< 70. The King Now Stands Alone, Heading Towards the Sun (2) >
*
In the deep abyss where moonlight cannot reach, Fernandez was being crushed as he was pulled down. The leap between spaces was not permitted for beings with flesh. As space twisted and tangled, his body was breaking apart.
‘Ugh!’
Pain throbbed in his head. His nervous system, already burned and torn, could only feel phantom pain. He screamed with an unstable soul.
-Now you understand how I feel?
Faijashi’s laughter echoed, sometimes far, sometimes near. Fernandez fell through the abyss, sometimes rising, sometimes floating, and screaming. Well, he would have if he still had vocal cords.
‘Grrrr!!’
A soul without a body is incomplete. The blood and flesh of the body anchor the soul, making the body the soul’s anchor. He realized this undeniable truth in that moment.
[You shall not fall, rest, or seek peace until your mission is fully completed. This is the first power I grant you.]
From afar, Vaitas’ cursed voice echoed. Fernandez groaned within his body, which was repeatedly being reconstructed and destroyed under the pressure of his soul being crushed. The Immortal Power was reshaping his body into a pulp.
‘My son. My son. My son…’
Fernandez tried to hold onto his sanity by comforting himself with these words. It wasn’t easy due to the burning pain. If he stopped saying this, if he surrendered to the comforting madness, his efforts would be in vain.
‘My son. You and I have been apart for sixty years. But it’s still the same.’
The eyes of his dying son came to mind. Dozens of times, his son’s eyes, soaked in madness, as he destroyed his own body until it was nothing but flesh and bone dust.
‘Now I feel the same pain as you. This is my karma.’
A broken finger grew inside his heart. His spine was beneath his feet. Fernandez, with his brain turned to mush and his language center tangled, felt both hallucinatory pleasure and pain.
He lived again, and died again. Each time he died, Vaitas’ laughter-filled voice echoed.
[You shall not fall, rest, or seek peace until your mission is fully completed.]
‘Even if you don’t say it. I will not rest or seek peace until my goal is achieved.’
Fernandez shouted with bloodshot eyes. His voice didn’t come out, so his scream echoed within his heart.
[You shall not…]
‘I will never stop. I will not give up. I will not die. I will not die like this.’
[You shall…]
‘I am not your dog!’
Now, Fernandez no longer called out to his son for comfort. His son was not a source of comfort or peace for him. Longing, desire, hope. They were names of burning fire and painful wounds. Thoughts of his son always left him with a scar that never healed, making his blood boil.
Originally, they were drifters, wandering far beyond time. Abel had said that. The wise dragon’s words, sadly, only applied to herself. He was not a drifter. He had never drifted.
His map always pointed towards the North Star. His compass was fixed in one direction, never wavering. She had said there was a lighthouse for her too. But for Fernandez, it was the same.
‘I am not your dog.’
How much time had passed? The sense of time was meaningless in this space. Fernandez gritted his teeth and repeated endlessly.
‘I am not a dog of fate.’
He had already proven that fate was not the same as the past by killing his uncle. Killing himself would be easier than that.
*
Abel stared blankly at the magical formation that had disappeared after swallowing Fernandez and losing its magical core. She was engulfed in confusion and sorrow.
[You’re leaving…]
Her true form, that of a dragon, was rapidly consuming her soul. The shattered fragments of a god that supported her soul were not strong enough to bear her true form.
[Melisildur, it seems our journey ends here.]
Abel slowly knelt and collapsed as if crumbling. Her body gradually shrank. Crimson scales scattered one by one, and the massive muscles and pillar-like bones that supported the dragon’s body disappeared.
Her golden hair, like a sunset wheat field, soaked in rainwater and fell, and her blue eyes, which once sang of hope, withered with moisture. Abel, in human form, lay down and wept.
“As you said, Fernandez. I will never take the form of a dragon again. I will listen to you. So, please.”
She fumbled at her neck. There was no necklace. Her empty neck felt like it was tearing her heart apart. She thought she had grown accustomed to death. That she would honor the glorious achievements of the heroes. But she couldn’t. She couldn’t calmly sing a dirge.
-Flutter.
“…Kirhas.”
“The rain is cold, Abel.”
Kirhas, who had approached unnoticed, draped a cloak over her. The rain-soaked cloak clung to her body. Kirhas stroked Abel’s wet hair and comforted her.
“He’s gone.”
“No.”
“…?”
Abel looked up at Kirhas with wet eyes. Kirhas’ body was heated with sweat and warmth. It was clear how far she had run. She was running with all her might towards her lord.
What she faced was only the scene of the audience hall stained with Fernandez’s blood. But her turquoise eyes burned with will and hope.
In truth, Kirhas could still see a light. The deep blue light of the dawn sky. The path emitting that light. Faintly flickering, but still straight and connected.
Towards her lord, it led.
Her own path. Even if it’s a delusion, it’s a hope she can’t give up. Kirhas wrapped her arms around Abel’s shoulders and spoke.
“Your Excellency is alive.”
“…Kirhas.”
“Don’t drown in sorrow. Just like we always move forward, watching the wildflowers beneath our feet.”
Kirhas plucked a small, withered flower bud from her embrace and placed it in Abel’s hand. Abel groaned and took the flower from her hand.
“I’m sorry, but whether Lord Albrecht is alive or truly dead, there’s one more thing left for us to do.”
Prince Vicente approached her with a sad expression. Prince Vicente was still reeling from the shock of the dragon’s resurrection and the recent battle. However, he managed to speak to Abel, who, though stunningly beautiful, had transformed into a human form.
Looking into Abel’s blue eyes, Prince Vicente blushed like a young boy. He stammered as he continued.
“The giants are destroying our city. The uprising of the Church of the Underground Burial hasn’t ended.”
It took Vicente a long time to get the next words out. During that time, the giants were gradually rising and bringing destruction to the city. Time was running out. But in his eyes, he saw the fragile figure of a woman weeping. And the mural of King Dane mourning the fallen dragon.
“Can you stand with us one more time?”
“…Ah. Yes. You young humans always needed my help.”
Abel’s blue eyes shone as she forced a weary smile. She looked at Kirhas and spoke.
“Kirhas. Do you know where he is?”
“…Yes. I see him.”
“Support him. He will need your help.”
“And you…?”
“Dane’s children are like my own. It has always been so. Fragile humans. They needed my help. I could never refuse them.”
The guardian dragon of humanity. The mother and teacher of the King Knight. She, who had burned her body and breath to protect the human city until the very end, could never ignore humans who sought her help.
She wanted to find Fernandez’s location immediately, but she couldn’t. Dane’s country, his city. She couldn’t bear to see the plains and hills where dragons once flew crumble like this.
“I trust you, Kirhas. You must save him and bring him back.”
“Yes, Abel. I will.”
Looking into Kirhas’s earnest green eyes, Abel felt a pang of shame. To see hope in such a young child. Abel shook her head briefly.
“Child, give me the sword. Though I have a promise with him, I will do my best.”
*
How much time had passed? A minute? An hour? Ten years? Maybe a hundred years had gone by. The leap spell sets the time and space coordinates for entry and exit, but the nature of the passage remains unexplained.
-Thud.
Even after falling to the ground, Fernandez felt no sensation. His body was already just a pile of flesh fragments. He was too far removed from humanity to feel human sensations.
-Whoosh…
But the wind blew. The world had stopped. Perhaps his body had stopped too. Fernandez slowly thought through the disgusting confusion. From afar, he heard Faijashi’s voice.
-You fool. Is this your end?
‘No.’
Though he didn’t know what kind of end it was, Fernandez replied shortly. Whatever kind of end it was, he couldn’t meet it before his goal.
-Thud, thud, thud.
Somewhere in his body, a heart slowly formed and began to pulse. Flesh gathered, bones twisted back into place—
-Crunch.
His arm bent backward, and his fingers found their shape one by one. Like assembling a broken puzzle. Piece by piece. Slowly.
-Thump, thump, thump.
The Blood of Diemonica revived, pumping through his body, and his flesh began to take full form. Thick tendons snaked around his waist and up his arms. Strength was returning.
Strength was returning. Fernandez repeated the words as he fumbled for the greatsword embedded somewhere in his body. It was an impurity in the recovery of his flesh.
-Screech.
Pulling out the greatsword, he instinctively pressed it against the ground. The blade dug into the floor. Supported by the greatsword like a pillar, he slowly knelt on one knee.
Black hair fell over his face. His heart began to beat fiercely again. The Stigma of Immortality only allowed him to evade death. But just as the soul is influenced by the body, naturally, the body is also influenced by the soul.
The body slowly, fully, took the form his soul desired.
-Are you conscious? Has your mind collapsed?
‘No.’
Through the black hair, blue eyes shone. Like a cold-forged Saintmetal Greatsword. Eyes weary with fatigue burned through the darkness.
[I have come upon you, and through this, you have become my proxy in the Temple of the Gods. You will never crumble, compromise, or rest. This is the second power I bestow upon you.]
Vaitas’s voice echoed in his head. The Stigma on his back burned white. [The Stigma of Unyielding]. No matter what, his spirit, body, soul, and will would not waver.
But it wasn’t just because of Vaitas’s blessing. Fernandez bit down to confirm the sensation. His fingers were intact. The blessing of Diemonica hadn’t disappeared. His body had fully recovered.
Shield’s blessing is a pity. Whether it’s because this is an abyss where moonlight doesn’t reach, or because two gods’ blessings can’t reside in one body, I don’t know. It needed to be tested.
Even before the blessing of immortality, his will had never died. Even before the blessing of unyielding, he had never stopped. Vaitas’s blessing was just a useful tool.
He had never rested. Fernandez slowly rose to his feet.
-Whoosh…
The wind was blowing. In the abyss, he felt a vast sense of space. Fernandez slowly flicked his fingers. There was no circuit to use magic, but flint was just a skill, not magic.
-Snap.
A small spark flew before his eyes, creating a brief moment of light. Diemonica’s night vision scanned the surroundings, and he felt a sense of déjà vu. It was a familiar ruin. To be precise, a ruin with a familiar structure.
It looked like Abel’s tomb. Assuming it was an intact ruin not buried under dirt when in the correct position. It was the same shape as the ruin where Abelesas had slept.
In the distance, he saw the massive throne where King Dane sat.
![[TS] Obsessed Gamer: The Ultimate Return](https://i3.wp.com/novelhitam.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/TS-Obsessed-Gamer-The-Ultimate-Return2.png?resize=85,105 "[TS] Obsessed Gamer: The Ultimate Return")
