It had been mostly nonsense, but I’d listened anyway, on the off chance there might be some hint about how this world had ended up like this after my death. Still, it seemed that no matter how long I listened, she would only keep rambling about her so-called noble duty. Completely useless.
“I was listening because I was curious what you were trying to say, but this is ridiculous.”
The woman turned toward me, her empty eyes widening. "You—!"
“So that’s how it is, Yu Hanul.” I’d tried hearing her out, but what the mage squatting inside this castle, wailing about sacrifice, actually wanted was simple enough. “This woman wants to turn the people of Earth into something like the residents of this castle.”
"What?"
“Don’t listen to that devil’s voice!” the woman screamed desperately at Yu Hanul. “It’s a lie! I never intended to make them suffer! They were simply
necessary
for this world!”
“Wait, are you saying you’re really the one who turned those people into souls?”
“…If only I were more capable, I wouldn’t have needed to share the burden with them.”
Sacrifice. Sacrifice. She claimed she had given up everything, but from where I stood, her words and reality couldn’t have been more different.
Yu Hanul frowned deeply. “Sharing the burden…?”
“Sadly, I cannot sustain magic that stops time and summons you from another world all by myself. I needed others to help bear the magical load… so I had no choice but to use them.”
As expected.
That explanation made everything click. They were both lifeless idols, but there was a reason the villagers had been classified as A-rank instead of higher. Like moons orbiting a planet, the people outside were nothing more than conduits, distributing the magical power required to sustain the core. No matter how gifted a mage she was, maintaining a barrier like this alone for so long would have been nearly impossible. From her perspective, it might even have seemed like a reasonable decision.
Yu Hanul looked down at the mage clinging to his ankle, his face pale with revulsion. “You call that ‘help’? What did you actually do to them?”
“I had no choice. The people of my domain are my property as well. Do you think this decision was easy for me?”
And with that excuse, I couldn’t help but nod.
That’s a statement more demonic than anything a demon would say.
Yu Hanul, meanwhile, looked utterly sickened. Even when he’d lived in this world, he’d never tolerated discrimination based on status. And now, as someone who had spent his life in a democratic society, how else was he supposed to take those words?
“You look like you’re having trouble following all this, so let me summarize.” There had been so much rambling that Yu Hanul was clearly struggling to keep up, so I laid it out plainly. “In short, this mage plans to offer up all of Earth’s humans to this world; just like those soldiers outside, just like the residents of this castle.”
Just as countless soldiers already had been. Absorbing magical power from beings of another dimension to replenish this world’s depleted mana.
That was the true goal: sacrificing humans from another world to save their own.
And it was also the goal of the Enemy of Humanity, the one that had dragged me into this world.
How very like you.
Toward the one who had once been my king, I felt nothing but genuine contempt. Even after my death—no, even after they themself finally died—their disgusting desires never changed. That bloated ego, willing to sacrifice anyone else to satisfy themself… just what kind of soul could house something so vile?
The mage, who had been watching the exchange in silence, suddenly screamed, “No!” Even she seemed to realize that Yu Hanul wasn’t going to side with her. Her shrill voice rang out. “Hero, you must save us! Surely we’re not expected to just sit back and die! Everyone has the right to live!”
“But death comes for everyone,” I said coolly. “Are
you
so noble that your life must continue at the cost of others?”
“Your Highness, provoking her recklessly is—”
“Silence!” the woman shouted, her eyes bloodshot. “I didn’t want this either! I truly didn’t! But this is my noble duty. As an archmage, for the greater cause of reviving the world—!”
“Then why did you preserve your own body so perfectly, freezing it inside this castle where time stands still?”
The mage reflexively shot back at my question. "What?"
It was a convenient excuse, but I had no intention of accepting her impassioned justifications at face value. If what she claimed were truly for such a lofty cause, for the sake of this world, there would have been no reason for her to hole herself up inside this castle while stopping time for her own body. She could have remained as a soul, just like the villagers she sacrificed, and still achieved her goal. No, if she herself had stayed in a spiritual state, she wouldn’t have needed to kill every living thing in the surrounding area to this extent. The mana contained within her own soul alone would have supplied a significant portion of what the barrier required.
“What you’re doing now is simply because you don’t want to die.”
If magic in this world had truly begun to run dry, that would have felt like a fate worse than death to a mage. Losing the sensation of freely wielding magic after having known it from the moment of awakening would be like having perfectly healthy limbs torn away. So yes, I could understand the desperation. What I couldn’t understand was something else.
“What value is there in a duty carried out by sacrificing others?”
Why call the struggle to fulfill one’s own desires a “duty”? How could extending your own life by taking others ever be noble?
Crunch.
The mage bit down hard on her lip until blood spilled. “Do not insult my cause!” Her voice was hoarse, every word steeped in hatred toward me. “If this world is filled with magic once more, I can give bodies back to those who exist only as souls!”
“No. The moment the barrier is lifted, this place won’t withstand the flow of time. It will collapse.”
Even her follow-up claim was something I couldn’t agree with. No matter how miraculous magic may be, it cannot defy death. And those souls hadn’t merely existed passively; they had been forced to continuously drain the area’s mana. It was obvious that the instant this unnatural balance faltered, everything would crumble. Those pitiful souls had been nothing more than sacrifices to one mage’s obsession, and it hadn’t even been their choice.
“You know that yourself. You’re barely clinging to life by feeding on others, hiding behind excuses like that.”
“Ridiculous!” Her voice sounded as though she were coughing up blood. The rage was so intense that bloody tears now streamed from her eyes.
It was an unspeakably grotesque sight.
“What could someone like
you
possibly understand? You, someone from a world overflowing with life, how could you ever comprehend my suffering?!”
“I don’t care to.”
“Your Highness, please step back.”
Yu Hanul, tense, reached out as if to shield me, but I shook my head. I’d planned to stay out of it and let Yu Hanul handle her, but this, I couldn’t let pass.
“Stop insulting me and get lost!”
The mage howled, thrusting out her hand. The mana packed into that gesture, power that must have devoured hundreds, perhaps thousands of lives—
Boom!
“Your Highness!”
Yu Hanul tried to intercept it, but he was too late. The magic she unleashed slammed directly into my abdomen. An overwhelming pressure crashed into my body.
“Ghk—!”
I was sent flying backward without even a chance to react. I smashed straight through the wall behind me, then kept going through layer after layer of stone, shattering them as I was hurled farther and farther back.
“Nooooo!”
The mage came flying after me at a monstrous speed.
“No! No, no,
no!
”
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Each time the mage screamed, the magic she hurled from her outstretched hand slammed into my body. This castle was entirely within her domain. She could even restructure space at will, so I was sent flying backward again and again, smashing through wall after wall.
“The hero won’t be able to save you!”
Just as she said, Yu Hanul vanished from sight as I was flung farther away, but I didn’t mind. In fact, I needed more distance from him. That was why I provoked her further.
Bang!
How many times did she fire magic at my body like that? At last, I could no longer break through the wall, and I crashed hard onto the floor. It hurt, unbearably so.
“Haah… hhk!” The mage, still firing magic as she chased me, staggered forward while gasping for breath. She grabbed me by the hair and yanked me up. “How dare someone like you mock me! What do you know about my life? About this noble duty?!”
“Hahahaha!” I burst out laughing.
How long had it been since I’d laughed this loudly? It was simply too ridiculous to endure.
“If you don’t dress it up like that, can you not even endure your own wretchedness?”
“What?”
“Well, of course. All you’ve managed to do is cling to life in this hopeless castle, alone, surviving day by day like a parasite, feeding on other people’s souls.” I sneered mercilessly at the human before me. “Does a bug possess nobility?”
Flowery words are nothing more than decorations humans use to hide their ugliness. No matter how loudly you shout about a
noble duty
or
saving the world
, the essence doesn’t change.
“If you truly wanted to fulfill your duty, you should have used your last strength to send the people of this world to another dimension.” If this nameless—no, undeserving-of-a-name—mage had genuinely wished to protect her people as the lord of this land, she had dozens of options. Instead, she chose to turn her citizens into wandering ghosts trapped within a barrier. All for one reason: she didn’t want to die. At her core, she was nothing more than a parasite feeding on others’ blood. She wasn’t even worth being judged by the hero’s holy sword.
“This is the first time I’ve ever been humiliated like this.”
The mage, who had been hurling magic in a frenzy just moments ago, now wore a completely cold expression. It seemed my provocation had struck home.
“I don’t wish to speak with you any longer. Just die. Die, and become the beginning of this world’s rebirth!”
With that, she grabbed my throat, trying to siphon mana from me.
Despite everything, she truly was a powerful mage. Having dominated this entire region for so long, her control over magic was impressive, even by the standards of my prime. Naturally, she wasn’t someone I could defeat easily in my current state.
“Ghk…!”
And just as the mana within my body began to surge toward her like a magnet—
Crack!
The mage’s body was slammed violently into the floor.
“Aaaaagh!”
A massive wolf, large enough to easily devour ten people, had struck her with its enormous forepaw.
“Grrrrr…”
As if greeting a master it hadn’t seen in a long time, the dignified wolf tilted its head toward me.
The mage, pinned beneath its paw, stared in shock. “The Demonic Hound? Why is it here… no, don’t tell me—”
“The Demonic Hound? Looks like you picked up an interesting nickname while I was gone.”
At my reply, the mage’s hands began to tremble. Then she asked, voice shaking, “Wh-who… who are you?”
I stood up, brushing the dust from my clothes, and answered kindly, “I am the Demon Lord who will destroy this world.”