Chapter 69
Chapter 69
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 69
Chapter Title: The Mental Realm's Trial
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“Will you yield? You fucking bastards?”
His voice erupted like pent-up rage from all those years.
“……!”
The black-clad man flinched at Sein’s aura and staggered back.
“How…?”
At that moment.
Crack!
The iron chains of Valdrak binding Sein began to tear apart.
Torture had never crossed paths with him in his thousands of lives.
However.
“Did you think I wouldn’t prepare for something like this?”
The moment his final life became reality, Sein had considered every worst-case scenario.
All he was given were threats and time.
Within that, he had done everything possible to prepare for the future ahead.
Crack!
But the conclusion he reached back then was that pain was something you could never get used to.
And so, what he learned was.
-There will be times when you have to endure pain you can’t bear in a crisis.
That too was a teaching from a master in one of his past lives.
The skill to build pain tolerance.
Moreover, binding Sein, who possessed a Dragon Heart, with Valdrak’s chains was practically impossible.
“All your efforts so far have been in vain.”
All that time filled with agony was an act.
The information the black-clad men had recorded about Sein was nothing but a performance.
“Why did you hold back until now?”
The black-clad man, now standing straight, asked.
The atmosphere had shifted.
“To learn your purpose… would be a lie.”
Sein clenched and unclenched his fist.
A single sword emerged from within.
“I was curious how far I could go.”
Sein.
Stab!
Without hesitation, he plunged the sword into the black-clad man.
For someone who wielded countless items at will and even displayed the might of an Absolute, it was a pathetically lacking end.
“Excellent.”
Pierced by Sein’s sword, the black-clad man whispered those words in Sein’s arms.
“The mental realm isn’t a place just anyone can enter.”
With an enigmatic voice from Sein.
Crack!
Fissures began to spiderweb across the world.
This place had never been reality from the start.
An artificially created mental realm.
In other words.
‘A virtual reality within a virtual reality.’
Virtual reality.
He realized it when exchanging glances with Cecil.
He and Cecil were bound by the name of Saint, yet that bond felt so faint.
And….
Thump, thump.
His heart hadn’t been beating.
Precisely, he couldn’t feel the contract with the demon dragon within the Dragon Heart.
Crack!
The fissures in the world grew more violent.
“This is such bullshit.”
Shatter!
The world finally broke.
In the returning darkness, Sein slowly opened his eyes.
There, about a dozen black-clad men knelt on one knee.
“Congratulations on passing.”
Items rare even across the world.
A golden brooch.
It was known as the mark of the remnants yearning for the old empire.
But if they truly were remnants of the old empire, Sein wouldn’t have failed to recognize them.
“Sein Demorus, Candidate for Heir.”
At the front.
The black-clad man who had tormented him so relentlessly in the mental realm was there.
Sein surveyed his surroundings.
Step.
He advanced without hesitation.
His body was in peak condition, meticulously maintained during that time, and though his clothes had been changed, the longsword at his waist and the Bastion on his back remained untouched.
Sein chose the longsword at his waist.
And then.
“Excellent….”
Slash!
“…work.”
The severed head rolled across the floor, uttering its final words.
“Feels shitty.”
Even if it was the mental realm, the pain he had to endure was real.
That horrific sensation, despite enduring it.
Splash-!
He had to vent it here.
After all, the very reason they waited for him here was likely for that.
“What a fucking awful place.”
Demorus, one of the three great underworld families dominating the continent.
This was all their test.
Further ahead, through the breached wall, the full view of Demorus came into sight.
It resembled not so much a ‘family estate’ as a ‘castle.’
“Insane.”
That was Sein’s first impression upon setting foot in Demorus.
*
*
*
The place where Sein awoke was Demorus.
While he was trapped in the mental realm, they had arrived at the main house.
Wasn’t this incident dangerous? No, it wasn’t without risk.
‘It must be a kind of blessing.’
Falling into the mental realm meant he had lost consciousness, even if just for a moment.
If someone had truly tried to kill him in that defenseless state, it could have been fatal.
‘I would have endured, but I definitely need to prepare for this.’
Things came to mind.
Ways to further reinforce the preparations he had already made.
“Ha.”
Sein let out a hollow laugh.
“What a fucking awful place.”
Demorus, where he had finally entered.
“To deal with this shit right away.”
Not a shred of comfort to be expected, only a place brimming with unease.
The fact that this blade-sharp tension was home was utterly nightmarish.
Then, someone approached Sein.
“How’s your body feeling?”
Roberta.
She said they had been trapped in the mental realm for less than three days.
“You still look like you’re about to drop dead.”
Roberta appeared to have lost over ten kilos in that short time.
“……Not yet.”
She couldn’t even string words together properly.
“Why not rest a bit?”
It wasn’t so much consideration as genuine worry that she might keel over.
“Escort… duty….”
“It’ll be chaos for a while. Do as you like.”
And so, the two slowly walked through the castle grounds.
Getting into Demorus was the issue; once inside, movement was relatively free.
And another amusing thing was that not a soul was visible in the castle.
Were they the only ones in this vast place?
“We have to stay here until when?”
No.
A question directed at the empty air.
Tap.
A shadow appeared from somewhere, kneeling on one knee.
“The family head summons you.”
In the unseen places, the vassals of Demorus lurked.
“Scram.”
At Sein’s word, the shadow vanished like smoke.
“Sigh.”
Sein inhaled sharply.
“I have to admit it.”
No matter how nightmarish this bizarre place was.
Splash-!
“Places like this still exist.”
Everything visible, everything breathed, was of the highest quality.
He had heard the stories.
The upper districts retained much of the past and maintained it.
‘Practically eighty percent or more of the continent’s purification power is concentrated in the upper districts.’
Clean air.
Overflowing mana.
Above all.
“…….”
A clear blue sky.
The untainted blue sky proudly displayed itself, as if showing off.
Roberta, wounded as she was, stared at it in a daze for a long while.
*
*
*
That day was no different.
Days confined in the castle, just sightseeing.
But Sein grasped the intent.
‘My mana purity is increasing.’
Those from the lower districts had lower mana purity.
Meaning, even the same amount of mana yielded different destructive power.
It was said to be an innate trait based on origin, something unavoidable.
“Is there a special magic circle in this castle?”
The castle where they stayed, and the district housing Demorus’s main house, seemed to hold a special power.
Sein purified his mana through the Dragon Heart, but impurities were inevitable to some degree.
“This isn’t bad.”
For Sein, who planned to increase his mana purity later, this effect was welcome.
Moreover, his blessings felt stronger too.
“Now I get why the main house folks are so superior.”
Without Sein, Sis would have been the heir candidate from Rasiel.
Valrak and Roberta had outstanding potential, but Sis’s physical prowess was on another level.
The same for Dante’s Damus, Kimo, Vita.
While other candidates scrambled to keep up, some reaching master level was due to this.
“I thought cheats were just for me.”
Being a child of Demorus.
He had to admit that was a cheat too.
He realized much.
Even with his studies, there were worlds he didn’t yet know.
“…….”
Then Sein stopped.
A presence different from the usual.
“Has our busy family-seed machine finally shown up?”
At Sein’s mutter, someone emerged.
He appeared around the same age as Sein.
And.
“But you’re too young for that.”
A young man with the same white hair and red eyes.
An odd sense of familiarity.
“You must be Sein Demorus.”
The returning voice was surprisingly cheerful.
“Yeah. Father sent me. Is it consideration?”
But somehow broken.
“Nice to meet you, Sein.”
“Introduce yourself first.”
“Oh, sorry. I’m….”
The guy strode toward Sein, offering his palm.
“Name’s Barze.”
“Barze?”
Barze smiled.
“You’re from one of the three organizations’ candidates, like me. Not like those stuck-up main house brothers.”
Sein’s eyes narrowed.
-You’ll meet him once you’re at the main house.
Alman had separately mentioned it.
-Cain’s candidate. That guy…
In talks about the future.
-Is a monster.
It was him.
“Cain’s candidate?”
“Yeah. Heard you got support from Rasiel and Dante? Caused quite a stir in the main house.”
Their eyes met.
“But how long are you gonna leave me hanging awkwardly?”
Barze waved his hand again.
The moment Sein slowly clasped it.
Boom!
The air seemed to get sucked toward them.
Rumble rumble rumble!
The castle shook.
But Sein and Barze only stared at each other.
“As expected, you too….”
The gentle, playful Barze was gone.
It was the face of a sharp hunter.
The eyes of a monster forged through countless battlefields.
“You’ve awakened the Progenitor’s Blessing.”
The moment they released their clasped hands, the chaos ceased as if it had all been a lie, returning to peace.
“If I kill you here, would that be a problem?”
Sein kindly asked Barze.