Dragon-king
Dragon-king
Foresight was not omnipotent.
It was a vantage born of intuition and sixth sense honed to the superhuman threshold. In the end, what it rested on was the individual's own ability.
For Aslan, with his physical limits, to protect Ereta while fending off the Dragon-king's attacks was nearly impossible.
Above all, foresight was not omnipotent.
Even when he used it, the cascade of calculations and deaths drove his accelerated cognition to devour him slowly from within.
Overuse of foresight could kill him.
It would melt his brain and leave him dead.
Yet Aslan could not let go.
The moment he released his foresight, Ereta would die. And after that, no vision would hold any meaning.
So why did Aslan cling so desperately to Ereta's survival?
It was a question he could not easily answer.
Why?
He asked himself even as he died once more. He had grabbed Ereta's arm and pulled her back to shield her from the hurtling claws, but he had failed to protect himself.
Aslan's head split in half, and time rewound.
Time reversed. Aslan revived and met the attack again. Ereta threw herself forward to aid him. Searching for an opening in that narrow gap, Aslan still found himself watching her.
Ereta died again and again.
Each time she died, Ereta confessed to him.
The confessions and the bodies—Aslan's, Ereta's—piled up layer by layer.
Even within the visions foresight wove, the stench of death clung unpleasantly.
Standing atop the stacked corpses, Aslan tallied the number of his deaths.
He swung his fist. He used Heart Piercing on his arm, aiming to gain the upper hand through penetrating force, but the Dragon-king's claws crushed his arm to pulp.
The shockwave that followed, far exceeding expectations, obliterated his entire chest along with the arm. Instant death.
His brain was straining. He genuinely thought it might melt. Outside the vision, his real body was bleeding from the nose.
The high priest was that powerful.
Even within his foresight, Aslan had died close to hundreds of times.
Hundreds of confessions accumulated alongside hundreds of deaths.
A high priest was practically a demigod.
An ordinary priest was demigod-level at best and could never match a high priest's might.
Such a high priest was not an opponent anyone could face unprepared.
Even prepared, survival was far from guaranteed.
Dying over and over, rewinding through his visions, Aslan reached a conclusion.
A high priest could not be eliminated without wounds and sacrifice.
This was a foe so formidable that victory, even survival, could not be assured without wounds and sacrifice.
And those wounds and sacrifices stood right before his eyes.
'I like you.'
Ereta, throat pierced by the Dragon-king's claws. Mouth opening and closing soundlessly.
An instant later, her head flew away. The claws hurtled toward Aslan, and as he tried to block them, his entire upper body was ground away.
If there was no path forward without wounds and sacrifice, then he need only step over Ereta's sacrifice and push past his own wounds.
But Aslan could not bring himself to do it.
Despite the headache that felt like his brain was dissolving, despite the nosebleeds and bloody tears streaming from his real body beyond the vision, he repeated his foresight hundreds of times.
And through it all, Aslan understood why. He could feel Ereta's warmth within the visions—warmth that gradually faded and turned cold.
Aslan was selfish.
He was fine with sacrificing himself for others.
Dying for them, fighting for them, getting hurt for them—none of it troubled him.
Whatever emotions they felt watching him sacrifice himself were not his to bear.
Because they could move forward on the strength of that sacrifice.
If it advanced Aslan's goals and let more people live, he would sacrifice himself again and again without hesitation.
But he was not accustomed to others sacrificing themselves for him.
The sight of someone laying down their life for Aslan—and actually losing it.
Every time he witnessed that, a hollow ache filled his chest, and his mood curdled.
A surge of nausea, a vertigo that made the world spin.
He hated sacrifice.
He did not want Ereta to die.
Even if she had been a wicked woman, even if she still was, even if she might commit atrocities the moment he stopped watching her.
She had been a priest once. An avatar of evil who had killed countless people.
Aslan was no flawless saint.
He was far too attached for sainthood.
He had felt it viscerally when he cut off Rowena's head. He had accepted it as fact when he left Fay. And now, watching Ereta, he was reminded of it once more.
He thought.
Ereta, who followed him around, initiated physical contact at every opportunity, and gazed at him with deep emotion whenever he performed a good deed.
He did not want to lose her.
Amid that realization, Aslan drew a deep breath and exhaled.
'Hammer it out.'
He heard something like an auditory hallucination. It might have been his imagination, or the echo of some colossal sound within the vision, mistaken for a voice.
It did not matter. Because that was the opening he had been searching for.
Even if his brain burned.
Even if his heart burst.
Even if his limbs were severed.
He had to hammer this foresight and forge a better future.
If someone had to sacrifice themselves—
'The first one is me.'
Foresight layered upon foresight. Death piled upon death. Hundreds of iterations passed where Ereta did not die. Aslan's movements carved a single-minded path toward one answer.
Thousands of times.
A count so high it was tedious to keep track.
Beyond all those accumulated deaths, Aslan's teal eyes blazed.
And then—
A metallic shriek!
With a sound like iron struck upon an anvil, Aslan opened his eyes.
Blood streamed from them. Burst capillaries dyed the whites red, and blood dripped from his nose—but Aslan moved.
Clang!
The first move was a dagger. Aslan drew it in a reverse grip and stabbed. The Dragon-king's claws, aimed at Aslan's heart, were knocked off course.
Kwa-wooong!
The claws tore through empty air with a thunderous roar. The dagger shattered into glittering fragments. Past the scattering brass-colored metal shards, Aslan blinked and reached out.
He snagged Ereta's wrist and pulled her behind him.
"Aslan...!"
A desperate cry. Aslan answered it with a bitter smile and blinked.
In the moment his eyes closed, he repeated the word.
'Jeojang.'
He opened his eyes and kicked up the weapon at his feet. White flames spread along the Blood Sword Rutil.
Kka-ga-gang!
A descending slash, then he deflected sideways and rotated. He cut as he spun. When the slash precisely grazed the Dragon-king's chest, wariness sharpened on his opponent's face.
That was how Aslan fought—using foresight with every blink.
He met a punch aimed at his head with the flat of his blade, twisted his body sideways, and let the force flow into the ground.
A kick meant to sever him at the waist was blocked with Purity, and he leaped backward to disengage.
As soon as he landed in the distance, a tail strike came crashing down like a bell—he blocked with his sword, then braced the blade with a fist wreathed in Thunder Call and deflected it.
Finally, the claws shot forward—the attack that had torn through Ereta's heart. Aslan thrust his sword directly into it.
Ka-ga-ga-ga-gak!
The blade chattered madly, spraying sparks. Claws scraped past. Aslan twisted his sword and diverted the trajectory overhead.
Every one of those attacks was nullified beneath the white-burning Blood Sword and tens of thousands of deaths.
Each deflection burst blood vessels in Aslan's wrists and forearms. His pupils reddened steadily. But the Dragon-king's attacks no longer reached him.
Even as they scattered into the air, shattered the surroundings, and swept the area in violent storms.
Aslan did not fall.
The Dragon-king's face contorted further. Sensing that something was changing, he leaped up and opened his mouth.
The force gathering in his maw was immense—a colossal energy that would burn and tear apart everything it touched. A breath attack the Dragon-king had only obtained after becoming a high priest.
The moment that colossal energy formed into a sphere and launched from his mouth, Aslan lowered his stance.
He blinked, used foresight, let the blood pooling in his mouth drip free, and extended his sword.
'Moon Splitting.'
As the blade-edge took on color, the slash collided with the sphere of breath.
—Kwa-aaaaaaang!
Plasma erupted, dyeing the surroundings red and white. Even within the breath that filled the air with shimmering heat, Aslan did not fall.
Kurrrrrr...!
The ground collapsed beneath him. Though his entire body was lacquered in blood and his breathing was ragged to the point of breaking—
Those eyes.
His eyes were not dead.
They still burned fiercely, glaring at the Dragon-king.
Shhh-ah, shhk. Breathing in short, asthmatic rasps, Aslan kicked up the Seobsaeng at his feet and caught it in his left hand.
Swords hanging from both hands, Aslan murmured.
"She's my companion."
Words that would not reach the Dragon-king.
"I won't let you... do as you please with her."
Though the words meant nothing to him, the Dragon-king did not bother to ask.
He merely analyzed the situation and adjusted his stance.
Until now, the Dragon-king had held the advantage in the battle of attrition.
He had crushed Aslan's means and sealed off support.
He had denied any variables and solidified his victory.
As if slowly tightening a noose, he had exchanged blows with Aslan without impatience.
In that exchange, Aslan had gradually worn down and accumulated mistakes.
The Dragon-king thought that pressing forward like this would bring victory, but he never let his guard down.
He was neither careless nor deluded.
From beginning to end, the Dragon-king remained unchanged.
It was Aslan who changed.
Aslan was transforming.
He was perfectly overwhelming the Dragon-king in the battle of attrition, deploying techniques exactly where they were needed without waste.
No—it was beyond that. The martial skill Aslan displayed clearly transcended the limits of technique.
While the Dragon-king took a high stance and Aslan a low one, the thick dust settled and revealed their surroundings.
Boiling lava churned all around, and a long, shell-like form was embedded deep in the earth.
They were in the depths beneath Belus Alpen.
The ground, collapsed from the Dragon-king and Aslan's battle, had pushed them into a bottomless pit scarred by artillery fire.
Into the crater where the Predator's bombardment had slain the God of Fire and Smithing.
Surveying that space—no different from a volcanic caldera—the Dragon-king's lips curled with scorn. Aslan exhaled a labored breath, his eyes gleaming.