And the fact that after inserting the 'Path of Light' into the core, he died himself.
Serengeti couldn't help but believe it.
But she still couldn't believe it.
“... Think back to the words you spoke to me before the star.”
Serengeti was cautious.
Her expression was even more solemn than before I mentioned my death.
It means she doesn't find it convincing enough.
'There's something more.'
I know Serengeti. More intimately than when I knew her in the game. I felt a strange sense of kinship and nostalgia when I met her as a player.
So I understand.
There's another reason related to my death that I can't speak of.
And another reason why I need to prove I am the Knight King.
'... What did I say again?'
But I can't remember.
Of course, it's natural that I can't remember.
At the time when I saved Serengeti from the star, I 'encouraged' her. I remember that clearly. The problem is that I don't know the content of that 'encouragement'.
It was just a character command.
By pressing the control key and the T key on the keyboard, you can perform one of 26 emotional expressions.
The 'encouragement' command involves patting on the back while muttering something, but I have no way of knowing what it was.
“... I always worried that if you transcended by consuming the star, you wouldn't be 'Serengeti' anymore.”
But it just naturally came out of my mouth.
The content of that time, which I shouldn't know.
“I didn't know about the worries you carried back then. Reflecting now, I must have hoped that your love for Hudson would never change.”
“... That's right.”
“Facing the star, I encouraged you. Shut up.”
“Ah...”
Shiver!
Serengeti trembled.
A memory only she and the Knight King knew.
I was just as flustered.
The scene from that time suddenly came back to me in a panoramic view.
- They say those who consume the star all change. I'm afraid I might change too.
- Shut up.
... It seems I pushed her away with my foot towards the star rather than encouraging her.
Is this encouragement?
And is it normal to be so moved by being told to shut up?
... Is she crying?
'It must be from reading the star's memory.'
A hidden effect of the Star Inheritor class.
Just as each class has its own hidden unique effects, I have one too. The ability to read the memory of the previous owner of the star.
It's probably due to that effect.
“Are you really Wilhelm?”
“Yes.”
“But your appearance...”
“There are circumstances.”
“Have you become a 'sinner'?”
“Sinner?”
A sinner is someone who has committed a crime.
They are usually referred to as those who are imprisoned.
But the word 'sinner' that Serengeti mentioned seems a bit different.
When I tilted my head, Serengeti wiped away her falling tears and said,
“There are people who call those who possess the memories of their death and 'possess' others as sinners and hunt them. They call themselves hunters or reapers...”
“I've never heard of it.”
Reaper. Clearly a player hunter.
It sounds like a word I heard when I listened to Hudson's life story, but I didn't know the details.
Serengeti shook her head.
“I don't know the details either. Just be careful. Their obsession and persistence in finding their 'sinners' is beyond imagination. According to rumors, they are the ones who hide a 'black bell' that doesn't ring.”
“I will keep that in mind.”
“And... there are things you must know about Wilhelm's final moments. I still can't believe what I saw, but if it's true...”
Serengeti bit her lip.
With a trembling gaze, as if she still couldn't believe what she saw, she began to tell the story.
*
That day.
The Knight King forcibly opened a warp to the Demon Realm with 200,000 soldiers.
The resistance of the demons was fierce, and thousands of soldiers died just by stepping into the Demon Realm.
The priests chanted and preached fervently, but the darkness of the Demon Realm was too powerful.
“I don't like this. It feels like the Demon King's army knew about our attack in advance.”
The warp to the Demon Realm.
The exact date and time it was opened were known only to a select few.
Yet, the demons of the Demon Realm seemed to have anticipated and prepared for it.
However, even such meticulous movements were shattered in one blow.
Kwaah!
The Knight King swung a massive sword of light, and thousands of demons evaporated in an instant.
The terrain changed, and all the traps became useless.
He was a God of War. The Knight King was a living god.
The demons standing before him were pitiful in the face of his overwhelming presence.
“The Knight King will not fall. Charge, all troops!”
“Kill the demons! Purge the darkness!”
“The Goddess of Victory smiles upon us!”
As long as the Knight King exists, victory is ours.
But the darkness of the Demon Realm was deeper than imagined.
‘Where did they all go?’
... As time passed, the soldiers were disappearing.
The distance between the vanguard knights and the soldiers grew.
At first, it seemed the soldiers were just lagging behind, but that wasn't the case.
Serengeti sensed something was wrong.
No matter how much this was the Demon Realm, they didn't enter without preparation.
They opened the warp after calculating all possible scenarios.
Naturally, the darkness of the Demon Realm was included in the considerations. They brought plenty of 'Dawn Torches' to ensure they wouldn't get lost.
‘It’s intentional. It’s artificial.’
The soldiers were disintegrating.
Gradually. Unnoticed.
Not by the demons, but by humans.
By the time she realized, it was too late.
‘Who betrayed us?’
A human in a position to disintegrate such a large army betrayed them.
And it wasn't just one person, but many.
It was impossible for one person to orchestrate such a systematic cover-up alone.
“Aah!”
“Saint Seia!”
The saint walking with them twisted her body.
She had been continuously chanting a sacrifice to protect the knights from the influence of the demonic aura.
Her once clean and beautiful face and body were now covered in all kinds of demonic sores, and her eyes were turning black like those of a demon.
Saint Seia. Even as her body decayed, she continued to chant.
“Go, go forward. I will sacrifice my life to bless you!”
“But...”
“You must not stop! You must never look back! This section is the 'Fly Hell'! The place where the Demon King's demonic aura is strongest! Those who look back will rot!”
Saint Seia was making her body decay through her sacrificial prayer.
In other words, some of the knights who went ahead couldn't resist the temptation of the demonic aura and kept looking back.
A hell where you can't look back or help those left behind.
Once you enter this hell, you can't confirm if anyone is following, which is why the soldiers were disintegrating without anyone noticing.
‘Then, does that mean there were those who knew about this hell?’
This is a place humans have never reached before.
If they knew in advance, it means they were in league with the Demon Realm.
Serengeti looked at the Knight King, who was still leading the charge.
He was moving forward without a moment's hesitation.
This Fly Hell was more terrifying than the seven hells they had already faced.
... When they emerged from the eighth hell, the Fly Hell, fewer than 30 knights remained.
‘Where... did they all go?’
Serengeti panted heavily.
Looking down, she saw that her legs were missing.
“... Foolish one.”
The Knight King looked down at Serengeti.
A trap was waiting as they tried to escape the Fly Hell.
A magic circle engraved by the Demon King himself.
The magic circle, which was supposed to sink half of the Demon Realm and take the life of the Knight King Wilhelm, activated.
At that moment, Serengeti used her transcendence to swap their positions.
The ability gained from transcendence took precedence over everything else.
She survived by luck, but her lower body was gone.
“Cough!”
Serengeti coughed up blood.
She was dying. There was no way to survive.
She managed to reach out and touch the Knight King Wilhelm.
“Wilhelm. The most honorable Knight King, even in defeat. If the expedition succeeds, please protect Hudson. And deliver this and my words. I'm sorry for going ahead... I truly loved you.”
She handed him the necklace in her hand.
But Wilhelm shook his head.
“Tell that sappy story yourself.”
He immediately poured the highest-quality elixir on the severed part.
Then he took out a talisman and attached it to Serengeti's chest.
Serengeti's eyes were full of confusion.
“Why would you give this to someone like me...!”
“You can't use it anymore anyway.”
The Ultimate Destruction Protection Talisman.
The Protection Talisman provides a safe haven by making the user invisible to monsters in the field.
However, it was useless against 10-level transcended monsters.
But even transcended monsters couldn't kill those inside the Ultimate Destruction Protection Talisman.
It had been reinforced countless times and broken through many levels.
But it was no longer needed.
Because...
“I'll show you. I'll kill the bastard.”
... The Demon King was right in front of him.
Goooh!
The Demon King's core shattered. The 'Path of Light' inserted into the core was tearing apart the demonic aura.
We won. We triumphed!
The long expedition to the Demon Realm finally came to an end.
But the joy was short-lived.
‘What...?’
Serengeti couldn't believe her eyes.
As the core shattered and the Demon King died.
Zzzzz!
The core exploded, and a demonic aura that seemed to engulf the world bound Wilhelm.
And...
“Monster. To push me to this extent without any 'interest' from the goddess.”
... The shadow of the Demon King began to move on its own.
Time slowed down.
Everything around seemed to have stopped.
The shadow looked at its own body and clicked its tongue.
It was completely tattered. With the core shattered, there was no hope of resurrection.
“But that's your mistake.”
The body was dead, but his essence was not.
Only the full power of a goddess could destroy him.
The human who decapitated his body was indeed a legendary hero, but the power of the goddess, the interests, were not properly contained.
That's why he was changing.
Swoosh!
The shadow was seeping into Wilhelm.
If it completely bound and consumed Wilhelm's body, it would resurrect in a new body.
This was the Demon King's final power.
‘Indeed, it’s incredible.’
The body that had transcended by consuming five stars was beyond imagination.
Not only that, the material of the body itself was beyond human. It had transcended human limits and reached a semi-divine level through intense training.
“... Hmm?”
Swoosh!
Suddenly, a light began to pour out of the Knight King Wilhelm's body.
And the afterimage of a goddess appeared above Wilhelm's head.
“Lea...!”
The shadow strongly resisted.
It immediately expelled the goddess's light but lost the most important things.
“To take the life of a knight who followed you to avoid losing the 'star'? Can you still call yourself a goddess!”
The goddess took Wilhelm's life and forcibly took the star.
As a result, the Demon King's plan to fully control Wilhelm's body failed.
In the place where the light faded, Wilhelm lay dead with a pale face.
*
“... There are no more memories after that.”
“...”
“However... what emerged was like pure evil...”
Boom!
Kwaah!
At that moment.
The ground suddenly shook, and something exploded.