Chapter 1161

A storm.

A storm of power that swept away and destroyed everything in its path—and a colossal explosion born of the collision.

KABOOOOOM!

The world shook beneath a roar that seemed to split the sky. The monsters had been staring blankly at the Dragon Lair, forgetting even the savagery etched into their souls. Now they felt darkness fall over them.

Then came a force they could never have imagined.

—!

Eyes wide. Mouths agape. Legs frozen by primal fear.

The monsters could not even let out a death cry.

No—in their final moments, the pitiful screams they managed were swallowed and erased by the deafening roar.

The impact was so horrific that “unprecedented” hardly did it justice. They were swept away helplessly, crushed into ruin.

RUMBLE, RUMBLE—!

Was this what it would look like if thousands upon thousands of meteors covered the sky?

The colossal castle, shattered into countless fragments by the blast, filled the air as its pieces plunged toward the earth. At the ends of their destructive arcs stood the monsters, frozen like statues.

CRASH! CRASH-CRASH-CRASH!

Destruction and death.

Those two things ruled the area in an instant. Sky and earth shuddered.

Everything mixed together.

Buried. Crumbling.

There was no way to stop it, no time to flee far enough.

Their tough hides and skin—so resilient that ordinary artillery could barely hurt them. Their bones, harder than alloy, and the immense durability those bones gave them.

Even the powerful magical power unique to high-tier monsters, which made all of it possible.

Nothing they possessed could save them from the death bearing down on them.

However brave a fighting dog might be, a tiger would still devour it. Strength yielded to greater strength.

CRUNCH! CRACK!

An ogre with both legs crushed let out a shriek. A Troll, half its body torn away by a fragment that had flashed past in an instant, shuddered and fell.

Even the Wyverns, descendants of Dragons who claimed the open sky as their domain, would never fly again.

Those closest to the explosion’s center had either died the moment the shock wave reached them or were now falling helplessly, their proud wings gone.

The explosion of power spread in every direction beyond the vast Dragon Lair. Its unprecedented magical power engulfed the monster army that had been in the area.

Relentlessly. Greedily.

The wave of death seemed as if it would never end. Only after swallowing tens of thousands of monsters did it begin to subside.

And at the center of it all, one being opened his eyes.

Psshh.

Ash slid down his slender frame.

Morgoth rose from the ashes of the Dragon Lair—no, even calling it a ruin would be too generous now—and turned to look around.

The earth had been overturned as if by a massive earthquake. Monster corpses lay piled like mountains. Green blood flowed in rivers, while a single shaft of sunlight peered through a break in the dark clouds at the dreadful scene.

Yet in this moment, not a hint of anger shone in the Black Dragon’s obsidian eyes.

“What a sight.”

The brief exclamation slipped through his parched lips.

That was all.

Though a moment’s carelessness had cost him countless subordinates, Morgoth didn’t care in the slightest.

More precisely, he had no reason to care.

He had gained a treasure far more precious and fascinating than those trifling losses.

“To obtain something, one must pay a fitting price. Don’t you agree?”

It sounded like a question to himself, but an answer came before long.

From right at his feet.

“Shut… up.”

At the faint voice, as hazy as a broken radio, Morgoth breathed a sigh of relief.

“I’m glad you still have some strength left. I was worried you might be erased.”

He wasn’t exaggerating.

The shock wave from the collision of two immense, utterly different forces had been truly terrifying.

If Morgoth hadn’t used all his power to protect himself, his entire body might now have been covered not in dust, but in his own blood.

“Still, there was some unintended damage… What can you do? This, too, must be the order of things, determined by someone.”

Morgoth smiled and brushed the dust from his shoulder. Like the dust drifting away in a pale cloud, the deaths of inferior monsters meant nothing to him.

Only one being mattered now: the one before him, his greatest interest and his sole objective.

“Thank you for holding on. You’ve exceeded my expectations in every way.”

In truth, even exceeded didn’t begin to cover it.

The blow his opponent had aimed at himself, prepared to be erased, had awakened a sensation Morgoth had forgotten over the ages.

Tap. Drip, drip.

Liquid began to wet the ground at his feet.

Morgoth frowned at his own silver blood, gleaming like molten silver, and at the blade jutting through his palm.

“Yes. So this is pain.”

A sensation he hadn’t felt in a thousand years.

It hurt all the more for that. Stung all the more.

Perhaps the memory of the last time he had felt pain made it worse—the day he had also endured a humiliation greater than the pain itself.

“…Asmodeus.”

Morgoth whispered the name. Then, as if shaking off the memory, he yanked the [Hero’s Sword] free and seized it.

Crash!

The blade split in two, and both pieces plunged deep into the ground, reflecting the image of their owner, now reduced to a head.

“Skeleton King. King of the cursed wraiths.”

Morgoth slowly bent toward the Skeleton King, who glared up at him, and stroked the skull where blue ghostly flames flickered in place of eyes.

“Can you see it? Your true self.”

“I told you… to shut up.”

“Calm your anger. You need only acknowledge and accept where you came from—and whom you should be with.”

His captivating voice rang out like a hypnotic spell.

But the Skeleton King didn’t waver.

Clinging to a thread of consciousness that seemed ready to snap, he squeezed out what little strength remained and spoke.

“You really are different from that guy.”

“That guy?”

“Yeah. An arrogant, downright devious human. But…”

That guy—Jin Taekyung—had once told him:

You’re just you.

And—

“He’s my friend.”

“……!”

“He’s the one who pulled me out of that godforsaken darkness. He’s the one who showed me a new world I’d never known.”

He had seen so much.

He had learned so much.

He had left the Gate, where only darkness and death churned, and spent time with everyone beneath the shining sun.

There had been happy days and sad days, but every moment had been dazzling.

Because he wasn’t alone anymore.

Because he was with them.

That was enough.

“So quit wasting your time with that stupid bullshit. You’d better get ready.”

The Skeleton King smiled.

Brighter and more radiant than ever.

“My friends will be here soon.”

At that moment—

Flick.

Like a lamp going out, the ghostly flames flickering in his empty eye sockets suddenly vanished.

“…Your friends, you say?”

Morgoth turned the Skeleton King’s final words over in his mind. The Skeleton King had finally lost his grip on consciousness, leaving Morgoth to ponder them alone.

Friend.

A familiar word, yet strange, as though he were hearing it for the first time.

Though he had once spent many years among humans in another world, he had never been able to understand friendship.

Why did people who shared not a drop of blood care so deeply for one another? Why did they sometimes make the foolish choice to give their lives for each other?

Morgoth knew all too well that they did such things. Why they did so remained a source of fascination and astonishment to him.

First, that the Skeleton King—nothing more than a cursed Undead Monster—could show such humanity.

And second—

Jin Taekyung.

A human who might have changed the Skeleton King into this extraordinary being.

There’s more I need to find out.

Of course, Morgoth already knew about Jin Taekyung.

The savior of a new age. The center of this world, a young hero who stood at the head of them all.

After Cheon Taemin, Jin Taekyung was among those Morgoth had to watch most carefully. That hadn’t changed.

Now, though, Morgoth was intensely curious about him in a way he hadn’t been before.

“Yes. I’ll have to get ready, as you advised.”

Morgoth murmured to the silent skull, then looked out over the earth. The rumbling had finally stopped.

Perhaps it was the shaft of sunlight peeking through the split dark clouds, but the overturned, fractured land had lost much of the pitch-black color that had made it resemble the Demon Realm—and much of the dense magical power that had permeated it.

Morgoth didn’t care.

He began to rouse the endless power within his heart: magical power, nearly infinite and utterly pure, born of corruption.

Or rather, he was about to.

Then he sensed someone he hadn’t expected.

Vwoom.

The magical power that had seemed ready to erupt like a volcano sank back down. So did the Black Dragon’s gaze.

The air trembled uneasily. The wind fell still. Morgoth’s tightly closed lips parted.

“My apologies. I didn’t realize a guest had arrived.”

Dark mist drifted away as he spoke in a low voice.

Beyond it, someone answered.

“I’m asking because I’m curious.”

The voice was calm, yet seething like lava.

“What’s that in your hand?”