Chapter 79 : Chapter 79
Chapter 79
I gnawed on my lip as I looked at the ‘King of Strategy’ who was hanging precariously from the ceiling, dead.
‘If I had seen this with a clear mind, I would have really gone insane.’
- Kadeudeudeuk!
As if agreeing with that thought, the system window that appeared with a roar was crumpled beyond recognition.
Just a moment ago, a message like [Steel Heart resists ■■■■■] was visible, so that sound and message must mean that ‘Steel Heart’ had broken.
‘Ha.
Fucking hell, really.’
If that was also good news, then it was good news.
It seemed I hadn't gone insane yet, even after seeing ‘me’ dangling from the ceiling.
The bad news was that there was an enemy strong enough to ignore my traits.
‘It must be a demonkin, right?’
I didn't know where the enemy was, how it would attack, or if I could even survive, but it wasn't difficult to guess the enemy.
Because there were only a handful of beings in this world that I didn't know.
I rummaged through my bag, intending to at least prepare.
‘I definitely put it here somewhere……’
As I took out the ‘Emergency Escape Potion’—a highly concentrated holy water that the Saintess had consecrated for a full 12 hours, contained in a bottle that concealed its divine power and tied with black leather—the King of Strategy began to thrash and go berserk.
“Don't tell me it's poison……?
You're going to die by poison?
Ha!
After putting me in this state, you want to die comfortably?!”
Finally, the King of Strategy, who had fallen to the floor with a thud, dragged his body and approached me.
“You're going to run away cowardly even in a fantasy?!”
At the sight of ‘myself’ with my neck dangling towards the floor, a feeling of instinctive disgust rather than fear made me nauseous, but I swallowed hard and focused on the faint repulsive force I had felt from the holy water.
Indeed, if you lock up a Saintess for 12 hours and have her consecrate holy water, you get a simple demonkin detector.
“A sword, at least pick up a sword, you cowardly bastard!”
As the King of Strategy shouted with his neck broken and his face dangling, a feeling of unease was stronger than any sense of intimidation.
It was plausible at first, but it was getting more and more obvious that it was an act.
Looking closely, the face that had looked plausible from a distance was so faint up close that its shape was unrecognizable.
‘Is this a method that uses a part of the fear I have?’
In fact, if it had been a normal human, they would have been swallowed by their unconscious fear and lost their reason at this point, but I had two mental-type traits, so…….
“A sword!
I told you to pick up a sword!”
Well, it's not like I can't.
As I slowly moved towards the place where the repulsive force was felt, I took out a thin and sharp piece of wood from my bag.
A simple holy relic made by adding the Saintess's consecration to the symbol of the Holy Nation, which I had snatched by hitting Rick, who was chanting an exorcism prayer at me, on the back of the head.
Looking at the thin stake, it seemed that the god of this place had also lived a pretty eventful life, but I wasn't curious.
“Yes!
That's it!
Before it's too late, before you end up like me, hurry up!”
Passing by the ‘me’ who was shouting, I staggered towards the place where I had felt the demonic energy, and as I waved my hand, I grabbed something solid.
‘Here it is.’
Ian's face hardened as he realized that he hadn't felt anything even though it was only two or three steps away, and seeing that, the corpse cackled.
“Yes!
Die!
Just give up and die!”
Following those words, I lifted the stake and thought.
‘What did Rick say when I hit him on the back of the head……’
The time-honored exorcism prayer from the Holy Nation's scriptures ends like this.
“─Go to hell, you evil spirit!”
And then, with all my might, I drove the stake into my hand.
But, isn't telling a demon to go to hell just telling it to go home……?
***
Kwa-deuk!
With the sound of bone and leather being crushed, a pain much greater than expected shot up my hand.
“Keuk!”
At the same time as the pain I felt through my hand, the King of Strategy and the room melted away, and a new hallucination began.
Ian, who had been prostrated like a slave in front of the Regent, begging for medicine, turned his head towards me and shouted like an evil spirit.
─This is reality!
Just wake up already!
Starting with that, the doubts and anxieties I had harbored for a long time took shape one by one and began to shout with all their might.
That I was crazy, that this wasn't reality, that I should come to my senses now and face reality.
‘Focus……’
Every time my mind blurred, I focused on the warmth of the blood flowing from my hand, and with one hand, I held up the ‘Emergency Escape Potion’.
‘Will it work?’
As the name suggests, the ‘Emergency Escape Potion’ is for a real emergency escape.
An expensive potion made by pestering Shendelzar, just in case, after seeing Ajiyog's murderous threats and the Regent's sudden conversion.
To be precise, it was a potion to buy time to escape from Mogul or Sven…….
‘You devilish bastards.’
I thought I would use this at least after I had obtained Moner.
Because no matter how I thought about it, it didn't make sense for a demonkin that looked like a late-game boss to visit Moner on the verge of collapse.
And to think that a demonkin would visit in the middle of the forest of demonic beasts, now that the Holy Nation's inquisitors were searching for demons with their eyes lit up.
‘Let's think of it as a performance test, a performance test……’
A performance test with my life on the line.
In the hallucination where time was greatly stretched, as I slammed down the hand holding the holy water with all my might, a clear sound of “-Clang!” rang out, and the characteristic cool and clear scent of holy water spread.
***
“Kyaaaak!”
Rihaltan, who had let out a scream at the pain he had even forgotten existed, stared blankly at his shoulder as if he couldn't understand.
‘A wound……?’
That couldn't be.
No matter how much his demonic energy had been suppressed by crossing the dimension, and even if the remaining faint demonic energy had been used up to create the nightmare, who was he?
The count of the demon realm and the lord of nightmares.
If it had been a hero or a saint, no, at least a being with a ‘class’ worthy of being called a hero, it would have been different, but to be wounded by an inferior species that looked weaker than a low-level incubus?
It was a situation where not even a laugh would come out, but Rihaltan faced reality at the sticky black blood mixed with red blood and the pain he felt from his shoulder.
‘I'm going back.’
Rihaltan, who had been born as a low-level incubus, did not forget the fact that he had been able to become a count because a more superior demonkin had died.
‘Anything that bleeds, dies.’
The incarnations of the bird-brains that seemed like they would never die, the heroes, the champions, all of them bled when he stabbed his demonic energy deep into their necks and hearts, and though the time it took was different, they all eventually died.
The same was true for demonkin.
He had witnessed several times how even the demonkin who had believed they would surely become the king of hell were torn and cut by the hands of a primitive and utterly inferior species.
So─
Rihaltan decided to flee before the blood from his shoulder even hit the ground and moved his demonic energy, but the stake stuck in his shoulder blocked the flow of demonic energy.
“Keoheok!”
Rihaltan, who had vomited blood at the demonic energy that had been unable to be released and was churning inside, shouted in bewilderment.
“A-a holy relic?!”
Why?
How?
How could such an insignificant human possess a holy relic?
And more than that, was there a crazy bastard who used a holy relic as a weapon?
Before he could even sort out his chaotic thoughts, he saw the human holding up a black vial.
‘Is it poison?
It's not a poison from the demon realm, so poison, poison is fine.
First, I have to get this damned holy relic out……!’
The moment the frantic Rihaltan moved his body to pull out the stake.
-Clang!
With the sound of breaking glass, the smell of unlucky bird droppings wafted from above his head.
‘Uh……?’
Rihaltan's eyes trembled gently as he looked at the water that was shining brilliantly in the empty air.
Not a single speck of light entered the space created by the count of the demon realm and the lord of nightmares, yet a liquid that glowed so brilliantly on its own.
The smell, the bird-like effect too.
‘That looks just like……’
“Kuaaaaaaaaak!”
Rihaltan screamed at the pain that was tearing his soul apart.
Holy water, fucking holy water!
Me, a demonkin, with a holy relic stuck in my body, taking a shower in holy water!
“Kiyaaaaaaaak!”
Rihaltan, who had received the top 1 and 2 causes of death for demonkin all at once, screamed in agony, but he did his best to maintain the nightmare somehow.
Because now that he couldn't move his demonic energy, he didn't know what the livestock would do if it escaped the nightmare.
‘Please, please, please!’
Rihaltan thought, desperately searching for the demon god.
I cannot accept this kind of ending.
He could not die in a ‘farm’, not a ‘battlefield’ or a ‘warzone’, and at the hands of a human at that.
If he were to die now, having manifested for an illegal entry, his very existence would be annihilated.
Even if it wasn't a great and noble death, at least not a new death.
‘Human, I have to aim for the human!’
Fortunately, the livestock in front of him was a human, and Rihaltan, who had come from a low-level incubus, knew humans better than anyone.
A species born with an epic foolishness and evil that proudly recorded the number 1 demon summoning rate since the beginning of time.
Some said they were an unlucky species that couldn't become demons, and some said they were more evil than demons and were abandoned even by the bird-heads.
If it was that human.
And a human whose soul was steeped in evil and hostility, even in a situation like this, he would not be able to resist the devil's whisper.
He opened his mouth, maintaining the crumbling nightmare with all his might.
“…Human!
I am… Rihaltan… the count of the demon realm!”
As if a scream like an imp's would burst out at any moment, he chewed and swallowed the words and the pain at the same time, and Rihaltan continued.
***
The moment the holy water broke, the dozens of ‘me’s who had been shouting that they were reality and spewing curses full of evil, suddenly stopped.
‘What is he trying to do now……’
The moment I thought that another version of Ian might appear, everyone surrounding me opened their mouths at the same time.
“““““Human, I am Rihaltan, the count of the demon realm.”””””
My face automatically contorted at the leisureliness in their voices.
‘Shendelzar……’
He had said that if he could just hit them properly, most demonkin wouldn't even be able to move.
Seeing as he was fine even after I had driven a stake in the shape of a cross, the symbol of the church, into him and poured holy water on it, it was certain that I had been duped by an exaggerated advertisement.
“A count?”
When I retorted, one of the dozens of hallucinations, the ‘Ian who was abandoned by Reina’, walked out leisurely and said.
“That’s right.
This body is the count of the demon realm and the great lord of nightmares.”
“Ah……”
If this hallucination was a nightmare he had created, then that form must be one of my greatest fears.
“This fucking game is really……”
It was so unfair that tears welled up.
I had really endured as much as I could.
I had endured when the goblin king appeared in the forest that was practically the front yard of the Moner family, and I had endured when the Orc Legion Commander was waiting with a trap.
I had even just accepted it when an Ogre had popped out of nowhere.
Because it was the forest of demonic beasts.
Because the masters of the forest of demonic beasts were the monsters.
But…….
“A demonkin?
And a count at that?!”
At least.
At the very least, shouldn't the species have been a monster?
Let's give in a hundred times and say that a demonkin is also a monster.
Then shouldn't a farmer, a stable keeper, or a farm owner, someone easygoing and gentle, have come out next, not a count?
“Ha……”
As I let out a sigh to cool my boiling anger, he cackled.
“There's no need to worry, human.
I've taken an interest in you, who has endured my nightmare─”
The headache that had been plaguing my head until just a moment ago disappeared, and a soft and kind voice continued sweetly.
“Tell me what you desire.
I will grant you whatever it is.”
The moment I heard the whisper that rolled like candy, the 10-pyeong or so room I had seen a little while ago came to mind.
If I asked him, I might be able to forget everything that had happened so far and go back to Earth.
As if I had just had a real nightmare, I could stretch my stiff body, sit in front of the computer again, turn on the broadcast, and start a new game…….
“Is that what you desire?”
As if he had read my thoughts, he chuckled lowly and asked, and I furrowed my already crumpled brow once more.
I had known from the moment he had freely brought out the fears hidden deep in my heart, but he was a bastard who didn't know how to respect privacy.
He should have learned as much as he could, being a count and all, but was family education in the demon realm self-taught?
“Ah, before I state my wish, there's something I'd like to ask first……”
As I opened my mouth, his laughter, which seemed to be enjoying himself, grew louder.
As I was listening to the laughter that was loud enough to give me a headache, I looked blankly at my hand with the stake in it.
My hand did not tremble in the slightest.