The beam of light from the mirror Yu Hanul had set up first was reflecting sunlight and illuminating the inside of the emergency exit. The problem was that it was already close to sunset, and the amount of light the mirror could reflect was steadily decreasing.
Given the children’s situation, I needed to break through this place as quickly as possible.
If only I could use magic, this would be simple.
Overall level has temporarily decreased.
Use of mana is not recommended.
Just as the system message warned, the body that had inhaled the smoke could no longer circulate mana smoothly. Just as the heart supplies blood throughout the body, mana should naturally flow through one’s body as well, but its circuits had been forcibly clogged.
This smoke. I don’t know who made it, but it’s remarkably well crafted.
Wasn’t it said to be something created by Estella, the head of the Hunter Association? As far as I knew, she was also a mage. It was impressive that she had managed to create an item capable of strangling even her own kind. Then again, considering how she spouted nonsense about making it for the happiness of the many, she probably wasn’t in her right mind. Most mages weren’t, anyway.
In any case, whether mage or swordsman, as long as one is human, they must breathe air to stay alive, so choosing smoke as a medium made sense. But this item was especially effective against mages.
Simply put, magic is the act of rewriting the laws of the world by pouring mana into a magic circle constructed by the mage. To pour mana into a magic circle, a mage must first circulate mana through the mana circuits within their own body, converting it into their own power. That meant that blocking those mana circuits with smoke was an extremely simple and efficient way to seal magic.
If a mage cannot circulate mana within their body, no matter how hard they try, they cannot use magic.
“Face your deepest fear.”
What would sound like nothing more than grotesque, terrifying monster howls to an ordinary human reached my ears as language no different from human speech, so there was no room for fear. Fear originates from things one does not understand.
Having crept closer while avoiding the mirror’s light, a shadow ghost wriggled and spewed forth a nightmare, as if vomiting it out. Black sludge flowed toward my feet. Yu Hanul would have torn it apart long before it ever got this close, but for me in my current state, that was impossible.
I simply let the nightmare spread across the floor like water. To be honest, there was also a bit of curiosity mixed in.
What am I most afraid of right now?
After a brief wait, what was reflected within the black nightmare spat out by the shadow ghost did not stray far from my expectations.
“Daon…” a miserable voice pierced my ears. Weakly trembling fingers crawled across the floor. “Why are you… you…”
As expected, what the shadow ghost showed me was the blood-soaked figure of Jeong Dajeong. The face of my false kin was stained with resentment.
“You promised me!”
The moment I saw the illusion of Jeong Dajeong, I immediately cursed my own curiosity. Just because my prediction was correct didn’t mean it felt good. No, if I were being honest, the instant I saw him, rage surged up within me.
How dare you.
The sight was even more repulsive than I had anticipated, and the urge to tear the monsters apart with my bare hands welled up inside me. Even if it was a lie, the fact that the one thing I cherished above all else in this world had been trampled on struck directly at my pride…
System warning to User “Jeong Daon”.
“…Hmph.”
It was ironic. The reason I was angry and the reason I restrained that anger were one and the same.
Taking a deep breath, I forced myself to calm down. The desire to gather those shadow ghosts together and rip them all apart at once was still there, but with the sticky smoke clinging to my mana circuits, it was impossible, at least for now.
For now, I had to wait and endure.
This chance will come only once, if I’m lucky.
With my current stamina and strength not even reaching double digits, I couldn’t pull off acrobatics like Yu Hanul, whose body was strong enough that his head didn’t have to suffer for it. So there was only one way for me, right now, to break through this place, and that was why I had to wait for the most suitable moment.
And to do that, a certain amount of sacrifice was necessary.
“Fresh vitality! It’s prey!”
A shadow ghost bit into the hand I was holding out, standing still in the middle of the stairwell. Crunch!
I clenched my teeth at the pain of living flesh being torn apart.
Damn it. Having to give even my own blood and flesh to creatures like these.
Because it bit my hand, the dagger I had been holding slipped free and fell to the floor with a clatter. Seeing the borrowed knife hit the ground, I couldn’t help but imagine Han Jaeyeong sighing in regret.
Blood streamed from the wound torn open by the shadow ghost’s teeth, getting drawn into the monster’s body in thick rivulets, as if it had gained new life. It was a revolting sight. Thanks to that, however, the smell of my blood inside the emergency exit began to grow stronger and inevitably, monsters that had found new prey began to gather in greater and greater numbers.
“Suck it dry to the marrow, and let’s increase our numbers.”
“Cover this territory in shadow.”
“Frail creatures. We must conquer them.”
Because of the path of light reflected by the mirror Yu Hanul had set up, countless wraiths that had been hiding in the shadows revealed themselves and overlapped with one another. Before long, the darkness had grown so dense and black that it no longer seemed to fear the light itself.
A shadow ghost stretched its jaws wide and peered straight into my eyes. The monster glimpsed a single strand of fear clinging to the surface of my soul.
“Face your fear, and be steeped in terror.”
“Hate others, and worship only yourself.”
“Lament your worthless life.”
Sometimes, an enemy’s assessment cuts deepest of all. Those words, spoken by a monster that had peered into the darkest corners of humanity, were exactly that.
People love to spout the absolute claim that human life is priceless, but is that really true? The life of a human, burdened with a weak body and an even weaker mind, changes in value so often that assigning it a price is almost meaningless. Even among humans, they constantly weigh whose lives matter more or less. The crimes of the powerful are lighter than a feather, while the crimes of the poor and weak are heavier than lead. The rich are praised as noble, while the poor are pointed at and called coarse. One’s own interest is said to take precedence over another’s life. More precious lives and lesser lives are tacitly divided. That logic is dressed up with words like “rational” and “efficient.”
And a world ruled by such humans? I don’t care what happens to it. Honestly, I no longer care what becomes of humans at this point. Whether they turn their backs on one another or die off entirely…
Crack! The faint sound of glass breaking snapped me back to my senses.
Turning my gaze, I saw that a shadow ghost, aiming for my thigh, had instead crushed the phone screen I’d kept in my pocket.
“…Ah, damn it.”
Even if it was a free phone, the bill was being paid with money Jeong Dajeong had earned by working himself to the bone!
That was when my head finally cleared.
…I almost got assimilated for a moment.
I keep forgetting, sometimes, that I’m human now.
Without realizing that I had nearly been persuaded by their voices and reverted to the Demon Lord, the shadow ghosts had been writhing happily, drinking my blood.
At least, that’s how it looked.
“Why? Why?”
The ghosts that had rushed toward the blood pooling on the floor fell into confusion.
“Why is there no vitality?”
“We can’t indulge in it. We can’t dominate it!”
But that confusion didn’t last long. The shadow ghosts soon realized that no matter how much they feasted, they couldn’t extract vitality from my blood, and they grew unsettled.
Shadow ghosts are monsters that seek to steal the blood and flesh of others to take their lives, using that stolen vitality to form bodies they themselves lack, and to overcome their one weakness: light. But what dwells within the life they just tried to steal is, in truth, a soul far closer to that of a monster. There was no way they could form bodies using my blood.
“She’s not human.”
“She isn’t afraid of us.”
Fear comes from an incomprehensible gap. The fear that had earlier swept over the humans was now closing in on the monsters instead.
To me, who could understand the monsters’ language, their existence could not truly be called terrifying as long as I kept my mind clear. For that reason, mental-type monsters were, from the start, not a particularly bad matchup for me.
At my feet, the nightmares the ghosts had spewed out overflowed like vomit, but if I were the kind of person to be led astray by voices from such petty nightmares, I would never have earned a title like “Destroyer of Worlds.”
This should be enough, right?
There was only one reason I had waited like this, offering up my flesh even though I wasn’t being swayed by the nightmares. I was waiting for as many monsters as possible to gather in one place. In my current state, unlike Yu Hanul, my stamina wouldn’t hold up if I tried to pick off the shadow ghosts one by one.
And now, I had endured enough.
I’ll only get one chance.
I drew in a breath.
Air passed through my lungs, but the mana circuits clogged with impurities had no intention of accepting mana as they normally would. It was like trying to pour water into a drain choked with filth. But no matter how much trash blocks the way, it can’t withstand a tidal wave. The debris would simply be swept away along with it. Just as you can stop tap water with a stopper, but you can’t block the sea with your palm. Just as humans may dam rivers, yet still have no choice but to accept natural disasters as punishment.
I breathed, and at the call of their master, the atmosphere answered.
Rumble!
I felt as though I could hear the roar of a tidal wave that should not have been audible. An overwhelming, uncontainable torrent of mana was surging toward me.
“Ahh…!”
A groan forced its way out of my throat since the pain was overwhelming.
Of course it was. Forcing open mana circuits that had been blocked by shoving massive amounts of mana through them was not something a sane person would attempt. This wasn’t an actual drain. Mana circuits were like blood vessels within the body. If you forced more mana than they could handle through them…
I’d be torn to pieces.
The slightest lapse in concentration, and even if my past life hadn’t been the Demon Lord but the Demon Lord’s grandmother, my entire body would burst apart and die.
But I was confident.
I’ve actually wanted to try this at least once.
For a mage, mana circuits are essential to casting magic, but doesn’t that also mean they’re a fatal weakness? I’d often wondered whether an item designed specifically to counter mages might appear someday. That curiosity naturally led me to think about how one should respond if their mana circuits were damaged. Now I simply had the chance to test it on my own body.
As delicately, and violently, as possible, I began forcing mana through the impurities clogging my mana circuits, pushing them aside. My fragile vessels seemed to scream in protest, but once they began to open, the flow wasn’t bad at all.
It was far more crude and unrefined an experiment than I’d imagined, yet the results were coming through steadily. The mana circuits that had been completely blocked and unable to circulate were slowly regaining their warmth.
Proving that my theory was correct was, as a mage, a genuinely satisfying experience.
See? This really is the most efficient method.
I don't like humans. And I don’t like seeing fragile lives, ones not deemed “a priority” by human standards, being cut down and killed by monsters.
And right now, I have a way to break through this situation. I have a goal that is utterly selfish. I have a reward. If that’s the case, there’s no reason not to act. That alone is why I stand here. Lives saved for reasons no greater than that.
Mana that had circulated through my entire body swept in like a storm, whipping up the wind. The nightmares that had been polluting the air like filth were helplessly scattered and dissolved into the atmosphere.
Rumble! The surging mana unleashed a violent storm strong enough to shake the building.
There were no obstacles left now.
“In these hands that have paid the price, no glory remains.”
There is nothing to be gained from such an inefficient act, no true objective to be achieved, but having been born as life upon this same star, there is a duty I must fulfill.
Mana gathered around my fingertips like a tidal wave.