Chapter 1

My ability was… tentacles.

Do you like tentacle stuff, by any chance?

If I stopped a hundred random people on the street and asked, ninety-nine would call me insane—or a pervert.

The one person who nodded vigorously would be some creep I wouldn’t want anything to do with anyway… but whatever.

A creature that gleamed with a slimy, sinister purple sheen, dripping with mucus as its writhing limbs coiled around prey.

Being able to control such a thing freely—ever since dimensional rifts appeared and gates opened—was still something you couldn’t exactly boast about, even in a world overflowing with all kinds of supernatural powers.

But if I were asked the same question, I wouldn’t hesitate. I’d simply nod and say,

Personally, I’m very grateful for it.

Not because I was some deviant, criminal, or tentacle-obsessed pervert.

Only because it was the sole reason I had survived hell.

“Should I have lunch at Bridge 13 today?”

Among the ruins of a collapsed castle, I found a flat stone about the size of a chair back.

After brushing off the dust, I summoned my tentacle and sliced it cleanly with a dagger.

The severed part oozed slime, which I collected in a container and briefly seared over the embers burning beside me.

And with that—voilà. A glossy, steaming plate of giant octopus sashimi.

Back on Earth, when I was just a porter, I wouldn’t have even dreamed of affording something this expensive.

Not when I was abandoned at an orphanage and grew up never knowing my parents’ faces.

Not when I barely scraped by in a world dominated by awakened superhumans, working day-to-day as a laborer mining magic stones.

Not even on the day a gate collapsed and swallowed me alone into another dimension.

Back then, I never once got to taste such a luxury.

But things were different now.

Because the ability I awakened with in the Demon Realm, of all things, turned out to be… tentacles.

Yeah. The very same thing that usually showed up in fiction—especially that kind of adult fiction.

At first, I was embarrassed and confused by a power too shameful to even mention aloud.

But as I said earlier, I’d come to be very, very thankful for it.

Especially because of the one who granted me this ability.

The only one I could rely on in this demon-infested hell.

“Well then, time to eat.”

『Fear not.』

I clasped my hands together in prayer, and a mysterious voice whispered from within my sleeve.

A single thin, smooth tentacle—like a pale serpent.

The Outer God.

Cosmic beings who lent their power in exchange for imposing their own existence and ideals upon the world.

They guided those aligned with them down the right path, or bestowed treasures upon them.

Of course, I’d never heard of a transcendent being literally living inside someone’s sleeve before, but hey, life was full of exceptions.

Just like me—who, while mining magic stones, accidentally poked at what I thought was a rich vein, only to trigger a portal that dropped me straight into the Demon Realm.

I didn’t even know their true name. For now, I just called them the “Outer God of Tentacles” or sometimes the “Outer God of the Octopuses.”

And since they only ever spoke a single phrase, I gave them a casual nickname.

“You know something, Mala-nim?¹ When I was a kid, they told me that if you left food unfinished, you’d go to hell and have to eat every last scrap all mixed together. Turns out that was a lie.”

『Fear not.』

“What do you mean fear? I’m not scared at all. It’s just that after eating nothing but octopus for fifteen years, I’m kind of sick of it. I’d kill for some dipping sauce at least.”

The Demon Realm was a wasteland where nothing was edible for humans.

The sky was split open, and magma gushed from the ground.

Even the native demons struggled to survive, which was why they opened gates to invade Earth.

But did they know?

That through the very portals they created, a single human would fall into their realm—

And that human would not only turn his homeland upside down, but also become the one being all demons trembled in fear of.

“There he is! The one who destroyed Lord Flauros’s citadel!”

“Oh gods, he’s using the throne as a grill to eat his own prey!”

“Wait—that figure burning down there… could it be Her Highness the Archduke?!”

“Then that human must be…”

“The Apostle of the Outer God…!”

The horde of demons that rushed in froze in shock at the sight of the Archduke of Flames—the sixty-fourth lord of the Demon Realm—reduced to mere firewood.

In the manga I’d read back on Earth, people usually loved this kind of scene. Guess the problem here was that the “ingredients” happened to be tentacles.

Well, no point worrying about that now. First, I needed to clear away the pests interrupting my meal.

Pulling my hood lower, I stood up. Behind me, countless tentacles unfurled like butterflies stretching their wings.

“Quite a lot of them, aren’t there?”

『Fear not.』

“It’s fine. If they really wanted to play with me, they should’ve brought at least ten Archdukes along. Otherwise… don’t you think they’re a little short-handed?”

I meant it literally.

The ability I awakened with was summoning and controlling tentacles.

But once trained to the extreme, things became different.

Because one of those paths overlapped with the domain of awakened magic users—magic itself.

There were two kinds of magic in the world: black magic and white magic.

And the essentials for casting them were mana, spell formulas, and hand seals.

Humans only had two hands at best. But me? I could weave dozens, even hundreds of hand seals simultaneously, all while keeping both hands free.

As hundreds of tentacles began forming seals, large-scale spells comparable to a magical battalion’s bombardment erupted into the skies in an instant.

“Th-this is impossible…!”

“A m-monster!”

BOOM! KWA-BOOOM!

Moments later, I stood on flattened ground that couldn’t even be called ruins anymore, calmly finishing the last slice of sashimi.

Tch. Still a bit fishy.

At times like this, a wave of homesickness welled up, rising from deep in my gut.

Sensing my thoughts, the Outer God twined their lone tentacle around my finger.

A surprisingly lonely being, for all their power.

『Fear not.』

“Don’t worry. I haven’t forgotten the vow I made—to restore the power you once lost.”

『Fear… not…』

“Of course, a man shouldn’t go back on his word. But it’s been a long time, hasn’t it?”

When I first fell into this place, I swore I’d retrieve her lost Star Scar in exchange for the Outer God saving my life.²

Yet even after wandering the Demon Realm for fifteen years, her power hadn’t returned.

Because the Archdukes who possessed those Star Scars fled the instant they saw me.

Some even escaped through the gates to Earth.

At this point, I had only one option left.

To return home—so I could hunt them down there.

“It doesn’t seem like your Star Scar remains here in the Demon Realm. I was just thinking… maybe it’s on Earth.”

『Star… Scar…?』

“That’s right. I told you before, didn’t I? There are other Outer Gods over there too. We might find a clue.”

『……』

She didn’t look pleased, but she didn’t oppose me either. As her only Apostle, my decision stood.

The tentacle coiled around my ring finger slid back into my sleeve as I looked down at the castle courtyard.

My spell had unearthed the core buried deep beneath the stronghold, and it pulsed with a crimson glow.

A dimensional core—the gateway to another world.

If I entered, I could return to where I came from.

The whole reason I’d come after the sixty-fourth-ranked Archduke was to secure exactly this: a path home.

I moved quickly, before the unstable mana could collapse the core.

But then…

The ashes at my feet crackled, twisting together into the shape of a human.

“You… bastard…!”

“Hm?”

The Archduke of Flames, Flauros.

As expected of a demon who wielded the “Flame of Resurrection,” killing her outright hadn’t been enough. She hadn’t completely vanished.

Unlike before, when she had appeared as a blazing leopard, this was her human-shaped incarnation.

“Where do you think you’re going?! I haven’t been defeated yet!”

“You’re in no condition to fight.”

“What nonsense! This body can still fight just fi—!”

“At least put some clothes on first. You look ridiculous.”

“Silence! I am the Archduke of Flames, the master of the sixty-fourth throne of the Demon Realm! I will never forgive y—mmpf!”

I shut Flauros’s noisy mouth.

Then, from inside my sleeve, I pulled out a particularly special tentacle.

Its tip ended in a sharp needle, dripping with a clear liquid.

The moment she saw it, she sensed danger and struggled violently, but the tentacle shot forward and stabbed into her slender neck.

“Guhk! Haa… what is this?”

“A mild drug that heightens sensitivity. About tenfold, I’d say.”

“What?! You—you pervert!”

“I’d stay still if I were you. If the toxin spreads faster, you’ll start feeling things you’ve never felt before.”

Despite my warning, she kept thrashing, her breaths growing harsher.

I could see the flames at her heart flaring stronger, her heartbeat racing several times faster.

Gone was the bravado from earlier. Now she trembled weakly—the mighty Archduke of the Demon Realm reduced to this.

Her crimson eyes glimmered with a beauty like a sunset about to sink beneath the horizon, glistening with tears. And then, like the sun vaporizing an entire sea, the light within them burned hotter than ever.

“Ugh… if you want to toy with me, do as you please. But remember this well!”

“Remember what?”

“I’ll carve it into my heart and never forget! No matter where you flee, I’ll follow and burn your soul to ashes!”

“Revenge? Well, suit yourself. But if you’re going to carve it somewhere, maybe try your forehead instead of your heart.”

“What?”

SMACK—!

“Gyaagh!”

With a flick of my finger, I delivered a snap imbued with mana—ten times sharper thanks to her heightened sensitivity. Flauros’s head snapped back violently.

Even a demon’s durable body was useless when her senses were turned up to such extremes.

“So? That’s a sensation you’ve never experienced in your life, right?”

“……”

“And she’s out cold.”

There she lay: the once-proud Archduke of Flames, collapsed naked, lips frothing embers.

And here I stood: a man draped in rags, waving around tentacles.

If anyone else saw this scene, what would they think?

I had once dreamed of becoming an awakened hero who would protect humanity from the monsters invading Earth.

But now… I couldn’t imagine ever using this ability proudly in front of others.

The reason was simple.

Society judged sex offenders more harshly than murderers.

An awakened who defeated countless demons would be respected as strong.

But an awakened who humiliated countless demons with tentacles? They’d be reviled as the worst kind of monster.

Not that I was an actual criminal, of course…

“Tch. Too late to worry about that. Let’s hurry through before this thing closes. Next time we run into her, there won’t be another chance.”

『Fear not.』

“Why are you sounding pleased? I’m not sparing her out of kindness.”

『Fear not…!』

“Honestly, sometimes I wonder. Out of more than a hundred tentacle skills, every single one is some kind of sedative or restraining type. And since I’ve been twisting myself inside out trying to adapt them for combat, I can’t help but suspect your true name isn’t really something like the ‘Outer God of Tentacles’ or the ‘Outer God of the Octopuses’ at all, but something… much weirder.”

『Not… not… not… not.』

“No, I wasn’t making excuses—ugh, whatever. Let’s just go. It’ll really close any second now.”

Urging along the clearly dissatisfied Outer God, I stepped toward the dimensional core.

It was my return after fifteen long years.