“Hoo……”
White mist puffed from her exhaled breath.
With each step she took, her legs sank deep.
Snow lay in every direction.
An entire mountain of dizzying height was buried beneath it.
A place where all was still save for the fierce wind and the flurrying snow, insensitive to change—this was a mountain held sacred in Pieria, the kingdom of snow and ice.
A forbidding peak too high for human feet to reach.
A place where blizzards raged in every season, and thick clouds and mist made it difficult not only to find one’s bearings but even to open one’s eyes, as though it were the domain of an angered god.
A single human was climbing toward the summit of that mountain.
Though it was a place nature had not permitted, the person moved at a steady pace, as if such things were of no concern.
From within thick fur clothing, a face flushed red peeked out and looked around.
It was Airaitz, who had been said to have gone missing.
“It should be around here……”
Airaitz, leaving blemishes in the soft snow as she walked, stopped in place and took a book from her pocket.
〔The Seventh Record〕
A title on the cover that gave no hint at all as to what it recorded.
Airaitz’s expression as she opened it was utterly grave.
Based on the clue Hio had left in the divine mage’s house, she had moved to the Randevur region.
Starting with the first record she found there, she had reached the current seventh record.
This was the place she had arrived at by following it.
〔……I could not accept it. That our god would vanish. That Venus of beauty and love would no longer exist. How could such a thing be possible? What future could there be in a world without love?〕
The record, composed of seven volumes in all, was the diary of a priest whose status was unknown.
It was his despair, and the record of his frustration.
Airaitz opened roughly to the end of that book and read down the page.
〔Yet acceptance is not within my authority. Faith, too, is not something I can do anything about, and so I have no choice but to believe and believe again. O Venus! Save us through love. Repay us with love!〕
To begin with, Airaitz was an atheist.
She did not believe in gods.
The only things she believed in were herself and Hio.
But a world without Hio was a life without meaning.
Just as the priest in the record had said, it was a gray world where love did not exist.
So what did anything matter?
What could she not do?
She tried believing in a god she had never believed in, and followed a baseless record all the way here.
Along the way, there had been rather arduous trials and difficulties, but that much was not particularly hard.
They were not enough to stir even the slightest ripple in Airaitz’s quiet fury.
If she was told to throw away her life, she could gladly throw it away.
If she was told to live her whole life with a curse, she could do so with a smile.
If she had to become a god, she would do so even if it took thousands of years.
So long as she could bring Hio back to life.
〔For three days, I prayed without drinking even a sip of water. For even such suffering must be far too trivial compared to the pain my god would endure. Earnestly wishing that my god might fall asleep even a little more peacefully, I spent two days and nights in tears, then dozed off beneath the statue of the goddess Venus.〕
If there was a difference between the nameless priest in the record and Airaitz, it was this.
The priest had prayed in tears, wishing that his god would rest in peace, but Airaitz did not.
She did not pray for the one and only being she believed in.
She only moved.
Wishing for her sole god to appear once more.
Wishing to see that leisurely smile, as always.
From now on, her life would be a journey for that purpose.
〔It was a world suffused with vivid crimson. Was it a dream? No. It was the heavens. It was Venus’s summons. That day, I listened to Venus’s words with joy, and saw her off with sorrow. Thus, when I opened my eyes again, I found myself standing before the shattered statue of the goddess.〕
She had already read the contents of the book itself several times.
She could understand the contents roughly enough as well.
Airaitz turned to the next page and began walking again.
〔O successor.〕
She had not noticed, but the raging blizzard had already stopped.
〔You who were born from blessing, yet were not loved and knew not love, yet already bore immense love within you.〕
She neared the summit of the mountain.
There were not many pages left.
〔Pitiful one, wounded by love, who sought to know love and was saved by love. Thus, one who ultimately reaches my record. Seeker who shall once more spread an ecstatic crimson light, that beautiful color, across the world.〕
The falling snow came to a complete stop.
Even the wind held its breath, and silence enveloped the place.
Amid it, the sentences in the book, which had been nothing more than letters, became a solemn resonance and were engraved into the air.
〔With a noble body already dead, with a pitiable soul already dead, you who covet love—〕
The sky glittered black.
A dazzling light burst from the book in her hand.
A pale pink radiance poured endlessly from Airaitz’s hand, from the book.
This was the diary of a nameless priest.
The record of his despair.
The struggle of his frustration, and at the same time—
〔Airaitz.〕
It was a book of prophecy.
Ruuumble—
Soon, the entire mountain began to shake violently.
〔These are Venus’s final words.〕
The light bursting from the book was now so bright that the letters could no longer be seen, but that was fine.
Because the same letters were being engraved in the air.
Ruuuumble—
The summit of the mountain trembled with terrifying force.
The piled snow collapsed and scattered, and the ground split apart.
Amid the enormous tremor that shook as if the mountain would crumble—
What slowly revealed itself from beneath the mountain’s summit was a single structure.
A vast, pure-white temple.
〔If you wish to obtain love.〕
The record turned into light and was sucked into the temple.
A moment later, pale pink radiance erupted from the depths of the temple.
What could be felt from it was an immense amount of divinity.
〔Die once more.〕
She stepped forward.
With one step, she felt divine power.
A force that tightened around her whole body.
“Ghk……”
With two steps, pain enough to make her mind grow distant washed over her.
She saw the illusion of her body being torn to shreds, but it was not real.
Even amid that unfathomable pain, she clenched her teeth and took a third step.
It felt as if her soul and body were being separated.
Her soul, already dead, and her body, which had died more than a thousand years ago, were shaken.
The dark mana of Hio that bound them together was being weakened by the divinity.
Her steps paused for a moment.
To reach the inside of the temple, she would have to take at least several hundred more steps.
“Ha.”
Even so, a smile spread across Airaitz’s face.
It was for Hio.
Was it not only natural that a trial of this level should exist?
Had she not said that, for his sake, she could truly smile and endure a lifetime’s curse and the torment of hell?
〔Be born anew.〕
And so she took a fourth step.
A footprint was engraved into the pure-white snow.
Suddenly, fire flared to life on Airaitz’s body.
A scorching crimson flame that melted all the snow in the area and even raised a thick haze.
The demonic flame of divinity.
The artifact protecting her body and her clothes burned away in an instant.
〔Descendant of Venus.〕
Amid that pain, she took a fifth step.
* * *
The collapsing Gate.
The Abyss erupted as if exploding.
—Kueeeek!
Abyss monsters poured out.
Grotesqueries surged forth like a tidal wave.
「Skill — ‘Highest-Grade Psychokinesis - Weight’ is activating.」
He tried blocking part of it, but it was like pouring water into a bottomless jar.
Like trying to dam a river with one hand.
Kwaaaang—!
The long wall surrounding the city.
Seoul’s final line of defense, prepared for years for a moment like this.
Kuuung—!
It collapsed far too futilely.
The barriers of defense-type Awakeners were destroyed by a single tremor, and the towering wall shattered.
All manner of attacks from the Awakeners burst forth like desperate struggles, but they were not enough to stop the incoming tidal wave of monstrosities.
Kwaaaang—!
At last, the final line of defense came crashing down.
「Skill — ‘Highest-Grade Psychokinesis - Bind’ is activating.」
「Skill — ‘Highest-Grade Psychokinesis - Break’ is activating.」
He held the collapsing structure in place and swept away the monsters in front of him, but a wave far greater in number came surging in.
There was no longer anything he could do.
No—in truth, there had been no way long before now.
Since the day the Supreme Heavenly Demon, Hio Pavlenko, died, hope had been as good as gone.
He had only realized it all the more painfully now.
Kwaaaang—!
Sirbert stared blankly at the explosion.
This was truly unreal.
Even after protecting it with all his might, it had ended up like this in the end.
Even if they stopped this attack with everything they had, there was essentially no future afterward.
Because the truth they had tried so hard to hide had been exposed by someone’s revelation, and it was now widely known that everyone in the world was living a life no different from a terminal sentence.
The system would collapse, and people would fall into extreme chaos.
Even so, there was nothing he could do.
Because it was true.
All ordinary people except Awakeners would be unable to withstand the energy and die.
His family, whom Sirbert had risked his life to protect, as well.
They had finally been infected by the Abyss’s energy and were dying in real time.
And so his will disappeared.
Both arms, which he had raised to maintain his psychokinesis, lost their strength and drooped limply.
He simply stood there, blankly, in the middle of the battlefield.
Kwaaaang—!
Explosions and screams ran rampant.
Buildings collapsed, and flames soared.
Even though the damage was accumulating by the second, Sirbert showed no intention of moving.
“Nam Tae-min!”
Someone flew toward Sirbert at high speed.
And slapped him across the cheek.
With a sharp crack, his head turned slightly.
Though it had been a rather strong blow, it seemed to have no great effect on Sirbert, who was evaluated as one of the highest-ranking among the first Awakeners.
His neatly combed-back hair became disheveled, and his unfocused pupils turned toward the person who had appeared out of nowhere and slapped him.
“……Yun Seul-a.”
“You crazy bastard! Get a hold of yourself!”
Yun Seul-a grabbed Nam Tae-min by the collar.
“What are we supposed to do if you give up!”
Still, as a combat-type Awakener in her own right, she had enough strength to grab and shake Nam Tae-min’s body.
Seeing as she had rushed over the moment he released his psychokinesis, her mind still seemed perfectly sound as well.
“If you controlled information and set all this in motion, then take responsibility until the end!”
Not a single word she spoke was wrong.
It was true that he had controlled information, and it was true that he had to take responsibility for it.
Excuses like “it was the best possible method” obviously would not work.
They were nothing but the excuses of a failure.
However.
“It’s too late……”
Responsibility?
He could take as much of it as necessary.
But what meaning did that have now?
“We’re all going to die anyway.”
“What do you mean, die! Fight to the end, damn it!”
“There’s no way. Antiphus, Daphne—no one will be able to stop this disaster. Even if we do stop it, what comes after? What will we do about the Abyss that has spread, and how will we stop the next floor from collapsing? Maybe it would be better if we just went extinct here.”
Kwaaaaang—!
The tremors created by the grotesqueries grew even fiercer.
The calamity moved past the outskirts of Seoul and toward its center.
He had done his best to prevent destruction and had fought countless times.
He could confidently say that he had stepped in and out of truly dangerous battlefields as casually as eating meals.
But there was only one thing he regretted bitterly.
“That day…… in that hell, we shouldn’t have run.”
The screams that had rung out while they were trapped in the Abyss.
The hell of the 58th Floor, where, hidden in darkness, they had died one by one.
“If only we hadn’t run…… if only that bastard had been alive……”
Would things not have been very, very different?
After that day, he had regretted it bitterly and had never run away or retreated, but had it already been far too late?
In the end, the destined conclusion was destruction.
Kwaaaaang—!
The tremors reached close by.
The Abyss, spreading more thickly than ever, completely covered the skies above Seoul, and the screams of chaos reached their peak.
Amid it all, Yun Seul-a’s gaze swept over Nam Tae-min before her.
The collar clutched in her fist.
His wrinkled clothes.
His unfocused pupils.
His disheveled hair.
The sight of him seeming to have completely lost his will.
But she had to hear the story to the end.
Using that small clue, she had to somehow draw his will back up.
“By that bastard you mentioned, do you mean the one from before……”
And at that moment.
Behind Nam Tae-min.
Far above him, brilliantly surging upward—
Jjiiiiiing—
A purple line.
A violet radiance that split the Abyss and stretched to the end of the sky.
It drove away the dark shadow cast over Yun Seul-a’s face, replacing it with an ethereal violet glow.
After confirming it, Nam Tae-min’s head also slowly turned.
What soon filled his pupils, which had been empty because nothing had meaning, was shock.
Charruruk—
Space folded one layer after another.
It split.
The sky opened, the earth pulsed, and the grotesqueries howled in fear.
At the center of it, a being revealed itself.
With violet radiance at his back.
With the split space behind him.
With enormous pitch-black wings spread on both sides, looking down upon the earth.
No—was that truly a person?
That figure was like—
A descent of a god, meant to save humanity.
“Supreme…… Heavenly Demon……?”