I Might Have Been There
...I might have been here, once.
Golden feathers came hurtling down.
As dozens of feathers rained in, I swatted every last one aside with my spear.
Geegigigeek...!
The feathers went flying off with a distinctly unsettling sound, embedding themselves haphazardly into the walls, ceiling, and floor — everywhere the mad destruction hadn't yet reached.
Sharper than I'd expected.
I reversed my grip on the spear.
Divinity was being sucked toward a single point, and the boss, sensing the anomaly, shot high into the air — but it was too late.
Eye of the Spear.
The storm of Rushala, the Angel of the Azure Sky, erupted from the spear's tip and swallowed everything whole.
Every last thing in the ruins was dragged toward a single point, and the power composing the Forgotten Emperor's very being began to warp, as if cracking apart at the seams.
Just as I thought — it's a blend.
Pharaoh's power, and the power of something with wings.
Those two forces mingled together were what sustained this creature's current state. Unstable — and precisely because of that instability, even more potent.
The mask shattered and fell away completely.
With the mask broken, the boss — the Forgotten Emperor — looked strikingly like Pharaoh in life.
Short golden hair and glinting eyes of the same color. Even the sun-bronzed skin.
Pharaoh had always preferred short robes to the gaudy, flowing garb typical of emperors, which meant the sun tattoos etched into both his shoulders were always in plain view.
Tattoos that flared with power every time Pharaoh wielded his might.
"...O great one."
The tattoos blazed with golden light.
"You have returned!"
"?!"
Pharaoh's power came pouring down on me.
Even as I raised the spear, shifting it into a hammer mid-motion, I dropped to one knee and caught the blow.
Kugugugung...!
The ruins shook violently, as if welcoming the master of this power, and even the storm of the Eye of the Spear did nothing to lessen the aftershock.
"I will never lose again! Now, tell me! Who is the true emperor?!"
"...I have no idea what you're talking about."
I poured strength into the hammer.
I shoved back the crushing pressure that threatened to shake the entire ruin to its foundations, and through the gap I forced open, the true emperor revealed himself.
"It doesn't seem to be you."
The Forgotten Emperor's left shoulder flared with brilliant light and sagged.
His arm trembled as though weighted down by an enormous sack of sand.
While he reeled from the sudden anomaly, his right shoulder drooped as well.
That tattoo belonged to Pharaoh.
Perhaps things would be different if he'd claimed Pharaoh's complete body and power — but in such an imperfect state, he couldn't possibly block Pharaoh's interference with his own authority.
In an instant, both of the Forgotten Emperor's arms were sealed. He shuddered, glaring daggers at Pharaoh.
"Who are you."
"That body. Where did you get it."
"This body? It is mine. I was born carrying the legacy of the great emperor — it is mine by right."
"...You seem to have trouble understanding what is said to you."
Whoosh! At a casual flick of Pharaoh's hand, both arms wrenched violently backward.
And then Pharaoh kicked the now-helpless Forgotten Emperor square in the chest.
The Forgotten Emperor went flying and slammed into the wall.
Having reclaimed the statue's foot, Pharaoh swallowed a low groan.
It wasn't that his attack had failed to land.
Quite the opposite — he had dealt a blow far heavier than his current abilities should have allowed.
"...Strange."
"Kgh..."
"There is no way it should end with merely this."
The one who had stolen the body of the great emperor.
Merely by claiming that body, he should have been able to wield overwhelming authority — enough to crush a Pharaoh in his current state with a single finger.
And yet the Forgotten Emperor was taking Pharaoh's blows head-on with both arms sealed.
"Even the lowliest of creatures resisted my dominion. So why is it that you cannot resist?"
"......"
"If you refuse to answer."
Pharaoh's authority ignited at his fingertips.
The Forgotten Emperor's body began to be dragged out along with it.
The body he had lost once before, to the demon race.
Reclaiming it could bring Pharaoh a tremendous transformation.
Certainly, it didn't look perfect yet — but with time, and with me growing stronger, Pharaoh's influence to intervene in Deoen would only expand.
And with that expanded influence as a foundation, he'd be able to return to his original form before long.
His hand drew closer and closer.
Just as Pharaoh's fingers were about to touch the emperor's head completely—
[Great one. Cease.]
A pincer burst up through the floor and severed the statue's arm clean off.
The golden pincer that had sheared through that impossibly hard arm exuded a chilling, frigid aura.
Pharaoh's authority cut out for a moment as well, and the Forgotten Emperor's eyes snapped wide open as he swiftly wrapped his entire body in his wings.
He was disappearing.
"Ghk! You won't escape!"
Pharaoh hastily unleashed his authority, but the golden-glowing pincer came for him a second time.
Scorpio was the boss of this dungeon.
If anything, it had to be at least as strong as the Forgotten Emperor — there was no way it could be weaker.
And if dominion didn't work on it, then Pharaoh — who held power comparable to Leo's — was suddenly in real danger.
I shifted the spear back into a hammer and smashed it down on the pincer.
The moment the pincer buckled inward, Scorpio registered the threat and yanked it back down below in a hurry.
Piercing and cutting power capable of punching straight through a floor that had been impenetrable mere seconds ago.
Sssszzz...!
The floor sealing off the gap between the layers was closing.
"...Damn it! I lost him!"
"I'm going on ahead. Follow me."
I threw myself through the hole without hesitation.
You have entered Underground Floor 10.
You did not enter through the normal route. The difficulty of the Interference Dungeon has increased.
You have acquired the title, Trespasser.
Long ago, there lived a great emperor. When danger came for him, he split his power and his body in two, laying plans for the future. But the emperor never returned, and his power became a legacy. Beware! Those who carry a legacy covet one another — though that does not guarantee they are enemies.
Splish.
A vast cavern welcomed me.
The scale of it was in a league entirely apart from Floors 1 through 9. Even right in front of me, a colossal statue — easily towering over twenty meters — gazed down at me with stern grandeur.
Pharaoh.
This was a temple that had once revered the great Pharaoh.
Now, all of it had crumbled into nothing.
"...Mm. Explaining it properly would take a while."
I scanned my surroundings.
At a glance, the statue seemed to be staring straight at me, but it was simply built in a downward-facing pose. It gave no sign of registering my presence, nor did it move on its own.
The other statues were the same.
After laying a hand directly on the statue, I strode straight out of the darkened temple.
Despite being on Underground Floor 10, sunlight poured down unfiltered.
"Uncle Inom wasn't something I made from scratch. If anything, it's closer to say I summoned something that already existed."
Endless buildings stretched out before me, and a golden aura pulsed from somewhere far in the distance.
Above all, an imperial statue of the emperor — tens of meters tall — caught my eye, standing in solemn vigil with a massive greatsword driven into the temple beside it.
"It looks like we've gone into the past."
Precisely speaking, somewhere within a past era.
Pharaoh's Empire of the Sun — Desertum.
The Empire of Desertum had swallowed half of the world's four great continents — a nation that ruled over the deserts entire.
Back then, countless powerhouses and monsters roamed the land, and even the demon race — the celestial demons, though only of the lower orders — walked freely among them. And yet Pharaoh's empire had stood mighty for over three thousand years.
Having claimed the desert that cleaved the continent in two, Pharaoh grew his power further through intermediary trade, and until the day came, his standing was nothing short of towering.
Yes. Until the day came.
For Pharaoh, it was a day more hellish than hell itself.
The day a high demon brought his empire to ruin in less than five minutes.
...It looks perfectly fine right now.
Who could ever imagine that this peaceful empire would soon be crushed into dust?
Desertum soon faced a great and coming calamity, and fell. The master of Desertum was defeated, and his legacy passed, long after, into another's hands.
You may 'interfere' with specific beings across three distinct time periods.
The beings of these time periods are unaffected by your presence; only by expending 'Interference Power' can you influence them.
The greater the influence, the more Interference Power is consumed.
You may interfere with anyone — but the ones affected by your interference in the future are only those who inherit a 'legacy'.
Current Interference Power — 100%
I read through the newly displayed dungeon information.
The content itself wasn't particularly difficult to grasp.
It felt similar to the scenario dungeon I'd experienced back during the World Tree arc.
"So I've been dropped into the setting of a past time period, and it seems I can spend something called Interference Power to influence the people there."
"It's not a regression."
Returning to the past was impossible.
To turn back the countless energies and souls surging forward, to reverse the endless web of cause and effect, would require power truly equal to a god's — and even the one who created Deoen couldn't manage that.
If there was one method available, it was only an overwrite.
They'd drawn a clear boundary — only legacy inheritors — so as long as souls remained undamaged, influencing them alone should be possible.
And thinking of the past, something suddenly came to mind.
If this place was from long ago...
I might have been here, once.
In the era when Desertum still stood whole and unbroken.
'Lily Elbrit' had visited this place too.