Chapter 244 — 화려한 귀환
Chapter 244
A Glorious Return
King Yulho’s gaze and Elric’s gaze tangled in midair.
A brief silence fell.
Then King Yulho’s lips curled into a grin.
In that instant—
Fwash!
Elric seemed to jerk backward, then drove a rough straight punch forward.
Booom!
With a sound like the air itself bursting, King Yulho appeared right in front of Elric.
Close enough to hear each other breathe.
With that massive frame looming so near, the wiry Elric looked almost scrawny by comparison.
Elric’s fist skimmed past the side of King Yulho’s head by a hair.
He’d sensed Yulho would rush in like this, so he’d preempted him with a straight punch shaped by the “Jin” hand seal.
“Heh heh. I figured you’d be different when we met again.”
A strange light flickered in King Yulho’s eyes.
“Not bad.”
“…!”
Elric yanked his arms inward, crossing them.
At some point Yulho had already swung that enormous fist at him with savage force.
Just that punch alone looked like it would make short work of a battering ram.
Kraaaash!
Elric’s body skidded back in a long line.
The blow was so powerful it carved a shallow trench in the brick floor that should have been hard as stone.
Dust billowed.
Elric grimaced, forcing down the churning Force Wave inside him.
If he didn’t, he felt like the gunk in his guts would splatter out.
“Damn it! Isn’t this cheating? My mana’s all sealed up while you’re throwing yours around like confetti!”
“Oh, was it?”
Yulho blinked as if he truly hadn’t noticed, then snorted.
“So what? Since when does the world move to your tune? Let it go.”
Elric ground his teeth.
Grrrk!
He was livid. Staring at that brazen face made the bile rise in his throat all over again.
And only then did it come back to him—
King Yulho had always been that kind of man.
When they parted in the Anbae, it had been so painful that the aftershock had glossed over his memories of the man.
Truth be told, Yulho’s personality was never what you’d call pleasant.
Just look at how he’d sealed Elric’s mana and dragged him through hell all the way here.
“Anyway.”
Yulho raked a hand through his hair and chuckled lightly. His eyes were full of fondness.
“Chieftain, huh. Been a while since I heard that.”
A smile that was almost fresh.
But Elric’s twisted expression didn’t relax in the slightest.
“Don’t play innocent. You’ve got to be at least a few hundred by now. Most folks your age would be not just in a coffin but already rotted back into dirt. Even you have to admit that’s a bit much, no?”
“Heh heh heh. Know what I missed most after you left?”
Crack, crack.
Yulho chuckled and rolled his neck.
Each time he did, the aura around him swelled like a storm.
Elric, tense, raised his guard.
“What?”
“That sassy mouth of yours. Whenever I got hot under the collar, I needed a sandbag.”
“That won’t go the way you want. I’ve changed.”
“Oh, yeah?”
Yulho’s grin deepened.
“So have I.”
The words had barely left his mouth—
Fwaaaash!
Yulho’s figure dipped low, and Elric drew a deep breath and fired up his dragonblood.
Rumble!
The underground cavern shuddered under a tremendous shockwave.
* * *
A thought-form.
Mephisto saw through exactly what Yulho’s body was.
An avatar fashioned by a being who’d opened a path to a lofty realm—physically manifesting data of the self through imagination and leaving it behind.
In short, the Yulho here was truly King Yulho—and also not.
By now the real body was likely buried somewhere else.
Or… had he actually become a god?
Mephisto glanced up at the ceiling, then shook his head.
No, surely not. If godhood were that simple, he or Azazel would have reached it already.
Anyway.
Elric and Yulho’s thought-form went at it hard.
Naturally, Elric lost.
The two blue shiners ringing his eyes were so comical—
Pff-hahaha.
“…Could you not laugh?”
Pwahahahahahaha!
“I said don’t laugh!”
Mephisto was rolling on the floor.
As a Demon King, he prided himself on never acting without dignity, but this time he simply couldn’t help himself.
“Hahaha! This look suits you better than anything I’ve ever seen! Positively dashi—!”
“Bloody hell. 【Dance】.”
“Gghyaaack! W-what are you doing!”
Mephisto shrieked as he was forced into a handstand tap dance for the first time in ages. By their agreement, he wasn’t supposed to have to do this ever again!
But the crease between Elric’s brows refused to smooth out.
“Our agreed time’s long over, you know.”
“You wretch! Release this! Undo it this inst—Gyaaaah!”
“【Be Quiet】.”
“Mmph! Mmmmmph!”
With a forced vow of silence slapped on top, Mephisto was ready to lose his mind.
And he was baffled besides.
When had Elric’s mana come back? This space should still be saturated with Yulho’s thought.
Elric, however, had no intention of answering that question.
He was too busy venting his spleen about King Yulho.
“Who’s that one?”
Yulho’s question made Elric blink and glance over.
“Huh? You can see Mephi?”
“Is that strange?”
“A little, yeah.”
“I’d guess it’s because this place is wholly mine.”
Elric nodded, thinking once more that Yulho was nothing like a normal person.
Even Augustine, his master, had only sensed Mephisto to a degree—never actually seen him.
Yet Yulho was taking it in stride.
Mephisto’s guess that the man had reached a half-divine state in life finally felt convincing.
“Still, our youngest got this strong. Heh heh! Makes me proud! This is why mentors matter. Yes, indeed.”
Arms crossed, Yulho bobbed his head, busy patting himself on the back.
Elric had a thousand things he wanted to say, but one wrong word could spell disaster, so he swallowed them and asked instead:
“Then… you remember me?”
Yulho blinked as if to say what are you talking about, then caught his meaning and smirked.
“Yeah. That surprised me too.”
What Elric had experienced in the Anbae was a virtual reality realized in the mental world.
It looked “real,” but wasn’t.
That was why it had hurt so much when it ended.
And yet Yulho remembered Elric exactly.
As if it had all been real.
“I’m not the only one.”
“Sorry? What do you mean…?”
“Ralph, who used to bare his teeth whenever he saw you. The Black Wolf tribe that ran with us, the other folk of Antromorph—everyone. They remembered you.”
“…!”
“And there were traces. The city we built. Why do you think it ended up right there?”
Elric wanted to say that made no sense.
The site of Antromorph—he’d mentioned that only because he knew exactly where the real Antromorph stood.
If what Yulho was saying was true, cause and effect had been scrambled.
But he couldn’t call it a lie.
If his traces truly remained in reality, then something impossible had already happened.
Grandfather, just what did you do…?
At this point, Elric couldn’t even guess what the shadow of Usdon he kept running into on his path really was.
“Gives you a headache, huh. Confusing, right. But what can you do. I’m in the same boat.”
“Then you made this place too.”
“I wanted to see you again someday.”
“…”
“I was curious. If you don’t wonder how someone’s been after they leave… what right do you have to call yourself a king—no, a chieftain?”
Elric felt a tight ache in his chest. Even after all this time, the man still saw him as a brother.
“…Don’t expect me to get choked up over that.”
“Pff! What would you even do with feelings for another man? Hard pass on my end too.”
For all the rough talk, Elric could feel the warmth in Yulho’s voice, and some of his pique finally eased.
He’d come to Yulho’s safehouse for the same reason, after all.
He’d never expected to meet Yulho’s thought-form in person, but he’d hoped to find traces here and relive old memories.
So in the end, he built all this just so I could see it?
How much time and money had he sunk into this?
Especially considering the Beastkin’s aversion to magic, it was obvious this had been made by sheer manpower.
Whether you call it impressive or just bullheaded…
Either way, he was one hell of a man.
Heh.
And it wasn’t so bad, knowing someone had remembered and waited for him all this time.
They talked for a long while after that.
Elric about the life he’d led.
Yulho about Antromorph, which had grown several-fold after Elric left.
“Huh? Ralph said that? That airheaded punk?”
“I’m telling you. Later on, he started copying you, and the others wouldn’t stop teasing him for it.”
“Bwahaha!”
After a good long while—
“Oh? It’s already this late?”
Elric gauged the time and pulled a face.
Then he realized Mephisto was still trapped in the hell of a handstand tap dance and waved a hand to release him. Hah… hah… Watching Mephisto sprawled on the floor, gulping for air, he dusted off his rear and stood.
“Heading out?”
“I should. I slipped out to come here.”
“Shame.”
“Tell me about it.”
Elric chuckled and glanced around.
“What happens to this place after I’m gone?”
“Nothing special. It stays, same as it has. If anyone follows my trail this far, it’ll serve as a safehouse.”
As it turned out, this space wasn’t just a shelter. As an Anbae, it had all sorts of provisions set aside for his descendants.
In the past, Elric would’ve salivated and asked what those “provisions” were, but ever since obtaining the Magic Report, that greed had faded.
What is Merbinger’s should go to Merbinger. What is the Beastkin’s should remain with the Beastkin.
Even if the Beastkin hadn’t produced a proper leader since Yulho, they’d need it someday.
Bel could probably pull it off.
Elric looked at Yulho.
“What about you, Chieftain?”
“Me? Well. I got what I wanted, meeting you like this. I’ll loiter here until more descendants show up, and if I get bored, I’ll bow out when it feels right.”
“Won’t you get bored?”
“Sure I will. But if I meditate here, time slips by before you know it. If you’re that worried, drop by often.”
Yulho joked, then caught the seriousness in Elric’s eyes and lifted a corner of his mouth.
“Looks like you’ve got something to say.”
“Chieftain.”
Elric held out his hand.
“Care to step outside with me?”
The Talent-Devouring Mage