The Handicap Called Being Human (1)
The Source of Spirits Management Bureau.
Even though everyone knew Lethe wouldn't return, the staff couldn't leave.
"The system is paralysed."
Rian's purification of the Valley of Wails was sending shockwaves through all of Hell.
Vivian, Rian's informant, relayed hidden-code reports.
"Lethe is holding Yahweh. The demons— they're furious."
"They would be. They were like oil and water. Still, Yahweh is something else. I never thought there'd be no compromise forever. You see things after working a long time."
"It won't be easy. Even if Lethe manages Hell, the demons ultimately answer to Satan."
The ground trembled and began to collapse.
'Not much time left.'
When this battle ended and the system was destroyed, they too would revert to nothing.
'So… what will you do?'
Riona wanted to watch the final journey of Shagal and Etella, the two under her charge.
"Hah! Hah!"
Shagal ran without stopping.
"Aaah!"
The massive karma that had weighed on them had been cut down into large, but still massive, increments.
"I'll kill you! I'll tear you limb from limb!" His roar proved the scale of Shagal's suffering.
"Why can't I reach her?"
No matter how fast he ran, Etella could not be caught.
"Wait. I have things to say. Things I want to tell you."
If he could see her face, he believed he could turn her heart.
No— even if he couldn't.
"I'll kill you!"
He'd rather slit her throat than let her go; otherwise he'd lose his mind.
"Damn it!"
No matter how he increased his speed, the gap remained constant.
"Why!"
Even when he wanted to give up, his nose told him her scent was within reach.
"Aaah!"
Shagal's heart was torn apart.
'Just let me see you.'
He wanted to slash everywhere she might be.
'Just get caught once.'
Make her scream and beg for forgiveness while he gave her pain again and again…
"Please."
Shagal realized.
"Please, give me one chance." He understood he might lose Etella forever.
"You bastard!"
Howling at the sky, Shagal stopped running and hobbled forward.
At last he fell to his knees and wept, saying, "I was wrong."
In that moment his heart fell into an abyss and a tremendous portion of karma was purified.
Riona's voice came through.
- Time remaining until purification: 24 hae, 8,341 gyeong...
Shagal didn't hear it.
How much karma remained no longer mattered.
"I ruined everything. I won't do it again. I don't care if I suffer in Hell forever. Please—" He choked and looked up. "Please, just let me see her once." That was his single wish.
"I was wrong. I can't let you go. Do whatever you want to me—just once… to see Etella's smiling face."
A sigh slipped over the line—an on-air mistake. Riona calmly cut the feed.
Leaning on the table, she clasped her hands and looked with sad eyes at the worst of evils repenting.
"You should have… why did you do it?"
You shouldn't have.
"You had countless chances to turn back. Opportunities to start over, to be happy…
They were given to you a thousand times in your life.
But you let blind rage take you; you couldn't think, and you only blamed the world.
"All that's left is regret." Vivian stepped closer. "You've truly come to the end."
"Yeah. For humans, time can't be undone. Regret might be the most pathetic and sorrowful emotion."
"You never change. You know the right answer and stubbornly write the wrong one—self-destructive creatures."
The handicap of being human.
Vivian and Riona followed with their eyes the figure of Shagal as he began running again.
"He has no choice."
It was his last hope.
A river of fire flowed through the Valley of Wails.
The golden lava, as rich as before Jin Seong-eum's purification, revealed itself…
"Kill Lethe!"
The demons gathered—majin—driven by rage.
"I'll cut that woman's throat and make her watch! I'll tear the loathsome Yahweh to pieces!"
Countless demons, willing to be destroyed, threw themselves into Lethe's flame.
"Kraaaah!"
Each child's disappearance pierced Lethe's heart.
"Poor children, why rage so? The end of anger is always regret."
"You betrayed us! You abandoned us!"
The demons cried with bloody tears.
As if their deaths might make Lethe feel anything.
Lethe's gaze grew lonelier.
"Of course… you were born of humans, too."
So many demons were being purified that the river of fire reversed and surged upward.
Rian and Jin Seong-eum were in that place. Shirone lay collapsed there as well.
Rian used every scrap of strength to swell Gehenna's flame.
"Aaaargh!"
The valley shook, and the backflowing river of fire vaporised in an instant before Shirone.
'I'll protect Shirone.'
Even in agony that almost stole his consciousness, one thought remained.
- What a ridiculous fool.
The black steeds hovering in the sky drove chains into Rian's immobile body.
"Krrrrgh!"
Skin split and cracked from his face until a skull-like skeleton nearly showed.
'I can't hold on like this.'
He had pushed divine transcendence to its limits, but Ideia's recovery was not what it used to be.
Muscles dissolved, then bone; Rian felt even his soul burning.
I am… someone with no special talent?
'The world calls me a Greatsword Hero, but honestly, it doesn't matter anymore. Whether people long for me or envy me, I don't care.'
Proud to have reached this state?
'No way.'
If the sky had dropped the title on him, he might bow, but—
'I don't feel good about it.'
It was a title earned only through pain.
'How to do something well?'
There's only one thing I know.
'Even if you're terrible and it hurts, even if selfish motives, unfair situations, masochistic pain, despair before the impossible, and the mockery of countless people who don't care about your suffering are piled on you…
"Endure."
That's it.
"Aaaargh!"
Endure.
"I will never break!"
Red energy began to surge along the chains driven into Rian by the black steeds.
- Danger! Fall back!
The black steeds scattered too late, but Gehenna's fire raced up the chains faster.
Pfoooom!
A cluster of black steeds exploded in a massive blast.
"What is that?"
Even the demons who hated Lethe were stunned by the sky filled with flames.
Lethe turned.
"It's purifying."
Rian's body burned like fuel, melting the chains linked to Jin Seong-eum.
Seong-eum's soul screamed.
"Kyaaaaaa!"
If she were purified now, she would be completely melted away and cease to exist.
'What do we do now, Shirone?' To save Seong-eum, the otherworld's system would have to be paralysed for a moment.
And that timing depended on the Jincheon Empire firing its Parma Radiant Star.
Anchal shouted in a cold sweat.
"Your Majesty! Final stage!" The energy building around Etella had passed 99 percent and was heading to 100.
*Gurgle!*
Jin-gang's body in the chair bent halfway like a willow.
"My— my liege."
He was barely alive.
Raising unfocused eyes, he slowly stood and staggered from the chair.
No one supported him because this, perhaps, was the most meaningful moment in the Emperor's life.
"My daughter."
My daughter, Jin Seong-eum.
'I only realized it after sending you to Hell. I, who never knew regret…'
He sobbed, shedding bloody tears.
"To send her to Hell?"
Jin-gang's face twisted like a demon's.
"How dare you send my daughter?"
A red light entered the lens of the Parma Radiant Star.
Shagal snapped his head up.
"Etella?"
Her scent, which had permeated the otherworld, suddenly drew close.
'She's near.'
Shagal sniffed frantically.
"Etella! Etella!"
Maybe because she had repented?
"Yes! Just a little longer!"
He had no greed.
If he could only see her face one last time, he would ask for nothing more.
"Etella!"
Hearing Shagal's cry along the Taeguk chains, Etella slowly turned.
Shagal could pick up her scent because her journey had ended.
"Children, we're almost there." The enormous energy amplifying from her body would soon lay Hell waste.
"Mom! Mom!"
Clinging to Limbo, Etella awaited the final moment and thought of Shagal.
"I'm sorry."
She couldn't turn to him because she knew what Taeguk's karma meant.
"It cannot be undone."
If freeing Limbo and saving Jin Seong-eum was the duty assigned to the good—
"Your misdeeds…"
Were a karma filled with endless regret.
"Etella! Aaaah! Etella!" Shagal ran, screaming.
Their positions were locking into place little by little, but the karma between them dwindled rapidly.
"No! No!"
Don't purify me.
'I'd rather be in Hell than disappear like this—on my own feet…'
He couldn't let himself vanish, so Shagal breathed until his nose bled.
Etella closed her eyes gently.
'It's coming.'
The moment she felt the massive explosion within herself, Shagal's eyes widened.
'There!'
Having pinpointed exactly where Etella was, he threw himself with all his might.
- Remaining purification time: 4,232 hours. 3,511 hours. 2,382 hours...
Shagal prayed.
"God."
Have mercy, please.
"Did you think you could shove us into Hell and be safe? You dared touch the Jincheon princess— my daughter!"
Spitting blood, Jin-gang clutched his chest and roared.
"Arghhh!"
A final strike from a father in Hell.
As Etella's body was engulfed in light, Shagal's voice came from afar.
"No!"
He was running straight for her, but Etella already knew how it would end.
"We cannot meet."
No matter how they closed space, time would not allow it.
Shagal held his breath.
'There!'
If he reached that spot, he could see Etella.
His eyes were useless anyway; it wouldn't matter that she was in the process.
- Remaining purification time: 5 seconds, 4 seconds, 3 seconds.
As if mocking him, karma counted down by exact distance.
Shagal reached out.
"Just a little more!"
When his fingertip reached one metre from Etella—
- 1 second.
"Ughhh!"
He finally realised.
One absent second.
But that missing second, when converted to space, was like an infinite distance.
"Etella."
Shagal choked out, "I was wrong—"
At that same instant, a tremendous explosion erupted from Etella's body and obliterated the process.
Kurrururur!
Seismic waves spread through all of Hell as the informant finished the last line.
- Purification… is… over…