely.
"My lord, I've brought the one you summoned."
Click.
Beyond the door stood the very man he'd seen on his monitor.
Munching on potato chips like some neighborhood slacker.
Unsure where to stand, Park Sun-woo froze awkwardly in the middle of the living room.
"So."
His voice was still languid.
"What do you want from me."
Lee Jung-woo asked.
Cold indifference laced his tone.
With trembling voice, Park Sun-woo pulled out his daughter's photo and poured out his soul.
His glory days as an engineer, his sudden fall, his comrades' deaths and the world's scorn, and his daughter's incurable illness—his last hope.
There was no exaggeration or lies in his tale.
Only the raw desperation of a father who'd lost everything.
Silence hung heavy in the living room after he finished.
"...So, what do you expect me to do? Is listening to your sob story my job?"
Lee Jung-woo's voice remained icy.
"No... I... I offer everything. My life, my soul, my worthless skills... Please, please save my daughter..."
He collapsed, forehead to the floor, sobbing.
Any pride for bargaining had vanished long ago before his daughter's fading breaths.
All that remained was his thirst for salvation.
Lee Jung-woo looked down at the weeping man like a curious insect.
Belial at his side urged, "My lord, wasting time on such a pathetic mortal..."
"Quiet."
One word shut Belial's jawbone with a click.
Jung-woo stared piercingly at Park Sun-woo, a strange smile curling his lips.
"Interesting."
He rose and stood before Park Sun-woo.
"Your daughter's disease. I can fix it."
"...!"
Park Sun-woo snapped his head up.
Incredulity and a sliver of hope blazed in his eyes.
"But I'm no god. Salvation isn't my specialty. However..."
"Since you're the first to crawl to my feet in this shitty world, staking everything, consider it service for my inaugural guest. A souvenir won't hurt."
With a gesture, a small crystal orb gleaming brilliantly appeared in Belial's hand.
Jung-woo took it and tossed it at Park Sun-woo's feet like a coin.
"Inside is a mana stabilization core you can implant in your daughter. Take it and give her a new heart with your own hands."
Park Sun-woo stared alternately at the orb and Jung-woo, eyes trembling.
He couldn't believe it.
A miracle granted without cost or test?
"Tha... Thank you... This grace, for life..."
"No need for gratitude. Instead,"
Jung-woo's eyes gleamed with mischievous madness.
"Spread word of this miracle far and wide. No, shout it from the rooftops. Prove with your voice who I, Emperor Lee Jung-woo, am. That's your payment."
The testimony of a man saved by the Emperor at despair's end.
It would pierce hearts more powerfully than anything else.
The next day, the world erupted in controversy once more.
Park Sun-woo held an emergency press conference outside KBC Broadcasting Station.
At his side stood Min-ji, her condition miraculously improved, beaming innocently before the cameras.
"The world abandoned me and my daughter, but Lee Jung-woo saved us! He performed a miracle, curing an incurable disease that even billions couldn't guarantee. People call him a terrorist or a disaster, but to me and my daughter, he is our one true savior!"
His voice rode the airwaves across the nation.
His testimony poured fuel on the Lee Jung-woo phenomenon.
Gate-free zones, talent recruitment, miracles, and now an irresistible personal salvation story.
Park Sun-woo's heartfelt press conference was snowballing into an uncontrollable social wave.
As expected, the media and government branded him a traitor and began a witch hunt.
His tragic past was dismissed as the cowardly excuse of a man who'd sold his soul to a monster, betraying the greater good.
People easily condemned him, drunk on righteous fury.
But beneath that condemnation, an unforeseen current began to stir.
Those who'd lost everything to Gates but received no recompense, the outcasts including Awakeners shunned by society, the incurably ill and their families abandoned by modern medicine.
They began to see Park Sun-woo's story as a small, singular hope blooming in despair.
Among them, Lee Jung-woo was no longer a disaster.
A strange faith took root, naming him the Black Savior descended in the age of apocalypse.
Even in the internet's darkest corners, boards for Necrosia Empire citizenship applications popped up,
and absurd phenomena unfolded, like analyzing his offhand words and debating his imperial philosophy.
They began calling Park Sun-woo the First Witness.
Unintentionally and ridiculously, this marked the birth of the primordial cult that would one day worship Lee Jung-woo as a god.
And soon, that hope would quietly, bit by bit, take root as blind faith in Lee Jung-woo himself.
Deeply, viciously, without him even knowing.
At the center of that chaos, Park Sun-woo began to move again.
Not just to pay the price Jung-woo demanded.
He instinctively knew that mere words to the world couldn't repay the weight of his salvation.
After leaving the hospital hand-in-hand with his daughter, he first contacted his old comrades.
Three years ago, when the guild collapsed and they scattered, they were the only ones who'd believed in him.
As expected, only scorn and condemnation returned.
Over the phone came the heated voice of his once-closest junior.
"Have you lost your mind, Sun-woo hyung? Do you even know what you're doing? What do you plan to gain siding with that demon? Don't you remember the kids who died because of you?"
Words like daggers to the heart.
But Park Sun-woo didn't give up.
He persuaded them persistently, calmly.
His wretched past, the truth the world ignored.
And Lee Jung-woo's overwhelming power, the unbelievable promise of Gate-free zones.
"...You know it too. The current system changes nothing. They see us as disposable parts. But that man... he might value engineers like us differently."
His words slowly shook some comrades' hearts.
They too had been rotting away, pushed out by big guilds' capital games and politics after his fall.
The world cared not for their skills, but their connections and reputation.
Talents the world had forsaken.
In them, Park Sun-woo saw his past self.
And he dimly grasped why Lee Jung-woo had opened the talent recruitment door, why he'd made him a witness—the grand design's meaning.
Of course, the very architect of that grand design was currently sprawled on the sofa, munching chips while eagerly awaiting the next twist in his trashy drama.
To Lee Jung-woo, talent recruitment was
nothing more or less than collecting useful parts to boost the empire's efficiency, letting him slack off harder.
But in the eyes of Park Sun-woo, who had tasted salvation, the Emperor's simple efficiency was
mercy for all the world's forsaken, the key to a new era.