Chapter 111
Chapter 111
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Ace
Chapter: 111
Chapter Title: Volter's First Memory
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Muspelheim's devil, Volter's first memory was of gazes soaked in prejudice and disgust.
"Too small."
"A worthless punk."
"A disgrace to Muspelheim."
He remembered looking up at the devils who spat those words for a long time.
Muspelheim was the world of giants.
The world where the great race possessing the power of both giants and devils lived.
That was the world called Muspelheim.
But in such a place...
'Why am I so small?'
Volter had been born deprived of the giant bloodline, possessing only the devil's power.
Crunch-.
If his first memory was disgust and prejudice, his first food was a bone stuck with scraps of discarded meat.
Volter grew up eating such things.
He ate whatever he could, building his strength. He barely escaped being trampled under giants' feet countless times and hid away constantly.
How much time passed like that?
One day.
Suddenly, he realized they weren't all that big.
Drip, drip-.
So he killed them all.
The day he stood atop the corpses of devils mangled by thousands, tens of thousands of thorns piercing their bodies.
Volter no longer feared other devils.
Then one day.
"...Huh?"
A devil unlike any he'd seen before came to him.
A body on another level entirely. A sturdy frame that no thorns could pierce.
A sense of helplessness washed over him, greater even than when he'd first faced those devils looking down on him in disgust.
"I have a task for you."
The creature thrust out both whip and carrot without preamble.
"Do it well, and I'll accept you as 'one of us'."
Us.
At that single word, Volter's chest burned hot.
He had slain countless devils who looked down on him.
But deep down, he yearned to nestle into the fold of Muspelheim.
"Wh-what do I have to do?"
To Volter's question, the devil whose head was shrouded in clouds replied.
"Bring me thunder."
Thunder?
Volter looked up at the sky with a puzzled expression.
Even in Muspelheim, blazing with roaring flames, thunder and lightning struck from time to time.
But Volter had never once thought of it as something he could grasp in his hand.
More than anything...
'Is it even necessary?'
The devil before him loomed even in the sky he gazed up at.
Overwhelming power and bulk.
His presence, one that naturally evoked the word 'great', seemed incomparable to mere thunderbolts crashing from above.
'For a guy like that?'
Forget thunderbolts—even natural disasters would be mere parlor tricks before him.
That was what Volter thought back then.
Kwarung-!
He heard the sound in a flash.
Something swept over his body. By the time he registered it, the world had gone black.
He felt it instinctively.
Can't take a direct hit. But he couldn't dodge.
Then, could he block it?
His body moved before his thoughts. Countless thorns wrapped around Volter like armor.
Kwajajak-.
Thousands, tens of thousands of thorns were shredded apart. In the blink of an eye, the black wave shattered the thorn armor and engulfed Volter's body.
'What just passed...'
Pajij, pajijiji-.
His body felt paralyzed, refusing to move.
Not even heat registered. By the time the black-tinged lightning surged over him like a wave, his entire body had already burned away.
'-Yeah.'
And after a brief moment.
Volter realized his condition.
'I'm... dead.'
Thud-.
His body toppled sideways.
The instant he sensed death, Volter painfully lifted his head to gaze at Lee Soo-hyuk.
Chijij, chijijiji-.
Faint black currents still flowed over his body.
What on earth had entered him?
He had become something utterly different from moments ago.
'Ah...'
Seeing that sight, Volter recalled the devil from long ago who had ordered him to fetch thunder.
'So that's why...'
He finally understood, a little, why such a great devil had craved that power.
Passeu-.
Volter's body, collapsed on the ground, crumbled into black ash and scattered.
Tssstsu-.
The power dwelling in his body drained away completely. As Master of Lightning deactivated, his body felt light, almost floating.
And in that moment.
He'd gained one level from hunting the devil already, and now three more from clearing the stage.
He'd earned a decent amount of points too. Wondering if there was another reward besides the Heart of Thunder, it seemed this was the trial's final prize after all.
'Gotta be satisfied with this.'
Glance-.
Lee Soo-hyuk eyed the gem in his hand.
The Heart of Thunder, sparkling with blue light.
No extra rewards was a letdown, but it wasn't like the prize was lacking.
This was, after all, an item Asgard and Muspelheim coveted fiercely.
'And that's not all.'
As shown in the cutscene, it wasn't just Asgard after the Heart of Thunder.
Far more beings than that—entities beyond his current level, ones he wasn't even permitted to lay eyes on—all desired this item.
However.
【 Heart of Thunder 】# Grade:Legendary# Type:Material
A gemstone imbued with the power of thunder.
It's only half.
The problem was that it was still in a state too tricky to use properly.
As he quietly revealed the reward details, viewers erupted into debates over whether it was good or bad.
Most agreed it was 'good'.
No special reason. Like most players, the first thing that caught their eye was the grade.
'Legendary grade, huh...'
It wasn't his first time holding one. He'd gotten his hands on a Legendary item during the second-floor trial alone.
But that 'Spear of Lightning' had been a one-time use item.
And now it was a material.
'Better than a one-shot item, but...'
His head was already starting to ache.
'The real issue is finding a craftsman.'
From testing it out, he could use the item in its current state.
And the effect exceeded expectations. The moment he drew on its power, he could unleash higher-output lightning with comparatively less effort.
But material items only truly shone when properly crafted.
That donation message popped up then.
And that sparked it.
Introductions led to viewers claiming their own jobs were item crafters.
Tales true or not lined up. Tempted for a moment, Lee Soo-hyuk pondered while scanning chat.
"Vi-Viola-nim!"
Vigo's urgent voice.
Wondering what was wrong, he turned to see Viola collapsed, unconscious.
"Move aside."
Fearing something amiss, he checked her pulse. Steady breathing sounds followed.
Lee Soo-hyuk, who had been urgently checking her, let out a sigh.
"She's asleep."
Seemed her tension had finally snapped.
Her wounds from Belveim weren't light, and she'd pushed herself too hard.
The immediate crises were over, but the trial wasn't finished yet.
There was a mountain of things he needed to hear from her.
In a forest devoid of light.
At its center, Kim Ye-ryeong gripped a demon by the throat.
"Talk."
Kwaaak-.
Her nails dug into the flesh of his neck. The red-skinned demon trembled violently, bloodshot eyes bulging.
"Who was here. And what went down."
"Squeezing like that, I couldn't talk even if I wanted to."
At Si-woo's remonstration as he watched, a flash of killing intent crossed Ye-ryeong's eyes.
She seemed unusually agitated.
And for good reason.
'Never thought it'd be empty.'
It had been quite a while since they'd entered the forest.
Yet in all that time, Si-woo and Ye-ryeong hadn't fallen into a single trap, nor encountered so much as an ant.
The only late discoveries were the demons hiding in the woods.
And from those worthless demons' words, Si-woo and Ye-ryeong pieced together what had happened here.
"Today's buffet's looking fancy."
"Blue Zone next, now two stray ants?"
Combat traces littered the forest everywhere.
Recent marks. Among them, plenty of footprints.
Ye-ryeong realized from the footprints alone what had gone down.
'A real fight happened.'
It wasn't a trap laid for them.
There had been another reason to mobilize all those players from Blue Zone.
Which meant...
'Is Gyu-seong really here?'
But why of all places here?
Thud-.
Ye-ryeong released the demon's neck. The creature, throat pierced by her fingers, gasped raggedly, clutching the wound.
"Kuhuk, heuk-."
"Now talk. Unless you want a painful death."
"Huuu-. Guess you're set on killing me."
"Wanna live? Then spill."
Coaxing or genuine, who knew.
Demons didn't fear pain. But they weren't nonchalant about death either.
At Ye-ryeong's promise of life, the demon's eyes wavered.
"......Lee Won-jae came from Blue Zone."
"Lee Won-jae?"
Ye-ryeong's brow twitched.
Lee Won-jae.
Blue Zone's vice-guild master, practically Kim Il-su's right-hand man.
No.2 in a massive guild. Not the type to move personally lightly.
Yet that sedentary bastard came all the way here.
"Yeah. Brought some human with him. Seems their purpose here was that guy—they grabbed him and left right away."
"What human?"
"Don't know the name. Higher-ups accepted him."
"That kind of answer—"
About to press as the response irked her, Ye-ryeong shut her mouth.
This demon in front of her was small fry. The real heavyweights were far above the sixth floor, not ones to be subdued this easily.
He probably truly knew nothing.
"......Anything else?"
"Nothing more. That's it."
"Yeah?"
Ye-ryeong nodded as if accepting.
Then.
Craaaack-.
The demon's body froze white solid. Si-woo spoke up.
"I never said I'd let you live."
Having frozen the demon from head to heart solid, Si-woo turned to Ye-ryeong.
Her expression complicated.
"Gyu-seong."
Si-woo shared his thoughts with her.
"Looks like he's alive."
"...Yeah."
And she thought the same.
"What now?"
"What're you asking?"
Crunch-.
Ye-ryeong's eyes hardened.
"We find him. No matter what."