Chapter 143 - Connection (3)

Chapter 143 – Connection (3)

[Nyaa-ahhhhhhhhh!]

[Koo-ohhhhhhhhhhhhh!]

The two large beings crashed into each other as they roared.  As he kept hearing the sound of the fight in the background, Artpe quickly read the words written on the altar.

“We cannot win.  I realized this truth.  Everyone tried to hide this from me.  However, my superior intellect and magical energy couldn’t be deceived.  The human realm….  Ah.  He still likes to boast about himself.”

If 10 was considered to be the full content written on the altar, 99.9% of the words were boastful words about sunbae-nim.  Artpe took the drastic measure of cutting out the boastful words, and he was able to salvage .01% of the words that was relevant to the current situation.  Even those words were speaking in a roundabout way, or it was content that couldn’t be deciphered if one didn’t live through the same era as the previous hero.  Only half of the relevant content he extracted was useful information to Artpe.

“Someone tricked the hero.  When he realized this fact, the despairing hero sealed the Evil Heart, and he asked the Dwarves to guard it.  Moreover, he made it so that the Abyss would fall as soon as the Evil Heart was freed.  Only someone trying to dye the whole world with Demonic energy would try to free the Evil Heart.  That is why anyone reading these words won’t be able to escape this place…..”

“Artpe, let’s quickly get out of here!”

“No, it’s alright.  I stabilized the magic before the Evil Heart or whatever was taken out.”

“······.”

He was sick and tired of desperately escaping from a collapsing ruin.  He had suffered too much in the past doing that.  If he was a prototypical hero, he would repeatedly fall for the same pattern over and over again.  However, Artpe was a former Four Heavenly King.  He would no longer take such abuse lying down!

“It is time for us to live a more leisurely life.”

“We’ll be entering into the Demon world soon.  Will it really turn out as Artpe wants…..?”

Artpe just laughed when he heard Maetel’s worried words.  Maetel was under a fundamental misconception.  If one wanted to split hairs, Artpe’s specialty wasn’t in the human world.  It was in the Demon world!

“Let’s set that aside for now.  So what is the connection between someone tricking the hero and the sealing of the Evil Heart in the Abyss?  Moreover, the previous hero said that ‘We cannot win.’  What was he referring to when he said that?”

The Abyss was showing no signs of collapsing no matter how long she waited.  Vadinet was relieved, and she was finally able to focus on the words written on the altar.  Artpe just shrugged his shoulders as he answered her question.

“Maybe, the previous hero actively did something that helped out the Demon race?  However, we know the sunbae was connected somehow to the Evil Heart.  If we look at the evidence….. He might have helped in a magic research that created the Evil Heart.  Or maybe he was carrying out a plan that he thought would destroy the Evil Heart.  Instead, it was part of someone’s plan to do something evil.  There are several possibilities.  If there was a faction within humanity that tried to betray him, I can understand why he would feel despair.”

“I see······.”

Everything that happened in the world didn’t fit together like a puzzle.  It wasn’t clean like that.  This was especially true in regards to things related to human desire.  It left behind a dirty mark.  A hero’s base instinct was to complete any Quest that a hero came across.  It was probably rare for a hero not to fall into a trap of someone else’s desire.

When one was confronted with such a deception, one had to either grow from the experience or not.  A fork in the road would be created.

“Still, it is amazing.   It is almost impossible to create such an item even in the Demon world, yet someone was able to create it in the human realm.  Of course, a Demon could have been involved in its production…..”

The item called the Evil Heart was letting out a horrific amount of Demonic energy.  Despite putting it inside the Dimensional Pouch, the Demonic energy was leaking out of the pouch.  Vadinet’s Sanctuary spell had to purify it continuously.  If one thought sticking the item in a different dimension would make it safe, one would have been mistaken.

“If we could destroy it, it would be for the best…..  Artpe-nim?”

“Impossible.  If one could easily destroy this item, why was it sealed?  If I’m to pinpoint the problem, a massive amount of Demonic energy will be released in the process of destroying this item.  If you are clumsy in your attempt at purifying the Demonic energy, you will lose your life.”

It was a very plausible answer.  Vadinet calmly asked another question.

“What shall we do then, Artpe-nim?  Shall we feed it to Roa?”

“That isn’t an option.  Even if it is Roa, she might go off the rails after eating it.  The most realistic option is to let Roa suck out all the energy.  She’ll be able to do it if I put a simple safeguard up.”

If that happened, Roa would be able to grow endlessly.  It will occur very slowly, but the Evil Heart will continuously weaken.

He couldn’t immediately get rid of the main cause of the problem, but the Shadows of Sinners would no longer form.  Moreover, Artpe’s party would be growing in power in real time, so he could ask for no better solution.  This was what the previous hero had been missing.  He needed a magical beast.

“I thought something more was hidden here, but by the look of things, this is it.  There isn’t even a Skill book or a Spell book here.”

“It means that sunbae-nim never expected the future hero to find this place.  Also….”

He didn’t think the sunbae had written the whole truth on the altar.  He told Vadinet that the previous hero had been tricked, so he could gloss over this fact.  He had given a likely story, but Artpe didn’t believe in what he had said.

‘Sunbae possessed excellent talent for magic, so there is no way he would have ended things just by writing mere words on the altar.  There is no way he didn’t know about the special characteristic of the Evil Heart.  The hero and the Evil Heart…  I’m sure there something between them that I am missing……’

Humans and the Demon race.  Hero and the Demon King.  Then there was the Evil Heart.  It was as if the answer to the question was at the tip of his tongue.  It tormented Artpe.  Fortunately, there was one conclusion that was a certainty.

‘We just have to get stronger.  If something annoying shows up later on, it’ll be less annoying if we are stronger.’

Artpe glanced at the Demonic energy being emitted by the Evil Heart from within the Dimensional Pouch.  He looked up.  He saw Roa ripping out the neck of the enormous Shadow.

[Nyaa-ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!]

[Gyahhhhhhhhk!]

It was the Shadow’s last words.  In the beginning, it had dominated Roa.  However, at some point, they started fighting on equal grounds.  The decisive moment had been when the Evil Heart was freed.  The Shadow had been distracted by the Evil Heart, and it had lost the initiative to Roa.  Roa didn’t let up as she clinched her victory.  The Shadow felt aggrieved, but this was the life of an extra in a story.  It couldn’t be helped.

[Nyaa-ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!]

Roa’s roar filled the Abyss.  Roa’s fur stood on end on her massive body.  Her black fur stretched out, and it circled around the powerless Shadow of Sinners.  It caused the Shadow to melt into pure Mana, and she absorbed everything.

In an instant, her level, Record and Mana rose significantly.  Since Roa was born, this was the first time she came across a ‘food’ that well suited to make most of her special characteristic.

“Roa is becoming extremely powerful.”

“That really is a cheat ability.”

She received EXP for defeating the monster, and this was separate from the Demonic energy she had absorbed.  Therefore, she grew once again.  While Artpe grumbled to himself, Roa had finished absorbing everything the Shadow of Sinners had to offer.  She once again let out a fierce roar, and her body started to shrink.  In the end, she returned to the size she had been before she had entered the Abyss.

[Nyaa?]

“Yes.  You did well.”

She said, ‘I was going to kill all of them, so why did you come in?’  She tilted her head in puzzlement as she jumped into Artpe’s arms.

Artpe made a declaration.

“Well, we cleared the Dungeon.  We cleared the Quest.  We should head aboveground.  Let’s take the Dwarves with us.”

“This is it? ······this really is the end?”

The unknown Dungeon had been a place where they were supposed to get acquainted with each other’s abilities.  They didn’t even have the opportunity to work with each other.  They didn’t even have the moment where they were confronted with some terrible truth that was hidden within the Dungeon.  Everything had just resolved itself.  Elrick yelled out in shock.  However, Artpe’s reaction was apathetic.

“What more did you expect?”

“Ah.  No.  It’s nothing…..”

Since hs armor had been strengthened, he thought he would have an opportunity to showcase his power.  This was what he was expecting inwardly.  When things turned out like this, Elrick didn’t know how to accept the current situation. He felt troubled, but he couldn’t say anything when he saw Roa, who was wriggling in Artpe’s arms.

It seemed there was a reason why Artpe had left behind Sienna and Regina.  He knew they could end everything quickly and easily!

“Roa, I want you to bite on this.  You can’t swallow it.”

[Nyaa nyaa.]

Even Roa knew that there was a finite amount of Demonic energy she could handle, and she probably knew her limit.  However, when Artpe spoke, she just obediently nodded her head.  She held the Evil Heart in her mouth.  It was small.  The Evil Heart looked like a black piece of metal.  When she held it in her mouth, the Demonic energy was all focused within Roa…..

[Nyaa!?  Nyaa nyaa nyaa!  Nyaa-ah-nyaa-nyaa-ah!]

“Right.  You ate that much, yet you are eating again.  Attagirl.  You’ll become a great cat-pig.”

[Nyaa nyaa nyaa nya!]

Roa cheered when the morsel didn’t run out no matter how much she ate.  The Greed Beast let out a hurray.  She was really cute.

[Nyaa-nyaa-ah, nyaa-ah-nyaa-ah-ah.]

“Yes, I’m not going to steal it from you.  Just don’t swallow it.  Vadinet, you’ll have to pay a little bit more attention to Roa from now on.”

“If it is Artpe-nim’s request, I’ll willingly do as you ask.  ”

[Nyaa nyaa nyaa.]

If one thought about it, it truly was a funny situation.  If looked at it from a certain light, Roa had been an unexpected accident.  She had been born from a treasure he acquired by chance, yet she had easily taken care of this problem.  The previous hero had to seal the Evil Heart, and he had to have the entire race of Dwarves sacrifice themselves to safeguard it.

“The Dwarven race had been trapped here for several hundred years, yet they were freed so easily.  It is as if their efforts had been in vain….”

“Elrick, you’ll have to act as our witness.  It is as you’ve said.  The Dwarves were trapped here for several hundred years, and their sudden freedom will be hard to accept.”

“No.  Even I am having a hard time believing this······.”

When Elrick first entered the Abyss, he had been proud as he declared his intentions.  However, he now wondered if he could actually keep up with these people.

However, Artpe just grinned as he looked at Elrick.  He had learned under the Demon world’s greatest chef.  Now that he had his independence, Artpe was confident that he could make his own excellent cuisines!  It would make the dinner table bend from the weight!  Elrick was already on the path to being a complete product, so it would be a piece of cake for Artpe to support Elrick’s growth.

“Don’t worry.  You’ll become stronger.”

“Dude.  Those words scare me more.”

A little bit of time passed before Artpe’s party exited the Abyss.  The Dwarves greeted them, but they were having a hard time believing the party’s words that they had cleared the Abyss in such a short amount of time.  However, they couldn’t deny the fact that the source of the Demonic energy was gone.

Of course, the source of the Demonic energy was being held in Roa’s mouth, but it was being absorbed by Roa as soon as it formed any Demonic energy.  The Dwarves were none the wiser.

“T…that means we can head to the surface?”

“I’m having a hard time believing it.  The Shadows of Sinners were terrible foes.  We don’t have to face them any more….”

“Since Elrick said it, we can believe his words.   Also, we can assess the current situation ourselves.  The terrible energy that has always permeated from the Abyss is gone!”

“Yes!  This is real!”

“Everyone get ready to move!  To the surface!  We are going to go to the surface!”

In his past life, the Dwarves hadn’t been part of the hero’s tale.  This was the moment when the Dwarves rushed into the human realm in earnest.

“Ah.  Don’t forget.  You guys have to make our equipments before you do that.”

“Kek.”

Of course, it would take a little bit more time than they had initially planned.