Chapter 10 : Color

***

Magic and swordsmanship thrived in the continent of Sekradon.
Everyone who lived there spoke with one voice.
They said that a hero from another world, chosen by the Goddess, had defeated the Demon King with a holy sword.
They said that the millennia-long cycle of light and darkness had finally ended.

Eternal gratitude to you, oh great hero.

***

A blinding light greeted Seo-hyun as he stepped through the gate.

Shining marble floors and beautifully crafted marble pillars. The cloud city where the Goddess resided.
The magnificent land from which the entire continent could be seen.
Exephalis, the Sky Temple of Sekradon, the fantasy world.

“Ugh, blech!”

In the sacred place where the Goddess blessed the summoned hero, Haneul vomited, seemingly without end.

Seo-hyun cautiously approached Haneul and looked down at the world below.

It was as he’d expected, yet there was a significant difference between expectation and reality.

“Damn.”

Seo-hyun frowned, but began to take in every corner of the grey-stained continent.

Small creatures crumbled into dust.
On the ground, the pressed faces of humans endlessly praised the Goddess, chanting bizarre verses.

Plants swelled to grotesque sizes with strange colors, sucking the life out of those who resisted.
Faceless giants opened their heads to reveal their contents, causing soldiers to devour each other.

Ominous light spilled from wells, engulfing villages.
Lovers fused into single beings, seeking others to join them.

As Seo-hyun watched the ground with sunken eyes, Haneul’s voice reached him.

“…Seo-hyun.”
“What?”
“Is this… because of me? Because I killed the Demon King…?”

Seo-hyun didn’t answer. Haneul wasn’t entirely wrong.
She speculated that this world had been balanced between two forces.
The factions of light and darkness.
And two divine beings. The Goddess and the Demon King.

The world formed by these two extremes fit together exquisitely.
They hated and rejected each other, but their balance must never be broken.

Every world has inherent properties.
Most worlds share similar rules, but each has at least one unique property.

In the world of martial arts, it’s Ki.
In the world of science, it’s ever-advancing technology.
In the world of magic, it’s constantly evolving spells.
In this world, it’s said to be a continent of magic and swords… but that’s just how Earthlings perceive it.
The most important element is the conflict between ‘light and darkness’.

There is warmth, so there is cold.
There is darkness, so there is also light.

The end of a world whose inherent properties are denied.
In martial arts terms, Ki manipulation becomes difficult.
In scientific terms, the basis of technology disappears.
In magical terms, the abundant mana dwindles.
That’s all.

However, what if it’s a world where two concepts oppose each other?

There was no need to overthink it.

With darkness gone, the uncontrolled light became infinitely intense.
And that light, in its greedy ascension, transformed into some incomprehensible thing in the infinite universe.

“It’s the Goddess’s fault. Not yours.”

He said, looking towards the far east of the continent, where the flames of life still flickered.

At the edge of chaos, the greatest beings remained.
A sight of various races gathered at the corner of the continent, waging a desperate struggle to protect their loved ones and preserve their species.

Watching them, Seo-hyun realized he had no choice but to accept the whispers of his true self this time.

As a human, the best he could do was to punish the Goddess who targeted his homeland.

For them to survive, some divine intervention was needed to overturn the game.

Seo-hyun slowly inhaled and closed his eyes.

Behind him, another otherworldly being faintly appeared, like ripples on the surface of water.
The drifting grey clouds stopped, and the bizarrely flashing sun lost its light.
Darkness enveloped everything, illuminating only Seo-hyun, Haneul, and the survivors at the continent’s edge.

The being behind Seo-hyun wriggled the tentacles that served as its head. Her lips began to move slightly.

`I will give them a choice to live.`

The sweet whisper of a god who loved humans reached Kim Ha-neul’s ears.
Haneul’s bloodshot eyes moved, as if entranced, towards the desperate battlefield at the edge of the continent.

Sweet words seduced Kim Ha-neul. His pupils trembled and wavered uncontrollably.

Peace, stability, love, and benevolence gently embraced him.
His fear-stricken heart was veiled by a warm curtain.

Based on essence and desire, it was time to ask.

`Do you want to save them?`

It was a question, but not to Haneul.
Words that pierced through his deepest desires, resolving all his conflicts.
Words that would finally allow him to steel his resolve.

He closed his trembling eyes.
He collected himself, clenched his fists.
He straightened his shoulders and spoke in a voice befitting a hero.

“I… want to save them.”

The god smiled silently.
The smile turned into laughter, then into a hearty roar.
As if waiting, a brilliantly pulsating rainbow sword sprouted from the god’s hand.

Handing it to Haneul, she said,

`Then become my apostle.`

Was the last thing Haneul saw her feet?

#

“Phew…”

Seo-hyun exhaled as he watched him leave.
Although it had been a leading question, it was a satisfying answer after a long time.
Feeling joy welling up in his heart, Seo-hyun looked away from the continent.

They have their battles, and I have mine.

Turning around, he saw the Goddess’s temple, radiating with shining marble.

To Seo-hyun, it looked like it was screaming.
The essence of light in this world was shifting, rushing towards the extreme point of the universe.
The stars hanging at the edge of the sky pulsed briefly, fearing the birth of something new.

A thought suddenly occurred to Seo-hyun as he watched.
That the origin of outer gods wasn’t actually from a broken balance, but from something reaching an extreme.
Something pushed to its limits, becoming terribly distorted.

However, he soon shook his head. There was absolute proof against this.
Deep within the universe, beyond the horizon of chaos, beyond time and space, where he’d given up observing, resided something that transcended the properties of that world. That something, which became the property itself, was undoubtedly an outer god, but it was certainly not something that could be created by something like this.

Simply put, what was being created now was an immature cosmic being.
What was inside the temple was not a complete outer god that fully controlled its laws.
It was merely an immature fetus, creating the new laws of the world.

Therefore, it had not yet eliminated the boundary between life and death.
It was a living, breathing, beating life, a beast bound to a single planet, forever tied to the framework of time and space.

So there’s no reason why Han Seo-hyun, a human, couldn’t kill it.

Since it’s within the realm of human capabilities, he’ll face it as a human.
He chooses the most efficient weapon to kill the being that has become closer to the world’s impurities.

He waved his hand and drew a crystal greatsword.
He caressed its surface, feeling the familiar coolness.
A weapon that had slain countless monsters when he was human, and the key he had used to stab his heart and become a god.
A sword that shone like a burning white flame, stained by the blood scattered at that time.

Therefore, it is a sacred object. The holy sword of the ominous outer god.

He gripped the sword with both hands and took a deep breath.
He raised the sword to the sky and swung it down once.
His hands trembled, and an unbearable pressure, too much for a frail human body, weighed down on his shoulders.

He ignored it and raised the sword again.
Blood, whether human or divine, boiled, rejoicing as if meeting its owner.
His hands holding the sword became infinitely light, and vitality surged through his body.

He swung the sword down again, and the sword began to resonate, adapting to him.
The shining blade drew a pure white trajectory as it plunged downwards.

A perfect arc.
Seo-hyun smiled deeply at the shining sword and swung it towards the void without a moment’s hesitation.

*Kwang-!*

The thin membrane surrounding the temple shattered, signaling the start of the battle.
He dashed into the temple.
Inside, a cocoon several times larger than the temple pillars pulsed.

The Goddess was gone, replaced by an unknown monster.
A bizarre cocoon, colored in hues not found on Earth, pulsed, and various lights shot out from its crevices.

Before the light could reach him, he spun, wielding the holy sword with both hands.
The crystals greedily devoured the light, splitting and refracting what remained.
The refracted lights touched the temple walls and burned grey.

Recalling the hunting methods of the weak, he circled the cocoon of light.
He deflected the emitted light, inching forward.

As he closed the distance, frustrated, the cocoon flashed with colors that didn’t exist in reality.
A wave-like surge erupted from the cocoon, distorting the surrounding reality.
Gravity and left and right reversed as the world warped.

“…”

He calmly observed his surroundings and realized it was a shallow trick deceiving his eyes.
He frowned slightly, and things he hadn’t seen before came into view.
His body was still running towards the cocoon, and red crystal shards sprouted along his path, piercing the temple.

*Clang*

Crystals bloomed like flowers wherever his feet landed, deflecting the light flying from all directions.
With surging exhilaration, he swung the greatsword, repelling the light coming from the front.

He maintained his thrusting stance from the momentum of his run.
The light pushing from the front scattered as it hit the sword.

*Thud*

He plunged the greatsword into a crevice in the cocoon where light of a color that shouldn’t exist seeped out.
The distorted god’s fate was torn apart by the greatsword.
At the tip of his sword, he felt the unmistakable flesh of the Goddess.

With the sword thrust horizontally, he twisted his body.
The cocoon ripped, and the blade pointed towards the sky.

He poured all his magical power into his arms and slashed the greatsword upwards.
His human body couldn’t withstand the explosive force and he lost his grip on the greatsword.

*Crackle, crash!*

With the sound of the cocoon rupturing, the contents were torn vertically.

He steadied his staggering body and caught the flying sword.
He felt his body, exhilarated from the long-awaited battle, slowly cooling down.

His roving blue eyes examined the silently crumbling cocoon.
It cracked open, and the dead Goddess’s body rolled onto the floor, turned grey.

He didn’t let go of the sword.
He knew it wasn’t over yet.
Beings close to godhood usually have at least one last resort.

Something flowed out of what would be the Goddess’s head.

An ominous color.
A light that shouldn’t exist in the world.

It was the new law the being was creating.
He couldn’t grasp it with human senses, so he couldn’t understand it.
It had no form, so he couldn’t kill it.
It wasn’t material, so he couldn’t touch it.
It only greedily absorbed all energy.

He lowered his sword to the floor.

`Is this the end?`