“Can you save me?”

The moment those words left Chief Secretary Kang Geunmok’s mouth, something flashed through Alberu and Rosalyn’s eyes.

There’s something there.

...Right now, that man is holding something more important than the laboratory.

Alberu had the intuition that Kang Geunmok knew something necessary for dealing with the hunters on a more fundamental level, beyond the Third District or the game Raising My Precious Absolute God.

“......”

But he stayed silent.

He did nothing.

Because—

“Save you from what?”

Cale Henituse never let chances like this slip by anyone.

“What exactly are you asking to be saved from?”

At some point, Cale had already withdrawn the dominating aura and was staring straight at Kang Geunmok.

Kang Geunmok drew in a deep breath.

“......”

For a moment, he regretted the words he had let slip. But the instant he looked into Cale’s eyes again, he opened his mouth once more.

He could not turn away from the only eyes that had shone inside that horrific hallucination.

“When I was young.”

Kang Geunmok dug up the terrible memory.

“Ah. One moment.”

He pulled out his phone.

“Hm?”

Rosalyn’s brows lifted slightly, and just as her gaze was about to sharpen—

“If I don’t make contact, Honorary Chairman Han Taeksoo’s side will send people here.”

Kang Geunmok showed the phone screen to Cale.

<I think I’ll be about ten minutes late leaving.>

Cale checked the message, and his eyes turned toward Kang Geunmok.

“I sent it to one of the secretaries on duty at the Chairman’s estate.”

Then, almost like a sigh, he added,

“I was sincere when I asked you to save me.”

Cale nodded.

There was no need to suspect that Kang Geunmok might be trying anything pointless here.

—If it doesn’t work out, we run.

With Rosalyn and Alberu, both mages, by his side, Cale was confident that unless Han Taeksoo himself showed up, he could avoid subordinates of that level and get away whenever he wanted.

Even while abducting Kang Geunmok along with him.

“Continue.”

Cale wanted the conversation to go on, and Kang Geunmok opened his mouth again.

He had bought them ten more minutes, but the story itself was long, so they needed to hurry.

“When I was young, there was a time I went to work at a festival hosted by a certain family.”

A festival?

Doubt flickered across Rosalyn’s eyes.

“!”

By contrast, something flashed in Cale’s eyes.

His mouth opened.

“You mean the festival hosted by the Transparent Blood family?”

“...How do you know that—!”

Kang Geunmok stared at Cale in shock.

Judging by Cale’s outward age, he should not have been able to know about that festival.

But Cale knew of one festival that came to mind.

Looks like it’s that one.

Or rather, he had heard of it.

The Central Plains.

The Blood Demon.

When Cale had gone to the Central Plains to deal with the Blue Blood family, there had been a time when he faced the old man named Baek who made jiangshi.

The moment that man saw Cale, he had said:

I’ll make you into a god.

That Cale’s vessel had already formed a world of its own, and that this was the vessel of a god.

Just like the king’s successor whom the hunters were trying to turn into the Absolute God, Cale too possessed the vessel of a god—that was what the old man Baek had been the first to tell him.

I suppose you could say I can see what is contained inside a human. Or perhaps, that I can see their limits.

The old man Baek had a rather special pair of eyes.

He said he could see “essence.”

Anyway, when I was very young, I once attended a festival held by the Transparent Blood family.

And he had mentioned that festival once before.

One by one, Cale pulled out the “records” engraved in his mind.

There, from very far away, I once saw the king’s successor.

At that festival, old man Baek had seen the king’s successor—the one who would become the Absolute God.

And he had seen what was dwelling inside that being.

“At that festival, did you see the king’s successor?”

Cale asked.

“Ah.”

Kang Geunmok let out a groan.

He clenched his fist tightly.

“Y-you saw the king’s successor too?”

Then—!

Then he would understand why he was this terrified!

“No.”

Cale shook his head.

“I have only heard that the king’s successor appeared at that festival. I have never seen the king’s successor myself.”

At that firm voice, the strength drained from Kang Geunmok’s fist, but even so, he was able to speak a little more calmly.

Because the other man had at least said he knew of the king’s successor.

Since he said he knew of that dreadful thing, then should he not speak as well?

“At the time, I went to the Han family’s festival to work a part-time job. Naturally, outsiders like me could only handle the festival preparations and outside work. We could not know the details of the festival itself.”

Yes. That should have been how it was.

“But I was on my way to the food storage building to fetch ingredients.”

The food storage building. It stood a little apart from the Han family estate.

Of course, there were several people working there too. And because it was the festival, there were more people working that area than usual.

Most of them were people from the Han family, while some were temporary workers hired from outside.

“There was a child there.”

A child.

At once, Cale realized it was the king’s successor—the one meant to become the Absolute God.

“So?”

At Cale’s low urging, Kang Geunmok spoke.

Both of his hands had begun trembling more and more finely.

“That child said he was hungry.”

A child in front of the food storage building, saying he was hungry.

“The people standing in front of the food storage building told the child, whose face was covered by a hood, to go to the dining hall instead. But the child only said that he was hungry.”

Kang Geunmok had seen the whole scene.

And he had been unable to move.

For some reason, he had the feeling that he should not go near that child.

“The moment I saw the child’s back, I felt an inexplicable sense of foreboding. So instead of going toward the storage building, I hid myself off to one side.”

It simply felt like he had to.

“And then I saw it.”

Kang Geunmok’s voice began to shake.

Unable to endure the trembling in his hands, he gripped his pants instead.

“The child pulled back his hood, and that, that monster—”

That dreadful evil spirit—

“H-he caught people and ate them.”

And then he looked at Cale.

“How?”

The moment Kang Geunmok saw Cale’s calm expression—not shocked by his words in the slightest—his own trembling unconsciously began to subside.

No, those eyes were not merely calm. The moment Kang Geunmok saw the fire inside them, his voice rose without his meaning to.

“He didn’t eat their bodies! That bastard—”

Kang Geunmok realized his voice had grown loud.

Along with that, he felt cold sweat running over him again.

He calmed himself.

Like Cale in front of him.

“When that bastard stretched out his hand, suddenly everyone working in the storage building dropped to their knees in front of him.”

It was a truly bizarre sight.

The person who had kindly told the child where the dining hall was.

The people who had poked their heads out, wondering what was going on.

Even the part-timers who had just been standing around.

Every last one of them dropped to their knees.

“Their eyes were empty.”

And then the child spoke.

“The child who had been saying he was hungry spoke.”

For the first time, he said something different.

“‘Let’s make this mealtime.’”

That was exactly what he said.

“And then hell unfolded.”

Though to call it hell was, in truth, almost strange.

“Do you know the five desires and seven emotions?”

“I know what they are.”

The five desires and the seven emotions.

“Joy, anger, sorrow, pleasure, love, hatred, desire.”

The seven emotions.

“I saw those seven emotions appear in every person there.”

They suddenly rejoiced. Suddenly grieved. Suddenly flew into anger.

With empty eyes, they carried out all of it, and then—

“In the end, they all collapsed like puppets with their strings cut.”

They died.

“Their bodies died.”

That was not even the end of it.

“And then afterward, something came out of those bodies. I thought they were souls.”

A memory he had not forgotten even after fifty years.

Rather, it was that horrible moment that came for him every time he fell asleep.

“Then that child suddenly grinned. And one by one, he pointed at the souls.”

Kang Geunmok lifted a hand and began pointing one by one into empty air, as though trying to reenact that time.

One.

“‘You suit sorrow.’”

Another one. And another.

“‘You, joy. You, anger.’”

After pointing to all of them—

“Those souls each began changing into the emotion the child assigned them. And then the child slowly opened his mouth and ate the souls one by one.”

As if he were eating something sweet and delicious.

With that innocent child’s face, he continued his meal one by one.

“Each time he devoured one, I saw a hallucination.”

And every single time, Kang Geunmok saw it.

“To this day, I still cannot tell whether it was a hallucination or reality.”

And yet Kang Geunmok carried an unexplainable certainty that it had not been a hallucination.

“The moment the soul assigned to anger— that soul with only an angry face left—was devoured, beneath the child’s feet, his shadow grew larger, and I saw an abyss full of those who were angry.”

That was—

“That was truly hell. Everyone there was angry. Their faces held nothing but anger, and yet they were clearly begging to be saved, pleading for help, giving up, screaming, and despairing.”

He heard no sound.

There were only angry faces.

And yet Kang Geunmok could vividly feel the emotions of those souls.

What was undeniably contained in that abyss was despair.

“Sorrow, joy, hatred. They all fell into their own separate hells like that. And every one of those hells—nothing remained there but despair.”

Even the abyss packed with souls that only laughed.

Even the abyss packed with souls full of joy.

What remained was only the souls’ soundless, unseen screaming and despair.

“All seven pits were contained within that child’s shadow. There were so many souls inside them too. In truth, I couldn’t even properly grasp the number.”

Kang Geunmok’s voice quickened.

As though pouring out words between ragged breaths, he continued.

“I just... simply felt it. Each of those pits was like a world unto itself. Yes.”

For the first time in fifty years, he was speaking aloud what he had seen that day.

“Each one felt like a world.”

A world of despair filled with only a single emotion.

“That child held those seven worlds inside his shadow, under his feet.”

And then he smiled.

That sight had looked like—

“As if he were a god of hell, standing alone atop hell itself.”

Mm.

Rosalyn let out a low sound.

This was different from the enemies she had faced until now. Definitely different.

Kang Geunmok’s shoulders shrank in on themselves.

“And then, at that moment, someone grabbed my shoulder.”

Cale spoke.

“Honorary Chairman Han Taeksoo?”

“Yes. He said this to me.”

Han Taeksoo, with a young face, smiled as he said it.

“You’ve got good instincts.”

After that, there was not much more to say.

“I was knocked unconscious by one of Chairman Han’s subordinates, and when I woke some time later, I could no longer see that child or anything connected to that incident. And after that, I came to serve Chairman Han.”

Heh.

Kang Geunmok let out a faint laugh.

“The Chairman told me that if I ever betrayed him, he would use me as feed.”

Feed.

Meaning he would be fed to that child.

“I am not afraid of dying. But I do not want to fall into that hell and, unable even to meet complete death, live on like that. Like that.”

Kang Geunmok stared blankly into empty space.

“...It was truly horrifying.”

The emotion in those words was painfully vivid.

“It /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ was more horrifying than any of the countless terrible things I saw while serving Chairman Han.”

As Cale stared at Kang Geunmok, who held that vivid emotion inside him, he recalled one record again.

“...Each abyss was like a world—”

The old man Baek of the Blood Cult had once said:

It was full of the screams of countless despairs and delights, joys and sorrows, good and evil. That was never something a single human could bear and go on living with.

The world contained in the king’s successor was horrifying. Not beautiful in the slightest. It was terrifying.

So while holding all those things inside himself, the king’s successor—that bastard—called it mealtime because he was hungry?

Cale felt as if he were slowly beginning to see the true nature of the bastard he would ultimately have to bring down.

That was when Kang Geunmok spoke again.

“I know.”

Having stayed beside Chairman Han, he knew him well.

“In the end, my fate will be that hell. Chairman Han would never grant me a peaceful death.”

Chairman Han was a monstrously vicious creature.

“Please save me.”

The corners of Kang Geunmok’s mouth lifted.

Their ends trembled violently.

“If you know Honorary Chairman Han Taeksoo’s true nature, then you must also know what I myself have done. I am not asking to be forgiven. I am not asking to be redeemed.”

Cale’s expression grew strange.

In truth, he had already assumed that whether by threats or by anything else, Kang Geunmok had done some fairly vicious things over the years.

“All I ask is that you grant me a peaceful death.”

Kang Geunmok’s face looked as though he might cry.

“I don’t want to fall into that hell.”

It did not suit a man who had spent more than fifty years under Chairman Han, consumed by fear, and who had therefore waded into evil himself.

No.

Perhaps it was precisely because he was such a man that he could show something so truly fragile.

And there was one thing Cale wanted to ask Kang Geunmok.

He had been curious about it for a while now.

But then—

“...What is it you trust?”

What exactly was he trusting, asking him to save him?

“What in me did you see, to ask me to save you?”

How could he be so certain?

Cale asked, and Kang Geunmok answered without hesitation.

“Your eyes.”

Cale met Kang Geunmok’s gaze as it stared back at him.

There was certainty in it.

“I saw your eyes. In that nightmare that always followed me, in that hallucination of hell, for the first time I saw something different. That was your eyes.”

That was why I could escape the nightmare.

How could he be pulled out at once from that nightmare, something no method had ever worked against before?

Kang Geunmok truly wanted to know.

“What kind of power is that?”

What on earth was that power—so steady, and yet shining so clearly?

It was certainly frightening, certainly fearsome, and yet even so it was a force that made him rise again.

It felt like a power standing on the opposite side of that evil spirit.

“......”

And Cale fell silent for a moment.

What power?

I just—

—I didn’t make any eyes, though?

I only used the dominating aura.

Just as the dominating aura itself, the owner of that power, sounded bewildered, the Sound of the Wind, the thief who had stayed quiet until now, spoke calmly.

—Cale. Doesn’t the God of Chaos show eyes too?

“!”

Cale’s eyes widened.

—Huh?

The dominating aura faltered.

Then—

—Ho.

Suddenly it let out an exclamation in a voice that sounded intensely interested. Because of that, a strange, unpleasant discomfort spread across Cale’s face.

He remembered the eyes that appeared whenever the God of Chaos used its power.

This somehow feels like it’s starting to resemble the God of Chaos’s power.

No way, right?

Come on.

It couldn’t be.

Surely not.

He really, really did not like that idea.

No. Seriously.

“Who knows.”

After a long while, Cale finally opened his mouth.

“Maybe what you saw was just a hallucination. I don’t have that kind of power.”

Heh.

Kang Geunmok shook his head.

“Let’s say that’s what it was.”

What the hell.

Why is this bastard reacting like that?

Cale turned his head in disbelief—

“......”

“......”

—and found Rosalyn and Alberu staring at him with strange expressions.

Cale reflexively opened his mouth.

“What? Why?”

Then he continued.

“I didn’t do anything!”

No one listened to that aggrieved voice.

Or rather, they heard it, but they did not believe it.

“How far are you planning to go?”

Instead, Rosalyn spoke meaningfully.

“...This is driving me crazy.”

Alberu merely shook his head side to side.

“No, I’m serious!”

Cale felt wronged.

—Heh heh.

And the dominating aura kept letting out strange little laughs.