**399. What He Is Creating**
—
Hudson’s pupils shook violently.
The plan he had been absolutely certain would end in victory had failed—completely.
The Reaper Cult and the Black King were far stronger than he had imagined.
He had thought that if the Star Guardians struck the Reaper Cult from behind as they entered the Abyss, it would be enough to throw them into chaos.
He had believed the Black King would be no match for the White King, who had completed the King of Extinction, Mork.
…It was all an illusion.
Every last part of it—a misjudgment.
“……It’s all my fault.”
Crunch.
Blood dripped from the fist Hudson clenched.
The cause of this outcome was crystal clear.
There was no one else to blame—it was his own mistake.
He had deluded himself into thinking that both the Reaper Cult and the Black King were in the palm of his hand.
Hudson had established information guilds on both Earth and Pangaenia.
Using the intelligence gathered through them, he compiled statistics and made his judgments.
He had monitored the Reaper Cult and the Black King closely, knowing they were threats, and on the basis of sufficient data, he had concluded that victory was possible.
‘They were never weak enemies.’
Park Hyun-myung had toyed with the Reaper Cult with ease.
He had even blocked the Black King’s advance, so it was easy to fall into the prejudice that they were not particularly formidable forces.
But—
‘Every one of my victories came from Lord Hyun-myung.’
He had forgotten that fact.
He was not Park Hyun-myung.
Every reversal snatched from impossible situations had begun with the miracles Park Hyun-myung himself had wrought.
The truth that both the Reaper Cult and the Black King stood far above his own head.
It was always Park Hyun-myung’s movements—operating far outside the bounds of common sense—that created victory.
But now, with Park Hyun-myung absent, it was foolish to expect such miracles.
—Aaaagh!
—Don’t fall back!
—W-White King!
The scene reflected through Hypnos’s Eye was catastrophic.
At this rate, the recapture of the Labyrinth was only a matter of time.
The enemy’s martial power was overwhelming.
They were being crushed outright.
To lose half their forces to a single miscalculation—
What a cruel thing.
“It isn’t your fault.”
Abelof, vice-commander of the Round Table, spoke as he gave Hudson’s shoulder a light tap.
The Knights of the Round Table were tasked with defending the very heart of the Labyrinth.
Their mission was to protect the **First Flame**.
“You don’t need to carry all the responsibility alone. No one wants that.”
“N-No, but… my misjudgment sent them straight into a dead end.”
“A dead end? Does that truly look like a dead end to you?”
“…?”
Hudson tilted his head at Abelof’s words and shifted his gaze.
And then—
“……!”
He could not believe his eyes.
As he watched, Abelof spoke again.
“Don’t forget this, Hudson. Everyone here is sincere about protecting *him*. This isn’t your responsibility alone—it’s the responsibility of us all.”
*
*
Boom!
The Giant of Ruin, cleaved in half, slammed into the ground.
The gap in raw power was absolute.
No matter how strong he was, he could never be a match for her—she who had devoured countless ‘gods’.
The other Star Guardians were no different.
It might even be amusing to slaughter them all and seize their stars.
Yet the Golden Fox soon tilted her head.
“……No sense of impact.”
It was strange.
She had clearly cut him down. He had fallen.
And yet—there was no *feel* to it.
She had certainly borrowed the power of Outer Gods and erased even his soul.
But he had not died.
She soon understood why.
Fwoooooosh!
…the bisected body of the Giant of Ruin began to glow with golden light.
At that moment—
The Star Guardians’ behavior abruptly changed.
—Everyone, get back!
—Lord Giant of Ruin!
—Our Mother!
The Star Guardians hurriedly pulled away.
It was clear they knew something about what was happening.
But one word snagged at her.
‘Mother?’
Our mother?
Weren’t they guardians of the Mother Star?
Why were the Star Guardians calling the Giant of Ruin ‘Mother’?
The severed halves of the Giant’s body fused together once more.
The spinal bones reconnected; skin and muscle regenerated.
“…Now I understand why the ‘Mother Star’ has never once appeared in the world.”
The Golden Fox murmured softly.
There had been countless rumors about the Mother Star.
But no one had ever confirmed its true form.
Now she understood the reason clearly.
“You yourself were the ‘Mother Star’.”
The Giant of Ruin.
He himself was the Mother Star.
A moving star.
Unlike the other Star Guardians, he was a being who had no need to test anyone.
The Giant of Ruin was now clad in golden armor and helm.
A sacred knight of the stars.
—…….
He did not answer.
Instead—
Ssssss—
Smoke began to seep out from between the armor and helm.
Whoosh.
BOOOOM!
In an instant, folding space itself, the Giant of Ruin charged and struck the Golden Fox head-on.
She reacted in a split second and drew her blade—but was cut apart regardless.
‘What kind of strength is this—?!’
The Golden Fox’s eyes filled with shock.
She had believed that mere brute force would never be enough to defeat her.
But she was wrong.
It was simply that the power had not been *great enough*.
Crush her with something bigger—that was all it took.
CRRRUNCH—
The Golden Fox’s body was sent flying, tearing through soldiers and tumbling all the way to the edge of the Abyss.
A distance invisible to the naked eye.
Watching the scene, the Reaper Cult soldiers all thought the same thing.
…She probably wouldn’t be coming back alive.
*
*
“…….”
“…….”
How much time had passed?
One thing was certain: with the awakening of the Giant of Ruin, half of the Reaper Cult’s soldiers had vanished.
And it wasn’t only the soldiers.
“…Three of them were taken out.”
The Reaper Cult’s executives were not unscathed either.
The Fox, the Monkey, and the Rat had been struck down.
The Monkey was gravely wounded, the Rat was dead, and the Fox had fallen into the Abyss and could not be found.
Given that she still hadn’t returned, the Fox was likely dead as well.
All of this had been accomplished by the Giant of Ruin alone.
A truly terrifying monster.
To display such might single-handedly against the Reaper Cult, now strengthened by devouring Outer Gods—
There was no monster like it anywhere in Pangaenia.
Still, even that creature was not unharmed.
“Although we failed to kill the Giant of Ruin, it won’t be able to interfere with us any longer.”
The Golden Lion spoke.
As he said, the Giant had been driven to the brink of death.
He likely didn’t even have the strength to move a finger.
But they couldn’t press the attack further.
To kill him outright, at least one more of their own would have had to die.
“…The Golden Rat is dead.”
“Golden Mask. What will you do?”
All eyes turned toward Golden Mask.
Casualties among the executives—this was unprecedented.
But the answer was already decided.
“Burn the body, and as for the ‘Lineage’—”
—Kikikekekekeke!
—…….
Golden Mask’s Lineage stared at the Golden Rat’s Lineage.
Already, their reapers were no longer what they once were.
Their outward appearance hadn’t changed, but their laughter and gaze had become grotesque.
Then Golden Mask’s Lineage opened its mouth.
Slurp.
…it sucked in the Golden Rat’s Lineage.
—Kikikikekekekeke!!!
Golden Mask’s Lineage began twisting its body, emitting even stranger sounds.
Its eyes rolled back, its entire form convulsing.
There was no trace of sanity left.
“We move to the Labyrinth.”
There was no time left to waste.
At Golden Mask’s command, the Reaper Cult forces once again advanced toward the Labyrinth.
And when they reached its entrance—
“…It seems the White King and the Black King have already clashed.”
“Neither is here. Has the battle ended without a conclusion?”
Before them lay a place where black beasts and monsters were intermingled.
A mountain of corpses.
But neither the White King nor the Black King—the ones who had fought here—were anywhere to be seen.
Where had they gone?
The deeper they progressed into the Labyrinth, the more violent the traces of battle became.
And when they reached the place marked **7 Lv**—
“…The Dark Elf Lord.”
“So he’s dead as well.”
They found the Dark Elf Lord’s corpse.
It was badly mutilated.
Shredded to pieces by something like a razor-sharp blade.
The Dark Elves were all annihilated too, yet the monster that killed them was nowhere in sight.
‘This is more difficult than expected…’
Golden Mask frowned.
Conquering the Labyrinth was not going to be easy.
The Star Guardians and the Giant of Ruin had only been the beginning.
If something here could kill the Dark Elf Lord and push the Black King into a hard fight, there was no telling what else awaited them.
One thing was certain.
Rumble.
The terrain shifted.
The bodies of the Dark Elves and their Lord sank beneath the ground.
A phenomenon they had witnessed several times already.
The Labyrinth itself was changing at will.
As if the Labyrinth were a living organism.
When the shifting finally stopped—
“…A Dragon God?”
Golden Mask tilted his head at the being that appeared before them.
The aura he felt was unmistakably that of a Dragon God.
Yet why would a Dragon God reside within this Labyrinth?
And that form…
“…So you were the one who killed the Dark Elf Lord.”
Those countless ‘blades’ left no doubt.
They matched perfectly the marks carved into the Dark Elf Lord’s corpse.
The **Blade Dragon God**, alone.
Not the ‘false’ image summoned in the Tower of the War God—
but the real one.
“Our god wishes for your deaths.”
…She was the real thing.
A being who should originally have dwelled in Earth’s ‘dragon veins’.
Having cast off all restraints, she had finally revealed herself before the Reaper Cult.
*
*
…What is he making?
The enormous ‘eye’ continued to watch Park Hyun-myung as he built walls.
He was altering the innate form of his Hidden Trait itself.
But after tearing down the wall he had been building, he began creating something entirely different.
Something that could no longer even be called a wall.
He even approached other collapsed walls, hauling bricks over from them.
For someone who believed himself dead, he was remarkably industrious.
The problem was that none of this was normal.
Hidden Traits were names given to the expression of a destroyed species’ primordial power.
They could be evolved and perfected—but they could never be changed into something else entirely.
Twisting the root itself.
Do it recklessly, and the result would be catastrophic.
If an immortal did it, their immortality would extinguish.
If a mortal did it, their life would vanish.
And yet he was doing it without hesitation—because he believed himself already dead.
…This was a first.
Everything happening here and now.
What, exactly, was Park Hyun-myung creating?
Randolph had been completed as ‘The End’.
He had evolved the keys he already possessed and proven his own existence.
In contrast, Park Hyun-myung was still nothing.
Thirteen new keys had been granted to him as well, yet he seemed not to know what he was meant to become.
He could not become the ultimate of light like Wilhelm, nor the ultimate of darkness like Randolph.
An ambiguous identity.
Perhaps because of that—
‘He is creating.’
He was creating.
Creating the path he would walk.
Destroying everything that existed before and opening up an entirely new domain.
It was astonishing.
He himself seemed unaware of what he was doing.
But the watching ‘eye’ soon realized what Park Hyun-myung was making.
It was absurd.
This was not something a mere human could accomplish.
Not even a god.
A chief god—no, beyond that.
The realm of a **Primordial God**.
Something only the greatest existence could ever do.
Right now, Park Hyun-myung—
was creating something that contained all of himself,
a place where he would live—
…a **home**.
