Chapter 1
“Haaah...!”
Had his breathing stopped for a moment?
Do-jin slowly drew in a deep breath.
The smell of rusted iron stung his nose, but he no longer even registered something like that.
He was used to it.
Corpses.
Everything around him was either a corpse or a ruin.
“...Am I the only one left?”
No.
Even if some of his companions were still alive nearby, it would not change the situation much.
Perhaps for them, being able to die now was actually a blessing.
“...”
Do-jin raised his head and looked at the sky.
Shrieeeeeek!
Shaaaaaaaaah!
The sky had lost its blue color and was covered in cracks.
Saying that the sky itself had cracked sounded absurd, but that was exactly what Do-jin was seeing.
It looked like a sheet of glass about to shatter and collapse at any moment.
And monsters continued pouring endlessly through those cracks.
They were nothing like the ordinary monsters Do-jin had encountered until now, such as orcs or trolls.
They looked like enormous slimes without any fixed shape, constantly twisting and squirming.
Yet those shapeless monsters were covered with countless eyes and mouths.
Their countless eyes endlessly searched for humans.
Their countless mouths devoured every human they found without leaving even one behind.
And now...
Only a single monster and a single human remained.
“...!”
Do-jin's aura surged into his spear with a roar.
He poured in every skill and item effect he had acquired until now, and immense mana gathered at the tip of his double-bladed spear.
Wheeeeeeng!
The highly compressed mana began spinning with terrifying force.
And...!
Do-jin awakened another power he had only recently learned to control.
He was not yet very skilled with it.
But this was the only way he could defeat the monster before him.
Hoo...!
The golden mana contained within the spear itself mixed with Do-jin's unique green aura.
Then a strange black energy began blending into them.
Black energy.
It was a power Do-jin had awakened after spending ten years constantly crossing the line between life and death.
Death Energy.
Do-jin had repeatedly crawled through the narrow gap between life and death, struggling to survive and seize victory.
Over time, death itself had become familiar to him.
At some point, he had become able to see the energy of death.
Then he learned to contain it within his body.
Eventually, he reached the point where he could control it with his own will.
That was the decisive reason Do-jin had been able to reign as humanity's strongest.
However, the monster did not remain idle.
When they had first appeared, the creatures had overwhelmed Do-jin's companions with sheer numbers, killing and devouring them one after another.
But perhaps because Do-jin's companions had fallen one by one until no other survivors were left to eat...
Or perhaps because they had begun to feel threatened by Do-jin, the one human who was killing them instead...
The monsters displayed a reaction they had never shown before.
The creatures that had been scattered everywhere, busy consuming human corpses, suddenly rushed toward the green monster.
Splat!
One after another, they stuck themselves onto it.
And began transforming into one gigantic creature.
Yes.
The very monster now standing before Do-jin.
“What is this, Phase Two?”
Do-jin stared past the shapeless monster at the countless cracks in the sky.
More monsters were still emerging from them.
The only difference from when the battle had begun was that the newly arriving monsters no longer scattered.
Instead, they immediately fused with the surviving monster in front of him.
“...”
Do-jin gritted his teeth as he watched.
“...Fine. Let's take this all the way to the end, you bastards.”
Do-jin sharply turned his head and took in everything around him.
His companions, half-eaten and discarded.
Their eyes were still wide open in death.
The land itself had turned black and lifeless.
“...Come!”
His aura was nearly depleted.
But there was one power he could draw upon without limit.
Especially now, with reality itself approaching destruction.
Death Energy.
The entire world was filled with death.
Because of that, Death Energy had become the one power he could use freely and endlessly.
At Do-jin's command, the Death Energy around him began to move.
It flowed through Do-jin.
Then toward the spear in his hand.
Shrieeeeeeeeeeeek!!!
The monster sensed that something was wrong and screamed like it was wailing in terror.
As if desperate to gather even a little more strength, it swallowed everything around it and expanded its body.
Fragments of his companions' corpses.
The bodies of monsters Do-jin had killed.
Even the soil and rubble contaminated by the residual mana of those corpses.
Do-jin became certain.
This would be his final battlefield.
Humanity was already finished.
What was the point of surviving alone?
Even if he stubbornly clung to life, he would eventually die by himself on this dead land.
In that case...
“...Die!”
He would take at least one more bastard with him.
As if responding to its master's determination, the Death Energy and aura gathered from every direction resonated with Do-jin's spear.
The violent mana seemed ready to become a vortex and burst forward at any moment, eager to devour the prey before him.
The monster stopped expanding.
Apparently, it had already consumed everything nearby that could be eaten.
Creeeeak...
Thousands of eyes and thousands of mouths all turned toward Do-jin at once.
Eyes of different colors and sizes rolled across its mottled flesh.
Every eye was bloodshot.
The mouths scattered across its body exposed disgusting teeth.
Their tongues flicked in and out while they released incomprehensible screams.
Wheeeeeeeeeeng...
Along with a transcendent sound created by colliding particles of mana, the monster began concentrating its power.
The energy gathered.
Compressed.
And then exploded toward Do-jin.
At that exact moment, Do-jin leaped from the ground.
CRACK!
Like a bolt of lightning, he drove his spear downward.
■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■!!!!!!!!!!
A bizarre, agonized roar that could no longer even be properly recognized by human ears shook the entire area.
The monster could not withstand Do-jin's final attack.
It vanished.
And above the dead land where nothing remained, Do-jin fell like a discarded doll after exhausting every last bit of mana in his body.
He would probably follow his companions soon.
