The Demon in the Basement (2)

"Kill!"

Rir shattered the heads of three skeletons in a single burst.

The moment the skulls crumpled, their bodies collapsed in a heap, turning into mounds of bone.

"...That was easier than I expected. Were they just regular skeletons?"

When it came to categorizing skeletons, the list was endless. Literally anything with bones that ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠moved counted as a skeleton.

Typically, the featureless, human-shaped kind that did nothing but shamble around was designated a regular skeleton.

And the weakest kind, at that.

Humans are neither strong like bears or tigers, nor fast and agile like cheetahs, nor stubbornly powerful like elephants — and neither are their skeletons.

Though among them, there are monsters that actually grow stronger after being skeletonized.

"Let's head deeper for now."

"Woof woof!"

Rir's tail whipped back and forth. At some point, he'd picked up a skeleton's shinbone in his mouth and was gnawing on it with obvious delight.

"That's not a chew toy, Rir."

"Whine..."

"I'll find you better bones once we're out of here."

"Woof!"

At my single word, he dropped the bone on the spot. Looking at behavior like this, he was the spitting image of a country puppy, no question about it.

[Flame Soul]

Fwoosh—!

I kindled a ball of Karma Flame to light our way.

"It looks even bigger than I thought."

As the light spread, a cavernous space pressed in around us — a structure so tangled and interconnected it resembled a maze. It carried the same mystical, skin-prickling atmosphere I remembered from an old ruins-exploration movie that had come out ages ago.

And this is where I'm supposed to find the dungeon's core.

I was still puzzling over where to even start when—

"Sniff sniff."

the tip of Rir's nose began twitching furiously.

Come to think of it, wasn't it Rir who had tracked down the place where Balrok was sealed back then?

"Rir, can you tell where it is?"

"Woof!"

Rir barked with total confidence and started moving. A spirit body or not, a divine beast was still a divine beast. Apparently he could pick out the scent of the demonic energy that demons gave off.

"Sniff, sniff, sniff... Woof!"

Rir pressed onward.

Clack! Clack!

Skeletons kept crawling out to block our path along the way, but—

"Yap."

"Grruff!"

—before my spear and Rir's claws, they crumbled pathetically. Even after running into skeletons who-knows-how-many more times, the result never changed.

I figured they'd only be weaklings near the dungeon's entrance.

Yet even now, after we'd clearly gone quite deep, no monster other than skeletons had appeared. The only difference was their number — every last one was a standard, human-shaped skeleton.

"Seriously? THIS is the dungeon that wiped out all those knights and mercenaries?"

Something about it was suspicious, but for now I kept following Rir.

We walked for about an hour like that.

"Uh... uhhh...?"

Rir froze in place. He spun his nose this way and that in visible confusion, then tucked his tail and cowered.

"The scent's gone?"

"Whine..."

It certainly seemed that way.

The trail cutting off with zero warning, no sign, no trace whatsoever.

Nothing about this felt normal. This meant that even Rir — who had managed to locate Balrok's seal after it had been hidden for ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠three hundred years — could no longer sense it.

"Let's head back for now."

This time we retraced our steps in reverse, working our way back toward the direction of the entrance. And sure enough—

"...It's gone."

The dungeon entrance we'd come in through had vanished. A cold stone wall sat there exactly where it was, as if nothing had ever existed at all.

"Huh?!"

"This dungeon is no ordinary dungeon."

The space itself was wrapped in a top-tier barrier. A labyrinth.

◇◇◇◆◇◇◇

I'd sensed something was off after cutting through quite a few skeletons. No matter how many of these things showed up, they could never beat a skilled knight.

So that was it. They were locking people in and starving them to death.

The skeletons were nothing more than a trap — bait. They made the dungeon look low-level on purpose, luring challengers inside.

And by the time you realized something was wrong and tried to turn back—

You were already caught in the trap.

Trapped in an endlessly repeating dungeon, you'd die eventually. Starve to death, or go mad and end your own life.

Rare, but Gates like this do exist.

Gates where breaking through traps and barriers took precedence over fighting monsters. But even those usually handed you your objective in a fairly intuitive way. If you were locked in a room spilling over with monsters, you cleared it by getting out of the room. If you were dropped into trap-riddled ruins, you cleared it by somehow dismantling the traps.

"There's never any head-scratching like this."

For now, I returned to the place Rir had led me to. A barrier powerful enough to warp space itself requires a suitably elaborate site to be installed upon.

Like ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the formation that guarded the village in the Ghost Valley — that B-rank gate.

If that were the case, the most likely spot for this barrier's anchor point was—

"Here, isn't it."

I laid my hand against the floor and poured mana into it.

Vmmm...!

Red light pulsed up from the floor, and the hidden barrier revealed itself. A star-shaped pattern crossed at its center, jumbled together with a chaotic mess of geometric script in all sorts of grotesque forms.

"Huh. This is... new to me."

The one who'd laid this barrier was, with high probability, a demon. Whereas the Ghost Valley's barrier arts had resembled Earth's barrier techniques in form, a demon's barrier art was completely alien to anything I knew.

It was like studying English your whole life and then having the exam handed to you in Chinese.

Which means breaking through it won't be easy either.

Worse, the barrier wasn't damaged anywhere — it was in perfect health. Evidence that it had been repaired and maintained up until fairly recently.

"Tch."

Disappointing, but there wasn't the slightest crack to exploit. The barrier's own level was high, and its upkeep was flawless.

I didn't know what kind of demon this was, but as far as barrier arts went, I had to hand it to them.

Still, there was one saving grace.

"It's not like I'm out of options."

I still had a means at my disposal.

"A barrier should be broken with a barrier — that's the proper way to do it."

Nothing affects a barrier more easily than another barrier. When two barriers overlap in one place, they push against each other, and the one with the greater coercive force shatters the other and imposes its own power.

To put it simply, it's like two laws coexisting on the same land: "theft is illegal" and "theft is legal." Obviously, such a contradiction cannot stand — one of the two has to disappear. That is the principle by which a barrier repels barrier.

A superior barrier capable of shattering that one.

And there was exactly one such thing I ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠knew. The highest-sequence barrier of the Baekho Closure Gates — the secret ultimate technique of the Closure Gates.

Baekho Banse — White Tiger Dividing the World.

The Baekho Closure Gates were generally rated as the weakest among the four directional gates. Even if you mastered its simplified barriers, both their versatility and their power fell short compared to the martial arts and spellcraft of other sects.

I'd thought the same thing myself. Right up until I awakened the barrier known as Baekho Banse.

In terms of raw power, the other sects can't even hold a candle to it.

Honestly, it was debatable whether this thing even qualified as a barrier. It was closer to a slash than a barrier.

People tend to assume that a highest-tier barrier has an enormously complex formula, or that multiple barrier masters have to unfold it in unison.

Not entirely wrong. The other high-sequence barriers do work that way.

But Baekho Banse is different.

It's a barrier that strips away, and strips away again.

It has no complex formula, none of a barrier's auxiliary effects. It keeps only the bare origin of what a barrier is, cutting away and carving off everything else.

To sever one thing from another.

To distinguish and divide — turning what was one into two, into three. Baekho Banse is the art of honing that most fundamental function of a barrier to its absolute limit.

It goes beyond simplifying the formula — it condenses and compresses the barrier itself.

"The principle is simple. Which is exactly what makes it the problem."

I sat down cross-legged and called Rir over.

"If any skeletons come near this spot, deal with them. I need to concentrate starting now."

"Woof!"

Rir circled round and round, standing guard over me.

"Alright. Let's do this."

I quietly closed my eyes. Within my mind, I selected an ordinary barrier technique and unfolded its formula.

And now, from here—

I removed everything. Stripped the "barrier" out of the barrier art, leaving only the skeleton of it. Carefully, slowly, so as not to damage the formula.

"...Nnngh."

As time passed, my mental strength drained away and a headache came creeping up.

Baekho Banse wasn't called the Closure Gates' supreme ultimate technique for nothing. Even my past self had chipped away at perfecting it in every spare moment — and ultimately failed.

And I was far from alone. Aside from the founding sect master of the Closure Gates, almost no one in history had ever succeeded.

The simplest barrier, and the hardest. The barrier that is the root of all barrier arts.

That is Baekho Banse.

Crack!

"Kgh!"

Midway through the stripping, the formula shattered.

"...Again."

Unfold the formula, strip the barrier away.

Crash!

"Ah, damn it."

That one had actually been feeling good, too.

"Again...!"

Unfold the formula, and—

Crash!

"Ah, this is driving me insane!"

It looked like I'd be needing quite a lot of time.

◇◇◇◆◇◇◇

"Hoo...! Hah...!"

After countless attempts, I had finally manifested a pure "formula" — a barrier with every one of its effects stripped away.

"Took long enough."

Honestly, I'd been a little optimistic about it. Unlike my past life, my stats were far higher now, and my understanding of barrier arts had soared thanks to my experience in the Ghost Valley. I'd figured that with a modest amount of effort, I'd be spreading Baekho Banse in no time.

I was arrogant.

This was not something to be gained by luck. It was a barrier art of a realm you could reach only after endless attempts and failures — barely a finger's breadth of progress at a time.

"......"

Remember your roots.

I am merely a creature clawing and struggling. I am not some exalted hero moving for the sake of some grand cause.

Not a road paved with glory and cheering.

A road strewn with blood and thorns. That is the road I have walked until now, and the road I will walk. Don't try to take it easy. Remember where you came from.

Compress the formula.

Vmmm...!

The skeletal remains of the barrier formula converged toward a single point. A massive repulsive force surged and hammered at my mind.

Forget the pain. Focus only on gathering the formula.

In an instant, the world blurred, and the boundary between me and it collapsed — a sensation as though my very existence were being erased.

Every sect master of the Closure Gates failed to pass this stage.

The terror of being annihilated — a side effect born of the barrier's power to sever and divide, running rampant.

But I am used to this fear.

"It beats the fear of dying."

After all, don't I already carry a memory in which everyone forgot me? A destruction where everyone but me vanished, where not a single soul remained to remember my name?

The terror of all existence being erased — everything except me.

For someone like me, who has already tasted that to the full—

this much is

"nothing."

The compressed barrier drew itself into a single line. I manifested it into the world, and then—

Zzzzzzzzz!

spread it across the demon's barrier!

That instant—

the barrier split in half.

Crrrack...!

Fissures began spidering across it, and at last, like glass, the barrier came crashing down.