After Ten Millennia in Hell

Chapter 388 - Beauty Trap (2)

He slowly raised his right arm, and the Key of the Demonic Sea began to turn into a shining golden sword. Satan would not be able to close his mouth from the shock if he were to come back from the dead and see this. After all, it was a replica of Satan’s Hell Armament Wrath except that it was shining gold. No, its form wasn’t the only similar thing.

Crack!

Space itself was severed along the path of the sword’s swing and then closed back up. The demonic energy mixed with Divinity had torn apart space itself. Not only did the two swords look the same, but the energies that they exuded were also almost identical. No, since it contained Divinity, Kang-Woo’s sword contained far more energy than Satan’s Hell Armament.

‘Well, even so... It wouldn’t be of much use against that guy.’

Kang-Woo smirked. No matter how powerful the sword was, the Constellation of Despair possessed martial arts that Kang-Woo could not surpass. He would not be able to win with weapons.

“It should be about time he took action.”

Kang-Woo transformed the Key of the Demonic Sea back into a ring. He had no intention of avoiding a fight against the Constellation of Despair just because he didn’t stand a chance in a battle with weapons. Rather, he could barely sleep from the anticipation of being able to fight him soon.

‘It was so fun.’

Kang-Woo’s battle with the Constellation of Despair had been so fun that the desires he had been suppressing until now felt like they had been nothing. He had realized his limit; he had used every ounce of his strength and even went as far as to open one of the Doors, but he couldn’t even imagine defeating the Constellation of Despair.

“Haaa,” Kang-Woo sighed ecstatically.

His heart was beating like crazy. How long had it been since he had faced an opponent that he had an utterly miniscule chance of winning against? It was only the third occurrence, the first being when he had first fallen into Hell, and the second time being when he had first met Bael.

“For God’s sake, this is driving me insane.”

Kang-Woo tightly held his trembling hands into a fist. It felt like he was in love at first sight. The desire that had been lit within him was blazing to the point that he could barely handle it. Kang-Woo thought about the Constellation of Despair’s face like some lovesick teenage girl.

Balrog was misunderstanding something. He thought that Kang-Woo had reluctantly fought against the Constellations by himself for the sake of his comrades under the guise that he couldn’t hold back his desire.

“People would think I’m a fucking saint if they didn’t know any better.”

Kang-Woo snickered. It was partly the truth; he did not want to see Kim Si-Hun, Han Seol-Ah, Balrog, and all of his other party members getting hurt. He did not even want to imagine them dying. However, he did not reluctantly stand on the battlefield by himself like some shonen manga protagonist; he was not that kind of person.

‘You could say that two of my objectives overlapped, or that it was like killing two birds with one stone.’

Kang-Woo wanted to fight against a Constellation of Evil, and he wanted to experience his limit. He wanted to let his blazing desire take control and rampage to his heart’s content. He could have held it in, but he didn’t.

It was just like going on a diet. People knew that they wouldn’t die even if they didn’t eat unhealthy foods, but they let their desire take control over them and eat to their heart’s content. It was not that they weren’t able to hold themselves back, but because they purposefully didn’t.

Kang-Woo was the same. He wanted to eat until his stomach burst as a reward for suppressing his desire for all this time. That was why he had fought a Constellation of Evil by himself, unencumbered by anything or anyone, to devour to his heart’s content.

‘Because there will be times in the future when I don’t want to hold myself back but have to.’

Kang-Woo smiled bitterly. He knew that the time would come, and he had already made up his resolve for the day.

‘One day...’

A time would come when there would no longer be prey that he would be satisfied with. Battles full of madness and desire that would drive him to his utmost limit would cease to exist. He was not talking about world peace; one day, he would become so powerful that there would no longer be any enemy that would be able to fire him up.

‘I think it took me about three or four years to get to this point.’

Kang-Woo recalled the day that he returned to Earth after his power was sealed by the Gaia System. It had not even been five years since then. In that short time, he had grown absurdly powerful to the point that his past self back when he ruled over the Nine Hells felt cute.

Although Kang-Woo had received help from the System and had come across several lucky occurrences, it had been ultimately all him. Even now, he was getting stronger at an uncontrollable rate.

‘The Demonic Sea is getting bigger.’

Kang-Woo had already devoured three Constellations of Evil. Even after his return to Earth, he had easily devoured over thousands of demons and demonic beasts. No, the deciding factor was that he had devoured one of the three corpses of the Demon God. It would have been weirder if the Demonic Sea had not grown larger.

‘No, it’s not just that.’

Kang-Woo looked down at himself with sunken eyes. He had come to learn something new after acquiring Deific Essence.

‘Even if I don’t use the Authority of Predation...’

The Demonic Sea was expanding all on its own as if space itself was expanding. Kang-Woo was confident that he would be able to control the endlessly growing Demonic Sea since his demonic energy control was also rising.

‘The problem is that at this rate...’

There would no longer be any prey that would be able to fire him up. His desires would not be sated, and he would only be left with an endless void. He was already prepared for it and was even confident that he would be able to endure it. He just wanted to, at the very least, experience things that would give him stimulation and allow him to reach his limits a few more times.

“You know, my king...”

Kang-Woo recalled Lilith’s voice. She had once said this to him in an extremely angry voice.

“You’re like a moth to a flame.”

He had no idea where she had learned a phrase like that when moths didn’t even exist in Hell. He couldn’t help but laugh.

“I can’t argue with that. I did manage to get through a lot of life-threatening moments.”

Back when the Demonic Sea had first been formed, Kang-Woo had been on the boundary between life and death every millisecond of each day. Even after he had formed the Ten Thousand Demon Core to be able to contain the Demonic Sea, he had willingly put himself on the brink of death several times through the repeated use of molting. After getting used to molting, he began to open the Doors entirely. He had managed to just barely survive so many times that he would not be able to say anything even if Lilith were to slap him.

‘Well, even if I were to redo things...’

Kang-Woo would not change a thing.

He lightly shook off the dirt on him and turned around. After coming out of the forest that he had gone in to train, he headed to the imperial palace.

“Ah, Kang-Woo!” Seol-Ah greeted him with a smile as soon as she saw him and walked up to him. “Are you done with your training?”

“Yeah.” Kang-Woo nodded.

His training to be able to use Divinity was mostly complete. It had not been that difficult since Divinity acted like an enhancer or auxiliary to another form of energy, so all he needed to do was check how much stronger his attacks became.

“Where are Si-Hun and Balrog?” Kang-Woo asked.

“They’re still training.”

“Still? They’ve been at it since dawn.”

After the previous incident, they had been abnormally obsessed with training.

“Well...” Seol-Ah slurred as she smiled bitterly.

Kang-Woo clicked his tongue.

‘I should have a word with them.’

Although he was not one to talk, training to abnormal degrees was not good for one’s body. They would do better to train in moderation.

“Huh? You’re back, Kang-Woo?” Cha Yeon-Joo said as she walked toward him.

Her hair was also damp as if she had been training until just now. Her hair, wet with sweat, clinging to her nape looked oddly sexy.

“What?” Yeon-Joo glared at Kang-Woo.

She covered her chest, misunderstanding Kang-Woo’s gaze.

Kang-Woo chuckled. “There’s nothing for you to even hi—”

Bash!

Yeon-Joo kicked him in the balls at the speed of light. Kang-Woo was able to dodge, but he purposefully got hit since he felt like dodging would be a bad idea.

“Ack!” Yeon-Joo was the one to collapse instead of Kang-Woo while grabbing her shin. She glared at Kang-Woo fiercely. “You goddamn monster...”

Yeon-Joo bit her lip in frustration after seeing that Kang-Woo was perfectly fine after being kicked in the balls. Rather, Seol-Ah was far more shocked.

“A-Are you okay, Kang-Woo?!” Seol-Ah reached out to him in pallor.

Kang-Woo bent his hips backward to dodge her hand. “I’m fine, darling.”

‘Rather, it won’t be fine if you touch it.’

“My, you’re back earlier than expected. I thought you would come back a little later.” Even Lilith had come out to see him.

“Divinity was easier to control than expected,” Kang-Woo answered while shrugging.

Yeon-Joo spat on the ground. “That aside, your Deific Name God of Splendor... What’s up with that?”

“What’s wrong with it?”

“I thought you’d become something like the God of Lies because you lie every chance you get.”

“What do you take me for?” Kang-Woo shook his head at the absurdity.

There was no way he was something like the God of Lies.

Riiing, riiing.

‘What the fuck is it this time? Give it a rest already.’

Kang-Woo swiped away the blue window in front of him without even looking at its contents.

“But honestly, I still can’t believe you’ve become a god... You look the same as always,” Yeon-Joo remarked as she scanned Kang-Woo from head to toe.

The overpowering pressure that one would feel from a god could not be felt at all in Kang-Woo. No one would have been able to tell that Kang-Woo had acquired Deific Essence or whatever it was if it hadn’t been for Layla.

“I mean, gods are different from our notion of them,” Kang-Woo responded with a smile.

Omnipotent gods that one normally associated with the word god were different from gods that possessed Deific Essence. They were not omnipotent or omniscient; they simply possessed the unorthodox power known as Divinity.

“So, does our great God of Splendor plan on choosing any apostles?” Yeon-Joo asked.

“Why? You wanna be one?”

“Can I become as strong as Kim Si-Hun if I become an apostle?”

“You’ll have to call me oppa in exchange.”

“Fuck off. Forget it.” Yeon-Joo turned her head while grimacing in disgust.

Kang-Woo snickered. To be honest, he had no idea how to make someone his apostle. No, even if he could, he had no intention of making anyone his apostle.

‘Besides, it’s not like Yeon-Joo will become as strong as Si-Hun even if she becomes my apostle.’

Si-Hun had not become that powerful because he was Gaia’s retainer. His talent far exceeded even that of Kang-Woo.

‘If any of them were to acquire Divinity after me, it would be Si-Hun.’

Kang-Woo smiled while thinking about Si-Hun.

“Right, Master Kang-Woo. Could you tell me about those Constellations of Evil in more detail? I can’t seem to get a lead on them,” Lilith asked.

Kang-Woo nodded and answered, “The man known as the Constellation of Despair was a middle-aged man with a large diagonal slash scar on his face.”

He slowly explained everything about the Constellation of Despair whom he had seen that day.

“Didn’t you say that there was a woman as well?” asked Seol-Ah, who had been listening in silence, her eyes narrowing.

Kang-Woo nodded. “Yeah. Her name was Proserpine, but I don’t know what Constellation she is.”

“Hmm.” Seol-Ah looked at Kang-Woo with sunken eyes. “Was she pretty?”

“Oh, yeah. Extremely pretty.” Kang-Woo casually nodded.

The Proserpine whom he had seen back then had possessed blinding beauty.

‘First and foremost, she’s an elf.’

It was an irrevocable rule that elves needed to be beautiful.

‘But why are succubuses so fucking...’

Kang-Woo was getting a headache just thinking about it. He trembled as his trauma came back to him.

“She was pretty?” Seol-Ah asked.

“That’s the first I’m hearing of it,” Lilith stated.

“Hmph, I guess her mid was pretty strong, unlike a certain person,” Yeon-Joo remarked.

‘Huh?’

The three women were glaring at him quite fiercely.

“No, I mean...” Kang-Woo looked at the three women as if he was being falsely accused.

‘What’s wrong with calling a pretty woman pretty?’

“She was pretty, but—”

“Hohoho, that’s no question.”

Just as Kang-Woo was about to continue, a woman’s voice cut him off. Kang-Woo turned to the source of the voice, and saw...

“No.”

... Tentacles. Black tentacles coming out from all over the body, eight eyes, and green pus flowing out from the ends of the tentacles.

“What?”

‘Who the fuck are you?’

Kang-Woo stared while trembling at the woman who had appeared out of nowhere.

“K-Kang-Woo...?” Seol-Ah stared at him with shaking eyes. She continued in pallor, “Is your fetish... N-No, such a thing...”

Tears were gathering at the corners of Seol-Ah’s eyes.

“No,” Kang-Woo remarked.

‘I don’t have that kind of fetish.’

“Hah! Master Kang-Woo! What about that unsightly bitch is pretty?” Lilith yelled nonsensically.

“She’s not pretty,” Kang-Woo said.

“Please take a good look! Her tentacles are black!!”

“I said she’s not pretty.”

“Hmph, her tentacles are dry, and there’s no gloss to them whatsoever! And most of all...!”

“Fucking listen to me.”

“She only has eight eyes!!”

“No shit.”