After Ten Millennia in Hell

The men surrounding Oh Kang-Woo charged toward him simultaneously.

Kang-Woo lowered his body, quickly checked his surroundings, and counted the number of opponents.

\'Twelve.\'

The black-robed man at the forefront swung down his sword while shouting, "Haap!"

Clang!

"Huh?!" he uttered.

He was pushed back the moment his sword collided with Kang-Woo\'s blade. The black-robed man looked back and forth between his sword and Kang-Woo\'s blade in disbelief.

However, he wasn\'t the only one who got a surprise.

"Haap!"

Someone else swung an ax at Kang-Woo from behind, but he dodged it easily. He used the Authority of Haste and moved at an incredible speed.

\'Authority of Invulnerability.\'

Kang-Woo dismissed the Authority of Blades and instead concentrated the Authority of Invulnerability on both of his hands. Black energy covered his fists in a form that resembled gauntlets.

With the combination of the Authority of Haste and Invulnerability, Kang-Woo\'s punches were faster than the speed of light and more powerful than a cannonball. Kang-Woo sent his opponents flying.

Bash!

"Kurgh!"

One of the men who received a punch was flung backward like a pebble.

Crack!

"Argh!"

It was useless if they tried to block the punches with their weapons. Thanks to the Authority of Haste, Kang-Woo could easily twist his body a bit and hit parts of his opponent that they couldn\'t block.

The black-robed men tumbled to the ground, accompanied by the sound of their bones breaking.

"What the..."

"Where did someone like him come from?"

Three people fell instantly, and none of the black-robed men could hide their surprise.

They were by no means weak. All of them had achieved their Fifth Awakening, and their leader had achieved his Sixth Awakening. It was difficult for Players to raise their levels easily without a high-ranking Attribute, so this meant that these black-robed men were all among the strong.

Moreover, there were twelve of them. Even if their opponent had surpassed the wall of Level 59, which was considered a Player\'s ‘Limit of Effort\', there was no way that he should be able to overwhelm them like this.

"D-Don\'t tell me… He\'s on his Eighth Awakening?"

"Th-There\'s no way."

The men couldn\'t believe what had just happened, so they grabbed their weapons again and charged toward Kang-Woo. Nevertheless, the result was the same as before. No, it was worse.

Crack! Slash!

"AARRGGHH!!"

The men who lost their arms and legs screamed while spewing out blood. They looked as pathetic as moths flying into flames.

Kang-Woo did not need to use refined techniques or complicated mind games against them. He beat them with just overwhelming speed and strength.

The number of people with all of their limbs intact was reduced to half.

"M-Monster..."

Expressions of fear were present on the faces of the black-robed men.

Kang-Woo was overwhelmingly more powerful than them. The beatdown made them lose all morale.

The black-robed man who seemed like the group\'s leader said with a frown, "All of you, unleash your power."

"B-But sir..."

"We\'ll all die at this rate anyway!" the group\'s leader bellowed.

Hearing that, the expressions of the remaining men stiffened.

\'What are they trying to do?\' Kang-Woo thought while frowning.

His question was answered soon after.

The men chanted in an unknown language, and demonic energy surged from them.

\'Demonic energy.\'

Kang-Woo\'s eyes narrowed.

The fact that the men were using demonic energy could only mean one thing.

\'They\'re members of the Demon Cult?\'

Now Kang-Woo was even more confused about why they were trying so frantically to get back the pornographic video.

\'Was there something I missed?\'

Kang-Woo thought about it deeply, replaying the five-minute video in his mind. However, no matter how much he thought about it, there hadn\'t been anything in the video except for the miracle of life.

"Guuuurrgghhh!"

The faces of the men crumpled as they used demonic energy. Their blood vessels protruded excessively, appearing hideous. The eyes of the men turned red, and their skin black. Their muscles bulged so much that it looked like they were going to burst.

"Whoa," Kang-Woo uttered while looking at them with great interest.

\'Their bodies are turning into that of demons.\'

Up until recently, they had been still been mostly human, so Kang-Woo hadn\'t noticed anything off about them. However, they were now changing and becoming more like demons.

\'But…\'

Kang-Woo\'s eyes narrowed.

\'It\'s subpar at best.\'

There was no better word to describe the transformation than \'subpar.\'

The moment a human accepted demonic energy, they were bound to change and become mostly a demon. Once that happened, there were two possible outcomes: the first was that the human would turn into a demon while maintaining their original appearance like in Kang-Woo\'s case, and the other one was that they would turn into a grotesque demon.

Demons constantly craved to fulfill their desires. It might not sound that bad, but it was by no means a simple feat for a human to suppress such desires. Once their desires completely devoured their sense of reason and they got drunk on their overflowing power...

\'They turn into a demonic beast rather than a demon.\'

Kang-Woo looked coldly at the men who could no longer be called humans. Their rationality had been lost to their desires; they had been completely devoured by demonic energy.

In the context of a martial arts novel, the men would be practitioners who had let the demonic arts completely devour their sense of reason, while Kang-Woo was a master that had perfect control over the demonic arts.

"Tsk. I won\'t be able to ask them why they\'re so obsessed with this video anymore," Kang-Woo said, clicking his tongue as he looked at the men.

Even with the Authority of Fear, Kang-Woo wouldn\'t be able to get any information out of the men because their human minds had been completely devoured.

"GRRRR!"

After the men transformed into giants with black skin and red eyes, they threw their weapons aside and charged toward Kang-Woo.

Echidna stood in their way and declared, "I won\'t let you lay a hand on Kang-Woo."

Unlike before, she could feel dangerous energy coming from them. Echidna immediately stepped in front of Kang-Woo to protect him.

The demonic beasts flinched a bit upon sensing the overwhelming force that Echidna was emitting.

"Echidna."

"Kang-Woo?"

Echidna looked worryingly at Kang-Woo, who placed his hand on her shoulder and pushed her behind him.

"Kang-Woo, it\'s dangerous. You could get hurt. I\'ll take—"

"There are a few things you still don\'t know about me," Kang-Woo said. He raised one of the corners of his mouth while stepping forward. "There isn\'t anyone who\'s a better match against them than me."

To become the lord of all demons, he had battled and devoured countless demons and demonic beasts throughout ten millennia. There probably wasn\'t anyone in the world who knew how to fight against demonic beasts better than Kang-Woo.

Clack.

Kang-Woo calmly observed their actions as he pulled out a blade of demonic energy from the back of his hand.

The men who had turned into demonic beasts charged toward Kang-Woo. Due to their increased physical strength, the hard concrete floor sank with every single step they took.

"GRRRR!"

Kang-Woo easily dodged their attacks and stabbed one of the demonic beasts. The thirty-centimeter-long demonic energy blade penetrated the demonic beast\'s chest. If the blade had pierced the chest of a human, they would\'ve died instantly.

\'But not if they\'re a demonic beast.\'

Demonic beasts had a regenerative ability that couldn\'t be compared to that of humans.

Kang-Woo infused more demonic energy into his blade.

Crack!!

The blade stuck in the demonic beast\'s chest grew and tore the demonic beast apart from the inside out. Dark red blood spewed out like a fountain.

\'You need to do at least this much to kill them.\'

Kang-Woo looked apathetically at the pieces of flesh on the ground and kept moving.

Slash! Crack!

"GRAARR!!"

Every time Kang-Woo moved, the demonic beasts screamed in agony.

Earlier, they resolved to unleash their trump card, but even after doing so, the flow of the battle didn\'t change in the slightest. Rather, Kang-Woo\'s movements became even more aggressive after he concluded that he wouldn\'t be able to get any information out of them.

"Guh... Aghh..."

The demonic beasts, who had lost all sense of reason, were stricken with fear. Their instincts as demonic beasts were screaming that their opponent was not prey. He wasn\'t someone that insignificant beings like them could face; he was an absolute being that ruled over them from up high.

"GRAARR!" the demonic beasts screamed as they fled.

Kang-Woo smiled when he saw them scatter to try and escape.

"It\'s far too late for that," he said.

Then Kang-Woo slowly extended his right hand. Powerful demonic energy surged from him. The demonic energy blade that had come out of the back of his hand burrowed into the ground on its own as if it were a living being.

\'Field of Blades.\'

Crumble!

Thousands of blades burst up from the ground, breaking through the concrete. They engulfed the fleeing demonic beasts like a massive wave. The demonic beasts were ripped apart, and pieces of their bodies splattered all over the ground.

"Fuu."

After wiping out all the demonic beasts, Kang-Woo caught his breath and took out his smartphone.

"Why did they go so far for something like this?"

He took out his smartphone and replayed the video yet again, but just like before, he could only hear the sound of pounding bodies and the moans of a woman.

"Hmm."

Kang-Woo frowned.

\'No matter how you look at it, it\'s just porn.\'

As he was staring at the screen in confusion...

Slam!

"Are you sure this is the place?!"

"Yes! The signal clearly came from here..."

Kang-Woo saw Cha Yeon-Joo and Baek Hwa-Yeon approach him at a frightening speed.

\'Cha Yeon-Joo?\'

Kang-Woo was surprised by Yeon-Joo\'s sudden appearance.

"Kang-Woo...?" Yeon-Joo said. Her eyes widened in disbelief when she noticed him. "Wh-Why are you here?"

"That\'s my line. What are you doing here?" Kang-Woo replied.

"Ah!" Yeon-Joo uttered and quickly shook her head, seeming to have remembered why she had come there. She then asked, "Kang-Woo, have you seen a memory card with a video on it somewhere around here?"

"Are you talking about this?"

Kang-Woo showed her a memory card for a smartphone, and Cha Yeon-Joo\'s eyes lit up.

"Yes, that\'s it!"

"But why are you looking for something like this...?"

"It has a very important video stored in it."

"... What?" Kang-Woo said, looking at her with a stunned expression.

Yeon-Joo answered him seriously, "It\'s something I absolutely need."

"This…?"

Kang-Woo looked at her with a stiff expression, but Yeon-Joo just nodded without hesitation.

"I need to use it right now, so give it here."

"..."

Kang-Woo trembled while looking down at the memory card. He recalled the video that was on it.

\'You need to use it right now? To do what… exactly?\'