Chapter 600: The Black Stone (3)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 600: The Black Stone (3)
Kim Do-jin agreed.
The power of a devil.
The aura emanating from that black stone was more than worthy of the name.
He racked his brain, relentlessly searching for the right word to describe that energy.
The word he found was ‘violence.’
It was violent, as if created with the sole intent of destruction.
Only then did he truly understand.
He understood why Hexagram had coveted that object so desperately.
And why the Saintess had so adamantly refused to let it leave.
It was an object worthy of such conflict.
For the purpose of destruction, it would be difficult to find anything better.
He let his imagination wander.
‘If that were in my hands…’
He wouldn't have to bother with such troublesome schemes.
With that power alone, he could do whatever he pleased.
The Guardians, Hexagram…
He could cleanly cut away the parts he disliked and boldly take the parts he desired.
No, that wasn't all.
‘With that, I could hold the entire world in my hands…!’
Just as a sliver of imagination born from curiosity was rapidly morphing into a desire that seethed like lava erupting from an active volcano…
“Do-jin!”
The Saintess’s urgent, desperate cry from beside him pulled his consciousness, which had been sinking into a deep mire, back to the surface.
“Ah…?”
Kim Do-jin tilted his head with a bewildered expression.
‘What was that?’
His mind felt a little fuzzy.
What had just happened?
‘I feel like my mind was filled with some very, very bad thoughts…’
This feeling.
He had felt it a few times before.
A greed for something overwhelming, something utterly captivating.
He must have been mesmerized by it once again.
And this time, by none other than that black stone.
As his gaze unconsciously tried to shift back to the Black Stone, the Saintess’s pale hands firmly gripped both his cheeks, fixing his line of sight on her.
“It’s dangerous to look any longer.”
The Saintess warned him in a firm tone.
Kim Do-jin asked with a dazed look.
“What was that…?”
It was a very strange sensation.
Like being torn away from the embrace of a femme fatale so alluring she could lead a man to his ruin.
While he was relieved not to have been completely swept away, a part of him felt an immense sense of loss.
What kind of ecstasy could he have experienced if he had remained in that embrace?
As he was thinking of a place he could no longer reach, a place he must never reach…
“This is one of the reasons the Black Stone must not leave this place.”
Her explanation continued.
“That object stimulates a human’s desire for destruction. It leads them to break, tear, and trample everything in this world, bringing it all to ruin.”
“Then, just now, was I…?”
“Yes, that’s right. You were standing on that very threshold just now and barely managed to come back.”
His mind went blank.
The temptation of an object.
It wasn't a common occurrence, but it wasn't something he had never experienced before.
They sometimes existed in high-level dungeons.
Traps, artifacts, and beings that mesmerized humans.
Whenever that happened, it had always been his role to snap his party members out of it.
His mental fortitude was so solid that it could never be broken by any ordinary temptation.
That was why it was so hard to understand.
“You’re telling me I was this shaken by a mere object…?”
Of course, the Black Stone was more threatening and alluring than any object he had ever seen.
The power to bend the world to his will through destruction.
Wouldn't any man who had, even in his youth, dreamed of world domination be tempted?
But it shouldn't have been to this extent.
To be shaken so easily meant that a crack had formed in his once-impenetrable mental barrier.
“The Black Stone’s temptation varies greatly from person to person.”
“Varies…”
From behind her veil, her gaze fixed sharply on Kim Do-jin.
“The stronger a person’s destructive desires, the more easily they are drawn in and fall for its temptation.”
Kim Do-jin’s face hardened.
Her words meant that a destructive desire lay dormant within him.
And the Black Stone had tried to draw out that desire to dominate him.
As if pitying him, her hand gently caressed his cheek.
“It must mean you’re carrying that many burdens. So many that you want to sever all the tangled threads in your life instead of untangling them one by one.”
“……”
He thought to himself.
Is that true?
Perhaps it was.
It would be easier, wouldn't it?
To just kill and destroy everything, rather than constantly weighing and calculating.
But he knew.
He knew that wasn't a true solution, but merely an escape.
Cutting the knot on a plastic bag of takeout food instead of untying it caused no problems.
But life was different.
If one were to ruthlessly sever the tangled threads of their life without calmly examining and untangling them…
The only future for such a life would be the same ruin.
“I’m sorry, Do-jin.”
She apologized out of the blue.
“I must have relied on you too much and given you too many tasks. That’s why…”
“No.”
He cut her off as she blamed herself, her hand still on his cheek.
He carefully reached up and placed his hand over hers.
Other than when she was healing him, this was the first time he had touched her personally.
Stroking the back of her hand, which was rougher than he’d expected, he made a resolution.
This was an opportunity.
A chance to raise her favorability with him.
A chance to make his existence seep even deeper into her being.
“I have never once thought that things were difficult because of you, Saintess.”
As he answered in a tone full of conviction, a slight change occurred in her.
“Ah, um… i-is that… so?”
Her voice was laced with bewilderment.
The pale nape of her neck, visible below the veil, was flushed red.
Her face behind the veil was most likely the same color.
He took another step forward.
“I’d rather you rely on me more, Saintess.”
“D-Do-jin…”
Startled, the Saintess took a step back.
She had heard those words once before.
From Francis Meyer.
The man who had shouldered the heavy burden placed upon her when she was still young.
He had said the same thing.
—“Lean on me when your shoulders feel too heavy.”
It hadn't felt like this back then.
She had felt reassured, like she had a dependable pillar to lean on, but there hadn't been this overwhelming feeling.
What was so different between Francis and the man standing before her?
‘Why is my heart…’
Pounding so hard?
The answer was not difficult to find.
Francis Meyer was much older, like a dependable uncle to her.
But Kim Do-jin?
Although he was younger, his deep thoughts made him feel like a peer.
Yes, a peer.
A man and a woman of a similar age.
The tender, heart-fluttering emotions that naturally form between such a pair.
Vaguely sensing this, she hastily pulled her hand away and took another step back.
“I-I understand. I fully understand what you mean, Do-jin. A-anyway.”
She quickly changed the subject.
“Y-you said you would replicate the Black Stone, right? Do you… think that’s possible?”
He hesitated for a moment.
One more step?
Or stop?
The deliberation was short.
“I’ll have to take a slow look at it now.”
He decided to follow her lead.
Pushing too far in a single day could often lead to an equal retreat.
“If I start acting strange again, please wake me up, Saintess.”
“…Yes, I will.”
With that, Kim Do-jin closed his eyes for a moment.
He composed himself.
He reminded himself.
Solving things through destruction was no different from running away.
And the option of running away had never existed in his life.
‘Though there have been strategic retreats.’
Anyway.
He carefully observed the properties of the Black Stone.
A violent aura.
And through it, the stimulation of desire.
If he could just implement these two properties, he felt he could create a Black Stone that was, at least on the surface, a perfect replica.
‘How do I implement that?’
The pull of strong desire.
And immense power.
As he mulled over the two, an idea came to him.
What if he used his own aura of Gluttony in reverse, to make his opponent constantly desire something?
And at the same time, what if he used Greed to relentlessly absorb and store the surrounding energy?
‘I can definitely make it.’
A fake Black Stone, similar yet different.
One that could be controlled, posing no risk whatsoever even if it fell into the enemy’s hands.
He accelerated his thoughts.
What else did he need to make this?
‘An artisan.’
He needed a master artisan, someone who could create an object durable enough to have these functions embedded within it and to store the vast amount of mana it would absorb without issue.
And Kim Do-jin—the Guardians—had such a person.
“Saintess.”
“Please, speak.”
“I need Angela.”
* * *
The moment the Saintess’s summons was issued, Angela boarded the fastest plane and arrived in Vatican City.
At first, she was unenthusiastic.
Vatican City was an incredibly boring place.
It was so pious that there was little to do, and everyone went to bed so early that she felt self-conscious about hammering late into the night.
However, the Saintess’s next words changed her mind.
—“Hmm… what should I do? Do-jin specifically asked for you, Angela.”
That was all it took.
She immediately packed her bags, boarded a plane, and arrived in Vatican City just after noon.
She faced Kim Do-jin with a fluttering heart.
“H-hey, have you been…!”
As if her brain had malfunctioned, she was about to greet him shyly like a nineteen-year-old girl in love, when…
“Take a look at this, Angela.”
He casually placed a piece of paper on the table.
Her mood instantly soured, and she asked in a blunt tone.
“…What’s this.”
“My lifeline.”
“……?”
She didn't know exactly what he meant, but the feeling of importance hit her hard.
So, she hid her disappointment and examined the paper he had placed before her.
The paper was a blueprint.
One that, upon completion, would result in an object with very peculiar properties.
Seeing it, she laughed.
“It’s nice that you think so highly of me, but I can’t make something like this.”
An object with the function of absorbing mana from the atmosphere.
It was possible to some extent.
But the absorption rate written on the blueprint was abnormally high.
It was an amount that couldn't be handled even by layering hundreds of mana-absorbing magic circles.
As an artisan, not a woman in love, she was about to firmly refuse to get involved in an impossible project when he spoke.
“Ah, I can handle that part. What I want to ask of you, Angela, is this.”
Kim Do-jin pointed to a section of the blueprint with his finger.
At the tip of his finger was a crudely drawn sphere.
“Can you make an object sturdy enough to handle these numbers?”
Her mind went blank for a moment.
He could handle that abnormal level of mana absorption?
Her heart began to pound, and she leaned forward eagerly.
“You can do this? Really? Don’t lie.”
“I really can. And if you can make it, I can handle even higher numbers.”
“If this is possible… th-that means…!”
An object that absorbs mana from the atmosphere.
With this, she could do countless things she had never been able to do before.
For instance, she could increase the usage count of an artifact’s built-in magic from a limit of one to three times per charge to tens, or even hundreds.
Or, creating a sword that could maintain its Sword Ki for a long time with the absorbed and stored mana would no longer be just a dream.
Her mouth watered.
She shot up from her seat and shouted.
“Can I do it?”
She asked herself.
Could she create a mineral that could easily withstand that immense output?
“I don’t know either!”
Of course she didn't.
She had never done it before.
But one thing was certain.
“Just wait a bit. I’ll make it, no matter what.”
She had to succeed.
“Sophia! The forge is ready to use, right?!”
“Fufu, of course. I anticipated this and prepared it in advance.”
“Great. I’m heading there now!”
She strode purposefully towards the forge.