Chapter 44

Chapter 44.

The process by which an ordinary person received the Blessing of the Tower and Awakened as a Hunter was similar to a newbie with no ability at all changing classes and obtaining a class.

Han Seol-ah had been born with the overwhelming ability called ‘Ice Crystal,’ so there had been no need for me to touch her, but Lee A-un, who was completely powerless, was different.

If classes suited to a Hunter’s Awakened Ability were unlocked according to that ability?

Could I not raise this blank-slate newbie to my own tastes and unlock multiple classes at once?

That was my hypothesis.

A perfect test subject who could be made into an EX-rank Hunter, used in the 94th Floor strategy, and used to figure out the Corridor’s unlock rules.

The cost price of such a nutritious test subject was merely one bottle of Red Elixir!

Its cost-performance was so excellent that it almost brought tears to my eyes.

“Heh heh.”

All preparations for Emperor Raising were complete.

I took out an item I had prepared in advance from my inventory.

It was a helmet that gave off billowing black mist and looked corrupt and ominous at a glance.

Its name was the ‘Helm of the Lich King.’

It was an ‘Ego Item,’ one of the few in Lost Honor.

It meant living equipment, and according to its settings, the Lich King’s lingering thoughts remained very thickly within this helmet.

Its traits were quite complicated, but... to summarize, wearing this helmet explosively increased aptitude related to Black Magic.

“Wear it, Lee A-un.”

I tossed the helmet in front of Lee A-un.

“Become the Lich King.”

[Uh... You want me to wear it? This?]

Lee A-un trembled and hesitated at the cursed item’s uniquely eerie ominousness, but I did not go easy on him.

“Do not worry. For the current you, there will be no problem at all.”

Lee A-un squeezed his eyes shut and slowly put on the helmet.

The moment he wore it, Lee A-un’s body trembled violently.

[Who awakens me...! I am the Lich King!]

And before even one second had passed, contrary to what I had said, Lee A-un’s ego was swallowed whole by the Lich King.

However, I was not flustered.

Instead, the corners of my mouth slowly lifted.

‘As expected. Everything is flowing according to my plan.’

The curtain rose on the first stage of Emperor Raising.

***

The moment he put on the ominous helmet.

Blue-tinged cold swallowed Lee A-un’s entire soul.

Kraaaaagh!

Lee A-un screamed without sound.

His blood froze, and his ego shattered into pieces—horrific pain!

Even amid the miserable agony of his soul being carved apart, Lee A-un desperately tried to pull his mind together.

‘This is a trial Brother gave me...! I have to endure it—kuheok!’

However, as though mocking his firm faith, Lee A-un’s ego blacked out in an instant.

Through the cracks in that fractured mind, transcendent thoughts aged for hundreds of years poured in like a waterfall.

Memories of covering the world in ice.

The arrogance of a monarch who commanded the undead.

Upon the white paint called Lee A-un, the pitch-black color called the Lich King was forcibly mixed in, carving his soul apart.

‘I am... I am being overwritten...!’

Just before Lee A-un’s ego was completely devoured.

The lingering thoughts that had seized Lee A-un’s body let out a roar filled with ecstasy.

[I will show hell to those who sealed me...!]

The Lich King had once filled an entire world with ice, death, and undead.

His evil deeds had reached the heavens, and he had been sealed by the ‘Guardian’ who descended because of them.

But the time had come.

The long years.

The suffering he had been forced to endure...!

Had all of it been hardship meant for him to obtain this soul and body now?

[Who awakens me...! I am the Lich King!]

However, the roar of the great evil that had once ruled a world did not last even one second.

Because in Lee A-un’s deep, deep inner self.

At the bottom of that abyss, ‘it’ opened its eyes.

—Ah Ah Ah

In that instant, Lee A-un’s inner world twisted grotesquely.

His sense of direction—up, down, left, and right—collapsed.

Even the Lich King’s blue cold was devoured by a sticky, unpleasant, strangely warm heat and began melting like a swamp.

[Wh-What is this? This, this horrifying...!]

The Lich King felt a colossal ‘gaze’ constricting his soul.

A vast chaos whose form could not be measured, and whose perception could not be dared by intellect.

A presence that seemed to have every kind of hostility—murderous intent, malice, and all other forms of enmity—pasted thickly onto it.

It was looking at him.

And clearly, from that faraway place, it was crawling toward him.

It spoke.

—Thief

The sound was too enormous for him to understand immediately.

[Gyaaaaaaaah!!!]

An eerie possessiveness, as though asking how he dared covet what belonged to it.

The monarch of death who had reigned for hundreds of years trembled like a microorganism before an unfathomable terror and screamed.

Tentacles? Jaws? Or merely an abyssal pit whose end could not be known?

‘Something’ that seemed as though merely facing it would collapse one’s sanity attacked the Lich King’s lingering thoughts.

Crunch!

Before an irresistible terror, the lingering thoughts of the great Lich King were nothing more than a lump of meat placed on a dining table.

Crunch. Crunch.

Only the grotesque sound of devouring resounded wetly.

***

Immediately after the Lich King shouted powerfully.

Mist several times blacker than the Helm of the Lich King wrapped around Lee A-un, then disappeared with a ‘crunch.’

After that, Lee A-un regained consciousness.

[Huh?]

Lee A-un looked bewildered.

Heh.

“As expected.”

Items with curses that negatively affected the user were called ‘cursed items.’

The Helm of the Lich King carried a curse that devoured the user’s ego.

If the player wore it, the character would act on its own, shout noisily through the speakers, and so on.

Why had I not destroyed an item I could not even use?

Because its specs were insane.

If one could endure, or perhaps remove, the demerit called a curse. 

A cursed item could transform into the strongest item.

Right now, Lee A-un was afflicted with a curse so horrific that it could not even be compared to such a low-grade curse.

How serious was the curse?

Serious enough that it would remove most ordinary curses on its own.

Curses with the keyword ‘Outer God’ were usually all like this.

They were curses, yet their possessiveness was unbelievable.

It was like saying, ‘I cannot tolerate any curse other than myself.’

In other words.

As long as the Outer God was obsessed with him, cursed items were practically Lee A-un’s exclusive items.

After finishing one round of cursed-item work, I pushed Lee A-un back into the class-change site.

[Class Change List Available: Branch 9 - Black Magic]

[1. Apostle of Plague] (Master)

[2. Bone Dragon Master] (Master)

[3. Warlock] (Master)

[4. Blood Mage]

[5. Cursecaster]

[6. Demon Hunter]

“Heh heh heh.”

Three classes that had not existed before were now marked as ‘Master.’

Lee A-un had graduated from those three classes without even changing into them.

According to his setting, the Lich King was a boss who had mastered three Black Magic classes during his lifetime.

Therefore, if one wore the helmet containing his lingering thoughts, it came with a judgment that the three classes—‘Apostle of Plague,’ ‘Bone Dragon Master,’ and ‘Warlock’—had been mastered.

Considering the enormous demerit of having one’s ego stolen, its specs were excellent.

When one considered that mastering a single class required leveling from level 1 to level 99...

This was an absurd level of compression.

“This is Emperor Raising.”

Furthermore.

This was only stage one.

“This is not the end.”

I took out ‘cursed items’ from my inventory one after another.

A brooch said to contain the sealed ‘True Ancestor,’ the first vampire. If worn, one’s body would be stolen by the True Ancestor.

A living grimoire that contained a fragment of the soul of the founder of curse magic, who desired immortality. If worn, one’s body would be stolen by the founder.

A demonic sword created by someone who hated demons so much that he went mad with the desire to hunt them forever and turned himself into a weapon. If worn, one would be cursed to go berserk upon seeing demons.

“Ugh, it smells like dung.”

Just look at those options.

They had rather serious defects, but each was a cursed item that allowed one to master Blood Mage, Cursecaster, and Demon Hunter.

With fearful movements, Lee A-un equipped the cursed items one by one.

[Ah—what a murderous moon. Hm?]

Crunch.

True Ancestor, cut.

[Hieek! Hieeek! Th-This curse!!! Spare me! Spare me, spare me!! Please!!!]

Crunch.

Founder, cut.

[Now I am complete! Hm? What is that?]

Crunch.

Demon Hunter, cut.

As a result of feeding the three cursed items to ‘Crunch.’

[4. Blood Mage] (Master)

[5. Cursecaster] (Master)

[6. Demon Hunter] (Master)

“Easy, is it not?”

It was a method I never could have imagined if not for the ‘Outer God’s something-or-other’ curse afflicting Lee A-un.

‘Thanks to that, I saved an enormous amount of time and resources.’

[Huuuu...]

Lee A-un was slightly broken.

I would solve it soon anyway, so I passed over it for now.

‘Trivial.’

I pushed Lee A-un back into the class-change site.

Flash!

Golden light burst out.

[All Black Mage aptitude requirements have been fulfilled]

[The Apex of Branch 9 - Black Magic has been unlocked]

Boom!

[Apex: Deathlord]

“Khh.”

Letters wreathed in black and crimson ominous energy appeared in large form.

“This is insane.”

The leveling grind in Lost Honor was unbelievably harsh.

It usually took thirty days to master one lower class.

To unlock an Apex, all six lower classes had to be mastered, so it took roughly six months.

Those six months.

I could compress them into one minute!

“I can control time...”

[Will you change classes?]

[1. Yes] [2. No]

The message urged me, as though telling me to press it quickly.

My choice?

Naturally, it was already decided.

***

“...Where is this now?”

Lee A-un muttered limply.

He had died and woken after being consumed by blue-tinged cold.

He had died and woken after his blood was sucked dry.

He had died after his entire body was paralyzed like a marionette, then fought an endless struggle that felt like ten years, died, died again, and died yet again...

It was after he had gone through a series of bizarre experiences that he never wanted to experience a second time.

During that time, his body had been stolen by transcendental beings of tremendous status, and he had glimpsed their memories, leaving Lee A-un in a state of being ‘mixed’ with them.

It was like all kinds of colors called transcendent beings had been violently mixed into the white paint called Lee A-un.

Before the ego called ‘I’ vanished amid that tremendous agony, he had awakened along with a strangely frightening yet warm heat, but...

Lee A-un was in a strange state, as though he could not tell whether he was himself or a butterfly.

With that sensation, he looked down at the Milky Way flowing beneath his feet.

“Space?”

When he raised his head, the world was a space filled with stars.

Below him flowed the Milky Way, and above him, enormous planets drifted.

No matter where he looked, everything was filled with shining stars.

[Beautiful, is it not?]

“Urgh!”

When a pleasant female voice whispered beside his ear, Lee A-un flinched in surprise.

“P-Please stop doing that!”

Thinking that something else had come to devour him, Lee A-un reflexively took a fighting stance.

“Hm?”

Behind Lee A-un was a star shining in the shape of a rhombus.

[Ahaha. Do not be so surprised. I will not harm you.]

“...Who are you?”

[My name is Gaia.]

The star shone brightly.

[I am the god of this world.]

“...God?”

[Yes. Well, I have essentially fallen almost completely... and only a very small amount of divinity remains. But since I was created as the god of this world from the beginning, a god is still a god.]

A cheerful laugh flowed from the star.

[Though the true god of this world is probably the Lord Guardian.]

“The Guardian?”

[Yes. The one who guided you here.]

“...Brother?”

[Oh?]

The star flashed red, as though surprised.

[To call that being... so comfortably. You have quite the nerve.]

“...I-Is that so?”

[Hee hee. I was joking.]

What was this?

At the joke he could not understand, Lee A-un scratched his head.

[...It was not funny, was it? I am sorry. It has been far too long since I conversed with a person.]

“...Yes. I apologize. I could not even understand what part was the joke.”

[...Ahem. In any case.]

The embarrassed star spun around and changed the subject.

[You... bear traces of having received a ‘baptism’ once in another world.]

“A baptism? What is that?”

[It is the act of drawing out the possibilities held by a human... In your memories, it is what is called ‘Awakening.’]

“Ah.”

[Hmm... How strange. There are traces of a baptism, but someone has plucked out the fruit itself.]

The star drew closer, as though observing Lee A-un.

Inside that star, Lee A-un could see a very small and beautiful fairy with green hair.

‘A fairy?’

“What does that mean...”

[This is why your soul has become so tattered... However, do not worry.]

“Pardon?”

[It seems the Guardian is giving you a second chance.]

The star emitted a bright light, as though congratulating him.

‘A second chance?’

[Under that being’s ‘permission,’ you will be reborn as one called the Apex of Black Magic!]

“!”

Thump. Thump.

After Awakening to the ability called Backflow, Lee A-un had been afflicted by a curse-like illness immediately afterward and had never once lived as a Hunter.

‘The Apex of Black Magic? I do not know what that is, but it sounds incredibly amazing!’

Lee A-un’s dreams swelled wildly.

[Huh?]

“?”

Lee A-un’s heart dropped.

That word, ‘huh?’ was... usually.

[Um... What? Th-This should not be possible.]

...Yes.

It was the kind of exclamation that came out when ‘an incomprehensible bad thing’ had happened, exactly like now.

“Is, is there some kind of problem...?”

[Um... The Guardian.]

“Yes! Brother did?”

[He refused.]

“?”

The star spun in place, as though it could not understand.

[He refused to change your class.]

“Pardon?”

The star’s voice trembled faintly.

[Deathlord... The Apex of Black Magic. The Guardian judged that even that enormous destiny was insufficient to be placed within your vessel...!]

What did that mean?