“…So to summarize, you were planning to put Lasty’s ego to sleep and take that opportunity for Blodia to completely occupy the body? Black Lily told you how to do that?”
“…That’s right. Ugh!”
“Hey, don’t wake up.”
As my Holy Power pressed down on Riven, he lay there trembling.
He seemed to have prepared a lot, as I could feel an incredible force when Riven got up.
That power was stronger than Blodia, and he could even use some of Black Lily’s abilities.
Moreover, he could also draw on the power of Lasty, who was currently in a sleep state, making him quite a tough opponent, but…
Creeeak…
“This is just…!”
“Stay still.”
This place is the Spiritual World.
From the moment Riven and Blodia entered the Spiritual World, their chances of winning converged to zero.
Even if Black Lily entered directly, she wouldn’t be able to defeat me now.
I embraced the unconscious Lasty, leaving the trembling Riven behind.
This is not inside Lasty’s memory but within Blodia’s.
Blodia’s presence was ‘much’ lighter than Lasty’s, allowing her to enter here first.
To enter Lasty’s memories, I would have to delve even deeper.
It took quite a bit of time, but with Lasty’s ego asleep and Riven captured, there shouldn’t be any problems.
“So what you’ve been talking about wasn’t Lasty? But it sure felt real.”
“…I can’t completely put her to sleep… so you could say it’s just part of it…”
“Hmmm…”
Whatever it is, I’d know when I get there.
Before entering Lasty’s memories, I lifted the pressure weighing down on Riven.
He exhaled deeply and lay on the ground, and I helped him up and confined him in a small Iron Cage made of Holy Power.
Riven, trapped in the cage, looked up at me.
“You can’t go anywhere this time. It’s a technique that traps the soul.”
“…Crazy.”
“Since you’re a Blood Knight, Lasty will have to deal with you. You’ll meet her again soon.”
“Can’t you just kill me?”
He bowed his head, pleading earnestly.
Having cared for the king named Lasty for so long, he should know her personality well.
Of course, he surprised me with a rather odd sight of ‘repentant Lasty’, but at the very least, he would know better than anyone how to deal with a betrayer.
She would probably deliver something far worse than death.
I breathed Holy Power into Lasty again.
“I don’t want to.”
“Ah.”
My consciousness sinks down deeply.
Blodia’s depth of life was shallow, so this entire process was extremely brief.
But Lasty is an ancient monster with at least ten thousand years of life experience.
If we exclude upper-tier celestial demons, her age had a depth comparable to that of young celestial demons.
In the past, she was too dazed and lacked power to properly read this ‘flow’, but what about now?
Hooook…
‘I can see it.’
The things Lasty did in the past.
Lasty ruling over the kingdom of bloodsuckers.
Lasty distributing true blood to the elders.
Lasty invading the human kingdom.
Lasty, who became a true progenitor by discarding her human pieces.
Lasty destroying everything precious from her human days with her own hands…
.
.
.
I descend further.
Her past flows like water, and I fill my mind with those memories, filling in the missing parts I couldn’t see before.
‘I did things like that too. I couldn’t help it back then because I was so out of it… Was that also Lasty’s doing? That’s a misunderstanding… Why didn’t she say anything?’
It’s an extensive story befitting her long life.
Unlike other monsters that indulge in destruction and gluttony, it’s a story that is vast even ‘qualitatively’.
I keep going down, down, and down some more.
Before long, Lasty was flowing back to a time before she revealed herself to the world. A time when she was experimented on by a top-class demon.
The girl Lasty trapped inside a transparent crown and the mysterious black thing standing in front of her.
‘It’ had no form and changed organically with every moment.
‘Top-Class Demon.’
Lasty didn’t know its name, and later attempted revenge, but ‘it’ was already torn apart and killed by the Demon King Orcus of the Netherworld.
‘To the point of being impossible to resurrect.’
If this continues, Lasty’s human days before she was experimented on will emerge.
At that time, it stopped at a fourteen-year-old Lasty, but it might go deeper because she’s using techniques stronger than back then.
Going further down…
.
SDVIMVFoanVzY1YwSVhjamMzUkt1YkU5K2Zzb2pjcGdEU3o1ZEJZRy94WnRSMlpVeVkyMlBwUGZYc25NM1dVeg
.
.
.
.
.
“…?”
The speed slows down.
A different phenomenon than the past, which always flowed at a constant speed.
I find myself questioning this unprecedented phenomenon and scan my surroundings.
I questioned the phenomenon and took in my surroundings.
Brrrr…
‘It’ is conducting an experiment.
The magic is filling a transparent casket, and ‘it’ is still staring at the transparent casket.
No matter how much Lasty suffers, ‘it’ injects more magic.
Celestials are disgusting, but the demon race is just as bad.
An existence that should vanish completely.
If it were up to me, I would smash everything to pieces, but this feels like a fantasy reflecting the past.
Time doesn’t turn back, so there’s nothing I can do for the guy who has already been torn to shreds─
“…Celestial… messenger?”
“!”
‘It’ turns to look at me.
The moment I tilted my head slightly, a wave of magic brushed past me, chilling my soul.
If I hadn’t responded right away, that wave of magic would have pierced my head.
The space that came into contact with the magic began to morph thousands, tens of thousands of times as if screaming.
I felt the threat of ‘soul’ for the first time in ages and used holiness to block the magic and conceal my existence.
Only then did ‘it’ seem to hesitate for a moment before turning its head back to the transparent casket.
The speed is accelerating again…
“…Chilling.”
It was from a long-dead demon, split into thousands of fragments of soul.
Yet, the power of this ‘upper’ level could perceive my existence precisely across time and space.
It’s a different dimension of ability than simply ‘borrowing’ power like a raccoon.
“I never experienced this in the past…”
Why is it happening now when it couldn’t even see me before?
For a moment, I wondered if this was part of Black Lily’s plan, but it can’t be.
Black Lily is ultimately ‘me.’
No matter how twisted my mind becomes, I wouldn’t play with Lasty’s ‘it.’
The only possibility is that my current state is stronger than before.
As ‘it’ looked at me across time, my existence must have influenced the illusions of the past.
I never thought a situation like this would occur, so I didn’t completely hide my existence, which likely means I’m right.
However, this hypothesis requires one condition.
“…So the Demon King is alive.”
The reason ‘it’ died was the Fourth Seat among the six thrones.
Orcus, the Demon King of the Abyss, shredded his soul and enshrined it in his hell.
One could say he’s nearly dead, but the fact that he can exert influence like this means that ‘it’ exists in some form.
“It means that ‘it’ exists in some way.”
“The condition must surely include Orcus’s survival.”
“…….”
“At that time, some of the Eight Seats and Six Demon Kings did die, but in the end, they reached a cease-fire.”
“They’ve all just hidden away; even if there are a few living Demon Kings or Eight Seats, it wouldn’t be strange.”
“I was pretty sure that the top of the Administrator was one of them from the start…”
“…Another worry has gotten added.”
“My head has gotten unnecessarily complicated.”
“Should I really regain my power quickly?”
“In an instant, countless ideas to regain power popped up, but then I shook my head.”
“If I meant to kill them all, I wouldn’t have set up such a game.”
“In the end, the one at the top of this game wants something and has no intention of breaking the board until their purpose is achieved.”
“I can’t say for sure what the goal is, but at least it’s certain that it won’t be achieved in 1 to 2 years.”
“At least 10 years. Looking at the growth trend, it might even take longer…”
“Suddenly, it won’t happen that a Demon King or Eight Seats pop out and flip the whole planet upside down.”
“Moreover, with the war over, such worries are a luxury.”
“…Ah. I need to have the meeting today.”
“The Lily’s Group meeting has been delayed.”
“I’ve been really busy lately, so I postponed it, but I can’t delay it any longer.”
“Plus, including the Academy classes, I need to meet Yena again, and there are quite a few things to do, so I need to wrap up this multi-dimension quickly as well.”
“I suddenly chuckled at the strange disparity between reality and Deoen, finally arriving at the end of the past.”
“It’s a flower field.”
“A flower field full of yellow and white flowers, not stained with blood.”
“Beneath the peaceful blue sky, a small girl about 7 years old was quietly looking at me.”
“She had a somehow sulky face.”
“Seeing the situation, it seems she’s already come to her senses.”
“Should we go back?”
“I’m pretty good, you know.”
“Among the monsters, I’m on the nicer side.”
“You even had the crab stew, sister.”
“It was delicious. The problem was I ate too much.”
“…Hmph.”
Lasty reached out her hand, and I smiled as I took hers.
Kaboom!
The space of the past crumbled away.
Support me by donating at least $10, and you'll have the right to request any novel from Novelpia (excluding 19+ content) using a newly developed tool.
