Chapter 4

Park Mu-cheol checked his watch with a restless expression.

It had been over twelve hours since Division 3 of the Special Unit had entered the Gate.

The entrance was still sealed, and the overflowing mana inside was unstable, ready to explode into a monster wave at any moment.

A decision had to be made.

Either forcibly destroy the Gate now—accepting the collateral damage that would ripple across the district—or brace themselves for the horde of monsters that would spill out once the door opened on its own.

Normally, headquarters would have already issued the order to abandon Division 3 and shut the Gate down. But the command tent kept repeating the same instruction: wait.

Everyone here knew the reason.

Because of the old man standing before them—the Sword Immortal, Yoo Chae-seon—who had descended from Mount Cheonsan for the first time in decades.

“Please restrain yourself, Elder. If we open the Gate and a master of the Demon Realm manifests, the citizens won’t even have time to evacuate. Have you forgotten the Tragedy of the Eighth Night?”

“And we don’t even know if your granddaughter is alive or dead. She could still clear the boss and return safely. That’s why we’re waiting here like this, right?”

“I’ve just received word from the Blue Tower’s European branch—they dispatched a mage blessed by the Outer God of Knowledge. A sensory specialist, Esma Miller. She’s one of the finest at clairvoyance…”

A snowy beard trailed down like fallen frost, his back bent with age.

His forearms, exposed by his loose martial robe, looked frail and veiny.

Yet the single sword gripped in his hand was enough to keep every Awakened from blocking his path.

The closer he stepped toward the molten yellow Gate, the more the front line retreated.

Park Mu-cheol sighed at the sight of Bureau officials turning pale and stepped forward himself.

“Any closer and this counts as obstruction of government duty.”

“……”

“Out here for a stroll, sir? Must’ve been a long walk for someone who hasn’t breathed outside air in so many years.”

The Sword Immortal halted when Mu-cheol leveled his blade at him.

Then he spoke, calling out the name of his old disciple.

“Mujin.”

“Yes, Master. If you’ve come to your senses, put down your sword. The Tower mage—Esma, or whatever—will arrive any moment…”

“You of all people know how much I despise those decrepit beings watching us from their perch atop that Tower.”

The “decrepit beings” he spoke of were the Outer Gods—those same beings the guild The Old Gods’ Wound took its name from.

“I once thought them our saviors, guiding us and protecting us. But look at the results.”

“They built the Towers, let us detect Gates, and even clear them before they grew too dangerous. Thanks to that, a few countries—ours included—managed to rebuild after collapse. Surely that’s a good thing.”

But the Sword Immortal shook his head.

“No. It wasn’t because we obeyed their rules and prophecies that the demons’ attacks lessened. Something else drove them into haste.”

“Whatever their reason, we cannot open this Gate by force. If you’re doing this because of your late daughter, I understand your grief, but still—”

“One day, you’ll see what those decrepit ones are hiding behind their palms. But waiting for that day will cost us too many lives.”

The sword slid back into its scabbard.

As the blade found its home, storm clouds gathered across the clear autumn sky.

It was as if someone beyond the heavens turned away, unwilling to watch the moment that weapon was drawn again.

The Sword Immortal’s power did not lie in polished steel.

It lay in the scabbard, forged with the blood of humanity’s enemies over decades of war.

Please… let this end soon. Let someone—anyone—bring this to an end before that blade claims new blood.

Park Mu-cheol prayed that the first blood staining his Master’s new scabbard would not be his own.

My purpose in returning to Earth was simple: recover the Star Scars that the Archdukes carried. But that was never going to be easy.

Most of those who’d fled me in the Demon Realm either hid deep inside the Gates they had created, or concealed their power within their Incarnations.

But there was a way.

Mala-nim could sense what was once their own power.

Depending on the number of Star Scars the Archduke carried, the signal varied, but once I got close enough, Mala-nim would always let me know.

That was why I was shocked.

The first Star Scar I found on Earth wasn’t carried by an Archduke or a dungeon boss.

It was in the hands of an ordinary Awakened.

“Are you sure it’s really that girl? You’re not mistaken?”

『Fear not.』

“Of course, I don’t doubt you. But Mala-nim… you don’t have eyes, do you.”

『Fear not.』

“And maybe you don’t realize this, but here, there’s a law so absolute even I can’t break it. Lay a hand on a strange woman without her consent? That’s a fate worse than falling to the bottom of the Demon Realm.”

『FEAR NOT!!』

No, I really am afraid!!

I barely managed to stop Mala-nim’s tentacle from lashing out at Yoo Se-byeol, freezing it just short of touching her.

If Mala-nim was this obsessed, then she must be carrying a considerable amount of Star Scars.

But no ordinary human could possibly wield a power that even most Archdukes didn’t have.

If she really had, that first strike would’ve cut through me along with my tentacle.

So what was this bizarre phenomenon?

After fifteen years of tracking Archdukes, one possibility came to mind.

“She might not realize it herself, but it seems she’s carrying the Incarnation of an Archduke. A pretty high-ranking one too—since she’s got a Star Scar.”

『Fear not.』

“That scabbard must be suppressing the Incarnation. Otherwise it would’ve been obvious. Whatever it is, it’s soaked in demonic power—maybe even the blood of an Outer God.”

An Incarnation was the shell an Archduke used to manifest in this world.

It was nothing to take lightly.

If it ever fully emerged, even a fragment of its power could recreate the disasters an Archduke brought with them. A fragile human body would be ripped apart instantly.

That scabbard’s “ward against evil magic” was just a side effect at best.

Her grandfather… he must’ve been a terrifyingly strong Awakened.

But how was I supposed to extract a Star Scar in a case like this?

Cutting her open or destroying her wasn’t an option.

“Why are you staring at me like that?”

“Nothing. My heart just nearly jumped out of my chest.”

“Of course. Beyond this door is the boss’s chamber. Anyone would be nervous.”

“Exactly.”

Another reason to join the Special Unit, then.

I could figure out the method later. Surely if I brainstormed with my tentacles, something would come to me.

For now, the priority was getting out alive.

“Creepy.”

“Yeah… there’s no way an actual Archduke is inside, right?”

I listened to the squad’s nervous chatter as I scanned the chamber ahead.

Behind a bloodstained altar rose a black door, flanked by statues—a three-headed wolf on one side, a crow on the other.

The emblem of Naberius, the Archduke of Commanders, ranked twenty-fourth.

But an emblem was only an emblem. Rank didn’t necessarily equal difficulty.

Still, since other Archduke mana was mixed in, the boss had to be significantly stronger.

And I already had a good guess at what it was.

The labyrinthine dungeon design.

The hostility toward intruders. The same affinity for Black Magic as Naberius.

And the fact that even with the Tentacle of Stimulation, I couldn’t hear a single breath—only silence.

It meant this thing wasn’t alive.

“Urgh!”

“That stench…!”

The squad pinched their noses as the door swung open and the reek of corpses poured out.

Inside, a burning skull holding a grimoire awaited us.

An Elder Lich.

One of Naberius’s servants.

To clear a Gate with first-grade monsters, you normally needed at least one Upper Level Awakened.

And the servants of Archdukes were a step above even those first-grade monsters.

As overwhelming mana crashed through the chamber like a storm, Yoo Se-byeol leapt in front of me.

“I’ll take point. Cover me!”

“Will you be alright?”

“Mages are the best matchup for me. I’ll finish this fast.”

She strapped the scabbard back to her waist and readied herself.

She probably intended to repeat the tactic she’d used on my tentacles: close the distance quickly and strike the vital point.

But a lich was different.

It could wield necromancy and Black Magic freely, spells at fourth-rank or higher.

It could restore its soul up to three times, reviving stronger each time.

Without Flauros’s mana contaminating this Gate, we never would’ve run into such a monster.

—Krrrhh… aaaahhh…

“It’s coming!”

“Good god, how many spells is it casting at once?!”

“Fall back! Spread out and open a gap for the Deputy Commander!”

“You, come with me!”

One squad member yanked me aside just as a deluge of spells rained down from above.

In this cramped chamber, there was nowhere to dodge.

The Special Unit scattered, only to be cut off by undead rising from the cracked earth.

Only Yoo Se-byeol managed to cut through the magic and push forward, step by step.

But halfway across the chamber, even Yoo Se-byeol couldn’t close the gap anymore.

—Aaah… aaah…

Realizing lesser magic wouldn’t work, the Elder Lich began focusing all of its attacks on her.

Bullets of annihilation, waves of darkness—spells that could kill with the slightest touch—blasted toward her in a single direction.

As the squads holding back the undead near the entrance were gradually pushed back, Yoo Se-byeol’s space to maneuver shrank further.

Boom! Kwang!

“Guhk!”

“Hayan! Hide behind me!”

The soldier guarding me collapsed, and Yoo Se-byeol shouted over her shoulder.

She was struggling herself, but thanks to her reflexes and the scabbard’s protective power, she was still hanging on, looking for a chance to counterattack.

But the same went for the enemy.

Sensing the Special Unit’s offensive had stalled, the Elder Lich began preparing a spell of a completely different magnitude.

Broken bones floated to the walls and ceiling, knitting themselves into a vast array. Above us, storm clouds swelled, brewing black lightning that hissed and bubbled like molten tar, aiming straight down at us like a rain of arrows.

The difference in power was larger than I thought.

If I really just cowered behind her here, we’d be wiped out.

I shook my head and sent a thread of mana toward Yoo Se-byeol.

A first-rank spell—Channel. Mages often used it to communicate mid-battle.

『It’s fine.』

“What?!”

Like Mala-nim’s voice in my head, Channel converted words into a mana-based language.

So even with the Elder Lich’s thunder shaking the ceiling, she would hear me clearly.

Right before the black lightning fell and smothered the room in silence.

『Just look forward. I’ll make the opening.』

Because I would bring it down first.

Inside my robe’s wide sleeves, I wove two sets of hand seals at once.

With one hand, I circulated mana into a White Magic formula at a fixed coordinate.

With the other, I inverted mana into a Black Magic formula at that same point.

Normally, when opposite natures of magic clashed, they simply canceled out.

But if both currents came from one person, things changed.

The will to compress mana into a single point and the desperate wish to split it apart shared a fleeting moment inside my mind.

Like a “hot iced Americano” (a paradoxical mix, impossible in ordinary theory).

But after ten years in the Demon Realm, and after mastering control of over a hundred tentacles, I’d learned to force this contradiction into reality.

And I gave it a name.

“Extreme Magic—Singularity.”

—Pak!

Space itself tore as it failed to withstand the clash of contraction and expansion, birthing a tiny void.

Maximum size: a baseball. Casting time: between 1.4 and 2.2 seconds.

Fast enough for even a sharp-eyed normal human to see and dodge.

So destructive force was never the point.

Singularity simply erased everything inside its range.

And while people might move, the “space” where a spell was being cast never did.

That was the result.

Kurrunng!

“Take cover!”

“Huh?”

“The attack… disappeared?”

The Elder Lich’s magic failed.

The massive array on the ceiling, the black lightning, all lost their shape in an instant.

Magic was fragile—layered and sequential. A single external disruption could collapse it.

That was why mages hid their hand seals, built mental barriers, shortened incantations.

Anything to make their spells harder to dispel.

But against Singularity, all of that was pointless.

I only had to scatter them like landmines at the enemy’s casting coordinates.

『How dare… you filthy, insect… human…!』

I opened a second Channel. Or rather, I tuned into the one that had always been here, already resonating in this dungeon.

As expected, the Elder Lich was screaming its fury at the failure.

But from the moment I first sensed its presence in this maze…

From the moment I showed Yoo Se-byeol Singularity, after she told me to try casting something…

This creature had never stood a chance.

Because…

『Your master drew their sword the instant they saw this spell. But you? Still too green to even grasp your own limits.』

『Wh-What…?』

Dozens of small tentacles paired up beneath my robe.

The boss room’s ceiling began to shimmer, points of light spreading like stars across a night sky.

Each one a Singularity, a spell that unraveled magic into nothingness.

『Did you really think a rotting corpse could stand before me and cast as it pleased?』

I leveled my final ultimatum at the Elder Lich, whose jaw had practically dropped off its skull.