Chapter 131
“No cards? Then I’ll go.”
I kicked off the ground and closed the distance in an instant using a movement technique.
At the same time, I threw a punch at Lin.
The fist wrapped in qi sliced through the air.
“Ugh…!”
Boooom—!
Lin hurriedly warped space to block it.
But he couldn’t stop the impact itself.
His body was shoved far backward.
“Grr!”
Lin’s doll-like face twisted grotesquely.
It was an expression mixed with rage and confusion.
I didn’t stop and unleashed a barrage of punches.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Lin desperately formed spatial barriers, but my fists smashed through them one by one.
The abyssal power I had gained from the Mark of Leviathan.
In front of that, his crude distortions meant nothing.
“Why don’t you give up and die quietly?”
At my words, Lin’s gaze wavered.
He stepped back to widen the distance.
But I was faster.
Using the Blue Wolf’s Step, I caught up to him in an instant.
“I…!”
Whoosh—
Gritting his teeth, Lin swung his arm.
Space twisted and shot toward me.
Yeah, I can see it all.
With years of experience, I read the trajectory easily.
I avoided it with nothing more than a slight tilt of my head.
The distorted space grazed right past my cheek.
“…quench my thirst with the enemy’s blood—”
An orc behind me was completely erased.
It was a dangerous attack, but the pattern was obvious.
“Do you even know who I am—?!”
Lin let out a shriek that was almost a scream.
His voice was trembling.
Whether from rage or fear, I didn’t know…
Probably both.
“I’m meant to become His daughter!”
His daughter?
My thoughts raced.
There was only one being his followers called “Him.”
The underground Outer God they worshipped.
One of the Twelve Outer Gods—
Falspera, the one who proclaimed Distorted Hope.
And a body meant to become his daughter meant…
An apostle.
Lin-00 wasn’t just any ordinary follower.
A messenger of a god.
A being meant to spread their will.
He had been a candidate to become an apostle.
Then those special abilities make sense…
But even so, nothing changed.
He was still human.
And as long as he was human, he couldn’t escape violence.
I swung my fist again.
“Daughter or son—what does that have to do with me?”
“……!”
KWAANG—!
This one landed cleanly.
My fist slammed into his shoulder.
His frail body rolled across the blood-soaked ground.
“Ugh…”
Lin groaned as he got up.
His shoulder was bent at an unnatural angle.
But he didn’t give up.
Instead—
“…Fine.”
Lin slowly raised his head.
His eyes began to change.
Madness.
No—something even more horrific burned within them.
“If it’s come to this…”
At that moment, blood vessels filled the whites of his eyes.
Red lines spread across his eyeballs like spiderwebs.
Then his eyes began to spin.
This is…
Déjà vu.
A very bad one.
It was the same 모습 Shible had shown when he consumed a mature core and received a revelation.
“Everyone… die.”
At the same time, a grotesque aura burst from Lin’s body, surging backward.
It wasn’t black, nor red—
It was a color beyond description.
“…Damn it.”
I instinctively retreated.
But the shockwave was faster.
A massive wave slammed into me.
KUUUUNG—!
My body was flung backward.
I only stopped after rolling across the ground several times.
The taste of blood filled my mouth.
Damn it…!
I hurriedly raised my head.
And I couldn’t close my mouth at what I saw.
Like apples being eaten away, sections of the Ashen Orc camp were being deleted.
In chunks.
“Th-the god… fi-finally—”
“That light, that form… surely it’s—”
“He is looking upon us—”
They weren’t just disappearing.
Their very existence was being erased.
No sound. No screams. No blood.
“……”
“……”
“……”
In that brief moment while the battlefield was steeped in his grotesque aura—
Every single Ashen Orc vanished from the field.
Now, the only one left standing in the opposing camp was Lin-00 alone.
Sacrificing every soldier but himself…
A chill ran down my spine.
What the hell did that lunatic just do?
No—what did he summon?
That was when—
Crack—
A sound came from two eggs lying on one side of the battlefield.
The eggs that held Geri and Freki.
Cracks began to form, blue and red light leaking through the gaps.
Now?!
The timing was absurd.
The glow grew stronger, and soon the eggs shattered completely.
From within the light, two wolves emerged.
“……”
I was speechless.
They were completely different from before.
Geri…?
No—he wasn’t Geri anymore.
His blue fur had deepened, and his body was more than twice its former size.
Frosty energy billowed from his back like a cloak, and his eyes burned colder than moonlight—deeper than death itself.
“…Wow.”
[Magical Beast Info]
Name: Lunir
Classification: Child of the God-Slayer
Rank: S−
Level: 10
Loyalty: 100
Skills:
Two Become One Lv.10 (S−)
Wolf Pack Max (B)
Frost of Niflheim Max (S)
Latent Abilities:
Riding (D)
Size Manipulation (B)
Weaponization (S)
Freki had also become something entirely different.
His red mane blazed like the sun’s corona, and each step scorched the ground.
[Magical Beast Info]
Name: Solvanir
Classification: Child of the God-Slayer
Rank: S−
Level: 102
Loyalty: 100
Skills:
Two Become One Lv.10 (S−)
Wolf Pack Max (B)
Embers of Muspelheim Max (S)
Latent Abilities:
Riding (D)
Size Manipulation (B)
Weaponization (S)
…As expected.
The corner of my mouth lifted.
From the moment I first met them, I’d had a suspicion about their true identities.
The two wolves from myth that herald the end of the world.
The monsters that devour the sun and the moon.
But it seems they haven’t regained their true names yet…
The classification “Child of the God-Slayer” and their forms matched my expectations,
but the names they’d been given were different.
Still, I was grateful they had awakened in time.
And I think I know how they can reclaim their true names.
The hint lay in their primary skill.
Ding!
[The final effect of the skill ‘Two Become One’ has been unlocked!]
[Two Become One]
Rank: S−
Level: Max
Info:
The paired souls will never be separated, anywhere, anytime.
The paired souls share thoughts and emotions at all times.
When the paired souls merge, they become one of the harbingers who announce the fall of the gods.
Yeah… that.
At that very moment—
Kiiiiiiik—!
“……!?”
A massive crack formed in the air above Lin’s head.
Space began to split apart, like shattered glass.
The rift widened.
And from within—
――――――!!!
With an eerie noise, something began to force its way out.
A gigantic, rotting wing.
Instead of feathers, thousands—tens of thousands—of hands were attached to it.
Those hands writhed, groping through the air.
Ding! Ding! Ding!
[Warning! Warning! Warning!]
[An undetectable higher-dimensional entity fragment, outside system rules, is descending.]
…An Outer God.
My heart pounded.
That thing shouldn’t exist on this floor.
One of the Twelve Underground Outer Gods.
A fragment of one of those monsters that covet everything in the Tower was descending here.
“Guh…!”
The Red Orcs around us dropped to their knees all at once.
Even Durmak was no exception.
Warriors who had faced death without fear were frozen in terror.
Their instincts as living beings were screaming a warning.
“…Ha… haha! Hahahaha!!”
Lin laughed.
He laughed like a madman.
He spread his arms wide, gazing up at the massive wing.
“Look, Kang Siwoo! This is—!”
But he never finished.
Swoooosh—
The rotting wing moved.
Thousands of hands shot out and wrapped around Lin, snatching him up.
“Huh?”
Lin’s face froze.
He looked utterly confused.
Of course he was—
The god he worshipped was attacking him.
“N-no… why…?”
Lin struggled in panic.
But it was useless.
The countless hands dragged him slowly into the rift.
“No! I—I am yours—!”
Lin vanished into the abyss-like gap.
No scream. No final words.
Nothing remained.
Thanks to that, I ended the quest with absurd ease.
Ding!
[Main Quest Completed!]
[Hidden Quest Completed!]
[Rewards granted.]
[Moving to the next floor…]
If I can just escape to the next floor like this…
But when had things ever gone my way?
As expected, something went wrong.
[…]
[Bzzzt…]
[An error has occurred!]
…What?
The system stopped.
I was supposed to move to the next floor, but nothing happened.
Then—
Ding!
[‘Distorted Hope’ is distorting the rules of this floor.]
Damn it!
I understood why.
That fragment of the Outer God was interfering with the Tower’s system.
After devouring Lin-00, it had grown stronger.
――――!!!
Another wing forced its way out of the rift.
Now two pairs of wings were fully visible.
Shiiiiik—!
The wings spread.
They were massive enough to cover the entire sky.
The countless hands attached to them began to move at once—
Toward the Red Orcs.
“……”
“……”
“……”
Squish!
The hands pierced the orcs’ chests and ripped out their hearts.
Then they absorbed them whole.
The orcs withered and collapsed one by one, unable even to scream.
…At this rate.
I looked at Lunir and Solvanir.
They were looking back at me.
Without needing words, we knew what had to be done.
“Guys, I’m counting on you.”
At my command, the two wolves moved.
Their bodies dissolved into smoke.
Blue smoke and red smoke intertwined and became one.
Ding!
[Soul Fusion has begun.]
[Current time: Day — ‘Solvanir’ takes control.]
[Status Change: Solar Eclipse Manifested]
[The world’s daylight collapses.]
The sun in the sky began to disappear.
As if someone were slowly covering it, the light faded.
Soon, complete darkness enveloped the world.
Pitch-black darkness.
And within it, a single light flared.
“—KWA AAAAAANG!!”
A thunderous roar echoed.
A crimson light tore through the darkness.
Its owner was a gigantic wolf.
But calling it merely a wolf didn’t do it justice.
Its power was overwhelming.
Its red mane blazed like hellfire, and its crimson eyes burned like embedded suns.
Ding!
[The sun-devouring one, ‘Sköll’, has manifested!]
[A harbinger of the fall of the gods has appeared!]
Sköll.
The harbinger of the world’s end.
The wolf that devours the sun.
That monster had now manifested here.
―――!
Falspera’s wings roared as they lashed out toward Sköll.
Thousands of hands swarmed him at once.
“Grr!”
Tzpat—!
Sköll leapt lightly into the air and evaded them.
As if invisible steps existed, he ran through the sky.
His blazing mane scattered like fire, tracing a brilliant arc.
Like a comet burning through the dark, Sköll charged straight for the rift.
Swoooosh—!
The wings attacked again.
Hundreds of hands surrounded Sköll, cutting off his escape.
Yet he didn’t stop.
He accelerated instead.
“KWAAAANG!!”
Fwoooosh—!
Solar flames erupted from his maw, engulfing the hands.
The stench of burning, rotten flesh spread.
The hands recoiled as if screaming.
Seizing the opening, Sköll reached the base of the first wing.
“Grrr!”
His sharp fangs sank into it.
Crunch—!
Bone and flesh shattered with a sickening sound.
The wing thrashed violently.
Thousands of hands grabbed Sköll’s fur at once—
Tearing, pulling, dragging him down.
His red fur was ripped out, blood spraying.
“Grr!”
But Sköll didn’t let go.
He bit down even deeper.
His fangs pierced through the wing’s root.
Then he twisted his body back.
―――!!
With a thunderous sound, massive tendons stretched and snapped.
Black veins burst, foul fluid spraying like a fountain.
The hands writhed in silent agony, flailing even more wildly.
They gouged at Sköll’s eyes, pried at his jaws, tried to choke him.
It was useless.
“Grrrrr!!”
Snap— crack— riiip—!
One by one, the tendons finally tore.
Like a massive rope being pulled free, the wing’s root was ripped out.
Black fluid poured from the rift like rain.
Thud!
At last, the first wing was completely torn free.
The rotten wing fell from the sky.
The hands twitched weakly in the air before going limp.
Boom—
It slammed into the ground, dust exploding upward.
But Sköll didn’t stop.
Licking the black fluid from his muzzle, he turned toward the second wing.
―――Kiiiiik!!
The second wing struck first.
Hands lashed out like tentacles, grabbing Sköll’s limbs.
“Grrrk…!”
Sköll struggled.
More and more hands clung to him.
Like prey caught in a web, his movements slowed.
Then—
Fwoooooosh—!
Flames erupted from Sköll’s entire body.
This was the true power of the beast that devoured the sun.
Fire poured from his crimson mane, engulfing the hands restraining him.
Flesh burned away, and moments later, bones turned to ash.
“KWAAANG—!”
Sköll roared within the flames.
His blazing form burst through the swarm of hands—
And he tore into the base of the second wing.
Crrrraaack—!
The wing vibrated instead of screaming.
Every remaining hand lunged at Sköll.
But he unleashed even fiercer flames and repeated the same brutal process.
At last, the second wing was ripped free and crashed to the ground.
“Finally… it’s closing.”
Kiiiiik—
The rift began to close slowly.
The fragment of the Outer God was completely expelled.
I looked up at the sky.
“……”
The massive Sköll was looking down at me.
His body was covered in wounds.
Fur torn away, blood flowing.
But his gaze was still sharp.
[Soul Fusion has ended.]
[The two magical beasts return to their original forms.]
Shiiiiik—
Sköll dissolved into smoke.
Moments later, two wolves landed before me.
Lunir and Solvanir.
“Good work.”
I patted their heads.
Wounded as they were, they wagged their tails and licked my hand.
Phew…
The frantic situation had finally come to an end.
