CHAPTER 192
The bottom of the Sky Castle. The Forest of Black Roots.
An endless war against the roots was unfolding there.
A single-minded goal to pierce through the black roots.
Driven by that sole thought, we swung our weapons and unleashed our holy power like absolute maniacs.
If we could have used fire magic, we could have blown them all to hell, but the black roots were immune to magic.
Maybe that was why I so desperately missed fire magic today of all days.

"Gah!"

Another person's body was pierced by a black root.
Before anyone could even react, he was dragged away in a flash, crushed and popped like a balloon deep inside the roots.
I couldn't even use my resurrection magic on him like that.
To revive him, I’d have to return to the Regular Army's base and cast the resurrection magic directly.
At first, others had tried to step in before someone could be fully dragged off, but since that just resulted in them getting dragged away too, we decided it was better to focus our entire minds on just breaking through.

"Harua, how much further do you think we have?!"
"I don't know! But the direction is still the same!"

I answered Inferno's shout while checking the root I had tucked in my arms.
Even though everyone was supporting us with holy magic, our stamina was being viciously ground down.
Before we knew it, we were trapped in a space completely filled with black roots on all sides.
Every single one of those roots was capable of attacking us.
If Meiran's ice hadn't been creating footholds for us, the very ground we stood on would have been roots as well.

"This is driving me fucking crazy!"

Inferno's explosion detonated once again.
Out of all of us, Inferno was the one dealing the most effective damage to the roots.
Perhaps because of that, he was squeezing out every last drop of his Ability with desperate tenacity.
And yet, our surroundings were still completely choked with black roots.
Is this something humans can even break through?
Everyone's faces were hardening as that very doubt began to set in.
As our stamina plummeted, our breakthrough speed began to drop.
Consequently, the black roots layered themselves even thicker, relentlessly blocking our path forward.
At this rate, we were going to hit our absolute limit before we even reached the center.
Just as the color was beginning to drain from everyone's faces...

"Lieutenant General Inferno."

Aigis dashed forward.
At the same time, the wings of a god began to cast their shadow over her back.
"I will break through at full speed before we slow down any further. Can you protect Harua for me?"

I instantly realized what she meant.
Aigis was planning to pour out her entire combat power to clear the path, fully intending to retire herself from the fight in the process.
Right as everyone was nearing their limits.
She was determined to burn through all of her strength to tear open a road for us.

Inferno bit his lip hard.
It was practically a declaration that she was going to sacrifice herself.
But a decision had to be made right here, right now.
He was the leader who had to make the calls in this hellhole.

"I'm counting on you."
"Thank you."

The moment Inferno's words fell, Aigis's wings erupted with a light far more intense than before.
There were no prayers, no vows.
The path she carved forward.
That alone was the proof of her final oath.

It wasn't her heart, but her soul that fluctuated.
Light spread through her bones.
Her muscles didn't just expand; they aligned perfectly, and her blood burned away its impurities, turning crystal clear.
The armor of divinity roared.
Covenants were engraved into every plate of armor, adhering so closely to her that the boundary between flesh and iron vanished, leaving only sheer holiness behind.

But the price was absolute.
The divine power did not intend to let her live.
It was not a power lent without a cost.
It was a judgment that demanded her entire physical body.
Her bones were holding out, but her life force was being consumed just like the light pouring from her entire body.

I immediately recognized what that form was.
The Divine Apostle Transformation granted by the Embrace of Holy Light.
It was Aigis's carefully guarded, ultimate suicide move.

Wrapped in a colossal amount of holy power, Aigis raised her greatsword.
Faced with that overwhelming divinity, even the black roots seemed to flinch.

"Harua."
Aigis gave a feverish smile.
"Let us meet again soon."

The final knight permitted by the divine.
Fully prepared for death, she stomped her foot forward.

Kooong—

At the same time, a shockwave unlike anything before rippled through the entirety of the black roots.
A brilliant, pure white light flowed down the greatsword.

Hwoooong!

The swinging motion was slow, but the trajectory was anything but.
With a single slash, a wave of holy light cleaved through the air and exploded outward.
The path the sword took remained as a scar of light, and only a moment later did reality seem to tear and collapse along that very line.

Aigis swung her greatsword in rapid succession.
The radiant light trailing the tip of her blade tore everything it touched to shreds.
A holy light that illuminated the battlefield.
As if proving what it truly meant to be the Divine Lord, Aigis's light shone brighter than anything else.

Her strikes weren't mere destruction; they were judgment.
The black roots were continuously obliterated.
Every time the light shattered, the roots shattered with it.

But Aigis's power was gradually fading.
Thanks to her, we had covered a massive distance, but her limit arrived quickly.
Aigis's wings grew smaller and smaller.
Her holy power also began to thin out.
Having exhausted all her strength, the Divine Lord began to collapse, her power fully depleted.

However, thanks to her fierce struggle, a path had opened.
Eventually, Aigis's final swing came to a halt.

"You did well."

Following right behind her, Inferno bumped his fist against hers and took the lead.
Having recovered some of his stamina while Aigis cleared the way, he unleashed his explosions.
Aigis's wings lost all their power and vanished.
Consequently, Aigis stopped in her tracks.

We had no choice but to run right past her.
Even so, a smile was etched on Aigis's lips.
It was a smile filled with relief and the sense of accomplishment that she had done everything she could.

Aigis reached her hand out to me one last time.
I took what was in her hand and kept running forward.
Aigis disappeared into the black roots.
To keep our promise to see her again on the outside, we pushed our speed to the absolute max.

And finally.

Kwaaaaaaaaang!

Inferno's endlessly advancing fist collided with something and stopped.
As soon as Inferno realized what was beyond his fist, he shouted.

"Harua!"

Standing there was a pitch-black wall with a durability on a completely different dimension from the black roots.
The color of the wall wasn't just a simple black.
It was an unfathomable darkness layered so deeply that its thickness couldn't even be guessed.
Furthermore, the patterns engraved on the wall were a chaotic tangle of straight lines and curves, yet they formed a bizarrely perfect balance.
Writhing, grotesque shapes that looked like living blood vessels or the remnants of constellations.
The moment I saw it, an instinctive chill crept up from my fingertips.

We had finally reached it.
The final destination pointed out by the root.
Beyond this lies the Artificial Transcendent Vessel.

"This is it!"

The moment he heard my answer, Inferno pulled his fist back as far as he could.
"Meiran! Maintain the space with your ice no matter what! The rest of you, block the black roots from getting in!"

As soon as Inferno's orders fell, everyone moved in different directions.
I stuck right next to Inferno.

"Lieutenant General Inferno, I'll help you break through."

I was just a glass cannon with nothing but destructive power anyway.
It was better for me to go all-in on breaking the wall rather than dealing with the black roots.

"Wanna bet on who passes out first?"
Inferno smirked, raising his explosion-charged fist.

To think he'd bring up a bet in a situation like this.
Should I say he's relaxed, or that he's deliberately faking it?
Either way, this guy was a special kind of crazy too.

"Loser buys dinner."

And I wasn't exactly normal myself.
A fist cloaked in holy power and a fist cloaked in explosions shot out toward the black wall at the exact same time.
Two explosive sounds rang out, and the entire wall shook violently.
However, as if to say one strike wasn't nearly enough, the wall stood firmly in place.

But it didn't matter.
Inferno and I had always been similar in our sheer stubbornness.
With bloodshot eyes, the two of us began an all-out barrage.

Explosions and holy power detonated in rapid succession.
A tenacious, relentless pummeling to break the wall.
I didn't care if my hands bled, if my bones broke and jutted out of my skin.
I had holy magic.
The ironclad rule of the Paladins instilled in me by Aigis:
A Paladin is a lunatic who will heal their own pulverized body just to keep attacking.

And that applied equally to Inferno.
The moment his fists shattered, my holy magic flowed into him, forcibly regenerating his flesh.

"Hahaha!"
For some reason, Inferno started laughing.
"Is this how the Holy Knights fight?!"

Had he never fought like this before?
Hearing his boisterous laughter, for some reason, a laugh escaped my lips as well.
"I told you they're a bunch of lunatics!"
"Well, we're no different right now!"

Ah, it was that.
That symptom where, if you pump a certain amount of holy magic into someone, they push past the pain and just start laughing.
I didn't know why it happened, but I had experienced it a few times during training too.

The reason the Holy Knights reigned as objects of terror in the world was probably partly due to this.
Imagine slicing someone's body a thousand times, only for them to suddenly flash a bright smile and charge at you with absolute madness.

But laughter aside, our fists were only growing stronger.
Both Inferno and I were in a state where we could be healed instantly.
Because of that, our fists continuously blurred together, hammering away at the wall.
No matter how hard a rock is, a few drops of water falling from above will eventually crack it.
Tens, hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of those drops gathered and struck the wall.

Behind my back, I could hear the Regular Army desperately holding off the black roots.
Some couldn't dodge in time and were dragged away, losing their lives.
But they fiercely threw their bodies on the line to fight the roots and protect us.

Meiran vomited blood from his mouth and eyes.
He had been continuously using his Ability all the way here.
Even though he had reached his limit long ago, he was squeezing out everything he had to keep casting.

Lululio's light zipped around in all directions.
To buy even one more minute, her light relentlessly severed the black roots.

The number of Regular Army soldiers dwindled.
Meiran's leg was pierced by a black root, followed immediately by his heart.
Right before he died, he threw himself into the black roots, vomiting out all of his remaining Ability to freeze the entire area.
The frozen black roots blocked the path, barely buying us a little more time.
But even that was soon shattered by other black roots pushing their way in.

"Protect the Saint-nim, uwaaaah!"
Someone from the Regular Army shouted as he threw his body forward.
The man holding the spear was Sergeant Jo Seunghyeop.
Sergeant Jo Seunghyeop's head was pierced by a black root, and the rest of his body was torn to pieces.
Another Regular Army soldier immediately filled his spot.

Before we knew it, the number of Regular Army soldiers had dropped to single digits.
And even they were in terrible shape.

"Harua."
Inferno swung his fist with all his might and turned his body.
"You better break through."
He disappeared into the black roots.
The sound of explosions echoed from behind.

Even in that situation, there was only one thing I could do.
Keep swinging my fists.

Eventually, even the explosions stopped.
I couldn't hear any human voices anymore.

Crrraaaack—

Instead, a faint sound echoed in my ears.
The black wall that had blocked our path, looking as if it would never fall.
That black wall was finally beginning to crumble, unable to withstand the force.

I swung my fist.
I swung it again.
I didn't know when the black roots would appear, and my hands were crushed and shattered hundreds of times, but I swung, and I swung again.

Koo-goong—

And finally.

Kwaaaaaaaaaaaang!

The black wall collapsed.

"Harua-nim."
A final voice rang out from behind me.
"Go straight ahead, sir!"

Lululio.
The last one left alive after everyone else had died was pushing my back.
I didn't think about what state she must be in. Without looking back, I stepped inside the wall.

The black roots did not invade the space inside the wall. Inside, there was only a chilling silence.
In the center.
I saw something tangled in green and black.
It was emitting a faint glow, like a will-o'-the-wisp.
Within that light, a single eye formed.

[To think you actually pierced the shell. Impressive. Do you have any idea how much I consumed to make that?]

Multiple voices tangled together and echoed out.
I didn't know whose voices they were.
Blood dripped heavily from my pulverized fists.
Clenching those bloody hands, I aimed my fist at the bastard.

"Yeah, nice to meet you too. I went through total hell to come here and fuck you guys up, so you better welcome me."

[Hahahahahaha.]
A flat, mocking laugh rang out.
[Alone? What can a mere Holy Mage do?]

Just as it said, everyone who had sent me here was dead.
Right now, there was only one Holy Mage standing here.
And even that Holy Mage had exhausted a massive amount of strength just to get here.
But this bastard had forgotten one very important fact.

"Hey, retard."

I am a Holy Mage.
And...
I am a Holy Mage with Resurrection magic.

"Ever heard of a delivery boy?"

A pure white light began to dye the inside of my grasp.
Before reaching this place, I had collected the corpses of everyone once. And just in case, I had separately secured their severed fingers.
The final trump card prepared for the worst-case scenario.
The variable to combat Black Dawn.

[Son of a—]

Because that was my role.

Light concentrated in the bastard's eye and fired at me. The shape of a monster blooming from the flames lunged to devour me.
The light swept away everything in its path and pierced straight through my body.
The monstrous shape bared its fangs and rushed in to swallow me whole.
It was a hasty attack thrown by the Artificial Transcendent Vessel.

But who was I?
I was someone who trained under the assumption that my body would be blown to pieces.
The light contained within the fingers in my hand was successfully transmitted.

Kwaaaaaaaaang!

With an explosion, the monster was blown to smithereens.
It was Inferno's fist, swung the exact millisecond his body was regenerated.
A punch thrown purely on killing intent, even before his consciousness had fully returned.
Those who expected to be revived immediately regained their senses without any lag in the resurrection.

Inferno's eyes snapped open, and he clenched his fist tightly.
Following that, Meiran's ice surrounded the area.
He formed a sword out of ice and simultaneously leaped toward the Artificial Vessel.
The revival of the two Lieutenant Generals.

Following them, pure white wings spread wide.
With a flick of her hand, my pierced body was healed, scattering brilliant light into the air.
The Divine Lord, Aigis.
She had been revived through the finger she handed me at the very end.

Just then.

Kwaaaaaaaaaaang!

A flash of light appeared from behind.
"Uwaaah, I thought I was a goner, sir!"

Lululio was there.
She was an absolute mess, but she was clearly alive.
Did she seriously manage to shake off those black roots and force her way in?
Well, just like before, Lululio's survivability really was the GOAT.

With this, all the puzzle pieces were gathered.
Now, it was time to smash this bastard's skull in with our completed puzzle.

[You resurrection-spamming son of a bitch!]

Realizing what had just happened, the Artificial Transcendent Vessel let out a desperate, agonizing howl.

Yeah, that's right, it's me.
Hold the fuck still, you bastard.