The fight, which should have ended simply with his victory long ago, was dragging on indecisively.
His demonic power was strangely lacking in force, and his attacking movements were slower than usual, giving his opponents easy opportunities to evade.
It was somewhat different from the overwhelming skill of the Leviathan I knew.
The demons fighting him also seemed to realize before long that something was different from usual.
“Hm? There’s no way he’s going easy on us… Leviathan, something’s wrong.”
“I don’t know what it is, but this state gives us a chance to win!”
Hiding nearby and hearing those words, I nervously bit my lower lip.
Rastan had always been an object of awe among demons.
‘Not respect, but awe. Something closer to submission out of fear.’
That was because the hierarchy among demons strictly followed the logic of strength.
Because of that, as soon as he appeared even slightly weaker than usual, the opposing demons immediately cast aside even the slightest trace of awe and charged at him.
‘What do I do…?!’
Startled, I covered my mouth with both hands.
Normally, I would have mocked the opposing demons for foolishly charging at him, but now, even to my eyes, Rastan was gradually being pushed back, struggling more than usual.
There were nearly ten high-ranking demons, not low-ranking ones, so the fact that he had even managed to hold such a fierce exchange in the first place was incredible.
At that moment, one demon tried to stab him from behind while he was blocking another demon’s attack.
“No!!”
Without thinking, I rushed out from hiding to stop the attack, rendering my hiding meaningless. It was a completely reflexive action.
Fortunately, hearing my voice, Rastan turned his body and avoided the attack.
The problem came next.
Nine pairs of glowing red eyes from the high-ranking demons who had been attacking him all turned toward me at once. No, ten pairs, including Rastan’s.
“What is this?”
“Isn’t that a dream demon? Why is something like that interfering here?”
Rastan’s eyes seemed to widen slightly when he discovered me.
Under the gazes of powerful demons, far beyond anything I could face, I shrank back in fear and staggered backward.
“I-I am sorry… I… I mean…”
At that moment, Rastan silently swung his arm and, in an instant, cut down three of them at once.
He hadn’t missed the brief moment when their attention had been distracted.
“Aaagh!! Damn it, because of this wench!”
“Was he pretending to be weak on purpose for this?!”
The surviving demons recoiled in shock and quickly distanced themselves from Rastan.
At the same time, one of them grabbed me and pulled me back.
“Ugh!”
With my neck trapped in his thick, rugged arm, I couldn’t even resist.
The demon holding me muttered ominously above my head.
“If I’m going to die anyway, I won’t go quietly, Leviathan. Even if I am annihilated, with this, I can at least make you suffer forever.”
Then suddenly, an indescribable pain struck my entire body like lightning.
I lost consciousness without even being able to scream.
My memories ended there, but the sword’s memories showed what happened next.
The demon who had captured me extracted all of the dream demon’s abilities from me.
For a demon, their innate ability was the essence of their life force, so after having my ability extracted, I died instantly on the spot.
As that high-ranking demon staggered, having exhausted nearly all his strength extracting my ability, another demon beside him took my ability from him and shaped it into the form of a sword.
It was the very sword I had just found deep within Rastan’s dream.
Without the slightest hesitation, that demon drove the sword into Rastan’s chest.
Rastan, who had been momentarily dazed, likely from the shock of my death, was struck by the sudden attack.
“Ugh…!”
The sword emitted a white light, then disappeared into his body.
Rastan, regaining his senses too late, examined his body, but it was impossible to remove the sword that had already vanished as if absorbed.
The memory of the moment Rastan was struck by the curse ended there. And the memories from when I was a dream demon also resurfaced partially.
‘Normally, a demon’s death means the annihilation of their existence…’
Like the demon Astaroth, whom Rastan had cut down and annihilated on the spot last week.
However, I was a special case. I hadn’t simply died, but had my ability extracted.
‘Perhaps those above and the Lord of Hell found it difficult to decide how to handle me.’
In the end, my soul wasn’t annihilated, and I was reincarnated as a human.
From my perspective, it meant I had gained a second chance, one where I could live a good life and go to heaven.
After all, it was much easier for a human to go to heaven than for a demon.
The life that followed passed quickly before my eyes.
It was the image of myself being reincarnated into this world, having lost my memories of living in Korea.
As the daughter of House Krone, I had been born with a vessel for supernatural ability, but for some reason, the power passed down through the family’s blood had nearly disappeared, so all I possessed was an empty vessel.
Then, when I met Rastan, the curse embedded in him recognized its original owner.
Each time I came into contact with him, it gradually transferred back into me.
‘Since it was originally my power, it must have been naturally drawn to my soul.’
No matter how much of that power flowed in, an ordinary person wouldn’t have been able to contain it, and it would have simply passed through meaninglessly.
But I happened to possess an empty vessel capable of containing supernatural ability.
Because of that, the power that was a curse to Rastan but an ability to me gradually accumulated within me, becoming a usable ability.
‘So that’s why the Archmage said that back then.’
“The source of this power… is evil. It means it came from the demonic realm.”
Since it was power that originally belonged to a demon, describing it that way wasn’t unreasonable.
Moreover, Rastan, who had possessed it, was also a demon, so it was power received from a demon.
After seeing all this, I left Rastan’s dream.
The numerous wounds I had received from the blade-like wind were, of course, completely gone, but what was even more surprising was the condition of my body.
Since I had done something tremendous in the dream today, I expected to be left half-dead like last time, but my condition was completely fine.
‘No, rather, it feels like my body is overflowing with strength.’
Sitting up in the bed where I had been sleeping, I clenched and unclenched my hand, recalling how the sword had disappeared as if absorbed into me. And then I realized.
‘Ah… since I’ve recovered all of my original ability, using that much power is no longer any burden at all.’
That meant my power was now fully unlocked to its limit.
To the same extent I had briefly glimpsed once before, with the help of House Lansval’s heirloom, on the day I destroyed Ifrit’s mental world.
‘To think I can not only manipulate others’ dreams, but brainwash them, control them, and ultimately leave them in a state no different from death.’
It was far too vast, too powerful, and too dangerous a power to simply be called House Krone’s supernatural ability.
‘Thinking about it that way, it really is the power of a demon.’
Although it was shocking to learn that I too had once been a demon, somehow it felt easier to accept when I realized that my ability had come from there.
‘I had only thought of it as a supernatural ability.’
It was almost ironic that I had been shocked by the fact that Rastan was a demon and had avoided him, when I myself had also been a demon long ago.
Feeling inexplicably sorry, I turned to look at Rastan’s face as he slept beside me.
He was sleeping deeply, with a more peaceful expression than ever before.
‘I’m sorry, Rastan. But… in the end, I did it.’
Since I had absorbed the source of the curse, the crystallization of my power, into myself, he would now be free from the curse.
I was happy, yet at the same time, thinking that he no longer needed my ability made me feel strangely empty.
At the same time, it also felt relieving to finally understand so many things that I hadn’t been able to comprehend before.
With a heart full of complicated emotions—pride, worry, relief, and emptiness all at once—I lay down again.
It was still deep in the early hours of the morning, so I gazed at Rastan’s smooth, handsome face beside me and tried to fall asleep again.
Perhaps because I fell asleep while still slightly excited.
The dream I entered once more showed a moment from my previous life.
I wished it would show one of the happier moments I had shared with that child, but unfortunately, the dream began at the moment Rosie drew her last breath.
“Gasp, Rosie, Rosie!”
Tears streamed down my face as I held the child’s cheeks.
