Chapter 383

Chapter 383
## Chapter 383: Heavenly Demon Kill

*** An imitation, he had labeled him.

Who was the one calling the other a fraud?

“I shall rip that tongue from your face.”

The Heavenly Demon’s features became like stone.

He was determined to violently remove that gossiping mouth so it could never utter another word.

And even if the monster’s claims held a grain of truth.

‘I have already eclipsed the First Heavenly Demon.’

His combat capability had reached a realm of the infinite.

He was even capable of the ‘Mind-Instant-Kill’, ending a foe’s life through mere intent.

With no rivals beneath the sky, he had presumed to title himself the greatest entity in history.

Just because the First Heavenly Demon had known terror, there was no reason for him to share that fear.

Quite the opposite.

“··· Consuming you should make the opening of the Sixth Gate a reality.”

Wasn’t this a stroke of luck?

The tedious task of hunting for another master who had finished the Five Gates was finished.

He only needed to seize the essence of the creature standing before him.

Through that, he would be transformed into a flawless and absolute Demon God.

He would rule over every inch of soil his shadow touched.

That creature was nothing more than the meat required for that evolution.

The Heavenly Demon sank into a low stance.

The instant he angled the Heavenly Demon’s Blade.

“Heavenly Demon’s Illusion.”

A pinnacle art.

It served as the opening move of a sword style consisting of three distinct forms.

The Heavenly Demon’s Illusion was a blade art that facilitated ten thousand simultaneous transformations.

Suddenly, a storm of rapid blade strikes, far exceeding any previous speed, pelted the monster like a torrential downpour.

Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa-kwang!

It was quite literally a deluge of blade energy.

The ten thousand cuts triggered in that split second each manifested as a lethal sword aura.

They followed no patterns, possessing no predictable rhythm, making them impossible to intercept.

No one existed who could endure this perpetually shifting martial discipline.

“Heavenly Demon’s Flash.”

Yet the Heavenly Demon did not pause.

He sought to extinguish the monster’s spark of life with absolute certainty.

Flash!

As the Heavenly Demon’s Blade radiated brilliance, the Great Annihilation erupted once more.

And it wasn’t a solitary strike; dozens of Great Annihilations surged forward without pity.

Moving at the velocity of light itself.

Can a man parry light?

Naturally, the thought of blocking it was beyond human reckoning.

Kwooooooooooooom-!

The celestial shield was shredded into ribbons.

The force of the Great Annihilation that pierced through the barrier slammed into the ground.

The crust of the world fractured.

The soil seemed to howl.

Simultaneously, the landscape shifted, and the very altitude of the terrain warped.

A colossal detonation occurred, on a magnitude that could easily wipe out several metropolises.

A towering plume of soot ascended until the sky and the ground were indistinguishable.

However, the Heavenly Demon could not suppress a grimace as he peered through the haze.

“Is this the extent of your power?”

“······.”

The reason was that the monster remained entirely unharmed.

Not even a microscopic grain of dust marked him.

He had neutralized the assault with an ease that made the effort seem pointless.

By what method had he stopped it?

The answer lay in the blade the creature gripped.

‘My eyes did not deceive me.’

The blade of destiny he had glimpsed during the first release of the Great Annihilation.

For a heartbeat, a sword the size of a peak had materialized in the atmosphere and disintegrated the Great Annihilation.

That was certainly the source.

Yet, it no longer held the massive shape he had first witnessed.

It had contracted to the dimensions of a standard blade, and he was wielding it with casual grace, as if it were a mere plaything.

“Still, that was fairly impressive. Had it been a touch more potent, it might have managed to leave a mark on me.”

What nonsense had he been rambling about this whole time?

One thing was certain: the creature did not view him as a ‘rival’.

His demeanor was soaked in relaxation, as though he were observing the tantrums of a toddler.

Never in his existence had he been regarded with such disdain.

‘I cannot confront this entity in a human vessel.’

The physical form of a living soul had its boundaries.

Only a deathless being, one without constraints, could manage this.

And because of that realization, he had uncovered a truth.

The Heavenly Demon slowly tilted his gaze upward and spoke.

“I see it now. You… have you already crossed the threshold of death once?”

That this monster was also an undying thing.

If not, he was at least an individual who had perished and been pulled back.

Consequently, he was a being who had shattered the shackles bound to a living frame.

A smirk played on his lips.

“Do I give that impression?”

······ Was that a confirmation or a denial?

Regardless, the Heavenly Demon was convinced his assessment was right.

If that were the case, he had no choice but to play his final concealed card.

For he still possessed a concluding ultimate art that he had vowed never to employ, even upon his deathbed.

‘Ideally, I would have unlocked the Sixth Gate before using this.’

There was no alternative.

It appeared impossible to crush the monster in his current state.

Gwooooooooo-!

The Heavenly Demon summoned every drop of his internal essence.

“Heavenly Demon Kill.”

The two blade forms he had performed earlier were merely the preparation for this.

The final, third form was so hazardous that he could perish just by attempting it, but it was a secret trump card of corresponding power.

He unlocked his lower dantian by discharging the ten thousand slashes.

The multiple beams of the Great Annihilation released at light-speed vibrated in harmony with his middle dantian.

And then, a singular moment of expiration.

Press, condense, and compact again.

He funneled all of that into the point of the Heavenly Demon’s Blade and forced open his final, upper dantian.

Stab!

The Heavenly Demon drove the Heavenly Demon’s Blade into his own midsection, the steel saturated with his total life force.

Twitch!

Then, the Heavenly Demon’s frame began to distort into a hellish silhouette.

His anatomy vibrated violently, and the Heavenly Demon’s entire skin was painted black with stagnant blood.

Thud!

His neck gave way.

His pulse ceased.

··· He had died.

But the duration of death was fleeting.

Whoooooooosh!

The golden surge from the Opening of the Five Gates flooded into his system.

Shortly after, the Heavenly Demon snapped his eyes open.

His pupils were drenched in gold, and a grin now stretched across his face.

‘So this is the realm of the deities.’

The world was transformed in his eyes.

He had truly evolved into a Demon God.

The Heavenly Demon Kill was a secret art that permitted one to touch the realm of gods for a moment by hollowing out all stored life energy into the upper dantian.

It was the ultimate path to godhood for a brief span by committing self-slaughter.

If one were to overlay death once more through the Opening of the Five Gates in this state, one would finally emerge as a perfect, unblemished god.

If he had successfully opened the Sixth Gate, his resurrection would have been total.

‘This is acceptable.’

The sensation of inhabiting godhood while technically deceased was not unpleasant.

It was as if he had become both a god of the grave and a Demon God.

He realigned his broken neck and calmly surveyed his adversary once more.

The man watching him spoke with a tone of curiosity.

“Truly······! Did you think to reach that state by mimicking me? However, you are a bit premature.”

He gave a slight nod of recognition.

Admitting that the other was more formidable than he had anticipated.

But he had also detected instantly that this was a flawed transformation.

That he had become an incomplete Demon God because the Sixth Gate remained sealed.

The Heavenly Demon.

No, the Demon God, gave a mocking laugh.

“It is more than enough to slaughter you.”

It was plenty.

He might have missed the Sixth Gate, but he had surpassed every other requirement.

He had seized the venomous fog and the vital essence of the void gathered over eons, along with all the wisdom of the First Heavenly Demon.

Was that all?

The internal stones of the void lords he had slain, the essence of the Spirit King of Water, and.

“Aaaaaah!”

“O, Heavenly God!”

“Long live! Long live! Eternal glory to the Emperor!”

The spirits of every disciple of the Thousand Mountains who had pledged themselves to him.

They had gladly surrendered their souls to the Demon God.

Furthermore, this location was saturated with the toxic breath of the abyss.

More than he had ever encountered in the depths of the void.

The energy that fueled the Demon God was this very toxic miasma of the abyss.

Therefore.

Was defeat even a possibility?

Shhhk-!

In that heartbeat.

Chwaaaak!

As the Demon God blurred past.

The monster’s blood sprayed in every direction.

At the same time.

Thud!

The severed left arm hit the ground and bounced.

✺✺✺

The Primeval Heavenly Demon who had fled the Gate of Truth had immediately become tethered to a specific physical vessel.

Subsequently, he had been constantly hunting for a chance, but.

‘There is no crack.’

There was simply no opening to wedge himself through to escape.

This mortal’s body held numerous personas, and because of those personas, he had reinforced his own sense of self even further.

To think such a human could exist.

Naturally, in his zenith, seizing the body would have been child’s play.

But because he had been imprisoned in the heavens for an eternity, the Primeval Heavenly Demon had been drained of most of his strength.

He needed to consume demons to mend himself, but for the moment, no window appeared.

So the Primeval Heavenly Demon scrutinized the body even more intently.

And then, he felt a surge of excitement.

‘It is truly a vessel of the all-powerful.’

It was even more magnificent than he had imagined.

This mortal’s anatomy was a container of omnipotence that could house and maintain anything, that could transform into anything.

It was so tempting that even the deities of the celestial realm would hunger for it.

If he could claim this, he might even be capable of enacting vengeance upon the heavens.

Was it not truly a prize?

He realized how the chance to slip through the Gate of Truth and flee had manifested.

Even Truth itself would not have anticipated the arrival of such a being.

Consequently, he had never stopped searching for a moment of weakness.

When the Heavenly Demon had finally shown himself, he had attempted to seize control of the body during that turmoil, but.

‘······ Did he discern my true nature in that brief span?’

On the contrary, this human had confined him in an even more profound abyss.

He had grasped in that fleeting moment that he had emerged from the Gate of Truth.

Yet it was standard for one to forget the contents of the Gate of Truth even if they had looked upon it.

It was especially impossible for a living soul.

The reason it had succeeded was not due to Park Hyunmyeong, but because of the opposite side.

‘Randolph. A being akin to an avatar of the void. This creature is the genuine demon.’

But it was peculiar.

Even though he had purposefully split it into radiance and shadow, the equilibrium was off.

The Primeval Heavenly Demon immediately grasped the reason for that as well.

‘Ah, Randolph’s vessel has its threshold constraints removed, while the other half does not, I see.’

Randolph’s form had no boundaries.

Its shackles were gone.

But Park Hyunmyeong’s form possessed limits.

This was because, unlike Randolph, Park Hyunmyeong had never experienced death in its absolute sense.

Of course, if he perished now, it would be final.

He could not be brought back again.

It seemed the power of rebirth had already been expended on Randolph.

It was a singular power that could not be invoked twice.

“Let us strike a bargain.”

Thus, the Primeval Heavenly Demon spoke with a heavy voice.

“I will shatter your boundaries, your shackles. In exchange, permit me to feast upon that monster.”

It seemed he held the key to this dilemma.

No, only he was capable of resolving this.

As payment, he demanded the demon.

He needed to devour that creature who titled himself the Heavenly Demon to reclaim a portion of his divinity.

And Park Hyunmyeong.

“You are free to do so.”

··· He had consented so quickly it was startling.

He had agreed with such nonchalance that it was bewildering.

Did he not realize the peril of surrendering the sovereignty of his own body like this?

Or was he so certain he could reclaim it at any moment, even after letting it go?

It mattered little either way.

Regardless, he intended to dissolve the limit restrictions of the vessel first.

Because only then could he consume the Heavenly Demon.

Thud!

Subsequently, his left arm was lopped off by the Demon God-aspected Heavenly Demon.

The left arm that he could not sever himself.

This was because the energy of the ‘Outer God’ was anchored in his left arm.

A grin spread.

The Primeval Heavenly Demon beamed.

“I knew you, of all people, would be the one to sever it.”

Even with his limb removed, he wore a look of pure joy.

It was because he had manipulated him into cutting off the left arm from the very start.

Twitch! Twitch! Twitch!

The left arm resting on the ground spasmed without rest.

Then, it rose into the air, attempting to fuse back into place, but.

Crunch!

The Primeval Heavenly Demon forbade it.

He had stomped upon it as it lay, pinning the movement of the left arm.

Then, he retrieved the left arm with his remaining right hand.

And then.

Whoosh!

The left arm transformed back into a plume.

The feather of the Outer God.

Watching this, the Primeval Heavenly Demon’s grin grew wider.

It was because he had been consumed by curiosity since the beginning.

A body like a container of the absolute.

Two souls that clearly held the attributes of both light and darkness.

Just as his fascination with the master of this body grew.

His fascination with the source of this feather had been just as intense.

‘To think I would discover a sign of the Bluebird here.’

Munch-

The Primeval Heavenly Demon consumed the feather of the Outer God.