Chapter 21
Chapter 21
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 21
Chapter Title: Blood-Drenched Satisfaction
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A man covered head to toe in blood.
His white hair, which seemed to symbolize purity, was dyed red like flowers in bloom.
His lake-blue eyes shimmered with madness.
Shwaaa—!
He swung his sword, unleashing a rippling crescent-shaped sword beam that sliced through several orcs in an instant.
"This is the taste."
Sein.
A week had already passed since Arin's trial and his contract with the demon dragon.
-I'll need time. For your body to adapt.
He had struck a deal with Arin.
To fulfill her unspoken wish, she promised not to hold back her support for him.
It was a bond more equal and intimate than that of mere patron and candidate.
-Elixir.
And she hadn't lied.
"Ch, chweeek!"
Even the rewards she had already given were more than enough.
"Orcs are the warrior clan, aren't they?"
"Chweeek!"
"Why are you running?"
Slash!
Even with the recipe, elixir was hard to produce, yet Arin had gifted it to him.
Sein's energies were tangled in disharmony.
To strengthen his vessel and stabilize them swiftly.
Elixir, said to revive the dead—it had been used merely to stabilize his power.
"Are you all there is?"
"...Chweeek."
The result was clear.
"Boring. I'll send you off."
"Chweeek?"
Orcs, the warrior clan.
They had set up a village near Borfeo to raid merchants, and now their eyes widened.
Faces flickering with fear soon lit up with hope.
Slash!
Then betrayal.
"Just kidding."
Sein cut down the orcs once more.
"You never let anyone who begged for their life go, either, right?"
He slashed, stabbed, and sliced.
Roooar—!
The power boiling inside him was impossible to contain.
What he gained from Arin's trial was immense.
First, the dragon heart's mana had surged explosively.
Repulsion from the blessing shard, encroaching demonic energy, and infiltrating holy power weaving through them.
Like wounded muscles regenerating, the dragon heart fought them off as if asserting its primacy, growing larger in the process.
"About done cleaning up."
The other energies followed suit.
They clashed against each other, vying not to lose, repeatedly devouring and expanding.
This was the result Sein had wanted.
'The ultimate build.'
Housing mutually antagonistic energies in one body to make them explode in growth.
Even without operating any cultivation method, the energies fought and consumed each other on their own, growing stronger.
The process brought agony to the body, but in the past, it was just a game, so it didn't matter.
And now...
"Tch. Still feels like something's missing."
The demon dragon.
Sein knew his own body.
The nature of his core—the dragon heart—had changed.
His original build had delicately balanced the three energies on a knife's edge, but now his body had lost that balance.
Boom! Boom!
The dragon heart—no, the demon dragon's heart—had fully enveloped everything.
And it seemed to declare:
-Obey me.
Yet the demonic energy and holy power were unruly forces too, growing larger and stronger to resist this absolute being.
Thus, there was no pain.
The demon dragon's heart, overwhelming all, was protecting Sein.
"Yeah. Now this is more like it..."
What appeared before him was a pitch-black troll.
The result of scouring the forest near Borfeo.
"Now this will taste good."
"Kuooooh!"
The dark troll, over five meters tall, roared and charged at Sein.
Slash!
*
*
*
The massive dark troll lay dead.
Sein, sitting atop it, finally wore a satisfied expression.
'At least level 10 equivalent.'
This mad hunt wasn't just to vent overflowing power—it was also to gauge himself.
Demonic energy, mana, and holy power served as fuel for special abilities but also directly influenced the body.
In other words, they affected his stats.
Thud.
Sein jumped down from the troll's corpse and stretched.
His physical stats were around level 10 from his final life in the build.
Plus the recovered perks.
"That alone shouldn't get me this far."
As expected, the biggest factor was that.
'The contract with the demon dragon.'
The contract with the demon dragon, Archibald.
It had profoundly impacted him.
Most importantly, he was still only level 4.
'Leveling up got harder, though.'
Thanks to Sanctuary's unique experience system, leveling was more brutal, but he was satisfied.
"As the saying goes..."
Heh.
Any gamer from South Korea would agree.
"High peak is the best."
Because at the limit he'd one day reach, his strength would be incomparable to others.
"Looks like the chaos is over."
Arin approached gracefully through the messy field of corpses.
She had watched his entire hunt.
"More or less. But still a long way off."
"You diced up a dark troll and say that?"
Arin glanced at the dark troll's corpse behind Sein.
Heh.
Sein grinned at the sight.
"Why? Disappointed?"
"......"
Arin hurriedly averted her gaze at his words.
Seeing that, Sein mimed retching.
"If I didn't know you were a necromancer, I'd have snapped your neck right then."
"Could you even?"
The deal.
No, he had formed a contract with Arin.
To achieve her unspoken wish and his own goal.
The name "Destroyer" was in the past.
-Let's start as equals.
Not Destroyer, but Sein Demorus.
Not the imperial shadow, but Arin.
"Curious?"
Arin narrowed her eyes at Sein's words.
Yet he didn't stop.
"I told you. Still a long way off."
Only then did Arin seem to understand.
Roooar!
A surge of deathly energy.
Bone spider legs had sprouted from Arin's back.
"Well, you needed it. To make sure you know my level, so you don't act rashly."
Arin's voice grew icy.
"No matter your past or your contract with the demon dragon."
Kwaaa—!
As Arin partially unleashed her power, winds whipped up.
"This world isn't to be taken lightly."
At that moment.
Flash!
Sein's figure vanished.
"Is it, really?"
Like a shadow behind Arin, Sein appeared without hesitation and thrust his sword.
"A deal's a deal."
The deal with Arin.
"But debts must be paid."
The debt for tossing him into the demon dragon's lair at her whim.
Not long ago, victory was impossible.
But now was different.
"Do as you like."
Clang!
Sparks flew.
A bone spider leg struck away Sein's aura-infused sword.
Shreeeek!
Another leg shot toward him in between.
Strengthened not by aura, but deathly mana.
But Sein didn't dodge.
Now he wielded power antithetical to necromancers.
"Turn Undead."
A power common in the past, but rare and hard to find now.
*
*
*
"Ugh! Crazy. No sense of proportion."
Sein groaned.
"Are you alright, Boss?"
Deren asked.
"Does it look like it?"
His first spar with Arin had been too threatening to call a spar—yet utterly safe.
Overwhelming skill gap.
Arin pressed him relentlessly without mercy, yet avoided vital spots.
-Since you took the elixir, even losing an arm should be fine for a while.
All while saying such chilling things.
Arin meant it.
But so did Sein.
"Kek."
Sein chuckled, recalling it.
"Must hurt, losing use of your loyal bone spider for a while."
Arin had studied and researched the Destroyer extensively over long years.
But that was only about the Destroyer.
She didn't know all the hundreds, thousands of lives Sein had lived.
Among them...
-She didn't even realize her bone spider had such a weakness.
That Sein possessed necromantic knowledge surpassing even Segmore.
She could never win or surpass it.
What Sein had wasn't just his own traversed lives—it was the collective wisdom of hundreds of millions of Sanctuary players.
"You look good, Boss."
Deren said.
"You look good too."
Deren.
"Thanks to you, Boss."
Sein's true right-hand man had succeeded in forming aura.
Easier said than done.
-Fucking insane!
Cyclops had freaked out at the sight.
-The hell's in Chichiron? Can I become like Brother Deren if I go there?
-Quit it. And Deren's younger than you.
-Aura means big brother.
Cyclops, who led the mercenaries dreaming of knighthood.
Even he seemed shocked that two aura users had emerged from Chichiron—not some upper district, but the dingy outskirts of zone 10.
"Deren."
"Yes, Boss."
Deren bowed at the suddenly serious tone.
"Now that you've got aura, I can leave Borfeo to you for a while."
"Of course."
"This will be my first base."
He'd planted the seeds.
"Support Aia fully. Same for old man Aron. You know my style."
Deren, by Sein's side since starting his life as Sein Demorus.
That's why he trusted him.
"I won't let you down."
"Naturally. Who else but you?"
It was sincere.
He didn't even fully trust Arin, but Deren he did.
"Then..."
As Sein left Cyclops's hideout, Deren bowed deeper.
"Come back safe, Boss."
In the corridor.
"Come back safe, Boss!"
Cyclops shouted.
At the stairs he'd finally reached.
"Come back safe, Boss."
Fox, one of the survivors.
As he descended the stairs and stepped outside.
"Come back safe—!"
Everyone in Borfeo's back alleys saw Sein off.
Today, Sein leaves Borfeo.