Return of the Frozen Player

Seo Jun-Ho walked forward, only looking at the Heavenly Demon.

The corpses gathered like a pack of dogs from all sides, but they could not make Seo Jun-Ho take his eyes off of the Heavenly Demon.

‘It’s a strange feeling.’

With every twist of Seo Jun-Ho’s wrist, the arms and legs of the corpses were cut off like twigs.

Seo Jun-Ho could not feel much joy even as he saw the enemies as fragile as paper in front of him.

‘I used to feel something hot boiling inside me before.’

As far as Seo Jun-Ho could remember, he used to feel much more angry whenever he saw the Heavenly Demon. This was especially true when he lost the Thunder God and went out to look for the fiends to slaughter them.

‘I wanted to rip them into pieces as soon as I saw them.’

However, he didn’t feel much emotion right now, even though the greatest of them was right in front of his eyes.

“...”

Neither had his emotions faded away, nor had his desire for revenge disappeared. As for forgiving them, he entertained no such stupid thoughts.

It was simply just that, as far as Seo Jun-Ho was concerned, the meaning and importance of the fiends and the Heavenly Demon had diminished considerably.

Slash!

White Dragon cut down another corpse. Seo Jun-Ho couldn’t tell how many corpses he had killed so far because he did not bother to count.

“...”

However, he realized that there were no more corpses attacking him.

Seo Jun-Ho looked at the enemy standing alone in front of him.

“What else?”

“...What?”

“What else did you prepare for me? Don’t tell me this is it.”

The Heavenly Demon’s eyebrow twitched. Indeed, this was all he had prepared, because he had thought that seventy-two corpses would be enough to deal with a bunch of Players who lost their magic.

‘But just one man managed to…’

More than thirty corpses had been cut down with ease, like bundles of straws, under Specter’s hand alone. It hadn’t even taken much effort for Seo Jun-Ho to take care of the corpses. All he had done was walk toward the Heavenly Demon and lightly swing his spear as if sweeping falling leaves.

“...”

Unconsciously, the Heavenly Demon took a defensive stance. The fear of not knowing exactly when the opponent would charge toward him kept poking at him.

‘He can’t use magic, but he is still fast.’

The Heavenly Demon realized that underestimating the physical ability of a being who reached the Star Destruction Stage had been a huge mistake.

Yet he was still confident that Seo Jun-Ho was no match for him power-wise because he could still use demonic energy, although only a few more times.

“You…you’re running…out of breath?”

Seo Jun-Ho murmured as he looked at the Heavenly Demon.

“Your muscles are tensed up because you are nervous, and you’re shaking.”

He started chuckling, and soon, he could not stop his laughter. He couldn’t believe that he had lost so much because of such an insignificant little man.

“Do you realize that you are afraid of me right now?”

“Bullshit!” the Heavenly Demon yelled.

The Players took a few steps back, blocking their ears—the Heavenly Demon’s voice contained demonic energy. However, this display only brought more confidence to Seo Jun-Ho.

“You don’t even have much demonic energy left. I wouldn’t waste it on protecting your pride if I were you.”

Seo Jun-Ho felt like he could finally understand what kind of person the Heavenly Demon was.

“Even the moment you die, you want to be feared by someone.”

Seo Jun-Ho could understand it, because there were lots of people like the Heavenly Demon.

“Children who are called geniuses when they are young often can’t stand themselves becoming more and more normal as they grow up.”

‘They pretend to still be a genius and different from others. They not only deceive others but deceive themselves.’

And the Heavenly Demon looked the same as those people in Seo Jun-Ho’s eyes.

“Certainly, you were strong.”

The Heavenly Demon was such an unconventional being that he had shocked humankind from his first appearance. He was so strong that all the best Players couldn’t stop him despite joining forces. He was the one who had created the title ‘Heaven,’ and he was also the one who had made the Players who were fighting each other over limited resources hold hands to some extent.

“But time has gone by.”

While the Heavenly Demon had strolled around looking at the world under his feet, Seo Jun-Ho had risked his life every day.

It hadn’t been easy. Every day had been torture, to the extent that even he often felt like he just wanted to quit, lie down, and cry.

But now that Seo Jun-Ho had finally overcome all those hardships and gotten through the pain, the time had come for the man who had terrorized humankind for decades to step aside and disappear from history.

“No matter how much you struggle, you can’t beat me now.”

And the reason why was none other than the Heavenly Demon’s arrogance and carelessness.

“Shut up.”

The Heavenly Demon glared at Seo Jun-Ho. He was disgusted by Seo Jun-Ho pretending to understand everything about him.

“Don’t you babble bullshit when you know nothing about me.”

“I think I know quite a bit,” Seo Jun-Ho spat out in a dull voice. He looked at the Heavenly Demon with dark eyes.

“I also know that your name is Erratum.”

“...!”

The Heavenly Demon’s breath suddenly stopped. He was shivering more than ever.

“You are one of the Frontier Kids. Your parents were both fiends.”

“How did you…”

“You thought Erratum, the word that your parents always called you, was a name. But it turned out that it meant…”

“Shut your mouth.”

“It turned out that it meant ‘mistake’ in Latin. Only then did you realize the reason why they abandoned you.”

“I said shut your mouth!”

The Heavenly Demon couldn’t bear it anymore and jumped off the ground. The demonic energy wrapped around his hand fell toward the top of Seo Jun-Ho’s head.

Crashhhhh!

“Don’t tell me that you forgot about me.”

“...”

The Frost Queen raised one hand and blocked the Heavenly Demon’s attack with ease.

Seo Jun-Ho continued to speak without even blinking.

“I know why you hate the Players so much and why you treat the fiends like consumables.”

“Shut your mouth before I tear it apart…”

“But that can’t be an excuse for what you’ve done.”

Erathum—the Heavenly Demon—was born with a natural talent. He was not only able to grasp the principles of everything he saw even once and copy it perfectly, but he also had the persistence of putting in effort until he made whatever he learned one hundred percent his own.

“If only you had been in your right mind, you could have lived a happy life and been loved, just like you wanted. People might have even called you a hero.”

“Shut up! Shut up! I said shut up!”

The Heavenly Demon’s eyes turned red. He pushed away the Frost Queen in an instant and charged toward Seo Jun-Ho.

“You hate us and despise us.”

And there was only one reason for that.

“Because even if we kill people like you do, we get love and respect when you don’t.”

The moment the White Dragon blocked the Heavenly Demon’s attack, Seo Jun-Ho instantly shifted his weight and let the power of the attack flow to his side, at the same time tripping the Heavenly Demon..

“Keuk!”

The Heavenly Demon pathetically rolled on the ground a couple of times and immediately sprang up.

Seo Jun-Ho had a bored look on his face.

“Let’s get this over with.”

“...”

The Heavenly Demon looked around. He felt nauseous and had a strong urge to vomit as he saw the Players surrounding him.

“...Keuk.”

But he could not show them such an unsightly face of him, because he was the Heavenly Demon. He was the savior who opened up a new era, the pioneer bearing the hopes and expectations of all fiends.

‘Then what kind of end suits me the most?’

The eyes of the Heavenly Demon, which had always been murky, shone brighter than ever. At the same time, he radiated a strong demonic energy that made everyone’s body ache.

“You’re right. I hate you all. It is disgusting to see you revered for being on the side of justice when we are both devoted to killing. I can’t stand it.”

Therefore, he had tried to open a new era. He had tried to create an instinctual world, where power was justice and there was no distinction between right and wrong.

The Heavenly Demon gathered all the condensed demonic energy into his one palm and stretched out his hand.

“Mortal.”

This was a skill he had created based solely on the belief that he would destroy anything that got in his way. As his hand reached forward, a violent storm broke out and all the surrounding buildings and roads were destroyed.

“Ugh!”

“Everyone get back! Retreat all the way back!”

“Damn it. If this continues, even the baseball stadium will be caught in it!”

“Jun-Ho! You need to step back as well!”

The Players encircling the Heavenly Demon stepped back and screamed.

The attack contained all the demonic energy left in the Heavenly Demon, and it was at a level that they simply could not handle.

“...”

But Seo Jun-Ho only stared at the Heavenly Demon’s palm approaching him.

There had once been a time when Seo Jun-Ho felt it burdensome to be called a hero. There had been a time when people’s expectations felt too heavy and scary. There had been a time when the fear of not being able to protect them weighed too heavy on his shoulders, crushing him day by day.

‘But it’s different now.’

He wasn’t sure when it had started, but he had actually begun to enjoy the burden.

‘I think it was after I lost a lot of my precious people and felt the pain of loss.’

Then Seo Jun-Ho inadvertently recalled Helic’s question.

-What will you do if you’re in a situation where you can’t help?

Back then, Seo Jun-Ho had answered that he wouldn’t be able to help. If he couldn’t help, then he couldn’t help, and that was that.

But now that this possibility had turned into reality, he felt like he knew the answer to Helic’s question. He was confident that he could give the right answer now.

“This is the kind of a person I am.”

Seo Jun-Ho was the kind of person who couldn’t run away if something like this happened in front of him.

“Frost, I need your help.”

The Frost Queen nodded without any hesitation. The smile on her face seemed to say that she already knew Seo Jun-Ho would act this way.

“I will do whatever it takes to help you.”

The blade of White Dragon was covered with cold ice.

Seo Jun-Ho tightly held the White Dragon in his hand, without a single speck of magic running through it, and stared at the Heavenly Demon approaching him.

What he was doing was no different from a normal human trying to stop a speeding truck with his bare hands.

‘But I can do it.’

Seo Jun-Ho was confident. As the Heavenly Demon’s attack approached, this conviction only became stronger. No—he instinctively felt that he would regret it for the rest of his life if he ran away.

The Heavenly Demon harrumphed.

“You are picking the dumbest option even now.”

But his voice was scattered even before it could reach Seo Jun-Ho’s ears.

The Heavenly Demon’s attack destroyed the space and clashed with Seo Jun-Ho’s White Dragon.

──────!!!

The deafening silence canceled out every sound in the world for a few moments.

Then, with his hands behind his back, the Heavenly Demon asked, “What’s the name of this skill?”

“...There is no name. I just thrust the spear forward, that’s all.”

At Seo Jun-Ho’s dry answer, the Heavenly Demon closed his eyes.

“Is that so?”

He looked down at his body slowly scattering away, starting from his fingertips.

“What’s the name of the star?”

What was the star that shone brilliantly inside the Star Destruction Stage Seo Jun-Ho, so brilliantly that it even eclipsed the attack of the Heavenly Demon?

Seo Jun-Ho hesitated to answer the Heavenly Demon’s question because even he himself couldn’t define his own star.

“I don’t know. It’s a star that desires to save at least one more person even at the expense of my own life.”

“Then the name of that star is…” murmured the Heavenly Demon, looking up at the sky slowly turning blue again. “...A hero.”

With most of his body scattered, the Heavenly Demon asked once again, “Specter. Do you think I’m a devil?”

“No.”

Seo Jun-Ho shook his head.

“You are nothing more than a pitiful criminal. You are a pathetic and miserable third-rate criminal who doesn't even know how to distinguish between right and wrong.”

“...Is that so?”

The Heavenly Demon, whose very life had been invalidated by Seo Jun-Ho’s words, laughed dryly.

“But you…will…soon…face the true…devil…”

“You talk too much. Just fuck off already, will you?”

Seo Jun-Ho wasn’t sure if the Heavenly Demon heard the last words, because his entire body had turned into fine particles and completely disappeared. Seeing that his stats had increased, it was certain that the Heavenly Demon was gone for good.

“...”

Seo Jun-Ho picked up the sword left on the ground where the Heavenly Demon had stood.

‘This must be the holy sword I need to give back to Helic.’

Seo Jun-Ho looked up at the blue sky and murmured, “I’ll have to go visit the old man with a good liquor.”

‘And tell him that the long quest for revenge is finally over.’