Chapter 173: Belial (5)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 173: Belial (5)
I remember.
His voice, the aura he exudes.
This person standing beside me was someone I had definitely seen before.
He hadn’t appeared recently, but I was certain…
I had seen him.
In my dreams.
When I opened my eyes, I would be standing alone in a vast, dark cavern.
And he, too, would be there, standing forlornly atop a high flight of stairs.
Upon waking, those memories would always scatter and fade like mist.
“Duck!”
– Kang!
In that instant, a violet arm launched by Belial grazed my hair and slammed into the barrier wall behind me.
“Whoa, shit… I almost died.”
But this was no time to dwell on the identity of the voice.
I could figure that out later, assuming I survived.
The opponent before me was not someone I could defeat by taking him lightly.
“What in the world?”
Belial’s voice echoed from the darkness before me.
His voice, stripped of its earlier composure and glee, was now laced with pure, incredulous doubt.
“You were… clearly on the verge of death…”
He was right.
I had been half-dead.
But not anymore.
The twisted flow of mana in my body began to right itself, my form becoming like a machine engineered for maximum efficiency with minimal movement.
The agony that had made me want to squeeze my eyes shut subsided into a dull, bearable ache.
The blood still trickled over my eyelids, yet my perception was far clearer than if my eyes had been open.
My vision was still shrouded in darkness, but every other sense had grown several times sharper.
“Well… I suppose it doesn’t matter.”
Judging by his reaction, Belial seemed to have no interest in the person beside me.
Or rather, it was as if he couldn’t even perceive his existence.
Could he not see him?
It was true my body felt much better.
My senses, too, were sharper. But this wasn’t a full recovery. It felt more like I was being forcibly held together.
If I allowed another attack like the last one, my situation would be reversed—no, it would be over even more quickly than before.
I prepared for my next move with the utmost caution.
‘Close-range attacks are dangerous.’
I knew that from experience.
It was practically suicide.
I needed to get in close, but his six jet-black wings and the dark hands erupting from all sides were an impenetrable shield and the sharpest of spears all at once.
Offense and Defense as One.
Even in the original novel, breaking through his perfect close-quarters defense had been no easy feat.
It had only been possible to create an opening with the help of Cheon Yeo-wool’s ranged Holy Fire.
Right now, I had nothing of the sort.
But dwelling on what I lacked would change nothing.
His power was the Distortion of Causality.
That ability, which reflected any damage I dealt right back at me, was unavoidable up close. But from a distance, it was a different story.
After all, it required contact to send the damage back.
There was only one path left.
To unleash a Spear Aura imbued with everything I had. A ranged attack.
Ghost Slash was, at its core, a ranged attack.
If I imbued it with the mana of the Fragment of Harmony, it would surely inflict significant damage…
But then.
“That… could be one way.”
The voice beside me answered as if it had read my mind.
“But you know.”
“……?”
“You’re not really using the power of the Fragment, are you?”
Not using the Fragment’s power?
That couldn’t be right.
I imbued every single one of my attacks with the Fragment’s mana.
My opponent was Belial, the very being against whom the Fragment’s mana was most lethal.
Every attack I’d made, without exception, had been infused with the Fragment’s power.
“What do you think the Fragment is?”
For a moment, that fundamental question left me speechless.
The Fragment.
A power lethal to high-ranking demons.
It grants the user the Authority of God-Killing.
My first Authority, Shatter Evil, Reveal Justice, said as much.
“The Fragment of Harmony possesses the greatest power of the four Fragments, doesn’t it?”
His voice was a revelation.
He was right.
That was why it had belonged to Seong Si-woo, the protagonist of the original story.
“It’s not simply about destroying evil or demonic force. If it were, it would have a more intuitive name, like Evil Killing, Tyrant’s Evil Destruction, or Anti-magic.”
He was right about that, too.
The other Fragments’ Expanded Authorities bore names just like those.
====
[Authority: Fragment of Harmony (片鱗)]
① Shatter Evil, Reveal Justice (破邪顯正)
— Shatter that which is evil.
② ???
③ ???
====
However.
Shatter Evil, Reveal Justice.
Mine was different.
Shatter that which is evil (邪), and reveal that which is just (正).
Then, what here was truly evil?
With my newfound senses, I looked at Belial.
His very existence was a colossal mass of malevolence, twisting the laws of this space and gnawing at reality itself.
He was clearly evil.
“And.”
His attacks, which twisted the law of causality…
…were fundamentally evil, defying the just principles of this world.
A thread of understanding began to form.
This place… was Belial’s domain.
A world governed by his laws. In that case, there was only one way to win.
I had to invite him into my domain.
I recalled the second possibility I had researched all last break for my next Expanded Authority.
My domain.
A way to strengthen my allies and maintain a unified sense among them.
Domain Construction.
– Fwaaaaaaah!!
In this moment of desperation, I unleashed the still-incomplete technique.
A single mistake would mean death.
A mist of black and green mana began to spread from me.
From this moment on, that mist would swirl around me.
There were no allies to sync my senses with, no other factors to consider.
This space was entirely mine.
“Hoh…?”
A look of surprise crossed Belial’s face.
“The idea itself… is excellent.”
He laughed, looking at my small, shabby domain compared to his own world.
“Now, what do you plan to do with that?”
What to do…
In truth, there was only one answer.
“And what are you worried about?”
The voice beside me said quietly.
“Just don’t get hit. Not even once.”
I laughed.
Because I happened to be thinking the exact same thing.
– Fwaat!
No Step.
I kicked off the air and charged straight at Belial once more.
“Ah… dear me… you shouldn’t have done that.”
A look of disappointment crossed Belial’s face.
His voice was tinged with disappointment, as if my charging in the same way, despite my new power, had let him down.
He once again caused hundreds of black hands to rise from the swampy darkness.
But I no longer tried to slash through them.
– Sssrk, swish.
I weaved through the hundreds of grasping hands as if a path had been there all along, flowing like water without a single touch.
‘I can see.’
Single-Minded Focus.
All my senses merged into one, and at their peak, a new world opened up to me.
This was no longer an impenetrable darkness.
Amidst the waves formed by hundreds of black hands, there was a single, safe path.
A single path to survival lay clearly before my eyes.
I followed that path toward Belial.
But walking that path was painful.
These were not normal movements.
A horrific pain crushed my body, as if my joints were bending backward and my torso was twisting.
“……!”
For the first time, a look of pure astonishment appeared on Belial’s face.
His hands couldn’t land a single touch; it was as if they were parting to open a path for me.
Like the miracle of Moses.
He must have thought I could never break through.
I hadn’t broken through by force; I had dodged every last one.
I finally reached him, right before his eyes.
I didn’t hesitate anymore.
With a bored expression, Belial once again deployed the violet, causality-distorting barrier before him.
My entire body became one giant spear.
– Kwaaaaaaaah!!
Once again.
Phalanx, One Flash.
And, Ghost Slash.
– KWAAAAAAAAANG!!
The spear containing my all shattered his barrier like glass and surged forward.
And at last, just as my spear was about to touch the space between Belial’s eyes once more…
“It’s the same this time.”
– Tuk.
Belial’s finger touched my chest first.
However.
Nothing happened.
– Wuuung… Kwagwagwagwagwang!!
Instead, the hundreds of black hands that had been surrounding us, guarding him, began to shriek and explode all at once.
– Pabababababang!
Horror flashed across Belial’s eyes.
As if unable to comprehend, he glanced back and forth between me and the black-green mist enveloping us.
This was no longer his domain.
It was mine.
I whispered to him.
“Welcome.”
And my spear.
– Ssk.
“To my world.”
It touched the space between his brows.
– Kwadeuk!!!