Wandering Mercenary in an Open World
chapter-61

Even for Ruon, who had become hardened to any sight, the tragedy before his eyes was too much to bear. It was pointless to list what was horrible about it. If he, who had been through hell and back, felt that way, then it was impossible for the young man who still had a trace of innocence to endure it.

Ugh-

Juliu vomited on the ground again. Even though there was nothing left to come up, he did it as if it was the only way to escape from reality.

This is crazy.

Ruon furrowed his brow at the pain in his jaw. Juliu’s emotions were flowing into his mind. He also felt the sensation of a person’s emotions collapsing.

Beldusias, who was gently caressing the giant hand made of corpses as if it was a piece of art, muttered.

“True courage begins when you don’t turn your eyes away from fear. That’s what Ganax taught. So, Juliu, lift your head. Do you have to be so out of it?”

His face was calm as he said that, but there was an unmistakable madness in his eyes. Ruon felt a subtle sense of incongruity in them and opened his eyes slightly.

The priest who had encouraged the young Juliu and the current Beldusias were clearly different people.

Ruon thought to himself.

He didn’t hide his true nature, he fell at some point.

In the blink of an eye, ten years had passed. Thanks to that, he had seen all of Beldusias’ extreme sides and came to that conclusion.

What happened in the blank period that I didn’t see?

As Ruon was murmuring to himself, Juliu licked his trembling lips.

“Why, why… did you do this? What is this…”

He spat out the question with difficulty, which was obviously directed at Beldusias, but the answer came from a completely different direction.

“That’s because he saw the true world.”

Without anyone saying who was first, Ruon and Juliu turned their heads to the direction where the sound came from. They saw ‘something’ slowly descending from the ceiling.

And at that moment.

Blood started to flow from Juliu’s eyes.

“Aah…”

Unable to bear the emotions of Juliu, who had completely broken down, flowing into his mind, Ruon widened his eyes. His bloodshot eyes were filled with an indescribable darkness.

The darkness that was impossible to discern its shape wriggled and said.

“You are a weak soul, less than a speck of dust. Aren’t you?”

Ah-

Beldusias, who was gaping his jaw and uttering a hollow moan, looked down at Juliu and answered indifferently.

“I don’t care.”

He turned his body around and continued.

“Today is the glorious day when my flesh is reborn. I don’t want to be attached to such a trivial thing.”

He smiled with an innocent expression and took a step towards the wriggling darkness.

“I am ready.”

As if he was pleased, the darkness that was shaking his body said in a damp voice.

“Beldusias, the priest who follows the god of courage. Are you willing to forsake him and choose the destiny of becoming the adversary of the heavens?”

He answered the question with a creepy laugh and slowly opened his mouth.

“…I had no god since the moment I looked into the abyss. Ganax was the same. His worthless courage only helped me to abandon him. It was never salvation.”

Whether it was enough of an answer or not, the darkness didn’t ask any more questions. Instead, it started to devour the air with its ominous mass.

It was not a figurative expression. The darkness devoured the air, and something unknown was crawling out from beyond the space that was torn apart.

The vague thing that couldn’t be distinguished whether it was a living being or a force soon filled the inside of the cave.

The darkness said.

“From now on, the living beings on the earth will shiver in fear whenever they think of your name.”

As soon as the words ended, the swirling force wrapped around the giant hand made of corpses and Beldusias’ body at the same time. It also started to pull in all the corpses in the cave.

And among them was Juliu, who had lost his mind.

Beldusias, the giant hand, hundreds of corpses, and Juliu. When all of them gathered at one point, the darkness exploded.

─────!

Ruon opened his eyes. He had been pondering over the situation that had happened in the cave a while ago. He saw someone crouching on the opposite side and walked over.

Feeling his presence, the being who had buried his face in his knees pressed against his chest slowly lifted his head.

Ruon muttered without realizing it as he faced the emaciated face that was barely alive.

“…Juliu?”

The dried face that looked like a mummy nodded slowly.

Affirming his action, Ruon looked around without a word. He realized where he was and groaned.

He looked at the pile of corpses that filled the surroundings and the pool of blood on the floor, then turned his gaze back to Juliu and asked.

“Did you show me all that scenery?”

It was a truncated sentence, but Juliu nodded again as if he understood.

What should I say, Ruon hesitated to answer and turned his body at the unpleasant energy he felt from behind.

Belducius stood there, not in his hideous form, but as he was when he was still human. He growled.

“How dare you ruin my body? The beautiful one that the abyss created…”

“Shut up.”

With a cold voice, Ruon cut off Belducius’s words and swung his fist without hesitation. The fist that tore through the air with a sonic boom hit the opponent’s forehead.

Crack!

Belducius’s face, except for his lower jaw, shattered and he fell stiffly backwards. As Ruon looked down at him, who was lying in a pool of blood, a sinister voice reached his ears.

“This is my inner world. You’re delusional if you think your brute force will work here.”

Belducius, who had lifted his upper body from the pile of corpses, relaxed his clenched face and showed a sneering smile.

“…But then again, a warrior who destroys the body of a great demon with his bare fists, there’s no better body to possess than this…”

He couldn’t finish his sentence. Ruon, who had rushed in, drove his steel-like knee into his lower abdomen.

Again, Belducius’s body flew backwards with the sound of his spine breaking. But before his back even touched the ground, another voice came.

“I told you it was useless.”

Belducius, who had risen from the distant pile of corpses, shook his head frantically.

He said.

“This is a place where all the sacrifices that have been dedicated to me for hundreds of years are condensed. You can’t destroy all the corpses in here even if you swing your fists for three days and nights. Before that, your mind will melt into this place. No matter how strong your willpower is.”

Ruon frowned. If what he said was true, it meant he couldn’t kill him until he destroyed all the piled-up corpses.

He thought he would die if he destroyed his heart… He wasn’t called a great demon for nothing.

He let out a faint sigh and his body blurred.

“Gah!”

In an instant, Ruon grabbed Belducius’s neck and lifted him high. He faced the flailing legs in the air and said in a calm voice.

“Let’s see how far you can go.”

With a terrifying grip, Ruon crushed the opponent’s neck bone and threw him to the ground like trash.

Belducius, who had an unbreakable will, didn’t make the stupid choice of getting up one by one. This time, hundreds of corpses rose in sequence and opened their mouths as if they had rehearsed.

“If you can’t surrender yourself, I’ll shatter your will myself.”

The damn bastard.

Ruon faced the corpses that filled his sight and felt an unexpected emotion sweeping over his body. It was anger.

The anger towards the demon who had taken away the extra lives of the innocent people made Ruon’s heart beat fiercely. He bit his teeth and clenched his fists.

He regretted not taking Ruin, who he had failed to take after piercing Belducius’s heart, but this was not the time to dwell on that.

The moment his toes, which were ready to strike the ground at any time, crushed the soil and made a trench!

Someone grabbed Ruon’s waist. He barely felt any weight, but when he turned around, he saw the pale face of Julius.

His dry lips moved with difficulty.

“…Courage”

His parched voice lost its strength and scattered in the air, but Ruon heard it clearly.

Courage.

That’s what Julius was saying.

“…Courage?”

Ruon asked back, surprised by the unexpected word. But Julius’s body was already falling apart. He turned into a handful of ashes and floated in the air, and Belducius laughed.

“You finally disappeared after trembling in fear for hundreds of years! You were always a thorn in my side because you were mixed in alive during the process of becoming a great demon!”

He made a refreshing expression as if he had lost a toothache and added.

“Before I move to a new body, what could be better news than this?”

That’s when it happened. The ashes that were floating in the air slowly descended on Ruon’s body.

What is this?

Ruon felt the long memories that the ashes contained as they melted and absorbed into his body. He opened his eyes wide.

It was Julius’s memory. The memory of the unfortunate man who was mixed into the body of the great demon alive.

His mind, which was completely broken during the process of soul fusion, was restored, which only brought endless pain to Julius.

Trapped in the inner world of Belducius, who had become a great demon, he trembled in fear at his horrible deeds and waited endlessly for someone who would end his suffering.

That’s how hundreds of years passed.

Julius’s mind, which had worn out, couldn’t even remember his parents’ names, but he still repeated one word in his mind.

Courage.

As he felt the word that he had repeated so desperately filling his body, Ruon clenched his fist.

His body cut through the air.

His fist, which came down with explosive momentum, smashed the skull of the corpse in one blow. Ruon twisted his waist and changed the trajectory of his fist, hitting the jaw of the one next to him, and then kicked the temple of the one who ran from behind.

As he braced himself for the onslaught of the undead, Ruon suddenly realized that they were cowering and retreating.

He saw Belducius clutching his chest and spitting black blood in the distance.

“H-how can you strike my essence directly? You are nothing but a simple spirit right now…”

The fool who had been babbling with a stupid expression widened his eyes.

“D-don’t tell me you absorbed Julius and shared my essence? That’s impossible…”

So that was it.

Ruon understood that the young man’s desperate wish that he had protected for hundreds of years was coming to an end in his hands.

He wasted no time and slammed the ground.

Belducius, terrified, stretched out his finger and shouted, “Stop! Please! Please!”

But it was useless.

In the blink of an eye, Ruon crushed the corpses that blocked his way and ran towards Belducius. He grabbed his neck with one hand and raised the other hand high in the sky.

“N-no! Stop! Please! Please!”

At the last moment, he begged for his life pitifully, but Ruon’s fist flew towards the devil’s head with a force that could shatter the world.

Crack!

The moment his head was smashed to pieces, the world filled with corpses collapsed.

As he fell into the abyss-like darkness, Ruon felt a sentence rising in his mind beyond his fading consciousness.

[The Slayer of the Great Demon]

He lost consciousness.