Now We're Friends, Right?
"So we're friends now, right?"
The Red Horse of Circulation glared down at me.
As master of this place, he had made an offer to everyone who tried to break the loop: hand over a suitable reward and leave quietly.
But I hadn't accepted his overtures. I had no intention of leaving — if anything, I planned to send him packing from this place.
Kugugugung!!
The earth groaned, and the crimson steed — a beast the size of a small mountain — charged straight at me. Pouring divinity into my body, I swelled to match his scale and reversed my grip on the hammer.
"Hoo."
Kwaaaang—!!!
For a moment, an incredible weight pressed down on the hammer and the hands gripping it — just a moment.
…!!
PUHIHIHIHIK!!
A massive shockwave erupted across his surface, and the Red Horse lost his balance and toppled over backward.
The deafening roar of the earth being torn apart sent the fragments that made up this world flying in every direction. The strange, alien power coursing through each fragment poured toward me as well.
I converted the hammer into a spear in an instant and thrust it forward.
Kwagak! The fragments hurtling toward me were annihilated against the spear's tip, shielding Jeoksa and Wind Gale Sword behind me.
"Insane…"
"Stay behind me. I think the Circulation stacks will apply to you too."
I'd revive them if they died, sure — but who knew how a respawn timer of 512 days would actually play out? In my fourth form I could ignore even those 512 days and bring them straight back, but right now…
Hard to say.
I wasn't confident.
I checked the wrist holding the hammer. It ached faintly, but a quick flush of divinity restored it to perfect condition.
The beast looked massive enough even to the eye, but his true mass ran far heavier than that.
Hnnngh.
It made sense — a being that was, in essence, an aggregation of the authority called 'Circulation' carried dozens of times the mass it appeared to—
"Ngh!"
KWAAAAK!!
I sprang back lightly — and a colossal crimson lance impaled the exact spot where I'd been standing.
No, not a lance. A horn.
KWAAAAAAA!!!
The power of Circulation boiled over, and hundreds — thousands — of crimson horns materialized in the empty air, blazing with savage killing intent. The sky filled to bursting, and all of those horns came pouring down toward me.
A familiar style of attack, this.
"Rain of Spears."
Dozens of spears bloomed behind my back and shot forward, splitting apart mid-flight. Dozens became hundreds; hundreds became tens of thousands. The ten thousand spears intercepted the horns head-on.
The Red Horse, refusing to be outmatched, poured more of his power into the horns — but it was no use. His horns numbered only in the thousands, while my spears, even after fulfilling their purpose, split endlessly and kept intercepting, kept striking.
Pudududuk…!
Before long, every horn had vanished from the sky, and only pure white spears remained, hanging there in a ring that enclosed the Red Horse.
…….
Now we're finally ready to talk.
"Let's have a chat, Red Horse."
Hnnngh.
Somehow he'd pushed himself back up, and now he was glaring at me with eyes brimming with wariness. He was as tense as a creature staring down a monster it knew it could never defeat — but then, I wasn't in perfect condition either. Rain of Spears demanded far more divinity than I'd expected.
"Didn't you say you needed a friend?"
─......
"I'll be your friend. A friend for one who lives an eternal life."
I extended a hand, casually. The Red Horse snorted and rose high into the air, as if laughing at me.
─By what means.
The world rang out.
As though the voice had been soaked into the very fabric of this space, the Red Horse answered in human speech for the first time — not the cry of a beast. It sounded like a gruff, ancient man's voice, and also like a soft, young woman's. A chorus of countless voices of indeterminate age and gender blended into one, and the world itself seemed to cry out with it.
The Red Horse of Circulation's twin eyes burned crimson.
─Eternity is no trifling matter.
"Becoming friends isn't a difficult thing at all. Spend time together, grow close — that's all a friendship is."
No matter that he was the ruler of this place, no matter that he'd been fighting me moments ago — he could absolutely be my friend. Just as I'd grown close to countless monsters in the past, sealing them within my soul and my weapons alike.
─You hold Circulation in low regard, it seems.
With a deep, thrumming hum, the world flipped upside down.
Not the loop itself — a kind of illusion the Red Horse was projecting. The ground inverted, the mountains inverted, the seas inverted. And when at last even the sky turned over, the entire world plunged into darkness.
No ordinary living creature could ever escape the eternity the Red Horse wove.
I felt my body plummeting toward the bottom of the earth — and in that instant, I understood exactly what he was.
A Concept Race. A special species bearing the trait of Eternity.
The Metamorphosis — beings of Metamor, the shape-shifting substance that could accept both divinity and magic. The Unicorn — capable of crossing dimensions and time to perceive truth with eyes like a god's. The Concept Races were beings who wielded divine authority within a single domain. Some could see through all things in creation, or possessed wisdom surpassing even the highest orders of Celestials and Demons.
But their combat power was pathetically low — and so, countless numbers of them were slaughtered by the Celestials and Demons who looked upon them with contempt.
Though he's the only one who was never treated as a mere insect.
At any rate — this Red Horse was a Concept Race bearing the authority of Eternity.
Any ordinary being would have sunk straight into that eternity and lived out their days on an endless treadmill. But—
─...!
Eternity was achingly familiar to me. Most Concept Races were close to immortal; to Celestials and Demons, eternity was practically a passive trait.
I took a single light step forward — the shattered world reassembled around me, and somehow I was standing on the Red Horse's back.
His brow furrowed.
─...What did you just do.
"Walked up. That's all."
I walked up, plain and simple.
─You defied Circulation?
"I walked up, I told you."
Regrettable as it was for him, the Eternity that Circulation carried could neither bind me nor warp me.
Because I already possessed eternity of my own.
I converted the spear back into a hammer.
─That's… impossible…
"So — will you be my friend, or not?"
─...Eternity is the absolute. You, who defy Circulation, are powerful. You might very well unmake my Circulation entirely.
The Red Horse's power surged once more. Having lived with Eternity for so long, he had spent untold ages honing and refining his ability. To him, Circulation was his identity, and everything that contradicted it had to be purged.
─Circulation must be eternal. I will grant you as much power as you require — so do not interfere. Get out of my domain.
"Come onnn. You can keep your Circulation AND be my friend. You'd just be changing addresses."
What, is moving house that painful?
There were four friends waiting at my place who lived forever, just like him.
Every one of them could be his friend.
"There are plenty of friends like you where I'm going. All of them live eternally."
─...Friends. Once, I wanted that.
"Then all you have to do is move—"
─But it is meaningless. They will die someday, and this place is my domain. I have no intention of leaving.
"Hmm…"
Stubborn as a mule.
I checked how much time I had left in my fourth form.
Fourth Form Transformation — 7 seconds remaining
Seven seconds left. Enough time for exactly one opening of the gate.
"Then would you like to take a look around? If you come back and still feel the same way afterward, I'll send you straight home. Deal?"
─...Very well. Though I warn you — nothing will change my min—
"So we're friends now, right?"
─Yes, we are.
"Looking forward to it."
─Of course.
And so, after a peaceful, pleasant little conversation, I became friends with the Red Horse of Circulation.
Happy ending, huh.
Mounted on the Red Horse, now fitted with the Saddle of Circulation — the semi-Mythic item I'd received as my dungeon clear reward — I looked down at him.
"We just had a little chat. With the professors, sweet little Sre, and the Shadow Spirit."
─……
"A lot of them have lived a very long time, so they gave me all sorts of advice. I turned them down at first, but it grew on me, and in the end I decided to stay. Happy ending, right?"
─……
"Right?"
─Y-yes! That's exactly right!
"Glad we agree."
"Professor Rasty gave me especially earnest advice, actually. Living all alone like that gets lonely, you know?"
─...That accursed blood fiend…
The Red Horse muttered under his breath and shook his head as if he'd seen enough for a lifetime. He looked completely hollowed out, which suggested Rasty had subjected him to something truly horrific — but honestly, she'd hardly done anything at all.
She'd simply tried to weave her illusion over him, the same way she'd once tried it on me, so I let her show him her own private hell in return. Nothing more.
It was nothing, really.