Chapter 264: Episode 264

I was wearing a new water veil. One half showed my face as Kim Yusin, the other half was a bare skull.

Seeing my face, Jeong Seojin looked utterly shocked, his mouth hanging open. His bloodshot eyes were wide with disbelief. With this little performance, I had successfully shaken his mental state. Now it was time for the finishing blow.

I shut off the core translator and spoke in my real voice. “Been a while, hasn’t it?”

Seojin’s pupils trembled uncontrollably.

“……”

Silently, he reached into his pants pocket. He pulled out a pack of cigarettes. Not much had survived the explosion intact, but he managed to find one decent stick, put it between his lips, and lit it. When he exhaled, gray smoke drifted up into the sky.

He burned through the cigarette in no time, then dropped the butt to the ground and adjusted his glasses. After that, he let out a long sigh.

“Are you a demon? Impersonating him in front of me is not what I would call a wise decision.”

My shoulders began to shake with laughter. Then my whole body started to twitch like a lunatic.

’When you play a demon, madness is everything.’

“Who are you?”

“Someone who once worshiped Kim Yusin.”

’And every demon needs a concept.’

“It took a lot of effort to get close to you, Chairman. But in the end, this day has finally come.” I gave him a sly grin. “It’s time for you to be judged.”

With a weary look, Seojin ran a hand through his bangs. “If you’re here for judgment, you’ve come to the wrong address, demon.”

“Oh, come now. Since we’re on the subject, why don’t we go over things properly?”

There was one thing that was absolutely clear. For Seojin, or anyone else, the direct trigger for becoming a demon was “my death.” If that was the case—

“What were you doing when Kim Yusin died?”

Seojin couldn’t answer.

“Do you remember the Albert Incident? While Kim Yusin was traveling around persuading the world guilds, fighting the Lion Fleet and the Sky Castle, what were you, his so-called strategist, doing? After the cure was developed, you were no help at all. You may have saved hundreds of millions of people, but you didn’t save Kim Yusin.”

He stayed silent, and I kept going.

“On top of that, just because he took you in, Kim Yusin had to go up against two colossal enemies, Unix and Frost. While he was risking his life going into Russia, what were you doing then?”

Again, Seojin had no answer.

’I already knew the story from Bora.’ After I fell into a coma, Seojin had apparently spent a long time in crushing helplessness, living like a broken man.

’Helplessness. A sense of debt. Guilt. Those were the emotions he felt toward me and himself.’

“You found Frost’s weakness and protected your comrades, but once again, you did nothing for Kim Yusin himself. In the past and now, you’ve never moved for Kim Yusin’s sake, only for other interests.”

Seojin squeezed his eyes shut. “…That was the role the Tower Master wanted me to play.”

“What a pathetic excuse.” I spread my arms wide. “Kim Yusin was a man who overdid everything. Maybe dying young in such a violent way was always how his story was going to end, like it was written that way from the start. And you, his handler, didn’t stop him—you pushed him. Because for your ambitions, Kim Yusin had to climb even higher.”

The skeletal half of my face twisted into a grin. “Why didn’t you give him advice for his sake instead of for your own ambition? Can you really say you bear no responsibility for his death?”

Seojin dragged his bangs down and gripped his glasses. “Advice to value his own life? It’s not that I didn’t give it. I couldn’t.”

The atmosphere shifted. A fierce will began to radiate from his body.

“You called me impressive earlier, but you’re dead wrong. I’m just an employee who does what the people upstairs tell me to do, like millions of others. There are plenty of people who could replace me.” He yanked off his charred tie and tossed it to the ground. “But the Tower Master had something I don’t. The ones who shake the world aren’t guys in glasses; they’re the ones who shine. All I did was clean up after what he did and turn it into something realistically workable. If you want to be generous, call me a plover bird. If you don’t, call me a parasite.”

His hands slowly clenched into fists.

“I couldn’t bring myself to break that shining side of him. I couldn’t turn him into some mass-produced, boxed-in product. Ambition, you said? I threw that away after we destroyed Frost and Unix. There’s only one reason I’m still alive.”

Seojin bent his knees, lowering his center of gravity, his whole body tensed like a drawn bowstring.

“To carry out the plan the Tower Master left behind. That’s it.”

Then he launched himself at me, shattering the stone pavement with terrifying leg strength. The ground shook with a single leap. I jerked my head back.

His fist sliced through the air where my head had just been. The sheer control of power sent a chill down my spine. When I glanced back, the shockwave from his punch had blown the stone wall behind me to pieces.

’Holy shit!’

Kicking up a cloud of dust, Seojin skidded to a stop, then pivoted and charged again. This time, I lifted my leg and stomped down.

<Gaia>

With my right foot as the center, the concrete ground heaved, and the earth’s pale underbelly revealed itself. A wave of ground surged toward Seojin.

Rumble-rumble-rumble-rumble!

He stopped in place and casually jabbed his fist forward. That alone bored a tunnel-sized hole straight through the earth.

’How is this guy only officially Rank 3?!’

He punched through Gaia and closed the distance in a flash, so I raised both arms.

<Gaia> ×2

The walls on both sides of the alley swelled and wrapped around his charging body from left and right. The ground and concrete compressed together, hardening into a solid sphere.

It didn’t last five seconds. Crisscrossing fractures spread across the sphere, and then Seojin’s fist burst out from the top. By the seven-second mark, the earthen sphere had completely shattered, and Seojin emerged, wreathed in mana.

’I was planning to play around a bit and then reveal myself…’

Watching him barrel toward me with that terrifying momentum, my heart pounded. My heartbeat quickened, my blood boiled, and a fighting spirit surged up inside me.

’Looks like this won’t end with just a light spar.’

Grinning wide, I raised my arms above my head.

<Fire Cannon> ×100

Countless flowers of magic circles bloomed in the sky. Seojin hastily tried to slow down, but it was too late to dodge. He was already well within range.

A crimson rain of fire poured down, filling every inch of the air.

Seojin chose not to evade. As expected, he went for a head-on breakthrough, charging straight through the flames with his bare body.

“Original magic sealed, seventh-order sealed, buff magic circles sealed, no Ea assist.”

After setting those limits on myself, I threw myself straight toward that all-piercing fist. Deva’s Eyes tracked every minute detail of his punch, and I tilted my head along its path.

His fist skimmed past my face by the thickness of a sheet of paper. As it did, I straightened my legs and drove my fist into Seojin’s jaw.

Crack!

The uppercut landed clean, snapping his head back.

Even with the gauntlet on, my knuckles throbbed. It felt like I had just punched a boulder.

Just as he was about to lose his footing, Seojin’s back foot dug in, and he fired a left counter straight at me.

’He’s got power and speed, sure…’

I reloaded and activated the gauntlet on my right hand—the one that had just thrown the uppercut.

’…but his movements are way too big.’

Boosters flared, forcing my arm down and smoothly transitioning the uppercut into an elbow strike. I aimed for the joint of his incoming left arm and hammered down with my elbow.

“Urgh…!”

As Seojin’s face tightened in pain, I spun in a full circle.

SMAAASH!

My spinning kick smashed into his face. He scraped backward across the floor, putting distance between us. I thrust out my right arm again, conjured a hundred fireballs, and unleashed them on him.

Rumble-rumble-rumble-rumble!

From within that roiling hell of flames, Seojin, his glasses shattered, charged at me like an armored vehicle.

A flash of light burst from his right arm.

’Magic…?’

<Scadi>

Fourth-order ice magic. An arm of ice surged out, and I kicked off a shield to vault into the air.

’So this guy’s affinity is ice?’

“That was a mistake.”

Seojin planted his feet, drew his right arm far back, and then drove it forward with all his might. The same shockwave that had blown apart the stone wall came roaring up at me as I hung in midair.

“A mistake?”

I cast the exact same spell as Seojin.

<Scadi>

I had barely used fourth-order ice magic because it was overshadowed by my original spell, Frozen Heart, but I was confident I could handle it better than he could.

“This is how you’re supposed to use Scadi.”

<Shield> ×300

I unfurled the shields in a tight, single-file line, then set Scadi’s ice hand beneath my feet and slid along them like a sled.

Continuously altering its form, I refined Scadi into a proper sled and accelerated.

Like riding a roller coaster, I banked and looped freely through the air, scattering Fire Cannons in every direction.

The ice javelins Seojin fired in response were too slow to keep up.

“…Tch!”

The difference in speed was decisive.

Unable to mount a proper response, Seojin was reduced to desperately dodging fireballs. I had completely shaken him off.

Riding my roller coaster track in midair, I curved the line of shields around and set my destination for the spot right behind him.

I shot toward his back like a flash of light, and by the time Seojin started to turn, my knee was already slamming into his face.

THU-UUUD!

The momentum of my charge hurled him violently backward. As he tumbled across the ground, I extended my right arm toward him.

Gaia hadn’t expired yet. The ground surged up to seize his tumbling body.

“Khrrrgh!”

Even as the earth constricted him, Seojin brought his arms together.

Once again, fourth-order magic flared from his palms. He’d been preparing a second spell all along.

<Scadi>

Cold surged from the magic circle. This time, however, it wasn’t an arm. The moment I saw how Seojin was shaping the spell, I dodged to the side.

WHOOSH!

An ice dragon tore through the space I had occupied just a heartbeat earlier.

’…You little punk. Using the same technique as your brother.’

I landed on the ground, and Seojin, the skin under his eyes darkened from mana depletion, burst through Gaia’s restraints and charged at me.

He was uninjured.

He didn’t fall.

A literal iron man.

’I can’t beat Seojin with non-lethal magic alone.’

For a moment, I considered lifting my leg and activating Devastar.

Right then—

In mid-charge, Seojin suddenly dropped to his knees in front of me.

He slammed his forehead into the floor with a resounding thud.

“…Have you returned, my lord?”

His voice was shaking uncontrollably.

’When did he figure it out?’

I lowered my raised leg and completely dispelled the watery veil covering my face.

I had no choice but to acknowledge it.

Yeah. There was no way Seojin would ever become a demon.

I grabbed the idiot by the shoulders and pulled him to his feet.

Then I grinned.

“Long time no see, Seojin.”

* * *

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