“Your Highness!”

“Are you alright, Your Highness!”

The young prince, who had been performing the feat of sticking a sword in and supporting his body on top of the rampaging aberration as if riding a rodeo, exhaled a deep breath.

“I’m… fine.”

Kurt clicked his tongue. He had thought the prince was no ordinary person since going to and from the training grounds, but where did that toughness come from, clinging to the creature’s neck with a sword until it died?

Moreover, look at those calm eyes that seem to say it’s nothing.

Anyone who saw him would think he was a seasoned veteran who had mastered the art of demon hunting.

Rather, it was the knight commander, Sir Masain, who was frantically tearing off the unpleasant tentacle-like things coiled around the prince’s body with a pale, frightened face.

Where did all that spirit he had when killing the imperial guards go, and why was he now acting like a lost puppy? Could that even be solved by hand?

Kurt raised his sword and sliced off a few of the tenacious tentacles pulling the prince’s body.

Although he didn’t know what was going on, it seemed to have settled for now. That’s what he thought.

So when the prince’s body suddenly collapsed forward, Kurt didn’t immediately realize what had happened.

“…Your Highness?”

Sir Masain, who had reflexively caught Prince Morres, who had suddenly collapsed into his arms, called out to him in bewilderment. After examining the prince’s condition for a moment, his voice became desperate.

“Your Highness!”

Sensing an ominous air, Kurt quickly severed the remaining tentacles and knelt towards him.

“What’s going on, Sir Masain?”

“Sir Kurt……”

Sir Masain’s face, looking up at him, was as empty as if his soul had left his body.

“…His Highness is not breathing.”

***

[Lee Seongjin……]

It was a call he could never ignore.

[Lee Seongjin……]

Before Seongjin even realized it, he had responded to that voice.

No, rather than a response, it was more accurate to say that his soul had automatically reacted to it. Just as one reflexively lends an ear to a voice calling their name without consciously thinking about it each time.

Buzz.

A strange sense of floating came over him, and his consciousness quickly became detached from reality. A dull sensation, like being submerged in water and looking at the sky through a huge water screen.

-Your Highness?

He thought he heard Masain’s voice ringing in his buzzing ears, but it instantly faded away.

His vision distorted, and his soul suddenly began to be sucked away somewhere.

Oh… I think I’m kind of screwed.

Seongjin realized that his soul had left Morres’s body. It was a truly sigh-inducing, futile ending compared to the trepidation he had felt before about being exorcised by a high-ranking priest or the Holy Emperor.

This easily?

Can a soul leave a body this simply, even if it’s possession?

His soul, which had passed through thick clouds and cozy fog at tremendous speed, was already flying in the dark night sky.

The sound of music could be heard from somewhere. Small sounds that resembled a music box or a xylophone had somehow become five different lines, stretching out long. Seongjin couldn’t even distinguish whether he was hearing or seeing it now.

[Lee Seongjin……]

The faint voice calling him continued.

Since he didn’t know how to return to Morres anyway, Seongjin decided to focus on the matter at hand now that things had come to this. As he listened to the voice, his soul, responding to his will, now began to race at an incredibly fast speed.

He flew like an arrow through the stars. The twinkling stars in the distance somehow began to elongate like spokes.

Even while flying directly, Seongjin felt dumbfounded. Those stars should be at an immense distance, yet they were stretching like this. Although he had no great knowledge of physics or astronomy, if this were the universe, he was already flying at a speed far surpassing the speed of light.

As expected, there’s no need for studying or anything. Once you die, everything becomes clear like this.

How much time had passed?

The last few scattered stars disappeared, and now his soul was floating in an endlessly deep and dark space. Seongjin’s soul shivered with a primal fear that felt as if his very existence would vanish.

It was not that there was darkness there, but it was so black because there was nothing. Was complete absence this piercingly cold?

If it weren’t for the faint light surrounding his soul, if it weren’t for that call that seemed to break off but continued, Seongjin’s soul might have quickly lost strength, frozen, and shattered into pieces.

And there it was.

A tiny light that looked as precarious as a candle about to go out.

[Lee Seongjin……]

Now looking like a small speck of dust, the little soul was flashing red and occasionally exhaling Seongjin’s name like a sigh.

Right. There was nothing else that could call his name except for this guy.

Feeling a bit sorry for its pitiful appearance that looked like it would fly away at any moment, Seongjin carefully clasped the Demon King’s soul with both hands.

Well, I don’t know if it’s okay to call these hands when I don’t have a body.

[Lee… Seongjin?]

Suddenly enveloped in unexpected warmth, the creature’s soul rapidly blinked with a faint red light. A feeling of puzzlement was conveyed in its entirety.

[Yeah.]

[Lee Seongjin?]

[That’s right.]

[The real Lee Seongjin?]

You bastard, if you call me one more time, I’ll throw you away.

Perhaps his fierce will was conveyed, the Demon King’s soul trembled for a moment. And then, the next thing it uttered was this.

[Why are you here?]

What the hell? Is that something the one who called me here should say?

But then, a feeling as if it was about to cry was transmitted from the Demon King’s soul.

[You should have called me from there! What are we going to do if you get summoned here?]

[……]

[We’re doomed. It’s over for us now.]

Then why were you calling me so incessantly? I was also doing fine and suddenly flew here.

The Demon King sniffled at Seongjin’s grumbling.

[I had no choice. This is a space of nothingness where everything scatters in an instant. If it weren’t for the Holy Emperor’s barrier, I would have been annihilated the moment I flew here.]

It meant that it had been sustaining its soul thanks to the Holy Emperor. Seongjin nodded, looking at the white cluster of light surrounding him. So this was that barrier.

Of course, it was also the Holy Emperor who had sent this guy flying here, but since it seemed to be grateful now, there was no need to deliberately remind it.

[Now, the only thing holding onto my soul is you. That’s why I had to constantly remind myself by repeating your name endlessly. Otherwise, my soul would have scattered long ago.]

[……]

[I don’t know how long I’ve been doing that here either. The concept of time becomes strange here.]

So it had been crying all along. The Demon King didn’t say it, but Seongjin could feel what words it had swallowed. Remembering the sorrowful crying sounds that occasionally reached him in his sleep, he felt a bit sorry.

And surprisingly, the words the Demon King uttered next were an apology towards Seongjin.

[I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to deliberately drag you in.]

[Uh……]

For a moment, Seongjin didn’t know how to respond. He thought this guy would cling to him, saying something like, “I won’t go alone, kehehehe” and go on a rampage.

However, the emotion conveyed from the Demon King was pure guilt.

In the end, Seongjin roughly replied with an “uh” and soon closed his mouth. The two floated like that in the dark space for a while without saying a word.

Surprisingly, the immense sense of fear that had weighed down on him when he first arrived here seemed to be diluted a bit just by having someone to converse with. Blankly watching the Demon King’s soul occasionally flash with a red light, Seongjin suddenly muttered as if talking to himself.

[What will happen to Morres if I fly here like this?]

[Since his soul is gone, wouldn’t he have faced death as is?]

Ah, yeah. He’s really dead now. It’s a bit unfortunate for Sir Masain and Sir Kurt, who had kindly accompanied him as escorts.

While thinking that, his heart strangely became calm.

The Demon King seemed to have felt a similar sentiment.

[Originally, it was supposed to be like this from the beginning. Our souls would have been engulfed in karmic fire and flown here. We would have scattered like that and faced complete death.]

[Yeah. I see.]

Suddenly, the Gehenna’s karmic fire had evolved, and they were dragged into the material world. He vaguely remembered the Demon King rambling about flying into the void or something at first.

[We haven’t completely left the material world where Morres was yet. This place is similar to the boundary between dimensions and the void.]

Suddenly, the Demon King lowered its voice and whispered, even though no one was listening.

[After coming here, I realized that the material dimension Delcross belongs to will likely face a great danger soon.]

What does that mean all of a sudden?

Could it be that a demon gate will open like in Sigurd’s 34th district?

However, the Demon King’s following explanation was a bit serious.

[High-ranking Demon Kings and lords of alien dimensions have set their sights on this place. Sometimes, I can feel terrifying gazes staring intently at Delcross.]

The Demon King’s soul trembled with fear.

According to its explanation, the owners of those gazes were of such high spiritual rank that just by drawing their attention, a single glance could flatten a soul. That was the reason it deliberately lowered its voice.

If it weren’t for the Holy Emperor’s barrier, the Demon King’s soul would have been annihilated long ago just by indirectly feeling those gazes.

[I don’t really know their names, and even if I did, I couldn’t say them out loud. But I know a bit about some of the high-ranking Demon Kings.]

According to the Demon King’s explanation, it was like this:

Unlike the lords of alien dimensions who seek opportunities for direct invasion by opening gates like Gehenna, those high-ranking Demon King enjoyed subtly infiltrating that world by spreading their attributes.

Before fully initiating the invasion, they would ravage and turn the entire world into a wasteland.

And their so-called attributes were truly problematic.

[They are the lords of ‘Famine’, ‘Pestilence’, ‘War’, and ‘Death’, respectively.]

Yeah. They sound like fellows who would be extremely troublesome just by hearing about them.

So it means that famine, pestilence, war, and death will unfold on a large scale in this dimension.

And after such disasters sweep through, the high-ranking Demon Kings and alien lords will directly open gates and invade. This was a total crisis.

The Demon King’s soul blinked its light. If it had a body, it would be the equivalent of tilting its head.

[Actually, it’s the first time I’ve seen this much interest concentrated on a single dimension, but…]

It was well understood that the more interest there was, the more devastatingly it would be destroyed.

[When will that invasion begin?]

[Who knows? Their concept of time is vastly different from the human world.]

Seongjin became a bit serious. Although it was brief, he had also developed some attachment to the world of Delcross while living as its prince, and he didn’t want to let it be destroyed like Seongjin’s previous world.

The faces of Sir Masain, Queen Lizabeth, Edith, Amelia, the twins, Sir Kurt, and other imperial guards of the Pearl Palace flashed by.

And Father, His Majesty the Holy Emperor.

Would he be aware of this fact?

[Come to think of it, a thought occurred to me……]

Seongjin suddenly became curious.

[Isn’t there definitely a god in this dimension? Why is the god just watching such an invasion?]

Seongjin was close to an atheist in his original world, but rather than not believing in a god, he had no interest in the existence itself. That was because he was too busy fighting demons to have the state of mind to cling to something without definite proof.

Well, among his comrades, there were devout believers who became more immersed in prayer the harder things got.

But this world was different.

There was a definite proof of a god called divine power, and there was a Holy Emperor who was referred to as the god’s proxy.

Moreover, Seongjin was now realizing the existence of souls and had learned about beings likely to be in an adversarial relationship with a god, called the demon lords.

At this point, it became harder to remain a pseudo-atheist.

[But why is the god who watches over this dimension just observing those guys waiting for an opportunity?]

Seongjin asked the Demon King, but the answer came from an unexpected place.

[That is because the patron god of Delcross is not a personal god, my son.]

What?

When Seongjin turned around, a divine figure enveloped in bright light was standing with his arms crossed, looking at him. The light surrounding him was spreading so wide that Seongjin and the Demon King’s soul were buried in that light.

Suddenly, Seongjin realized that the soul-piercing cold had eased considerably.

[You wanted to study theology and philosophy, but was it just empty words? You really know nothing.]

Uh…….

Why is this person appearing here?