Date with the Demon King (3)
Cracks in severed space rained down like shattered puzzle pieces, baring the gaping abyss beyond. The warped timeline thrashed erratically, carving jagged fractures before collapsing in upon the points of discordance.
The heart of the parched Wasteland rumbled, literally detonating under the sheer distortion.
“…Tsk!”
I clicked my tongue, staring down Rubias as she drifted out of targeting reach. She had held out for a remarkably long time, but it seemed she was finally nearing her limit.
“Cough! Huk… haah, haah… My dear. You truly are… cold and merciless. To trample a maiden’s longing with such utter indifference.”
“If you weren’t a Demon King, I wouldn’t have gone this far. You brought this state upon yourself.”
“Is that so…?”
Offering a bitter smile, Rubias raised a trembling hand to wipe the blood from her face.
“How sorrowful. Is this, too, destiny? Even I, the sovereign of space and time, cannot bend this single truth. Ah, cursed causality…”
Her voice trailed off in a mournful, solemn murmur, yet the pressure radiating from her began to swell—slowly, inexorably.
Grrrrr…!
The aura was so suffocatingly perilous that Kubel’s Authority dormant within my soul surged to the surface on its own, rumbling in a bestial snarl.
“Phew… Very well, I admit it. Perhaps I took things too lightly.”
Her face contorted into an ambiguous expression caught somewhere between weeping and laughing. She snapped her wings wide, shaking free the splatters of blood clinging to her feathers.
“I thought that if I could lean upon the tenderness I glimpsed in you, if I could appeal to that soft heart you try so hard to hide, I might escape these shackles. I thought… that even for a fleeting moment, I could savor what it felt like to be a woman in love. Yes, just like any ordinary maiden in a bustling market.”
“……”
“Yet… yes. If this is the natural order, then I must heed it. If this is fate, I shall walk it willingly. And if my love, my joy, and my delight lie along that path… then we must slaughter one another.”
Kwwaaaarrrr!!
Demonic energy surged forward like a tidal wave, sweeping across the surrounding terrain and cleaving through the earth.
“I have no choice but to answer. After all, that is the sole reason I live.”
The next instant, Rubias’s silhouette blurred.
“…!!”
Instinct honed far beyond mortal limits screamed in my head. She was behind me, beside me, and above me—existing everywhere simultaneously. Transcending time and space, the potential for her presence manifested anywhere and everywhere at once.
“Graaaagh!!”
Roaring like a beast driven into a corner, I swept my hooked claws across every conceivable angle. The motion took no more than a fraction of an instant, and it was no hollow swipe through empty air—an embodied authority trailed in its wake. A massive, razor-sharp claw, shimmering like heat haze, cloaked my entire hand.
Neither mana nor aura, it was no different from a Mind Sword that gave tangible form to a concept.
Skrrrt!
It was a strike sharp enough to sever the fabric of time and space itself.
“Oh? So that is Kubel’s Authority. Magnificent. Contrary to my expectations, this will be quite the entertaining clash.”
“Kaaarrrgh!”
Spinning toward the voice behind me, I slashed without hesitation. The Wasteland fractured and space tore open, but along the trajectory of my strike, Rubias was already gone.
“…!!”
At that exact moment, my instincts flashed like lightning.
“Don’t you die on me, Kang Han-gil!”
Appearing right under my guard at point-blank range, Rubias drove her fist straight toward my solar plexus. The sheer density of demonic energy and divine authority packed into her blow made every hair on my body stand on end.
KWA-CHAAANG!
A violent shockwave rippled out in concentric rings across the vast Wasteland.
“Oh? You blocked it? And that shape… is that a tortoise shell?”
Rubias curled her lips in sheer intrigue, but I had no intention of standing there admiring her reaction.
“Grrr-waaaagh!”
“Hahaha! Truly a beast! Your raw savagery makes you all the more captivating!”
Effortlessly slipping back to open distance, she narrowed her eyes and inspected my right hand. Over that hand rested an authority shaped like the carapace of a giant tortoise, acting as an impenetrable shield. Though it wavered transparently like shimmering mist, it possessed a durability capable of withstanding any assault the world could muster.
“Hmm… It seems you are capable of emulating far more than just a wolf. Since it is the authority of the Beast God Kubel, you can replicate the anatomy of all manner of beasts, can you? Fascinating.”
“Pant, pant… I’m not… emulating anything. I’m manifesting it.”
“Hmm? On the surface, there hardly seems to be a difference.”
“It’s the difference between heaven and earth.”
Crack! Crr-crack!
“…Well now.”
As the shimmering heat haze coiled around my entire body and rapidly crystallized into physical substance, Rubias let slip a soft gasp of genuine admiration.
“To think such a feat was possible. Overlaying an authority upon your flesh… No, perhaps saying you are ‘wearing’ the authority would be more apt? Furthermore, what is that… a horse? No, a wolf? Looking closer, there is a hint of a tiger woven in as well… I see. I understand now.”
Nodding to herself, she grinned and tilted her head up to meet my gaze as my frame swelled in size.
“Selecting only the greatest strengths of various beasts and draping them over your body… It is indeed worthy of being called an authority. Immensely potent, and wonderfully practical.”
“Hooooo…!”
Clad entirely in the manifested authority, my appearance was nothing short of a monstrous abomination. Legs redesigned purely for functional performance, synthesizing the traits of multiple predators; dense muscle packed across every inch of my frame; and a wolf’s gaping maw extending forward like an animalistic helm.
To an outside observer, it would look as though a man had been swallowed whole by a wolf-headed beast, his face barely peeking out from beyond its gullet.
“Heheh. One would be hard-pressed to tell which of us is the demon. Mortals would faint dead away if they laid eyes on you right now.”
“Shut your mouth.”
My Shamanic Ritual Tattoos burned like blazing embers, scattering glowing sparks into the air. Feeling the primal vitality flooding my veins, I bared my teeth in a savage grin and lunged at her without a breath of delay.
BOOOM!
“Guh-kff…?!”
Taking a direct, brutal blow, Rubias coughed up a spray of blood, genuine shock flashing across her face.
“What in the…?”
Barely catching her footing, she stared at me with wide, astonished eyes.
“Just now… did you fix the phenomenon in place?”
“Tsk. You caught on in a single strike, huh.”
“Haha… Ahaha, hahaha! You wield that authority far better than I gave you credit for! To think you would forcibly freeze the concept to prevent me from invoking mine! Color me truly amazed!”
KWWAAARRRR—!!
Expanding her aura in a singular, explosive burst, she bared her fangs, her killing intent laid stark and bare.
“I acknowledge you! Kang Han-gil! You are truly my destined adversary! From this moment on, there will be no holding back. I shall crush you with everything I possess!”
“Tsk…!”
I ground my teeth, feeling her space-time authority descend like a suffocating shroud, forcefully driving back the Domain of the Beast that had held dominion over the clearing. I had secretly hoped she would remain careless until the very end, but reality was rarely so generous.
“……”
I cast a quick, sideways glance toward the others battling the high demons. Fortunately, thanks to Cecilia’s holy arts, Arpe’s buffs, and Weller’s magic, they held an overwhelming advantage. However, the demons were stubbornly clinging on, making it clear the battle wouldn’t conclude anytime soon. The longer this dragged out, the more disadvantaged we would become. We had to settle this fast.
—Arpe! Use Forced Awakening!
—…! Yes!
An instant later, dozens of ethereal instruments manifested around Arpe, weaving a solemn and poignant melody that resonated across the battlefield.
“—!!”
Riding atop that grand overture came her breathtaking voice, threading into the melody with divine grace.
“Gasp…?!”
The sheer shock of the sensation caught me completely off guard. It was my first time ever receiving Arpe’s Forced Awakening, and it occupied an entirely different dimension from any standard buff I had envisioned.
“Grrr, grrr-aaaaagh!”
Kubel’s Authority exploded outward in an instant, elevating the soul that housed it by an entire tier and kicking wide the horizons of my cognitive perception. And into that vastly widened expanse rushed an overwhelming tide of pure bestial instinct.
My reason, my values, and my mortal ethics dissolved into a molten sludge beneath the wild surge.
“GRAAAAGH!!”
Though I fought desperately with every shred of willpower to keep from losing my sanity entirely, I was powerless to stop my transformed, beast-like body from acting purely on primal instinct.
SHRRR-RIP!
“Khk…?!”
Claws that had doubled in length cleaved through the empty air, carving straight through Rubias’s deployed authority and leaving shallow lacerations across her flesh.
“Heheheh…! Hahahaha! Wonderful! Marvelous! Truly electrifying! A true battle to the death, where a single moment of carelessness means losing one’s life! How long has it been since I last felt such terrifying peril?!”
KWA-BOOOM!
Laughing maniacally as she unleashed her power in earnest, the very properties of space warped and deteriorated entirely. In one pocket, space became viscous like a sticky spiderweb, dragging at my limbs; in another, all friction vanished, making it impossible even to stand; and in yet another, the air vanished into a complete vacuum, choking the breath from my lungs.
My legs became trapped in stagnant, decelerated time. My vision failed to process the flow of reality trapped within frozen seconds. And time flowed at entirely different rates through my left and right arms, violently throwing off my sense of equilibrium.
“GRRRR-AAAAA!”
Yet, transcendent instinct and precognitive senses foresaw incoming threats and mortal dangers with prophetic precision, while incomprehensible physical prowess bypassed every single hazard with effortless grace.
Crack! Crunch! Shk!
In that chaotic dance, Kubel’s Authority morphed at dizzying speeds—shifting like a tattered robe whipping wildly in a tempest, conjuring dozens of distinct silhouettes in the span of a single heartbeat.
‘Incredible…!’
Even while desperately clinging to my fading reason, I couldn’t help but marvel at the miraculous utilization of the authority unfolding before me—methods I never could have executed, let alone conceived, at my current level. It wasn’t merely a matter of manifesting and layering external limbs over my flesh.
From breathing techniques to specialized sensory organs, internal organs, nerve pathways, and subtle shifts in center of gravity belonging to diverse beasts—countless adaptations flared to life and vanished across the interior and exterior of my body until my very identity felt warped beyond recognition.
‘This… might actually be a massive opportunity…’
Truth be told, because the applications of Kubel’s Authority were virtually limitless, finding the optimal balance had been a grueling challenge. But now that the perfect answers were being laid out right before my eyes, there was no reason not to learn from them. While reproducing this exact mastery on my own would be impossible, even incorporating a fraction of it would elevate my combat strength exponentially.
“Hahahaha! How thrilling this is!”
CRACKLE!
Of course, that was a luxury to ponder only if I managed to survive this encounter first.
What an absolute monster of a woman.
At this point, I couldn't even tell if the Absolute Ring Set had dealt any real damage to her at all.