DMHS 53

There was no more time to hesitate. Kian also went up the stairs leading to the upper floor.

Even then, thud, thud, thud, the vibrations shaking the floor continued. When Kian stopped on the floor where the vibrations grew nearer, he checked the door numbers along the corridor.

Room 11103.

He had clearly come up, but the numbers had gone down.

“Aaah! Help me! The chimeras are rampaging!”

It was the first human he met in the Magic Tower, excluding the doll Wendy. A mage ran out from inside the corridor, screaming, and his face brightened when he saw Kian.

“Please help me! Suddenly the magic on the iron bars was released and the chimeras went out of control!”

“Is there no one else on this floor?”

“How would I know. Everyone moves with spatial magic. But now teleportation magic isn’t working! Damn it!”

The mage checked the stairs, and his face turned pale.

“The stairs are ruined too. What do we do? It might be better to just jump down than fight the chimeras like this!”

“Calm your breathing and clear your head.”

“Easy for you to say… Wait, where are you going? That’s the laboratory with the chimeras!”

Kian quickly reached the room at the end of the corridor. There was a basement beyond the open door. In the dark, wide space, dozens of iron cages stood.

The problem was that all the cages were open, and the chimeras that had come out were biting and killing one another.

Kian saw several chimeras with a bear’s body, a lion’s head, and an eagle’s wings.

‘The same kind I saw in the forest.’

Kian drew a dagger from his inner pocket and cut their throats one by one. Because they were berserk and there were so many, he had to move many times.

“Haa…”

After a while, Kian had killed all the chimeras. Blood spilled by the chimeras stuck thick to the floor and ceiling, and to Kian’s clothes and hair.

Kian wiped his reddened eyes with the back of his hand and put away his dagger. When he returned to the corridor, the mage was trembling as he looked at him.

“You don’t mean… you killed all the chimeras? All of those monsters?”

“Yes.”

At the same time, the thud, thud, thud, began again from the floor above.

“I’ll go upstairs.”

Kian left the mage behind and climbed up. The situation was not much different on the next floor.

“Magic isn’t working! The chimera went berserk!”

“It’s urgent here too! At this rate, the chimeras might break outside!”

On the upper floor, even more laboratories were set. Kian went through each connected lab, killing the berserk chimeras.

The next floor, the floor above that, and the floor above that were the same. Kian kept killing chimeras as he climbed higher.

The room numbers on the doors changed at random, from 56712 to 33301, to 99099 and 149672. Even so, the number of chimeras did not decrease.

The screams of mages and the sound of cages being broken echoed from rooms.

The staircases twisting endlessly. The unpleasant sensation when he cut their throats. He could not tell how many chimeras he had killed.

“Haa, haa, haa…”

Rough breaths sounded in his ears.

‘When did I get this tired?’

His mind was blurry. When he lowered his head, everything in sight was red. His whole body was drenched with the blood of chimeras.

‘Red.’

Kian rubbed his eyes with the back of his hand. But the view stayed red, drenched too much in blood.

‘Red…’

His head spun like he had taken a drug. Kian pushed back his bangs and opened his eyes wide.

‘Where am I?’

Then he noticed the scenery around him had changed. The white walls and ceiling were gone. Kian had fallen into a strange forest.

A warm and gentle voice spoke in his ear.

–Beti, my beloved child.

–You will always be my child. That will not change.

–I pray your future will be filled with eternal happiness.

–I love you…

‘Beti’ was Betias’s nickname.

‘Was there anyone who would say such things to Betias?’

The thought lasted only a moment. When Kian blinked, he was standing blankly in the laboratory, with piles of chimera corpses like mountains.

Kyaaaak!

Another scream came from the corridor. The growl of a chimera followed.

Kian closed his eyes again. He ignored the sounds in his ears and the stench of blood. He exhaled slowly, steadying his breath, and gathered mana into the tip of his dagger.

Kian stabbed the dagger into the floor and shouted loudly.

“Betias!”

The dagger did not pierce the chimera corpses. It sank downward like it would with something soft and weak.

Kian’s body also began to fall. When Kian opened his eyes, letting the wind carry him, he was sitting in a sunny study.

Across the large desk, someone turned their chair.

Silver hair, watery-colored eyes, the pointed ears unique to elves. The old friend he hadn’t seen in so long looked the same as the last time. Even the relaxed smile was the same.

Kian felt a fire burning inside him.

“What on earth are you doing?”

“After such a long time, shouldn’t you at least say hello?”

Betias narrowed her eyes.

“Hello? Do you not see the state of the Magic Tower right now? The chimeras are berserk and the teleportation magic inside the tower is broken. At this rate, the mages trapped here will die.”

“Ah.”

Betias rested her face on her clasped hands and nodded. Kian pointed toward the window.

“Go out there and fix it immediately. How can you just sit and watch this, are you sane right now?”

“That, now or before, is hard to be sure of.”

Betias got up from her chair. With the window behind her, her face turned cold like frost.

“I’m going to leave this place.”

“You’ll abandon the Fourth Tower? What about the Forest of Creation? And the elves who sleep there?”

“I found someone to entrust it to. From now on, that person will look after the forest.”

This place had been Betias’s long-time dwelling. Betias spent each day tending the elves’ graves and living in the fortress built in the image of the World Tree.

“Where are you going? Did you find a way to another dimension?”

“I wish I had… but even if I haven’t, it can’t be helped.”

The last time Kian had seen Betias was when the hero Edward passed away.

On the way back from burying Eddie, Betias declared she would leave this world and go to another dimension.

In fact, that wasn’t the first time Betias said she would leave. Every time they held a hero’s funeral, Betias had complained she was sick of this world.

Even so, she had stayed, unable to shake off her lingering ties. But now… seeing her indifferent even when her own dwelling had fallen into this state, this time she might really leave.

Kian grabbed hold of her.

“The kingdom isn’t doing well. The demonization has already begun.”

“I know.”

“And even so, you still mean to leave? What happens if the Demon King’s castle appears?”

“This time it’s different. It won’t end with the Demon King rising. This world has reached its limit.”

“What do you mean?”

“The two-headed divine beast.”

Betias looked down at Kian.

“The Arbiter has been born.”

At those words, silence fell between them.

“……”

“……”

Kian opened his mouth after struggling to find words.

“Are you certain?”

“It’s accurate information. So you should give up too, stop wasting effort. The kingdom—no, this world—will be destroyed before long.”

Kian blinked slowly. Outwardly he looked calm, but his sight was shifting from white to black and back again.

He sighed. The words he could speak were already set.

“Does Rowan know this too?”

“She must. The spirits would have made a commotion about the Arbiter’s birth.”

Kian stood from his seat.

“Then I have to go to Rowan and confirm it.”

That was the best he could do. A trace of pity passed through Betias’s eyes.

“Stop, Yan. You’ve already done enough.”

“No.”

“There are things that can’t be done no matter how hard you try. You need to accept that.”

“Not yet.”

“It’s already been four times! Four times is enough. We defeated the Demon King four times, we built new kingdoms four times. If we held up this world for fifteen hundred years, we’ve fulfilled our duty. We can’t fight against the Arbiter of the End.”

Kian didn’t answer. When he recalled the past, he felt emotions he had buried in his heart. Memories and feelings that hardly felt like his own made him anxious.

‘Don’t think about the past.’

Kian soothed himself and spoke of the information he needed now.

“Do you know about the dolls made from black magic?”

Fortunately, Betias answered the change of topic.

“All I know is that one day they took over my fortress. I haven’t cared what happened here for a long time.”

“What about Ivan Harkin?”

“Who is that?”

“The Tower Master who fell from the tower and died three years ago.”

“Died falling from the fortress? That can’t be. If someone had died, there’s no way I wouldn’t know… no, wait. Three years ago I was busy and often away from the fortress. If it was then, I might not know.”

“What about Gimere Harkin?”

“Hearing those names, they all sound like shamans of the Delia tribe. I don’t know them at all. I’ve never been involved in the mages using my fortress as they pleased.”

In the end, there was no useful information to gain from Betias. Kian checked one last thing.

“I’ll get rid of all the dolls causing chaos in the Magic Tower. Even if the tower collapses in the process, even if the Forest of Creation burns down completely.”

“Do as you like.”

Betias’s expression didn’t change at all. She seemed to have cast away every attachment to this place.

The reunion with his old friend ended there.

As Kian was about to step outside, he suddenly recalled what had happened earlier.

“Come to think of it, was there someone who used to call you Beti?”