Ganak.
The god that everyone naturally seeks, from the child who woke up at night to pee, to the warrior who fights in the bloody battlefield. Age and gender do not matter.
Why did they feel the divine courage that everyone loves from the sacred tree that had become a fertilizer for the god tree after dying long ago?
Even as monsters with the shape of evil spirits approached from all sides, Colin frowned and asked, unable to let go of his frustration.
“The god who became a fertilizer for the god tree died a long time ago! Then what is Ganak now? Who have people been asking for courage from until now? Fuck.”
He spat on the ground as if he was in a bad mood. Aslan did not say anything to him. He just looked at the knights who came to him one by one with a complicated gaze.
Among them was Chevil, who had been his lieutenant in the past. He had a hard time breathing because his nose had melted away in the process of burning his divine power, but his appearance now was restored to his previous solid features.
“Aslan, sir. What is this?”
Was he flustered by the divine power that filled under his skin? Chevil’s voice, which had never lost his calmness in any situation, was trembling.
The other knights seemed to have the same question, as they were happy with their own changes, but also confused.
Then Aslan said.
“Nothing has changed. We are just facing the fear in front of us as we always have.”
At his calm voice, the knights regained their senses and their eyes brightened. Now their eyes were directed at the countless demons that surrounded them.
Then Aslan moved his gaze to Ruon and said.
“I will open the way with you.”
Then a faint smile appeared on Ruon’s face.
“This time, it’s a real army.”
Aslan, who smiled back at him, took a big step forward and stretched out his ice axe to the front.
From his mouth, a verse of the prayer that he had kept in his heart for a long time quietly flowed out.
“Instead of making the fear in front of me disappear, please give me the courage to face it bravely.”
The knights who stood behind him shouted in unison.
“Even if my death is at the end of it! Let me smile gladly that I did not break!”
Just then, the demons rushed in like a flood. With a ferocity that was incomparable to before.
Kee-ee-ee-ee!
Ruon ran forward without a moment’s hesitation. Aslan, who ran side by side with him, shouted.
“For Ganak-!”
As if blessing the believers who had finally reached this frozen land after crossing thousands of years, a beautiful golden light shimmered over the heads of the rushing party.
The party was only a dozen in number, but their momentum was no less than that of thousands of troops. Soon, the golden-protected ones and the evil demons collided head-on.
In a situation where the difference in military strength was so great that strategy and tactics were excluded, it would be natural for the side with overwhelming force to swallow up the weaker side, but this time it was not.
As Ruon, who was in charge of the front line of the party, advanced by smashing all the enemies that blocked him with his amazing strength and speed, Aslan, Kyle, and the knights of courage who followed him closely finished off the enemies that were split or pushed away the enemies that came from the side.
Inside the protection of the knights, Colin was busy moving his feet while carrying the exhausted Amela on his back. Even while doing so, he used the abilities of his protective band and dagger to help at the right place, as if he was not just playing around.
The party, which pierced through the soft mud like a golden spearhead, gradually increased their momentum. As if to stop their unstoppable advance, a huge demon with the shape of a cow with eight horns on its head rushed in, but Ruon’s punch broke its neck and it collapsed on the ground. And it never got up again.
Immediately after, the ones who followed Ruon swept past the place where the demon’s flesh, which had been in the shape of a cow, was scattered in the air.
“Keep going-!”
“Don’t stop! We can do it!”
“Our master is waiting for us!”
As everyone encouraged each other and ran, from some point on, black snowflakes began to fall from the sky instead of white ones. The bizarre spectacle, which could not be called a natural phenomenon, was the evil that the corrupted god tree spewed out, which condensed and materialized as it approached.
Kee-ee-ee-ee-ee!
The demons that were hit by the snowflakes shivered as if they had received a baptism and became more violent and blocked the front of the party.
-Move!-
But the ego sword, Ruin, which had grown with its master and cut down two great demons, could not be stopped by any demon, even if it was heavily armed with thick scales.
The demons that were torn apart by the hooks turned into experience points in Ruon’s inner world in a moment.
Grrr-oo-oo-oo!
This time, a giant demon with three heads ran in, but it also failed to withstand Ruon’s sword strike and its upper and lower body were separated at the waist. It swung its axe-like right arm even as its upper body slid down, but it was frozen by Aslan and shattered by Kyle’s lightning that fell on it.
Immediately after, Kyle shouted.
“We’ve narrowed the distance so much, but the god tree is not visible! Amela! What’s the order?”
At his question, Amela raised her head from Colin’s shaking shoulder and opened her eyes slightly. Soon, a cluster of light formed in her blue eyes.
“…The space is twisted. To be precise, it’s better to say that we have our feet on both the phenomenal world and the essential world. He said he had roots in the abyss… He was serious. Crazy bastard.”
At her voice, Ruon asked without looking back.
“So what’s the way?”
As he asked that, his eyes also saw the black snowflakes swirling in the air and the disgusting part of the world where the black aura and the flames were waving.
This is crazy.
Then Amela said.
“Beolun is on the edge of the boundary, so if we time it right and force the broken space together, we can approach him. I’ll try it once.”
Colin lifted his arm to prop up Amella’s body, which kept slumping down weakly.
“Do you know that you’ve bled more than anyone else here, without even getting stabbed once? What are you going to do if you die from overwork after casting another spell?”
Amella smiled faintly at his worried voice and answered.
“What can I do?”
“Shit. There’s nothing normal here. Really.”
Colin grumbled, but he tightened his arm around her. As if he would never let her go, no matter what.
“Ruon. We’re going to overlap the space from the position of that wolf-like demon. We can’t hold it for long, so hurry up.”
Ruon nodded silently, memorizing the location she pointed out. At the same time, Amella uttered a spell at an incredible speed and stretched out her arm forward.
“Hurry up.”
He said briefly to Kyle and Aslan on his sides, and then sped up. He pushed away the demon’s chest with his shoulder, and swung his sword with both hands like a storm in the space he secured. The ones around him exploded as if they had received the judgment of God.
Finally, he hooked his finger into the jaw of the wolf demon that Amella had pinpointed, and slammed it to the ground without giving it time to close its mouth.
As he crushed the head of the wolf that was writhing and screaming with his foot, the scenery of the world that was half-overlapped in his eyes became perfectly aligned.
──────────!
The sound subsided, and a colorless world where all the landscapes faded away unfolded before the party. They didn’t understand what was going on, but they didn’t try to understand and slammed to the ground. It was because the floor that was crumbling like dust.
At the end of the party’s sight that broke through the silent corridor, a small entrance that was dimly lit by darkness appeared.
It looked ominous at a glance, but they didn’t have time to choose leisurely, so they threw themselves into the darkness.
And they disappeared.
***
Where is this?
Ruon frowned at the distorted world that was not standardized. In the scenery that looked like a child who had not healed his hand had scribbled randomly, there was a huge tree that did not match him.
And in front of it, an old man with a bent waist stood still, leaning on a jujube tree cane. He scanned the faces of Ruon and his party as he approached them and opened his mouth.
“Really. It’s hard to believe. It’s amazing that you broke through all the military forces and entered this borderland… Even the knights of courage. It’s been a long time since I’ve been so wrong in my predictions. It’s a refreshing feeling.”
Then Aslan, who was looking at the tree, pointed his ice axe at the old man and said.
“You are a disgusting being. My master, whom you could not swallow, commands you to be punished.”
At that, the old man, Beolun, burst into laughter. As if in sync with his laughter, the tree behind him began to sway without wind.
“My master? With the remnants of the power that faded away, you repaired your broken body, and you really think you became the agent of God? You are a worm that lives in an instant. The being you call your master has already been defeated long ago. What is embedded in you is nothing but the oxidized residue and secretion he left behind!”
As he continued to speak, his tone gradually rose, and he finally shouted at the end. He lowered his voice again, though.
“…Of course, I have to admit that it’s an amazing feat to keep your will in this long time, but still, a ghost is a ghost.”
The body of the great demon, who said that, began to rise slowly. At the same time, he took his hand off the cane and clapped his hands. The moment he did, the pressure that had driven the party into a panic state poured down like a waterfall over their heads.
“You miserable heavenly dogs. In this borderland, there is only one god, and that is me. All of you-”
He couldn’t finish his sentence. Something flew like a ray of light between the swaying people and hit his chin.
Maybe it wasn’t a good expression to say like a ray of light. He was already a star that sparkled on the ground.
With one punch, Ruon tore off the jaw of the great demon and used the force that came flying to hit his smashed face.
The great demon, who was flung back and slammed into a tree faster than the arrow that was shot, flashed his hand forward without even groaning. More than ten thick bolts of lightning flew out of his palm, leaving no place to escape.
Ruon dodged or blocked all the attacks with his amazing movement and charged forward. The ground that couldn’t withstand the force in his stride crumbled like graphite.
“You brute! Do you have no eyes as a young star?”
Beolun clenched his fist and aimed at Ruon, who was approaching through the barrage of lightning. His face, which had been ragged, had long recovered.
This spell was more intuitive.
Ruon realized that the pressure that gripped his whole body was trying to squeeze him into a ball and sneered. He was confident that he would never lose in this simple contest of strength.
In fact, his flesh sank inward as if he was being squeezed by an invisible giant’s hand, but there was no further progress.
In that situation, Ruon, who didn’t slow down at all, kicked the ground and jumped up to the body of the great demon, who was trying to widen the distance with a levitation spell. His fist struck down again.
Even as his skull collapsed, Beolun reached out and hit Ruon’s body, which was clinging to him, mercilessly.
Ruon staggered back from the heavy impact that was unbelievable for the dry old man’s fist, and the great demon growled at him.
“Damn you, young star. Didn’t I tell you? I’m the god here!”
His jaw, which had fallen out of place, recovered at an incredible speed, and his hand was surrounded by black darkness.
He swung his fist in that state and hit Ruon’s chest. A huge explosion occurred as if he had stepped on a mine, and Ruon’s body began to fall down below.
But that was only for a moment. He immediately stabbed his sword into the tree and fixed his body, then stepped on a branch as big as a house and swung his sword at the great demon again. All of that happened before he even breathed in and out once.
The light exploded again.
Amella, who was watching the whole process from afar, regained her blurred mind and waved her hand at Kyle, who was getting up and staggering next to her.
“…Kyle.”
At her voice, Kyle shook off the heavy pressure that weighed down his body and approached her.
“The tree, which is fused with the great demon, is drawing power from the abyss. As long as the tree is intact, Beolun will keep recovering. In the phenomenal world, demons will be born endlessly.”
Kyle asked.
“Then what should we do?”
“We have to cut down the tree while Ruon is holding on.”
“…That’s simple.”
Kyle, who got up with a faint smile and forced his body, saw the knights and Colin scattered in his sight. He didn’t know the exact reason, but the presence of the great demon, who had already begun to swallow most of the divinity of Ganicus, was like a natural enemy to them.
As if to prove that, the knights tried to get up with clenched teeth, but failed repeatedly. And that was the same for Aslan.
“Are you okay?”
Aslan, who refused Kyle’s support by shaking his head, put his hand on Kyle’s shoulder with a trembling hand. A golden light flashed under his palm.
“You…have to do it…”
Aslan, who said that, lost consciousness and rolled his eyes. Kyle, who received his divine power, lifted his lightened body and grabbed the axe that was rolling on the ground.
Amella, who was looking at his back, smiled faintly and said.
“Show them what you’ve got. Lumberjack.”
