From Today, I'm a Player

Chapter 269. The End of a Tragedy Pt. 5

The Sponsors were split apart with every gesture from the giant. It wasn’t that they weren’t fighting back. They viciously used every ability and resisted Lee Jun-Kyeong and the Demon King with all their might.

“AGHHH!”

However, nothing they did could prevent their deaths. A blue blade cleaved toward them with red-hot flames engulfing its edge.

ROAR!!

When the enormous mana of the Sponsors was turned onto them, instead of harming them, the flames rather consumed it.

ROAR!

Lee Jun-Kyeong, who had become a flame giant, devoured it all.

WOOSH!

He burned even hotter as his body swelled even more. Before he knew it, he was in the complete form of a flame giant.

BOOM!

With every swing, the Sponsors blew up.

“Make them explode even more,” the Demon King's voice rang out. “That isn’t the limit to your abilities.”

There was a strange eagerness on his face.

“The reason why , I was so reluctant to grant you sponsorship was…”

He was also moving while killing the Sponsors. Nevertheless, his voice was calm and calm, “Because I have already given you all the sponsorship I can.”

He took a step back.

BOOM!

Lee Jun-Kyeong’s arm had pierced right into the spot where he had just been a moment ago. In a split second, one of his arms had morphed into a figure that was too strange to call an arm anymore. It had become a spear. The arm was shaped like a long flaming spear, piercing through a Sponsor as if skewering it.

“The Player special ability was just simply your process of rediscovering what I had given you.” The eagerness on the Demon King's face became even deeper.

“You already have everything you can,” his voice whispered. “You’ve already become stronger than the Sponsors. Understand what you have become. Realize what power you have.”

It was as if his voice was now echoing directly in Lee Jun-Kyeong’s head.

-Use more of the powers of the source.

His tone was like an order.

“AGH!!!!” Lee Jun-Kyeong screamed and ran wild even further, feeling like he had become a monster with no reason anymore. His flames began to burn everything—from the scattered corpses of the Sponsors to the monsters of Gehenna that littered everywhere he stepped. Everything was igniting.

–Only then will you be able to do it.

When he heard the Demon King’s final words, a small resonance began within him.

Thrum.

The flames burning on him seemed to be compressed for but an instant before quickly expanding and emitting even more intense flames.

BOOM!!!!!

***

“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop,” Zeus said as he approached Heimdall and Athena.

Athena hurriedly wiped her tears as Heimdall stood up.

“I still have my mana,” Zeus said sheepishly, scratching his cheek.

He wasn't the only one.

“…”

There were eyes directed at them. It was from everyone who hadn’t lost their mana yet had heard their story. Although they had tried not to listen, they couldn’t help it as their hearing, enhanced by mana, didn’t allow them to miss the sound of Heimdall and Athena conversing.

“...”

Athena lowered her head in embarrassment. Because Heimdall had collapsed suddenly and had gone unconscious for a moment, they had spoken without ever casting a mana barrier.

“No, I already knew you were listening.” However, Heimdall reacted differently. “I told it to you all because I wanted you to hear it too.”

Zeus quietly nodded after hearing that.

“This is a story…that’s almost…not as hard to believe as the story of the Demon King…” he said. “Assuming the Demon King’s story is true, then your story roughly makes sense. Whether it’s the reactions you showed…or even considering the kindness you showed Ragnarok.”

The secret organizations had done a lot of research into the relationships between Heimdall and the Underdog. Because the Underdog had been a rookie with such a sudden rise, they had been worried about the strength of the organization behind him, Asgard.

However, when they looked closely behind the scenes, the circumstances were a little different from what they had imagined. Heimdall had been the one to make everything happen.

“At first, the appearance of the Underdog had been shocking in its own way. I thought that it was the birth of a new rookie. However, there had been no reason for Asgard to make such moves in such a hurry,” Zeus explained calmly. “But I know that you were the one who was involved behind the scenes. Moreover, during the situation in England.”

Zeus looked over at the fallen Hercules and Athena. “You even used the Bifrost to save the Underdog. That wasn’t normal.”

“…”

“I had been suspicious that there was some sort of unknown relationship between you and the Underdog.” Zeus scratched his cheek. “But I didn’t think it would have been something like this.”

“...”

Heimdall just stared at him, his mouth shut tightly before finally asking, “What is it that you want to say?”

He knew that there was no way that this was all Zeus would have wanted to say after hearing his story.

“Fine,” Zeus said, nodding as if Heimdall’s intuition was right. “I keep having some doubts.”

“What sort of doubts?”

“Although it’s hard to believe that story that you told me about the Demon King, let alone your own, in the end, I know that it’s the truth.”

The circumstances spoke for themselves.

“But.” However, Zeus’ face hardened. “Can you really be sure that the Demon King wants to die?”

“...?”

“You said that he suffered for eons? Yeah, I get that. He probably wants to die. I mean, haven’t all of us experienced Andlangr?”

There, they had wanted to die every day. His experience had just been ten years, which was an insignificant amount of time compared to the Demon King’s.

“Do you really think he would be the same as us? What do you think would happen if his goal was something else?”

“What…what is it that you want to…”

Heimdall's eyes also wavered as if he was anxious.

“It looks like you’ve already noticed,” Zeus said as he changed his posture and squatted down. “Don’t we know of other beings who have suffered for eons like the Demon King?”

Zeus continued when Heimdall raised his eyes and was about to open his mouth, “The Sponsors.”

***

“Khahahaha! “It’s a masterpiece!”

The Demon King’s laugh roared through Gehenna, flames flickering in his eyes. Lee Jun-Kyeong had suddenly grown to a size that almost reached the moon within Gehenna. A flame giant danced in the reflection of his pupils.

BOOM! BANG!!

The sound of explosions continued relentlessly as all the Sponsors around him had already been killed a while ago. Even within all of Gehenna, the number of surviving Sponsors would have been small.

“You killed them all~!”

The Demon King only had to get involved a couple of times, as the rest were handled by Lee Jun-Kyeong, who had gone on a rampage.

“Khahahaha!”

The Demon King laughed loudly again as Lee Jun-Kyeong was still screaming and destroying the surroundings.

“Feel the powers of the source! Let it course through you!!”

The powers of the source were powers that dealt with the essence of life. However, Lee Jun-Kyeong didn’t understand the full extent of what that meant. He may have simply thought that the powers of the source were just limited to bringing about life, but he couldn’t have been further from the truth.

“This is the real powers of the source!”

An endless power of destruction was also a part of the powers of the source. Destruction and creation, the duality of existence, was contained within as the powers contained everything. Lee Jun-Kyeong had gone on a rampage after awakening the power of destruction.

“Come here!”

The Demon King led Lee Jun-Kyeong, now nearly a mindless force of destruction, by provoking him. They went out to find the other Sponsors, already knowing where they were. It was obvious where the Sponsors would go.

“Revenge! We are getting our revenge!” the Demon King shouted. “Revenge for your life! Get revenge on the Sponsors who ruined your world!”

Lee Jun-Kyeong moved, guided by his light.

BOOM!

Even with just a single step, the entirety of Gehenna seemed to shake as he continued to get bigger.

“Now let’s deal with these foolish hypocrites, my dear nephew!” the Demon King said as he flew away like a cannonball. “Now, it will all come to an end!”

His shout rang in Lee Jun-Kyeong’s ears.

"Revenge…” The giant opened his fiery mouth and said, "Re…venge!!!!!"

Lee Jun-Kyeong’s voice reverberated through the flames.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

His feet moved quickly and before he knew it, he heard the Demon King’s voice again.

“We’ve arrived,” he said. “Those are the last remaining Sponsors. The hypocrites.”

In Lee Jun-Kyeong’s blurry vision, he could see a group of giants through the flames that burned before his eyes. These giants were special. Unlike the others whom they had attacked who weren’t properly armed, the ones before him had proper forms and were fully outfitted.

ROAR!!!

However, Lee Jun-Kyeong wasn’t sentient enough at this point to notice their specialness. They were just something for him to destroy.

“REVENGE!”

Thus, his gigantic arm crashed into the ground. The land of Gehenna divided as heat and fire surged within the cracks. Magma was approaching the group of giants along the cracked ground.

“Kill them! Kill them!!”

BOOM!

As the Demon King’s roar echoed through the earth and sky, there was a crashing sound as the air filled with pale smoke.

Woosh!

As Lee Jun-Kyeong cut the smoke with his other arm, a sound that he had never heard before rang out.

CLANG!!

The wind caused by the collision of his arm and what was before him pushed back the smoke and revealed the situation.

“Come to your senses, my child.”

Lee Jun-Kyeong heard a voice speak to him, a voice that wasn’t the Demon King’s or his own.

“Ra… in… bow…”

The one who had opened its mouth was a giant wearing rainbow-colored armor all over its body.

***

“What is that supposed to mean?!” Jeong In-Chang shouted. He also hadn’t lost his strength and had also heard their conversation. “That means…! Are you trying to say that the Demon King’s goals aren’t what we imagined?”

“It’s just a possibility.”

“Then…!” It seemed as though Jeong In-Chang had already passed the point of hearing Zeus.

“The Demon King…! If he has a different purpose…!!! That means that Mr. Lee is in danger!” Jeong In-Chang shouted as he stomped off the ground.

His eyes and his body were directed toward Gehenna, racing toward that black gate. Zeus and others did not stop him.

Thud.

As he ran toward Gehenna, suddenly, he just collapsed, falling helplessly to the ground and rolling about several times. Small scratches were visible on his face and body.

“The cuts…”

They weren’t recovering. Wounds of this magnitude should have recovered the moment that he blinked. However, he wasn’t healing.

“Who on Earth do you think you’re going to help in that condition?” Zeus said. “You’ve also lost your mana.”

A huge sense of helplessness weighed down Jeong In-Chang.

"AGHHHHHH!!!!”

It was a scream full of agony, but it wasn’t from any pain of the flesh.