Chapter 382: Monster of the Demonic Sea (4)

Oh Kang-Woo's consciousness was fuzzy. His sense of reason was flickering like a candle that was about to go out.

'It's... not over yet.'

He couldn't let it end yet. Kang-Woo added more strength into his hands and forcibly widened the gap in space.

"What the..." said the man across from him.

Kang-Woo could see the shock in the man's eyes.

'Who was he again?'

His consciousness flickered again.

"U-Urghh."

Kang-Woo lowered his head as he held on to his sense of reason the best he could. He could feel the black sea flooding him through the wide-open Door.

'This is... a bit bad.'

Kang-Woo barely managed to stay conscious. He thought about why things had ended up this way, but did not have to think for long. After all, he knew this would happen from the moment that he opened a Door.

Kang-Woo could not die while a Door was open. Even if he was beheaded, his heart exploded, was split in half, or even all the blood in his body evaporated, he would not die. Since the power of the flooding Demonic Sea reconstructed his body, he would continue to resurrect unless the entire Demonic Sea itself was annihilated.

'But...'

Kang-Woo's consciousness flickered once again. He could not quite remember where or who he was. His consciousness became more fuzzy the more the Demonic Sea reconstructed his body. His sense of reason was disappearing, and his intelligence was evaporating. All that was left of him was endless hunger.

'More. More, more, more, more. I wanna eat, I wanna eat. I'm hungry. Hungry, hungry, hungry. I haven't eaten all of that spirit yet. That man with the dark blue sword looks good too. Oh, so does that elf next to him.'

"Haa, aaah," Kang-Woo exhaled.

Squelch. The surface of Kang-Woo's body pulsed as if a rock was thrown in a lake. His limbs, head and torso lost their form and turned into black mucus. Countless mouths appeared from the pulsing black mucus.

"What... in the..." someone expressed.

'No, no. Those three aren't enough. You've been holding it back all this time, haven't you? You haven't eaten until you were fully sated since you've left Hell, right? Let's eat just a little more. Aren't you hungry?'

"..."

Kang-Woo heard a voice— a sweet and lovely voice.

'Now, now. Eat, eat, eat. Three is nowhere near enough. Eat some more. Devour this entire world. It's not even your world, right? It's none of your business even if this world ends, right? So, let's eat them all. Humans, angels, demons, monsters, elves, dragons, and gods. Let's eat them all.'

"..."

Growl.

Horrifying hunger took over Kang-Woo. His vision was getting distorted. He heard the voice once again.

'What do you think? Why don't you... open... another Door?'

"Y..." Kang-Woo bent forward like a bow and quelled his body that was starting to turn into black mucus. He answered the sweet voice in his head. "You've gotta be joking."

Kang-Woo stood up within the black sea that was flooding him. His disfigured body returned to its normal form. He wondered whose voice he had heard. It was not the Demon God. If it was not him, there was only one other it could have been.

'My desire.'

The essence of demons, as well as the origin of the being that was Oh Kang-Woo. It was likely the voice of his desire that he had allowed to run wild.

"It... was you. You were... the Demon of... Prophecy."

Kang-Woo recalled what the Constellation of Agony had said to him. He was the being that would bring all worlds to ruin. If he was consumed by the Demonic Sea, would that prophecy be fulfilled?

'Well... That will never happen.'

Kang-Woo chuckled. If that was the case, the universe would have long since ceased to exist.

"What... are you?" someone asked.

Kang-Woo turned toward the voice, seeing a half-dead Constellation of Fear as well as the middle-aged man holding him.

Kang-Woo clicked his tongue as he looked at the middle-aged man. "Bro, you said earlier that it was pointless to ask something like that."

'Why do all these characters have the same lines? This is why you get flamed for having a repetitive plot.'

"Who cares about that?" Kang-Woo raised his right hand. The Key of the Demonic Sea that had been flung away by Tai Wuji returned to him and transformed into a dark red spear. "Enough caring about boring shit like that and let's have some more fun."

Tai Wuji's face stiffened.

He fell into thought as he touched the hilt of his sword, and then threw the Constellation of Fear at Kang-Woo as if to divert the attention of a wild beast by throwing food at it.

"Hah." Kang-Woo asked while chuckling, "Are you giving him for me to eat so that I'll give up on you?"

Tai Wuji did not answer.

"Well, fine." Kang-Woo slowly walked toward the ragged Constellation of Fear and picked him up.

There was a risk of him losing his sense of reason if he were to fight for any longer. Kang-Woo despised things that he could not control. He did not use demonic energy from the Abyss because there were still things about it that he did not know, or Chaos skills because he could still not fully control them. He was not above making gambles if it was absolutely necessary, but there was no need to risk his life when there was no reason to make a gamble.

"Let's meet again," said Kang-Woo.

He raised the ragged Constellation of Fear. His mouth split open extremely wide like that of a snake and swallowed the Constellation of Fear whole.

"I will remember you," Tai Wuji muttered.

Kang-Woo smiled as he rubbed his stomach after devouring the Constellation of Fear. "You won't be able to forget, even if you wanted to. Because I'll come find you."

Tai Wuji turned around and walked into the black Rift. Proserpine was staring at Kang-Woo blankly. He was a monster that she had never seen before, even during the era of myths.

"Ah..." Proserpine trembled slightly as vivid fear and her desires intermixed.

"Proserpine," Tai Wuji called.

"Yeah."

She turned around and walked into the Rift as well. Only Kang-Woo remained within the area enveloped by the black barrier.

"Haaah."

Kang-Woo pounded on his full belly after having devoured the Constellation of Fear. He would take care of the digestion later.

"Disappear." Kang-Woo used Soul Speech to lift the Demonic Sea barrier.

The black barrier that had been covering the imperial garden melted and flowed into Kang-Woo. The garden that he had fought gods in was back to being full of flowers like the battle had never taken place. It was only possible because the Demonic Sea had absorbed all the impact and destruction.

'If it hadn't been for the barrier...'

Forget the garden, the entirety of Arnan might have been blown off the face of the continent.

"Hehehe," Kang-Woo giggled.

The battle had personally been satisfying enough to blow away the disappointment that he had felt when facing the Constellation of Agony.

"Haaa," he exhaled.

Kang-Woo slowly walked off. The battle had been a success; now, it was time to pay the price.

"Is it over?"

Kang-Woo heard a deep voice. He turned to see Balrog walking toward him in his human form.

"Yeah, it is," Kang-Woo answered.

"Were you satisfied?"

Kang-Woo smirked. "More or less."

Balrog approached Kang-Woo and carefully touched Kang-Woo as he stood still. "What a relief."

Despite saying that, Balrog did not seem relieved in the slightest.

"Did the others find out?" Kang-Woo asked.

"Of course they did."

It was no wonder; although the area had been protected by a barrier, thousands of wraiths had appeared in the imperial garden. There was no way that Kim Si-Hun and the other party members wouldn't have found out that Kang-Woo had fought a Constellation all by himself.

"What did they do?" Kang-Woo asked.

"I'm sure you can imagine." Balrog smiled bitterly.

They would most certainly have tried to join the battle if Balrog had not stopped them.

"Thanks."

Balrog looked down at Kang-Woo in silence, and then carefully lifted him up. Kang-Woo drooped down lifelessly in Balrog's arms like a corpse.

"How severe do you think it will be?" Balrog asked.

"The aftereffects? Who knows...? Worse than molting, probably," Kang-Woo answered calmly.

However, Balrog knew how hard Kang-Woo had tried to say that as calmly as possible.

Balrog aggressively bit his lip, and black blood trickled down to his chin. He clenched his fists, which were slightly shaking.

"Why did you... fight by yourself?" Balrog asked, despite knowing the answer.

"I told you. Because I couldn't hold back my—"

"Enough of your lies!!" Balrog shouted as if he couldn't hold it back anymore.

Deathly silence fell.

"I know that you've been holding back your desire for a long time. I know that it was getting hard for you to hold it back, and that it had gotten worse after the previous incident. But even so... If it was you, my king..." Balrog's voice trembled. "You could have... held it in."

Kang-Woo did not answer.

"You could have held it in... but you just didn't."

Balrog lowered his head. He knew why Kang-Woo did not hold himself back. Because Kang-Woo always shouldered everything on his shoulders, even if the weight broke his shoulders. He always moved forward.

"Balrog."

"I know. Yes, I know very well."

Balrog knew that he was just grumbling. It was like a child that was conplaining at their father for coming home too late because of work. He knew that, but he couldn't stop himself from saying it.

"It was because of Uriel, was it not? You were worried that we would also end up mangled by the power of a god, just like that angel."

Uriel had faced the Constellation of Agony, and had ended up in such terrible condition that it was a wonder why he had not died. Balrog could tell what his king thought after seeing that.

"That's why... you made an excuse to fight by yourself."

Kang-Woo had fooled himself by making some convenient excuse like that he could no longer hold back his desire.

"My king..."

Balrog raised Kang-Woo and carefully embraced him. As the one who had been by Kang-Woo's side the longest, he knew very well how dangerous opening the Doors was, as well as the unimaginable pain that Kang-Woo would experience after.

Kang-Woo would only end up experiencing unimaginable pain because he could control it; if he were to open too many of the Doors to the point that he could not control the massive influx of power, he would be devoured by the Demonic Sea, never able to get out.

"Balrog."

Kang-Woo raised one of his arms that he could barely move with all his might and placed it on Balrog's head. He wondered since when Balrog knew. It might have been from the very beginning, and he was simply just playing along with Kang-Woo's games.

'Son of a bitch. Why are you so perceptive about stuff like this when you look like even your brain is all muscles?'

Kang-Woo lightly hit Balrog's head.

"We've lost too much." He smiled faintly and continued, "I don't want to lose anything else anymore."

And with that, Kang-Woo slowly closed his eyes.

Balrog trembled. He gritted his teeth as he looked down at Kang-Woo in his arms. An overwhelming sense of worthlessness weighed down on him. He did not want to become baggage; he did not want to be one of the weights on Kang-Woo's shoulders, but...

"H-Hurgh."

Sounds of sobbing seeped out as Balrog bit his lip. His shoulders trembled subtly. However much he struggled, his king was walking far too ahead of him.

"Hurghhhh..."

Balrog embraced his king while continuing to weep silently.