The Hero Returns

* * *

Su-hyeun was taken aback by the messages he hadn't heard in a while.

The emotions and thoughts he felt until now didn't enjoy the chance to stay for long as the noisy system messages shattered them to bits like breaking glass.

"Huh," a soft exclamation escaped from his lips.

That was when he sensed the change taking place within his physical body.

[Name: Kim Su-hyeun]

[Magic Count: 110]

[Magic Level: 11]

[Strength: 101] [Agility: 100]

[Stamina: 100] [Reflex: 100]

[Death Aura: 99]

[Skill: Leap * advanced]

[Skill: Transfiguration * advanced]

[Skill: Godhood - Flame * advanced]

....

[Fatigue: 0]

[Title: Hero] [Title: Taoist God]

He confirmed through his status and made sure that he didn't hear wrongly just then—the Magic Count of 100 and 10, then, the Magic Level of 11, and finally, a brand new title that appeared right below the title of "Hero": the "Taoist God."

Su-hyeun quickly confirmed the title's details.

[Title: Taoist God]

* Someone whose mind and body have ascended to godhood.

* Can live for eternity

* Will not experience aging

* Will receive additional correction on all the abilities related to the Sage Arts

* 100% increase in the recovery speed of prana

* 20% increase in proficiency in the Divine Art

* May overlap with the effects of other titles

[Divine Art]

* Grade: God

* Category: Passive

* The cultivation technique used by the Taoist Gods will enhance the purity of magical energy and will push the abilities of the Sage Arts to a higher realm. It can create new abilities.

* Proficiency: 0.00%

He had just acquired a title, as well as a "skill." Even though he had confirmed the details of both, the Divine Art still gave off a strong sense of ambiguity.

The cultivation technique used by the Taoist Gods, abilities of the Sage Arts reaching higher realms, and finally, the creation of new abilities—although he had read about them, they didn't seem all that impressive to him quite frankly. However, the story was different for his new title.

"This title...It's really something else."

Forget about the enhancement to the Divine Art's proficiency for now or the eternal life or the prevention of aging for that matter, one effect definitely caught his attention.

"One hundred percent rise in prana's recovery speed. Really?"

After reaching the realm of a demigod, Su-hyeun became able to wield a power called prana, and although he hadn't been wielding it for long, he still knew what kind of power this was and how incredible it was.

As strength that was different from magical energy, a source of power on a higher realm, Prana could substitute magical energy, and even with only a small amount of it, it allowed Su-hyeun to use many powerful skills. This power also allowed him to completely recover from fatigue and heal wounds riddling his body. This energy was basically the essence of life for not just humans but all living things.

Not only that but the utility of prana was truly limitless and only depended on how he decided to use it.

"Could it be that the creation of new abilities through the Divine Art referred to this?"

In a way, this was similar to magic. The only difference between magic and the Divine Art was that the former used magical energy instead. Other than that, magic was also a field of study, a cultivation technique if you would, that allowed you to create brand new abilities.

"As for the details, I can gradually uncover them myself."

He suddenly acquired this power. Of course, he earned them through his efforts and not through the aid of the system, so this new power didn't feel too sudden or foreign to his senses.

Still, he needed to confirm the extent of the change to his status.

* * *

Su-hyeun returned to the Jongno Tower. The worldwide news media had already reported on where he had made his appearances by now.

When he went to see Lee Ju-ho, he discovered that he wasn't alone.

"You're back?"

The Bull Demon King was with him, sharing some tea with him.

"First brother, you're here as well?"

"As it turns out, I had nowhere else to go since I know no one here. Thankfully, this gentleman here ensured that my stay during the past day or so would be quite comfortable," the Bull Demon King replied while shifting his gaze over to Lee Ju-ho who was sitting in front of him. "I am grateful. Thank you for your hospitality."

"I haven't done anything special, though. More than that, however, please continue to look after our Su-hyeun. He might not look it on the outside, but inside, he's still a bit immature, you see."

"Is that so?" The Bull Demon King chuckled softly and looked at Su-hyeun, "However, it seems that you don't have to worry about such things anymore."

"Sorry?"

"Please don't say something like that, first brother. Besides…" Su-hyeun shifted his gaze over to Lee Ju-ho and asked, "Did anything happen during the last month or so?"

"Nah, nothing much. A few dungeons popped up, but the awakeners already on this side easily took care of them, and those awakeners who ran off to the Tower got the news and are coming back one by one."

"Well, that's a relief."

"No need to worry, little brother. I'm sure that fool won't show up here for a while."

Slurp—

The Bull Demon King took a sip of the tea and continued to speak, "That creature said that it'd devour me one day. Most likely, it will only appear after it's confident of devouring me for real."

"Which means it could very well be some time in the distant future, first brother."

"When short, several years. If not, dozens of decades, maybe several hundreds of years. As such, you don't need to be so concerned after you've been away for only a month," the Bull Demon King said and leisurely stood up from his seat. He then picked up a box of tea resting on the side, which had been prepared by Lee Ju-ho earlier. Right after that, however, his demeanor changed, "My apologies."

"Huh?"

FWHOOOOOSH—!

Baaaang—!

The Bull Demon King's punch rushed toward Su-hyeun. In response, the latter opened his palm and blocked the punch, which caused powerful ripples to explode everywhere around them.

Ruuuumble—!

Crash, kaboom—!

The interior of the office was overturned in an instant. The impact force that crashed in like a storm shattered all the windows, blew apart the floor tiles, and utterly ruined the surroundings.

Lee Ju-ho couldn't withstand the ripples and got flung off his chair, his butt kissing the ground hard.

What the hell just happened here?!

He quickly took a look only to discover Su-hyeun grabbing hold of the Bull Demon King's fist. This whole thing happened just too quickly.

"Mm. With this, it seems that I don't have to worry about you, little brother," the Bull Demon King said as he withdrew his fist.

As for Su-hyeun who had reflexively reached out to catch the fist, he began making a somewhat dazed expression. He found the Bull Demon King's action and words rather drastic and uncharacteristically hurried.

"I must leave now to look after our second brother. That kid, he's getting involved in so many things lately. Seriously now, I just can't look away for too long before something else happens," the Bull Demon King chuckled and then turned around to leave by opening the door. Since his business here was over, he planned to go back to his original world.

"Could it be...?" Su-hyeun couldn't help but wonder about something at the current appearance of the Bull Demon King and had to ask, "First brother, are you preparing for 'it,' too?"

"It must be several tens of thousands of years that I have maintained this lifestyle," the Bull Demon King replied with his back still turned toward Su-hyeun. "Don't you agree that it's time for me to also forge ahead?"

Su-hyeun kept silent after hearing that.

Step, step...

The Bull Demon King then left through the doorway. His figure soon vanished beyond the door.

Su-hyeun bowed deeply at the spot where the Yogoe used to be.

"Thank you, first brother," he said in his head.

The Bull Demon King walked on a long pathway for his own sake, but in the end, he couldn't abandon the lingering attachment called his family.

However, he was no longer trying to abandon them; instead, he was going through the process of satisfying his wishes so that he wouldn't have any lingering attachments or regrets in life.

"W—what just happened here...?"

Lee Ju-ho, holding his head protectively as he sat on the floor, alternated his gaze between Su-hyeun and the doorway where the Bull Demon King had vanished through. A stupefied expression refused to leave his face, as he gingerly stood back up.

After taking a look at the state of their surroundings, though, he could only make a tense face. It was just one punch, and a block of said punch, yet the office ended up in such a state.

Lee Ju-ho shook his head helplessly and then got down to reorganizing his office, only to be interrupted by a phone call.

Vrrrr, riiiing...

Wondering what happened, he pulled out his smartphone tucked inside his pocket. The call came from Hak-joon. "Hello? What's wrong?"

"Bro! Did something happen in the office?!" The voice from the other side sounded frantic.

Lee Ju-ho asked back, confusion evident in his voice, "Yeah, something happened here, alright, but how did you know?"

"Can't you see from there? Look up at the sky!"

"The sky?"

Lee Ju-ho walked over to the broken window. He looked outside, but all he could see initially was a thick cloud cover blanketing the sky.

"There's nothing out here, so what's...Eh?"

However, Lee Ju-ho soon forgot what he was saying, as his phone slipped out of his grasp.

"T—the sky…it—?!"

The sky right above the Jongno Tower, which he saw when he poked his head out of the window itself, had dissipated in a circular pattern right above the building, which caused Lee Ju-ho's head to snap back inside to stare at Su-hyeun.

By then, the latter had finished expressing his gratitude and was trying to fix the mess left behind in the office. Lee Ju-ho had never felt that figure to be so unfamiliar and unfathomable like this.

* * *

The world returned to how it used to be. The repair work for the destroyed buildings had progressed to around the halfway mark. As for Su-hyeun, he wandered from one dungeon to the next for a while.

High-ranked dungeons rarely showed up during this period. Even the highest was only around the green color, meaning there was no real need for Su-hyeun to step up.

Even then, he still made a move because he wanted to check out the effects of his new title, the Divine Art, the newly acquired boost to his stats, as well as his prana.

Unfortunately...

"At this rate, I'll never get a proper confirmation," he thought.

The dungeon Su-hyeun had entered just now boasted the difficulty of green color. He urgently rushed here since he heard that it was the highest difficulty dungeon that appeared recently, but this...

"Why isn't anyone attacking me?" Su-hyeun let out a groan and continued to stroll forward.

The backdrop of the dungeon was a forest. This sort of dungeon appeared rather frequently, and unsurprisingly, most of the monsters that showed up here were the wild beast types that could be found in dense forests.

These creatures were not only carnivorous but also quite aggressive. Su-hyeun even recognized a fair few of the monsters he could see.

However, not a single one tried to attack him yet.

Never mind being aggressive, they were all huddled together and shivering away pathetically as if they were all deeply terrified right now.

This reaction seemed similar to when he used the Predator skill. No, wait—they seemed to be even more scared compared to when he used it.

"Is it because of the Taoist God title? Or something else entirely?"

He didn't feel like hunting some scared monsters that didn't even try to fight back. Killing such creatures wouldn't even give him any yardstick to measure his current ability.

At this point, he could only hold out hope for the boss monster of this green dungeon. Unfortunately, the story here was the same.

Whimper, whimper...

A humongous wolf, with a physique as big as a house and enough leg strength to make it jump dozens of meters in one go, began cowering the moment it discovered Su-hyeun's figure.

If a wolf could sweat, this monster's silver fur would have been coated and dripping with cold sweat by now. This boss monster of the green dungeon, called the Silvers Wolf, showed not a single trace of wanting to fight Su-hyeun.

"What the heck," Su-hyeun spat out yet another groan.

He got the exact same reaction from the other dungeons. Still, he did hope for something a bit better since this monster was the boss of the green dungeon, but as expected...

"At this rate...I knew it."

If it was at all possible, he wanted to confirm everything on this side first, but now, it seemed that he had no other choice left.

"No other way except to go to the next floor, is that it?"

The recent trials of the Tower had been related to the Predators without an exception.

As such, Su-hyeun had been paying especially close attention whenever he decided to challenge the Tower's trials. He believed that challenging the next floor without even fully analyzing his newly acquired powers made zero sense.

But now, he couldn't do much here.

"I'll have to go ahead, then."

It had been a long while.

Returning to the tower, that was.