The Stigma Left Behind
The same routine kept repeating day after day.
They woke, ate, set out again. When mealtime came, they stopped wherever they happened to be, ate, and moved on once more. Eat, sleep, wake, eat, travel.
Yoon Sang-hyuk kept his eyes on the world outside the carriage window.
This was no longer the barren stretch of Demon Realm land he had seen until now. Somewhere along the way, grass had begun to appear, along with short, sparse trees. There were fruit trees he couldn’t identify, and flowers too, strange in shape but unmistakably blooming.
“We’ve reached the outskirts of the Gray Wasteland,” Zeronia said.
Yoon Sang-hyuk nodded.
“Feels more like the entrance to paradise than a wasteland.”
The standard of beauty held by humans and the beings who lived in the Demon Realm might well be different. At least to Yoon Sang-hyuk’s eyes, the scenery before him looked far more livable than anything he had seen before.
As they went deeper into the Gray Wasteland, the green grew thicker. A small lake came into view in the distance. When he focused his gaze, he could even make out unusual animals gathered around it.
“Peaceful,” he murmured.
“That’s because Baal, like the former Demon King Satan before him, declared this place forbidden and shut everyone out,” Zeronia replied.
Yoon Sang-hyuk raised a hand and clenched his fist. At once, the carriage came to a stop. Zeronia and her brothers could communicate by telepathy within a certain range.
“How about one last meal before we meet the divine beings staying in the Demon Realm?”
At his words, Zephyr, his brothers, and the members of the Arian clan began preparing the meal. Calling it preparation was generous; all they did was take out the food from Earth that Yoon Sang-hyuk had pulled from his subspace.
During the entire journey to the Gray Wasteland, the group had fallen completely in love with Earth food. The most popular items by far were ramyeon and coffee.
Even Arin and the children of the Arian clan liked coffee. He had worried they might not sleep well because of the caffeine, but the children were natives of the Demon Realm, after all, and seemed completely unaffected. In fact, they loved the sweetness of instant coffee so much that after every meal they drank not one cup but two or three, faithfully and without fail.
Yoon Sang-hyuk made do with a single energy bar.
“Subspace really is convenient.”
He muttered it while drinking milk.
Subspace preserved whatever was stored in it exactly as it had been at the moment of storage. That meant even ingredients that spoiled easily could be kept there without any worry. They kept taking out instant food because the group liked it so much, but inside the subspace were vegetables, meat, and countless other ingredients.
The Arian clan children were hard at work on black bean noodles, their mouths covered in dark sauce. In front of each of them sat a chocolate snack.
Maybe not so much for the adults of the Arian clan, but for the children, joining Yoon Sang-hyuk had clearly been the best decision they could have made.
Once the meal was finished, they set out again.
The green waves, so out of place in the Demon Realm, grew even denser. There were trees laden with appetizing fruits that looked plainly like apples or pears. There were also many birds and four-legged beasts living in the area. It was only natural, given the growing abundance of edible fruit and pastureland.
About an hour after the meal, the party had to stop once more.
Kieeaaak-
When the sharp cry rang out, the beasts pulling the carriage, which had not even flinched at the waves of monsters, reared up their forelegs and went wild.
“Divine beings,” said Zeronia.
He already had a rough idea of what was happening outside.
When he stepped down from the carriage, he saw three griffons and the people mounted on them. One was a handsome man, and the others were two women. All of them wore armor with a soft golden sheen, and a holy power radiated from them.
They were divine beings.
When Yoon Sang-hyuk stepped forward, the divine man blocking the road widened his eyes in surprise.
“You are...”
“Hello. I’m Yoon Sang-hyuk, a human.”
He understood very well why they were shocked.
It was probably because of the equipment he wore and the energy he carried. The Yorgheim Set possessed a considerable amount of holy power, befitting a myth-grade item. On top of that, Yoon Sang-hyuk had even received a direct blessing from the saintess.
And that wasn’t all.
It was also thanks to him that the three gods, including Idea, had been able to exert their influence on Earth directly.
As a result, while he couldn’t compare with the highest-ranking priests, Yoon Sang-hyuk still carried a substantial amount of holy power.
“What is a human doing in the Demon Realm?”
“The explanation is a bit long. If I may, would you allow me to meet Lord Atram?”
The divine man looked over the faces of the people gathered around Yoon Sang-hyuk and then shook his head.
“That will be difficult.”
With everyone in Yoon Sang-hyuk’s party except for him belonging to the Demon Realm, the divine man had more than enough reason to be wary.
Especially since his eyes had fixed on Ibrahmut and showed no sign of leaving. The discomfort in that look was unmistakable. He had said he came by from time to time, but it seemed he still had quite a bit built up inside him. Feeling Yoon Sang-hyuk’s glance, Ibrahmut laughed awkwardly and shrugged.
“I have a reason I absolutely need to meet him,” Yoon Sang-hyuk said. “Please.”
“I’ll pass the message along first. But the decision will be Lord Atram’s.”
* * *
The place the divine beings guided them to was the outer district of the central area of the Gray Wasteland. Not far away, old-fashioned buildings stood clustered together in a neat little spread.
It was too large to call a village, but a little too small to call a city.
Divine beings were walking through the streets. Children among them, clearly divine as well, stared at Yoon Sang-hyuk and the others with wide, innocent eyes and open curiosity. It was much like children who had just visited a zoo for the first time, marveling at the animals inside.
The same went for the children of the Arian clan.
“Wow, their hair colors are weird.”
“Their skin is so pale.”
The children stared at one another’s differences with fascinated expressions. Yoon Sang-hyuk patted Arin’s head, smiling at her bright-eyed wonder, and climbed back onto the carriage. Children aside, he had no desire to become some caged animal on display in a pen.
“How is it?” he asked.
“I’m fine.”
Since entering the territory of the divine beings, the holy power had been growing stronger by the moment. He had worried about that, since it clashed with Valender von Graus, who was a death knight.
But it didn’t seem like this level of holy power would affect Valender von Graus much.
“What do you think Atram will do?”
“We won’t know until we meet him. If I go alone, I should be able to see him. But I’ve got a strong feeling it won’t be a pleasant meeting.”
* * *
The meeting with Atram, the god of light, or rather the former god of light, only came together three days later.
Yoon Sang-hyuk stood face to face with Atram in a space made entirely of light and nothing else.
The radiant halo around him was striking, like the saints depicted in the stained-glass murals of a cathedral. As a god, Atram possessed a beauty that transcended humanity.
“A human carrying the fragrance of Mother,” Atram said.
“It turned out that way,” Yoon Sang-hyuk replied.
“What brought a human all the way to the Demon Realm?”
“It’s a long story...”
Yoon Sang-hyuk began to explain calmly.
First, there was Earth, a dimension unfamiliar to Atram.
Then there was the fact that the players of Earth had been forcibly dragged into the Roselia Continent while playing a game called Eternal World. The struggle to survive there. The return to reality through the final quest. The way reality had then transformed into something like a game. The countless crises he had handled, and how he had brought humanity together. The last battle with Baal in the Demon King’s castle after endless combat.
And finally, the cause behind all of it, the massive conspiracy on a dimensional scale that he had uncovered.
“I’ve heard a little about the fallen ones from other dimensions through Mother,” Atram said. “An existence called Greed is probably one of them. Still, impressive. To fight the Demon King and end in a draw.”
During the Shinma War, Atram had been badly wounded while fighting one of the beings ranked third among the demon lords. If even a god had been injured to that extent, then it was only natural to be astonished that a human had fought the Demon King, not even a demon lord, to a standstill.
“To return to the dimension called Earth, I need to eliminate Satan, who is imprisoned in the Abyss of the Void, and obtain his heart.”
“Ha, eliminate Satan? Even Mother could not do that.”
The meaning was clear: it was impossible, so he should give up on the dream before he wasted any more time.
“I matched the new Demon King, Baal, blow for blow. I don’t think eliminating Satan is impossible at all. Of course, there is something I need in order to do it.”
“Is it the stigma?”
Yoon Sang-hyuk did not deny it and nodded.
Atram stared at him for a long while with a strange expression, then finally spoke.
“Do you know what a stigma is?”
“I heard it has something to do with the stars.”
“That’s right. A stigma is connected to the stars. To talk about a stigma, I suppose we need to talk about stars first. Mother and all the other gods each have their own star. The star where a god resides symbolizes that god. Well, my star is probably already gone...”
He spoke with bitterness, then let out a dry laugh.
“The stigma here is connected to Mother.”
At the mention that it was tied to the goddess Idea, Yoon Sang-hyuk’s eyes widened.
“Mother suffered a serious wound in the battle against Satan. Not fatal, but deep enough to be grave. At that time, part of Mother’s star was broken.”
“And that fragment remained here?”
“More precisely, I hid the broken fragment away. This is it.”
Atram turned his palm upward, and a brilliant light rose above it. Feeling a familiar energy, Yoon Sang-hyuk stared at the glowing radiance. It was the same power he had felt from the Idea Order, and from the saintess as well. In other words, the holy power of the goddess Idea.
“Mother’s stigma. This cannot be given to anyone else. As you saw on your way here, this region is no different from the rest of the Demon Realm.”
“So it is.”
“That is only possible because of this stigma. With my power, already stripped of most of its holy force, I cannot maintain this place. That is why I can’t hand it over.”
“Is there truly no way?”
He still didn’t know exactly how to make use of the stigma floating above Atram’s hand. But one thing was certain: it would be a tremendous help in the fight against Satan.
“A way?” Atram gave a hollow laugh. “If you can break the contract that binds us and let us return once more to Mother’s embrace, then this stigma would no longer be needed.”
“A contract?”
“Yes. A contract forced upon us after we were taken prisoner by the beings of the Demon Realm. Because of that contract, we have been unable to leave the Demon Realm for a very long time.”
“A contract with Satan?”
Atram shook his head.
“There are three dragons in the Demon Realm corrupted by evil. Those evil dragons were the vanguard of Satan’s army, and they slaughtered countless lesser gods and members of the light’s bloodline.”
As he recalled the past, Atram’s face twisted with pain.
“The ones who made the contract were those evil dragons.”