On Monarchs

Right after returning the favor with a scorching mouthful of flame, I gave him no room to breathe, swinging my spear in a ceaseless flurry.

Balrok's body was shredded, gash after gash carved across it—every wound dealt while the Karma Flame was still smoldering. He couldn't even gather his wits, taking the spear's bite helplessly, over and over.

"What in the hell kind of attack is this...!"

Spraying blood, Balrok abruptly spread his wings and tore open the distance between us. Looking closely now, I could see his wounds knitting closed, little by little.

"My recovery has never crawled like this...! Don't tell me you carry the blessing of light?!"

"The blessing of light?"

Never been on the receiving end of anything like that.

Well, the spear did carry something along those lines. Apparently the light attribute slumbering inside the Pilgrim's Spear happened to be the natural bane of his constitution.

"Eh. Close enough—let's call it that."

"A saintess has appeared in this dimension as well?! Damn it all!"

Balrok stamped his feet and ground his teeth.

"After I deliberately fled all the way to this world...!"

"This dimension?"

Of everything he'd spouted, that was the one thing I couldn't brush off.

"Don't tell me you came here from another dimension?"

"Kukuku! That is so! A demon baron descended upon this dimension! I am he—Balrok—"

"Even better."

Originally I'd meant to simply catch him and take his head. The plan had changed.

"Seems there's something worth milking out of you, too."

Squaring my spear, I slowly brought my mana to a boil, driving my body toward its very limit on the foundation of my hardened stats.

"You think I shall fall so easily?! I only let those hits land because you caught me off guard!"

Having finished his recovery, Balrok drew his claws out to razor points and filled his maw with flame.

"You are nowhere near fit to face a demon noble! Three hundred years ago, the humans of this land managed nothing better than to barely seal me away!"

"Man, you sure are chatty."

Maybe three hundred years alone will do that to you—the brute seemed desperate just to keep flapping his gums.

"This time, I shall devour this world without fail!"

THOOM!

His fist slammed into the cavern wall.

RRRRUMBLE!

The cavern began collapsing at terrifying speed. Shards large and small, the mountain's guts, came pouring down over my head.

"Be buried alive along with your mountain!"

Once upon a time, I would have had to evade at once or spear my way to an exit. The me of now could punch through this far more simply.

"Rir."

"Woof!"

Rir's power spread through me, and beginning at my toes, my body gradually turned translucent.

And on top of that—

—the gait of mist, layered on.

Ssssssss! WHOOM!

Making footholds out of the cascading debris instead, I crossed the rapidly collapsing space in a blink and arrived squarely in front of Balrok.

But the brute had known I was coming—he was already poised for a follow-up strike.

"Turn to ash!"

Sticky flame welled up around his maw. His ballooned chest caved in with a jerk, and a monstrous fire blasted out in the shape of a beam.

"Hell Fire!"

KWAAAAAGH!

Hellfire erupted with enough force to smash the mountain to rubble. Normally, no one could withstand flames like these—they'd burn you down to the bone.

"Kuhahaha! With the saintess's blessed one dead as well, the master of this world shall now be—"

"Ooh. Nice and toasty."

...If his opponent had been anyone but me.

His flames couldn't deal me so much as a scratch.

"Wh-wh-what did you say?!"

"Your fire's not bad, though."

I gathered his flames atop my palm.

"How can a human wield the fires of hell?!"

"Everything's got a story."

Savoring the horror contorting Balrok's face—

—I stirred Rir's power into that fire. The blaze that had sat thick as molten lava a heartbeat ago honed itself into something as keen as a blade.

So it really does live up to the name Resonance.

The skill reacted beautifully with other skills and powers—just as ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠it had when Soul Sprint and Mist Shadow Step wove together into Ghost Shadow Step.

"It'd be fun to find out just how far this can go."

"You dare...! You take your eyes off me while I stand before you?!"

Balrok let out a vicious shriek and raked his claws toward me.

"DIEEEE!"

"So... this is how you use it?"

Having condensed the hellfire atop my palm—

FWOOSH...!

—I simply shoved it forward.

"Hell Fire."

BOOOOM!

I returned Balrok's Hell Fire to sender, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠exactly as delivered.

Ah, right—mine had Bleeding Strike packed into it, so I supposed that made it the superior technique?

What of it?

What was certain was that the flame had punched clean through Balrok's chest.

"Kghack...!"

Chest and upper belly alike were bored straight through. Perhaps thanks to the bleed effect, his regeneration didn't seem to be doing him many favors either.

"I... I lost...?"

"You play with fire and you don't even have fire resistance?"

"Do not mock me...! Perfect resistance to flame is not a power granted lightly...!"

Got mine from the Trait Training Grounds myself, but sure.

"Anyway—you've got some time left before your airway gives out, right?"

I planted the spear into the ground and folded myself down cross-legged.

"Let's have a chat."

"...Why would I?"

"Do, and at the very least I won't finish you with this spear."

A spear steeped in holy power. From what I'd just witnessed, these creatures found that power utterly repugnant. And with all his talk of nobles and barons, this one seemed to put real stock in appearances.

"What do you say?"

That sort tends to cling obsessively to exactly this kind of thing.

"Kheheh...! Dying either way... Very well. At least I shall die without disgrace."

"Good."

And with that, we had ourselves a conversation.

I opened with the most basic question of all.

"What are you?"

"I am... Balrok, demon baron. A being descended not from this world, but from another dimension entirely..."

"And where is this dimension of yours?"

"Halheim... a realm beneath a night blacker than any pitch."

Balrok carried his account onward.

"It is the homeland of countless demons, a land governed by its strongest nobles."

"Then why abandon such a fine home and come all this way?"

"...Human. You overcame me without strain, so you must already know it—the imbalance that great power carries."

Mighty power, mighty organizations, mighty authority. In every age, East or West, strength heaped too far onto one side has always been the kindling of calamity.

"Halheim was once a land where three archdukes held power in balance. Whenever one grew strong beyond measure, the other two would rein him in, dividing authority on a razor's edge."

"And ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠then?"

"But in the end, one was born."

Balrok's eyes bulged as he ground the words out like a curse.

"A Demon Monarch!"

A Monarch. I never imagined that word would surface here of all places.

"Monarch...! You know about Monarchs?"

"Heh... even I do not know the details."

"Anything will do. Tell me everything you know."

"...Very well."

The third Monarch, after the Iron Blood Monarch and the Specter Monarch. In Balrok's homeworld of Halheim, a Demon Monarch had been born.

"Monarchs are beings who transcend dimensions... to become a Monarch is to 'arrive.'"

"Arrive?"

"When the strongest being of a given dimension grows beyond a 'certain level,' they gain the qualification to become a Monarch."

"And this 'certain level'... how strong is that, exactly?"

"That, even I cannot say—for I have never climbed to such a height."

If Balrok spoke the truth, it made sense that Monarchs existed in the plural. Countless dimensions out there meant there could be just as many Monarchs.

"One of the three archdukes attained that qualification and became the Monarch."

"What does the Demon Monarch's birth have to do with you abandoning your world to wander?"

"A Monarch is born to rule... yet not all who reach that station are rulers."

The very first thing the Demon Monarch did upon taking that seat—

"The Demon Monarch slaughtered the demons of Halheim and wrung their power from them."

"...!"

It was a massacre.

"A countless number of demons were butchered by that thing. Some fled to other dimensions, but those who had no means to cross... every last one became a part of him."

"What the...!"

"Nor was that all. He raided dimension after dimension, inflating his power ever further. I fled before him, descending through world after world, until at last I reached this place."

One of the threads tangled around the Monarchs had come loose.

Transcendents who hold dimensions in their grasp.

The Iron Blood Monarch was so overwhelming because one could not become a Monarch without being overwhelming from the very start. Just as a master at the absolute peak ascends into the divine realm, the battlefield a Monarch walked stood on an entirely different tier from that of ordinary beings.

"Not every dimension gives birth to a Monarch. But a dimension without one makes easy prey for the Monarchs of others."

"But if a Monarch is born... then the world might just as easily be destroyed by that very Monarch."

I'd already seen two cases with my own eyes. The land turned into a realm of the dead by the Water Ghost, and Balrok's Halheim. Both had been doomed by a Monarch born within their own world.

What kind of either-or is this?

Annihilation by an invader from without, or collapse from rot within. A Monarch was a weight so crushing that its mere existence defied all reason.

"A Monarch is a calamity... they must never, ever be allowed to be born..."

But if none was born, the world would simply be ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠devoured by some other Monarch instead. The way Earth had been before my regression—the way the Iron Blood Monarch razed an Earth where no Monarch had ever come to be.

"So the best anyone can do is flee across dimensions away from the Monarchs—the way you did?"

"......"

"Sorry, but I have no intention of throwing my world away."

A life of nothing but running—I'd had my fill of that before the regression. So this time, I would fight back.

"Any bastard who so much as eyes my world—Monarch or Emperor, I couldn't care less—I'll put them down all the same."

"Kheheh... what an amusing human..."

"I do hear that a lot."

Little by little, the strength drained out of Balrok's voice.

"Anyway—thanks. Your information was worth something."

"......"

"And this next part is just me talking."

Gathering wind into my grip, I murmured it almost under my breath.

"Someday, if that Demon Monarch ever comes looking for a fight, I'll kill him for you."

"...All talk, aren't you."

His eyelids sank, and he gave a faint chuckle.

"Then... I shall look forward to it. I will be waiting, over there. For the soul of the Demon Monarch."

SHHK!

A blade of wind sheared through Balrok's neck.

No soul rose.

"A high-grade monster confirmed!"

The knights of Etrun convened an emergency meeting. The cause: a surge of mana, presumed to belong to a high-grade monster, detected somewhere in the mountain range. The one small mercy was that two knights happened to be stationed here at present.

"I shall go."

"Everyone else, protect the remaining cadets!"

Chadwick and Lunan, neither yielding an inch to the other, raced off toward where the mana had been felt.

A high-grade monster. For the safety of the kingdom—and for the fledgling young stars of Etrun.

Above all, for the record!

That creature's head had to be theirs. It simply had to be.

"Why not give up and head back? That doesn't look like a monster you can handle."

"Watch your tongue! You know perfectly well my subjugation record is longer than yours!"

The two voices bickered without pause even as they reached the site at a dead sprint. And what they laid eyes on, moments later—

"What in the...!"

"Uh, uhh...?"

—was Lee Tae-hyun, ambling along at his leisure while dragging the enormous head of a demon behind him.

"Oh? You all came out to receive me?"

He handed the demon's head and corpse over to them.