Chapter 221
Chapter 221
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 221
Chapter Title: 87. Black Devil (4)
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A mimic of the demon's grimoire hovered right in front of him.
Black energies poured out from it, enveloping his surroundings. At some point, the smoke began distorting not just his vision but all his senses, drawing his consciousness toward a new place.
It was an invitation.
Yuri was pulled into the source of the black energies by the grimoire.
Hernando had said the demon's grimoire was akin to a sentient magical beast. But the ego it possessed was different from what humans imagined. The grimoire didn't think consciously through language like a human did.
Thoughts and images echoed, along with unidentified sounds.
Yuri's mind was swept away like driftwood on waves, pushed far into the distance.
Suddenly, he saw someone collapsing in the darkness.
A man was crumbling.
There was no way to know the background, the situation, or who was responsible.
All he knew was that the man died, letting out a final scream. With bloodshot eyes wide open, his face twisted hideously in agony, he wailed.
One death played out before Yuri's eyes.
Yuri could tell the man had perished in despair. He hadn't resigned himself to death. The man left a legacy of curses and hatred for the world.
Then another appeared.
He wasn't much different from the first. He died gruesomely impaled on spikes. Sharp stakes rising from the darkness riddled his flesh with countless holes.
It resembled an ancient form of execution. No executioner was visible, but thorns continued stabbing his body relentlessly from the shadows.
Yuri saw his face. He too died in hatred and rage. He never stopped cursing until the end.
The deaths multiplied in chains. In the dense darkness, an equally dense number of deaths repeated endlessly.
The bodies of the dead were buried in the earth, returning whence they came.
But their souls did not.
Souls stained with resentment and hatred polluted the world as they were. There were so many that they blotted out the sky.
The death rattles of the slain had echoed through the world since time immemorial.
And at some point, a single mage intervened. A sorcerer might have been a better title.
He was obsessed with gathering the resentment and hatred clinging to the world's underbelly and shaping it into a single object.
He too might have harbored some grudge. But it was so long ago that the creator's existence no longer mattered.
A single book was born.
Yuri realized it.
The pages he had thought were parchment were actually human skin.
He connected his consciousness to the grudges left by the slain, scrawling unknown languages and dialects across them haphazardly.
It borrowed human power, yet what was inscribed atop it were the death rattles echoing from antiquity to the present.
The mage's knowledge fused with the grudges of the dead, birthing forbidden arts disallowed by the world.
This process continued for eons. The demon's grimoire bore many names, passing from owner to owner as it wandered the world. In the process, the grudges grew denser, and the contents warped. At some point, it became a language not of humans, extending its tendrils not just across the earth but to distant otherworldly beings.
The moment it reached concepts incomprehensible and forbidden to comprehend, Yuri's mind turned away to protect itself.
Yuri caught his breath.
Suddenly, he saw his reflection in the crystal-clear darkness. Unidentified languages from the demon's grimoire crawled over his body.
Yuri activated Heart-Soul Severing to block his soul's corruption. But through his eyes, nose, tongue, ears, skin—every sense—the demon's grimoire poured in. All he could do was delay it.
Time was short.
Yuri traced the grimoire's records, seeking what its owner desired.
The demon's grimoire was a sentient being, a magical beast that devoured human minds. It learned and evolved with each owner. Thus, it contained the minds of all who had possessed it.
Some were utterly incomprehensible, others vaguely contextual.
Yuri strained to focus on the nearest fragments.
The mimic was still linked to the original. Through it, Yuri sought to uncover Cedric's true aim. He still couldn't fully understand him.
In the arbitrarily connected neural network of malice, Yuri advanced toward the most brilliant part.
His mind floated.
At that instant.
The grudge-laden language crawling up his body sharpened.
The chaotic frenzy trying to devour his mind suddenly changed. Strokes aligned, piercing Heart-Soul Severing.
Yuri's body disarmed in an instant. As Heart-Soul Severing crumbled, the protective barrier around him collapsed.
The intent embedded in the language attacked Yuri. Images of all manner of horrors began passing through the center of his skull. The demon's grimoire recorded every gruesome death across the world.
But Yuri endured.
Ironically, his mind—worn by daily demonic temptations—only frayed at the surface in the crucible of malice, without shattering completely.
Clinging to his sinking consciousness, Yuri looked around.
Silence had fallen everywhere.
If the previous grudges thrashed in malice, this was different. Everything was calmly ordered. And that terrified Yuri more.
This was Cedric.
He was different.
Yuri closed and opened his eyes.
Fuzzy images passed by.
Within the grudge language, Yuri found traces of Cedric and peered into him.
It was hazy like fog, but the outline was visible.
Cedric stood there as the culmination of disciplined thought... like a gardener emotionlessly weeding without bias toward feelings or personal history... wearing a faint, pastoral smile devoid of remorse for his actions, with the demon's grimoire tucked under his arm.
He controlled it more perfectly than any previous owner.
If the rampant grudges within cried out in malice as revenge against a betraying world, Cedric pursued it simply as the conclusion of his own logic and nature.
Yuri thought he understood Cedric's ultimate motive.
'Yuri. Look at this picture.'
As a child, Cedric had shown him a drawing.
Too long ago to remember what it depicted, but he recalled something unsatisfactory about it.
When Yuri tilted his head, Cedric laughed and smeared paint over parts with a brush.
Suddenly, everything fit perfectly.
'Balanced now?'
Yuri had nodded. Gradually, the forgotten landscape in the picture came into view.
It was the world.
The imperfections of the human-made world didn't suit his aesthetic sense.
Yuri lowered his gaze.
Paint dripped from the brush, splat splat, staining the floor.
It was blood red.
Yuri understood.
The picture Cedric painted was more beautiful than the world Yuri lived in.
Humanity's production could feed all and still have surplus, properly distributed. No more children rummaging through trash. Brutal wars of mutual slaughter vanished. No more soldiers wailing on battlefields. Humans, gifted with reason, were controlled to resist sloth and greed.
Cedric was the one who could wield black magic best.
Suddenly, colors overflowed everywhere.
Here, only Yuri was black.
Demon...
Yuri felt the gazes.
The radiant beings in Cedric's envisioned world stared at him.
With eyes of fear, they murmured once more toward him.
Black demon...
Yuri looked down at his hands.
Clutched in blackened fists was a blackened sword.
To the inhabitants of this world, he was the demon.
He sought to thwart their beautiful world, and unlike Cedric's rational conclusion, his reasons weren't logical.
His motives resembled the layered grudges in the demon's grimoire.
Countless gazes surrounded him.
Yuri lowered his eyes and murmured.
You saw...
He fiddled with Guilty in his hand. In this world, Guilty was just a demon's skewer disrupting peace.
Yuri lifted his eyes and murmured.
You saw.
He grinned, lips curling up.
And swung Guilty.
The beautiful world encircling him split apart.
The future landscape Cedric sought to create tore like rags before Yuri's violence, crumpling.
Yuri said again.
"You saw me coming."
Gazes looked down at him.
A tower piercing the sky's end.
A single eye floating atop it.
Yuri now knew whose pupil it was. Cedric was watching him.
Yuri burst into loud laughter.
Akuaktar.
The new title the orcs had given him.
Black demon.
A most fitting nickname.
Cedric sought to reshape the earth to his tastes. A human unable to bear pretending to be a monkey among monkeys now aimed to build a world befitting humans.
Thus, he who stood in his way would be a demon to that world's humans.
Yuri called out to the one seeking to become god of the new world.
"Cedric."
Then, Cedric's form appeared before Yuri. Blurry, but Yuri recognized it as his own.
Yuri thrust into his chest and said.
"Sorry, but I've played the demon role to death. It doesn't faze me anymore."
He had shown Yuri his desired world to shake him, but it failed.
Cedric, pierced through the chest, bled from his mouth and smiled back.
"As expected. You always exceed my predictions."
His face beamed with joy.
Displeased, Yuri twisted Guilty. Cedric's form wavered violently and began to scatter.
"Farewell."
Cedric bid goodbye.
That was the end.
The world around Yuri shattered. His mind whirled in the vortex.
When he came to.
He stood once more in Marirose's workshop.
Yuri slumped to the floor.
His legs gave out. His brain throbbed. Exposure to too much malice caused burning pain throughout his body.
Marirose approached and supported him.
"Are you okay?"
"That bastard knew."
"Pardon?"
"Cedric knew. He invited me in."
With Marirose's help, Yuri stood.
"But I got results."
Yuri grinned.
This chance revealed what Cedric desired.
Building a new world.
He had shown the blueprint to sway Yuri, but Yuri didn't budge.
No matter how well Cedric controlled the demon's grimoire or how beautiful a world he planned, Yuri didn't care.
He had come too far to be shaken by such things.
Because.
"I'm a demon..."
As Yuri murmured and laughed, the people gathered around flinched and stared.
But lost in thought, Yuri didn't notice and murmured again.
"Depending on the opponent, I can be an angel... or a demon..."
"A-Are you alright?"
"I'm the black demon. Heh heh heh..."