Chapter 133
Chapter 133
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 133
Chapter Title: Do Not Seek Tranquility, Not for Yourself (2)
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*
Light streaming down from high above the cavern's ceiling was scattering chaotically within the dense fog formed of mana.
There was no wind blowing, yet he could feel the flow of air. Amid it, the outline of the thing slumbering in the fog rippled like waves.
-Step.
The moment he took one more step toward it, the fog swirled into a vortex. Mana warped, embroidering letters into the empty air. Hieroglyphs from the ivory sheets.
-Turn back. Run. For the sake of your posthumous name.
"Don't talk nonsense."
Fernandez pushed through the letters with another step. The fog thickened, growing so dense it obscured everything just inches ahead. It wasn't merely physical substance—the density of mana itself was reaching extreme levels.
His eyes read not just light, but the flow of mana as well. Amid the fog, his blue eyes gleamed a sharp azure.
-Run. For the sake of your life.
"If that's what it takes, I'm already running."
He took another step. The mana surged. Now it bound his entire body tightly, like an unbreakable vise. The ultra-compressed density of mana pressed down on him as if he were walking the ocean floor.
-Creaaaak.
His muscles screamed. His aged body could never have endured it. And yet, inexplicably, he pressed onward.
-Will you give up? I will show you the days you dreamed of.
Whoosh—flames engulfed the fog, igniting it, and before his eyes appeared a sunset over hills. The air reeked thickly of ash and fire, blood and iron. The deafening toll of bells tore at his eardrums.
Before him stood Aria, her back to the sunset, beneath a sky soaked in blood. Faintly distant.
It was that time. Fernandez let out a hollow chuckle. Past and future, dream and reality tangled and blended. What was truth felt utterly distant.
If this moment he saw now was reality, then perhaps the past three years he had trudged through were the dream instead? Fernandez met the eyes of Aria gazing at him.
"Do you regret it, Teacher?"
"That's not what I'm wondering about, Aria."
Fernandez approached her and caressed her cheek. Tears overflowing from her eyes soaked his hand.
"If I abandon you, what would become of you?"
"Is that what you need to do, Teacher?"
"It seems so."
"You won't regret it?"
The moment she looked up at him with a smile. The moment she slipped the ring he gave her onto her finger and laughed in joy. The moment she handed him milk, stroked his hair. The moment she fell asleep in his arms.
All those moments—
"I do regret it, Aria."
"That's enough for me, Teacher. I'll bear your regrets in your place."
Aria smiled through her tears. Beneath the sunset, her smile shone brilliantly.
"So regret only me, Teacher. In every other moment, just as always. Be yourself. Be proud."
If I can be your one weakness, your sole regret, your pure lighthouse. That alone is enough for me. Aria rubbed her cheek against his chest as she said it.
He felt his chest growing wet with her tears. I promise you. I won't stop. I'll keep going.
He knew. This was mere delusion. A phantasm conjured by Mumto, an elaborate deception built from his memories. And yet—
Was a masterpiece in a frame merely a copy of reality? A painting had its own beauty, and Fernandez would never forget the warmth of that sunset, the coziness of her embrace and the dampness of her tears, or the sweetness of the milk.
Flames enveloped them. Aria scattered into fog. One dream shattered. His emotions fragmented into tiny pieces and dispersed.
"Your sins—I will carry them."
Fernandez closed his eyes, recalling the sensation lingering beneath his hand. The fog rippled. Now a voice whispered directly into his ear, sticky and low.
"If a phantasm is so utterly realistic, how does it differ from reality? Speak your desires. If you wish, I can let you feel your dreams eternally—the moments you crave most, your happiest days, your most glorious times."
A medley of scents wafted to his nose. Fire, mana, and flowers. Freesia. Her flower. The bloom that symbolized his sins' weight, his regrets in his stead.
"All the moments you desired are within your grasp. Will you give up?"
Fernandez opened his eyes at those words. Beyond the cavern filled with fog, amid the materialized mist, a massive silhouette loomed.
Red eyes glared down at him.
"I will seize them."
Do not hand over happiness as charity. Fernandez slowly released the flower stem clutched in his hand. From one knee, he gripped the sword hilt slung across his back.
"I made you a promise."
"What was it?"
"If this is all a dream, then you die, Mumto."
"This is my world, my domain subjugated beneath my power. Do you dare declare you'll oppose me in my own territory?"
"Pray."
Fernandez's hand drew the sword. Cleaving the fog, the saint-metal greatsword slid out slowly. Black hair fell across his eyes. Wrinkles faded, and new strength coursed through his worn muscles and tendons.
-Shiiiing...
He gripped the fully drawn blade and thrust its tip inverted into the ground.
"I am the god of this world, its creator. To whom should I pray?"
"Prayer is no mere wish. The prayer you must offer is your defense against your sins. Pray—to the gods you devoured. Take the proper posture of repentance, sinner of the great wilderness."
"Someone once said those words to me. Think you're the first? You're not the first, nor the last."
Power surged through Fernandez's muscles. He felt the pulsing of unfamiliar divinity flowing through his blood. Unfamiliar, yet a sensation he had felt before.
[Of course.]
A jackal's laughter erupted from his throat. The divinities remaining in this world thrashed against the weakened one's dominion.
The power of a dead god cloaked his hand. As if fur were sprouting and claws emerging. His hand crushed the sword hilt.
"Demons, heretics. And..."
[Witches—we shall burn.]
The catalyst was the key-sword. The blade of the god who, in its final moment, pierced Cardan's heart to seal itself away.
God of Discipline, Ruler of the Scales. The Judge. The fallen god who lost its divinity first to Mumto.
Kadan, hunter of heretics, descended upon his body.
*
-Shraaaak!!
Chains lashed out from beyond the fog like serpents, targeting his body. He deflected some, dodged others, and for the unavoidable ones—
'Take them with my body!'
-Kwachak!
Blood overflowed down his throat. His left shoulder, right calf—black chains pierced through and pinned him to the ground. His body teetered, on the verge of losing balance, but miraculous equilibrium steadied his stance.
-Kak!
He slashed the greatsword short to sever the chains. Hatred, curses, corruption... If it had a name, it would be something like that. Sticky hell-mana flooded in through the wounds.
But his flesh immediately began repairing the damage. Kadan's divinity dwelled within his body. His blessing was [Hunt]. A manifestation of endless-burning will, biting the enemy's throat and slaking its rage with their blood—and even if arms, legs, every fang were torn away, it was the jungle serpent that split its own heart to drive the final stinger into the foe's!
-Kwajijik!
Curses rained down. In the form of chains, dozens of high-order spells intertwined, assailing his body! Yet he dodged. He burrowed in, thrust, parried, deflected, redirected—some with his body!
A wounded jackal charging to bite the enemy's neck. Divinity blazed across his body, transforming him into the shape of thick tawny fur. Almost crawling from the injuries and agony assailing his entire form. Like a four-legged beast, he raced toward the foe.
His blazing-divinity claws sharpened like a beast's. He snapped the curse-chains and bindings burrowed into his forearms, chewed, and swallowed them.
-Rise!!
The shape beyond the fog bellowed. Deep beneath its voice, terror oozed thickly. Soon, skulls and mummies erupted within his radius, lunging at him. But—
"Is this all?!!"
Great Demon, Mumto. Lord of Nightmares, Scourge of the Great Wilderness, Empire Ender. He who donned thousands of curses. Emperor of the Spectral Empire—
-Kwajijik!
Skulls and mummies shattered into dust before his claws and blade. Wounds multiplied with each, and now mana and curses flowed where blood should have beneath them.
Utter contamination that could topple him into death at any instant. Every vein burned, filled densely with Mumto's curses.
Even as the tiniest passages in his vascular walls fragmented under the curse's bindings in horrific agony. The divinity of the god who vowed eternally to hunt demons at the cost of its own death did not halt.
[You've weakened, Mumto.]
The jackal laughed. Azure eyes blazing, it charged toward the great necromancer beyond the fog!
[Weakened. If this is your end, I pity you.]
'Funny. That guy?'
[No. Mortal. That my long revenge ends so futilely.]
Fernandez charged Mumto's silhouette, breaking through skulls, mummies, surging and crashing curses. A storm of blade and fangs.
"Wait! Do you truly believe this world is my illusion?"
Mumto's frantic voice rang out. Amid the voice battering his ears, Fernandez's exhilarated mind paused briefly. Even as Kadan's ferocity dominated his body and Mumto's curses raced through his veins, his mind retained reason.
"This world is formed from your memories. Yes. I have seen your memories. Feizashi, betrayer of humanity. I saw the world you destroyed. The core world. And you called this Beitasser's horizontal world, did you not?"
-Kuuung!
With those words, a massive skeletal hand crashed down before Fernandez's eyes. A gigantic grip of black bone slammed right at his feet.
He staggered briefly from the earthquake, and surrounding objects began blurring one by one, receding. For an instant, the world tangled into blackness, the fog's composition raging madly with mana to form new shapes.
A colossal black skull appeared before him. A skull wearing a pharaoh's ornate crown, gazing at him.
It whispered.
"Even if illusory, a world this intricate is no different from the real. You yourself are always the arbiter of reality. But consider: Beitasser made it possible, so how could I not? I am more versed in mysteries than he."
The skull chuckled lowly.
"This is a horizontal world made solely for you. Yes. I glimpsed your knowledge. I salute you, mortal. In a thousand seven hundred and twenty years, you are the first to threaten me so. So I offer you a chance. Overlay this horizontal world upon the core world, achieve the heaven-defying feat Beitasser so desired. Live eternally happy with those you love. Yes. I will even save your son's soul."
Isn't that all you desire? Why take the long way around? Mumto whispered lowly.
[Don't listen, mortal.]
'Shh.'
Fernandez clicked his tongue briefly and caught his breath. Mumto's mana, curses, hatred coursed wildly through his veins, whispering to him.
I'll save your son. I'll revive your wife. I'll project your world eternally to your final moment, the happiest instants you crave.
A masterpiece in a frame—is it worthless? Honey seemed to drip from the end of Mumto's words.